In the Weeds Read online

  The crew chief had yanked his sidearm. Before she could reassure him, Colby’s sidearm was against the chief’s temple.

  Rex was now on full alert. His snarl filled the cabin loudly enough to have both pilots looking back at them wide-eyed. Rex was moments from leaping to take out the crew chief’s throat.

  “Really should learn to trust your own, buddy. Now ease the weapon.” Colby’s voice was low and sounded incredibly dangerous.

  He didn’t understand that Marines guarding the President were trained in scenarios where anyone on the team could be a traitor. And that McShea wasn’t going to ease off until he’d been reassured this wasn’t the start of an attack—not even at risk of his own death.

  Time to move slowly. She placed one hand on McShea’s sidearm and eased it downward with a light pressure. Laying her other hand on Rex’s head quieted the dog. Colby looked at that in surprise, then reholstered his own sidearm with a shrug. Easing forward, she leaned into the cockpit far enough that she could speak to the pilots. The copilot had his own sidearm drawn, held mostly out of sight close by his belly in case he needed it. Out the front windshield, she could see that they were fast approaching their destination.

  “Captain Juarez. Can you confirm for me that Marine One aircraft never travel without ECM jamming on? Not even when returning to base?”

  “I can confirm that. Full ECM on all official maneuvers.”

  “Thank you, Captain.”

  Ivy eased back into the cabin, still moving slowly, making sure to reassure Rex as she did so. She buckled herself back into her seat as everyone watched her closely. She noted that neither the crew chief nor the copilot had reholstered their weapons. She’d have to remember to commend them later on their vigilance. That’s how she wanted her Marines around the President, act first and apologize for killing any potential aggressors later.

  “So, Major, what is the reason you swore in my face?” The President asked it in a perfectly normal tone.

  “I swore in your face, sir?”

  “Rather vehemently,” Colby was grinning.

  Dilya giggled. As she’d proven earlier that she wasn’t some bubble-headed teen, Ivy suspected that Dilya had calculated that to be a tension breaker. It seemed to work. McShea, at least, put away his firearm. Ivy deciding against turning around to check on the copilot’s actions.

  “My apologies, Mr. President. I’d realized something that I should have recalled yesterday. I can’t imagine how we missed it. We need to review our debrief procedures, but the F-14 model was a scenario we had never previously anticipated.”

  “Which is?” Colby prompted.

  Right. Get to the point, Saint Ives.

  “It was neither an accident nor a random attack. It was a strike by an expert.”

  “How do you conclude that?” Harvey Lieber’s voice was suddenly pure ice. As head of the Presidential Protection Detail, there was nothing that he would find more upsetting.

  A random attack was unlikely to succeed because of the security bubble around the President. But a planned assault would take the Secret Service’s capabilities into account. An expert assault implied that its planning included actual knowledge of those capabilities. It was the nightmare scenario. Even the attack on the Presidential Motorcade in Colorado had been mostly an application of brute force. This was far more dangerous.

  “That F-14 model should have fallen out of the sky when it flew so close to us. Our ECM—electronic countermeasures—block almost every frequency, except for a very few that we’re using ourselves. Frequencies that we’re constantly changing. Pull out your cell phone. You won’t be able to place a call. All of those frequencies are blocked within a hundred meters or more of this aircraft. That F-14 should have fallen out of the sky rather than performing a pinpoint maneuver.”

  “So the drone’s transmitter wasn’t randomly damaged by the crash with our tail rotor. It was designed to self-destruct, to hide how they did that,” Colby was nodding. “Slick.”

  Harvey began to swing up his radio, which was on an authorized frequency, but Ivy held out a hand to stop him.

  “You were about to call in an abort on the visit?”

  “Yes, ma’am!” Harvey snapped out.

  “Don’t. It almost had to be an inside job. If you perform an abort, they may just go underground. You can’t keep the President locked away forever.”

  “Now,” said the President, “I believe it’s my turn to curse. My apologies, ma’am, but damn straight you aren’t doing that, Harvey. I expressly forbid it. We need a solution, not a retreat.”

