The President's Shadow by Brad Meltzer Read Free Book Online

the First Lady added as Nico headed back to the kitchen and noticed the way the seams in the tile floor formed a hidden crucifix. He saw them everywhere now—around the neck of the waitress at the truck stop, on the young girl in the fast-food commercial that kept running on TV, and—like those first few weeks at St. Elizabeths, when they were worried he would kill himself—in those places no one else sees: hidden in telephone poles and windowpanes…in intersecting sidewalk cracks and perpendicular tree branches…in pens that crisscrossed, extension cords that overlapped, and of course, in the white spaces between the columns of a newspaper, in the blank spaces between the push buttons of a phone, and right now, in the small X’s he had carved into the nails of his four main fingers.
    Four. Always four.
    Four seasons. Four states of matter. Four directions on a compass. Four earth elements. Four chambers of the heart. Four movements in a symphony. And who could forget the four suits in a deck of cards? Nico never forgot the cards.
    In chemistry, the valence of carbon—the basis for all life—is four. In religion, Buddhism has Four Noble Truths, Islam has four sacred months, and Judaism has four questions, four cups of wine, and even writes God’s name with four letters. Darkest of all were Christianity’s Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Always four. Indeed, when ancient tribes first wrote the number four—as just a glyph on a cave wall—they did it by joining four lines into a modern plus sign. An actual cross! One, two, three, four pieces. But as Nico stared down at the four X’s on his nails, he knew that the true Four Horsemen had already arrived. Throughout history, four Presidents had been assassinated. Again. Four.
    It was time for a fifth. There was no choice. All the others were dead. The only way to survive was to move forward! Liberation! he told himself as—
    “ Nico, don’t get fixated! ” the First Lady scolded. “ Forward thinking, not backward thinking! ” she added, stealing the words from the pretty black nurse Nico always responded to at St. Elizabeths.
    “ Forward thinking ,” Nico whispered, readjusting his knit cap and tugging open a nearby kitchen drawer. Inside were steak knives, carving knives, even a cleaver. There were also two small measuring cups whose handles overlapped like a—
    “ Forward thinking ,” the First Lady repeated as Nico slammed the drawer shut and pulled open the one next to it. Forks, spoon s …No, that wasn’t it either.
    He knew what he was looking for. The house was small; no garage, no work shed. That meant…
    He pulled open the last drawer, next to the stove, which clanged as it opened. There we go.
    Tool drawer.
    Nico’s fingers dug to the bottom, burrowing past screwdrivers, wrenches, even a hammer. So much to do damage with. But the only thing he pulled out was a pair of small needle-nose pliers with a red rubber grip.
    Heading for the bedroom, Nico squeezed the pliers, relishing the small joy in the way they sprang back open in his hand. The nurses would never have let him have a tool like this. It’d been nearly a month since he’d escaped St. Elizabeths. A month since Clementine had snuck him out of D.C. and brought him to the best place to hide.
    For the first few days, he couldn’t adjust to the quiet. In the hospital, ever y meal, every shower, even when he was punished in a quiet room, it was all so noisy. He also couldn’t adjust to the color. Or the size. A decade of beige rooms, locked doors, and closed fences made even a two-lane street in Tennessee seem blinding and endless. But by now, Nic o knew what needed to be done.
    Giving a final squeeze to the pliers, he looked down at the four small crosses on his fingernails. Always four. Could any mission be more clear? He’d seen it in his head…plotted it…dreamed it…for years. Four Horsemen had come. Four Presidents were dead at the hands of four assassins. Four assassins. And