Alex sighed. “Yeah, about the first lady. I’m not sure she’s dead.”
“What do you mean? I thought the running theory was that Samuels pulled a fast one over on her and killed her with that explosion a day earlier than he said.”
“That’s what we thought, until now,” she said.
“What’d you find, Alex?”
“I finally cracked a few of those encrypted messages from Fortner’s phone that Black gave me.”
“And?” Hawk asked.
“Madeline sent Fortner a message that contained a series of coordinates. And when I entered them into my mapping program, it came up as the site of the Potomac Airfield.”
“Are you suggesting that she faked her death?” Hawk asked.
“I think she was in on this thing the whole time—and she’s working with Fortner.”
CHAPTER 31
Two hours earlier
The White House
A HAND CLAMPED AROUND Madeline Young’s mouth as a masked man snatched her from beneath the covers in the residential quarters of the White House. She fought for a few seconds before he whispered in her ear.
“You have to get out now,” he said. “Stop fighting. I’m here to help you escape.”
The man eased his grip and released her. She twisted and turned for a moment before locking eyes with him.
“What do you want?” she said in a whisper.
“The general sent for you,” the man said. “It’s time to go right now.”
“But I didn’t—”
“It’s now or never,” the man said. “I mean that in every sense of the word. If we don’t leave now, we’re going to be killed by that bomb you set.”
She looked up at the ceiling at the device with a green light blinking rapidly. “But I thought—”
“Now!” the man said, gesturing toward the closet.
She finally complied, hustling around her bed and into the spacious walk-in closet that contained a doorway leading to a secret escape tunnel. As she opened the door, another man carrying a large plastic bag emerged from the tunnel.
“Give me your ring,” the man demanded as he held out his hand.
“My ring?” she asked. “What on Earth for?”
“Just do it,” the other man barked. “We need to move.”
Madeline twisted the ring off her finger and depressed it into the bagman’s palm. She watched him drag the sack into her room and start to unzip it.
“Trust me,” the other man said. “You don’t want to see what’s in there.”
Madeline grabbed her pre-packed bag and stepped into the passage. She continued along with her escort until she left the space beneath the White House. Following her guide’s directions, she wove through a series of tunnels and eventually emerged street level three blocks away from the presidential residence.
They sped along the Washington surface streets that had quieted down for a few hours before 5:00 a.m. rolled around and the city sprang back to life at full throttle.
“Where are we going?” she asked.
“The plan hasn’t changed, ma’am,” the guard said. “We’re still taking you to General Fortner.”
She was staring toward Pennsylvania Avenue when she heard the explosion and felt the ground rumble through the car. Suddenly, alarms filled the night as fire trucks and law enforcement vehicles raced to the scene in response to the explosion. While she was still hesitant to assist in the plan, she thought she knew what she’d feel like when she was free from Noah’s grasp, not that he held her tightly. That was always the problem. It was like he didn’t care at all. But finally she was about to be reunited with a man who claimed that he just couldn’t live without her. Madeline wasn’t entirely convinced General Fortner was telling the truth when he professed the depths of his love to her. But she didn’t care. It was better than her current situation, not to mention she fancied the idea of listening to people talk about her after she was gone.
They drove for fifteen minutes before they switched vehicles beneath an overpass. Instead of driving straight toward the airfield, the new car doubled back and headed toward the city.
“What are we doing?” Madeline asked as she scooted the front edge of her seat and leaned forward. “It seems like we’re going in the wrong direction.”
“Just a precautionary measure, ma’am,” the driver said. “We’re trying to throw everyone off our scent so we can get you to the destination safely.”
“You think someone is following us?” she asked.
“Not at the moment, ma’am, but any of the agencies could be tracking our vehicle using satellite imagery. We need to be extremely careful since the full weight of the government’s resources are at your husband’s disposal.”
“You mean he wasn’t the intended target?” she asked.
The other man escorting her shook his head. “This attack served a two-fold purpose, primarily for helping with your extraction.”
“Extraction?” she said, furrowing her brow. “You make me sound like some CIA asset. I’m First Lady of the United States.”
The man chuckled and shook his head. “Not any more, you aren’t.”
Madeline swallowed hard and leaned back in her seat, pondering the reality of his statement. She had grown to loathe the duties and expectations that came along with being First Lady, but that didn’t mean she didn’t enjoy the title. After a few minutes, she realized she had to come to terms with the fact that she had traded a title for love. Perhaps it would be the wrong choice, but there was no going back now.
Madeline and her escorts switched vehicles three times as they crisscrossed the city for an hour before finally heading to Potomac Airfield. By this time, the radio airwaves were flooded with on-the-scene reporting about the attack on the White House. Just as they pulled up to the hanger, Madeline made the driver keep the car on while she listened to one that mentioned her name.
“The explosives ripped through the residential quarters of the White House, where experts believe that the president and
