Corkscrew

No Hesitation

As Rodgers came around the corner, he saw that the man in the watch cap had seized Suzanne’s throat with his left forearm. There was a flash of polished steel in his right hand. He didn’t have to tell Rodgers that the message was “back off or I’ll kill the woman.” Jack didn’t even consider asking the man to drop the knife. He cut to the chase, raising his silenced automatic pistol swiftly and smoothly. A pair of small jagged holes appeared on the bridge of the man’s narrow, aquiline nose, and his head jerked backward with an ugly-sounding snap. His lifeless body loosed its grip on Suzanne’s neck and slumped to the ground.

Berkley titles by Bill Yenne Raptor Force Raptor Force: Holy Fire Raptor Force: Corkscrew A Damned Fine War

Nonfiction Lost Treasure: A Guide to Buried Riches Aces: True Stories of Victory and Valor in the Skies of World War II Secret Weapons of World War II Secret Weapons of the Cold War

RAPTOR FO RC E

CORKSCREW

Bill Yenne

b BERKLEY BOOKS, NEW YORK

THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP Published by the Penguin Group Penguin Group (USA) Inc. 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.) Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England Penguin Group Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.) Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.) Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi—110 017, India Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, North Shore 0632, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.) Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. RAPTOR FORCE: CORKSCREW A Berkley Book / published by arrangement with the author Copyright © 2007 by William Yenne. Cover photographs by Mason Morfit/JupiterImages. Cover design by Steven Fermat. Interior text design by Kristin del Rosario. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions. For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014. ISBN: 1-4295-8771-7 BERKLEY ® Berkley Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014. BERKLEY® is a registered trademark of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. The “B” design is a trademark belonging to Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

PROLOGUE

October 20 7:07 A.M. Central European Time

I

T looked beautiful, Joyce Livingstone thought as she gazed at the dawn’s light on the spires framed against the cobalt blue of the sky. It was cold and clear in Brussels as the big, black embassy limousine glided into the Grand Place, the Belgian capital’s central square. A dusting of frost covered the ledges of the architecturally magnificent buildings above and the cobblestones below. Joyce could see the tracks made by the few vehicles that had arrived here ahead of her car. It was like a Christmas card picture. The first lady of the United States was here for a meet and greet with the city’s mayor, a short tour of the Hotel de Ville, the city hall, and a brief photo op for the few correspondents who followed her, rather than her husband. While his wife was in the ancient, gothic city center, the president would be about two miles to the east, in the

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decidedly modern “European district,” where fashionable steel-and-glass skyscrapers house the nucleus of the European Union. Two of the three main institutions of the EU, the European Commission and the EU Council, are located here. The third, the European Parliament, is located in Strasbourg, but even it has a parliamentary chamber in Brussels. President Thomas Livingstone was in town overnight on a whirlwind tour of Europe that had taken him and the first lady to London and Buckingham Palace the day before yesterday, and that would carry them on to Paris for an official reception at Versailles this evening. In a couple of days, they would be home for the final act of Tom’s reelection campaign. In a couple of weeks, it would be over. It had been a close-fought, often bitter campaign, and it was still neck and neck between the president and his challenger, Senator Wilson Darmader. The international visit had been planned as an opportunity to tidy up the often strained relations between the United States and its European friends, but it didn’t hurt that it would make Livingstone look like a statesman at home. Joyce had mixed feelings about the election. She didn’t want her husband to go down in history as a loser, but the past four years had not been easy. The only time they had seen their grandchildren since last Thanksgiving had been at photo ops. There was a growing part of her that just wanted it to be over. Flanked by the vehicle carrying her Secret Service detail, the first lady’s long Cadillac glided across the Grand Place to the entrance of the Hotel de Ville. The mayor and two of his aides stepped forward as the vehicle came to a stop. The Secret Service man in the front seat of the limousine stepped out to open the door for Joyce, and she

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glanced across the car at Buckley Peighton. The former U.S. Army Special Forces general smiled and nodded. Peighton was an old friend of her husband’s, but he was retired from the service and had no official role in the Livingstone administration. Peighton was as surprised as Joyce was at having been invited on this trip. Tom Livingstone had just called him out of the blue and asked him to look after his wife. When the president asks, especially when the president is an old friend, a military man doesn’t ask too many questions. Tom Livingstone had been asking a lot of Buck Peighton over the past year, and Joyce knew it. She didn’t know exactly what they had been doing—and she didn’t want to know—but she could guess. When Fahrid Al-Zahir and his Mujahidin Al-Akhbar terrorists had left smoking ruins in Denver and Kansas City, and there were thousands of Americans dead on their own soil, the United States had been powerless to act. Without an International Validation from the United Nations, Tom Livingstone was in a corner. It seemed that there was nothing the president could do, but Joyce knew that he had called Buck. A few weeks later, Fahrid Al-Zahir was dead and his Mujahidin Al-Akhbar was in shambles. As far as the world knew, this had occurred without the United States having done anything, but Joyce suspected different. When Sultan Omar Jamalul Halauddin had threatened the world with nuclear weapons, the United States once again had been powerless to act without an International Validation, and again Tom had called Peighton. As before, the antagonist died, and the problem dissipated without the United States seeming to have done anything. When Tom called Buck last week, and it involved her, Joyce didn’t know whether to be very nervous or very assured that the

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man sitting across from her in the limousine was Buck Peighton. Joyce had been making small talk with the general, but it was the small talk of people who had met one another only a few times. It was the small talk of people who knew about one another more than they actually knew one another. Peighton was an old friend of Tom’s from another era, a simpler time when friendship was truly friendship and not an alliance for political necessity. They had gone to school together at Penn a long time ago but had gone their separate ways. Livingstone entered politics. Peighton became a soldier. Peighton retired with four stars. Livingstone became president. Peighton had been to Livingstone’s inauguration party, but they had not had a chance for more than a few minutes of conversation. Then, in that terrible week when Al-Zahir had first struck, Livingstone needed to react decisively, but he couldn’t. The United States had signed the International Validation Treaty, which forbade members of the United Nations to act militarily outside their borders. As an agreement among sane and agreeable nations, it was a wonderful thing. Unfortunately, gangs like Mujahidin Al-Akhbar didn’t subscribe. President Thomas Livingstone had applied for an International Validation to go after the enemy, and the United Nations turned him down. As Joyce Livingstone suspected, her husband had reached out to Buck Peighton to do something—something very covert. There was nobody inside the military establishment that Livingstone could trust as he trusted Buckley Peighton. Indeed, there was nobody anywhere in the government who he could trust as he trusted Peighton. The general recalled that they met in an aircraft hangar in Denver, greeting one another with a mix of joy and guilt,

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as old friends who have been too busy to stay in touch often do. They talked, and Livingstone asked for help. Tom reminded Buck of a story from more than half a century ago. General Claire Chennault was a former Army Air Corps general who went to China to set up the American Volunteer Group to fight the Japanese before the United States got into World War II. President Franklin Roosevelt used him to covertly fight the Japanese invasion of China at a time when the United States military could not yet act overtly. Livingstone had asked Peighton to find him a Chennault, and Buck had. Livingstone did not know, and did not want to know, who it was, but Peighton had found a Chennault—a retired Special Forces colonel named Dave Brannan who planned and executed the demise of both Fahrid Al-Zahir and Sultan Omar Jamalul Halauddin. After the work had been done, Peighton’s Chennault had simply faded away. That was probably just as well. If it came out in an election year that the president had created a secret private army, he could kiss reelection good-bye. Now, something else was afoot. The first two times when Livingstone had called on Peighton, it was against a backdrop of a crisis of immense magnitude with all the world watching. This week, it had been different. No international crisis had preceded Livingstone’s call. He simply told Buck that he had a feeling. He admitted that he had nothing to substantiate the feeling, but Buck promised that he would meet the first couple in Europe and go along for a ride. Peighton was surprised and intrigued. It would probably be uneventful, but Buck Peighton assured himself that a first-class trip through European capitals at government expense couldn’t be all work and no play. Peighton opened the door and slid out, pausing for a

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second to fill his nostrils with the crisp, morning air. As he walked around the limo to take Joyce’s arm, there were three loud cracks almost on top of one another. Gunshots. The head of the Secret Service man nearest the rear of the limousine jerked violently to one side. The mayor and his aides scrambled back up the steps of the Grand Place. Shots were coming from at least two directions. A small number of Belgian cops that had been standing nearby collapsed in a hail of bullets, paying the price for having no body armor. As Peighton turned to push the first lady back into the car, another two Secret Service agents went down with head shots. Their body armor was of no use. There were bullets flying everywhere. With Joyce facedown, only partway inside the bulletproof car, Peighton glanced around. He wished now that he had carried his own sidearm. He had figured that a small army of heavily armed Secret Service agents could handle anything. He—and they—had grossly underestimated the present threat environment. A few feet from the car, a Secret Service man was groaning—actually gurgling more than groaning. Beside him, his weapon lay on the frosty cobblestones. As Peighton reached for the gun, he heard the sound of an accelerating vehicle. Looking up, he had only a split second to see it coming directly toward him. The feeling of being hit was like a powerful electric jolt. It was like slamming your thumb with a hammer, but a million times worse. Time stood still. Peighton felt helpless, out of control. He watched from somewhere outside his own body as he was thrown like a limp pile of dirty laundry into the air. He felt the cold air on his face. The spinning

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images before his eyes disintegrated into millions of tiny granules. Then there was nothing. The pain was gone and a deep sleep enveloped him. The gray Citroën that knocked Peighton to the pavement stopped between the limousine and the steps leading to the Hotel de Ville. A door swung open. Someone sprang out and grabbed Joyce’s left leg and arm. The whole thing had happened so fast that she couldn’t react. She couldn’t move. She didn’t even scream. She just stared in disbelief. As she was dragged into the Citroën, she saw the expressionless face of a young man with short, blond hair parted in the middle. Suddenly, she was filled with rage. She reached up to scratch that face, and maybe the eyes. Then she smelled the clean, antiseptic, overpowering cloud of chloroform spreading from the rag that was pressed over her face. Her reaching hand fell limp.

ONE ONE MONTH EARLIER

September 20 9:54 A.M. Central Time

“

T

HAT’S why Louisiana license plates say ‘Sports-

man’s Paradise,’ ” Greg Boyinson said emphatically, nodding to the two four-point bucks lying in the bed of his pickup. “It’s a little early, but I think this calls for a beer,” Will Casey smiled. “Roger that,” Boyinson agreed, pulling the visor of his Washington Huskies ball cap a little lower on his forehead. “I’m ready.” Neither man was above a drink or two—even four or five—but both made it a rule to avoid tossing down a pint or a shot on the eve of a hunting trip. Now that they both had their deer, it was time for a beer—or two or five. Both Boyinson and Casey were former U.S. Army Special Forces men and both had reputations that still

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inspired awe within the shadowy world of special and covert ops. Boyinson had been a chopper pilot with the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, better known as the Night Stalkers. With the 160th, and while TDY with the Rangers, Delta Teams, and other units that officially don’t exist, he had flown in and out of tight spots on five continents. Once, he saved a platoon of British SAS commandos in the Balkans by flying back and forth through city streets just a few feet off the ground, shooting up an entire Serbian battalion and destroying seven T-55 tanks. Some people claimed that Will Casey was the best sniper ever to serve with American Special Forces. One night he took out seventy-seven bad guys at about a thousand yards with seventy-nine shots. The two misses bothered him, but most people gave him a pass because it was night and pouring rain. On top of that, the two misses were from a helicopter that was bucking hard in high wind. The same storm had already brought down two other Black Hawks also flying at low level. Both Boyinson and Casey had left the service shortly after Operation Raptor, a high-level covert mission into Iran during the late nineties. Led by Colonel Dave Brannan, himself a legend around the special ops community, the extraordinarily dangerous mission was on the verge of immense success when it was abruptly and inexplicably cancelled by the National Command Authority. Thanks to their skill and resourcefulness, most—but not all—of the GIs survived the mission. Good men had lost their lives because someone in Washington got cold feet. Men were angry. Men were pissed off. Some of the best men in the Special Forces—including Boyinson and Casey, as well as Brannan—had left the service as soon as they could.

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A number of years later, when Buck Peighton called on Brannan to form an off-the-books team, the colonel called Boyinson, Casey, and several others—a select group of veterans who he considered the best of the best. The Raptor Team, as they called themselves, had to be the best because they operated beyond official sanction, with no backup but themselves. There were no M1 Abrams tanks beyond the next ridge. There were no F-16 Vipers and no A-10 Warthogs to back them up with a withering air strike of AGM-65 Maverick tank busters or GBU-38 JDAM smart bombs. The Raptors did it alone. They did their job with deadly precision and faded back into the shadows without anyone—except Buck Peighton and Tom Livingstone—knowing they had been there at all. After each of their missions, the men went their separate ways. Often on separate continents. Greg Boyinson was an oil company chopper pilot, operating a Bell JetRanger between a base south of Lake Charles and the company’s nine offshore oil rigs in the Gulf. Will Casey was a professional hunter. When a grizzly killed someone in Alberta or Montana and had to be taken down, Casey got a call. Coyotes killing livestock? One shot, one kill. It was the sniper’s credo. No muss, no fuss. That was Casey’s motto. From time to time, the Raptors crossed paths. Boyinson had invited Casey to go hunting and Will had accepted. With deer, there were steaks at the end of the hunt. Who in the hell wanted to eat coyote? As Boyinson nosed his old pickup onto U.S. Highway 171, heading south toward Lake Charles, his cell phone began squawking. “Shit, it’s the boss,” he said, recognizing the number. “Thought you were off,” Casey said.

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“I am. Got another forty-eight hours. He knows better than to bother me. Must be important.” “This is Boyinson,” he said, clicking the green button. “What’s up?” “It’s out at Tango Platform,” the boss began. “Some bastards have kidnapped one of our guys. I think it’s Bobby Girardeau.” “Bobby? Who the hell would’ve done that?” Over the past few years, the Gulf of Mexico had become a dangerous place to operate. Kidnapping for profit, one of the dirty little secret problems associated with doing business in Mexico, had migrated into international waters. Just as they had been doing off Nigeria for years, it had become common for pirates to snatch people from offshore drilling rigs and sell them back to their companies or their families. Thanks to the International Validation Treaty, the U.S. Coast Guard could do nothing but watch. Usually the men were returned alive, a little worse for wear, but alive. Occasionally, they never came home. Now it was Bobby Girardeau’s turn, and for Boyinson, it was personal. A few months ago, Bobby had been working on an offshore oil rig when he was slammed by an appendicitis attack. With a storm coming in, the rigs had been evacuated, but Bobby was trapped. It was impossible to get him off except by helicopter, and the weather made flying impossible. Nevertheless, Boyinson flew and Bobby lived. Two weeks later, a little girl was born to Bobby’s wife and she had two parents—thanks to Greg Boyinson. That’s why this thing today was personal. “Get the chopper fueled,” Boyinson ordered his boss. “What are you going to do?” “I’ll think of something,” Boyinson assured him. “I will think of something.”

