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«Should we let someone else take a crack at it?»
Dumond was offended by Rapp's question. «Listen, if I can't find out where that money came from, no one is going to.»
«I'm just asking.»
«His body was still warm when you arrived.» Ke
Coleman thought about it and said, «There was one woman entering the staircase when we got off the elevator.» He shrugged. «Didn't get much of a look at her.»
«Mitch?»
Rapp thought of the woman he'd seen. The more he replayed the scene, the more he believed it was Donatella Rahn. The way she moved and the way Peter Cameron had been killed both pointed to the Italian beauty. Rapp knew he couldn't tell Ke
Rapp shook his head and looked at Ke
«Well, I've sent someone over to grab the security tapes. We'll have to sit down tomorrow and go over them.»
«Good thinking.» One of the reasons Rapp liked working for Ke
«So where do we go from here?» asked Coleman.
«We all go home and get some sleep, and then we plow ahead in the morning.» Ke
Dumond rolled his eyes at the request. «Yeah, I can do it. No problem.» It was obvious that Dumond was less than enthused about the idea.
«What's wrong?»
«We've put in a lot of hours on this.» Dumond waved his arms around the table to include everyone. «I was hoping we could get a little bonus out of the deal.»
Ke
«No. I can have it done within an hour.»
Ke
«We're not sure. The director and the president are going to have a chat with him in the morning, but it never hurts to overdetermine your outcome.»
44
It was Friday morning, and the West Wing of the White House was bustling with activity. Word had quickly swept through the halls that the president was on the warpath.
This didn't happen often with President Hayes, but when it did, the members of his administration usually knew enough to stay away. Today, he had been complicated by two additional pieces of information. The first was that upon entering the Oval Office at 7:54, the president had called his chief of staff, Valerie Jones, and demanded that Secretary of State Midleton be tracked down and told, not asked, to get to the White House immediately. The second was that a very frail-looking Thomas Stansfield had arrived and was now in the Oval Office with the president. The president's surly mood, his rather forceful request for the secretary of state, and the appearance of the director of the CIA had created an uneasy mood in the West Wing.
White House staffers prided themselves on being in the know, but on this particular Friday morning, they found themselves in the u
Inside the Oval Office, the president. had calmed a touch. Seeing Stansfield in such obvious pain made him forget about his troubles for the moment. Hayes, like almost all of his predecessors, understood the importance of good theater. There were far more subtle ways to confront this problem, but that was not what Hayes wanted. He wanted to send a message. He wanted to make an example of the pompous Charles Midleton and put him in his place. Hayes knew full well that by the end of the day, anyone who mattered in Washington would know that the president of the United States had handed the secretary of state his ass, and it would be done without a single word being printed.
Stansfield hadn't been so sure about the president's plan. There were many ways to handle such a meeting without anyone being the wiser. Both Stansfield and Senator Clark had entered the West Wing the night before without anyone other than the Secret Service knowing they were there. President Hayes explained to Stansfield that Midleton had already been warned to mind his own shop. His unusual cooperation with the German ambassador after the Hagenmiller assassination was bad enough, but his meddling in the nomination of the next DCI was indefensible.
There was also a second meeting pla
SECRETARY OF STATE Midleton was not a stupid man. He had tried to make several calls to find out what was going on, but since everyone else was in the dark, he got nowhere. He had managed to learn one thing from Michael Haik, the president's national security advisor, and that was that the president was in as bad a mood as he'd seen him in for some time. Armed with this limited amount of information, Midleton decided to make the trip to the White House without the accompaniment of any of his aides. Midleton entered the Oval Office by himself, his chin held high, trying to exude an air of confidence.
President Hayes wasn't about to stand to greet his guest, and Director Stansfield didn't have the strength or desire to do so.
«Mr. President, I came as soon as I could. What is wrong?»
«Sit» was the single biting word that left the president's mouth.
The president and Stansfield were sitting in separate chairs in front of the fireplace. Midleton crossed the room and sat on a couch that was closer to Stansfield. «What's wrong, Robert?»
Hayes let the tension grow for a moment before speaking. Staring at Midleton with a look that would be impossible to mistake for anything other than disdain, Hayes said, «I think I should be the one asking you what's wrong.»
Midleton had racked his brain on the way over trying to figure out what he could have done to so anger the president, and he had only come up with one answer. It must have been his meeting with Congressman Rudin and Senator Clark. Until he knew for sure, though, he would keep his mouth shut. There was no sense in taking the heat for two wrongs. Using a more formal tone, Midleton said, «Sir, I honestly don't know what you are talking about.»