  “Sir!” Harvey protested, but the President shook his head.

  “I flew Combat Search and Rescue for multiple tours. I’m not getting chased out of the sky by some nutcase, no matter how smart they think they are. Figure something out.”

  The helicopter flared for its landing before settling gently on its three wheels.

  “Please hold your seat for a moment, sir.”

  When the President turned to Colby, he continued.

  “I’m supposed to have landed at least thirty seconds ahead of you, sir. Until Rex and I have secured the area, we’re going to ask you to stay aboard. I don’t like that Marine One landed without Rex first checking the landing zone. You’re not going to die on my watch, Mr. President.”

  President Zachary Thomas clenched his jaw tightly at the restriction, but finally nodded when Lieber rested a hand on his shoulder to keep him in his chair.

  Colby opened only one side of the double door built into the side of the aircraft, keeping the President shielded by the armor built into the other door. Ivy tried to follow Rex out onto the Orlando hotel front lawn, but Zackie raced out first, dragging Dilya in her wake. At least Dilya made it look that way, but the dog weighed so little that the girl could easily have picked up the dog.

  “Trust me. I have similar problems with her,” the President explained. “She and that dog are always underfoot at the oddest of times.”

  At times that Dilya finds most interesting. But Ivy kept that thought to herself and instead followed with what dignity she could muster as the President laughed.

  To one side stood the Disney Dolphin Hotel, a nine-story, stucco-red edifice that rose another eighteen stories to a triangular pinnacle in the center. Atop either end of the main roof were massive smiling dolphins—each six or seven stories high themselves. To the other three sides of the narrow green lawn sprawled a man-made lake. Wide, low passenger boats carried hotel guests to and from Epcot. And today, each was manned by a team of Secret Service agents. She looked but didn’t see any agents in the little swan paddle boats, which would be worth the price of admission.

  Colby and Rex had circled Marine One and the second decoy helo that they were supposed to have arrived in. The other decoy remained aloft—better able to react in case of an emergency. A pair of gunships hovered in the distance providing cover.

  As Colby and Rex proceeded up to the hotel’s entrance, Dilya and Zackie tagged closely behind. Apparently Zackie had a new hero and was mimicking Rex move for move, even if the First Dog didn’t know what it was searching for.

  Ivy did her best to only show her Marine Corps discipline as she marched up the slight slope from the water’s edge to the glass-and-steel main entrance. Past the hovering staff and Secret Service agents, Colby radioed just as Ivy caught up with him.

  “Lieber, this is Thompson. Clear.”

  Ivy didn’t have an earpiece, as she was just along as an observer. Colby was her way to stay connected with what was going on. She hated being dependent on him. She still wasn’t sure if she was even talking to him.

  Then the President, his advisors, and a team of agents brushed by her into the hotel. Into the hotel and out of the bounds of HMX-1 for the next seven hours—which they would spend in intense negotiations with Mexico, Cuba, and the governors of the five Gulf Coast states. All she could do now was wait.

  May in Florida was enough to melt a man. And to dissolve a dog.
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  So he chose one of the deep leather armchairs in the vaulted lobby and listened to the water fountain that splashed merrily into the big sandstone-edged pool.

  Dilya had been a distraction for a while. She’d wanted to know everything he could tell her about how to control a dog off-leash. Rex was very mellow when he wasn’t under the seek command—his elder statesman mode—so they worked with hand signals and voice commands until Rex paid attention to her as well. He wished he could ask Rex what was going on. First, he seemed to have fallen head over all four heels for Ivy. Now, he was accepting commands from a teenager.

  Zackie proved to be far less of a bubblehead than the Sheltie had first appeared. Once she understood a command, she followed it every time. Soon, Zackie was trotting about the lobby with a bright click of her nails on the terracotta flooring in patterns that, at least roughly, matched each of Dilya’s gestures.

  Now they were off practicing their new skills elsewhere in the hotel.