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September 20 10:54 A.M. Eastern Time

S

EC RETARY General Baudouin Abuja Mboma glanced

out the window of his spacious corner office high in the United Nations Headquarters overlooking First Avenue in New York City. It was a blustery day down there, but behind the huge rosewood desk, the most powerful man on earth was warm and comfortable. Thanks to the International Validation Treaty, he literally was the most powerful man in the world. Order and balance in the world was insured because the member states of the United Nations had subscribed to the notion that only the world body could issue an International Validation certification to permit any nation to act militarily outside its borders. Ultimately, Mboma had the power to pull the strings to grant or deny this certification. Baudouin Abuja Mboma had come a very long way from Djambala, the squalid back corner of the Congo where he was born and raised, and even from Paris, where he had gone to university and where he had reinvented himself as an urbane man of the world. As his lofty perch in the United Nations building reminded him, he had reached the pinnacle of global power—and he liked it here. As much as he relished his global power, however, Mboma has succumbed to that sickness that has afflicted nearly every man—or woman—to have achieved such domination throughout history. That is, the insatiable lust for yet more power. Napoleon felt it and so did Stalin. Caesar and Hitler both died of this disease. These men and countless others felt that they could manage the malady, and so too did Baudouin Abuja Mboma. The intercom on his desk hummed. When his intercom

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hummed, it was always important. In order to reach his secretary’s desk, visitors had to be prescreened at half a dozen checkpoints and rescreened at half a dozen more. “Mr. Quintara to see you, sir.” “Send him in. I am expecting him.” Through the years, Enrique Quintara had proven himself as someone who could be trusted. He was the ultimate and stereotypical yes-man. He had no greed for money, the lifeblood of the back rooms of diplomacy. Money meant nothing to him. Unlike nearly anyone within Mboma’s inner sanctum, money could not buy him. The son of a fantastically wealthy Chilean landowner, Quintara had a unique perspective on wealth. He saw it only as a toy, a piece on a board game. He was a diffident man who craved only the opiate rush of the unseen shadow world behind those who romped on the playing field of geopolitical power. Mboma satisfied this craving and was rewarded with a cunning and able lieutenant who gladly delivered complete loyalty. Quintara was a gifted linguist and economist trapped in the bureaucratic backwoods at UNESCO when Mboma had crossed his path in Geneva. Mboma recognized his unique talents and ushered the young man into his inner circle. Quintara quickly made himself an indispensable player in the penumbra behind the bright and public world of the secretary general. By the time that he was twenty-eight, Quintara could speed dial any United Nations ambassador and get his direct line. By the time he was thirty, he could do the same with virtually any head of state in the world. And vice versa. Anyone who wished to contact the secretary general on any urgent matter knew that confidential arrangements could be made through Enrique Quintara.

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Because Quintara saw wealth as a mere toy, Mboma knew that whatever “fees” might be involved in transmitting favors would arrive intact with Quintara on the job. “Buenos dias, Enrique.” Mboma smiled, shaking the young man’s hand. “Good day, sir.” Quintara replied, deliberately responding in English, and showing the senior official the appropriate deference that was due a man of his rank. He even stood at attention until Mboma gestured for him to take a seat. The secretary general liked that in a man. “I have a project that I’d like you to handle for me.” “Anything, sir.” “Normally, you make special pickups of sensitive material for me,” Mboma said, making reference to the bribes, backsheesh, and tributes that are routinely paid to the secretary general as the usual way of doing business at the United Nations. The secretary general wields immense power when steering United Nations funding this way or that and it is only natural that expressions of gratitude be made. It would be impolite not to. “Of course, sir.” “This time, I’d like to have you help me with making some expense payments,” Mboma explained. “This office has been offered a unique opportunity to take a major step toward global unification. And, of course, global peace as well.” “Of course, sir.” “Have you ever been to West Virginia, Enrique?” “No, sir, I’ve been to Virginia several times, of course, because I’ve often been to Washington, but I’ve never been to West Virginia.” “Neither have I,” Mboma admitted. “But I have a project that will be taking you there. If certain people are able

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to deliver on a certain proposal, then I have agreed that their expenses should be offset.” “In the interest of world peace.” Quintara smiled. He understood several languages, and he knew exactly what the secretary was saying in the diplomatic dialect. The secretary general was making a payoff. “It’s a rather outlandish proposal, but the upside potential is enormous. In two or three days’ time, we’ll know whether certain conditions have been met, and if so, I’ll be asking you to go down to a place called Brewster’s Knob. There, you’ll meet with a man and make an initial payment. If all goes according to the plan that I’ve been given, additional payments will be made.” “That will be no problem, sir.” “Thank you.” Mboma nodded. From Quintara he knew he would receive not only absolute loyalty but absolute competence. “And I’d like to have you keep a watch over my investment. This is a very sensitive project, and one with global ramifications, and I’d like you as my eyes and ears on this as things unfold.” “Of course, sir.”

September 20 1:04 P.M. Central Time

C

ARL Carruthers watched as a madman drove a pickup

loaded with the carcasses of two four-point bucks into the parking lot of his operations shack. To those whom he employed, Carruthers was the boss, the independent owner of a half dozen offshore oil rigs. To most of the oil industry, the Carruthers corporation was a small player in a world dominated by larger and larger

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players. Carl Carruthers had taken a chance in deep water that made others skittish. It had paid off. He was worth millions, but Carruthers was still a small player in a game dominated by big players. They were worth billions, and in some cases, trillions. Carruthers was still small enough to know his people personally, and to care when they were in trouble— especially when they were kidnapped off one of his rigs. The madman was Greg Boyinson, and he was mad as hell. “What have those bastards done with Bobby?” “We’re not sure,” Carruthers admitted. “They came onto the rig this morning, armed to the teeth. They stole a bunch of stuff and they grabbed Bobby. The guys patched together a radio and called it in.” “Did you alert the Coast Guard?” “Yes, but they can’t do anything.” Carruthers shrugged. “International waters. International Validation Treaty. What are our options?” “As far as I can see, there’s only one,” Boyinson replied, carefully removing his Winchester .30-06 from the gun rack behind the seat in the cab of his vehicle. “Is the chopper fueled?” “You’re not going out there with a gun, are you?” “Actually, we’re going out there with several,” Boyinson replied, strapping on his sidearm and nodding to Will Casey, who had retrieved his own hunting rifle from the rack. “I don’t know if that’s the best idea,” Carruthers cautioned. “Do you have a better idea?” Boyinson asked. “As General Patton used to say, a good plan executed today is always better than a perfect plan executed tomorrow.” As the JetRanger lifted off, Carruthers wondered if he would see it—or the men inside—ever again.

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Once airborne, Boyinson nursed the helicopter south toward Tango Platform. He would have liked to have opened up the throttle all the way and raced to the platform, but it was a long way, and fuel management played a role in the choices he would have when he got there. As they flew south, Casey loaded both rifles and rigged a gun rest on the open window so that he could steady his aim. They had started the day hunting a quarry for which they had the proper tags. They ended the day hunting a quarry for which they did not have an International Validation. Of course, the banditos didn’t have an International Validation for what they had done, so the sides were even. Boyinson contacted the platform to get the details of the assault. He learned there were six bad guys in two Zodiacs. They had three or more AK-47s between them. In an embarrassing irony, they had trouble starting one of their high-speed inflatable boats when they were making their escape. The good news was that this had cost them about an hour. They still had a two-hour lead—three by the time the JetRanger arrived—but the delay would be useful in the pursuit. Boyinson altered his course. Rather than flying to Tango Platform, he turned to the southwest to head off the Zodiacs as Will Casey scanned the horizon with highpower binoculars. “I have a target,” he said at last. Boyinson immediately took the chopper down to wavetop level and the pair of Zodiacs dropped out of view. The boats were low to the water and it would be hard for them to spot a low-flying helicopter. The boats were also very noisy, and it would be impossible to hear the JetRanger until it was on top of them. Hugging the surface so close that the spray of the salt

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water splashed his windshield, Boyinson edged close to the bad guys. They were making about thirty knots. It wasn’t the top speed for the Zodiacs, but respectable for open water. “What do you see?” Boyinson asked Casey, who was now sighting with his high-power rifle scope. “Your guy is in the trailing boat with two of them. I see four in the lead boat. They’re about thirty to forty yards apart. They don’t seem to have made us.” “Let’s do a rescue,” Boyinson said. “Steady as she goes, Captain,” Casey said, carefully taking aim. In rapid succession, Casey three times aimed, fired, and ejected a spent shell. The first round hit the guy driving the rear Zodiac between the shoulder blades. Aim low, he decided. Take no chances. His second shot impacted the other man’s head and the third shot crashed into the engine. The lead boat shot ahead as the crippled boat sputtered to a stop. As yet, nobody up there had noticed. Greg Boyinson glanced down at Bobby Girardeau as he slid the JetRanger over the Zodiac. This was probably the last thing in the world that Bobby would have imagined just thirty seconds ago. Will Casey climbed into the aft passenger compartment, opened the door, leaned out, and grabbed Bobby by the duct tape that bound his wrists. Bobby was amazed by the strength of this man who could lift all two-hundred-plus pounds of him out of the boat with one hand. With the liberated hostage safely aboard, Will pulled his Heckler & Koch MK23 automatic pistol from its shoulder holster and put three rounds into the Zodiac. As the boat began to deflate and sink beneath the waves, Casey noticed that the driver, whose spine had been severed by Casey’s

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first shot, was moving his arm. He wouldn’t be swimming far with an injury like that, but Will shot him in the head anyway. The men in the lead boat were now aware of what had happened and came about to face the Carruthers Corporation helicopter. They were closing fast and spraying 7.62millimeter rounds wildly when Will Casey opened fire. Four kills with four shots, and three more to deflate the boat. The sniper set his rifle aside and began removing the mass of tape from Girardeau’s wrists with his hunting knife. “I can’t tell you how glad I was to see you guys,” Bobby gasped when he pulled off the strip of tape that had covered his mouth. “I had just ’bout given up—” “Well, look what we have here,” Greg Boyinson interrupted. As he pulled the chopper up from wavetop level, a large fishing trawler came into view about a quarter of a mile away. “That’s the mothership,” Bobby shouted as all three men stared at the vessel. “That’s where they were headed. That’s how they get back to Mexico.” “Fuckin’ pirate ship,” Boyinson snarled. “Let’s finish the job,” Casey said. “I was just thinking the same thing,” Boyinson agreed. “I sure as hell wish I was flying a Little Bird with a rack full of Hellfires.” The last time that he had been flying a McDonnell Douglas MH-6 Little Bird multimission special ops helicopter, Boyinson had tangled with a much more potent vessel, a 206-ton Waspada-class missile ship using twin thirtymillimeter cannons to try to kill him. He had taken it out

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with an AGM-114 Hellfire missile. Designed to terminate tanks, the Hellfire had no trouble doing deadly damage to the aluminum-hulled warship. “I might have the next best thing,” Casey said calmly. “When I was hunting in New Mexico two weeks ago, I came across this joker who was hunting deer with tracers.” “Fuckin’ tracers?” Greg growled. “That’s not very sporting.” “That’s what I thought. That’s why I took the rest of ’em away from him. Laws are made to be broken, but you don’t hunt deer with tracers! That’s just wrong.” “You’re talking about attacking a ship, and you’re worried about hunting deer with tracers?” Girardeau laughed. “It’s a fuckin’ pirate ship!” Boyinson said. “Ain’t no law in the world that covers those bastards . . . except the law of gravity.” Giving Casey a moment to load the .30-06 tracer rounds, Boyinson took the chopper in low and fast. The few men on deck started running, probably to get their weapons. “We’re in luck.” Will smiled as Boyinson banked hard. “They had some welding gear there on the deck, just aft of the bridge.” As Boyinson slowed on his second pass, one man with an AK-47 squeezed off a burst, but the slugs went wide. Will Casey put a large acetylene tank in his crosshairs and squeezed the trigger. Almost instantly, the bridge was swallowed in a sheet of flame. The clown with the Kalashnikov was tossed into the water by the blast. Debris was flying everywhere. Casey put two rounds into the hull where he guessed the vessel’s fuel would be. He was right. The tracer ignited the gasoline and a fireball engulfed the ship’s stern. The men in the helicopter felt the concussion of a larger

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secondary explosion just as Boyinson banked the JetRanger to head for Lake Charles and home.

October 19 8:17 A.M. Central European Time

T

H E light mist that had gathered over the Ligurian Sea during the night had started to burn off. It promised to be a pleasant day. Col. Dave Brannan took another sip of cappuccino and unfolded his International Herald Tribune. The front page was heavily devoted to the Livingstones’ glorious visit to Buckingham Palace. Based in Paris, the International Herald Tribune had long ago been the proud European edition of the powerful New York Herald Tribune. When that great newspaper folded, its Paris “annex” had gone on to become a home away from home for generations of Americans traveling in Europe. Even in the day and age of endless cable television news, the paper is a popular part of the lives of Americans abroad. The man who was still a legend in the whole special operations community calmly turned to the back page of the paper. The Chicago Cubs had won the first two games of the World Series against the Yankees when everyone had expected New York to sweep four in a row. Brannan wasn’t particularly a fan of either team, but it was good to see the Cubbies keep the Yanks at bay. Brannan had come a long way since that night the National Command Authority hung him and his men out to dry in Iran. It was at about that same time that Brannan’s wife had died, and he became a recluse. He spent the next several years in his cabin high in the Montana Rockies,

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hunting, fishing, and occasionally dropping into the nearest trapline tavern for a few pints with friends. Then, Fahrid Al-Zahir and his terrorists reared their ugly heads, and the colonel found himself running Buck Peighton’s private army. Thomas Livingstone could see the results, but he never asked who and how. Peighton wouldn’t have told him about Brannan anyway. A shadow passed in front of the doorway to the little cafe, blocking the sunlight that was starting to stream into the room. Brannan glanced up. It was a beautiful woman in a short khaki-colored skirt and a dark gray sweater. Her long dark hair swept across her shoulders. The perfect shape of her legs and the flawless contours of her body were accentuated by her being silhouetted in the open door. “You’re getting an uncharacteristically late start this morning, Professor.” Brannan smiled. “While you were down here sipping coffee, Colonel,” she said with a smile, “I was working. I was surfing the web for that pensione in San Michele di Ganzaria that the Hungarians were telling us about in the bar last night.” “Find it?” “Yeah, I emailed them . . . told them that we’d be there on the sixteenth . . . seventeenth at the latest,” she said, leaning down and planting a long and deliberately passionate kiss on Brannan’s lips. “They have plenty of room this time of year.” The professor smiled as the young man brought her a cup of cappuccino and a basket of pastries for the table. She put her bag on the floor, pulling up a chair and seating herself next to Brannan so that they both faced the sea. Brannan had met Professor Anne McCaine in the Turkish outback when the Raptor Team was chasing Fahrid Al-Zahir and the Mujahidin Al-Akhbar. He had watched in

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disbelief as this diminutive woman had killed three terrorists. After he had personally intervened to save her from a fourth, he had been even more incredulous to discover that this woman was not a female commando but an archeology professor from the University of Colorado whose dig had been attacked by Islamic fundamentalists. Dave Brannan had been even more amazed when she later used her archeological skills to help the Raptor Team catch Fahrid Al-Zahir. Knowing that it had been Mujahidin Al-Akhbar that had murdered Anne’s husband, Brannan let her deliver the final coup de grace to a stunned Al-Zahir in an apartment overlooking the Seine in Paris. Less than a year later, Brannan was again astonished by the little professor as he watched her convince Sultan Omar Jamalul that a worthless pile of rocks was actually Suvarnadvipa, the Southeast Asian version of Cibola or El Dorado, a mythical city of gold. That was just before he watched her kill this man who had murdered all those civilians in San Francisco. In the meantime, the colonel and the professor had made the transition from a pair of professionals with a high level of mutual respect to lovers with a white-hot mutual obsession. Anne McCaine had gone home to Colorado mourning her dead husband, only to find that he left a portion of his considerable fortune to his twentysomething mistress. Distraught and depressed, Anne had salvaged the phone number of that big Special Forces officer who had saved her life. She went to see him, dreading what she was getting herself into. She found a Montana cowboy who lived off the land high in the mountains, but whose log house had bookshelves that made the place look like the stacks of a university library. There were hundreds, perhaps even

