First Family (Sean King & Michelle Maxwell 4)

As he touched his daughter’s face, he thought about his phone call with Jane Cox. He had never talked to a First Lady before; folks like him never had that opportunity. He had read about her for years, of course, followed her husband’s career. He had expected more from her on the phone, educated, refined, but battle-tested person that she was. But she had disappointed him. She’d sounded human on the phone. Meaning scared. So safe in her high tower all this time; never saw the shit going on down below. Well, she had seen it now. And she would see it even closer soon enough.

He took a long breath. This was really it. At any point up to this Quarry could have called it off. And he almost had until the walls in the basement had brought him back. He pulled Pride and Prejudice from his pocket. By the light of his daddy’s old flashlight he read the last chapter of the novel. And this really would be the last chapter he would ever read to her.

He closed the book and laid it gently on her chest. Quarry took one of her hands and squeezed. He had done this for years, always hoping that she would squeeze back, but she never had. He had long since given up the thought that he ever would feel Tippi’s fingers curl around his own; they didn’t this time either. He put her hand back down, slid it under the covers.

He slipped the small tape recorder out of his pocket, set it on the bed and turned it on. For the next several minutes he and his daughter listened to Cameron Quarry saying her last words on earth. As always, Quarry spoke the last line along with his dead wife.

“I love you, Tippi, darling. Momma loves you with all my heart. I can’t wait to hold you again, baby girl. When we’re both healthy and fine in the arms of Jesus.”

He switched the recorder off and pocketed it.

The memories washed over him, coming in long, undulating waves. It could’ve turned out so differently. It should’ve turned out so differently.

“Your momma will be real happy to see you, Tippi. I wish I could be there too.”

He leaned down and kissed his daughter for the final time.

He left the door open, and then turned and looked back in the room. Even in the dark he could make out Tippi’s form under the illumination of the machines that had been the only thing keeping her from the grave all these years.

They had tried to get the Quarrys to pull the plug many times.

Persistent vegetative state. No brain activity. Brain dead in fact, they had told the couple, throwing in big medical jargon that Quarry felt certain was meant to both intimidate and confuse. After listening to them wax eloquent over the ultimate fate of his daughter, Quarry had asked each of them one simple question. “If she was your child would you let her die?”

The blank faces and still tongues he had gotten were all the answer he needed.

A part of him was unwilling to leave his child now, but he really had no choice. He stepped off the porch and looked toward the treeline. In the little bunker that Quarry had dug out and reinforced with wood sat Carlos, remote in hand, with one cable line hooked into a port on the device, and the other end embedded in the wall of the little house. The bunker was covered with dirt and grass, and underneath all that was lead sheathing that would block X-rays and other electronic imaging. Knowing that the Feds would be bringing specialized equipment, Quarry had fashioned the lead covering from old X-ray blankets he’d gotten from a dentist’s office.

No one looking at it from even a few feet away would be able to determine that a man was in there watching, and the lead covers would block most anything the Feds would have with them. The other cable line Quarry had run down the tree and then underground and into the bunker where it was hooked into the small TV monitor that Carlos was now no doubt staring at right now. It gave him the live feed from the camera in the tree. Carlos was supposed to stay in the bunker for as long as he needed for things to clear out. The bunker was ventilated and he had plenty of food and water. The plan was for him to escape to Mexico and from there to keep heading south. Quarry hoped he made it.

Quarry stood in a spot where he knew Carlos could see him on the TV. He gave a thumbs-up and then a salute. And then he left and drove home.

Quarry had written a letter that he left in the room in the basement. It wasn’t addressed to Ruth Ann or Gabriel, but it was about them. He wanted the people who would be coming to know the truth. This was his doing and nobody else’s. He also left his will.

He crept upstairs and looked in on Ruth Ann, who was sleeping soundly. He next went to Gabriel’s room and watched the little boy sleeping peacefully. Then he pulled a silver dollar from his pocket and placed it on the table next to the bed.

Under his breath he said, “You go to college, Gabriel. You get on with your life and you forget you ever knew me. But if you do think of me from time to time, I hope you’ll remember I wasn’t all bad. Just dealt a hand in life I didn’t know what to do with. But did the best I could.”

He walked through the house to his library. The fire was out now, doused with a bucket of water. He flexed his arm where the burns were, where the completed mark was. He clicked the light on, stared at the walls of books for a bit, and then turned off the light and closed the door for the final time.

A half hour later he parked his truck next to his Cessna. Twenty minutes later he was lifting off from the ground. As he soared over the land he looked down to where the little house was. He didn’t wave, didn’t nod, didn’t indicate he knew it was there at all. Now he had to be focused. What was past was past. He had only to look ahead now.

Daryl had illuminated the runway for him using lit torches spread ten feet apart. He landed with a hard jolt because of the winds, taxied down, turned ar

ound, got out, and chocked the wheels.

If things went according to plan he and Daryl would fly out of here and land in Texas. It all shouldn’t take more than a few hours. From there they had set up a way to sneak across the border into Mexico. It was easier to go south across the border than it was to go north over it. Once there Quarry would use a stolen cell phone to call the FBI and give them the exact location of the mine so that Willa and Wohl could be rescued. They would be perfectly fine there until then, with plenty of food and water.

It was a good plan, but only if it worked.

He grabbed his knapsack and trudged toward the mine entrance.

Well, he would have his answer in a very few hours.

CHAPTER 75

WHEN SEAN AND MICHELLE pulled into the packed dirt road leading to Atlee the sun was very near to starting its ascent up the eastern seaboard.

“Creepy,” said Michelle as they drove down the lonely, winding road. “You left a message for Waters?”