King and Maxwell

CHAPTER 83

SEAN AND MICHELLE IMMEDIATELY MOVED away from Grant and his explosive belt, but Brown stood rooted to the spot. “What are you doing here?” he said slowly.

Grant pointed at Sean and Michelle. “Following them. Are you the one who stabbed me in the back, Curtis? Because without somebody’s help I don’t see how they could have done what they did.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Alan,” replied Brown, eyeing the detonator in his hand.

Grant observed this. “Idiot switch. Fitting, actually, since I’ve learned this is what Wingo used in Afghanistan to escape. Otherwise, he would have been dead as planned and I wouldn’t be standing here now as a flesh-and-blood IED.” He eyed Brown. “Pity you didn’t have the intelligence about Wingo’s fail-safe, Curtis. But then again you’ve failed me in so many ways.”

“It doesn’t have to end like this, Grant,” said Sean.

Grant looked at him. “Nice to finally meet you face-to-face, Mr. King. We seem to communicate too much these days with texts and emails.” He paused, and his calm face finally showed a flash of anger.

“Twenty-five years. A quarter century I’ve lived with this hurt, this shame. This injustice.”

Michelle said, “But how exactly is it justice to kill a man who had nothing to do with your parents’ suicides?”

“Well, I couldn’t kill the man in office at the time could I? Because he’s already dead. So it’s symbolism that matters, Ms. Maxwell. This all began with Iran and now it will end with Iran. Or at least that was the plan. President Cole’s heroic escape with your help apparently will allow him to suffer no consequences for his actions. The guilty once more go free and brave, honest people die.”

“I was the one under the Potomac,” Michelle snapped.

He looked directly at her. “I should have thought of the oxygen tanks being used as an explosive device, but I didn’t. I commend your ingenuity.” He gave a mock bow in their direction.

“Is this how you want your family to see you go out, Grant?” asked Sean. “In a flame ball? Like a suicide bomber? You fought against those guys when you were in uniform. Now you’re taking a page from their book. Is that how you want to be remembered?”

“My options are limited.”

“I didn’t betray you, Alan,” said Brown.

“I don’t believe you. I paid you well for your services. Was it too much to offer loyalty in return?”

“I didn’t betray you,” shouted Brown.

“He’s telling the truth, Grant,” interjected Sean. “We figured it out for ourselves. Wingo followed Jenkins to Vista Trading. That’s the link to you. We knew about what happened to your mom and dad. That was public information. That gave us the motive. We tracked your lease of the satellite through a shell company. Jenkins had purchased the cabin, which we found out from his computer records. By the way, the police found a shallow grave up there with the remains of Jean Shepherd.”

“Another one who lost her way,” said Grant.

“We were on to her,” said Michelle. “That’s why she ran.”

“Then why are you here?” said Grant. “If not to hook back up with your confederate?”

“We’re here to tell him why the FBI is going to be showing up here any minute,” said Sean. “To arrest him for being a co-conspirator with you to assassinate the president.” He stared at Grant. “What, did you think I slugged him because he’s my buddy?”

Brown paled. “The FBI?”

Sean looked at him. “Did you really think we just came over to blow a lot of hot air and then let you walk? The FBI used our intel to do their deep dig. They have the evidence to nail you to the wall.”

“You’re lying,” barked Brown.

“Now you know how it feels, Curtis, to have your life ruined,” said Grant.

Brown turned to him. “Did you order the hit on Dana? Are you the reason she nearly died?”

“She was working with these two. And what did you do? Blab to the bitch about Wingo. That was the betrayal.”

“So you were just going to kill her? For that?”

“I’ve killed for a lot less than that. Just like right now.”

Sean said, “Grant, you don’t want to do this.”

Grant hadn’t noticed that Michelle had edged close enough to strike.

She hit him chest-high, her long, strong fingers clamping over the detonator, keeping the button pressed down. But Grant was also strong and agile. He spun around and threw her off. He had not anticipated the next attack, though.

Curtis Brown screamed and hit Grant so hard the two men flew backward and crashed right through a window, toppling into the front yard.

Sean grabbed Michelle from the floor, and they hurtled into the kitchen. He pushed her down and she landed on the floor and kept sliding. Sean threw himself forward and covered her body with his.

When the C-4 detonated it blew out the entire front of the house. The walls collapsed and the roof toppled downward. Glass shards and other debris thick as fists hurtled in all directions.

“Move, move, move!” shouted Sean. He grabbed Michelle’s hand and they burst out the back door, jumped off the deck, and ran across the back lawn. Sean gave her a leg up over the fence and then scrambled over it, too. He landed face-first in the grass on the other side at just the moment when the severed gas lines in Brown’s house erupted.

In a blazing flash the entire house was leveled. The explosion was so huge that it blew out windows in the houses next to Brown’s even though each was over a hundred feet away and there were stands of trees in between. The remains of the destroyed house quickly caught fire.

The fence Sean and Michelle were behind was impaled with glass and metal shards. Part of the top was sheared off.

Michelle helped Sean up. “You okay?”

He nodded, holding his hand at an odd angle. “But I think I fractured my hand,” he said.

She dialed 911 and reported the explosion.

“Is the FBI really on the way?” she asked him.

He shook his head.

She drew a long breath and leaned against a tree for support.

“Is this sucker over yet?” she said, in a husky, drained voice.

Sean shook his head.

“One more to go.”