Hostage Zero

Today, as she waited in the narrow hallway outside of the Oval for the cabinet meeting to adjourn, Brandy scrolled absently through the e-mails in her BlackBerry, developing her strategy for breaking the bad news to the secretary. Their efforts to control the outcome of one very important matter had taken a bad turn, and it fell to her to keep the boss in the loop without propelling him over the edge. The roots of this particular matter reached back to the earliest days of his career.

When her electronic leash revealed that the news had not yet improved, she thrust it back into her purse and checked her watch again. Six-thirty. It hadn’t yet been eight hours since her previous seventeen-hour day had ended. For a job that delivered so many perks, the hours sucked.

The president had always prided himself in being an early riser, but in the three months since the New York Times had played up that element in the profile they’d done on him, he’d become maniacal about it. Of course, when you have the ultimate home office and you’re an early riser by nature, why not call 6:00 a.m. meetings? It’s not as if anyone’s going to say no.

Brandy sighed and recrossed her legs, this time daring to return the agent’s glance. If she didn’t want men to notice her body, she’d have long ago surrendered to her French fries jones. If she didn’t want them to drool on her boobs, she’d quit wearing push-up bras. It was becoming obvious that a recognizable love life would be the price paid for her patriotic zeal, so why not encourage a few stares from the Secret Service? There were far worse bed partners in this life than a hard-bodied man who lived for the opportunity to sacrifice his life for others.

Besides, you know what they say: Big hands, big feet, big…gun.

The door to the cabinet room opened, and her fantasy lover snapped back to attention. Brandy stood. As the lesser ranks of Washington royalty filed past-the secretaries of agriculture and interior departed the meeting first-Brandy might just as well have been invisible, and their studied indifference amused her. In the two-plus centuries of the republic, no one who held their positions had left so much as a dent on history. Ditto Transportation, Commerce, and, God help us, Health and Human Services. For them to have any self-respect at all, she figured, they felt compelled to pretend she wasn’t there. She almost felt sorry for them. How difficult it must be to be at the pinnacle of your career and know that you’ll be banished to obscurity.

“Cheer up,” Secretary Leger said as he powered into the anteroom. “Don’t think of it as early; think of it as a running start on the day.”

“I try, sir,” she said, forcing a smile. She hurried to catch up with the stride that never slowed.

He gave her a sideward glance. “Did you just call me sir? Sounds foreboding.”

As they approached the door that led to Executive Drive and the waiting limos, Brandy slipped into her proper place three feet behind the secretary, just in case any reporters had infiltrated this deep. A second rule of power in Washington was to never risk hogging the frame of a picture that was being shot of your boss.

While all cabinet secretaries got a car and a driver as part of their package of perks, only the secretary of state and SecDef got their own security details. Granted, SecDef’s was a small one-a driver and a shotgun rider, plus a single follow car-but it was enough to add to the mystique of the position. The shotgun rider was the man in charge, a thirty-something Army major in civilian clothes, and as Secretary Leger approached the right rear door of the town car, the major opened it for him and then closed it as soon as his butt hit the seat. On the opposite side, Brandy was left to fend for herself. A few weeks ago, during a conversation that Brandy had mistakenly thought was flirtatious, the major-his name was Binder-had made it clear that his duty to protect the secretary in no way extended to her. In fact, he’d emphasized his point by explaining that staffers like her were considered by bodyguards to be de facto human shields whose presence made it more difficult for an assassin to take a clear shot.

Once they were moving, Leger settled into his corner of the seat and crossed his legs. “Let me have the bad news,” he said.

Brandy’s jaw dropped.

Leger laughed. “Don’t fake surprise,” he said. “I can read you better than my wife. You’ve been guarding bad news since before the meeting.”

Brandy had a better poker face than people gave her credit for, but she could be transparent as glass when she wanted to. Bad news was always easier to deliver when it was asked for. “Our special operation hit a snag,” she said.

Leger’s ears turned red at the news, and his right eye squinted just a little. Apparently, it was not the bad news he’d been expecting.

“It turns out that the team didn’t completely follow the protocol. We just recently found out that one of the targets was killed on U.S. soil.”