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thousands of books on the shelves amid the gun racks and wildlife trophies, some new, some very old. There was a lot of fiction, but most of the books were not. She saw titles on philosophy and natural sciences. There were banks of books on history—ancient history, modern history, and the history of the Wild West of which the colonel seemed such a part. The books were mainly in English, but she saw works in German, Italian, and a smattering of other languages. In a corner of one shelf, there were even books on archeology. Anne was startled when she noticed an advanced textbook on Mogollon culture to which she had contributed, and she reached for it. As she took it down, she saw that he had bookmarked her section of the text. The notes scribbled into the margins told her that he had actually read it. This big man with the auburn mustache hunted wild game, but quoted Pliny in the original Latin. She had fallen hopelessly in love even before they made love on the buffalo robes on the floor before his huge stone fireplace. From that day forward, she ached to be close to him. His touch was like that of no man that she had ever known. In the months since she had been with him, he had been her obsession. During their days together—spent high in the Rockies, on the Australian Gold Coast, and in Italy’s remote hill towns—she found him as mentally challenging as the most brilliant multidisciplinary scholar she had ever met within the halls of academia. At night, his touch was an addictive drug for which she had developed a physical need. As his powerful hands worked their magic, her body convulsed in waves of orgasms unlike anything she could remember. Where had he learned this? Had it been in some

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Bangkok whorehouse from a mysterious harlot who had known a thousand men and at least that many women? Anne just didn’t care so long as he was beside her. Since she had first crossed paths with Brannan and the Raptor Team during that firefight in the mountains of Turkey, Anne McCaine had also discovered another obsession. At first, the precarious lifestyle of violence and danger had seemed frightening, but she soon found that it was also exhilarating. Adrenaline, she discovered, is an addictive drug. Maybe it was all of those Modesty Blaise novels that she read when she was a girl, or maybe it was the colonel himself. Blood, carnage, and large-caliber rounds fired from automatic weapons seemed inconsequential when he was near. She had found herself nearly as captivated by the thrill of the action as by this man. Her following him into his world of danger and violence alternated with his following her into her world. She had abandoned the petty chicanery of academia for the more unrepentantly lucrative world of private collectors. Primed with a tasty down payment from a well-heeled nobleman near Rome, she and the colonel would shortly be headed for the rustic village of San Michele di Ganzaria in Sicily, near which there were reputed to be some unexcavated Carthaginian tombs. The Roman aristocrat was about to purchase some antiquities from the area, and before he did so, he needed some expert advice. Brannan laid his International Herald Tribune back on the table and gazed at the woman beside him. The Chicago Cubs could win or lose without him—just watching the way that the professor crossed her legs or the way that her freshly dried hair tumbled across her shoulders was captivating enough to make a man forget the World Series. It was what she did with those legs at night, and the way that

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her hair tumbled across his shoulders beneath the moon, that made him forget everything. “What’s in the news?” Anne asked, taking a bite of pastry. “President’s in England. Cubs and Yankees in the Series. Not much else.” “Yankees will win,” she said calmly. “They always seem to.” “Not always. Could I use your laptop? I haven’t looked at my emails for a few days.” “Sure,” Anne said, taking the slim notebook out of her tote bag. Brannan popped open the top and logged on. It still amazed him that even here in a nineteenth-century cafe in a beach town that couldn’t even be reached by train, you could log on to a wireless connection that instantly carried you anywhere in the world. He waded through the morass of refinances, cheap drugs, and Ukrainian brides, finally finding a handful of real messages. His neighbor in Montana wrote to say that he had checked on Dave’s house and all was well. His second cousin had sent a mass mailing about a family reunion that he knew that he would miss. At last, his eyes fell on a message from “old_shep.” “Uh-oh,” he said out loud. “What’s wrong, Colonel?” Anne asked, glancing up from the newspaper that she was now reading. Even after everything, she still called him “Colonel,” as he still called her “Professor.” Like the way some lovers refer to one another by their surnames as terms of endearment, the titles had become nicknames that they both found enticing and a more than a little sexy. “Message from Buck Peighton. Cousin Tom asked him

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to come by and help out again. He’s going to meet Tom at St. Mike’s.” “St. Mike’s would mean Brussels,” Anne said, leaning over to look at the screen. “St. Michael is the patron saint of Brussels. Obviously, Cousin Tom is Livingstone, who the paper says is flying to Brussels when he wraps up in London.” “He says that Cousin Tom hasn’t asked him to bring along anybody else, but Buck asks if I’m on the continent, he’d like me to stop by.” “Mmmm.” Anne smiled. “That means we’ll have to postpone San Michele di Ganzaria, but Cousin Tom is going to Paris after Brussels, and I wouldn’t mind going back to Paris. I fell in love the last time I was in Paris.” “I think that I was already in love by the time we got to Paris on that trip,” Brannan said, making reference to their first few days together. “Touché, mon colonel,” Anne replied in a seductive whisper, kissing him on the lips. “J’ai pensé ainsi.”

October 19 4:56 P.M. Central European Time

T

H E sky hung low like a lead-gray blanket over the Belgian mining city of Namur. The drizzle was flecked with snow—big, icy dollops, not intricate, graceful flakes. It had been snowing in the Ardennes, and by midnight many of the roads would be closed. Jack Rodgers was standing at an aisle window as the train from Luxembourg jerked and twisted its way toward the station. He glanced at his watch. If there were no delays, he could just about make his scheduled rendezvous with Buck Peighton in Brussels.

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As Captain Jack Rodgers, he had served under Colonel Brannan on more special operations missions than either could probably recall and certainly more than they could ever talk about. As private citizen Jack Rodgers, he had killed three Mujahidin Al-Akhbar terrorists and saved everyone on board a hijacked Western Air jetliner. Not long after that, Rodgers had entered the murky gray area between active duty and the civilian world as part of Brannan’s Raptor Team. Between operations, as the members of the team went their separate ways, Rodgers worked as a security consultant. He plied his trade with some of the biggest and most paranoid companies in the world. Most of these companies had triple-A grade in-house security, but when all else failed, there was a number that you could call, and that number brought Jack Rodgers. When Dave Brannan had contacted him this morning, Jack had been in Luxembourg, just wrapping up a gig. Brussels may be the de facto capital of the European Union, and Strasbourg the seat of the European Parliament, but Luxembourg City houses the Secretariat of the European Parliament. It was the security office of the Secretariat that had called Rodgers. The Europeans had been a bit sheepish about having to call an American freelancer, but the job needed doing and they needed the best. Jack thought that it was pretty funny. One would think that a consortium of two dozen countries—backed by Interpol— could come up with some pretty good security men, but they had called him. It was hard for him not to let it go to his head. The sooty train slithered to a stop under the dirty glass of the station’s fin de siècle dome, and Rodgers stepped across the platform to buy a copy of the International Her-

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ald Tribune. He’d returned to his compartment and had taken a window seat as the train again lurched forward. He was joined in the compartment by a Belgian couple in their late fifties. The man wore a little cloth cap and a bulky blue sweater with a grease stain on the front. The woman was overweight and carried an overstuffed plastic shopping bag with the caricature of a heraldic lion on it. Jack watched them out of the corner of his eye for a moment as they argued about a cousin they would be visiting at Auderghem in suburban Brussels, and then returned to his paper. The front page was awash in news of the state visit of the president of the United States and his first lady. There were photos of them at Buckingham Palace yesterday, and details of their European itinerary. Last night it was London and tomorrow night they would be in Paris. Brannan and Rodgers had agreed that Jack would meet Buck Peighton in Brussels. Jack was close enough to Brussels that he could scoot up by train and be there by evening. Brannan and McCaine would take the train up from Italy and rendezvous with them in Paris. A blast of cold air filled the compartment when Jack’s two companions clattered off the train at Auderghem. There was a chill in the air, but it wasn’t snowing north of Namur yet. The forecast called for unsettled weather over the North Sea, with a chance of rain mixed with snow over the Flemish plain and the Brussels area. Rodgers knew that “unsettled weather” was just a cryptogram from a meteorologist unsure of what was going to happen. It was dark by the time the train crawled into Brussels’s Gare du Midi. The light mist made the neon that spread across the city’s facades look like costume jewelry on velvet. Jack liked Brussels. It was less pretentious than Amsterdam

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and considerably less ostentatious than Paris. Still, it was a good cafe town, with a lot of tiny bistros filled with an amazing variety of good beer. Rodgers took a little-used side entrance when he left the station, caught a tram on the Boulevard du Midi and rode it for two stops. The tram had not been very crowded. It was just past rush hour, and not many people were traveling toward the city center tonight. Near the Palais de Justice, he found the rendezvous point, a little hole-in-the-wall pub, bathed in the warm, red glow of its Duvel sign. Two men in cloth caps, like the one worn by the man on the train this afternoon, came out. They slapped each other on the back several times, then ambled down the narrow sidewalk in the opposite direction. A small car bounced slowly down the street as the woman driving negotiated her way between the parked cars. Other than this, the street was quiet. Jack crossed the street and went into the dimly lit tavern. The center of attention for the three men at the bar was a sporting event on television. A pair of lovers were arguing at a table near the front window, so Rodgers took a table near the back of the otherwise empty establishment and ordered a foamy glass of Rodenbach Grand Cru. Being a typical Belgian tavern, it had racks of glassware crammed into every square inch of the back bar. In Belgium, where beer connoisseurship verges on being a religion, every beer requires a glass of a unique shape, and woe to any publican who does not stock the correct glass for each beer. Also, woe to any publican who doesn’t stock at least three dozen beers. Jack was taking his first sip when the retired four-star general walked in. His ears were red from the cold and he appeared to be out of breath. “Sorry I’m late,” he said as he sat down. “I was at the

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embassy reception for our friends and it was a bit hard for me to just slip away.” Peighton ordered a glass of golden ale from St. Feuillien, a picturesque little brewery down at Le Roeulx, and described the reception that was being held that evening at the American Embassy in honor of President and Mrs. Livingstone. “I hope that the first couple are enjoying their brief visit to the Benelux,” Rodgers said. “They seem to be,” Peighton replied as the waiter in the long, black apron brought his chalice of ale. “What brings us together?” Jack asked. “When the colonel called, he said you weren’t sure. I turned on the television, and started buying the papers. It all seems pretty routine. Before when we called there was some sort of crisis going on. This time there isn’t, so I’m kind of in the dark.” “Frankly Jack, so am I,” Peighton admitted. “He said to meet him, so I came. I’ve talked to him for all of ninety seconds. He said that he’s having a problem here that’s complicated by the fact that, all of a sudden, he doesn’t know who else he can trust. He even wants me to escort Joyce on her visit to city hall in the morning.” “Who can’t he trust?” Rodgers asked. “Secret Service? People in the administration? Who?” “He didn’t say. He just seems concerned. It was something that was picked up in random electronic chatter. He thinks that it may have something to do with Mrs. Livingstone. That’s why he wants me to look after her. He said something about a corkscrew.” “A corkscrew? As in getting screwed or a literal corkscrew?” “I think that it’s a figure of speech. He said that it came

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up in a Secret Service briefing. They specifically used the word kurketrekker, the Dutch or Flemish word for corkscrew. Tom told me that he had a sense that it may be some kind of an inside job,” Peighton explained. “He got the impression that somebody inside the Secret Service might be involved. He said he couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but he wanted me here to keep an eye on Joyce.” “Do you think he’s just being paranoid?” Jack asked. “There are always a lot of peculiar things coming through the Secret Service that don’t amount to anything. He’s up for reelection, that could make anybody go crazy.” “It’s a crazy business. This guy Darmader is slick cutthroat head to toe . . . and his manager is Justin Underwood, who is about the most notorious mudslinger in Washington. Anybody who pulls the other guy’s high school transcripts is an asshole. I’m ready to vote for Livingstone because of the fact that he got in trouble when he was fifteen.” “So what.” Rodgers grinned. “I spent most of my own junior year in the principal’s office.” “What did . . . ?” “I rewired the public address system in the school.” “What . . . ?” “You don’t want to know,” Jack assured the general. “Back to the operation. Do you think that Darmader and Underwood are involved?” “I wouldn’t put anything negative past people like them. It’s a presidential election, and that will make somebody do some pretty outrageous things. I wish we knew what Underwood has up his sleeve.” “It has to be subtle, and I don’t know what Underwood could possibly do over here,” Jack observed. “What about this being an inside job? Does he think that Underwood has penetrated the Secret Service? What do you think?”

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“I’m not sure about that, but I also got a sense that something is going on. When I was poking around at the embassy before the Livingstones showed up, I sensed that people were definitely concerned about some rather odd message traffic that was coming and going. I couldn’t tell exactly what.” “I’m surprised that you got that close to message traffic.” “Oh, being a retired four star has certain privileges,” Peighton said, smiling for the first time since he’d sat down. “There’s a guy named Avery Anderson that I knew back at Fort Bragg when he was a colonel in intelligence. He’s on the staff here at the embassy. He said he’d meet me tomorrow at noon away from the embassy. That’s after I go to city hall with Joyce. I think he may have the information that could provide the key to this whole thing. I’d like you to be there too.” “Did the president ask you to officially activate the Raptor Team?” Rodgers asked. “No, he did not. I knew that you and the colonel were on the continent, so I just wanted you nearby in case something happened. You might as well be there when I talk to Anderson so that you’ll know what I know. I’m supposed to meet him at the atrium cafe in the Radisson Hotel.” “Are you talking to the president in the meantime?” “I’ll try to talk to him tonight. We’re both staying at the embassy. That will make it easier than usual . . . unless the walls have ears.” “Now who’s being paranoid?” “See you tomorrow at noon. Hopefully we’ll know more about this mysterious ‘corkscrew.’ ” Rodgers remained at the table as Peighton made his way to the door. He wondered about why they were here. What

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was bothering Livingstone so much on the eve of the election? Was Wilson Darmader that much of a threat? Was Darmader trying to screw him, or screw with him? Was all this just politics? Jack felt like the weatherman who used the phrase “unsettled weather” to cover himself while he tried to figure out what was going to happen. Could it be that Livingstone had gone off the deep end and planned to use the Raptor Team to keep himself in office? Now, who was being paranoid?

