Split Second (Sean King & Michelle Maxwell, #1)

by David Baldacci

released

“It’s good you can joke about it now.” “If you had asked me eight years ago, I wouldn’t have been so glib. Time doesn’t really heal, it just makes you not give a crap.”

She glanced at him and smiled. “I told you I was a slob.” “Michelle, this is beyond a slob. This is a mobile garbage dump; this is total and complete anarchy on wheels.” “So philosophical. And call me Mick.” “You prefer ‘Mick’ to ‘Michelle’? Michelle is an elegant, classy name. Mick sounds like a punch-drunk boxer-turned-doorman in uniform braids and fake medals.” “The Secret Service is still a guy’s world. You go along to get along.” “Just drive them around in this truck one time, and you’ll never be mistaken for anything but a guy, even if your name was Gwendolyn.”

He looked at King. “Oh, but I’m wrong about that, because now you’re keeping company with one of the Service’s legendary losers. You can start a club, the screwup club. You have the king of them right here. Isn’t that right, Sean?” King had loathed Bishop when he was at the Service, and Bishop had been one of the loudest voices in crucifying King. The intervening years hadn’t mellowed the ex-agent’s feelings one jot. “Careful, Walt,” said King. “I won a libel case and I can win a slander case, and the pleasure it would give me to pickle your teeny-weeny dick in a jar, I can’t begin to tell you.” “I’ll have your soul!” Bishop roared. “I’m not with the Service anymore, so save the histrionics for somebody who actually cares, if you can find one.” “You can’t talk to me that way!” “I’d rather talk to a pile of horseshit than waste one minute of my life with a lightweight peckerhead like you!” King snapped back. “I never let a presidential candidate die because my head was up my ass!” “Your head’s always been in your ass! At least I came up for air.”

“Talk about your reversal of fortune. In less than ten years the guy goes from king of the hill to permanent residence in a nuthouse.”

“Well, we have them all on our radar now. King, Maxwell and Dillinger—a most unlikely triumvirate when you think about it.

The problem is, even if we solve this thing, the damage has been done. I really might have to move from here.” “Running away? That doesn’t sound like you, Sean.” “Sometimes it’s just best to strike the tent poles and move on. You sort of get tired of fighting, Joan.”

“Just checking. I wonder if people lock their doors around here?” “You’re not thinking of going in? That’s breaking and entering in the nighttime.” “Not if you don’t break when you enter,” he said. “Oh, really? Where’d you get your law degree? The University of Stupid?”

My theory is that the South today is no longer the ‘Old South.’ That, in fact, it’s one of the most heterogeneous, teeming pools of immigrants this country has seen since the turn of the last century. I won’t say that it’s quite yet a bastion of liberalism or even radical thought, but it’s not the South depicted in Gone with the Wind, or even in To Kill a Mockingbird. In fact, the fastest-growing population element in Georgia right now is Middle Eastern.” “I can see how the Hindus and Muslims coexisting with the bubbas and the Baptists must be fascinating,” opined King.

someone’s violent death.”

And lastly, my apologies to any passengers on the Amtrak Acela train who overheard me discussing with various experts poisoning techniques for the story line and were probably scared out of their wits with my seemingly diabolical intent. Want more David Baldacci?