  “You know what she’s probably doing?” Ivy slipped into the next chair over.

  He’d noticed her in the shadowed bar at one edge of the lobby, sipping a Coke. He idly wondered if she still crunched the ice cubes in her teeth—a sound that had always sent nearly-painful shivers up his spine.

  He shrugged, unsure of how he was supposed to be reacting to her. Childhood friend? Except they hadn’t really been friends. They’d been almost enemies—more like adversaries in ways only the closest family members might be. And now that he’d slept with her, the whole “childhood” thing was a moot point. She was more of a woman than…maybe anyone else he’d ever bedded. She took and gave and groaned. She melted and attacked, was vibrant and alarming. Ivy was—

  “Dilya is probably sending Zackie running into the President’s meetings so that she has an excuse to chase after her and eavesdrop.”

  He wouldn’t put it past her. But it wasn’t some teenager and her dog that he was thinking about.

  “What’s going on, Colby?”

  “Me and Rex, we just be hanging.” After an hour’s exposure to Zackie’s high-strung energy, Rex was taking a hard-earned nap.

  “Hanging at the Disney’s Dolphin Resort doesn’t sound like hot babe territory. More like moms with families.”

  “You’re here.”

  “You calling me a babe, Colby?”

  That sounded like dangerous territory. “I don’t know what the hell you are, Ivy. Do know that I’ve never wanted a woman the way I want you at the moment.” He kept his voice calm so that he didn’t attract the attention of any of the other agents or aides who flowed through the lobby in a near constant stream.

  Ivy didn’t reply for a long time—long enough for him to look over at her.

  “I’m not used to men thinking about me that way,” her voice was a whisper.

  “Get used to it, lady, because I definitely do. Especially after last night. Hey, this is a hotel. I bet they have rooms. Rooms with beds in them.”

  “Colby,” her tone landed deep in shut-the-hell-up territory. Which sounded like an excuse to keep teasing.

  “Hot showers. Hell, I’d settle for a broom closet at the moment if it meant I could get my hands on you.”

  And that’s what she was to Colby: some babe to “get his hands on.”

  Yes, last night had been amazing. Colby Thompson was a spectacular lover…yet about as deep as the man-made pond in front of the resort—as in not very.

  “There’s a whole past family-brother-relationship thing going on that you’re not paying any attention to, Thompson.”

  “I didn’t know Marines did that.”

  “Did what?” She wanted to slouch lower in the soft armchair, Colby made it look so comfortable. She never slouched, especially not in her dress uniform. She should be working. While Colby had been working with Dilya, she’d checked her queue. There were three options for the upcoming trip to the Ottawa trade meeting. Preliminary field work for the Pacific Northwest fisheries tour, including a haul over to Japan to once again try to cut down their whaling activities. And a prospectus for the Quito, Ecuador, Climate Conference.

  “I didn’t know Marines invited their whole family into relationship discussions.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “What I’m talking about is you, me, and a comfortable bed. What you’re talking about is beyond me. What’s your family doing in the middle of this conversation?”

  “And your family, Thompson.”

  “Hey, I didn’t invite them into this conversation. I was just thinking about sex with you and—”

  “And that’s all you’re thinking about. A man with a dick where he’s supposed to have a brain.”

  Colby snorted out a laugh hard enough to attract the attention of a Mexican and a Cuban government aide conferring hotly in the next set of armchairs over.

  “Been called a dickhead before, but never quite like that.”

  “Tell me it isn’t true.”

  “It isn’t true.”

  As if she believed that.

  “Ivy, all I’m talking about at the moment is great sex. It’s not as if we’re getting married.”

  “That’s not what you told my brother Reggie.” Why was she arguing with him on this? Yes, the sex was great. No, not a chance did she want to be in a relationship with Colby Thompson. So why was she arguing that he wasn’t being committed enough?

  “Okay, fine. Let’s invite our moms into this. Mine has asked me enough times about getting together with you that I should have her on a loop recording.”

