More Than A Place In The Sun 2

By Dr. Kevin Whitten

Woody, Dawn, Ryan, Summer and their friends continue their island adventure as a new political movement takes shape, the Caribbean enters the Space Race and a hostile White House unleashes a bumbling C.I.A. "black ops" team.

Include a flying cat, an unconventional billionaire inventor, a new satellite weapon, a prototype transportation system and some personal payback into the mix.

What could possibly go wrong?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tellwell Talent
• Release date: Dec 7, 2020
• ISBN: 9780228845652

Dr. Kevin Whitten

Dr. Whitten is a Canadian lawyer with a Doctorate in Business Administration. He has held a number of senior positions in the banking industry including Vice President and General Counsel for Manufacturers Hanover Bank of Canada, International Counsel for The Bank of Nova Scotia, Managing Director of Alexandria Bancorp Limited and Chairman of Whitten Bank & Trust Company Limited.He has seen life from the Chairman's office and he finds it very funny, if not completely dysfunctional.

Book preview

More Than A Place In The Sun

BOOK TWO

Dr. Kevin F. Whitten

More Than A Place In The Sun 2

Copyright © 2020 by Dr. Kevin F. Whitten

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law.

Tellwell Talent

www.tellwell.ca

ISBN

978-0-2288-4564-5 (Hardcover)

978-0-2288-4566-9 (Paperback)

978-0-2288-4565-2 (eBook)

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter One

The President of the United States looked across the resolute desk at his Chief of Staff.

The Oval Office was empty except for the two of them.

Are you absolutely sure about this?

Tom Parker nodded emphatically at the President.

I just got off the phone with Maddox, the head of Fox news and he swears by it. Apparently he got the information directly from someone very close to Ambassador Turner.

If we don’t do something to stop it, the Ambassador will address the G20 meeting in Helsinki in 15 minutes with the intent to slam you and the whole administration.

Who knows how much damage he could cause?

Give me the word and I will contact the Ambassador’s secret service detail to return him from Helsinki immediately and we can issue a press release removing Turner from his position.

The President leaned back in his chair.

Let me think this through first.

Turner is very popular with the party’s old guard and dumping him now may cause more problems than it fixes.

The election is only a year away and I don’t want to do anything to jeopardize my re-election.

The Chief of Staff kept his game face on but he was thinking;

If this moron gets re-elected, I’ll eat my shoes.

All Parker wanted to do was stay long enough in the office to write his tell all book. Until then, he was content to follow any and all instructions that this nincompoop could come up with.

Okay I’ve decided.

The President looked very pleased with himself.

As you know, no one understands people like I do. In fact I may be better at this than anyone else in the world.

Parker smiled at the President.

I think it comes with being a stable genius Sir.

The President squinted suspiciously at his Chief. Was there a note of sarcasm there?

Parker returned the President’s look with his best blank face.

In his head, he was thinking;

How in God’s green earth did this dimwit get elected?

However, if anything the Chief of Staff was a professional.

Excuse me Sir but we are running out of time here. What would you like me to do?

The President spread his hands.

Okay, I want you to call Pastor Mitchell and tell him that he is resigning as Secretary of State as of this moment. If he gives you any trouble, tell him we know about the apartment and the girl.

The President shook his head.

God I love the evangelicals. If they ever started practising what they preach, this would be a very different world.

The President started laughing:

What am I saying? As if that would happen.

The two men shared a laugh.

Okay, you get started and I will call Turner to offer him the Secretary’s job.

Parker looked across at the President.

Excuse me Sir, just so I have this right, you are dumping a man who can’t spell betrayal with another man that is about to disown you in front of the whole world.

Did I get that right?

The President shook his head patiently.

Parker, you can’t begin to understand how a mind as great as mine works.

The higher Turner rises in the administration, the more he and his career are tied to its success.

In a couple of months we will manufacture some excuse to dump him and he will become a footnote in history.

While the Chief thought that this was the stupidest thing he had ever heard, he did recognize that it would make for a great chapter in his book.

Okay sir, I will go and make the call to Pastor Mitchell.

The President smiled.

And when you come back, can you arrange for a cheeseburger?

Also ask my secretary to get Turner on the line.

*    *    *    *

Ambassador Turner turned from the window where he had been lost in thought when he heard the door to his suite open.

Mark Hayden, his assistant, waited at the doorway and spoke with one of the secret service guys. The man nodded and indicated for him to enter into the main area.

The Ambassador looked over to him and raised his eyebrow.

