King and Maxwell

CHAPTER 44

THE CHOPPER SWEPT OVER THE bucolic Maryland countryside.

Sean gazed out the window and then down below.

“Damn,” he muttered.

Michelle was sitting next to him. “What’s wrong? Don’t like flying in whirlybirds?” she said sarcastically. She well knew that as a Secret Service agent Sean had flown in more copters than just about anyone outside the military.

“I don’t like our particular destination.”

“Which is?”

“Camp David.”

Michelle shot him a glance, leaned over him, and looked out the window.

“Damn,” she said.

“I thought I already said that,” Sean shot back.

She flopped against the seat. “We’re going to see POTUS[35]? He’s the man?”

“Apparently so.”

“Remember the last president you met with?”

“I’m hoping this one is a little better.”

The chopper landed and they were escorted to the main building of heavily fortified Camp David, named after Dwight Eisenhower’s grandson and situated in Maryland’s rustic Catoctin Mountains.

They sat in a large room with knotty-pine paneling.

“You ever pull protection detail at Camp David?” Sean asked Michelle.

“Once. I watched the king of Jordan do some putting on the one hole they have here. It would make you wish for milk curdling as a distraction.”

“I’m sure it would,” said the man.

Both Sean and Michelle instinctively sprang to their feet when the man entered the room. Old habits died hard.

President John Cole was a bit under six feet and obviously fighting the battle of the waistline at age fifty-five. Still, his shoulders were broad, his face ruggedly good looking, his smile infectious, and he radiated impressive health and confidence.

“Mr. President,” Sean said while Michelle respectfully nodded.

“Please, sit,” said Cole.

Sean and Michelle eyed the two Secret Service agents who were escorting Cole. They had obviously been told of Sean and Michelle’s Secret Service past; Michelle even recognized one of them as a former colleague. But they also knew that both agents would regard them with suspicion and would have no problem firing bullets into each of their brains if the conditions warranted such extreme force.

The president was dressed informally in slacks, a polo shirt, and a blue blazer. His guards were similarly outfitted; you followed the president’s fashion lead. Cole sat behind a desk while Sean and Michelle sat across from him.

Cole eyed them intently. “I know you had dealings with my predecessor.”

Sean nodded and said, “Unfortunately, yes, we did.”

“The truth is the truth,” stated Cole. “And the public, at the end of the day, demands that. And well they should.”

“Is that why we’re here?” asked Michelle.

“I think you both know that it is.” Cole eyed one of his bodyguards. “Billy, you know Ms. Maxwell, I take it?”

Billy eyed Michelle, gave a curt smile and a nod.

Michelle skipped the smile and just returned the curt nod.

Sean said, “How can we help?”

“Sam Wingo?”

“We know about his disappearance.”

“With over a billion dollars of this country’s treasure.”

“We’ve been working with his son.”

“I’m sure the young man is terribly worried about his father.”

“And you’re worried that his father is a traitor, a killer, a thief, all of the above?” said Sean.

Cole put his feet up on his desk and steepled his hands. “This is not how I envisioned my first year going. I have a lot I want to do. I have some political capital with which to do it. This sort of potential scandal takes all the wind out of one’s sails. Media has already started speculating. My friends on the other side of the aisle smell blood and are circling. I’m not saying anything. Want to see how it shakes out. At some point I have to make a public statement. But before I do I’d like to have something to say, something positive, that is. Right now I have nothing.”

“Where was the money supposed to go?” asked Sean. “We understand that a bunch of Muslim insurgents from an unknown country were found dead at the rendezvous spot.”

“We prefer to call them freedom fighters,” said Cole. “Although over there your ally at breakfast is your enemy before dinner, so I’m not sure how valid that description of them is. Nonetheless I made the bed, now I have to sleep in it.”

Sean said, “So the money was meant for them. To help in the fight against an Islamic government? Which one?”

“I can’t disclose to you the name of the country. I’m sorry. Neither of you would be privy to any of this but for your relationship with Tyler Wingo.”

“And you need him?” said Michelle.

“I need his father. I need his father to tell me where the hell the money is and what the hell happened over there. If he’s turned against us, we have to track him and the money down. If he’s innocent we still need him to come in and explain what happened.”

“Do you think he’s innocent?” asked Sean.

