Chapter 8: The Daughter and the Cop

Friday evening

“SIR, WHEN IS IT CONVENIENT for your daughter and me to get together?”

“Call her directly. Whatever she wants is OK with me.”

“Yessir.”

Suzanne punched off and looked at her phone. This was going to be interesting. She pulled up the girl’s number and connected.

“It’s me.”

“Yeah.”

The older daughter was a girl of few words today, apparently. Suzanne remembered how chatty she was when they’d first met a few years ago, a cheerful girl, full of questions as Suzanne, along with other MPD detectives, assisted at a public function the then-senator was attending with his family, not long after they’d arrived in Washington to begin the senator’s first term.

They’d had a connection, Suzanne knew. They’d seen each other from time to time since then, their conversations brief but friendly, and more than once the daughter now code-named “Sunshine” had called her when she had something on her mind. Last night was one more of those calls. Suzanne was someone outside the family Sunshine could talk to but they weren’t friends, not really. Was the girl ever really alone, Suzanne wondered. It was starting to look like she wasn’t, even when she was in her own room in the White House residence.

“Your dad said whenever and wherever you wanted is fine with him. What’s your choice?

“That coffee shop, you know the one. How about tomorrow morning, late? It’s Saturday.”

“See you then.”

Suzanne wondered what the girl would tell her. Everyone thought her a very pulled-together and serious kid. Teens did stupid things, including sharing the wrong kinds of images and texts, but this episode seemed out of character for her.

Saturday morning

Suzanne got to the coffee shop first. She recognized the Secret Service agent who came in to take a quick look around, and nodded when she caught his eye. He returned the nod and moved to take up station at the coffee shop entrance, the glass door open. In a moment, the girl came through the door wearing a black t-shirt with “Not Italian” on the front. A second agent followed her in and closed the door behind him. Suzanne stood up.

“Thank you for meeting me.”

“Hey.”

Suzanne leaned forward to hug Sunshine. The girl did not lean in as she usually did, and their hug was a brief one. The two agents settled at the next table, far enough away to be out of earshot, Suzanne hoped.

“Have a seat, Sunshine. What can I get you?”

“Tea, please.”

Suzanne returned with the drinks and sat down.

“Sunshine, I’ve got to ask you some questions. They’re pretty personal, I know. Are you up for that?”

The girl shrugged.

“Sure, I guess.”

“OK. Heather Guardalabene says Josh seemed frightened in the last few weeks, that people were scaring him. Did you notice this? If he seemed scared, did he give you any hint about who they might have been?”

Sunshine shrugged again.

“Not really.”

She looked out the window.

“I mean, yes, he sounded scared, and he seemed to think they were connected with his father’s business, somehow, but I don’t know how or why. I’m not sure he knew, either.”

“Did he ever feel he was in danger?”

Sunshine stared a Suzanne.

“Yeah.”

Her voice was a whisper, and Suzanne had to lean close to hear her.

“Can you tell me more about it?”

Sunshine shrugged once more.

“I mean, everybody does it. You know, sending pictures and stuff.”

Suzanne kept silent.

“Fooling around, you know? No harm, no foul.”

Her face screwed up.

“That’s the way it’s supposed to be, anyway.”

Suzanne touched the girl’s forearm. She jerked her arm away. Out of the corner of her eye, Suzanne saw the agents at the next table snap to attention at the girl’s movement.

“I’m sorry, Sunshine. Didn’t mean to startle you.”

The girl shrugged. The agents relaxed.

“It’s OK. I guess.”

She moved her arm back, and Suzanne touched her again.

“What’s bothering you, sweetie?”

While the girl collected her thoughts, Suzanne summed up to herself what they knew. Old Josh had sexted with her, but unbeknownst to the girl, at first, he’d also managed to video her reaction while she got herself off. Perhaps he hadn’t captured her fingers between her legs, but anyone who saw the video and the expression on her face knew she was coming. There was something else, Suzanne was sure of it. The video was embarrassing, but it wasn’t that big of a deal. These were kids with powerful parents. Sure, Sunshine was the president’s daughter, but the other kids in her circle weren’t exactly chopped liver.

Sunshine took a healthy slug of her tea.

“It happened last summer. Our two schools are big on the whole fifth year thing so a lot of us were going to be back in the fall for 13th grade, but everyone still felt kind of liberated, you know? By that summer I was eighteen, so was Josh, so was just about everyone in our circle, so there was this whole “We’re adults! We can do anything!” kind of vibe.”

Sunshine snickered.

“Yeah, right. I mean, we’re all going to be back in high school in three months, so the whole “being free” thing didn’t make a lot of sense.” A shrug. “Anyway, we all felt pretty good and pretty loose, right?”

She drank more of her tea and reached for the plate of cookies Suzanne had brought to the table with the tea.

“We were on Martha’s Vineyard, we go there every summer. A gang of us got together every day to fool around. I mean, these people weren’t strangers. Some of them were my classmates, and everyone who wasn’t had been checked out by the Secret Service.