MY DESK IS shoved in a corner of the White House basement office called Room W-17, which is the command center for the Secret Service at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Since I’ve been assigned here, one of the few jokes I’ve told about the place to friends and family is that my staff and I are closer than anyone else to the Oval Office, only seven feet away.
That usually brings ooohs and aaahs of appreciation, until I tell them the punch line: I and the others working in Room W-17—also known as Horsepower—are seven feet below the Oval Office.
Not exactly within spitting distance.
My desk has a wooden nameplate my eleven-year-old daughter, Amelia, made for me two years ago with wood and a burning tool that says, in clumsy letters, SALLY GRISSOM, AWESOME AGENT. The only agent who ever laughed at the nameplate is now with Homeland Security, inspecting cargo containers in Anchorage. What the nameplate should say is SALLY GRISSOM, SPECIAL AGENT IN CHARGE, PRESIDENTIAL PROTECTIVE DIVISION, but as much as Amelia enjoys making me gifts, I think if I asked her to make me a new one with my correct title, she just might cry.
A closed-circuit feed from one of the scores of surveillance cameras shows Marine One landing on the South Lawn. Hoo-boy, I think, I bet the President wishes he was still up in the air, circling around, high up from his angry wife and the very hungry news media.
Then I get back to work.
No doubt the rest of the nation is going to be shocked by what’s been uncovered about the President, but not me. Unlike 99 percent of the rest of the Secret Service detail, I’m a DC girl, through and through, and know all about the rumors and scandals that always bubble below the surface here among the pretty old buildings. Politics is politics, and human nature will always be human nature, so why pretend to be stunned?
Mom worked at the Department of Education, while Dad worked for the Capitol Police, and they’re both now in Florida, enjoying sunshine, practicing Tai Chi, and fighting with each other. I have two sisters, one who works for the Government Accountability Office (GAO), and the other for the NSA, and let me tell you, family functions are lots of laughs, with one sister going on and on about budgets and spreadsheets and the other not able to say anything about what she does.
On my crowded desk are two framed photographs: one of Amelia, with her sweet smile and long blond hair—unlike the frizzy brown mop I wrestle with each morning—and another of the both of us, grinning with red, sweaty faces as we finished last year’s Marine Corps 10K, both of us wearing Secret Service T-shirts: “You elect ’em, we’ll guard ’em.”
There’s also an empty space that once held a photo of my soon-to-be—God willing—ex-husband, Ben, one of the faceless, nameless bureaucrats in the Department of the Interior who helps keep our national parks and other treasures running.
That photo’s been gone for almost a year, and since he and his rat bastard—excuse me, overzealous—attorney have come to their senses, our divorce should be final in less than two weeks.
My desk is small, crowded, and located just where I like it. I have another office across the street in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, where I host the occasional dignitary and, more rarely, fire an agent who’s screwed up, but I don’t like being in the big office with all the nice furniture and bookcases and couches and coffee tables. I like it here, right up close with the Man and my people, who spend every waking second of their lives preparing to die to protect him and his poor, put-upon wife.
Then again, I’ll probably use that big office later to debrief Jackson Thiel after his shift ends today and find out how long this affair has been going on—and why he hadn’t told me. Definitely not good, but something for later. I grab a file folder from a thick pile and again wish I spent half the time wasted on paperwork out in a gym or on the range keeping my weapon qualifications current. The phone rings.
“Agent Grissom,” I answer, which surprises some of my coworkers. According to protocol, I should answer the phone, “Special Agent in Charge Grissom, Presidential Protective Division,” which is too much of a mouthful. Suppose someone is in the East Room tossing off a smuggled hand grenade in the time it takes me to announce myself?
But there are surprises, and then there’s this one: on the line is Mrs. Laura Young, the President’s secretary. I can’t recall the last time she phoned me.
“Agent Grissom,” she says, “the President would like to see you, right away.”
“Ah…”
Then one of my agents makes a handwritten notation on the backup status board, reflecting the electronic board. One of the changes I had implemented months ago, in case the power went out. “CANAL is in the Oval Office.”
I say, “I’ll be there,” and I hang up the phone.
I don’t like it.
Scotty sees me and says, “Everything all right, boss?”
I stand up and start walking.
Unless there’s a major emergency or crisis, the President never calls the head of the Presidential Protective Division like this.
Never.
“Boss?” Scotty asks again.
I keep on walking to the office door.
Fast.