Chapter 4 #2
“I should’ve brought her a candle,” I said, glaring at Reggie accusingly for not letting me stop by the store on our way to Washington. But which fragrance—was there a Hibiscus Icon or Timeless Role Model Peony Ovation?
“You will not be speaking to Ms. Pershing or making eye contact or whimpering,” said Reggie. “Our suspect will possibly be part of the Estonian entourage.”
“Gentlemen,” said Maunders, whose I’m-the-boss apron had his signature embroidered across the chest, “check your earpieces.”
We’d been equipped with these concealed devices, which were so tiny I couldn’t believe how effective they were, as Reggie said, “Tuck in your shirts,” right in my ear.
Then the group lined up and left the basement, each member surreptitiously catching sight of himself in any reflective surface and touching his hair.
I wanted to look good for Reata and also, it struck me, for my country.
I’d never served in any of the armed forces or even thought about enlisting; I was a spoiled member of a peacetime generation.
But in my crisp Coxley Blossoms apron I felt a surge of duty.
I was also incredibly, throat-parchingly nervous, always my go-to response before stepping onstage.
Our carts, stacked with graciously well-thought-out floral displays, were waiting for us. I checked and rechecked the note card in my pocket: I was being sent to the Blue Room, with a map to guide me.
Everyone silently pushed their cart in a different direction, like a billiard ball tapped by a pool cue. The front wheel on my cart wobbled and I stopped breathing, but after a second’s pause, everything was fine.
White House staffers hurried by, as I concentrated on acting as dedicated and well mannered as I could, as if I were someone who’d done this a thousand times.
I almost overshot the double doors to the Blue Room, but backed my cart up and pushed it into this grand oval parlor, where Jackie’s renovation had covered the walls with a cream damask, leaving the floor-to-ceiling draperies and custom carpet in a deep sky blue.
There were upholstered and gilded chairs, along with a mantel and two ornately carved mahogany tables set with floral arrangements awaiting my care.
I carefully lifted the vases now to be retired onto my cart and diligently positioned their replacements, sniffing the fresh flowers, which shamed the toxic air-freshener aromas of the candles I hawked.
There were voices from the hallway. Two Secret Service agents in dark suits entered, secured the space, and then there she was, in an emerald pantsuit and polished hair and makeup: Reata Pershing.
As a cater waiter I’ve passed hors d’oeuvres to big-name stars, noting who was even shorter than reported, who’d had a recent eyelift (the upturned crow’s feet are a giveaway), and who said thank you.
A few of these celebrities had wowed me, in that bizarre manner of brushing against a brand name in person, and accepting that they weren’t a plausible look-alike but the real thing.
I’d almost prod them with a fingertip, as if they were mannequins in a wax museum.
But Reata, who I was trying not to stare at, with scant success, was something else, maybe because she wasn’t an actress or a newscaster gobbling a dab of caviar on a Triscuit at a fundraiser.
Reata glowed, with a generosity and a pleasure in her task.
She was almost a parade float representing herself, but there was a down-to-earth quality that had disarmed the world and caused me to freeze with a vase of flowers in my two-handed grip.
“Stop staring,” said Reggie’s voice via my earpiece. “There are four undersecretaries with the Estonian delegation. We’re focusing on the guy with a mustache.”
As I deposited the mantel arrangement and stepped back to measure its symmetry, I turned my head to scope out the Estonian prime minister, wearing a pinstriped gray suit, and his wife, who had the rigid ash-blond upsweep of someone determined to look identical in every photo.
They were listening closely to Reata, who was detailing the renovations undertaken by previous regimes: “Teddy Roosevelt was responsible for the Napoleonic chairs, with reproductions commissioned during the Truman administration. But one of my favorite pieces was salvaged from a warehouse by Mrs. Kennedy and restored through donations. It’s the pier table along the wall, where this handsome young gentleman is placing those gorgeous anemones and freesia—is that right? ”
As Reata spoke, it occurred to me: of course she’s attuned to the room’s past, as a historian.
Her voice was warm but authoritative, sharing her passionate research and appreciation.
I was also thunderstruck: it had taken me a second to grasp that I was the “handsome young gentleman” and that Reata had asked me a question.
Maunders’s voice in my ear said, “Yes, they’re freesia, along with lilies of the valley. ”
“Are you watching the guy with the mustache?” said Reggie’s voice.
