Free Lady Liberty by Vicki Hinze

he wanted the public to know—information the people had the right to know. The two men used each other for their mutual benefit and never had pretended otherwise. On their opinions of Sybil Stone, they were kindred spirits. They both felt Cap should have been offered the job as vice president and that he had been bypassed for the politically correct choice of the times: a woman. Yet Lance had said he would serve only one term, so unless Cap screwed up big time between now and then, he would snag the Republican Party’s nomination for President. If and when that happened, Sam felt confident the first order of business on Cap Marlowe’s agenda would be to send Sybil Stone packing back to her native Pennsylvania for good—as a private citizen. Provided, of course, the PUSH call had been a hoax and she was still alive.
    Sam rounded the corner and entered Cap’s office. Jean, his personal assistant, was seated at her desk, keying in something at her computer terminal.
    Forty, bright-eyed, conservative, and razor-sharp, she glanced up and smiled. “Hi, Sam.”
    “Good to see you, Jean.” She looked too cool and collected to know the veep was dead. The call had to have been bogus. He nodded toward the senator’s private office. “Is he still in?”
    “For the moment.” She lifted the phone receiver and cradled it between her ear and hunched shoulder. The overhead light glinted on her red hair, twinkled on her gold earring. “Sam’s here, Senator.” She listened and then cradled the receiver. “Go on back. He’s due at a fundraiser, but he can give you ten minutes.”
    “I won’t make him late.” Sam breezed past Jean’s desk and opened the door to Cap’s inner sanctum. The smells of old money, lemon oil, and rubbing alcohol surrounded him. Cap sat at his desk with his sleeve rolled up and his arm braced elbow down on the desktop. Holding a syringe in position, he injected himself. Sam swallowed a sharp breath. “What are you doing?”
    Pushing sixty, white-haired, and still gifted with distinguished looks the camera loved, Cap laughed, crinkling the skin around his eyes. “Not what you’re thinking, that’s for sure. It’s insulin.”
    Sam shoved his hands in his pockets to cover his surprise. “You’re a diabetic?”
    “Twenty-two years now.”
    How could Sam not have known that? And what did he say now? He couldn’t deny that he’d thought Cap had been shooting up. “I’m—I’m sorry. I didn’t know.” Didn’t most diabetics inject themselves in the abdomen or thigh?
    “No problem.” Cap blew off the apology. “I don’t advertise it. People are ignorant and biased as hell. They perceive anything like this as a weakness.” He rolled down his sleeve and slid the syringe into a red biohazard sharps waste box. “What can I do for you?”
    “You can tell me what’s going on at the White House.Staffers are burning high octane, but none is talking. We’re still waiting for the three o’clock briefing.”
    “It’s been rescheduled for nine in the morning. Word came out about five minutes ago, with profound apologies for the delay.”
    “What’s going on over there, Cap?” Should he mention the PUSH call? Probably not, until he had some kind of credible verification. If she were dead, Cap would know it.
    “I haven’t been briefed on anything. If I am, you’ll be the first to know”
    “Thanks.” Still stinging and embarrassed about his reaction to seeing the senator inject himself, Sam made small talk for a few minutes and then left the office.
    Cap had lied to him, of course. He knew exactly what was going on, he just hadn’t wanted to share it at that moment. If running true to form, that translated to his having uncovered something interesting about Sybil Stone, though not her death. Cap wouldn’t be able to contain himself on that. He guarded “deniability” with a vengeance that bordered on religion. He never relayed negative information on the veep or anyone else directly