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Authors: John Sandford
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under his eyes, did a final touch-up with a tissue, and said, “Go.”
—
WHILE THEY WAITED for the governor to finish with the camera and get on the bus, Lucas took Green aside. “Is it possible that there’s somebody on Bowden’s bus who might be a problem? Anybody I should be worried about?”
“I doubt it. They’re thoroughly vetted. I talked to the Secret Service campaign liaison guy in Washington, an old friend of mine, had him run all the names in depth. That’s us, Bowden’s and Gardner’s campaigns. Everybody seems to be clean, a few pot busts, a couple of cocaines, four DWIs. Most of the bus people are political, but more on the technical side of things, rather than, you know, policy.”
“Not nuts, then,” Lucas said.
“No. There are a few crazies around, but not on the buses. Why are you worried about the buses?”
“If there was somebody feeding information, or support, or money, or whatever, to these stalkers, if there are stalkers, I need to know who I should look at,” Lucas said. “It’s like Neil—Neil wouldn’t betray Henderson, they’re joined at the hip, but he knows everything about Bowden, too. Where she’s going, what time she’s going there . . . That’d be pretty useful if you were planning an attack.”
“Most of that you could find out on her website,” Green said. “You wouldn’t need Neil to tell you.”
Lucas grinned and rubbed his nose. “Okay. I’m the new guy. I didn’t think of that. The website gets updated every day?”
“Not just every day, but every hour,” Green said. “We’ve got a Web tech on the bus with us. Bowden does, too. Right now, our guy is posting to people in Des Moines that we’ll be fifteen minutes late.”
“And Bowden does the same thing?”
“Sure. Minute-by-minute,” Green said.
“Okay . . . so if you know all this stuff, where’s the mostuncontrolled spot Bowden will be in the next couple of weeks? Or the governor?”
“That’s easy—the Iowa State Fair in Des Moines,” Green said. “Every candidate goes there. It’s the major event of the summer, as far as the campaigns go. There’s between ninety and a hundred and ten thousand people going through the fair every day. There are no effective security controls, as far as I can tell.”
“Holy shit.”
“Yeah.”
“All right. That gives me a deadline,” Lucas said.
“But—this is all just a
feeling
on Elmer’s part,” Green said. “That something’s wrong. I kind of agree with him, but when I was with the Secret Service, we dealt with all kinds of perceived threats and virtually none of them were real. Or realistic. Mostly they were goofs who wanted some attention.”
“And got it.”
“Yes, but the critical thing was, they’d never be a real threat to the president,” Green said. “They just didn’t have the planning ability, the . . . foresight . . . to be a real threat.”
—
LUCAS THOUGHT ABOUT THAT as the bus pulled out of the parking lot. He thought Green was interested in what he was doing, but protecting Bowden wasn’t part of her job description. While he’d told her of Elle Kruger’s psychological analysis of the e-mails, he had the feeling that she hadn’t taken that as seriously as he had—because Elle was a nun, and Green didn’t know her. Where did a nun get off peddling advice on possible psychotic assassins?
But Lucas
did
know Elle Kruger and she’d left him with a bad feeling about the whole situation. Somebody, he thought, was stalking Bowden. Whether or not they’d pull the trigger on her was another matter. The problem was to get to them, before they had the chance to act, before they had to make that final decision.
—
AFTER SEEING THE BUS OFF, Lucas went back to his motel, used the Wi-Fi to send a short note to Weather, who was probably in an operating room and wouldn’t see it until the afternoon. He found another short e-mail from Bell Wood that asked, “Do you know where you’re staying
—
WHILE THEY WAITED for the governor to finish with the camera and get on the bus, Lucas took Green aside. “Is it possible that there’s somebody on Bowden’s bus who might be a problem? Anybody I should be worried about?”
“I doubt it. They’re thoroughly vetted. I talked to the Secret Service campaign liaison guy in Washington, an old friend of mine, had him run all the names in depth. That’s us, Bowden’s and Gardner’s campaigns. Everybody seems to be clean, a few pot busts, a couple of cocaines, four DWIs. Most of the bus people are political, but more on the technical side of things, rather than, you know, policy.”
“Not nuts, then,” Lucas said.
“No. There are a few crazies around, but not on the buses. Why are you worried about the buses?”
“If there was somebody feeding information, or support, or money, or whatever, to these stalkers, if there are stalkers, I need to know who I should look at,” Lucas said. “It’s like Neil—Neil wouldn’t betray Henderson, they’re joined at the hip, but he knows everything about Bowden, too. Where she’s going, what time she’s going there . . . That’d be pretty useful if you were planning an attack.”
“Most of that you could find out on her website,” Green said. “You wouldn’t need Neil to tell you.”
Lucas grinned and rubbed his nose. “Okay. I’m the new guy. I didn’t think of that. The website gets updated every day?”
“Not just every day, but every hour,” Green said. “We’ve got a Web tech on the bus with us. Bowden does, too. Right now, our guy is posting to people in Des Moines that we’ll be fifteen minutes late.”
“And Bowden does the same thing?”
“Sure. Minute-by-minute,” Green said.
“Okay . . . so if you know all this stuff, where’s the mostuncontrolled spot Bowden will be in the next couple of weeks? Or the governor?”
“That’s easy—the Iowa State Fair in Des Moines,” Green said. “Every candidate goes there. It’s the major event of the summer, as far as the campaigns go. There’s between ninety and a hundred and ten thousand people going through the fair every day. There are no effective security controls, as far as I can tell.”
“Holy shit.”
“Yeah.”
“All right. That gives me a deadline,” Lucas said.
“But—this is all just a
feeling
on Elmer’s part,” Green said. “That something’s wrong. I kind of agree with him, but when I was with the Secret Service, we dealt with all kinds of perceived threats and virtually none of them were real. Or realistic. Mostly they were goofs who wanted some attention.”
“And got it.”
“Yes, but the critical thing was, they’d never be a real threat to the president,” Green said. “They just didn’t have the planning ability, the . . . foresight . . . to be a real threat.”
—
LUCAS THOUGHT ABOUT THAT as the bus pulled out of the parking lot. He thought Green was interested in what he was doing, but protecting Bowden wasn’t part of her job description. While he’d told her of Elle Kruger’s psychological analysis of the e-mails, he had the feeling that she hadn’t taken that as seriously as he had—because Elle was a nun, and Green didn’t know her. Where did a nun get off peddling advice on possible psychotic assassins?
But Lucas
did
know Elle Kruger and she’d left him with a bad feeling about the whole situation. Somebody, he thought, was stalking Bowden. Whether or not they’d pull the trigger on her was another matter. The problem was to get to them, before they had the chance to act, before they had to make that final decision.
—
AFTER SEEING THE BUS OFF, Lucas went back to his motel, used the Wi-Fi to send a short note to Weather, who was probably in an operating room and wouldn’t see it until the afternoon. He found another short e-mail from Bell Wood that asked, “Do you know where you’re staying
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