TWO

October 20 7:07 A.M. Central European Time

P

E RC H E D sixty feet above the Grand Place in an upper room of the Maison du Roi, directly across from the Hotel de Ville, Leo Verstegen rubbed his gloved hands together. He was indoors, but in an unheated room, and it was very cold. Rotund and ruddy faced, with the look of a prosperous businessman, Verstegen had been born in Ghent, a couple of hours northwest of Brussels in the Flemish-speaking region of Belgium. He was born into the ruins of postwar Europe, a continent exhausted and devastated first by Nazi conquest, and then by liberation. Early in Leo’s life, his father had decided that there was no future in the grim, gray rubble, so he picked up the family and set sail for his country’s colonial empire in the heart of Africa. The Belgian Congo, a swath of central Africa nearly eighty times larger

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than Belgium itself, had been the private hunting reserve of King Leopold II for nearly four decades before 1908, when the monarch generously gave it to the country that he ruled. The Congo was known as a place where a man could live well if he was well connected, and if his ancestors had been born in Europe. At least Leo’s father met the latter criteria. He did better than he might have in war-weary Belgium, but not much better. For a while, the Verstegens got on pretty well in Africa, but the fifties were a time of great upheaval on a continent that was ruled mainly by people whose ancestors had been born in Europe. Gradually, the British and French tried to get ahead of the curve of nationalism by beginning to groom their subjects for self-government. The Portuguese and the Belgians, hoping that nationalism was a passing fad, dragged their feet. When independence did finally come to the Congo in 1960, it was amid a whirlwind of chaos, civil war, and bloodshed. The Verstegens, like most people whose ancestors had been born in Europe, abandoned the Congo for Belgium, but Leo stayed. The Congo was the only home he had ever known. Barely into his teens, but smart, shrewd, and fiercely independent, he saw opportunity amid the turmoil. Leo Verstegen, amiable and streetwise, quickly succeeded as his father had not. He ran scams that exploited the lawlessness of the country and ran several businesses. Naturally good with a gun, he also did side jobs as a mercenary, one of career fields where there were always opportunities for shrewd young men who could handle a variety of small arms. He came to love the acrid smell of gunpowder, the feel of plastique, and the elation of seeing his men crush guerrilla units four times their number.

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They came to know him by his affectionate nickname, the White Rhino. His career as a gunslinger was cut short in the early seventies on a moonless Mozambique night when a land mine killed three members of Verstegen’s unit and severely damaged his left leg below the knee. Recuperating in Belgium, the White Rhino soon discovered that, within the complex theater of power politics being played out across Europe, there were numerous opportunities for a clever and congenial young man who could put together profitable deals under even the most trying of circumstances. As he began to discover, Europe had pulled itself out of its postwar feebleness and presented a wealth of opportunities that were often rewarded by wine, women, and wealth— the lifestyle that Leo had learned to enjoy. Verstegen checked his watch. Within an hour he’d be at a table in his favorite cafe, enjoying a cup of black coffee and a hard-boiled egg. But now he had to wait. He didn’t like waiting, but he knew he didn’t have to wait long. He studied the rooftops of the Grand Place and the guild halls that surround the Grand Place with his binoculars. The American Secret Service always had sharpshooters on rooftops when the president visited a public place. The same with his wife, apparently. He could see one on the Hotel de Ville and one on the brewer’s guild hall to the east. He imagined that there was also one above him amid the filigreed parapets of the sixteenth-century Maison du Roi. Far below, a long black car entered the Grand Place accompanied by a vehicle filled with the Secret Service. Verstegen had an excellent view as the bodyguards swarmed about and as the door facing the Hotel de Ville opened and a woman got out.

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October 20 7:07 A.M. Central European Time

A

S Joyce arrived at the Grand Place, the president’s motorcade turned off the Rue de la Loi and delivered him to the elevator on the uppermost of the four levels of underground parking that crouched beneath the fourteenstory Berlaymont Building. Livingstone and Secretary of State John Edredin reached the large European Commission boardroom on the thirteenth floor without incident. Steve Faralaco, Livingstone’s hardworking chief of staff, was already there and he saw to it that Livingstone and Edredin each were offered a cup of coffee as they shook hands with the Danish foreign minister and a couple of commissioners who had arrived early. Today’s plan was for a “working session,” which meant that there would be no formal speeches, only discussions around a table large enough to accommodate at least one diplomat from each of the EU member countries. The true “working” had already been done by staffers who had stayed up for a half dozen nights running to hammer out an agenda. The president’s visit to the European Commission was essentially like that of his wife’s to city hall, a meet and greet that was high on symbolism and long on photo op. The symbolism was the substance. The Europeans liked to be noticed. Never happy to see the United States develop a worldview without consulting them, the Europeans are always delighted to be recognized with a personal visit from the young nation across the Atlantic. Like aging relatives, they detested being ignored. As Livingstone made small talk with the Danish foreign minister and Edredin opened his briefcase to arrange

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papers for the meeting, Steve Faralaco felt his cell phone begin squirming in his jacket pocket. He reached to shut it off, but noticed that it was the Secret Service. He had better take this one. “Holy shit! . . . My God! . . . Yes, I will. I’ll tell him.” Everyone within earshot looked at Faralaco as his face went pale. “What the hell is it, Steve?” Livingstone asked, perturbed that his chief of staff was cursing in front of the Danish delegation. “It’s Mrs. Livingstone, sir. She’s been kidnapped . . . by terrorists!” Livingstone grabbed the phone. “This is the president. What’s going on? What’s happened to Mrs. Livingstone? Where is she? Who’s got her?” What he heard was devastating. “She’s been abducted from in front of the city hall in Brussels, by as many as three armed terrorists in a gray Citroën . . . not more than fifteen minutes ago. Four Secret Service men were shot and two are dead. General Peighton, who was accompanying Mrs. Livingstone, is seriously wounded and he may also be dead.” At that moment, two members of the president’s Secret Service detail entered the room, fingers instinctively touching their earpieces. They too were getting the call. “We have to get you out of here, sir,” said Walter Meril, chief of the president’s personal Secret Service detail, taking the president by the arm. When a major incident occurs, or when a dangerous threat is perceived to be present, it is standard procedure for the Secret Service to immediately remove the president from the area and to get him back to Washington or another secure location from which he can manage the executive branch.

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“I just can’t believe this is happening!” he moaned. “I was with her less than two hours ago. There were Secret Service everywhere. I just can’t believe it! Steve, I need you to find out what these damned Arabs want, so we can figure out what to do about it.” Moments later, as the EU foreign ministers were starting to reach the thirteenth floor for their working session with the president of the United States, they learned that the president had already left the building.

October 20 7:19 A.M. Central European Time

T

H E gray Citroën left the square and raced through the ancient, narrow streets that twist and contort through the center of Brussels. Still mainly deserted at this early hour, they offered a maze in which the kidnappers could lose themselves for a short time. Secret Service snipers on the Maison du Roi had managed to get off several shots, but with the first lady inside the car, there was little they could do. Within seconds, the vehicle was out of sight. In only a matter of minutes, Brussels police would be stopping every gray Citroën, and indeed every gray or silver car of the same general size and weight class, but for now it was alone. Before one minute had passed, the car had slipped into a short, narrow, curved street of warehouses. On the convex side of the curve, located in such a way that it could be seen from neither end of the street, was the open door of an automobile repair shop. The old, wooden doors were swinging shut even before the Citroën had come to a halt inside,

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leaving the street once again still and quiet in the gathering light of the new day. As Joyce was pulled, still groggy from the chloroform, from the backseat and injected with a tranquilizer, she went almost unnoticed by three men in dirty coveralls who were already expertly taping brown paper over the windows of the car. The dented grillwork, spattered with General Buckley Peighton’s blood, had to be removed, cleaned, and repaired. This was an unexpected extra in the work at hand, but these people were professionals. The driver of the Citroën, a woman the others called Ilse, removed her long black wig, changed coats, and climbed behind the wheel of a black Mercedes-Benz that was parked in the garage with its trunk lid up. The other two kidnappers wrapped the limp first lady in burlap and placed her in a hollow area in the bottom of the trunk, then covered it with carpeting. It would be virtually impossible to conceal a body completely in a car, but these measures would fool a hurried or inexpert examination of the trunk. Provisions had also been made to allow fresh air into the compartment and to keep the exhaust fumes out, so that the next leg of Mrs. Livingstone’s state visit would not be her last. The blond man who had chloroformed Joyce and bound her wrists with duct tape removed his false mustache and got into the passenger’s seat of the Mercedes. He glanced at his watch and smiled. They had spent just over ninety seconds in the garage. The door opened and closed once again. The Mercedes rolled to the end of the block, then turned into a wider street where it slid quietly past a pair of police cars going in the opposite direction, their lights flashing.

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Back in the garage, the growing ree-ah, ree-ah of police sirens could be heard in the distance as the four men finished covering the exposed parts of the Citroën and began painting it dark brown, the color of the chocolate for which Brussels is famous. A gray car had been used in the kidnapping because a light color could more expeditiously be covered by a darker color, such as brown for example. The brown paint was chosen more for its quick-drying quality than for durability, because this car wasn’t going anywhere. As the paint dried, the four men rolled a delivery truck from the corner of the garage into a position where it blocked the door. Having been painted, the Citroën was moved to the corner and jacked up. The engine would be quickly dropped and the front tires removed. Using a modified vacuum cleaner, the men in coveralls would spray a thin coat of dust over the car and the surrounding area. Had the Brussels police arrived just a half hour after the gray Citroën, and had they stumbled past the van with a broken axle that blocked the larger doors of the garage so solidly, they would have been shown the documentation proving what they could see with their own eyes. That is that the only Citroën in the place was chocolate brown, not gray. It had obviously been in the repair shop for at least a week, and it hadn’t been in drivable condition since it had come in.

October 20 7:40 A.M. Central European Time

J

AC K Rodgers had taken a room at a comfortable but

nondescript little hotel near the center of town, and he went down to breakfast later than normal. He had planned to arrive at the Radisson early and do some looking

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around. He was just pouring his second cup of coffee when he heard a commotion in the lobby. Someone had come in from outside and was talking excitedly to the desk clerk. Whatever they were saying, it was interesting enough to have gathered a small crowd. Rodgers casually stood up and stepped closer to the door leading into the lobby. It sounded as though the man who had come in from the street was talking about a kidnapping that had something to do with the visiting American president. Someone else was saying that he thought it unlikely that anyone would be able to kidnap the president, what with all the bodyguards he had. The desk clerk turned on the television set and tuned it to Sky News. The talking head was flanked by a still photo of a smiling Joyce Livingstone. “Terrorists believed to be driving a gray sedan have forcibly abducted Mrs. Joyce Livingstone, the wife of the president of the United States,” he explained as a “Breaking News” banner appeared on the screen. “In the process, at least two American Secret Service agents were killed. Brussels police have sealed off the entire city. They expect to locate the missing woman within a few hours. The president, who was to have been taking part in high-level discussions at the European Commission in Brussels has been taken to Air Force One and will be departing shortly for Washington.” So the other shoe had dropped. Last night, Rodgers and Peighton had wondered what in the world the president feared. Now it had happened—or had it? Was the abduction really what he had feared, and if so, why had he not been straightforward with Peighton? Was Wilson Darmader involved? Had American politics really devolved to the point where a candidate for president

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of the United States would actually kidnap the other guy’s wife? Jack headed for the street. He decided to walk in the general direction of the Radisson and to phone Peighton on the move. It was only about ten American blocks, or somewhat more if you counted every little alley off the Rue des Bouchers. He could hear police sirens everywhere, but other than that, things seemed relatively normal on the street. He dialed Peighton’s number, with its 303 area code prefix. It rang and rang. The general had been with the first lady and obviously he had a lot on his plate. Rodgers would try again later. Just as he was about to click off rather than letting the connection roll over to voice mail, someone answered. “Hello,” the voice said in a tentative tone, spoken with a faint trace of east Texas around the edges of the vowels. It was definitely not Buck Peighton. “Oops, sounds like I got me a wrong number,” Jack said. He was sure that he had dialed correctly, so he stayed on the line to see who had answered the general’s phone. “Who were you trying to reach?” “Buck . . . Buck Peighton.” “I’m afraid that Mr. Peighton is not available.” “Why not? Who are you?” “This is Agent John Jefferson Davis of the United States Secret Service. Who are you?” “I’m just an old army buddy who’s here in Denver for a few days,” Rodgers explained, feigning that he was assuming Peighton and his cell phone to be at home, and not halfway around the world. “I see,” Davis said, processing the information.

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“What are you doing with his phone?” Jack queried. He might as well keep this guy off guard. “Mr. Peighton cannot come to the phone,” Davis replied, his slight Cajun twang belying his waspish name. “Can I take your name and number?” “No, I’ll call back,” Rodgers said as he hung up. Now it was his turn to have to process information. Davis would soon discover that the call came from an untraceable cell phone, but Rodgers would have to stop using it and switch to another. He paused at the plate-glass window of a coffee shop when he saw a news bulletin appear on the television set inside. The creeper at the bottom of the screen mentioned Buckley Peighton. He was unconscious and not expected to survive. No wonder he couldn’t come to the phone.

October 20 10:01 A.M. Central European Time

“

W

HO took her?” barked President Thomas Livingstone. “What do they want?” “We don’t know who took her,” Walter Meril replied, his voice tense but steady. “There have been no statements yet. But if this is anything like a typical terrorist kidnapping, we should know something very soon.” “This isn’t a typical terrorist kidnapping!” Faralaco explained firmly. “This is the wife of the president of the United States! Find out what’s being done!” Tempers were frayed aboard Air Force One as the president’s aircraft climbed out of Belgian airspace. U.S. Air Force F-15Cs of the 48th Fighter Wing out of RAF

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Lakenheath in England formed up to escort the big VC-25. Flying top cover were about a dozen Royal Air Force Tornado ADV fighters. This Anglo-American show of force would protect the president as he made his way across the Atlantic, but the barn door had already been open too long to protect his wife. “I’ve been in contact with the Brussels police,” Meril continued in a calm monotone. “They’ve sealed off the area and are searching everything that goes in or out. They’ll stop every gray Citroën in the country, if necessary.” “Who can this be?” Livingstone asked, wringing his hands. “What and why? What Islamic fundamentalist gang is it this time?” “Mr. President,” said Faralaco, “I don’t think we’re sure that they’re Islamic. Reports are that the woman driving the car had black hair, but both the men with her were blond. That may rule out the usual suspects. We don’t know whether there’s been any communiqué stating their demands.” “What about Buck Peighton?” Livingstone asked. “He was there . . . he was injured. Is he all right?” “He was hit hard and tossed some distance,” Meril explained. “The last bulletin that was relayed to me said that he was still in surgery and that it didn’t look good.” “Keep me posted on his condition,” Livingstone said. “He was a friend, an old and trusted friend.” With that, the president closed his eyes, pulled off his glasses, and leaned back in his chair. Faralaco nodded to Meril and the two men left his compartment. For the moment, nothing more could be done. He felt alone. Even when things had been their darkest, he could confide in Joyce and he could call Buck for help.

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Buck’s private army, his Raptor Team, had performed magnificently when everyone else was powerless. Now, when he needed them most, the Raptors were out of touch, because it was only through Buck that he could reach them. Who could have done this? Every day the Secret Service processes a staggering number of potential threats to the president. The majority, indeed well over 99 percent, are obviously not credible, but that leaves hundreds that require investigation. It is not the job of the president himself to worry about these. It would drive a person insane. But, this one was different. It cropped up about a month ago, and it appeared again a week or so later. Then it reappeared on the eve of the trip to Europe. They said that maybe it had something to do with Joyce. That was all he needed. If Joyce was involved, that made it personal. Livingstone called Buck Peighton. Livingstone regretted the last call he had made to Buck. If he had not done that, he could call him now. He could call Buck and tell him to find Joyce. All the resources of the United States armed forces and its intelligence and law enforcement organizations had been mobilized to find her, but Tom Livingstone yearned for Buck and his Raptors. Sometimes, you don’t miss something or someone until they’re gone. He missed Buck. Tom Livingstone’s head was spinning. In one split second, it seemed, he had lost his wife and the only man he was sure that he could truly trust. Both were probably still alive now, but the odds were even that he’d never again see them alive. Who could have done this? Livingstone’s thoughts kept coming back to one man. But why would Wilson Darmader do something so outrageous and so reckless?

