Squeeze Me - Carl Hiaasen Page 0,93
leggings, had offered her trademark unbreakable smile but avoided eye contact with all of the Potussies except Fay Alex, who responded with the slightest of conspiratorial nods. Fay Alex had told none of her friends how she’d persuaded the First Lady to reinstate their Secret Service protection.
“What in God’s name has that woman done to her hair?” Kelly Bean sniped.
“She fired her colorist is what I heard,” whispered Yirma Skyy.
It was Dee Witty Wyndham who later, over lobster rolls, brought up the subject of the affair. “POTUS deserves someone who appreciates him,” she said, “not someone who carries on like a common tramp.”
“Or even an uncommon one,” added Deirdre Cobo.
“Well,” Fay Alex said. She paused cruelly to polish off her Tito’s and beckon for another.
“Well what?” honked Dottie Mars.
Fay Alex smirked and dropped her voice. “I heard it’s over.”
A trenchant glee rustled through the room. One of the Potussies asked Fay Alex if the juicy bulletin had come from her own Secret Service man.
“Ha! William barely says good morning,” said Fay Alex. “No, I got this from someone on the staff of the club, very reliable. Apparently the First Lady’s special ‘friend’ broke up with her this week. Now he’s all hot and heavy with one of the other agents. Supposedly they’re hooking up at some trucker motel out by I-95.”
“Ughhh,” was the tablewide reaction, Dee Dee Wittlefield emitting the loudest and following with: “Which agent is it, Fay Alex?”
“Rose is her last name. It’s the blonde we just saw him walking with in the hallway.”
“That skinny thing with the retro bangs?” Yirma Skyy yipped. “For Heaven’s sake, what kind of man dumps the President’s wife for that? And how has he not been transferred to Bumfuck, Alaska?”
“No, Arkansas,” said Kelly Bean. “That’s my prediction.”
“For both him and the blonde whore,” Dottie Mars added coldly. “Bumfuck, Arkansas.”
Fay Alex understood that the group was torn over which revelation would humiliate their beloved President more—that his gorgeous spouse had been cheating on him, or that her lover had rejected her for someone else.
Like she wasn’t hot enough!
Dee Wyndham said, “No wonder the First Lady didn’t look happy today.”
When does she ever look happy? Fay Alex wondered.
“Obviously she doesn’t have the warmest personality,” Deirdre Cobo cut in, “and she definitely needs to re-think some of her collagen choices—but, still, no man in his right mind would say nay to those incredible legs!”
Fay Alex agreed, though in the absence of fresh details she’d grown bored of discussing the scandal.
“Ladies, we have our big show number to rehearse. Now, who’s been practicing? Raise your hand!”
Large-print lyrics to “Big Unimpeachable You” were distributed around the lounge and, with Fay Alex leading, the Potussies commenced to harmonize.
* * *
—
Typically there was an uptick of trespassing at Casa Bellicosa in the days before the Commander’s Ball—curious tourists, daredevil spring breakers, brainless Instagram dolts, and mumbling psychos in bathrobes.
Secret Service agents would turn the harmless ones over to the Palm Beach Police Department, and Jerry Crosby’s job was to make sure they remained locked up until the morning after the gala. The chief didn’t mind his secondary role; managing security for presidential events was a pain in the ass. His officers actually preferred working traffic outside the gate, overtime pay being the sweetener.
The chief happened to be southbound on A1A when Paul Ryskamp called to say that two belligerent men had been arrested in the foot tunnel between the oceanfront and the Casa’s parking garage. Claiming to be VIP friends of the First Family, the trespassers had demanded that Crosby be summoned to vouch for them. Reluctantly, he did.
Both young Cornbrights bore evidence of their Jet Ski injuries—Chase had gleaming new dental veneers and a Burberry-pattern cast on his broken knee, while Chase sported matching shoulder braces that not only stabilized his reconstructed joints but markedly improved his posture. The sons of Kiki Pew Fitzsimmons had been confined to a half-renovated powder room on the mansion’s second floor, where they tag-team bitched at Paul Ryskamp while waiting for Jerry Crosby.
Chase and Chance had been catching some rays on the beach when they decided to drop by the Winter White House for a late lunch and Bloody Marys. Agents had intercepted them in the tunnel and asked for ID. The Cornbright brothers had become infuriated when they learned that their club privileges had terminated with the recent death of their mother, whose membership slot at Casa Bellicosa had already been re-sold to another widowed heiress on the