repeat: We have fire!”
“Get down! Get out of the way!”
From that point forward, Ben felt as if time went into slow motion. He had been taught in school that time was relative, and for the first time, he believed it. From the shots to the time he was inside Cadillac One, he later realized that barely thirty seconds had elapsed. But it seemed an eternity.
The president had stopped speaking and there were at least half a dozen men racing toward the podium. Ben knew they were running as fast as possible but to him it seemed as if they were moving unbearably slowly, like on The Six Million Dollar Man.
The Secret Service agents finally reached the presidential podium. Two of them tackled the president and quite literally knocked him to the ground.
When the leader of the free world hit the floor, panic ensued. The people at the front of the rope line surged forward, pushed against their will by the teeming mass behind them. The police officers guarding the line attempted to hold them back-but there were a lot more people in the crowd than there were police officers. People buried in the middle tried to race off to the sides and break free, creating even more turmoil and confusion.
The shots continued, faster and louder.
“Get down!” Ben heard Agent Zimmer shout, lunging toward him. He thought the man was protecting him, but of course he was actually guarding the first lady. He grabbed her and pulled her to her feet, careful to position his body between Emily Blake and the line of fire. He placed his hands under her arms and lifted her off the ground. As he carried her toward the back of the raised platform, her face showed that she knew she was in danger, but to her credit, she remained quiet and cooperative.
“Tell me about Samson!” Zimmer barked into his sleeve, even as he carried the first lady away. “Is Samson down?”
Ben waited for an answer, but before he heard one, two plainclothesmen approached and began herding his group to the side of the stage.
“Man down!” he heard someone shout, but he didn’t know whom they were talking about. One of the Secret Service agents standing by the presidential podium dropped, obviously wounded. Blood saturated his neck and shirt with astonishing speed. Aren’t they wearing Kevlar? Ben wondered. Another agent to his right fell. How many shooters are there? How many bullets? How many people are dead already?
The remaining Secret Service agents formed a circle and pulled the president to his feet, careful to keep him surrounded at all times. Another round of shots rang out and another agent dropped. The remaining four instantly closed the circle, keeping the president covered. Another line of agents went down on one knee, aiming their weapons into the distance.
Pop! Pop! Pop pop pop!
Even from the side of the stage, Ben could see a war was taking place. Four more Secret Service agents crouched on the sides of the stage, weapons out, pointed above the heads of the crowd. He knew the problem. They couldn’t find the target.
“Nest One!” the agent standing in front of him shouted. “Where is Nest One? Come in, Nest One!”
Ten more agents came out of nowhere and formed a protective perimeter. The four circling the president moved backward as quickly as possible.
Agent Gatwick raced by, shouting, “Cadillac One. Now!”
The agent in charge of herding Ben’s group nodded and steered Ben, Mike, and Tidwell in the same general direction that the president was moving.
“Cadillac One?” Ben whispered under his breath.
He heard Mike grunt a reply, talking as he moved. “Right now, it’s probably the safest place in the city.”
Before they reached the steps at the rear of the stage, Ben saw three more Secret Service agents drop to the ground. The two men moving his entourage forward continued to plow ahead as if oblivious to the death and carnage.
Outside the stage, the crowd had advanced from panicked to frenzied. The police tried to restrain them, without success. People were climbing walls, splashing through the reflecting pool, climbing the Survivor Tree- anything to get out of the line of fire. Parents were torn between trying to keep their children covered and trying to move them as quickly as possible. Terror had seized the assemblage. The screams were heartrending. A woman near the front was holding a small child in her arms. The child was not moving.
“How can it happen again?” the woman wailed, her voice a piercing, aching cry that cut through the turmoil like a knife. “How can it happen here again?”
The raised platform that had served as a stage began to buckle. Too many people were pressing up against it, trying to escape. Ben just prayed no one had crawled beneath it. The metal supports creaked and groaned and then it all came tumbling down, buckling under the collective pressure of hundreds of desperate people.
As he approached the parked motorcade, Ben for the first time heard shots echoing far above them from different locations. Federal snipers, he guessed, or hoped, and only prayed they would find their target. Was he out of range yet? A Secret Service agent standing next to the rear door of Cadillac One suddenly dropped to the ground, horrifically answering Ben’s question.
And then he heard the shriek. In the days to come, Ben would try to explain how he knew it had come from the first lady. Was there something unique about her voice? He could never answer their questions convincingly. But he knew. He knew it with unshakable certainty.
It took his own injury to snap Ben out of his trance. All at once, he felt a stinging sensation race across his cheek, as if someone had tried to strike a match on the side of his face.
I’ve been shot! Ben thought, lightly touching the side of his cheek. Blood trickled onto his hand. His entire body began to tremble.
Dear God. I’ve been shot!
Four Secret Service agents positioned themselves around the car, guns drawn and at the ready. On a signal, the two men in front began firing, laying down a blanket of cover fire as the president’s four remaining bodyguards literally shoved him into the backseat of the car. No one was more surprised than Ben when his protectors pushed him in behind the president. Mike and Senator Tidwell were the next to enter the bulletproof sanctuary of the automobile.
“Does anyone know what’s going on?” he heard a Secret Service agent outside the car cry out. “What happened to Nest One? Why wasn’t Juliet where she was supposed to be?”
Agent Gatwick ran up to the car, shoved the doors closed, and slapped the windshield. “Go!”
“What about Emily?” President Blake shouted back at him.
Gatwick simply shook his head and pointed at the driver. “Go!”
The driver, who had never left the car, nodded.
“Go!” Gatwick shouted again.
The driver held up his hands helplessly. The panicked crowd blocked his path. There was nowhere he could go without mowing down a dozen people.
“Damnation!” President Blake swore. His face was scraped and his mouth was bleeding, but he seemed essentially intact. There was a wildness in his eyes that Ben suspected could come only from realizing that someone, perhaps many people, had tried very hard to kill him. And he wasn’t in the clear yet. What a change-ten minutes ago Ben had been stammering in the presence of this man; now he had been thrown practically on top of him and barely noticed. “At least we’re safe in here. Bastards can’t hurt us as long as we stay inside.”
Mike nodded. His ears were starting to recover from the constant sound of bullets whizzing by much too close to his face. Thank God they’d made it here. This had to be the safest place in the city right now.
So why didn’t he feel relieved?
It was a comfort knowing that Cadillac One was bulletproof, but in truth that was not being tested because the bullets weren’t coming this way. Why not?
There were ony two possible explanations. Either the president was not the primary target…
Or the sniper had him exactly where he wanted him.
Mike whispered into Ben’s ear. “Do you see that?”
“What?”
Mike was staring out the window. “It’s a reflection. On the chrome of that officer’s motorcycle. And it’s… changing.” His eyes widened. “We have to get out of this car.”
