Patterson, James - Alex Cross 3 - Jack and Jill

“Oh, there's a very good reason, a fully satisfactory explanation for all our actions. Maybe we just like the power trip of frightening the so-called most powerful people in the world. Maybe we like sending you a message from all the little people you've frightened with your command decisions and almighty mandates from on high. At any rate, no one who's been killed was innocent, Mr. President. They all deserved to die, for one reason or another.”

Then Jill laughed. The sound of the electronically altered voice was almost childlike.

I thought of Aiden Cornwall's young son. Why did a nine-year-old boy deserve to die? At that moment, I hated Jill -- whoever she was, whatever her motives.

President Byrnes didn't back down. The President's voice was measured, calm. "Let me make one thing clear to you: you don't frighten me. Maybe you ought to be afraid, Jill. You and Jack.

We're getting close to you now. There's nowhere on earth you can hide. There isn't one safe spot on the globe. Not anymore."

“We'll certainly keep that in mind. Thanks so much for the warning. Very sporting of you. And you please keep this in mind -- you're a dead man, Mr. President. Your assassination is already a done deal.”

That was the end of the tape. Jill's final words to President Byrnes, spoken so coolly, so brazenly.

Jill the morning deejay. Jill the poet. Who are you Jill?

Your assassination is already a done deal.

I wanted to interview President Byrnes again. I wanted to talk with him right now. I needed him in this office, listening to the sick, threatening tape with me. Maybe the President knew things that he wasn't telling any of us. Someone must.

I played the frightening taped message several more times.

I don't know how long I sat in the FBI office, staring out over the becalmed lights of Washington, D.C. They were somewhere out there. Jack and Jill were out there. Possibly planning an assassination. But maybe not. Maybe that wasn't it at all.

You're a dead man, Mr. President.

Your assassination is already a done deal.

Why were they warning us?

Why warn us about what they planned to do?

IT WAS PAST TEN-THIRTY, but I still had one more important stop I wanted to make. I called Jay Grayer and told him I was on my way to the White House. I wanted to see President Byrnes again. Could he make it happen?

“This can wait until the morning, Alex. It should wait.”

"It shouldn't wait, Jay. I've got a couple of theories that are burning a hole in my brain. I need the President's input. If President Byrnes says that it waits until the morning, then it waits.

But talk to Don Hamerman and whoever else needs to be talked to about it. This is a murder investigation. We're trying to prevent murders. At any rate, I'm on my way over there."

I arrived at the White House, and Don Hamerman was waiting for me. So was John Fahey, the chief counsel, and James Dowd, the attorney general and a personal friend of President Byrnes.

They all looked put out and also very tense. This apparently wasn't how things were done in the Big House.

“What the hell is this all about?” Hamerman confronted me angrily I had been waiting to see what his bite was like. I'd seen worse, actually

“If you want, I'll wait until tomorrow. But my instincts tell me not to,” I told him in a soft but firm voice.

“Tell us what you want to say to him,” James Dowd spoke up.

“Then we'll decide.”

“I'm afraid that it's only for the President to hear. I need to talk with him, alone, just like we did the first time we met.”

Hamerman exploded. “Jesus Christ, you arrogant son of a bitch. We're the ones who let you in here in the first place.”

“Then you're the ones to blame, I guess. I told you that I was here to conduct a murder investigation and that you wouldn't like some of my methods. I told the President the same thing.”

Hamerman stormed away from us, but he returned in a couple of minutes. “He'll see you up on the third floor. This shouldn't take more than a couple of minutes of his time. It won't take more than a few minutes.”

“We'll see what the President has to say about that.”

THE TWO OF US met in a solahum that is attached to the living quarters on the third floor. The room had been a favorite of Reagan's. Outside the windows, the lights of Washington were shining brightly. I felt as if I were living a chapter out of All the President's Men.

“Good evening, Alex. You needed to see me,” the President said, and seemed calm and cheerful enough. Of course, there was no way for me to judge his true feelings. He was dressed casually in khakis and a blue sport shirt.

“I apologize for coming in and causing a lot of upset and inconvenience,” I said to him.

The President raised his hand to stop me from apologizing further. “Alex, you're here because we wanted you to do exactly what you're doing. We didn't think anybody on the inside would have the balls. Now, what's on your mind? How can I help you?”

I relaxed a little bit. How could the President help me? That was a question most of us had always wanted to hear. “I spent the day thinking about this morning's phone call, and also the murders out in McLean. Mr. President, I don't think we have a lot of time left. Jack and Jill are making that pretty clear. They're impatient, very violent; they're taking more and more risks. They also have a psychological need to rub it in our face every time that they can.”

“Are they just flattering their egos, Alex?”

“Possibly, but maybe they want to diminish your power. Mr. President, I wanted to see you alone because what I have to say needs absolute confidentiality. As you know, we've been checking out everyone who works at the White House. The Secret Service has been cooperative. So has Don Hamerman.”

The President smiled. “I'll bet Don has.”

"In his own way, he has. A watchdog is a watchdog, though.

Based on our findings so far, we've placed three members Of the current staff under surveillance by the Secret Service. We would rather watch than dismiss them. They've been added to the seventy-six others currently under surveillance around Washington."

“The Secret Service always has a number of potential threats to the President under surveillance,” Thomas Byrnes said.

"Yes, sir. We're just taking precautions. I don't have particularly high hopes for the three staff members. They're all males.

Somehow I thought we might turn up Jill. But we didn't."

The President's look darkened. “I would have liked to meet Jill and have a private chat with her. I'd have liked that a lot.”

I nodded. Now came the really difficult part of our little talk.

“I have to broach a tough subject, sir. We need to talk about some of the other people around you, the people closest to you.”

Thomas Byrnes sat forward in his chair. I could tell that he didn't like this at all.

“Mr. President, we have reason to suspect that someone with access into the White House, or possibly with power and influence here, might be involved in all of this. Jack and Jill are certainly getting into high places with the greatest of ease The people close to you have to be checked, and checked very closely”

Both of us were suddenly quiet. I could almost visualize Don Hamerman waiting outside, chewing on his silk tie.

I broke the awkward silence.

“I know that we're talking about things you would rather not,” I said.

The President sighed. “That's why you're here. That's why you're here.”

“Thank you,” I told him. “Sir, you have no reason not to trust me on this. As you said yourself I'm an outsider. I have nothing to gain.”

Thomas Byrnes sighed a second time. I sensed that I had reached him, at least for the moment. “I trust many of these people with my life. Don Hamerman is one of them, my bulldog, as you correctly surmised. Whom don't I trust ? I'm not completely comfortable with Sullivan or Thompson at the Joint Chiefs. I'm not even sure about Bowen at the FBI. I've made serious enemies on Wall Street already. Their reach inside Washington is very deep and very powerful. I understand that organized crime is none too pleased with my programs, and they are much more organized now than they've ever been. I'm challenging an old, powerful, very fucked-up system -- and the fucked-up system doesn't like it. The Kennedys did that -- especially Robert Kennedy”