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October 20 10:02 A.M. Central European Time

F

AR beneath Air Force One, across the English Channel in France, a nondescript middle-aged couple of indeterminate nationality disembarked from the train at the Gare de Lyon in Paris. Nobody really noticed Col. Dave Brannan and Professor Anne McCaine as they wheeled their luggage toward the side exit facing Boulevard Diderot. The headlines at the news kiosks already screamed “Joyce Emprissoné!” and “Joyce dans le Cage!” Somehow, American first ladies garnered far more sympathy in the European press than their husbands. The French had continued to swoon over Jackie Kennedy for decades. The colonel and the professor had gotten their first news of the kidnapping when someone boarded the train in Auxerre with a newspaper. Brannan had gotten the news about Peighton when he contacted Jack Rodgers. “Do you think that this is it?” Anne asked as they stepped out into the blustery October weather. “Is this why the president called Buck Peighton to Brussels? Did he suspect that something like this was coming?” “Anything is possible.” Brannan shrugged. “Jack said that the president told Buck that he thought the ‘something’ might involve his wife. With Buck incapacitated, we don’t know.” “Should we be trying to find Joyce Livingstone?” “When Livingstone called on Buck last spring and last winter, it was to get us to do something that the armed forces and the CIA couldn’t do because of the International Validation Treaty. Kidnapping is clearly a traditional crime, so this time, Interpol and every law enforcement outfit in

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Europe will be bending over backward to cooperate with the FBI and the Secret Service to find her. International Validation doesn’t even figure into it.” “I see what you mean.” Anne nodded. “Before, you guys were handling hot potatoes that nobody wanted to touch. This time everybody in the world wants his hands on the action.” “Yeah, that’s why I don’t even want us to get mixed up in this thing until we have some idea of what’s going on.” “But you told Jack to go ahead and keep Peighton’s meeting with this guy Anderson?” “It can’t hurt,” Brannan smiled. “In case we do get involved down the road, it wouldn’t be a bad thing to have a little independent intel of our own . . . just in case.”

October 20 2:51 P.M. Central European Time

T

H E automobile traffic on Rue des Bouchers was in chaos, but Jack Rodgers was on foot. The police were still frantically searching gray Citroëns all over town, even though they probably realized that it was just an exercise in pointless desperation by this time. Rodgers knew that Buck Peighton would not be making the noon rendezvous at the Radisson, but Avery Anderson still might come. Jack didn’t know whether Peighton had told Anderson that their lunch would be a threesome, but if he had, Anderson may still come. Rodgers and Brannan had agreed that it was a case of nothing ventured, nothing gained. If Anderson did show up, and if he could shed some light on the situation, why not know what he knew? The Radisson Hotel, especially its bar, was abuzz with

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people talking about the abduction. Jack found a place at the bar where he could keep an eye on the door. He picked a pair of American businessmen who’d obviously had quite a bit to drink and struck up a conversation. Within two minutes, they were treating him as though they’d been drinking together all day, which was exactly what he wanted. He didn’t want to stand out, but he hoped that Anderson would. He wasn’t disappointed. Avery Anderson was obvious, but he was very late. He was a tall man about a dozen or so years younger than Buck Peighton. Although he wore his hair longish, he walked in the erect manner of an ex–military officer. He stood out. The security analyst gazed carefully around the room, looking for the man Peighton had told him about, but Rodgers was all but invisible between the two businessmen. Moments later, Anderson was startled when someone behind him asked, “Have you heard how Buck is doing?” “He’s out of surgery but still critical. Who are you?” “I’m the person you came here to see. You knew Buck wouldn’t be here, so he must have told you I’d be here.” “He mentioned you,” Anderson said as a perky young lady carrying a pair of menus stepped up to escort the two Americans to a table. “You obviously know who I am . . . tell me about you,” Anderson said, carefully sizing up the scruffy-looking man in the faded raincoat. “You can call me Jack,” Rodgers explained, reaching across the table to shake Anderson’s hand. “I served under General Peighton as you did. I left the service as a captain. Special Forces.” “If I did call you ‘Jack,’ would I be using your real name?”

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“Actually, you would.” Rodgers smiled. “What did the general tell you about me?” “Buck said he had a man he could trust. Someone who could help us.” “Help you do what?” “I could be digging my own grave by telling you this,” Anderson began, “but I trusted Buck Peighton, and I don’t have time not to trust you. As you apparently know, Buck and I knew each other back at Bragg. As you may know, after I got out, I went over to the State Department as a European security analyst. I was surprised to see him over here, but when he said that the president had invited him to come in on this official tour, he didn’t have to tell me that it was more than just a case of Tom Livingstone padding the guest list with an old college buddy. It was rather strange that he showed up when he did, but it wasn’t hard to figure that it wasn’t a coincidence.” “What do you mean?” “Just before the president arrived, we were getting some strange traffic on secure lines. Nothing that you could really put your finger on, but it raised some eyebrows.” “Something about a corkscrew?” Rodgers asked, leading the Sate Department man. “He briefed you on Kurketrekker?” Anderson sounded surprised. “Only just a bit,” Rodgers said. “He said he didn’t have much information.” The two men each ordered a bowl of Waterzooi, the seafood stew made with potatoes in a creamy tarragon and fennel broth that is popular in Belgium. “I’ll admit that we don’t know what Kurketrekker is or what it means, and neither does the Secret Service,” Anderson explained as the waiter left.

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“I’d assume that it has something to do with what happened this morning in the Grand Place, wouldn’t you?” “Probably, but I don’t honestly know. Is that what you think?” “I’m still putting the pieces together.” Rodgers shrugged. “Sometimes the obvious conclusion is the right conclusion.” “Did Buck say anything about the Blauwe Lantaarn?” Anderson asked. “No,” replied Rodgers as though it didn’t matter. Was Anderson starting to play with him? At the moment they were nothing more than Dutch or Flemish words—just like Kurketrekker—but they obviously stood for something more. “How does a ‘blue lantern’ fit into all of this?” “It’s not a light fixture, it’s a place. It’s a seaman’s bar in the port of Ostend up north. The phrase was mixed into the chatter along with ‘Kurketrekker’ yesterday.” “How do you know that it’s not just a blue lantern?” Rodgers parried. “You know, like in the old Robert Johnson blues song where he says ‘The train left the station with two lights on behind . . . the blue light was my blues, and the red light was my mind’?” “Maybe, but the Blauwe Lantaarn is an actual place,” Anderson said when the two bowls of stew and the obligatory pommes frites had arrived. “Have you been there?” “No.” “It might be a good idea, don’t you think?” “You mean go there?” “Do you have a car?” “Yes, it’s just outside.” Rodgers just nodded.

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As the two former U.S. Army officers finished their lunch and paid their bill, Jack kept his eye on a young woman in a purple sweater at a nearby table. He could guess by her paperback that she was American, and it was obvious to him that she’d been watching them. She had been watching them for a reason. There was a sense of recognition in her eyes. She had tried to conceal this, but had only succeeded in making herself even more obvious in the process. She was the kind of woman who was attractive without being glamorous, beautiful almost in spite of a conspicuous effort to appear understated. There was a spark of recognition in her eyes, but he couldn’t tell which one of them she had recognized. Rodgers mentioned the woman to Anderson as they walked out of the Radisson, but he hadn’t noticed her. On the street a cold wind was blowing and it was getting dark. Evening comes early in the northern latitudes in October, especially with storm clouds blowing in. Anderson’s Opel Vectra was parked in an alley several blocks away, so they turned up their collars and walked as fast as they could. As they came up to the car, Anderson stepped into the street to unlock the door. Neither of them noticed a van that had slowed to a crawl about a block away. The older man was explaining the distance to Ostend and which road to take when suddenly, the van shot forward. Anderson’s voice stopped abruptly as his body slammed against the car. Neither of them heard the spit of the silenced gun. Two bullets ricocheted off the lamppost behind Jack as he dropped to the cobblestone street. He drew his own gun and lunged for a space between the cars from which to

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return the fire, but the unmarked delivery van was gone, vanished like an apparition. It was quiet on the side street when Rodgers reached Anderson. There were no other cars or pedestrians in sight. The only noise he could hear was the roaring of traffic on the nearby boulevards, which seemed so far away. Anderson stirred slightly. A bullet had torn through his left shoulder blade, and he was breathing in deep, shallow gulps. Rodgers pushed him into the backseat and rammed the car into gear. There was a hospital five minutes away, and it had an emergency entrance. As he steered into the center of the drive-through ramp and leaned on the horn, two attendants ran to the car. He pushed the door open and quickly told them in French that the man had been shot and needed help. As they pulled Anderson onto a stretcher, Jack told them he’d go park the car and be right back. One nodded and waved, but they were both too busy with Anderson to really even notice Rodgers as he drove away. He wasn’t coming back. He headed through the green light at the corner toward a blue lantern in the north. As he wheeled the small car around the traffic circle at the far side of the Parc Elisabeth, Jack knew he’d be better off taking the highway through Aalst rather than the expressway. It would be a much longer drive, but there would be more flexibility in dealing with the roadblocks that had probably been imposed since Mrs. Livingstone was kidnapped. As he passed through the last fringes of the Belgian capital, the road narrowed to an undivided three lanes and the rain began. He slowed, knowing that the west pavement might soon be a minefield of icy patches. For the first time since breakfast, he let himself relax. He turned on the radio. He had missed the news, but he

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caught a weather announcer predicting rain from the nowdislodged frontal system that was dragging itself across Flanders. Tomorrow there might be clearing—or it might continue to rain. Unsettled weather.

THREE

October 20 8:07 P.M. Eastern Time

“

I

didn’t think you’d still be here, Mr. President,” Steve Faralaco said as he stepped into the Oval Office with a sheaf of papers. The chief of staff was wasted beyond his limits and he couldn’t imagine that the president was not at least ten times as mentally and emotionally spent. Even before Air Force One touched down at Andrews Air Force Base, Faralaco had been dictating press releases and fielding calls from congressional leaders and nearly every state governor. The president had asked that certain calls be put through—including a half dozen key foreign prime ministers and the congressional leadership from both parties—but in most cases, it was Faralaco who explained that the president was simply not available. They understood. “You know, Steve, I’m so exhausted I can’t keep my

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eyes open, but I really don’t want to go up there,” Thomas Livingstone said, nodding in the direction of the White House living quarters. “I dozed off, and when I woke up it took me a minute to, you know, remember what has happened.” Livingstone’s head was spinning. Here he sat surrounded by the most absolute security in the world and Joyce was being held by terrorists somewhere. On his ride in from Andrews on the Suitland Parkway, he was escorted by two dozen armed vehicles, including armored Humvees. AH-64D Apache attack helicopters were overhead. Traffic around the White House was blocked off all the way to K Street. All this was done, for him, when onetenth of one percent of it could have saved Joyce. “Have you heard any more from Belgium?” Livingstone asked Faralaco. “We’re still getting updates from the embassy and the CIA about every ten or fifteen minutes, but there’s no news. The FBI is on the ground and working with the Belgian police and Interpol. There are roadblocks at nearly every intersection in Belgium, but they haven’t found the car. To date, there have been no credible ransom demands. There’s been a couple of Islamist websites and a separatist group in Corsica claiming responsibility, along with a bunch of people asking for money, but nothing credible.” “What about Buck Peighton?” “He’s still unconscious,” Faralaco explained. “They’re not calling it a coma yet, but he’s unresponsive. The embassy is keeping an eye on him.” “I hope that Joyce wasn’t injured,” Livingstone said sadly. In the back of his mind, he imagined her bleeding to death in a dark room. He wished for some word from the kidnappers—anything. He imagined her pleading for her

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life in a grainy video, but even that would tell him that she was alive. Not knowing was just eating him up inside. “The whole world is hoping and praying for the same thing,” Steve Faralaco reassured him.

October 21 2:07 A.M. Central European Time

I

T had been just past midnight when the rain stopped, re-

placed now by a thick ground fog. The landscape that skittered past his headlights melted into a monotonous scene that reminded Rodgers of a succession of blurry X-ray photographs. He had taken a wide detour around Aalst and had circled north between Ghent and the Dutch border on little-used local roads. Even so, the network of roadblocks that the Belgian police had thrown up in the hours immediately after the abduction caused horrendous traffic tie-ups and his progress was painfully slow. The later it got, and the farther he got from the capital, the more the traffic thinned and there were fewer and fewer stops. He was confident that he would be in Ostend by daybreak. He’d find the Blauwe Lantaarn, and perhaps resolve at least part of the mystery. Just after he crossed the A-17 expressway south of Brugge, Jack began to have the feeling that he was being followed. Most cars in this part of Europe carried a pair of yellow foglights below their regular headlights. The car behind him now was missing one of its foglights, which was in itself not unusual, it was just that he’d remembered noticing a similar car in his mirror near Ghent. The possibility of two cars with missing foglights cropping up in his rearview mirror on these lightly traveled back roads in the

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middle of the night was a plausible coincidence, but nevertheless suspicious. Rodgers had long since learned the value of being skeptical of plausible coincidences. When the car turned onto a side road and was swallowed by the foggy darkness, he breathed a sigh of relief. However, when it reappeared ten minutes later, Jack realized that someone was following him. Was it the gunman who had shot Anderson? How long had that car been back there? In the heavier traffic near Brussels, it would have been easy not to have noticed. It seemed possible that they were letting him lead them to Ostend. If they had known about the Blauwe Lantaarn, they could have just intercepted him there and not taken a chance on following him over hundreds of miles of back roads. Something didn’t quite fit. Somehow, he had to find out who it was. The same ground fog that his pursuers had used as a screen would now afford Rodgers a chance to turn the tables. He reached a point where the road made a sharp curve to the right around a large stone-walled barn. Jack made the turn, but rather than continuing down the road, he snapped off his lights, turned sharply to the right again, and stopped Anderson’s Vectra behind the barn. Seconds later, the car with the missing foglight, a small Ford Focus, made the curve and glided down the road into the fog. Rodgers made a tight U-turn and bounced back onto the main road, keeping his own lights off and the Vectra hidden in the fog. He could see the taillights of the Focus moving away faster and faster in the mist ahead as it speeded up. The driver must have realized that his prey had eluded him, and that it could be a short time before he himself became the prey. Who the hell was it?

