The Election (3 page)

“We do have one other problem that needs to be addressed,” stated Randolph matter-of-factly.

“Go on,” insisted Milton as he returned to his seat.

Randolph watched each of his partners intently as he described the last remaining obstacle to world domination and recommended how to eliminate it. He watched carefully for any sign of disagreement. Pierce was of no concern; the man wasn't brave enough to cross Randolph. If there were to be a problem, it would come from Milton.

The room grew momentarily silent when Randolph finished speaking. Pierce's face showed only submission. However, Milton—as expected—appeared concerned. But since Randolph was convinced of the problem's resolution, he refused to be challenged. He set his face in its most unwavering expression to convey an unspoken message to Milton:
On this issue there is no other option. We must follow my recommendation for our own safety…and the implementation of the plan.

“Collateral damage?” Milton inquired. Looking anguished, he rubbed his nearly bald head.

“It will be kept to a minimum,” assured Randolph. He discerned Milton's capitulation and knew his message had been received. A small assurance, and the pact would be sealed. “We only desire to eliminate the problem, not create new ones.”

Milton stood up, put his coat on, and left the room without saying good-bye to Randolph or Pierce. Randolph knew that nothing else would be said, or needed to be said. The matter was closed. The last remaining obstacles would soon be removed.

After Milton left, Randolph placed a call, dialing the number from memory. Only a few words were spoken. But with those few words, the process to eliminate what the Federalists believed to be their last remaining obstacles was set in motion.

Reed residence, Jackson, Tennessee

Jake Reed would have preferred to hear the sounds of activity, but that was too much to ask this Monday morning. It was only the second full week of the school year, and his children were not yet accustomed to the early-morning wake-up call after a summer of leisure. He was partially dressed—trousers and undershirt—when he looked at the clock on his nightstand and realized it was already seven fifteen. Jake hated being late.

Rachel, his wife, always awoke before Jake. He slept while she had her morning devotion time and until after she had prepared lunches for the kids. She got the kids started on breakfast, let the dog out for his morning constitutional, and then took a shower. Most days Rachel took the kids to school. But on Mondays she went to a women's Bible study at a local church, and carpool duty fell to Jake. He found Rachel in front of the bathroom mirror, getting ready for the day. Rachel had a running feud with one little twirl of hair in the front, and it always took at least thirty minutes each day to either defeat it or surrender. And Jake knew that surrender was rarely an option.

“Do you think you can help hurry the kids up?” Jake asked Rachel as he squinted over her shoulder into the bathroom mirror and manipulated his necktie. His six-foot-one-inch frame made it easy for him to see himself over her. “We're already going to be late.”

“I'm almost ready,” Rachel replied. “And then I'll go check on them. Just settle down. You've got plenty of time.”

Jake saw her glance at his image in the mirror.

“That tie doesn't match your suit by the way,” she added.

“What do you mean it doesn't match?” He frowned.

“I mean it doesn't match. You need to find one with blue in it.”

“I don't have time to change.” Frustrated, Jake began looking for the kids to evaluate their level of readiness. “Have you even brushed your teeth?” he asked Courtney when he met her coming down the stairs, still in her pajamas. “We're running late.”

Courtney was the oldest of the three children. The other two were boys: Brett and Jeremy. Courtney was nine going on nineteen and decorated her room with the latest teen singing sensation. Brett and Jeremy were in the process of redirecting their attention, and inextinguishable energy, from summer-league baseball to schoolyard football.

Courtney had her mother's auburn hair and blue eyes; Brett and Jeremy, their father's brown hair and brown eyes. All three were a deep bronze from a summer of countless hours at the country club swimming pool.

“Dad,” Courtney retorted, “I'm way ahead of you. It's the boys who are wasting time.”

Jake wasn't crazy about the attitude in her voice, but he realized she was right. Charging up the stairs, he found Brett rummaging through his dresser for his favorite shirt.

“Brett, will you please just put on the clothes Mom laid out for you last night?” Jake said as he watched from Brett's door. He meant it more as a directive than a request.

“But Dad,” Brett whined, “I don't like that shirt. It looks like a girl's shirt, and all my friends will laugh at me if I wear it.”

Jake knew his response had to be forceful, or they'd never get out the door. “I don't have time to argue with you. Just put it on.”