“The betting here is running about nine to one against him,” said Cole frankly. “Personally, I don’t know. He was vetted for the mission. Outscored everyone else. Patriotism above reproach, all that. But the proof is in the pudding. The money is gone. The freedom fighters are dead. And the longer Wingo stays away, the more we’re going to assume he’s against us. Just human nature.”

“He might be afraid to come in,” said Michelle. “He might believe he was set up and doesn’t know who to trust.”

“Has he made contact with anyone at DoD?” asked Sean.

“His field superior, Colonel South.”

“And what did he tell South?” asked Michelle.

“He told South that he was set up. That someone ostensibly from the CIA met him at the rendezvous spot, told him the mission had been changed, and demanded the money. At gunpoint.”

“Was the person from the CIA?” asked Sean.

“Not that we’ve been able to discover. Wingo was attached to DIA. And while DIA has been working more closely with CIA, they were not in this instance. The loop was small and closed: DIA and me. And while it’s true that Langley is always demanding more budget dollars, I can’t believe they would resort to stealing from Peter to pay Paul in order to get it,” Cole added dryly.

“Did Wingo give any indication to South where he might go or what he might do?” asked Michelle.

“Apparently, he wants to prove his innocence. Where that takes him I don’t know.”

“I guess that partly depends on who set him up,” reasoned Sean.

“If someone set him up,” amended Cole. “We only have his word for that. And I’m still missing a billion euros.”

“And euros were used for an additional layer of cover,” said Michelle.

“Ben Franklins might have been a little too obvious. And there was a very practical reason. A billion bucks in hundred-dollar bills, which is the largest denomination we use, would have weighed a lot more than forty-eight hundred pounds.”

“Which brings us back to what you want us to do,” said Sean.

“You have Tyler Wingo’s loyalties by all accounts. We believe that his father will try to contact him again. They’ll want to meet. We need to be there when they do.”

“So you want us to deliver Sam Wingo to you, using his son to do it?” said Michelle.

“That’s basically the plan, yes. I’ve been told the boy will say nothing to my people. You’re the only ones he trusts.”

“And if we betray that trust?” said Michelle, her voice rising just enough for the two Secret Service agents to draw a step closer to them.

“Better than betraying your country,” pointed out Cole.

“Was Jean Wingo part of this?” asked Sean.

Cole nodded but tacked nothing on in speech.

“She’s disappeared.”

“We know that.”

“But she didn’t come in to you?” asked Sean. Cole shook his head. “So she might have another partner in this deal.”

“Like Sam Wingo?” shot back Cole.

“I didn’t say that.”

“No, I did. So, will you help me?”

Michelle looked at Sean and Sean looked at her.

He said, “We need to talk about this.”

“I can give you a few minutes alone,” said Cole.

“We’re going to need longer than that,” said Michelle while Sean looked at her nervously.

Cole raised both eyebrows and then gazed for a long moment at the ceiling. He rose with an extremely disappointed look on his face. “I expected better, I really did. I assumed that a direct appeal from your commander in chief would carry the day. I could have pushed you off to a lower-level flunky, but I flew you up here to go eyeball-to-eyeball. To tell you that your country needs you.” He paused. “And you tell me you have to talk about it.” He shook his head disgustedly. “Well, I guess they don’t make them the way they used to.”

“We’re between a rock and a hard place, Mr. President,” Sean said by way of explanation. “It’s not as cut-and-dried as it may seem.”

“Billy here will show you out. Thanks for humoring me. I’ll await your… answer.”

With this curt dismissal, Sean and Michelle turned to the door.

As Billy walked them down the hall Michelle said, “How is your family doing, Billy?”

“Fine.”

“I remember your wife had a rough pregnancy.”

“She’s fine.”

“Okay.”

Michelle waited but the question never came.

Finally she said, “Just so you know, I’m fine too.”

They got back on the chopper. As soon as the door closed it lifted off.

Sean and Michelle settled into their seats and strapped on their belts.

“Well, now I know what it’s like being cold-cocked by the president,” she said.

Sean shrugged. “What did you expect? A medal for meritorious service? His ass is in the fire. He’s looking for any way to put the flames out. That’s why he let us leapfrog the normal chain of command.”

“And it’s our fault all this shit happened?”

“We made the choice, so I’d say we’re partly accountable.”

“We were helping a kid find his dad, Sean. I never expected this to become an international incident.”

He sighed. “I know. Neither did I. But now we’ve got the most powerful man in the world pissed off at us. That’s cause for worry in my book. A big worry.”