Luther’s finger nudged the blade of the letter opener through the plastic before secreting it in his duffel bag. He went quickly over to the window and carefully peered out. The limo and van were still there. That wasn’t good.
He went across to the other side of the room, took out his rope, secured it under the leg of the enormously heavy chest of drawers, and ran the line across to the other window, which would drop him at the opposite end of the house, hidden from the road. He carefully opened the window, praying for a well-oiled track, and was rewarded.
He played out the rope and watched it snake down the brick sides of the house.
Gloria Russell looked up at the massive face of the mansion. There was real money there. Money and position that Christine Sullivan did not deserve. She had won it with her boobs and artfully displayed ass and her trashy mouth that had somehow inspired the elderly Walter Sullivan, awakening some emotion buried deep within his complex depths. In six months he would not miss her anymore. His world of rock-solid wealth and power would hurtle on.
Then it struck her.
Russell was halfway out of the limo before Collin caught her arm. He held up the leather bag she had bought in Georgetown for a hundred bucks and was now worth incalculably more to her. She settled back down in her seat, her breath normalized. She smiled, almost blushed at Collin.
The President, slumped in a semicatatonic state, didn’t notice the exchange.
Then Russell peeked inside her bag, just to be sure. Her mouth dropped open, her hands frantically tore through the few contents of the bag. It took all her willpower not to shriek out loud as she stared horror-stricken at the young agent. The letter opener was not there. It must still be in the house.
Collin tore back up the stairs, a thoroughly confused Burton racing after him.
Luther was halfway down the wall when he heard them coming.
Ten more feet.
They burst in the bedroom door.
Six more feet.
Stunned, the two Secret Service men spotted the rope; Burton dove for it.
Two more feet, and Luther let go, hitting the ground running.
Burton flew to the window. Collin threw the nightstand aside: nothing. He joined Burton at the window. Luther had already disappeared around the corner. Burton started to head out the window. Collin stopped him. The way they had come would be faster.
They bolted out the door.
Luther crashed through the cornfield, no longer concerned with leaving a trail, now only worried about surviving. The bag slowed him down slightly, but he had worked too hard over the last several months to walk away empty-handed.
He exploded out from the friendly cover of the crops and hit the most dangerous phase of his flight: a hundred yards of open field. The moon had disappeared behind thickening clouds and there were no streetlights in the country; in his black clothing he would be almost impossible to spot. But the human eye was best at spotting movement in the darkness, and he was moving as fast as he could.
The two secret service agents stopped momentarily at the van. They emerged with Agent Varney and raced across the field.
Russell rolled down the window and watched them, shock on her face. Even the President was somewhat awake, but she quickly calmed him and he returned to his half-slumber.
Collin and Burton slipped on their night-vision goggles and their view instantly resembled a crude computer game. Thermal images registered in red, everything else was dark green.
Agent Travis Varney, tall and rangy, and only vaguely aware of what was going on, was ahead of them. He ran with the easy motion of the collegiate miler he used to be.
In the Service three years, Varney was single, committed entirely to his profession, and looked to Burton as a father figure to replace the one killed in Vietnam. They were looking for someone who had done something in that house. Something that involved the President and that therefore involved him. Varney pitied whoever he was chasing if he caught up to him.
Luther could hear the sounds of the men behind him. They had recovered faster than he had thought. His head start had dwindled but it still should be enough. They had made a big mistake by not jumping in the van and running him down. They had to have known he would have transportation. It wasn’t like he would have coptered in. But he was grateful that they weren’t quite as smart as they probably should have been. If they had he would not be alive to see the sun come up.
He took a shortcut through a path in the woods, spotted on his last walk-through. It gained him about a minute. His breath came in quick bursts, like machine-gun fire. His clothes felt heavy on him; as in a child’s dream, his legs seemed to move in slow motion.
Finally he broke free from the trees, and he could see his car and was again grateful for having taken the precaution to back in.
A hundred yards behind, a thermal figure other than Varney’s finally came alive on Burton’s and Collin’s screens. A man running, and running hard. Their hands flew to their shoulder holsters. Neither weapon was effective long-range but they couldn’t worry about that now.
Then an engine roared to life and Burton and Collin ran like a tornado was raging at their heels.
Varney was still ahead of them and to the left. He would have a better line of fire, but would he shoot? Something told them he would not; that was not part of his training, to fire at a fleeing person who was no longer a danger to the man he was sworn to protect. However, Varney did not know that at stake here was more than a mere beating heart. There was an entire institution that would never be the same, in addition to two Secret Service agents who were certain they had done nothing wrong, but were intelligent enough to realize that the blame would fall heavily on their shoulders.
Burton was never much of a runner, but he picked up his pace as these thoughts flew through his head, and the younger Collin was hard-pressed to keep up with him. But Burton knew it was too late. His legs started to slow down as the car exploded out and turned away from them. In moments it was already two hundred yards down the road.
Burton stopped running, dropped to his knee, aimed his gun, but all he could see was the dust kicked up by the fleeing vehicle. Then the taillights went out and in a moment he lost the target entirely.
He turned to see Collin next to him, looking down at him, the reality of the whole event starting to set in. Burton slowly got up and put his gun away. He took off his goggles; Collin did likewise.
They looked at each other.
Burton sucked air in, his limbs shook. His body was finally reacting to the recent exertions now that the adrenaline had stopped flowing. It was over, wasn’t it?
Then Varney came running up. Burton was not too distraught to note with an envious twinge and a small measure of pride that the younger man wasn’t even out of breath. He would see to it that Varney and Johnson didn’t suffer with them. They didn’t deserve that.
He and Collin would go down, but that was all. He felt bad about Collin; however, there was nothing he could do about that. But when Varney spoke, Burton’s thoughts of the future went from complete and absolute doom to a small glimmer of hope.
“I got the license plate number.”
“Where the hell was he?” Russell looked incredulously around the bedroom. “What? Was he under the goddamned bed?”
She tried to stare Burton down. The guy hadn’t been under the bed, nor in any of the closets. Burton had examined all those spaces when he was sanitizing the room. He told her so in no uncertain terms.
Burton looked at the rope and then the open window. “Jesus, it was like the guy was watching us the whole time, knew right when we left the house.” Burton looked around for other possible bogeymen hovering nearby. His eyes rested on the mirror, then moved on, stopped and went back.