“Beecher, do me a favor and take a seat,” he says, pointing to the single table at the center of the room and the rolling research cart stocked with documents that sits next to it.
I stay where I am. He doesn’t seem to care.
“Beecher, I’ve thought long and hard about this. I know I can keep putting the pressure on you. I can keep huffing and puffing and trying to blow your house down. Or I can be honest with you,” he says, his voice softening to nearly a whisper.
“Before I started working here, y’know what my old job was?” Khazei asks as he leans a hand on the research cart. “I used to be a cop out in Virginia. The pay was good. The hours were bad. And the pension couldn’t even touch what I get here, which is why I made the switch. But there’s one thing I learned as a cop: Sometimes good people don’t know how to be good to themselves. Y’understand what that means?”
“It means you’ve been reading too many self-help books.”
“No, it means you have no idea how many guns are aimed at your head. So let me do you one favor and tell you what I know: I know who your girlfriend Clementine is. I know who her dad is-which explains why you’ve been trying to hide her. Sure, I don’t know why Orlando died-yet-but I do know that President Orson Wallace was scheduled to be in this room two days ago. I know that the Secret Service did everything in their power to clear out the CSI investigative folks from being here. And I know that despite the fact that there are over two dozen other SCIFs in this building that the President could’ve picked, he for some unexplainable reason asked for this room, with you, which puts him right back in the exact same place that, less than forty-eight hours ago, was the last known location that Orlando was seen before they found him lying downstairs on the carpet with his eyes permanently open. Now I know you’re one of the smart ones, Beecher. Whatever deal you’re working with the President-”
“I’m not working any deals!” I insist.
“Then you have even bigger problems than I thought. Look up and down at that totem pole you’re stuck in. You’re the lowest man. And when it comes to presidential scandals, when that totem pole finally tips and everyone starts yelling ‘Timber,’ you know what they call the lowest man? The scapegoat,” he says, his dark eyes locked on mine.
“We’ve got Moses outside the building,” Khazei’s walkie-talkie squawks through the room.
“Beecher, I know you need a life preserver. This is me throwing you one. All you have to do is take hold.”
“Moses is in the elevator,” the walkie-talkie announces. “One minute to arrival…”
There’s a hollow knock on the metal door. Secret Service want the SCIF opened and ready. Even Khazei knows he can’t stop a request like that.
“Please, Beecher,” he says as he reaches out and twists the metal latch on the door. My ears pop from the change in pressure as the door swings inward and the vacuum seal is broken. “I’m begging you to take hold.”
It’s the last thing I hear from Khazei. Without looking back, he steps out into the hallway, where three suit-and-tie Secret Service agents motion him out of the way.
An agent with blond hair and a tiny nose joins me in the SCIF, taking a spot in the back left corner. “Thirty seconds,” he whispers to me as a courtesy. “Oh, and he’s in a good mood.”
I nod, appreciating the news.
Within a few seconds, everything goes silent.
The calm before the storm.
From outside, there’s a quiet clip-clop as a set of finely polished dress shoes makes its way up the long hallway.
As Orson Wallace turns the corner and steps inside, I instinctively step back. I’ve never seen him face-to-face. But I know that face. Everyone knows that face. And those rosy cheeks. And those calming gray eyes. It’s like the front page of a newspaper walking right at me.
“Sir, this is Beecher White. He’ll be staffing you today,” the blond agent announces as I realize that Wallace has come here without any staff.
There’s another audible pop as the two-ton metal door slams shut and metal bolts kunk into place, sealing me in this windowless, soundproof, vacuum-packed box with the President of the United States.
“Nice to meet you, Beecher,” Wallace says, heading straight for the desk, the research cart-and the single wooden chair-at the center of the room. “I appreciate your helping us out today.”
68
"That’s the single dumbest idea I’ve ever heard,” the barber snapped. “Why would you send him in like that!?”
Through the phone, Dr. Palmiotti didn’t answer.
“I asked you a question!” the barber added.
“And I heard you. Now hear me: Be careful of your tone,” Palmiotti warned through the receiver.
“There’s no reason to put him at risk!”
“Be careful of your tone,” Palmiotti warned again.
Taking a breath, the barber stared up at the brick walls of the narrow alleyway that was used as a breakroom behind the barbershop. An unkind wind shoved the rotting stench from the nearby garbage cans into his face.
“I’m just saying, he didn’t have to go there,” the barber said, far more calmly. He knew he was already out of bounds by making the phone call. But he never forgot the rules-especially after what they think happened. Not once did he refer to the President by name.
“I appreciate your concern,” Palmiotti shot back, doing a poor job at hiding his sarcasm. “But we know what we’re doing.”
“I don’t think you do. By bringing him in like that-”
“We know what we’re doing, okay? He’s not at risk. He’s not in danger. And right now, he’s in the best possible position to find out exactly who’s holding the tin can on the other end of the string. So thank you for the concern, but this time, why don’t you go back to doing what you do best, and we’ll go back to doing what we do best?”
Before the barber could say a word, there was a click. Dr. Palmiotti was gone.
Even when he was little, he was a prick, Laurent thought as he shoved his way through the back door of the barbershop, anxious to refocus his attention on his next haircut.
69
I’m waiting for it.
And watching.
And standing there, swaying in place as my hands fiddle in the pockets of my blue lab coat, pretending to fish for nothing at all.
The President’s been here barely two minutes. He’s sitting at the long research table, eyeing the various boxes and documents that are stacked in neat piles on the rolling cart.
“Do you need help, sir?” I ask.
He barely shakes his head, reaching for a file on the second shelf of the cart: a single-page document encased in a clear Mylar sleeve. I saw the request list. It’s a handwritten letter by Abraham Lincoln-back when he was a regular citizen-requesting that better roads be built by the government. There’s another on the cart from Andrew Jackson, petitioning for money well before he was elected. From what I’d heard, Wallace loves these records: all of them written by our greatest leaders long before they were our greatest leaders-and proof positive that life exists before and after the White House.
But today, as Wallace squints down at Lincoln’s scratchy, wide script, I can’t help but think that he’s after something far bigger than life advice from his predecessors.
If Dallas and his contacts in the Culper Ring are to be believed-and that’s a big if-they think Wallace is here to talk. With me.
I eye the blond Secret Service agent who’s still standing in the opposite corner. He stares right back, unafraid of the eye contact. At the table, the President leans forward in his chair, both elbows on the desk as he hovers over the document. I watch him, picking apart his every movement like a mall cop studying a group of loud kids with skateboards.