Until a moment ago, and despite all the evidence pointing to the contrary, she hadn’t been totally convinced that she’d been the actual target of the attack. Now, with all her protective detail but Clayton dead, there couldn’t be any doubt. But why? she asked herself. Why? She was an archaeologist with little or no influence outside the archaeological circles she operated in. She did have a significant social media footprint, but there was no way anything she had ever posted could have led to an attack on her life.
Could it be because of her father? She didn’t see that either. Her dad wasn’t even the vice president yet. She knew he used to be the commanding officer of JSOC. Could that be it? Terrorists coming after him through her? She wasn’t naive. She was well aware of what JSOC did. Not all the operators assigned to JSOC were like Clay. A bunch of them were real killers, sent deep behind enemy lines to exterminate America’s adversaries. She understood the need for that, but, on the other hand, it would be immature to think their enemies wouldn’t fight back the same way.
It made her nauseous to think that she had fought Clay about the number of men he wanted to bring along. She had even threatened to relinquish protection if he continued to push for a bigger protective detail, afraid of what her academic friends would think of her. These folks didn’t live in the same world her dad and Clay did. It was their night, and she hadn’t wanted to make a big show, or to draw too much attention for the wrong reason. Her insides were churning, and for a moment she thought she was going to be sick. She took a deep breath to quell the feeling.
“You’re okay, ma’am?” the agent asked. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said—”
She raised her hand. “No, thank you. Thank you for what you do . . . what’s your name, again?”
“Jeremy, ma’am. Jeremy Myers.”
“Well, thank you, Special Agent Myers,” Veronica said. “And I’m sorry for the loss of your friends and colleagues.”
“We’ll get whoever did that,” Myers replied through clenched teeth as the plane slowly came to a stop inside the hangar.
Veronica nodded. Clay had promised her the same thing.
Outside the plane, she saw a Humvee with flashing orange emergency lights leading a small motorcade of three identical black SUVs.
Vice President-Elect Alexander Hammond had arrived.
Bottle of water in hand, she got up from her seat, squeezed past Myers, and walked to the back of the Gulfstream to use the lavatory, her stomach heaving with each step. She locked the door behind her and pressed her back against it. She wasn’t ready to see her father. Not yet. The faces of the agents who’d been killed at the Ritz-Carlton were the only things occupying her mind. She felt hot tears behind her eyelids. She hadn’t known the agents well, yet they had sacrificed their lives for her. They had given up everything, absolutely everything, in order for her to live. What kind of men did that? She wasn’t worthy of such sacrifice. She clamped her eyes shut, emotions caught in her throat, warm tears rolling down her cheeks.
“Heroes do that,” she whispered to herself. She wiped the tears away angrily, as if she was mad at them for their audacity at falling.
I should have taken the time to learn more about them, about their families, she thought. I didn’t even know most of their names.
She had taken them for granted. And it was true for Clay too. It wasn’t until today that she had truly realized how much he meant to her. She was an idiot. How had she been so blind? She looked down at the ring on her finger and lightly touched it. She wished he was here now, with her.
Veronica glanced at her reflection in the small mirror above the sink. She grimaced at the darker patches of skin around her neck. Her eyes were puffy and sad. Her brown hair hung limp around her shoulders. She turned on the water faucet by pressing the blue and red buttons and then squirted the cheap soap into the palm of her hand. She scrubbed her hands, picking at some imaginary dirt beneath her nails. When the water stopped, she repeated the process. Then she washed her face and tied her hair into a bun, pushing away a few strands from her eyes. On her left, above the roll of toilet paper, was an alcove with courtesy bags stacked on top of each other and secured with a blue rubber band. She grabbed one of the bags and yanked the zipper open. Inside were a toothbrush, a minuscule tube of toothpaste, a pair of earplugs, a small bottle of hand sanitizer, two Tylenols, and a condom.
She opened the Tylenol packet, put the two pills in her mouth, and swallowed them with some water from her bottle. She then brushed her teeth and drank more water. By the time she was done, she was feeling much better, but angrier too. She needed answers, and by God she was going to get them.