No Way Back(Jack McNeal #1)(69)

“I am.”

“Remember the place where we used to play?”

“I see where you’re going with this.”

McNeal could see his brother knew the very location he had in mind. “No one will ever find him there. It’s the perfect place to kill this guy.”





Fifty-One

It was past midday when Andrew Forbes got called into the office of White House Chief of Staff Blane Skinner. He knocked twice and walked in, shutting the door quietly behind him.

“Pull up a seat, Andrew.”

Skinner sat behind a huge desk, neat piles of paper in front of him.

Forbes had been in there just once before, on his first day. He knew Skinner only by reputation. He was feared by nearly all staff at the White House. He shouted at staffers, interns. On occasion, even shouted at the Secret Service for standing too close to the President or getting in his way. He was known to harbor grudges that lasted months, sometimes years. He never forgot people who slighted him, or those who disappointed him in some way. Sometimes people were dismissed simply for giving off weird vibes, but the people who crossed him were invariably coldly dispatched. Skinner was supremely fit. He prided himself on working out three times a day, wherever in the world he was. Even on Air Force One, Skinner took up yoga positions. The guy was a machine. A maniac.

Forbes shrank in his seat. His gaze fixed on the chief of staff’s lifeless gray eyes. They seemed to match Skinner’s pallor.

Skinner adjusted the knot of his red silk tie. “How long have you been in this job, Andrew?”

“Three years, three months, and five days, sir.”

Skinner grimaced. “That’s a long time. The President is a demanding man. I know that better than most. It takes its toll, right?”

“I find him to be good company, sir.”

“He is good company; I’ll give you that.” Skinner picked up an envelope from his desk and handed it to Forbes. “You want to have a look inside?”

Forbes took the envelope. “What is it, sir?”

“Have a look for yourself.”

Forbes opened the envelope and rifled inside, pulling out some color photos. He took a few moments to digest what he was seeing. All of a sudden, he felt as if his world had imploded. Intimate pictures of him with Karen Feinstein. He looked through the five photos.

“She looks like good company too. Do you know how I got those photos?”

Forbes gripped the chair, as if the room had started to sway. He felt light-headed. But instead of answering, he just sat, mute, lost in a bad dream.

“These photos were couriered from the national security desk of the New York Times. They received these from an unknown email address in Oman. Clearly not where they came from. Can you explain how these came to be? And who is this woman?”

Forbes’s gut reaction was to leave the room and call his father. His father always sorted things out for him. His father had instilled in him that, above duty to country and president, family was everything. He ran through his mental list of evasions, whether he should try and bluster his way out of the situation. Maybe he should just take the Fifth.

“Are you refusing to answer? Is that it, Andrew? You won’t be leaving here until I have an idea of what the hell is going on. Who is the woman? Why is the New York Times getting photos of you and her? How have you been compromised? Because if you have been compromised, this reflects on the President’s judgment. Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I can make this easy. I can make this go away, but you have to be up-front with me, son.”

Forbes steeled himself, like a freight train was careering in his head. “I understand, sir.”

“You see, there is one other thing I have to consider. Actually, it’s the obvious thing.”

“What’s that, sir?”

“That this is a honey trap. And you have been sharing information. Classified information with this woman. Do you understand that this means you are prime blackmail material with these photos? Was she a Russian spy? Was she working for the Chinese? A million and one possible explanations. Maybe she has a different agenda. I don’t know.”

Forbes nodded, as if reflecting on what he’d been told. He thought about who had set him up. The photos had been taken in a hotel room. Had the room been bugged? Who would spy on him?

His mind flashed back to how he had gotten involved with Feinstein in the first place. It began with a meeting with the President. The Commander in Chief had just been elected and was finding his feet. Three months in, late one night, the President visited Andrew in his office. He confided in Andrew how stressful the job was, how much pressure he was under, day and night. He spoke of the long-standing affair with his mistress, Sophie Meyer. She had grown increasingly erratic, threatening to go to the press. It was causing him problems. I trust you, Andrew. That’s what he had said. I know people, Andrew. But they can’t make this go away. I might have to resign. Can you reach out to your father? He’s a man I trust. Andrew said he would speak face-to-face with his father. He met up with his father at his club on the Upper East Side and told him everything. His father made a call and told him to return to Washington and await instructions. Twenty-four hours later, a friend of his father’s—Jason Iverson, a New York attorney—took Andrew for lunch at a fancy restaurant on Capitol Hill and handed him a card for the services of Fein Solutions. A personal referral to Karen Feinstein. Her firm dealt with such matters.