The Book of Fate - Brad Meltzer [92]
As the car leaves, the camera whizzes back and forth, searching the aftermath and sifting through the ballet of slow-motion chaos: Secret Service agents with their mouths frozen open in mid-yell . . . bystanders darting in every direction . . . and on the top right of the screen, just as the limo pulls away, a pale, skinny kid crashing to the ground, twisting in pain like a worm along the concrete, his hand gripping his face.
The tears tumble down my cheeks. My fingers press so tight into the heel of my palm, I feel my own pulse. I tell myself to look away . . . to get up and turn on the lights . . . but I can’t move.
On-screen, two suit-and-tie agents carry Boyle off the battlefield and to the ambulance. Since their backs are to us, it’s impossible to make them out. But in the swirl of dust behind the limo, I’m still lying on my back, pressing my face so hard, I look like I’m pinning the back of my head to the asphalt. And while it’s all in full color on TV, I still see it in black and white. A flashbulb goes supernova. My fingertips scratch against the sharpened metal in my face. Boyle’s ambulance doors slam shut.
“Wes, you with us?” Rogo whispers.
Why won’t they stop slamming shut—?
“Wes . . .” Rogo continues to whisper. He says it again, and I realize it’s not a whisper. His voice is loud. Like he’s yelling.
Something clenches my right shoulder, shaking.
“Wes!” Rogo shouts as I blink back to reality and find his meaty paw holding my shirt.
“No, no . . . yeah . . . I’m fine,” I insist, pulling my shoulder free of his grip. It’s not until I look around the conference room that I realize the videotape is no longer running. In the corner, Lisbeth flicks on the lights, looking back to see what’s going on.
“He’s fine,” Rogo insists, trying to block her view. “He’s just . . . just give him a second, okay?”
Heading back from the light switch, Lisbeth still continues to stare, but if she sees what’s going on, she’s kind enough to keep it to herself.
“So that basically accomplished a big fat nothing, huh?” Dreidel asks, still clearly annoyed we’re even here. “I mean, except for giving Wes a few brand-new nightmares to deal with.”
“That’s not true,” Lisbeth says, heading back to the opposite side of the table. Instead of sitting next to Dreidel, she decides to stand. “We got to see the agents that carried Boyle off.”
“Which means nothing since we can’t see their faces—not to mention the fact that since the Service clearly helped, I personally don’t think it’s safe asking any of their agents for help.”
“We would’ve gotten more if the camera weren’t swirling like my mom taking home movies,” Lisbeth points out.
“Yeah, that cameraman was a real jerk-off for ducking down and trying to protect his life like that,” Dreidel shoots back.
“Dreidel,” I interrupt.
“Don’t Dreidel me, Wes.”
“How ’bout if I Dreidel you?” Rogo threatens.
“How ’bout you sit back down and let the boy fight his own fight for once?” Dreidel pushes back. “Wes, no offense, but this was stupid. Except for getting inside juice for when Drudge-ette here writes her best-selling tell-all, there’s not a single good reason to come here. She could’ve just sent us the info we needed.”
“I was trying to help,” Lisbeth insists.
“This was helping? We’ve got a thousand unanswered questions, half a dozen absurd theories, and you wanna spend the day watching the one video that Congress, the public, and every conspiracy junkie in the world has combed through and still didn’t find anything suspicious? It didn’t even give us a good shot of Nico to see if there’s anything else we might’ve been missing.”
I shake my head. “That’s not—”
“He’s right,” Lisbeth admits from just behind Dreidel, who has to spin around to see her. She’s got her back to us as she stands in front of the big plate-glass window. “We didn’t get any good shots.” Turning back to us with that same crooked little smile from when she was picking fights