Mark gave a thumb’s up and the Ambassador smiled.

It was at that moment that one of the secure phones carried by the Ambassador’s security detail buzzed.

One of agents answered, gave and received the necessary security codes and asked the caller to stand by.

Mr. Ambassador, the President of the United States would like to talk with you.

The Ambassador reached for the phone and when he turned back to the window for a little privacy to speak, Mark caught the quick smile that raced across the man’s face.

Mr. President, it’s an honour Sir.

Just getting ready for my speech to the G20 delegates. Yes Sir, I’m hoping for a very positive impact.

I’m sorry Sir, can you repeat that please.

As the President repeated his request, the Ambassador could hear one of the other secure phones buzzing.

Yes Sir, I would be honoured Sir. You can count on me. Needless to say, you and the Administration have my full support.

The Ambassador disconnected the call, handed the phone back to the secret service agent and then addressed the room.

Gentlemen, it seems that you are now providing security for the new Secretary of State for the United States.

The room burst into applause.

One of the agents sheepishly approached the Ambassador.

Excuse me Sir, when you were on the phone to the President, you received another call. I don’t know how they got through the security protocols, but someone called Rosie asked that her congratulations be conveyed to you.

The Ambassador smiled knowingly and turned to address Mark who was at his side.

Before the new Secretary was able to say anything, Mark whispered into his ear:

Remind me never to play poker with you Sir.

*    *    *    *

The President smiled at his Chief of Staff.

That’s how you do it. Turner is fully on board and we have him where we want him.

Parker wasn’t so sure about that but who was he to derail the crazy train.

Excellent Sir.

I hate to ruin the moment but you have mustard on your tie.

The President looked down.

Damn, not again.

Chapter Two

Ryan sat in his campus office scrolling through the MSNBC YouTube channel.

There was so much work to do before the University officially opened in 5 days that he found that this was the only way he could keep up with current events.

He was almost at the end of an interview with the new U.S. Secretary of State, when Woody popped his head inside the door.

Ryan froze the video and turned to his best friend and soon to be brother in law.

What’s up? We don’t have anything scheduled until this afternoon.

Woody shrugged.

Not sure myself. Charlie called and asked for everyone to meet in the student centre in half an hour. He didn’t explain but I think it’s important. Charlie seemed quite excited.

Ryan turned his attention back to his computer.

No problem. I’ll finish off this video and then I’ll give Summer a call. I know that she, Dawn, Megan and Tess like to have coffee together in the morning on those picnic tables out where that new coffee shop is being set up.

Woody nodded.

Sounds good. I’ll find Paul and Bernie and let them know.

Presumably Charlie has already spoken to Tommy.

Woody smiled and rushed from the doorway. Ryan could soon hear him running down the stairs at the end of the hall.

Ryan leaned forward to push the play button on the video when he suddenly stopped.

Leaning forward, he carefully examined the picture of the Secretary of State frozen on his screen. Something tugged at the back of his mind.

Why do I have the feeling I know this man?

Ryan leaned back in his chair.

This is very strange.

Ryan shook his head.

I better get my act together if I’m going to make sure everyone is there for the meeting.

As he turned off the computer, he couldn’t quite shake the feeling that he was missing something.

Something big.

*    *    *    *

The girls sipped on their coffee and laughed as Tess told them about her morning.

Honestly that man is going to be the death of me.

For some reason Bernie is absolutely convinced that socks are either right or left.

Have you ever seen someone go through sixty identical black socks trying to match the left and rights up?

That’s two hours of my life gone forever.

If I had my service pistol with me, I think I would have plugged him right then and there.

Summer shook her head.

You think you have problems.

Yesterday, Ryan let me know that he would be coming with me to my yoga class.

Dawn leaned forward.

Why would he do that?

Summer smiled.

Well, you know how hectic it has been around here lately. I think he feels that we haven’t be able to spend enough quality time together.

The other girls nodded.

However I don’t think he has clued into the fact that I look forward to my yoga as a time to spend quality time with myself.

Everyone laughed knowingly.

Anyway he comes and it is a disaster of epic proportions.

He was so bad that he brought the whole class to a standstill. I mean he was terrible.

Megan looked over.

Who was teaching the class? I hope it wasn’t that sarcastic instructor Sam.

Summer nodded.

You guessed it.

So at the end of the session, Sam goes up to Ryan and asks whether they will be seeing more of him in the classes.

Ryan shook his head and made some remark about it not really being his thing.

At which point Sam nodded and said: Thank you Yogi