'Four days. Since surgery.'
'Where am I?'
'Laredo hospital.'
'How?'
'Border Patrol. They brought us all here. The federales shot at us, from across the river. They hit you and Jesse. He died in the colonia. We buried him next to his mother.'
She cried now.
'I'm sorry, Lindsay. For Jesse… and for hurting you.'
She stared off a moment then turned back to him.
'You need to know something, Bode. I loved Jesse, but I didn't have an affair with him. Not a physical one.'
'Can you ever forgive me?'
'I already have.'
'Why?'
'Because you came for me.'
FORTY-FIVE
Cameras and reporters from the networks and cable crowded into the press room and staked out positions in the corridor outside. Across the foyer, on the other side of the white marble statues of Sam Houston and Stephen F. Austin, the governor of Texas stood at the window of his Capitol office staring out at the satellite trucks that lined the driveway circling the building. Since they had returned from Laredo, he had thought a lot about what it meant to be a good man, and while he hadn't worked out all the details, he had figured out the important points.
Honor.
Love.
Family.
Bode Bonner would be a good man again. He would live a life with honor, with love, and with his family. Jim Bob Burnet slapped him on the shoulder and out of his thoughts.
'It's been a great ride, Bode. Thanks for taking me along.'
'I know you wanted the White House as much as I did. I'm sorry.'
'Don't be. You got something better than the White House-a second chance with your family. Don't fuck it up.'
They shook hands. Left hands. Bode's right arm was still in a sling.
'Besides, I just might get to the White House without you.'
'How?'
'Palin called, wants me to come see her in Alaska.'
Now Bode slapped him on the shoulder.
'I'll be rootin' for you, Professor.'
Bode walked over and put his arm around the governor's wife.
Lindsay Bonner felt her husband's arm around her. Where it belonged. Where she belonged. She loved Jesse Rincon, but she had loved Bode Bonner longer. He had been a part of her since she was fifteen; he would always be a part of her. There was no denying it and no fighting it. She had loved him from the moment she had first seen him, and she would love him until the moment she died. They had shared twenty-nine years of life together, they had joined together to create the most wonderful child, and they had survived Nuevo Laredo. He had come for her. She had come back with him. He wasn't the same man she had married in Comfort twenty-two years before, and she wasn't the same woman who had left Austin five months before. But he was her hero again.
And she would never again leave their bed. Not over politics.
Becca turned the volume up on the television. The broadcast was from the press room just across the foyer. A reporter addressed the camera.
'Breaking news from Nuevo Laredo that Enrique de la Garza, also known as El Diablo, head of the notorious Los Muertos cartel that made two assassination attempts on the governor of Texas, is now dead, killed by Governor Bode Bonner himself. That's all we have now, but I'm sure we'll learn the rest of the story when the governor addresses us. Speculation is ripe that Governor Bonner will use this opportunity to announce his candidacy for the presidency of the United States.'
Bode walked into the press room with Lindsay, Becca, Miguel, Alejandro, and Josefina in a new green dress. And Pancho. Bode stepped to the podium.
'Good morning. I have several announcements. First, I am resigning as governor of Texas effective immediately.'
The reporters jumped out of the chairs and began shouting questions. Bode held up his hand.
'My actions have resulted in good people dying. Hank Williams and Roy Rogers, two brave Texas Rangers. Darcy Daniels, my daughter's partner. Mandy Morgan, my aide. Eddie Jones, a campaign staffer. And Dr. Jesse Rincon.'
Seventy-five miles south, San Antonio Mayor Jorge Gutierrez watched the governor on the television in his office in city hall. Jorge knew he would die without respect.
'I've liquidated my blind trust,' the governor said. 'The money will be used to provide utilities to Colonia Angeles, in honor of Dr. Rincon.'
One hundred sixty miles further south, the Border Patrol agent named Rusty stood at his post by the gates in the border wall one mile north of the Rio Grande. For the first time in his career, he wondered why.
In Colonia Angeles, Inez Quintanilla sat at her desk in the clinic, as if awaiting the doctor's arrival that day. Tears streamed down her pretty face. She could not believe that the doctor was dead, but she knew he was because she had stood at his grave in the small colonia cemetery when his body was lowered into the ground. She knew she would never see him again. She knew life in the colonia would never be the same again, without her brother or the doctor. She knew there would be no laughter and no joy, no movie nights and no one who cared for them. She knew her life had been irrevocably altered. But she did not yet know that the doctor had executed a last will and testament that left his homestead on the other side of Laredo to 'my devoted assistant, Inez Quintanilla, who shall live beyond the wall.'
In his cafe in Laredo, Luis Escalera got drunk on whiskey.
Two hundred miles downriver in the clinic in Colonia Nueva Vida, the governor of Texas spoke of the doctor on the small television, and Sister Sylvia wept.
In his office in the U.S. House of Representatives, Congressman Ernesto Delgado watched the governor on television as he spoke of Jesse Rincon, and at that moment, he decided to retire. He did not want to die in Washington. He wanted to die in Laredo. On the border. Where he belonged.
'I will not be a candidate for the presidency.'
The reporters erupted as one, shouting questions at him. Bode held a hand up until they calmed down.
'I lost my way here in Austin. Ambition can do that to a man, blind him to what's important in life. I found my way again in Nuevo Laredo. I remember what's important now.'
He put his good arm around his wife.
'I'm going back to where I belong with my wife and my children, Becca, Alejandro, Miguel, and Josefina. And our dog, Pancho.'
The room had fallen silent. A reporter spoke softly.
'Governor, after killing El Diablo, you'll be unbeatable. You can be the next president of the United States of America. You're a living legend. There's even talk of erecting a statue of you here in the State Capitol-next to Sam Houston.'
'A legend, huh? Well, I don't deserve a statue. You want to erect a statue, make it of Jesse Rincon. He made a difference in people's lives. I just wanted their votes.'
'Governor, you're really going to walk away from the White House? It's really over?'
Bode Bonner nodded.
