Free The Inner Circle by Brad Meltzer Page B

important—back in the corner, just outside his cubicle. Right where Dallas and Rina were first standing.
    There’s a black rolling cart, like you see in every A/V department, with a small TV on top. But I’m far more interested in what’s underneath.
    I push forward, trying to fight through the crowd as it squeezes back, bleeding into other cubicles to make way for the stretcher.
    “ Easy! ” a middle-aged woman in full security uniform snaps, shoving me back with a shoulder.
    It’s just the shove I need. On the lower shelf of the A/V cart sits an ancient bulky VCR. Like the one upstairs, it’s a top-loader. Unlike the one upstairs, the basket that holds the tape is standing at full attention, already ejected.
    And empty.
    No. It can’t be empty! If someone has it… I bite down hard, swallowing the thought. Don’t assume the worst. Maybe Orlando hid it. Maybe it’s still—
    I feel another shove from in front of me. It nearly knocks me on my ass.
    “ Move, people! Show some respect! ” one of the paramedics shouts.
    With a final swell, the crowd packs extra-tight, then exhales and loosens its grip, dissipating as the stretcher leaves the room. Within seconds, there are coworkers everywhere, whispering, talking, the gossip already starting to spread.
    Fighting for calm, I search for Dallas and Rina. They’re gone. I turn around, looking for Khazei. He’s gone too.
    But I hear him loud and clear.
    Of all the people in this room, he came straight to me. And while I still don’t know if Khazei’s threatening me for the book, or just investigating the loss of an employee, based on the intensity of his questions, one thing is clear: The book… the video… the President… even Orlando… There are multiple rings on this bull’seye—and right now, every one of those rings is tightening around my neck.
     
    12
    It was late when Dr. Stewart Palmiotti’s phone began to ring. It was late, and he was comfortable. And as he lay there, toasty under his overpriced down comforter and protected from the December cold, he was perfectly happy to feel himself slowly swallowed by his current dream, a piano dream involving old childhood Italian songs and the pretty girl with the bad teeth who he always sees at the supermarket deli counter.
    But the phone was ringing.
    “Don’t pick it up.” That’s what his ex would’ve said.
    That’s why she was his ex.
    This wasn’t just some random call. From the ring—high-pitched, double chirp—this was the drop phone. The phone that could go secure with the flip of a switch. The phone with the gold presidential seal on the receiver. The phone that was installed in his house two years ago. By the White House Communications Agency. And the Secret Service.
    The drop phone was about to ring again, but as Palmiotti knew, only a schmuck lets the drop phone ring twice.
    “Dr. Palmiotti,” he answered, sitting up in bed and looking out at the late-night snow that had already blanketed his street in Bethesda, Maryland.
    “Please hold for the President,” the White House operator said.
    “Of course,” he replied, feeling that familiar tightening in his chest.
    “Everything okay?” whispered Palmiotti’s… girlfriend ? Girlfriend wasn’t the right word. Girlfriend made them sound like they were teenagers.
    Palmiotti wasn’t a teenager. He was forty-eight. Lydia was forty-seven. Lost her husband to… she called it cancer of the soul. Meaning he was screwing the overweight girl from the dry cleaners.
    It took Lydia two years before she would date. She was happy now. So was Palmiotti. He was happy and warm and ready to dream.
    And then his phone rang.
    Palmiotti didn’t like being on call. He had given it up years ago. But that’s part of the job of being personal physician—and one of the oldest friends—of the most powerful man in the world.
    “Stewie, that you?” President Orson Wallace asked.
    By the time they entered their freshman year at the University of Michigan,