No Rules, Ridge King [the snowy day read aloud TXT] 📗

“Yes.”

“I’ll see to it, sir.”

“OK.”

“Sir?”

“Yeah?”

“What do you plan to do with the money, if I may ask?”

“Oh, let’s see. $60 or $65 million? I don’t know. I thought the first thing I’d do—after we pay Camilo and his people handsomely—is give you a raise.”

Gargrave smiled.

“Thank you, sir.”

“And pay all your expenses the next time you go back to London. Now you can stay at Claridge’s or the Connaught.”

“Thank you again, sir.”

“Otherwise, I think we’ll just sit on it till the right thing comes along that needs that kind of money.”

Jack turned and looked at Babe in the rear cabin. The 206L-4 was a large version of the regular Bell model, and with two wide seats facing each other, the rear cabin could carry more people. He caught Babe’s eye and waved at her. She yelled something but he couldn’t hear a word, even if a thick sheet of glass had not separated the cabins. Rafael and the girls were having a great time.

He turned back and looked out his own window as Gargrave brought the chopper over Biscayne Bay. Downtown Miami’s dramatic skyline was to his right. Dead ahead lay St. Clair Island and the massive Beaux-Arts edifice of Flagler Hall, built in 1902 by Henry Flagler.

Jack saw a couple of ground crew come into sight as they approached one of three helipads off to the side of Flagler Hall. A couple of servants came from the house to assist with their luggage.

Gargrave brought the Bell 206L-4 down gently, landing it like a feather. Jack thought that Gargrave’s training in the Black Group, the unit specializing in helicopter assault Special Ops in M Squadron, part of the British Special Boat Service, was in evidence every day he worked for Jack. He’d met Gargrave when they in the service on a joint operation, back when Jack was on SEAL Team 9, the team the Navy never acknowledged even existed.

As the noise from the rotor died down, Jack crawled out and opened the rear door to help Antonia out, followed by Babe. Rafael came out last. Babe and Antonia were laughing hysterically. Rafael merely smiled sheepishly.

“Clue me in. What’s so funny?” said Jack.

“Hey, Jack—we’ve just been talking,” said Antonia.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” said Babe.

Rafael held up his hands in a defensive gesture.

“Leave me out of this,” was all he said.

“Antonia thinks it would be cool if we did a double wedding,” said Babe.

Jack burst out laughing. Even the ever-reserved Gargrave cracked a grin.

“We’d have to make it a double wedding and a funeral.”

“What?” said Antonia.

“To bury your sister Raven, ’cause she’d have a heart attack and die!”

Chapter 3

DO NOTHING?

Frederick Thurston, the senior senator from Michigan and Democratic Presidential candidate, didn’t know what to do in light of Eric Stathis’s revelation about the Keystone File the night before at Patricia Vaughan’s party. He knew what he wanted to do. He wanted to call a news conference and shout the undercover operation’s existence to the entire world, exposing President Norwalk and his slimy minions like Slanetti. Though he was convinced the world would wholeheartedly support him when it found out about such a thing, there were disadvantages with that approach.

He met first thing in the morning with campaign manager and best friend Jesse Epstein and Lamar LeGrand Perryman in the speaker’s office to discuss the situation. Epstein was the only person he told about Keystone. Both men, however, were hesitant about doing anything.

Thurston mentioned a straightforward news conference.

“I’m not sure it might not be the worst thing we could do,” said Epstein, Perryman silently thanking the man.

“I agree, Senator,” said Perryman. “The danger members face who have been approached is exposure. If you cause that exposure where Slanetti has only threatened it, you might do yourself more harm than good.”

“We’ve got to do something!” shouted Thurston, alarming the others with his sudden and passionate outburst. (This was the man who wanted to lead the country?)

“If you made such an announcement, and you’d have to do it in very specific terms, naming names of individual congressmen, I’d deny I’d ever been approached if I was one of the congressmen involved,” said Epstein.

“The only way they might figure on saving themselves,” added Perryman, “is by branding you a liar. This would give them better public reasoning for supporting St. Clair. I don’t see how you can win if you do that.”

Thurston bit his lower lip.

“Then what do you suggest, either of you?”

Epstein and Perryman glanced at each other. Neither knew what to say.

“We might approach them on the sly,” suggested Epstein.

“We don’t know who’s on their list,” said Thurston, getting up and pacing like a caged tiger the century-old carpet in the speaker’s lavish office in the Capitol Building. “Stathis only remembers seeing files on Delamar and Fulton. Delamar didn’t come to the party last night, but John Fulton came by and told me he still thought I was certain to win. He said his support hasn’t wavered a bit.”

Perryman, traitor that he was to his fellow Democrats, knew that Fulton hadn’t been approached yet. He was one of the last men on Slanetti’s list, and he was a formidable man at the very least.

“You can start with the ones who’ve switched over in our own caucus. It’s pretty obvious which ones were approached,” said Epstein. “There’s Delamar, Moldow, Berman and some others.”

“I might do that,” nodded Thurston, still extremely perplexed.

“But you’ll have to be mighty, mighty careful what you say,” chimed in Perryman seriously, his slow Virginia drawl much in evidence. “If you let them think you know what Slanetti knows, you might never get them.”

“That’s true,” agreed Thurston.

“And I’ll do what I can from over here,” said Perryman, lying through his teeth.

“Since