Page 42 of The First Gentleman

Pearce slides his feet off the desk and positions himself so that he and his guest are eye to eye. “Rachel, I’ve heard that the vice president may be spreading baseless rumors that someone is trying to sabotage the president.”

Bernstein’s expression doesn’t shift. She doesn’t even blink.

“Listen, Rachel. I remember the convention, how upset you were when your boss agreed to take the VP spot.”

“Agreed? I’d say he was forced.”

“Let’s play it this way,” says Pearce, his voice level and calm. “All rumors, all remarks—whether they’re coming from the vice president’s hospital room or your office across the street—are to stop.”

“I don’t work for you,” says Bernstein.

“I didn’t say you did. But anything and everything that involves this administration belongs to me. I own it.”

“You don’t ownme.”

“Maybe not. But I can make it hard for you to get your job done. So hard that you might start considering one of those lucrative offers you’re getting from the private sector.”

Bernstein is smiling now. Pretty smile. Perfect teeth.

“Let’s play itthisway,” she says softly. “In my position, I don’t know everything, but I know a lot. And from what Vice President Faulkner has said in the hospital, I know that you and the president are working on a legislative deal that’s highly compartmentalized. I know it involves entitlements. I know enough to put some activist bloggers on the case. With the right poke, the whole thing will pop like a balloon. So stop threatening me. It makes you look small.”

Pearce digs the fingernails of his right hand into his left palm.A trick for managing his anger. “We’re done here,” he says. “Go to your meeting.”

Bernstein picks up the inauguration photo. She turns it around so it faces Pearce again. “I like this office, Burton,” she says, standing up and smoothing her dress over her hips. “And I’ll do what I have to do to make it mine.”

CHAPTER

34

Rhode Island Maximum Security Prison

According to former Boston PD detective Eddie O’Halloran, an inmate named John DeMarco had confessed to killing Suzanne Bonanno.

Actually, what DeMarco did was brag about the killing to another inmate, soconfessedseemed like a strong word. That inmate owed a favor to Eddie and tipped him off, after which Eddie got Garrett approved for a prison visit.

So Garrett is here. Only one visitor is allowed, but that’s not a problem, since Brea is going back to Seabrook on a mission of her own.

Garrett shows his ID multiple times and goes through two metal detectors, a pat-down, and a wanding. He leaves his keys, wallet, change, and phone in a locker. He tries to hold on to his pen, but a corrections officer shakes his head. “Ever see a guy with a Bic through his brain?”

As he waits, Garrett runs through the facts O’Halloran gave him about the convict he is about to meet. DeMarco is doingtime for aggravated assault, weapons possession, and armed robbery. And it’s not his first stretch as a guest of the Ocean State.

“Is he connected?” Garrett asked.

“Slightly,” said O’Halloran. DeMarco was a soldier in what was left of Boston’s Angiulo crime family. “Not really a family anymore,” O’Halloran said. “More like a few distant cousins trying to resurrect the good old days. They don’t scam a gift card without a nod from the Providence Mob.”

Garrett moves through security into the visitors’ room, where he’s surrounded by gray concrete walls and guards with guns. At octagonal orange tables, inmates in khaki pants and smock-like shirts sit across from wives, girlfriends, children, or social workers in street clothes.

A loud buzzer sounds, and a metal door on the far side of the room slides open. A uniformed corrections officer steps into the room, followed by a thickset inmate with tattooed arms. A second corrections officer points to Garrett. The inmate locks his eyes on him as he walks over. Even from a distance, he projects menace.

When he gets to the table, the inmate stands with legs spread. “You Wilson?”

Garrett nods. “John DeMarco?”

DeMarco sits down heavily across from Garrett, arms on the table. One of the corrections officers steps up and goes through the interview protocol until DeMarco waves him away.

The inmate angles his head for a better look at the right side of Garrett’s face. “The fuck happened to you?”

Garrett reflexively touches his stinging cheekbone. “Fell in my driveway.”

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