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On the horizon the stationary lights of a small village coming to life in the predawn darkness flickered into view. Jack watched as the car with the missing foglight braked and slowly turned off the road near a row of shuttered retail shops. He pulled off the road amid a cluster of parked cars and waited. Jack heard the driver of the Focus shut off the motor, and he could see now that there was only one person in the car. A large truck rumbled through town as he got out and began walking cautiously toward the other car, using the shadows of the building facades and the fog to keep himself out of view. Soon it would be daybreak. He fingered the small Heckler & Koch P2000 SK nine-millimeter automatic in his pocket. Who the hell was it? In a few minutes he’d have some answers. The village main street through which the highway ran was still and quiet, but Jack could hear the sounds of an occasional car being started and dogs barking on nearby side streets. Rodgers noticed a hint of pink in the eastern sky. In the misty darkness, he could hear a vehicle, probably a small truck, approaching from the direction of Ostend. A few seconds later, its headlights would play upon the condensation on his quarry’s windows, causing a moment of blur that would give him the visual cover he’d need to sprint to the Focus. Just as the truck’s headlights came into view, he heard the scraping pop of the car door opening. He sucked in his breath and flattened himself into the doorway of a small hardware shop. A figure moved around the front of the Focus. It was a woman! It was the same woman he’d seen at the

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bar in the Radisson Hotel in Brussels. She was wearing the tweedy gray winter coat and the purple sweater he remembered from Brussels, a straight black skirt, and she was apparently unaccustomed to walking on cobblestones in boots with three-inch heels. This confirmed his earlier guess that she was American rather than European. Who the hell was she? She appeared to be alone, but that defied logic. She looked up and down the road as though she expected to see the Vectra nearby. How could she have guessed that? She climbed back into the Focus and Jack could see the blue light of her cell phone being opened. He had to move. He jerked open the passenger side door and pointed his pistol at her head. By the expression on her face, Rodgers could tell that she was unused to looking at guns up close—especially from this angle. “Close the phone, put your hands on the wheel, and start talking to me,” Jack said as he climbed into the car and closed the door. “Who are you, and what are you doing out here?” “I was just about to ask you that,” she replied in a quavering voice. He guessed that she was in her midtwenties, but the panicked expression made her look younger. “The guy with the gun asks the questions.” “My name is Suzanne Harris and I’ve been following you since Brussels. I watched you and Avery Anderson leave the cafe and I saw him get shot. I know you didn’t do it, so you don’t have to point that gun at me.” “But I don’t know that you didn’t do it,” Rodgers said quickly. “And how do you know Anderson? Why did you follow us out of the bar? Who do you work for?” “I’m a reporter for the San Diego Herald. I interviewed Avery Anderson once when he lectured at the La Jolla Institute. I recognized him at the Radisson.”

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“So what’s the San Diego Herald doing on the backroads of Belgium tonight?” Jack asked cynically. “My assignment was to report on Joyce Livingstone. I work on the society desk,” she said apologetically. “After London, all the news reporters from the Herald went directly to Paris to cover the summit. When she was kidnapped, I was the only one in Brussels, so my editor put me on the kidnapping story until the others could catch a plane over from Paris. This is the first chance I’ve had to do a real hard news story in the two years I’ve been with the paper. I spent all of yesterday following dead ends until I saw Anderson. I thought he could give me a lead, so I followed him—both of you—out of the hotel. I wish now that I hadn’t. Are you going to kill me?” Rodgers let the question hang. He transferred the gun to his left hand and opened the car’s glove compartment. The Avis folder with the rental car agreement was right on top. He thumbed through it. It showed that a white Ford Focus had been rented at the Brussels Zaventem airport two days before by a Suzanne Harris from San Diego. There was a receipt from an American Express card with the same name on it. Her purse lay on the car seat and Jack picked it up. It was heavy enough to hold a gun, but the largest solid objects he found in it had the rattle of plastic makeup containers. He located an airline ticket envelope and a passport. The face on the passport was noticeably younger than the Suzanne Harris who stared at him with frightened eyes, and the hair was also a good deal longer. But it was the same nose, the same chin—each delicately formed and in perfect proportions for the shape of her face. He remembered that he had found her attractive when he saw her back at the Radisson.

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Apparently, she really was Suzanne Harris. Rodgers had been successfully tailed halfway across Belgium by a society page reporter. Jack seethed with anger at having been followed, but most of that anger was directed at himself for having allowed it to happen. Harris was obviously deathly afraid. “You did a very nice job of trailing me this far, but I’m afraid this will be where your story stops,” Rodgers told her as he pulled the keys from the ignition and put them and her cell phone in his pocket. “I’m going to leave you now,” he said. “When this shop opens, you’ll use their phone to call your rental car agency and report the loss of these keys. You dropped them and you can’t find them, and you want somebody to bring you a new set. Meanwhile, you’ll forget about me. None of this ever happened. Do you understand?” She nodded nervously as he opened the door and began to back out. Jack looked back down the road toward where he had left Anderson’s Vectra. Another car was parked next to it now—a Belgian highway patrol car. Anderson must have been identified and the police had been told to search for his car. Finding it this quickly was a lucky break for a couple of cops, but it complicated Jack’s life dreadfully. Thanks to Suzanne Harris, however, he hadn’t been in the car when they found it. A large red truck pulled out from a side street and briefly blocked his view of the police car. He climbed back into the passenger’s seat of the Focus, pressed the keys into the ignition, and looked at the bewildered reporter. “Start driving,” he told her. Within moments they were out of town and heading toward Ostend, unnoticed by the two policemen who had been preoccupied with Anderson’s car.

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“You didn’t bother to tell me who you are,” she said after a few minutes. “I’m an art history professor specializing in Flemish Renaissance painting,” he told her, “and I’m in the Low Countries gathering material for my doctoral thesis on Hans Memling.” “The art history professor I had in school didn’t carry a gun,” she replied with more self-assuredness than he’d yet seen in her. “Times have changed,” he replied.

October 21 10:43 P.M. Eastern Time

“

I

thought I told you to pull that goddam thing!” Justin Underwood was livid. The manager of Senator Wilson Darmader’s presidential campaign had been playing damage control all day long. Never in the history of presidential campaigns had a challenger faced such a potentially catastrophic turn of events. The moment that the cable channels first mentioned the kidnapping, Underwood had jerked all of his media— or at least he thought he had. Some bozo out in California had failed to take a commercial off the air in the Los Angeles market. It was a particularly graphic thirty-second spot harshly taunting Livingstone. The worst part was that there were about seven seconds of Joyce Livingstone in the commercial. “The negatives are spiking all over California,” a young staffer clutching a clipboard explained, her voice shaking. “Who fucked up?” Underwood asked. “I’m not sure,” she stammered. “It might have been the

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agency, and it might have been the San Diego office. They were with the candidate in Escondido all morning.” “You’re not sure?” Underwood said with disgust, a tinge of east Texas still audible beneath his Yale-polished diction. “You’re not sure, but you are fired! On your way out, which will be immediately, send in somebody who can tell what the fuck happened out there.” As the young woman left the campaign boss’s office, tears streaming down her cheeks, Underwood turned back to his computer to replay the video clips of the candidate that had aired through the day. As mad as he was at all those fuckups in California, Underwood was also mad at himself. He had chosen to stay at campaign headquarters while Darmader made a three-day spin out to the coast. If he had been there in Escondido, he could have helped spin things for the candidate—like most professionals in his field, he always referred his client simply as “the candidate.” The kidnapping had occurred in the middle of the night California time, so there should have been ample opportunity to prepare. Underwood had been awakened from a dead sleep and had called the best spin doctor on the coast to get on the case. He had run a thousand scenarios, but the candidate was ambushed before breakfast by a question about his personal feelings. There was a hastily convened press conference at the Marriott. Darmader made a statement about how tragic it was and about how the whole country was praying for Joyce Livingstone’s safe return. Then someone from one of the San Diego papers asked him how he would have felt if it had been his own wife. The senator stammered and stumbled. His tempestuous relationship with the shrewish Mrs. Darmader was the

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subject of much speculation and many late-night monologue jokes. In all fairness, anything that he could have said would have fallen short. Indeed, it wasn’t how he answered the question—because he really didn’t answer it— it was how he reacted, and he reacted badly. His face turned red as he hemmed, hawed, and faltered. Despite Underwood’s best efforts, the numbers were really bad. One of the wonderful things about modern polling is that for the right price, a campaign can get continuous, virtually instantaneous numbers that flow almost with the rapidity of a stock ticker. Indeed, today had been like watching a stock market crash. Yesterday, Darmader had been down by only 2.7 points. After the Escondido debacle, he had sunk behind Livingstone by nearly 7. He had gained a little ground after he made a personal phone call to the president expressing sympathy, but the California ad put him behind Livingstone by 12. Darmader had been strong in California. It was Underwood’s ace in the hole. Without the Golden State, Underwood knew that Darmader could kiss the election good-bye. Something had to be done!

October 21 7:05 A.M. Central European Time

“

S

O what did your editor say when you told him that you were following someone out of Brussels?” Jack Rodgers asked, casually making conversation with the woman he had more or less kidnapped on a back road in the Flemish countryside. In fact, it was less a kidnapping than a case of the lucky—albeit not unskilled—hunter being outfoxed and becoming the hunted. Suzanne Harris

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had sought to know where Rodgers was headed when he left the Belgian capital, and now she would know, although not in the manner she had planned. “As a journalist, I’m not obliged to tell you anything,” she asserted. She was growing gradually more assertive now that she had figured out that Jack almost certainly wouldn’t kill her—at least for the time being. “You didn’t have time to call him, did you?” Jack smiled. “It was the middle of the night and you were too busy following the Vectra. Right?” Silence. “Thought so.” That was a relief, he thought. He certainly didn’t want to leave this spunky young reporter as roadkill on a trail to who knows where. As they zigzagged across northern Belgium, taking three times longer than necessary to reach Ostend, Rodgers had wondered what would await him at the Blauwe Lantaarn. How long could he continue to follow this Kurketrekker enigma down the rabbit hole? The trail was indeed still warm, and the steps on that trail were plain. Peighton had been going to meet Anderson, so Rodgers went to meet Anderson. That was an obvious first step, just as driving to Ostend was an obvious second step. The fact that Anderson was shot only piqued Jack’s curiosity to see what was next. Now there was his unexpected companion, and the fact that without her, both he and Anderson’s Vectra would be guests of the gendarmes. Without Suzanne Harris, the choice of whether to take a third step would not have been available to Jack. “Pull over here,” Rodgers ordered as the Focus entered the narrow streets of central Ostend. Jack had directed

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Suzanne through the twisting streets that had been laid out in medieval times by people who must now be rolling with amusement at the curse their handiwork had wrought on twentieth-century motorists. Suzanne did as he directed and turned to him with a “what next” expression on her face. “Drive directly back to Brussels,” he told her. “Forget that any of this ever happened. I’m sure that you won’t, but I’m asking you anyway. I’m going to keep your phone just to make it harder for you to call.” “No,” she replied. “You kidnapped me and you’re stuck with me until I get my story! You know damned well that I can’t use anything that I’ve seen or heard all night. I witnessed a killing and followed a mystery man who kidnapped me without witnesses and turned me loose unharmed. There’s no verification that any of this happened. I can’t write a story with that. I don’t have anything that I couldn’t have made up in my hotel room back in Brussels. I’ve spent too long on that damned society desk to miss this one. You can shoot me if you want, but that’s the only way you’re going to get me off your back.” Rodgers got out of the car and started walking toward the center of town. “You’re not going to just leave me!” Suzanne said, getting out of the car and shouting after him. “I want to go with you.” A number of passersby were staring at the attractive young woman shouting at the man in the overcoat who was walking away. It had all the makings of a lovers’ quarrel, and nothing excites onlookers like a good spat. There was no telling how many people here understood English, but the tone of Suzanne’s voice was obvious to all, including both her and Rodgers.

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“What am I going to tell our child when he’s born?” Suzanne screamed. That did it. Jack turned and started back toward the angry woman standing next to the Focus. “Okay,” he said in a low growl, hoping that he had made the right decision. “Let’s get the rules straight. First, I want you to do exactly what I tell you; second, don’t ask questions; and third, if I see you trying to make another phone call to your editor before I tell you this is over, that is where your story stops. Understand?” She nodded. Rodgers walked to a nearby telephone booth that appeared to have a directory and checked the address for the Blauwe Lantaarn. The seedy waterfront tavern was open when they arrived. It was the kind of place that catered to the drinking schedule of the average seaman on port call—meaning that it was closed for only the number of hours required to right all the tables and chairs and to hose down the floor. Like the bars in most of the towns in North Sea ports, it still bore the tattered trappings of long-gone, better days. High on the old stepped Flemish gable facade was a brass lantern with a broken beveled blue glass globe. The namesake of the establishment was now embodied in a single blue electric bulb that hung near the door.

October 21 7:05 A.M. Central European Time

J

OYC E Livingstone awoke with a throbbing headache.

Her arms and legs felt limp and sticky, like jelly. She was lying on a huge, sagging metal-frame bed in a large

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room with a high ceiling. There were two huge windows with ornamental grillwork on the outside. The air was cold but dry. There was nothing else in the room. Outside, she could see that the sky was gray. It looked like late afternoon, but it could have been early morning. She couldn’t tell. She tried to pierce the cobwebs in her head, to remember exactly what had happened. At first the events of the day came back in pieces, like shards of a broken mirror. She remembered being driven into the Grand Place in a limousine. She remembered being grabbed and manhandled, but she couldn’t remember anything after that. It seemed like so long ago. How much time had passed? Was it the same day? Was it the next day? Was it the next week? She struggled out of bed. The ice-cold floor stung her bare feet. All her clothes were gone and she was wearing a sort of smock or hospital gown. It smelled like it had been freshly laundered, but it was very old and had been mended many times. She felt embarrassed, violated. There were two doors in the room, one on the wall opposite the windows and another at the end of the room. Joyce tried the first door and found it locked. The second door opened to a bathroom with oversized, chipped white porcelain fixtures. The hardware showed signs of rust. There was a single towel and a single bar of soap. She went back into the larger room and walked over to the windows. She was on the second story of a building with a wide lawn that sloped down into some woods. There was a light dusting of snow on the ground, and nothing out there moved. She could see no other person, nor hear any human sounds—no voices, no traffic in the distance. Joyce suddenly felt very alone and very cut off from reality.

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Where was Tom? What had happened to him? Had he been kidnapped too—or killed? Joyce Livingstone wanted to throw open the windows and scream for help, but they were bolted and wouldn’t budge. There was nothing in the room that she could use to break the window. She crossed the room and tried the other door again—just in case. It was locked and the cold metal lever wouldn’t even move. She felt so small, and so alone. Her embarrassment turned to anger, her anger to rage. She pounded on the door and screamed. Then she paused to listen. Nothing. She pounded again and screamed as loudly as she could. She pounded and screamed until her fists and throat were too sore to continue. Then, sobbing, she crumpled onto the cold floor.

