Gregg Hurwitz: We Know

I took a moment to collect myself, to quash the rise of fear in my chest, and then I shoved through the elbow-to-elbow press gaggle and made my way toward the checkpoint.

The speakers conveyed the first question, a woman, shrill with nerves. "Hello, my name is Cynthia McGinty. My question is for Senator Caruthers. You've said we need a change in our policy in the Middle East. But can we really be blackmailed by the likes of bin Laden into changing our views? Can we really rethink our position because of threats and violence? "

Jasper Caruthers's smooth voice, a marked contrast to the timidity of his interlocutor's. "The question in my mind, Cynthia, is whether we can persist with failed policies simply because we fear looking like we 're willing to learn from the past. "

Black town cars were pulled up onto the walkways and the patio before Royce Hall. Their tinted windows were dark and emotionless, the eyes of predators. The day had gone from Southern California bright to confused dusk. The buildings that had gleamed just fifteen minutes ago now looked cloaked and grainy.

Caruthers was still going on about reacting to different cultures and updating stances, but finally the next audience member stepped to the microphone: "Hello, my name is Bill Little, and my question is for President Bilton. As an educator I've had a hard time understanding the cuts you've advocated while pushing through tax breaks for wealthy corporations…"

My hands moved back and forth, tapping my pants on either side. Was I really going to do this? I realized I was holding my breath, and I exhaled so hard that static tinged my field of vision. I'd gone without oxygen for the past minute. Nice and subtle, Horrigan, teetering red-faced through the crowd.

Adjusting the rucksack, I approached the line of agents, none of whom I recognized. Robotically crossed arms, hair slicked back, asshole-handsome faces murmuring in polite monotones, "Hands, please. Can I see your hands? Hands." Their eyes swiveled past me. One pressed a finger to the flesh-colored earpiece melded into his head and grinned a sharp grin, a Presidential Detail alpha dog baring his perfect teeth. I recalled Frank's old crack about the Presidential Protective Division guys: Two holsters-one for the gun, one for the blow dryer.

Bilton's detail was running the show, of course, but Caruthers had his faithful crew-five or six agents, according to Wydell-at least one of whom was likely stationed outside, on the lookout for me. Though Caruthers's men didn't know the whole backstory, they'd proved they were all too willing to bend laws to protect their principal.

President Bilton's answer continued, a low-register drone. I sneaked a glance at one of the suspended screens. The bombardment of democracy continued. "I'm Patsy Ryan, and as an elderly person I feel great concern about rising health-care costs. President Bilton, if reelected, would you…"

I walked along the building, glancing at the cordons blocking the side doors. Behind me the viewers sitting in the quad jeered and clapped, news crews moving among them, bulky with equipment. It was an angry year, an angry election, and the voters weren't afraid to play hardball. "I'm John Quinn, and I'd like to know what the president has to say about the sweetheart deals with war contractors-"

A muscular college girl stepped aside, leaving behind a wall of her floral perfume and clearing my view to the building. By the last side entrance, his eyes raking across the crowd, stood Reid Sever. He was about twenty yards off, behind a line of sawhorses and police officers. I hesitated for a panic-stricken moment that stretched out like a warbling piano note.

I rotated away. Caruthers's enormous figure loomed on the screen above me. He had his head bent down, a hand clamped to his cheek, intently focused as Bilton continued to string together catchphrases and slogans. From the corner of my eye, I saw Sever's face lift and freeze with sudden focus. My heart started palpitating.

I turned my head, just barely. Sever was speaking into his wrist. Looking across the quad. There was another Secret Service type-he looked like Brown-touching his earpiece. And relaying what he was hearing to the guy next to him. Alan Lambrose.

Then all three looked directly at me. I ran.

Sever hurdled the sawhorses, shouting into his wrist. Rucksack bouncing on my shoulders, I plowed into the heart of the crowd, stepping on legs, tripping over college kids. People scattered, shouting complaints until they saw Sever coming, his Glock clear of the holster. It didn't take long for the news crews to pick up the disruption. Glinting camera lenses swung over to capture me — zooming in from either side, leering from strategically parked vans, coasting overhead on a crane like Peter Pan in a bad stage production.

I made my way to the heart of the quad and turned, holding my arms wide. The energy of the crowd pulled to me, an electric charge. There were cameras everywhere, people's eyes. Could I actually bring this off? Agent Brown was on Sever's heels, as were several of Caruthers's other agents I recognized from the jogging detail and Induma's walkway. They spread out, closing in on me from all directions, pants whistling as they ran. Innumerable pistols aimed at my head. I waited for the crack of a gunshot, the kiss of jagged lead. People rose, first those nearest me, then in waves, an astonished standing ovation. I thought, at the same time, This might actually work, and, You '11 be shot.

"I'm Nick Horrigan!" I shouted. My voice wasn't thin or trembling. It was clear as a goddamned bell. "And I don't have a weapon on me. I have-"

But Sever hammered me, wrapping me up, and then the others were there, too, frisking me. Someone ripped the rucksack off my back. There was movement all around us, a windup to a stampede. One of the agents shouted, "He's unarmed! Unarmed/"

"What's in the rucksack?"

"Styrofoam peanuts." The guy was dumping it as he answered.

"Nothing else? "

Black shoes stomped near my face, barely missing, as more agents jockeyed for position. I stayed perfectly still, not wanting to give them an excuse to shoot me. An iron bar of a forearm pressed across the back of my neck, grinding my cheek into the ground. Through the ankles and moving bodies, I glimpsed the post supporting the giant horn speakers.

A familiar voice: "My question is for Senator Caruthers, and it's on behalf of someone who couldn't be here tonight. It s on behalf of Gracie Everett."

Despite the lawn smashed to my face, I felt a blast of triumph.

I was hauled roughly to my feet. Cuffs pinched my wrists. I twisted to see the nearest giant video screen, and there Induma was, two stories high, holding the ultrasound aloft so the light streamed through it.

"Gracie would have been old enough to vote next year. But she was murdered when she was thirteen days old. Along with her mother. "

A hush passed over the quad, all faces suddenly intent on the screens. The agents around me stiffened and looked at one another, suddenly aware that their crew had been drawn out of the building. A breeze lifted a few of the Styrofoam peanuts from the grass, underscoring my ruse, that Caruthers's men had been diverted out here in pursuit of an empty rucksack, leaving no one inside to shut down the senator's surprise interrogator.

Caruthers sat frozen on the stool-one loafer on the rug, the other touching the footrest as if to keep its bearing. Those brilliant green eyes were lit with alarm. An odd quiet spread through the quad, everyone sensing that something unscripted was taking place. Heads turned, voices hushed, people pointed.

Every set of eyes focused on that black and gray film, on the eighteen-week-old curl of Gracie Everett. For a brief moment, she was the center of the universe.