Free The Second Shooter by Chuck Hustmyre

does everybody keeping saying the word terrorist?"
    "He tried to kill the president of France," Chris said.
    "The guy with the hot wife?" Jake asked, and he saw Stacy roll her eyes.
    "No, not Sarkozy," Chris said. "He's not even the president anymore, but I don't mean the new one either. I'm talking about Charles de Gaulle."
    Jake looked back and forth from Favreau to Chris, not fully comprehending his friend's words. "The guy from World War Two?"
    "Yeah," Chris said. "But he was president after the war."
    "He's dead, though, right?" Jake said. "I mean he's been dead for a long time. I think."
    "Yeah, he's dead now." Chris said. "But in 1962, when he was president, a dozen French soldiers ambushed his car. Being French, they missed their target, but they did manage to kill a couple of motorcycle cops." Chris pointed at Favreau. "He was the only one who got away. The rest were executed by firing squad. He's had an international warrant out for him for fifty years, Jake."
    Jake turned to Favreau. "Is that true?"
    The Frenchman nodded. "We hit the car with more than a hundred rounds. The bullets just didn't penetrate."
    "So you really are a...terrorist," Jake said, his head reeling. "And all that nonsense about Kennedy..."
    "Was also true," Favreau said.
    "Wait," Stacy said. "What nonsense about Kennedy?"
    Favreau looked at her and said in a calm voice, "I killed President Kennedy."
    "Oh, my God," Stacy said, her tone unmistakable. Not the Oh, my God of someone who just realized the truth behind a great mystery. But the Oh, my God of someone who knows for certain that the person she's talking to is batshit crazy. She looked at Jake, eyes brimming with pity. "Jake, what have you gotten yourself into?"
    "I know it sounds crazy but—"
    The beating of a helicopter cut off the rest of Jake's words. The sound was incredibly close. Helicopters buzzed around Washington all the time, and like everyone else in the nation's capital, Jake had learned to mostly ignore them. But this one sounded like it was coming down right on top of them.
    The big helicopter, a Bell UH-1 "Huey," bounded over a line of trees and swept toward them. For an instant it was just a dark silhouette. Then the night exploded with blinding light. Jake threw his hands up to shield his eyes, but all he could see was a swirling mishmash of cascading colors. Over the whoop-whoop-whoop of the helicopter's rotors, he heard a metallic voice booming through a loudspeaker, "Drop your weapons and lie facedown on the ground."
    Jake didn't have a weapon. Neither did Favreau. They had left the stolen pistols inside the stolen van. They were unarmed. Their hands empty. So why was the guy in the helicopter shouting for them to drop their weapons?
    "I'm sorry, Jake," Chris said. He was clutching his FBI-issued Glock in a two-handed combat grip and pointing it at Jake and Favreau.
    Stacy's face was white with fear as she stared at the pistol. "Chris, what did you do?"
    "He told them where you were meeting us," Favreau said.
    "I did my duty," Chris shouted over the thump of the rotors. "You're an intel analyst, Stacy, not an agent. It's my responsibility to make arrests. Jake is a fugitive. They're both fugitives."
    The helicopter hovered fifty feet above them. The voice boomed from the loudspeaker again. "Get on the ground now!"
    "You heard him," Chris said as he glanced up at the helicopter.
    That's when Favreau moved. He was amazingly fast for an old man, crossing the eight feet of empty ground between himself and Chris almost faster than Jake's brain could register the movement. And clearly faster than Chris could register it. Favreau swept the Glock aside and drove the heel of his palm into Chris's chin. Then he twisted the gun from Chris's hand as the FBI agent collapsed to the ground.
    Someone inside the helicopter opened fire. The weapon was on full automatic, the bullets blowing chunks of asphalt and clods of earth into the air as they chewed up the ground.
    Favreau raised