Jake retraced his steps down the staircase and returned to the kitchen. That's where he found Jeremy, still in his pajamas, his face nearly buried behind a big bowl of cereal as he watched the television on the counter.

“C'mon, Jeremy, time to get dressed,” Jake insisted as he strode toward the master bedroom to finish dressing. He glanced back. Jeremy never took his eyes off the television.

“Honey, can you help me with Jeremy?” Jake pleaded as he entered their bedroom to heed Rachel's advice and change neckties.

Rachel was now standing in their walk-in closet, selecting her attire for the day.

“We're never going to make it to school on time,” Jake finished.

She rolled her eyes at his impatience.

But Rachel had a way with Jeremy, Jake knew. Probably because Jeremy was the baby of the family. Whatever the reason, she was always able to coax him into compliance. So Jake was glad when she slipped her slender figure into a pair of blue jeans and a T-shirt bearing the logo of the Tennessee Titans and went to try some motherly diplomacy on Jeremy and the other two kids.

Finally the children were ready. Backpacks were filled and zipped. Lunch boxes were packed, and everyone appeared to have on clothes that actually matched. Brett needed to run a comb run through his hair, but if that was the biggest omission, then they were OK. They might make it to school on time after all, thought Jake.

“Shotgun,” screamed Brett as the children bounded down the steps into the garage.

“But you were in the front seat last time,” Courtney yelled.

There was only one way to solve the argument. “Everyone is riding in the backseat,” Jake pronounced.

When he glanced at Rachel, who stood at the door, he knew dismay was written all over his face. Rachel gave a wry grin and waved good-bye. He couldn't help but chuckle to himself as he climbed into the driver's seat and saw the kids through the rearview mirror trying to get their seat belts fastened. He reached into the backseat and helped Jeremy with his seat belt, then looked back at Rachel again.

Jake could see Rachel laughing as he backed the car out of the garage. He smiled at her and waved good-bye before pressing the remote control to close the garage door.

Jake drove a four-door Volvo 860 Turbo. Burgundy with tan leather interior. Seat warmers were standard, but they wouldn't be needed for a few more months yet. It was a safe, practical car, but had just enough yuppie in it to impress his friends.

After delivering the children to their assigned destinations, Jake began the short drive to his office. The traffic was lighter than normal for a Monday morning. He had the air-conditioning system set to its highest level, because the August heat was oppressive, and Jake didn't like the feeling of his perspiring back sticking to the leather seat. West Tennessee was in the middle of a summer-long drought, and the clear, blue sky meant at least one more hot and humid day without rain.

The radio in Jake's car was always set to the local talk-radio station. Today's topic was last week's Democratic National Convention. Jake turned the volume down and finished the drive in silence. He preferred to stay away from politics. The hypocrisy made him sick to his stomach.

Jake's office was half a block off the court square in downtown Jackson. Convenient to the courthouse but impossible for clients to find a parking place. He had heard that complaint more than once.

He turned left onto Main Street, which led past his front door. The office was located in a row of buildings with common walls, much like the old part of Williamsburg, Virginia. The exterior was stucco and the color of eggshells. The hunter green front door proclaimed Holcombe & Reed, Attorneys-at-Law on a brass plaque. The building, once a funeral home, still maintained several of its characteristics. Barrett Holcombe, Jake's partner, jokingly told people that dead bodies were no longer kept in the basement, just dead files.

Jake turned left into an alley just past the dry cleaner's, drove along the end of the row buildings, then took another left into the parking lot behind his office. Not many of the office buildings in downtown came with employee parking, and Jake was glad his law firm was one of them. He pulled into the parking space marked Reserved for Mr. Reed. His space was the second one from the back door. Barrett used the closer space.

Jake popped his wireless phone from the hands-free dash mount, grabbed his dictation recorder from the console, and exited the Volvo. The back door to the office required a key for access, and Jake fumbled with his set until he found the right one. Jake had learned early in his career that lawyers never enter through the front door of their own office, for fear that the one client they do not want to see is sitting in the lobby. Once safely inside, he zigzagged through the hallways toward his office in the back right quadrant.

“Good morning, Jake,” his assistant warmly greeted him as he rounded the last corner.

