Kill Alex Cross - James Patterson [41]
“Thank you for coming. Won’t you please follow me?” she said. That was it. There was no briefing, no explanation.
Once I cleared the security desk and another magnetometer in the entry hall, I expected to be taken to a conference room, or maybe up to the First Lady’s offices on the second floor.
But it quickly became clear that wasn’t going to happen. Ms. Friedman walked me straight through the East Wing lobby and out the other side.
I kept my mouth shut as we passed from one building to the next, down the long East Colonnade with its view of the Kennedy Garden, and into the ground floor of the White House itself.
It made sense, now that I thought about it. Secret Service was probably restricting Mrs. Coyle’s movement as much as possible. Her office time would have been kept to a minimum, at best.
They stopped us for another ID check at the base of the main stairs. Then again on the first-floor landing before we could continue up to the residence. By the time we got to the stair landing on the second floor, the agents seemed to be expecting us. They only nodded at Ms. Friedman as we passed.
The museum quality of the lower levels had given way to something more like a home up here. There was plush blue and gold carpeting, a baby grand piano, several built-in bookcases, with hardbacks that looked like someone had actually read them.
I’m not so jaded that I wasn’t tripping out a little on where I was, either. It was impossible to be there and not think about all the presidents and First Ladies who had walked through these very rooms for the last two hundred years — all the way back to John Adams.
I guess the word for what I felt is humbled.
The hall narrowed and then narrowed again through a deep arch that opened to a sunny sitting room on the other side.
Mrs. Coyle was there with two female aides. To my right was the Lincoln Bedroom. This was just shy of surreal. I was definitely in the loop now.
The First Lady’s deputy chief of staff started the introductions.
“Mrs. Coyle, this is —”
“Detective Cross. Yes, of course.”
As Regina Coyle came over to shake my hand, I could see her eyes were still red from whenever she’d last cried. Probably not long ago.
“Thank you so much for being here,” she said. “I’m hoping you can be of some help to me.”
“MRS. COYLE, I’M so sorry about every thing that’s happened,” I said. “I’ll do whatever I can.”
She gestured me inside while the others quietly left the way I’d just come. A few seconds later, the First Lady and I were as alone as we were going to get in that building, even upstairs in the private quarters.
She sat on a long couch with a view of the Treasury Department building behind her. I took one of the yellow upholstered chairs, the same color as the walls and curtains, while she poured coffee from a service of White House china.
“You have some relevant experience with kidnap investigations, isn’t that right?” she started in. “The Gary Soneji case and others?”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said. “Three major cases since Soneji. It’s not my primary expertise —”
“But you’re good at it,” she said. It wasn’t a question, but she waited for an answer anyway.
“Experience is probably the best teacher,” I said. “So yes, I’m pretty good.”
Mrs. Coyle nodded, then looked down. She seemed to be building up to something.
She was a quiet First Lady, as they went. More Laura Bush than Hillary Clinton. Both she and her husband were originally from Minnesota farm stock, and I don’t think she ever relished the high-profile aspects of this job.
When she looked up again, her gaze was steady. More focused than before. I realized she was as strong as her husband.
“I know that most of the people looking for Ethan and Zoe right now probably don’t expect to find them alive,” she said all at once. There was no outward emotion to it. Just a fact. “I’m not blind to the statistics on this kind of thing.”
“No, ma’am,” I said. “But I hope you also know that you’ve got some of the best people in the world on this. You have since day one.”
“Of course,” she