First Daughter

a call to arms that made your pulse race, rushed at you like a freight train. Above all, you longed to believe what he told you-like a father communicating with his son, or at any rate what in Jack's mind was how a father ought to communicate with his son. But that was all idealistic claptrap, a pasteboard cutout, a larger-than-life image from the silver screen, where happy endings were manufactured for captive audiences. Unlike reality, which had never been happy for Jack and, he suspected, never would be.

'I'll do my best,' Jack said. 'I'm honored you asked for me, sir.'

'In all honesty, who better, Jack?'

'I appreciate that. Sir, in my opinion the first order of business is to create a plausible cover story.' Jack's gaze swung to the woman by the window, who was holding herself together by a supreme force of will. He recalled Sharon in a similar pose, as Emma's coffin was slowly lowered into the ground. He'd heard a whispering then, just as he'd heard in the main building. Sharon said it was the wind in the treetops. He'd believed her, then.

He inclined his head slightly. 'Mrs. Carson.'

Hearing her name, she started, summoned back into this time, this place. She seemed thin, as if she'd lost her taste for food. For a moment she stared bleakly into Jack's face; then she came away from the window, stood in front of him.

'Ma'am, do your parents still have that olive farm in Umbria?'

'Why, yes, they do.'

He looked at Edward Carson. 'It seems to me that would be a good place for Alli to be 'spending the holidays,' don't you think?'

'Why, yes, I do.' The president-elect put his cell phone to his ear. 'I'll have my press secretary get right on it.'

Lyn Carson moved toward Jack. 'Now I know what you must have gone through, Mr. McClure. Your daughter…' She faltered, tears gleaming at the corners of her eyes. She bit her lip, seemed to be mentally counting to ten. When she had herself under control, she said, 'You must miss Emma terribly.'

'Yes, ma'am, I do.'

Finished with his call, the president-elect signaled to his wife and she stepped away, turned her back on them to once again contemplate the world outside, forever changed.

'Jack, I have something to tell you. You've been briefed, no doubt, given the theories, the evidence, et cetera.'

'About E-Two. Yes, sir.'

'What do you think?'

'I think there's a hidden agenda. E-Two may be a prime suspect, but I don't think it should be the only suspect.'

Lyn Carson turned back into the room. Her lips were half-parted, as if she was about to add something, but at a curt shake of her husband's head, she kept her own counsel.

When he spoke again, it was in the same tone, Jack imagined, with which he held sway over backroom caucuses-hushed and conspiratorial. 'What's important, Jack, is that you not leap to judgment like these political hacks. I want you to follow your own instinct, develop your own leads. That's why I expended a great deal of political capital to have you reassigned.'

Lyn Carson held out her hand. It was very light, very cold, no more than the hollow-boned wing of a bird, but through it pulsed the iron determination of a parent. The terrible agony in her eyes he recognized as his own.

'I'm so awfully sorry.'

Her words had a double meaning, and he knew it. She was talking about both Emma and Alli.

'Bring our daughter back to us.'

'I'll return her to you.' When he squeezed her hand, the bones felt as if they truly were hollow. 'I promise.'

Tears overflowed from Lyn Carson's eyes, fell one by one at her feet.

EIGHT

YOU SHOULDN'T have promised,' Nina said. 'You can't guarantee you'll find Alli, let alone bring her back.'

Jack found it interesting and enlightening that Nina Miller had been privy to his conversation with the Carsons. Garner's deliberate exclusion was an all-too-graphic example of the schism within the task force, behind which, of course, was the disagreement between the fundamentalist wing of the Republican Party currently in power and the moderate wing about to take that power away from them. It was no surprise that a political agenda governed the task force. This was precisely what Bennett had warned him about, and he knew there was no good news to be had here.

'What I can guarantee is hope,' Jack said shortly. 'Hope is her food and drink. Only hope will keep her going through the darkest hours.'

'Hope dangles people from a slender thread,' Nina said. 'It's patently unfair.'

They had been striding down the hallway. Now Jack stopped, turned to her. 'Do you know anything about darkest hours?'

Nina stood staring at him. She didn't answer, because apparently she had nothing to say.

'I've had my darkest hours,' Jack continued. 'And now the Carsons are having theirs.'

He stood very still, but there was so much energy coming off him that Nina, as if slapped in the face, took an involuntary step back.

His eyes glittered. 'I will bring Alli back, Nina. You can make book on it.'

JACK LED her to the right, skirting the shed. There was a swath of lawn, rather narrow by the standards of the rest of the property, beyond which lay a thick stand of fluffy pines and large, gnarled, very old oaks. By the time they reached the trees, Jack had determined that Nina had low-slung hips and a walk that, defying the odds, was distinctly sensual.

'I want you to know…' Nina stumbled over a stone as well as her words.

'What?'

'I've… had my darkest hours, too.'

Jack, navigating through the rooty trees, said nothing.

'When I was a kid.' Nina picked her way under tree branches, over exposed roots, the knuckles of angry fists. 'My older brother… he molested me…'

Jack stopped, turned back to regard her. He was startled at her admission, which couldn't have been easy to make. But then again, it was often easier to confess to a stranger than to someone you knew.

'And when I fought back, he beat me. He said I needed to be punished.'

Jack felt a ping, like the ricochet of a steel ball bounding from bumper to bumper in his own shameful pinball machine. 'You know that's not true.'

Nina's face was pinched, as if she wanted to make the past disappear. 'He's married, got two kids. Now he's got a whole new family to dominate. How I hate him. I can't stop.' She made a little sound in the back of her throat that was either a laugh or a sob. 'My parents loved God, they believed in his loving kindness. How wrong were they?'

'When we were growing up,' Jack said, 'parents were unconscious when it came to their effect on their kids.'

Nina paused for a moment, considering. 'Even if you're right, it doesn't make what they did better, does it?'

They resumed their trek through the stand of weeping hemlocks and pin oaks. He heard the rustle of the wind through brittle branches, the hiss of faraway traffic, the call of a winter bird. The melancholy sounds of winter.

At length, Nina said, 'Where are we going?'

'There's a secret path.' Jack pointed ahead. 'Well, it isn't a secret to the juniors and seniors, but to the adults…'