Madge Mayfield was in her midfifties. She had been a legal assistant for thirty years and had been working for Jake the last five. She was widowed, slightly overweight, and always dressed professionally, even on casual day at the office. Her brunette hair was peppered with gray, and eyeglasses dangled from a thin chain around her neck.

“Good morning, Madge,” Jake replied as he walked into his personal office and hung his coat in the closet. “What do we have this morning?”

“You have a real-estate loan closing for Jackson National Bank at ten and a meeting about probating the Thomas estate at eleven-thirty. There's also a meeting on your calendar at nine this morning with Mr. Jedediah McClellan, but I'm not sure what it's about.”

Jedediah McClellan
. Jake repeated the name in his head. Everybody who knew him called him Jed. Jake had helped Jed with a workers' compensation claim a few years earlier. Jed had received a nice settlement, Jake got a big fee, and everybody was happy. That's the way Jake liked his fees—big.

“I spoke to Jed last week,” Jake remembered. He had set the appointment himself. “He told me he was having trouble with the mortgage on his house. I told him I would take a look at it. I believe the note is held by Jesse Thompson's bank, but I'm not certain. If it is, then Jesse is probably robbing Jed blind. I doubt there's anything I can do about it, except to help Jed file bankruptcy.”

Jake didn't plan on his meeting with Jed lasting very long. He had more important things to attend to today. “What else do we have?” he asked Madge as he shuffled through the morning's mail.

“That's it for the morning,” she replied. “You have a couple of appointments after lunch.”

“Hold my calls, and let me know when Jed gets here. I'm going to try to finish some dictation.” He laid the unopened mail on Madge's desk and returned to his office, closing the door behind him.

The interior of Jake's office was tastefully decorated but not too elaborate. A mahogany desk with matching credenza and bookcase rested against the wall opposite the door. The bookcase contained law-school books Jake had never used since then and also displayed pictures of Rachel and the children. Two wingback chairs, supposedly for visitors, were covered with stacks of files. On one corner of his desk sat a telephone and an antique brass lamp Jake had purchased at an estate sale a couple of years earlier. The entire desk surface was cluttered with various drafts of letters, court documents, unopened mail, Post-it notes, and file folders.

The walls in Jake's office were adorned with prints of lawyer-related paintings and pictures drawn by his kids. “The Brag Wall,” as lawyers called it, displayed his college and law-school diplomas, and his license to practice law.

T. Jacob Reed had graduated from the University of Tennessee in May 1992. He and Rachel had begun dating while both were sophomores and had married the summer after graduation. Rachel's shoulder-length auburn hair, striking blue eyes, and long legs had made her one of the most desired girls on campus. Jake considered himself lucky to have married her.

After their wedding Jake and Rachel moved to Nashville so Jake could attend law school at Vanderbilt University. He had excelled and graduated magna cum laude in May 1995. There were offers from large firms in Atlanta, Georgia, and Charlotte, North Carolina, and Jake wanted to pursue them. But Rachel persuaded him that Jackson, Tennessee, her hometown, was a better place to raise a family. He knew she was probably right. However, the glamour of the big law firms still intrigued Jake. At times he wondered what it would have been like had he gone to Atlanta or Charlotte.

Barrett Holcombe had been practicing law for twenty-two years when Jake graduated from law school and came to work with him in May 1995. They were both glad when Jake passed the bar exam in July of that year. It was Barrett who taught Jake how to make a comfortable living as a lawyer in a small town. Five years later Barrett offered Jake a full partnership, and their two-man practice had thrived ever since.

“…and that letter needs to be faxed to Judge Prickett's secretary so maybe we can finalize the court approval later this week,” Jake spoke into the dictation machine. “Finally I need to prepare a letter to the attorney for—”

“Jake, Jedediah McClellan is here to see you,” interrupted Madge over the phone's intercom.

“OK,” Jake responded, turning off the recorder. “I'll be right out.”

Jake couldn't believe it was nine o'clock already and wondered if he could finish his appointment with Jed by nine thirty. If so, he'd have time to complete his dictation before his ten o'clock real-estate closing.

Jake left his office and headed down the narrow hall to the front lobby. The old wooden floor creaked with each step. He opened the door to a small but lavishly decorated lobby and found Jed McClellan perched on the settee against the wall near the receptionist's counter.

“Jed,” he called, “come on back to my office.”