The Inner Circle - Brad Meltzer [160]
“Beecher, I will only say this once. Don’t threaten me. You have no idea what happened that night.”
“The barber told me. He told me about the vacuum hose—and the tailpipe of the Honda Civic.”
“You have no idea what happened that night.”
“I know it took you four hours before you found her. I know how it still haunts you that you couldn’t stop it.”
“You’re not hearing me, Beecher,” he says, lowering his voice so that I listen to every syllable. “I was there—I’m the one who found her. You. Have. No. Idea. What. Happened. That. Night.”
His burning intensity knocks me back in my seat. I look at the President.
He doesn’t look away. His baggy eyes narrow.
I replay the events… The barber… Laurent said it took four hours before they found Minnie that night. That Palmiotti was the one who pulled her from the car. But now… if Wallace says he’s the one who found her first…
You have no idea what happened that night.
My skin goes cold. I replay it again. Wallace was there first… he was the first one to see her unconscious in the car… But if Palmiotti is the one who eventually pulled her out… Both things can be true. Unless…
Unless Wallace got there first, saw Minnie unconscious, and decided that the best action…
… was not to take any action at all.
You have no idea what happened that night.
“When you saw her lying there… you didn’t pull her out of the car, did you…?” I blurt.
The President doesn’t answer.
The bitter taste of bile bursts in my throat as I glance back at the silver picture frame. The family photo.
The one with two kids in the family.
Not three.
“You tried to leave her in that smoke-filled car. You tried to let your own sister die,” I say.
“Everyone knows I love my sister.”
“But in that moment, after all the heartache she caused… If Palmiotti hadn’t come in, you would’ve stood there and watched her suffocate.”
Wallace juts out his lower lip and huffs a puff of air up his own nose. But he doesn’t answer. He’ll never answer. Not for what they did to Eightball. Not for hiding him all these years. Not for any of this.
I was wrong before.
All this time, I thought I was fighting men.
I’m fighting monsters.
“That’s how you knew you could trust Palmiotti with anything, including the Plumbers. He was there for your lowest moment—and the truly sick part is, he decided to stay even though he knew you would’ve let your sister die,” I say. “You belong together. You ditched your souls for each other.”
There’s a flash on the digital screen that lists the First Family’s location. In a blink, Minnie’s status goes from:
MINNIE: Traveling
to
MINNIE: Second Floor Residence
Now she’s upstairs.
“No place like home,” Wallace says, never once raising his voice. He turns directly at me, finally undoing the prayer grip of his hands. “So. We’re done now, yes?”
“We’re not.”
“We are. We very much are.”
“I can still find proof.”
“You can try. But we’re done, Beecher. And y’know why we’re done? Because when it comes to conspiracy theories—think of the best ones out there—think of the ones that even have some semblance of proof… like JFK. For over fifty years now, after all the Jack Ruby and Lee Harvey Oswald stories… after all the witnesses who came forward, and the books, and the speculation, and the Oliver Stones, and the annual conventions that still happen to this very day, you know what the number one theory most people believe? The Warren Commission,” he says dryly. “That’s who the public believes—the commission authored by the U.S. government. We make a great bad guy, and they all say they hate us. But at the end of every day, people want to trust us. Because we’re their government. And people trust their government.”
“I bet you practiced that monologue.”
“Just remember where you are: This is a prizefight, Beecher. And when you’re in a prizefight for a long time—take my word on this—you keep swinging that hard and you’re only gonna knock yourself out.”
“Actually, the knockout