October 21 8:01 A.M. Central European Time

R

ODG E RS had watched the front of the Blauwe Lantaarn for nearly an hour. He wasn’t sure what he was watching for, and only half sure that he’d know it when he saw it. After numerous unsuccessful attempts to draw more information from Jack, Suzanne had turned to small talk to pass the time. Rodgers was about to suggest that they move to a nearby cafe for coffee, when he saw a man slowly making his way up the opposite side of the street, checking addresses against a piece of paper he carried in his hand. He was clearly not the usual clientele that they had been watching come and go this morning. His Brooks Brothers topcoat gave him the appearance of a man who earned his living behind a desk, not behind a fishing net or an anchor

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chain. He was obviously as unfamiliar with the Blauwe Lantaarn as Rodgers. “I think it’s time for a drink,” Jack told Suzanne, pointing to the man. “Wait here and don’t run off.” “Not when things are just starting to get interesting,” she replied sarcastically. Jack entered the tavern, glanced around, and ordered a Duvel. Two men were sitting near him at the bar arguing in Norwegian, oblivious to such esoteric notions as time of day. Behind the bar were ancient cut-glass mirrors nearly buried by an avalanche of artifacts—photos of soccer teams, past and current patrons, as well as hundreds of postcards and pictures of assorted people with dubious claims to fame. There were also souvenirs of Belgium’s past and of her long-lost colonial empire, plus memorabilia suggesting that during the 1940s these walls had echoed to a good many choruses of “Lili Marlene.” Rodgers wasn’t grubby enough to have just climbed off a tramp steamer, but with his scruffy salt-and-pepper beard, well-worn coat, and blue jeans he melded into the scene better than Mr. Brooks Brothers, and he had honed his ability to hide in plain sight to a fine art. Despite being obviously out of his element, the other man moved with the assuredness of someone who knew what he was doing. He sized up the place and confidently ordered a glass of gin. Jack immediately recognized the voice, with the faint trace of east Texas around the edges of the vowels, of Agent John Jefferson Davis. It was a small world, but why in that small world was the Secret Service agent who had picked up Buck Peighton’s cell phone standing in a seaman’s bar in Ostend ordering straight gin? Moments later, as that question was answered, new questions arose. A large, rosy-cheeked man entered and

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smiled at Davis. He greeted the Secret Service man in Dutch, but they soon switched to English. Rodgers edged closer to eavesdrop on what they were saying, but a man and woman at the other end of the bar began arguing loudly and it was hard to hear. Jack made out something about a package being delivered into storage for a couple of weeks. There was something about a hospital, the same hospital in Brussels where Rodgers had dropped Anderson, and then that word again. “Kurketrekker.” This strange word was taking shape as the probable code name for the kidnapping, but Rodgers still couldn’t figure out a motive. Nearly all kidnappings are either about money or politics. If Joyce Livingstone had been a sixteenyear-old girl, there might be a third possibility—white slavery was a growth industry in Europe these days—but she wasn’t. If it was money, there would have been a lot of easier and much less dangerous marks than the wife of the president of the United States. That left politics—but whose? He could pretty much rule out Middle Eastern jihadis, and European terrorists had been pretty quiet of late. If there was an American involved, there had to be an American angle. If there was a Secret Service man involved, the plot had to run pretty deep inside the U.S. government’s security apparatus. The big Dutch-speaking guy was obviously no stranger to the cloak-and-dagger world either, and he was clearly not just an amateur revolutionary pursuing some cause or other. Like Davis, the other man wore a pricy topcoat that made him look out of place, but nobody else in the bar seemed to notice or care, except one man who seemed to be watching everyone. Jack had made him straight away. He was dressed like a sailor, with a moth-eaten watch cap and an oilskin jacket. He was the type of opportunist that

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you often see around seaports preying on the unfortunate— the kind who makes his living noticing things. Since the nineteenth century they’ve been called “crimps.” They were well paid by unscrupulous sea captains to round up crews by drugging or coldcocking drifters. Once “shanghaied,” the unfortunate victim of the crimp had no choice but to work the ship or jump overboard, because by the time he woke up, the ship was already at sea. Today, the crimp’s stock in trade includes a whole host of activities from major theft to drug dealing and white slavery. The two well-dressed men concluded their brief conversation, Davis downed his remaining gin in one gulp, and they left separately by the main door. Rodgers left a few euros on the bar and slipped out a small entrance near the bathrooms at the opposite end of the bar. Outside, he watched the two men walking their separate ways toward their parked cars and he started toward the Focus. Something was wrong. Suzanne wasn’t there. The car was there, but it was empty. What the hell? What was she doing? Rodgers had her phone. Had she gone to find a pay phone? No. She didn’t have her story yet. As frightened as she might have been of Rodgers and the situation he had pulled her into, she was more afraid that her editor would pull her off of this story. With what she could tell him at this point, the story was so improbable that he would perceive it as just big a wild goose chase. Like Jack, she needed more information, and like him, she had apparently gone looking for it. But where? Where the hell had she gone? He looked back across the street at the Blauwe Lantaarn. He had left by the side door, and he had watched the

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front door. There was a third possibility, a narrow alley on the left side of the building. She may have followed him, and if so, she would have tried to avoid being seen by him as she attempted to eavesdrop on whatever was going on inside the bar. She had gone into the alley looking for a back entrance, and she had not returned. Jack needed to know what was keeping her. He heard her voice even before he reached the alley. A stifled scream and the sound of a struggle. As Rodgers came around the corner, he saw that the crimp in the watch cap had seized Suzanne’s throat with his left forearm. There was the flash of polished steel in his right hand. He didn’t have to tell Rodgers that the message was “back off or I’ll kill the woman.” Jack didn’t even consider asking the man to drop the knife. He cut to the chase, raising his silenced P2000 SK automatic swiftly and smoothly. A pair of small jagged holes appeared on the bridge of the man’s narrow, aquiline nose, and his head jerked backward with an ugly-sounding snap. His lifeless body loosed its grip on Suzanne’s neck. She stepped back as the man’s body slumped to the ground, her eyes were filled with horror at what she’d experienced in those few seconds. She had never in her life been near a gun as it was fired, much less having watched as one pumped two rounds into a human face six inches from her own. “You could have killed me!” she screamed at Rodgers, knowing at the same time that his shots had removed a far greater threat than they’d presented. Sobbing with relief, she instinctively took the hand he held out. “What are we going to do now?” she asked. “Give me your car keys,” he said. “You’re in no shape to drive.”

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October 21 2:10 P.M. Central European Time

J

AC K Rodgers watched the Ford Focus disappear into Brussels traffic. He wondered whether he’d see Suzanne Harris again, and guessed that he probably would. To get what she needed, she still needed him, and there was now that special bond that people seem to have with people who save their lives. He wondered whether she would be able to successfully tail the big coffee-colored Mercedes CLS, and he guessed that she probably would. After all, she had tailed him. They had come to an understanding. They were both looking for pieces of a puzzle, and during the long drive back to Brussels, they had agreed that they could find more of those pieces by working together. Suzanne still didn’t know who this man named Jack really was, and she knew that she probably never would, but he had saved her life and that counted for a lot. It also counted for a lot that he would help her get what she needed to file a story that would change her career. As for Jack, he knew that he needed her as well. She had inadvertently saved him when the gendarmes caught up to Anderson’s car, and she had provided him with the means to follow the trail to the Blauwe Lantaarn. Now, he needed her because he needed to be in two places at once. Brannan and McCaine were en route to Brussels from Paris, but until they got here, Rodgers needed the young reporter to follow the CLS. Disposing of the corpse in the watch cap had cost valuable time in their getting out of Ostend. Rodgers had hoped to follow Davis, but he was long gone by the time the body was safely in a Dumpster. Amazingly, they had been able

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to catch up to the other man as he stopped at a coffee bar for a take-away cup. They followed his big Mercedes as he took side roads back to Brussels. The roadblocks were still numerous, but the cops continued to be more concerned with traffic leading away from the capital than back into it. Just as going to the Blauwe Lantaarn was an obvious step yesterday, following the ruddy-faced man in the brown car was clearly another step on the same trail. Rodgers and the reporter had agreed that she would follow him, while Jack got out as near as possible to the center of Brussels. It was time to check up on Buck Peighton’s condition. The wounded general was not hard to locate. It was widely reported in the media that he had been taken to the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire St. Etienne, the sprawling medical center on Belangrijkstraat. It was not only well known as one of the top trauma centers in Brussels, it was the only major hospital in this part of the city center. Locating the hospital was the easy part. Rodgers had already been here, as it was coincidentally the same place where he had dropped Avery Anderson last night. Gaining access to Peighton was another matter. After what had happened to Joyce Livingstone, the authorities were a bit proprietary about guarding the man who had been at her side. Brussels police were outside, and Rodgers figured that they’d be inside as well. He bought a bouquet of flowers, which he used to penetrate far enough to find a place where he could borrow some scrubs. He picked the lock of an obviously unused locker, caching his own clothes and the bouquet here. He found the area of the intensive care unit that was crawling with Belgian cops, both in and out of uniform, and knew that he had arrived. There were also Secret Service lurking around, but no sign of John Jefferson Davis. Jack had spent a lifetime studying the ebb and flow of

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random groups of people in large public places, and large groups of troops on both covert and overt battlefields. Somewhere between the science of fluid dynamics and the random nonsense of chaos theory, he had discovered the existence of a rhythmic pattern not unlike waves at the seashore. Making himself virtually invisible to both the cops and the Secret Service, Rodgers washed up on the shore of room 3005W. The chart on the table in Peighton’s room was good news. Jack had not known what to expect. The newspapers had reported only what they got from the hospital press releases. They were more interested in Joyce Livingstone and nobody had bothered to take a firsthand look at what was really going on with Buckley Peighton. The reporters were all chasing the “big story” and willing to just repeat what they were given on this side story of poor old Buck. From these reports, Jack had read of unspecified surgery and that Peighton was unconscious. From the chart, Rodgers learned that the surgery had been on a badly injured leg. Internally, there were no serious injuries. The newspaper reports had made it sound as though Peighton had suffered a concussion. The chart mentioned that there had been a concern about head trauma, but that it had been ruled out. Peighton had been sedated after his leg surgery but was expected to be coming out of it soon. Rodgers smiled as a nurse came into the room to check Peighton’s vitals. She didn’t recognize him, but his calm smile gave her the sense that he was not out of place. Jack had a knack for hiding in plain sight. She spoke to Peighton soothingly in French and he murmured something unintelligible. She touched the patient’s forehead softly and exchanged smiles with Rodgers as she left the room. He watched her through a crack in the door as she continued on her rounds.

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“General, it’s Jack Rodgers. Can you hear me?” Peighton murmured something and his eyelids flickered. “Can you hear me?” “Jack . . . dammit. Is it you? Shit, I ache all over. My leg hurts, man, it hurts.” “They’re fixing you up. You’re gonna be fine.” “Joyce? What happened? I heard somebody say that she was kidnapped.” “That’s true.” “Who? Why?” “Nobody knows yet. There’s been a lot of people claiming responsibility, but nothing credible.” “I fucked up, Jack.” “Whaddya mean?” “I fucked up,” Peighton repeated. “Tom asked me to look after her and I screwed it up.” “No, you didn’t,” Rodgers insisted. “When you briefed me the other night, you weren’t advised of a specific threat. You were blindsided. So were the Secret Service. Don’t beat yourself up over this . . .” “Anderson . . . I’ve gotta talk with Anderson.” “Listen, General,” Jack whispered. “Anderson was shot. It’s best that you don’t mention his name to anyone.” With that, Peighton’s half-opened eyes became alert as though the news of Anderson’s being shot had shaken him suddenly awake. “If Anderson was hit, then it means that somebody on the inside is involved.” “Probably does,” Rodgers agreed. “And if somebody on the inside is involved, it’s no mystery why there haven’t been any leads . . . right?” “I guess you could draw that conclusion,” Jack admitted.

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“Maybe somebody on the outside needs to get involved,” Peighton suggested. “Officially the Raptors aren’t active, but just say the word,” Rodgers told the general. “The colonel will be in town soon, if he’s not already here.” “I’m saying the word,” Peighton told him. “We’ve got to make this right, Jack. Do what it takes. Find her.” “Yes, sir.” Rodgers smiled. “And one more thing,” Peighton said, raising his IVtube-ensnared arm as Jack stepped toward the door. “What’s that?” “Get me the hell out of here. I’m feeling a bit exposed here, and I don’t mean the back of this damned hospital smock.” “Just keep your head down and act sicker than you are. Nobody’s going to make a move if they think you aren’t going anywhere. I’ll be back.”

October 21 4:30 P.M. Central European Time

J

OYC E Livingstone wrapped herself in a gray blanket and huddled in a chair in the corner of the frigid room. Outside, it was dark. Maybe night was falling, or maybe it was just that the clouds were getting darker. They were black and vicious, and the icy wind rattled the tall, barred windows. Time passed slowly, she thought, but she wasn’t sure. Was it minutes seeming like hours or vice versa? Her sense of perspective had been radically altered, and now she didn’t know what to think anymore. Joyce estimated that she hadn’t seen another human being for more than

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twenty-four hours . . . or more. She had discovered a tray with some black bread and thin soup that was left inside her door while she dozed, but that had been her only contact with the outside world. She felt so groggy. Her mind felt as though there was a greasy smudge across it like a streak across the lens of her reading glasses. Had it really been twenty-four hours? Or was it fortyeight hours or longer since her abduction? It seemed like forever. The memory of those terrible moments in the Grand Place was with her like broken pieces of a fearsome jigsaw puzzle. After what she was used to as first lady, it was eerie and frightening to feel so alone. In that far distant other life, she was almost never alone. It seemed that she hadn’t been alone for two minutes in the past four years. There were always aides, hangers-on, and press secretaries interrupting each other and fighting for her time and attention. People were around her constantly, hovering, chirping, nagging. She had often longed for solitude. Now, she had it. Be careful for what you wish for, she thought. She tried to figure out what kind of building she was in. At one time, it had been something a great deal more elegant. The intricate moldings around the ceiling must have once looked down on furnishings far more luxurious than the oversized metal-frame bed and single straight-backed chair that were here now. Joyce felt stripped naked—both physically and psychologically—by someone she had yet to see. She started to cry softly and then began to shriek, until her throat felt stretched like a deteriorating rubber band. Her sobs were answered only by the mocking laughter of the howling wind. She felt like the tree that had fallen in the forest, with no one around to hear it.

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In the back of her jumbled memory, she remembered reading a newspaper account about a university professor who had been held by terrorists in the Middle East for twelve years, and when he’d gotten out, he couldn’t remember what it was like not to be blindfolded in a dark room—but as time went on he came to regard his captivity as a dream and even insisted that it had never happened! Joyce wondered how long she would be here and whether this was in fact a dream. Yes. That was it! She had fallen in the Grand Place and had a concussion. She was in a coma and this was what she was dreaming while in the coma. Then a horrible thought occurred to her—what if she was in this coma for years? Would she continue to have the same dream for years? What if minutes did seem like hours? Would a year seem like twenty? What would twenty years in a coma seem like? She screamed, and once again her screams were answered only by imagined demons riding upon the gusts of wind. The demons were her only companions, the ones outside . . . and the ones inside. Joyce wrapped herself in the coarse blanket and sobbed quietly.

October 21 6:23 P.M. Central European Time

S

UZANNE Harris followed the Mercedes CLS on a circuitous route south from Brussels into the hills east of Namur. The rain that had fallen in Flanders last night had translated as light snow down here. At last, the car turned into the long driveway. A sign at

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the entrance identified the property as Maison Lièvre. She drove past the driveway on the main road without braking. She had probably been successful in tailing her quarry this far without being seen, but she certainly wasn’t going to turn into a driveway. The main road rounded a bend and continued up a hill from which she could glance back and see the Maison Lièvre. She made a U-turn and pulled off to the side of the road. The view toward the place was essentially unobstructed, but it was a long way off. She wished that she had a pair of binoculars. The long, straight driveway led from the main road to what appeared to be a nineteenth-century, neo-baroque manor house. This main building was surrounded by a circular car park and a few smaller buildings that looked like sheds or garages. Including the Mercedes, she could see three cars. Three rooms on the main floor and one on the top level had their lights on. Suzanne watched and waited, not knowing what to expect. An hour passed and she dozed, but caught herself. In a little while she dozed again. She hadn’t slept in two days and exhaustion had finally overtaken her. When she awoke again, night had fallen and it was completely dark out here on this hillside east of Namur. Only one light burned at Maison Lièvre and the Mercedes had gone.

