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“Morgan,” Henry Lamden said with real affection.

Taylor quickly observed that the heart attack had aged the president. He was thinner, weaker, and smaller. His suit was too big for him. Lamden slowly came to his feet and stepped away from the desk used by Franklin Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, George W. Bush, and Henry Lamden. It had been given to the U.S. by Queen Victoria. Roosevelt added a front panel to cover the mid section so that visitors wouldn’t see his wheelchair. The desk seemed to dwarf Lamden now.

“Well, Henry, you’re looking good.”

“Don’t bullshit a bullshitter, Morgan,” Lamden countered. He braced himself against the desktop, right in front of the hinged panel, which could swing open. Years ago, little John-John Kennedy played with the door while JFK worked.

Taylor came the rest of the way into the Oval Office and shook Lamden’s hand. He got half the energy in return.

“Looks like you took quite a beating,” the president offered.

“Sons of bitches,” was Taylor’s reply. “Call it serendipity, but I suppose by being there we prevented one helluva bloodbath. They planned on taking Jakarta. I can’t even imagine how many hundreds of thousands of Christian Indonesians would have been killed.”

“Just serendipity?” asked Lamden. He was a religious man, more so than Taylor.

Taylor hadn’t really thought about the circumstances that brought him to Haruku Island. “Makes you wonder.”

Lamden closed his eyes believing there was more to it. When he opened them again, he returned to the leather chair behind the Victorian desk — the power seat.

“I’m exercising my right as president. I’m going to talk and you’re going to keep your damned trap shut, which I know isn’t your nature.”

“Henry, I need to talk to you, too.”

“No, you don’t.”

Taylor laughed. This was his old friend. He brought up one of his favorite chairs — the Colonial Adams. It’s what he used for personal conversations. He felt that’s where they were going.

“Good, now listen. I’m not going to give you a long speech and I’m not taking questions after like a goddamned press conference.”

“Okay, okay,” Taylor said obligingly.

“I’m happy to have my picture in the history books. Maybe someday they’ll even put me on a fifty-cent stamp. But I have to tell you, Morgan, I’m not up for this job anymore.”

Taylor leaned forward, clearly caught off guard. This isn’t what…

“Look at me,” Lamden said rolling on. “They say I’ll get stronger with time, but the doctors admit it’ll never happen with the pressure of this place. Personally, I like hanging around here. But I’ve spent enough years away from my wife: first on ships with nothing but smelly men, and then on the Hill with men whose politics stank. Quite honestly, I missed a lot of years getting laid. Given the choice, if my wife’s willing and there’s enough Viagra in the world, I’d rather be in bed with my wife than being fucked by voters who didn’t want me in the first place.

“Morgan, you’re the president the country needs, whether or not they know it. You’ve proven it to them once and again. Get yourself a vice president you can really trust and do what you need to do.

“If you really feel you have to, parade me out on holidays and special events. Send me to meet the Pope; I think I’d like him. Or get me over to England for a royal wedding. My wife loves Wedgwood. But don’t argue with me now. Not one word. My mind is made up. This is your job, Morgan. You’ve got the balls for it. And for God’s sake, between you, me, and the lamppost, you even have the heart. But you won’t hear me admit that in public. You’ll get too many votes from Democrats next time. Which leads me to an important question: Can you even run again? After all, you didn’t get elected last November. But hell, that’s your problem, not mine.”

Taylor fought the tears back. He did have the heart.

“So, do what the country needs you to do. Become president for the third time.”

Chapter 78

The New York Times
Two days later

“This is Weaver,” the Times editor answered.

“Ms. Weaver, my name is Roarke. Scott Roarke. I’m with JL the Secret Service.”

“Yes, Mr. Roarke.” She was nervous; distracted. “I know who you are.”

“Can we talk about Michael O’Connell?” Shannon Davis passed along the details, or at least what was known by NYPD, to Roarke.

She had trouble replying. “You heard?” she managed to say.

“Yes, what happened?”

“He was robbed and killed.” Weaver’s voice cracked. “His body was found in the Bronx. Why, for God’s sake?”

Roarke decided to volunteer information: something he rarely offered. “He was on the way to see me, Ms. Weaver. He had something to tell me. Do you have any idea what that was?”

She hesitated. The time it took her to respond told Roarke she did.

“Please. What was it?”

“I can’t,” she said. Andrea Weaver was falling on a useless sword.

“Look, who robs someone in the middle of Manhattan and drives them to the Bronx? He was on his way to see me at the White House. He had something to tell me in person. You know what it was.”

Still silence.

“It’s what got him killed,” he continued. “If you want to help, tell me.”

He could almost hear her thinking.

“It was important enough to cost him his life.”

“The police were here,” she said weakly.

“Did you tell them anything?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“For the same reason I haven’t told you. We’re the press and….”

“He’s dead, Weaver. Michael O’Connell is dead. Because of a story he was working on? Something he discovered? He had to see me. Me! And he pretty much hated me. But still, O’Connell had to come down in person. He didn’t want to do it over the phone. He was grabbing a cab for the airport.” He raised his voice, something Roarke rarely did with a woman. “For that reason alone, I have to assume that it was too important to discuss on the telephone. So, what was it?”

“But the robbery?”

“Come on.”

“And the Bronx?”

“He was dumped there.” An uneasy thought started forming in his mind. The taxi driver. It evaporated as soon as she spoke.

“What’s your e-mail address?”

“My e-mail?” he responded.

“I’ll send you the story Michael was working on. I’ve only got part of it. We got hit by a weird computer virus the other day. His computer got fried, most of my files were lost.”

The e-mail dumped into Roarke’s mailbox a minute later. He opened it and read what remained of Michael O’Connell’s last story. It was a saga that began years ago on a California back road and led to U.S. Route 281 in Lebanon, Kansas. Time after time, according to the report, Strong’s career advanced, as if orchestrated by an outside force.

The next two pages were a jumble of words. The computer gibberish cleared up midway through O’Connell’s description of his trip to Russia. The reporter intimated that a famous American radio talk-show host may have been there as well. The article became incomprehensible again. Roarke scanned ahead until he came to a section, which covered Andropov Institute’s Red Banner curriculum, where Russians and Middle East agents were trained to become Americans. Michael O’Connell made the leap of faith that the sleepers could have found their way to positions in the U.S. media, including radio. The loosely connected dots formed a picture of Elliott Strong.