“Freesia?” Reata repeated. “Although I shouldn’t bother you while you’re working.”
Reata’s ease nudged me into action, and as I was about to answer, I saw the secretary with the mustache reaching into his pocket. I had to distract him, so I undertook the unthinkable and dropped the vase on the floor, yelping, “I’m so sorry! Everyone be careful, broken glass!”
Reggie, Maunders, and Brock, hearing the commotion over my earpiece, rushed into the room, as the Secret Service agents rapidly escorted Reata into the outer hallway and as far away as possible.
The Estonian prime minister and his wife were befuddled, but one of Reata’s aides had entered and was leading them outside as well.
This was all happening at once, as Reggie stepped behind the mustached secretary and yanked his arm behind his back; Maunders reached into the guy’s pants pocket and found his phone, which he tossed to Brock.
The mustached guy twisted free from Reggie and ran toward one of the room’s five doors; as a reflex, I tripped him and he fell onto the shards of shattered crystal, slicing his hands.
He grabbed my leg and I tumbled onto the floor with him.
He pulled me to my feet, holding a chunk of jagged crystal to my throat, telling Reggie and the others, in lightly accented English, “We’re walking out that door. If any of you follow, I kill him.”
“Feel free,” said Reggie. “He’s not important.”
“And he broke the vase,” said Maunders.
“Because he was out all night dancing with his boyfriend,” said Brock. “Who’s cute but please, they’re both bottoms.”
This chatter confused the mustached guy, as Reggie propelled his cart directly at him, ramming it into his crotch.
As the guy yelped and loosened his grip on my neck, Maunders grabbed a second vase and, gritting his teeth, slammed it onto the guy’s head, sending the freesia flying and knocking the guy at least momentarily unconscious.
Brock pulled a pair of handcuffs from beneath his apron, flipped the Estonian onto his stomach, and secured his hands behind his back, as I struggled to my feet, slipping in the spilled water.
Within minutes, Reggie had dumped the hogtied Estonian onto a cart and wheeled him to a service elevator like a suckling pig on a platter at a Yuletide banquet, and with each floral arrangement replaced—Maunders had wisely stockpiled backups—we returned to the basement.
“Stick around for the interrogation,” Reggie told me.
“We don’t have time to drag this asshole back to New York, and the FBI will be useless.
His phone would’ve triggered a chunk of explosive material someone had duct-taped under that pier table.
If his plan had worked, you, Reata, and the Estonian delegation would’ve been blown to bits. ”
“Was he a suicide bomber?”
“He’d probably given himself a margin to escape, since he’d planned what was about to go down.
But he’s working with someone else in the White House, and we’re going to find out who that might be, right now.
Whoever it is, they’re probably long gone, but there’s still a chance they’re on-site. Follow my lead.”
Before I could digest the havoc we’d skirted past, and the likely end of my life, Reggie was opening a steel door. As Brock gestured and ordered, “Go!” I followed.
The Estonian was tethered to a metal chair with zip ties at his ankles, the handcuffs still in place, and bungee cords around his chest and waist. A linen napkin, lifted from a supply cabinet, had been shoved into his mouth, and I tried not to think about an identical porn image I’d seen on a site called Daddies in Bondage: The Twink’s Revenge.
There were two folding chairs, and Reggie pointed to one, so I sat as he stood over the Estonian, removing the napkin.
“I am not speaking,” said the Estonian, and without looking at me, Reggie held up a forefinger so I wouldn’t say, “But you just spoke.”
“And you’re not Estonian,” said Reggie. “Your accent is Romanian.”
“I’m from Uzbekistan!” the guy protested. Reggie had only said “Romanian” to draw him out.
“So why are you trying to kill the First Lady?” Reggie inquired, without raising his voice. “Who’s paying you?”
“I am not speaking,” the guy repeated, and I mimed zipping my lips.
“Rick, the power drill?” Reggie told me, barely turning his head in my direction. Power drill? What power drill? But then Brock entered, handing me a power drill, with his expression transmitting, “Do I have to do everything?”
I held the power drill, remembering when my dad had ventured to help me build a birdhouse in our garage, and after five misshapen attempts and a full squeeze bottle of Elmer’s glue, we’d agreed to call the debris an “art piece.” Reggie cleared his throat, so I passed him the drill.
He pressed a button and the ferocious-looking five-inch drill bit roared to rotating life.