The following chapter was cut from South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem’s recently released autobiography, No Going Back.
The chinook’s rotors pumped a distant heartbeat into the South Dakota night.
“The cartel. They found me.” I flapped away the bed sheets and told Byron to wake the kids.
“Drug runners have military helicopters?” my husband said while hopping on one leg to don his jeans.
“The ones crossing Mexico’s border into South Dakota do,” I said.
“How did they know where to look?”
“I don’t know. But hide the kids in the saferoom of the South Dakota Governor’s Mansion.”
“What about you?” his voice cracked.
“This is why I became a Navy SEAL before becoming governor,” I said. “To become an instrument of war. And I feel like playing a tune.”
I grabbed my Remington shotgun from the fireplace mantle—as my forebearers would whenever the bloodthirsty Sioux itched for scalps—and pumped it with one hand.
“Why did you forego bodyguards,” Byron asked as he headed out the door. “They’d be handy right about now.”
“Don’t need ’em,” I said. “Now, where are my lipstick, eyeliner, and red headband?”
“You’re putting on makeup?” Byron screamed.
“I’ve got appearances to keep up,” I said. “If nominated, I’d be the first woman Presidential candidate in history who men would want to sleep with. But I only have eyes for you, baby.”
He smiled. “Your hair extensions are in the left dresser drawer. I moved them to clean up all the spent shell casings.” He fled to round up the kids.
I’d stared down worse than a bunch of meth-slinging hombres. I’ll fight Mexican gangsters over the Russian mob any day of the week. A Ruskie with a blade attacks like a barnyard cur with a taste for chicken blood. And I’ve killed both.
Heck, Ukraine wouldn’t be in its current mess if the State Department had cleared me to take out Vladimir Putin when I had the chance in the 1990s. We eyed each other from across a small table, drinking vodka, shot-for-shot, in some Nepalese dive bar I was running at the time.
“Make it snappy, Vlad. The Führer’s men are hot to trot, and my old boyfriend wants me to dig up some relic my father gave me,” I said.
“You have, how you say, Nazis in Nepal in 1993?” Vlad said after slamming down his thirteenth upturned glass.
“One kiss from me would melt off their faces,” I purred.
Vlad toppled off his chair into a stupor.
“Stand down, Agent 5,” my earpiece crackled. “Clinton says Putin’s a washed-up has-been who’s no more dangerous than a New Kid on the Block.”
“I don’t know, lieutenant,” I said. “I hear that Donnie Wahlberg has a mean streak.”
“Dammit! Stand down! Don’t be a strong, empowered female maverick who puts country before self! America’s not ready for that!”
I slid my straight razor back into my stiletto-heeled boot. I never listened to authority again.
The chinook rattled the mansion from above. “They’re roping down,” I muttered. Smart. Like how we originally planned on getting bin Laden before the chopper crashed. Attack from above and below. Thing is, unlike me, bin Laden wasn’t ready.
I wasn’t bothered when Rob O’Neill took credit for killing bin Laden. Water off a duck’s back, like the one that I blew apart during my last hunting trip with Dick Cheney. Too bad Liz wasn’t there. Traitor.
But you haven’t lived until you behead the world’s most-wanted terrorist and stand atop his Abbottabad compound to display his dripping pate toward Kabul like Perseus did with Medusa’s to turn the Kraken to stone.
“Señorita,” came a bullhorn-amplified voice from outside. “Surrender and you won’t suffer. Don’t make us remove your fingernails without the clippers.”
“No dice, Mendoza,” I yelled, sidling next to a window to peek outside. “You think you scare me? I stared down Kim Jong-Un at the International House of Pancakes in Rapid City.”
“What the hell are you talking ab—”
“Roly-Poly had done his homework,” I continued. “Donning a busboy’s costume and ditching the Three Stooges haircut. The eyeglasses and acne were a nice touch. I knew it was him the second I saw ‘Kim’ on his nametag. He almost cried when I jerked him by the collar an inch from my mouth and hissed, ‘Kim, a Korean in South Dakota’s like a leprechaun in Loch Ness — unbelievable. Free your people and reunite with the South. You better thank your lucky stars you’re not a puppy and this ain’t a gravel pit.’”
The bullhorn squealed, “Are you done, Señorita?”
“I tell ya, Mendoza, Kim even perfected his English, the way he said, ‘You’re confusing me with someone else.’ Sure, working at IHOP to pay for grad school. Talk about an original cover story.”
Nothing gets me grinning like weapons being loaded and clacked, deafening rotor whirls, and Spanish shouts of “Prepare to die!”— all preludes to war.
“You ready to dance?” Mendoza roared.
I chuckled. “My life has been leading up to this moment. Believe me.”
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