The First Lady - James Patterson Page 0,10

divorce should be final in less than two weeks.

My desk is small, crowded, and located just where I like it. I have another office across the street in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, where I host the occasional dignitary and, more rarely, fire an agent who’s screwed up, but I don’t like being in the big office with all the nice furniture and bookcases and couches and coffee tables. I like it here, right up close with the Man and my people, who spend every waking second of their lives preparing to die to protect him and his poor, put-upon wife.

Then again, I’ll probably use that big office later to debrief Jackson Thiel after his shift ends today and find out how long this affair has been going on—and why he hadn’t told me. Definitely not good, but something for later. I grab a file folder from a thick pile and again wish I spent half the time wasted on paperwork out in a gym or on the range keeping my weapon qualifications current. The phone rings.

“Agent Grissom,” I answer, which surprises some of my coworkers. According to protocol, I should answer the phone, “Special Agent in Charge Grissom, Presidential Protective Division,” which is too much of a mouthful. Suppose someone is in the East Room tossing off a smuggled hand grenade in the time it takes me to announce myself?

But there are surprises, and then there’s this one: on the line is Mrs. Laura Young, the President’s secretary. I can’t recall the last time she phoned me.

“Agent Grissom,” she says, “the President would like to see you, right away.”

“Ah …”

Then one of my agents makes a handwritten notation on the backup status board, reflecting the electronic board. One of the changes I had implemented months ago, in case the power went out. “CANAL is in the Oval Office.”

I say, “I’ll be there,” and I hang up the phone.

I don’t like it.

Scotty sees me and says, “Everything all right, boss?”

I stand up and start walking.

Unless there’s a major emergency or crisis, the President never calls the head of the Presidential Protective Division like this.

Never.

“Boss?” Scotty asks again.

I keep on walking to the office door.

Fast.

CHAPTER 10

ABOUT THE ONLY entertainment source that has gotten the White House right in my opinion is The West Wing. Oh, not because of the crackling dialogue or the staff members arguing while walking backward or a President depicted as one who relaxes in the afternoon by strolling alongside the Reflecting Pool, but because The West Wing showed just how crowded and busy the place is.

There’s always lots of people scurrying around, everyone save a special few wearing an access pass around their neck, color-coded to keep the serfs (excuse me, the workers and volunteers) isolated from the West Wing. I nod to those staff members I know fairly well, and one of my agents, Carla Luiz, opens the door to the Oval Office.

Little-known secret: the doors to the Oval Office have special doorknobs, meaning that if some crazed tourist from Idaho breaks free from a tour and manages to race his way here, he’ll waste precious seconds trying to figure out how to open the door before he gets Tasered to his knees.

The office door closes behind me and there’s the President, standing up from one of the two couches. Sitting next to him is his chief of staff, Parker Hoyt. They’re both well dressed and groomed, of course, but they look like cousins who’ve just learned their family farm is under six feet of floodwater, with a swarm of locusts due in once the waters recede.

“Mr. President,” I say, and then, “Mr. Hoyt.”

“Sally,” the President says, gesturing to the couch opposite him, past a low-slung coffee table. “Please, have a seat.”

I glance around and see we’re alone.

I instantly don’t like it. Usually there’s an aide or three hovering in the background, to fulfill any request from getting a cup of coffee to getting the president of France on the phone, but no, we’re alone. The famed desk of the President is to my left as I sit down, flanked by the American flag and his own standard. Thick bulletproof windows look out on the Rose Garden, and I see the back of another agent out there, keeping watch.

I flash back to my sixteen weeks of training at the Secret Service’s James J. Rowley Training Center over in Laurel, Maryland, where my class and I were put through hours of different scenarios involving gunshots and explosions