extraneous thoughts, cares and concerns were as if they had never been. He wasn’t hungry, wasn’t thirsty, wasn’t nervous. He was ready.
About five o’clock I got back to the hotel. Grafton hadn’t called on my cell phone, and when I got to the room, I found he had left no message. So I was just supposed to go. With Marisa as my date.
I showered and shaved, then dressed in my rented tux that the agency had flown up from Washington. There was a rental place near my apartment where I always rented a monkey suit when I needed one, so the guy had all my sizes. He even got the right size of patent leather shoes, although they weren’t very comfortable.
I checked the Colt — loaded, cocked and locked — and put it in my waistband in the small of my back. The strap of the cumberbund helped hold it in place.
At six o’clock sharp I knocked on the door to the Petrou suite. Isolde opened it. She was dressed to the nines, but Marisa was still in her slip dabbing makeup. Her slip plunged almost to her navel, leaving very little to the imagination. Of course she wasn’t wearing a bra. She barely acknowledged my presence.
I could tell by looking at each woman that neither had a concealed weapon under her clothes. Just to be sure, I helped myself to their purses and stirred through them as Isolde watched with narrowed eyes.
“You are very forward, young man.”
“I’m aging quickly,” I replied. “At this rate I’ll probably be old enough for Social Security next year.” I handed her back her purse. I could see that Isolde didn’t like my attitude. “They behave better in France, don’t they?” I said.
I could see Marisa glancing at me in the mirror as she put on lipstick. I met her gaze. There was something going on there, but damned if I knew what.
Isolde went into the other bedroom, leaving us alone.
Marisa went into the walk-in closet to dress. She came out in a full-skirted gown that above her waist barely covered the slip, and a set of three-inch high heels. Just looking at her made my heart go pitty pat.
She needed help putting on her necklace. I stood behind her and did the clasp. “Tommy …” Marisa began, watching me in the mirror. I didn’t say anything.
“I meant what I said the other night, about wishing it were different.” “I wish it were, too.” We left it there.
Jake Grafton was dressed and waiting on his wife when the telephone rang. It was Sal Molina. “He wants to see you.” Sal gave him the room number.
“I’ll meet you downstairs,” Jake told Callie and kissed her.
She seized him by both arms and looked into his eyes. “You’ve done the best you could, you know.”
“I do know.”
“However this works out is how it works out.”
“I know that, but still… I don’t want the president dead. Not on my watch.”
“Jake!”
“Hey. Being your husband has been an adventure, lady. I just want you to know that.” He kissed her gently on the forehead.
She bit her lip and watched him leave the room, pull the door closed behind him.
She knew that Jake Grafton was perfectly capable of stepping in front of the president to stop a bullet meant for him. And he had just said good-bye.
Wilkins was in the presidential bedroom with the Secret Service’s Goldman, the secretary of Homeland Security, the director of the FBI and Sal Molina. They were standing around with their hands in their pockets, looking glum, when Grafton was ushered in by a Secret Service agent. The president was sitting in an easy chair. The first lady was in the bathroom, still dressing.
Grafton took a letter from his coat pocket and passed it to Wilkins. “Just in case,” he said.
Wilkins knew what it was — Grafton’s letter of resignation — and pocketed it with a nod.
Goldman was arguing that the president shouldn’t appear this evening. He glanced at Grafton, then summed up. “This whole thing is an unnecessary risk. We’ll announce that you are indisposed, and Molina here can make his first public appearance since his high school graduation. He can shake hands, tell lies, pretend he is somebody, and we’ll catch this son of a bitch Qasim.”
“If he shows up,” the director of the FBI added. “I’m betting that he won’t. This whole thing is a half-baked, half-assed, cockamamie load of bullshit, if you ask me.”
The president looked from face to face. This argument had obviously been going on for a while before Grafton arrived, and these were the final love pats.
“Admiral?” the president said.
“If we knew what he looked like, we could go down there and drag him out, but we don’t know.”
“That Petrou woman knows,” Wilkins said sourly.
“She should be able to recognize him, regardless of how he is disguised,” Goldman said. “Grafton says she thinks she can, and I certainly hope so. If he’s in that room, we’ve got him. That’s the logical, safe way to do this.”
They all fell silent. Everyone had had his say. The president got out of his chair so that he could look everyone in the eyes. “I don’t want another 9/11. I don’t want any more spectacular terrorist attacks on American soil, and our allies don’t want any on their soil. Abu Qasim is the most capable terrorist alive — I believe he could pull off something like that.”
“If the bastard kills the president of the United States,” Goldman shot back, “that would be the biggest coup of all.”
“Enough,” the president said. “We’ve got soldiers who go in harm’s way every single day, and I’m the guy who sent them there. I’ll be damned if I’m going to run and hide. We are going to do this just the way it’s planned.”
He reached for Grafton’s hand, shook it, then shook the hand of everyone in the room and shooed them out.
Isolde Petrou, Marisa and I took the elevator to the lobby and walked past a phalanx of police to the ballroom entrance. As Grafton said, the women had to pass through a metal detector. My pass got me a detour around it. I wondered if Abu Qasim had a nifty pass like mine. I didn’t see the Geiger counters, but I had no doubt they were there.
Inside, the maftre d’ checked the master list, then a uniformed helper wearing a different-colored pass escorted us to our table, which was on one side of the room about five rows back. Jack Yocke was already sitting there, and he had a date.
“Hey, Yocke. I didn’t know you gave money to politicians.”
In answer, he lifted his pass, which was also on a chain around his neck, so that I got a good look. It was a different color than mine. “Working press,” he said, then introduced his lady to the Petrous and me — a different woman than the lady he brought to dinner at the Graftons’. She, too, had a press pass dangling from her neck.
I looked at the name tags on the table and maneuvered the women so we were all in the right seats. Isolde was on my left, sort of facing the head table, and Marisa was on my right. Marisa and I had our backs to the wall and were facing the bulk of the room.
It took a while for the room to fill, what with the security at the door and the seating protocol. A half-dozen Secret Service agents were stationed behind the speaker’s table, and two knots of three in front. Another dozen or so were scattered throughout the room, standing and moving around in small areas. New York cops in uniform were at every entrance and fire exit.
I listened to Isolde and Marisa make small talk with the two reporters and another couple that arrived toward the end, a car dealer and his wife from Indiana. The car dealer was full of enthusiasm for meeting the president. “One of my heroes,” he said frankly.
I decided the guy was an idiot and dismissed him. Jake Grafton was my hero, not some politician. Not any politician.
I kept the eyes moving. Saw Winchester and Simon Cairnes come in with Jerry Hay Smith, who looked to be wearing a typical guest pass. Guess his press credentials were getting rusty. I recognized some prominent industrialists, some actors, more politicians and a couple of high-powered lawyers. Most of the people were, of course, strangers to me.
The seater led Winchester and his pals to a table where the two Grafton women were seated. The table was
