A Heartbeat Away - Michael Palmer [45]
“She’s reported from hot zones before.”
Allaire and Salitas silently conferred and agreed.
“I’ll see if we can track her down.”
Griff flashed back to the scene outside the Capitol, the chaos of the gathering crowd, and the disembodied woman’s voice that kept calling his name.
“No need for that, Mr. President,” he said. “I believe she’s outside the Capitol right now.”
CHAPTER 19
DAY 2
10:30 A.M. (EST)
“I knew it was you, Rhodes!” Angie cried out. “I knew it!”
Griff was there as she entered the Capitol through the airlock, his military entourage a respectful distance away.
“Welcome to hell,” he said, reaching out to take her gloved hands in his.
“You know, I almost didn’t bring my binocs with me, but at the last moment I threw them in my bag. All it took was one good look through that visor of yours and I knew it was you, despite the Rip Van Winkle beard.”
“It’s a long story.”
Through the visor of her butyl hood Griff could see that, if anything, Angela Fletcher was even more beautiful than the woman in his memory—wonderful skin; sensual, truculent lips; velvet, deep brown eyes. It was hard to believe it had been twelve years since they first met in Kenya. She must have been a baby.
“If you’re here,” she said, “things must be really bad.”
“Worse than you can imagine.”
She set her hand on his arm.
“Whatever they want of you, Griff, I know you can do it. I’m pleased to see you’re back in the game.”
The temperature inside his suit went up several degrees.
I know you can do it.
He had heard those exact words from her before. First in Africa, then again, years later, on his houseboat in the Keys.
I know you can do it.
She always had more faith in him than he did in himself. He had never told her, and probably never would, but Angela Fletcher was the only woman he had ever loved.
The canvas backpack Angie wore contained blood collection supplies. Strapped over one shoulder she carried a lightweight video recorder and a digital SLR camera, accounting for all the items Griff had requested.
“How’s the suit, kiddo?” he asked.
“It’s a little tense in here, but nothing I can’t handle.”
“Some claustrophobia at first is expected. But now’s the time to turn back if you’re feeling panicked. Believe me, no one will hold it against you, least of all, me.”
“I’m a reporter. This is the story of the century. I’m not going anywhere. Besides, I might be able to help.”
“You already have.”
“You going to tell me the story behind that beard?”
“When we have time. You ever draw blood?”
“I worked as a phlebotomist in college before I switched out of premed. But I don’t think I ever did it with bulky gloves on.”
“We’ve got the president’s doctor to do some of the drawing, and we’ll see if there’s a corpsman here. I can do the rest. In case you couldn’t guess, a puncture in these suits is highly undesirable. Let’s walk.”
“So what do you know about this virus?” Angie asked. “And how did you end up here? The last thing I remember was when I found you on that houseboat of yours vowing to the heavens that your Ebola encounter had done you in, and you were through with viruses.”
“Things happen, people change,” he said.
It had been just another day in an unending sequence of fishing, naps, and Jack Daniels when Angie showed up on the deck of Sanctuary, the moss-colored sixty-eight-foot Sumerset houseboat Griff had bought at a Drug Enforcement Agency auction and set up in a sleepy little marina in Key Largo. Seven years had passed since the two of them had first met in Kenya—six years and nine months since Griff, with little explanation, had ended their intensely passionate love affair and gone off chasing after the source of an outbreak of deadly Lassa fever.
Angie had come to Africa on assignment to report on virus hunters for Science Times Digest. “Cowboys of the Jungle,” the article would eventually be called. She was young, beautiful, bright, brash, and ready for adventure. The whole package. It was difficult to say which one of them fell quicker … or harder. Griff’s sudden pullaway was nearly as surprising to him