Jimmie tried to inhale deeply to steady himself, but all he could take were quick and shallow breaths. His heart was pounding now like a hotel bed against a wall. The agent had a hold on him and was staring through his eyeholes, just inches away.
“No Xbox, you hear me?” the agent said. “You need your sleep. Big day tomorrow.”
If Jimmie didn’t respond, he’d be unmasked for sure; if he said something, even a word, the agent would discover his ruse.
He looked the agent in the eyes… and stomped his Oxfords in protest.
“I don’t make the rules, kiddo,” the agent said, letting him go.
Jimmie stomped his way up the stairs, playing the part of the petulant Trump child to a T. When he reached the third floor, he turned down the hall and ditched the tablecloth behind a potted plant.
From the closed door nearest him, he heard a full artillery at work: machine-gun fire, grenades. Human Hiroshima 3: Soldier of Misfortune, if he wasn’t mistaken. Somebody was disobeying daddy. If he was anything like the gamers Jimmie had known in college, Junior wouldn’t be getting up for a good long while-not even to use the restroom. Jimmie was thankful he’d only ever been a casual gamer. He could stop any time he wanted-and he had stopped, when he’d pawned his PlayStation to pay off his parking tickets. And then pawned his Xbox after his car got towed when he double-parked outside the ticket-payment office.
Jimmie straightened his tie and ran a hand through his short-cropped hair. He strutted down the hall. So this is what James Bond felt like. A little tipsier, probably, but there’s a swagger that begins to course through your veins when you’re firing on all cylinders. James Bond… Jimmie Bernwood. They even shared the same initials. They also shared them with Justin Bieber, but Jimmie wasn’t quite ready to proclaim himself the next Biebs.
He paused at the doorway to the Lincoln Bedroom. The door was cracked an inch. He looked to his left and to his right down the hallway to confirm he was still alone and then slipped inside the Lincoln Bedroom.
Moonlight filtered in through the spacious glass doors that opened onto the veranda. The sliver of light shone directly onto the desk, where a handwritten copy of the Trump Address was laid out on permanent display. Next to it sat the recorder.
He felt his way along the wall toward the desk. If he’d planned this out, he would have brought a flashlight with him. If he’d had his phone, he could have used a flashlight app, even. But he didn’t have time to plan. He didn’t even have time to use the restroom (which he badly needed to do).
Jimmie picked up the recorder. He could barely believe it was real, but it was. A sense of relief rushed through him. He still had to figure out a way to get the damned recorder out of the White House, but the first part of his mission was complete. Mission impossible? As W would say, “Mission accomplished”!
But just like George W. Bush had learned, you should never celebrate before the end of a mission, even if the end is within sight. Before he could even turn around for the door, a woman’s voice rang out from the darkness:
“Took you long enough, Mr. Jimmie.”
Chapter Fifty
Victoria’s Secret
Jimmie Bernwood recognized the woman’s husky voice. Her Eastern European accent was unmistakable.
“Mrs. Trump,” he said, slipping the recorder into his pants pocket. He turned around. With a fuller moon, he might have been able to see her more clearly on the bed. As it was, he only saw her outline. And what a fine outline it was.
“Call me Victoria,” she said, pronouncing it Veek-toria.
“I didn’t know you were here,” Jimmie said. “I thought you’d gone to Florida.”
“Mar-a-Lago?” she said. “Donny took Mr. Christie. They’re going to golf all weekend. And who knows what else.”
Jimmie eyed the door. His first instinct was to bolt for it. Get the hell out of here. Unfortunately, he couldn’t just run out of the White House. His aching ribs couldn’t take another beating.
“I was in here talking to your husband earlier and left something behind,” he said. “Sorry to disturb you.”
“The little tape machine.”
He swallowed hard. “The recorder. Yes.”
“I assume you have found it,” she said, “or else you are very happy to see me.”
Jimmie glanced down at his pants. The recorder bulged unseemly in his pocket.
She asked, “Are you happy to see me, Mr. Jimmie? I have been thinking about your big hands ever since our little flirtation earlier this week.”
Victoria flipped on the bedside lamp. Jimmie felt his breath hitch as he got a good look at the first lady, who was sitting upright against the headboard. The bedsheet and comforter had been tossed aside, giving him a full view of the toned and tanned body that had graced so many magazine covers over the years. Her lacy, black bra-and-panties set left little up to the imagination. Jimmie had spent enough time with her racy National Review spread to fill in the missing pieces.
Still, he had to control himself. The first lady was toying with him like a cat with a mouse. If he wasn’t careful, he’d end up decapitated on the porch by morning.
He cleared his throat. “Are you trying to seduce me?”
She slowly traced her full, luscious lips with her tongue. “I’m not trying to seduce you-I am seducing you.”
“Your husband-”
“Isn’t here.”
“He’s the president. If he found out I was even in his wife’s bedroom…”
“Why do you think I’m sleeping in the guest bedroom?”
“Do you always sleep wearing lingerie? I would imagine the underwire isn’t very comfortable.”
She giggled. “I usually sleep naked. Very naked.”
Jimmie had no idea how one could be “very naked” as opposed to simply “naked,” but he was sufficiently intrigued. Now there were two bulges in his pants.
What the hell are you doing? his rational side chimed in. Sure, you’re “intrigued” by the prospect of seeing this gorgeous woman in the nude. But what woman aren’t you “intrigued” by? Remember that you’re doing this to save Cat from the kidnappers. You’re risking your livelihood-right here, right now-for the woman you used to love. And also the woman you need to help you complete the puzzle of Lester’s death.
Jimmie said, “Listen, I know it can’t be easy, being married to the president of the United States-hell, it can’t be easy being married at all. I’ve never walked the aisle myself. I thought I’d found the right girl once, but then things fell apart. I might have found her again-but it all depends on me getting this recorder to the bad guys who’ve kidnapped her.”
“What a shame,” she said. Victoria’s fingers went to the front of her push-up bra. She unhooked its clasp. The bra split in two, releasing her breasts from their captivity. The bra hadn’t been a push-up bra after alclass="underline" Her breasts seemed to float before her in defiance of gravitational laws. The natural order of things might have been put temporarily on hold, actually, as Jimmie had sucked all the air out of the room.
Y’know, he thought, I’m not actually dating Cat right now.
Yes, he was going to rescue her from the bad guys, and blah, blah, blah. But until they actually started seeing each other again, it meant they were free to see other people. Right? When else was he going to get the chance to hop into bed with a supermodel of indeterminate age in the Lincoln Bedroom? He could practically sense Lincoln’s ghost in the room, telling him to hit that shit.
He dropped his voice to a whisper: “Aren’t there, like, video cameras all over the place?”