“It can transmit farther?” Roarke asked.
“Just the opposite, pal. Weaker. Internal. Designed to kick out a signal only across a few floors. Short range, within the damned law firm.”
“Oh, shit.”
“By the way, we left them in place. No need to tip anyone off.”
The text message came through Katie’s cell phone. She lit up when she saw it:
Dinner and kisses. Usual place. 2nite eight-thirty.
Chapter 23
Katie was three delicious sips into her Lemon Drop martini when she saw Roarke walk into their favorite haunt, an intimate restaurant at the base of Boston’s Beacon Hill called 75 Chestnut. She’d already licked off some of the sugar on the rim of her glass. He was guaranteed a sweet kiss.
A new host at the front desk asked, “Table sir?”
“It’s okay. I’m joining someone.” Roarke scanned the room and found Katie sitting farther inside. She’d purposely left the seat against the wall for him. She’d learned on their first date that’s where he needed to sit. “Right over there,” he told the host.
Roarke caught Katie’s eyes. He smiled broadly and maneuvered around the other patrons. When he reached the table, he leaned in for a simple peck. Instead she locked him in a deep, passionate, delicious kiss.
“Mmmm,” Roarke sighed. “That’s your hello?”
“Uh-huh,” she said, smiling.
“Okay, my turn.” Roarke began to move forward again, but she held a finger up, licked it, traced the martini glass, and placed the sugar on Roarke’s lips.
“Now,” Katie said closing her eyes.
They hadn’t been together for nearly two weeks. “I think dinner’s going to be very quick,” he said, taking his first breath.
For an appetizer, they shared a warm goat cheese and spinach salad with roasted pecan and bacon dressing. The taste was just right, but the experience wasn’t as sensual as when they came to the main course, lobster scampi over a bed of saffron rice and vegetables. The dessert completely put them in the mood. They fed each other little, sexy spoonfuls of ginger-lavender crème brulee.
No lingering tonight. Roarke wanted to be within Katie’s deepness. Katie needed Roarke’s strength. They were at each other the moment they walked through her door. Neither worried about the tapped phone. Anyone listening would hear the Dave Koz CD over them. Roarke make sure the phone was right next to a speaker. Anyway, they didn’t care…not as they made love on the floor to the smooth jazz…not as Katie wrapped herself around his waist when he carried her into the bedroom…and not as they gave into each other’s pleasures in joyous moans.
They made love through the night, resting through need, then awakening again. The smell of the flowers left by the FBI was Roarke’s only reminder that something was wrong.
Chapter 24
The Secret Service chief raced through the pages. The protocol was all there. Notify the vice president. Move him. Locate and brief the Speaker of the House, the president pro tempore of the Senate, and each of the cabinet members. Call the chief justice. The same for the National Security Advisor, the NDI, DCI, and the FBI chief. Finally, hand the PR problem over to the White House press office.
The procedure was the same whether it was in the middle of the night or during the World Series. The only difference was that Presley Friedman decided to tell Morgan Taylor in person. That added an extra seventeen minutes.
The Secret Service agent guarding the vice president’s residence at the southeast corner of 34th Street and Massachusetts Avenue had just been alerted that Friedman was on the way. Though he didn’t know why, the fact that he was coming at this early hour was an indication it was serious.
“Good morning, sir.”
“Sanchez,” the chief said. The directness hinted there was nothing good about it.
Another career agent on the inside, Malcolm Quenzel, also alerted to the visit, greeted Friedman in the same manner, and received the same clipped answer in return.
“Is the vice president still sleeping?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I need to wake him.”
“This way, sir,” Quenzel responded.
It had been three years since Presley Friedman had been inside the VP’s quarters. Although the home was built in 1893, it was still a relatively new vice presidential address.
For eighty-one years, Number One Observatory Circle was home to whoever served as the Superintendent of the United States Naval Observatory. In 1974, Congress called in the moving vans. The vice president, who until then could live wherever he wanted, would finally have a government pad.
Not that anyone wanted to rush into it. The roof leaked, there was no central air conditioning, the wiring was not up to code, and the fireplaces were a hazard. While Gerald and Betty Ford were going to be the first to be eligible to move in, they were spared the pain when Richard Nixon resigned.
President Ford’s VP, Nelson Rockefeller, wisely decided to remain in his own lavish Washington home. So contractors tore into the walls. Three years later, the renovated residence had its first occupants, Vice President Walter Mondale and his wife.
Now, three decades later, it was Morgan Taylor’s. However, he hadn’t changed a thing since the day he and his wife moved in. That was a sure sign that Taylor really didn’t consider the Queen Anne-style house a home.
Presley Friedman and the nighttime agent-in-charge walked up the stairs to the second-floor master bedroom. Along the way, they passed paintings of America’s vice presidents, some who had become presidents, including Truman, Johnson, Nixon, and Bush, and others who hadn’t succeeded to the presidency. There was no portrait of Morgan Taylor. Word in the White House was that he banned “the so-called housepainters” from sitting him down.
At the top of the stairs, Friedman and Quenzel followed a hallway to Taylor’s bedroom. Another agent was posted by the door.
“The vice president and Mrs. Taylor are still asleep, sir.”
“Time for a rude awakening,” the Secret Service chief answered. He knocked hard on the bulletproof door. “Mr. Vice President, this is Presley Friedman. I must speak with you.”
Morgan Taylor was a light sleeper who always bolted awake, a habit left over from his years as a Navy pilot. He recognized the voice. “I’m up, Press. Be right with you.”
True to his promise, he unlocked the door in under two minutes. He wore an Adidas sweatsuit and sneakers. His breath was fresh and he appeared robust; hardly the look of someone rousted out of sleep.
“What is it?”
“Can we talk, sir?”
Taylor recognized the urgency. “Yes, come with me. Coffee?”
“Actually, that would be great.”
Taylor held up two fingers, and Quenzel radioed the request to the kitchen. A pot would be sent upstairs immediately.
Taylor invited the chief into the study, an austere oak room filled with bookcases that contained a complete library of vice presidential memoirs and biographies. It was a constant reminder to Taylor that he hadn’t started his. He’d already turned down a multi-million-dollar advance, believing he had a great many chapters yet to live.
Friedman began looking at the titles while they waited for the coffee.
“You know, Press, the Mondales started the collection of books here,” Taylor said, noting the agent’s interest.