  “She did? I didn’t know that.” How could she not know that? She’d followed Reggie over to the Thompsons’ nearly as often as Colby had come to their house.

  “I always figured it was just a sign of how disappointed she was in her only child’s lack of motivation.” Colby seemed to slip even lower. If he wasn’t careful, he’d end up on the floor with Rex. “She probably figured you’d set a good example or whip me into shape or something.”

  “That doesn’t sound like her.” Mrs. Thompson was a Beltway lawyer, specializing in high profile divorces—known for representing the wives of philandering congressmen, senators, and other officials. Yet, despite that, she always seemed to have such a positive attitude.

  “If not that, then maybe it’s because our moms are already best friends and just wish they were related. We’d be their only chance unless they switch sides and run off together.”

  “Doesn’t sound like either of our moms, the latter part. You could both switch sides and marry my brother.”

  “So not. First part is true though. Our moms might as well be sisters anyway.” Colby glanced over at her. “Anything your mom says?”

  “Not directly.”

  “She’s a Marine. I thought everything Marines did was forthright and direct. What does she say instead?”

  “We can be subtle when it’s called for. Every now and then she points out how handsome you are.”

  “How handsome I am?” Colby shoved himself upright and raised his voice. “How handsome I am? Your mom says that? Shit! It looks like I’ve been chasing the wrong family member.”

  She was on the verge of taking him down, hard, even if half the lobby was staring at them. And then she caught on that Colby was teasing her. Somewhere along the way, she’d taken him seriously on the topic of relationships. He was right—she was the one who’d hauled their families into a conversation about casual sex. She hated that she’d fallen for it.

  Ivy considered throwing him into the deep end of the dolphin fountain, but her mom was right: Colby was incredibly handsome. And, no, he wasn’t chasing the wrong family member.

  Besides, the fountain wasn’t more than a foot deep.

  Harvey Lieber might not have been able to send the President home, but he made it clear that he wasn’t going to trust him in the air unless he had to. Instead of a twenty-minute helicopter flight, the President took a forty-five-minute, sixty-mile ride in the Beast. The Secret Service punch
ed down a sealed-off corridor at the peak of Orlando rush hour, closed Highway 528, and roared down the empty two-laner and into the twilight at well above the speed limit.

  With Jim and Malcolm the springer spaniel covering the Motorcade, he, Ivy, Dilya, and the two dogs were the sole occupants of the three helicopters returning to Cape Canaveral.

  “Kept him running, did you?” Colby asked the girl. Zackie was passed out during the flight—a state he’d rarely witnessed the Sheltie in.

  “Might have.”

  “Learn anything interesting?”

  Dilya looked at him with a puzzled expression. So disingenuous that he might have bought it if not for Ivy’s snort of laughter.

  The teen shifted to a bright smile and shrugged off her defeat easily. “Not all that much really. Mexico is still trying to hold on to old styles of energy production; drilling the Gulf is how they’ve always propped up their economy. Now that we can generate the oil more cheaply and more safely with fracking—that’s such an ugly word, isn’t it? It’s like the word itself causes even more people who don’t understand it to hate it. Words are so fascinating that—”

  “No one can sidetrack us,” Colby warned her and she actually frowned for a moment before giving in.

  “Cuba is far too desperate to be concerned with any ecologic considerations. They were more worried about being nice to the governors of the two particular states that border the Gulf. They’re nearest to Florida, but their economics minister hovered around the Alabama and Mississippi governors. He wanted to know all about their casino operations and how he could rebuild the old Cuban casinos as if it was still the 1950s and they could get Hollywood and tourism money pouring in. ‘Green oil’ he kept calling it. ‘Green oil for our economy.’ I liked that analogy. I think the governors liked it too. As if it made sense to them.”

  “Are you the one who gave it to him?”

  She stumbled to a halt as if she’d just accidentally showed her poker hand. Then she shrugged like she didn’t know what he was talking about and became interested in whatever was out the window. He checked, a twilit expanse of Florida’s never-ending lakes.