October 21 5:30 P.M. Eastern Time

“

M

Y fellow Americans, these past two days have been

the most difficult of my life,” President Thomas Livingstone said, looking into the television camera from

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behind his desk in the Oval Office. He appeared visibly drained as he made his nationally televised address, thanking his countrymen for their prayers and good wishes. He went on to thank all those around the world who were aiding the FBI and other authorities in what amounted to the manhunt of the decade—if not of the century. Like watching an airplane take off, Steve Faralaco concentrated on his boss on the flickering monitor until the speech was safely airborne, then he relaxed, leaned back, and closed his eyes. He knew what was being said—he had written much of it and had edited the final draft. There would be no mention of the reelection campaign, no mention of Wilson Darmader. There was no need. The sympathy factor had buoyed the president by about a dozen percentage points. The nation was rallying around the man. The campaign was over. After Escondido—especially after Escondido—there was nothing that Darmader could say or do. Livingstone would win. And then what? A few days ago, Steve Faralaco’s number one concern had been getting his boss reelected. As chief of staff, he didn’t have a hands-on role in the campaign, but he ran the president’s schedule with only one thing in mind. Indeed, everyone in the West Wing knew what was priority number one. It was top priority for their own job security as much as for Livingstone’s. Now— ironically with its having become a sure thing—winning the election didn’t seem important at all. As his mind wandered to what was now priority number one for everyone in Washington, Faralaco felt impotent and frustrated. He was used to being able to manage and spin. Even in the most difficult crisis, there was always someone he could call, always something he could do—but finding Joyce Livingstone was impossible. It was beyond

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his grasp. All he could do was hope that someone else could succeed where he couldn’t even begin to try. “And having said that, I’d like to leave you with one final thought,” Livingstone said. The sound was muted on the monitor, but Steve could hear the president live though the open door between his office and the Oval Office. Instinctively, he stood up and headed for the door. Whenever Livingstone delivered a speech from the Oval Office, Steve always made sure that he was there to congratulate him as soon as the director gave the high sign for “fade to black.” “And that one final thought . . .” Livingstone said, a confused look on his face. Something was wrong, very wrong. As Steve watched, the president’s head slumped onto his desk. The director gave the “fade to black” order as Steve rushed to Livingstone’s side. The White House medical team was on top of the desk in an instant, pulling off Livingstone’s necktie and checking vital signs. Faralaco stepped away, stunned.

FOUR

October 22 8:31 A.M. Central European Time

“

Y

OU look like you had a bad night.” Jack Rodgers

smiled. He was glad to see Suzanne Harris. Very glad. When they parted, they had agreed to meet at the Soleil d’Or, a small cafe on Rue Léopold in Brussels. It was a busy place in the morning, with people coming and going, rushing to work or meetings and priming themselves with coffee and pastries. He had arrived early and was nursing his second cup when she came in with dark circles under her eyes. He had expected that her curiosity would bring her back, but he wasn’t sure of that until she walked in the door. “I slept in the car,” she said. “Get me a cup of coffee.” Jack obliged and watched as she drained half the cup without speaking. “I lost him,” she finally admitted.

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“Where?” “Down by Namur.” I followed him to a mansion sort of place in the country down there. It was early evening. I watched the place for a couple hours and then I just passed out. I woke up around midnight and he was gone. I didn’t know what else to do so I just went back to sleep.” “Could you find the place again?” “Of course,” she said defiantly. “I have a good sense of direction.” “Great.” Jack smiled again, sizing up the spirited young reporter in the purple sweater. Though he was sure that she’d beg to differ, the dark circles under her eyes made her look sexy. “Was there an address of any kind on the place?” “There was a name. It was called Maison Lièvre . . . the ‘House of the Hare.’ ” “That’s appropriate,” Jack said. “At the bottom of the rabbit hole, you’ll find the rabbit’s house.”

October 22 9:07 A.M. Eastern Time

“

Y

OU look like you had a bad night,” Secretary of State John Edredin told the president of the United States. “I had a very, very bad night, John. Every night is worse than the night before and every night is the worst night of my life. I was awake until four, dozed off, and woke up screaming about six.” Thomas Livingstone was lying in the bed in the White House living quarters that he had, until the last hellish few days, shared with his wife. Edredin was sitting nearby in a straight-backed chair as Dr. Joseph Iconiche, the president’s personal physician, poked and prodded his patient.

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After the president had passed out during his speech to the nation last night, a crisis atmosphere had descended over Washington. “Every minute that goes by I worry that we won’t find her alive,” Livingstone admitted. “That’s what the FBI says about kidnappings, isn’t it? That after the first twenty-four hours the odds of finding the victim alive decrease exponentially? Right?” “They are doing everything they can, Mr. President. Everybody is.” “When we catch the bastards, I want all the stops pulled out to punish them in no uncertain terms. We should consider going nuclear.” “This is something to discuss when you’ve had your rest,” the doctor said, putting his hand on Livingstone’s shoulder. “I’ve given you a little something to help you rest, and we’re going to leave you alone now so that you can catch up on that sleep you’ve missed.” The doctor ushered Edredin out of the presidential bedroom and closed the door. They walked a short distance to the sitting room where Steve Faralaco sat slumped in an overstuffed chair. He had been up most of the night as well. Livingstone had called him to come in at two, when he had insomnia, and Steve was here when the president woke up screaming. Edredin noticed a second man in the opposite corner, a U.S. Army major with a black leather suitcase at his side— the “nuclear football,” which contains all the codes and communications necessary for the president to order a nuclear strike. Everyone who works with the president is used to seeing a military officer sitting nearby with the football, but today, after what Livingstone had just said, the satchel seemed all that more ominous.

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“We need to talk,” the doctor said, sitting near Faralaco and nodding to Edredin to join them. “His condition is not good. After last night, I realize that this is understood.” “Did he suffer a stoke?” Edredin asked. “The cable news channels and the morning papers are suggesting that.” “No, and I said as much in the bulletin I issued last night,” Dr. Iconiche said, shaking his head in disgust. “But rumors persist. If there is any speculation of any kind, everyone wants to be part of the gossipmongering.” “But you say that he’s not good?” “He’s suffering from severe stress and anxiety. It’s more or less what a layman might call a ‘nervous breakdown,’ which is a term that professionals don’t like to use. His blood pressure is dangerously elevated, which puts him in danger of a stroke, but last night’s episode was a just fainting spell. It happened at the most inopportune time, but he just fainted from exhaustion.” “Will he be all right?” Steve Faralaco asked. “When will he be back to normal?” “I’m afraid that he’s headed the other way,” Iconiche said grimly. “When I examined him on the plane coming back from Europe, he was badly shaken, but generally in control, but his mental state’s been deteriorating.” “You mean, he’s getting worse?” Edredin said with concern. “Yes, psychological trauma can often lead to what we call ASD, acute stress disorder, which is the aftermath of exposure to acute psychological trauma. This often takes a day or so to manifest itself. Initially, the body’s defense mechanisms kick in to protect it from the stress, but then the ASD takes over. It has for him.” “What’s the prognosis?” Faralaco asked. He wanted the doctor to cut to the chase.

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“Well, ASD may lead to post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, and in his case, I believe that it has,” the doctor replied, cutting to the chase. “He’s manifesting all the symptoms . . . anxiety, excessive startle response, hypervigilance, irritability, and loss of appetite.” “I’m losing my own appetite,” Faralaco said, leaning back in the chair. “In turn, PTSD can lead to all sorts of unpredictable situations,” Iconiche cautioned. “Such as melancholia or despair . . . eventually to clinical depression.” “Can you treat him?” “There are a number of treatments,” the doctor said thoughtfully. “In the short term, we could try drug therapy with antidepressants or antipsychotics like mirtazapine, olanzapine, quetiapine, sertraline, venlafaxine, or fluoxetine.” “Fluoxetine?” Edredin asked. “That’s like Prozac, right?” “That is Prozac,” the doctor confirmed. “Putting the president of the United States on something like that could be pretty extreme,” Edredin asserted. “Not compared to what might happen otherwise,” the doctor retorted. “With anxiety, panic attacks, and other erratic behavior. You heard what he said about going nuclear.” “That’s just a figure of speech,” Faralaco said hopefully. “It’s still dangerous,” Edredin said in a worried tone. All three men looked across the room at the major who was still quietly sitting in the corner with the nuclear football at his side. “Under a worst-case scenario, it could be,” Iconiche admitted. “Steve,” Edredin said, feeling his own blood pressure

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start to rise. “I think that it’s time to have a chat with the vice president.”

October 22 9:07 A.M. Eastern Time

“

M

AKE him look presidential. Make Darmader look like he already is the president.” As President Thomas Livingstone was under the care of his doctor, Justin Underwood was on the line to his doctor, his spin doctor. The manager of Senator Wilson Darmader’s presidential campaign had been on a roller coaster. The abduction of Mrs. Livingstone had brought her husband’s poll numbers soaring, but when he fainted on live television, there was a ripple of panic in the tracking polls and Darmader was the beneficiary. Where could all the undecideds who were adrift on the great ocean of uncertainty find safe harbor? The answer—or so Underwood intuited from the numbers—was Wilson Darmader. Heading the Darmader campaign was what Justin Underwood had been working toward all of his career. The energetic and ambitious Yale graduate from Beaumont, Texas, had worked his first winning campaign at age nineteen and had not looked back. He became a force to be reckoned with in the Lone Star State. Half a dozen statewide wins later he engineered Wilson Darmader’s victory in his first U.S. Senate race. This had earned Underwood the cover of Time magazine and a shingle on K Street. When Darmader decided to run for the presidency, Underwood led the charge. Taped to his wall, Underwood had the old Vince Lombardi quote that “Winning isn’t everything, it’s the only

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thing.” Like the top echelon of campaign managers everywhere, he operated under the theory that losing was never an option, and so far, he had yet to taste defeat. Underwood had the reputation for doing whatever it took to get his people elected. His clients loved him, but asked no questions. His opponents truly hated him, and they were quick to point angry fingers. There was even a story that Underwood once sold his soul to the devil to get a candidate elected—and then he wagered the devil double or nothing that he could get him elected mayor of a major American city. The devil lost the bet but served two terms as mayor. Exactly which major American city varied in the retelling of the legend. “Just don’t do anything,” Underwood told his spin doctor. “Let Livingstone self-destruct on his own. We don’t want to be seen pushing him over the edge. Issue a statement. We are as concerned about the president’s health as anyone and wish him a speedy recovery . . . blah, blah, blah. Be subtle, but use words like ‘health’ and ‘recovery’ to make sure that people are reminded that Livingstone is sick. Don’t mention his wife. That could backfire.” As Underwood clicked his cell phone shut, an aide handed him the printout of an email that had just come across. Four points. Darmader had gained four points in the last three hours! This was the big initial bump and it wouldn’t continue like this, but Livingstone was starting to sink like a stone. “How deep did you dig into Livingstone’s medical records?” Underwood asked, having dialed one of his chief aides on his cell phone. “Not so deep that we couldn’t dig deeper,” the aide promised. He knew that for Underwood, any job could be done better.

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“Get out your pick and shovel,” Underwood told him. “I want you digging up dirt. I want you digging up shit. Livingstone’s on the ropes and I want him down for the count. I want you digging into his kindergarten transcript. I want congenital defects. I want a Livingstone who is too sick to be president. I want a danger to the nation that needs to be removed. I want a cancer on the body politic that needs to be excised!” “I get the picture,” the aide replied.

October 22 3:07 P.M. Central European Time

“

W

HO are the people we’re meeting?” Suzanne Har-

ris asked apprehensively as they made their way through the warren of small streets in the heart of Brussels. “People I work with on projects like this,” Jack Rodgers explained. “What sorts of projects are those?” “This and that.” “Listen, Jack, assuming this really is your name and not just an alias . . . I spent the night in a car in freezing weather in order to cooperate with you. I deserve a bit more than some ‘this and that’ bullshit!” She really was gorgeous, Jack thought to himself. Her anger brought color to her cheeks, just as the dark circles around her eyes accented them and made her all the more attractive. “What are you looking at?” Suzanne demanded. “You’re beautiful when you’re mad.” He smiled. “That was a really peculiar thing to say,” she said angrily, blushing all the same. He had struck a cord. She had

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sort of found him attractive as well—in an odd sort of way. Maybe it was a little bit of Stockholm syndrome, but she was starting to like this guy. How could you not start liking a guy who saved your life? They took the elevator to the ninth floor of a nondescript but comfortable little hotel. Suzanne had no idea what to expect. Who were the people he worked with? What kind of sociopaths would work with such an obsessive loner as him? If Suzanne had expected a room full of scruffy loners, she was disappointed. “You must be Suzanne,” the well-dressed woman said with a smile. “I’m Anne and this is Dave.” She was an engaging woman, possibly in her late thirties, with an charming smile and a firm handshake. She had dark hair with a gray streak that was tied back in a bun. She was dressed conservatively in a straight pin-striped skirt that fell just below her knee and a dark blouse with a high collar. The man she introduced as Dave was a tall, powerfully built man with an auburn mustache and a relaxed selfconfidence that had the effect of putting her immediately at ease. “I’ve read some of your work online at the Herald website.” Anne smiled. “I liked your piece on the gardens in the O’Keefe Quadrangle at Mission San Luis Rey.” “I’m afraid you have me at a disadvantage,” Suzanne said with surprise. “You seem to know my work, but I don’t know much about you.” “I’m an archeologist,” Anne said. “I did some work a long time ago at San Antonio de Pala—that’s an asistencia of San Luis Rey . . . the only free-standing campanario in the California mission chain.” “O’Keefe was in one of my travel features,” Suzanne

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explained. “As Jack has probably told you, I’m mainly chained to the society page.” “He tells me that you’re hoping to break into hard news.” Dave Brannan smiled. “That’s right.” “I assume that you know that there are certain sources that we’ll be counting on you to keep confidential if your story about the current activity gets to print.” “I think we have parallel interests in this ‘current activity,’ as you put it,” Suzanne told him. “I have no reason to jeopardize what you’re doing now that Jack has generously allowed me to be part of it . . . not to mention his having saved my life. Nobody would believe me anyway.” “That’s how these guys meet girls,” Anne laughed, winking at Brannan. “I’m sure there’s a story behind that,” Suzanne said, smiling hesitatingly. “Suzanne tells me about a place called Maison Lièvre,” Rodgers said, changing the subject. With that, Suzanne related her experience of the night before, and Anne sat down and started pecking at her laptop. Suzanne noticed that Anne had plugged it into a wall jack rather than using a wi-fi connection—obviously to avoid eavesdropping. “Does this look like the place?” Anne asked at last, showing Suzanne a picture on the screen of a large stone baroque-revival house. “Yes, that’s it,” Suzanne confirmed. “What is it?” “Private sanitarium,” Anne replied. “Very exclusive and pricy.” “Some place for rock stars on dope to dry out?” Brannan asked, leaning over her shoulder. “No, it’s a long-term care facility for nutty relatives,”

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Anne said, scrolling though the description. “It’s where you park your crazy Uncle Pierre when you want him out of the way. Very discreet.” “I get it.” Jack laughed. “The inconvenient heirs check in, but they don’t check out, at least while the inheritance is still unsettled.” “I guess that’s one way of dealing with an age-old problem,” Suzanne added. “Well, let me see,” Brannan said, looking thoughtfully out the window. “If I had someone I wanted out of the way, but not completely and not permanently, where would I put her?” “Someplace discreet,” Anne answered. “Money is no object,” Rodgers added. “I suppose it would be redundant to add that Joyce Livingstone isn’t crazy,” Suzanne interjected. “Neither, I would say, are many of the poor fools who’ve been guests of this stony mansion,” Jack replied. “And there are pharmaceuticals available to create every imaginable form of madness.” “Wouldn’t the staff have recognized such a high-profile ‘guest’?” Suzanne asked. “They’re very discreet,” Anne repeated sarcastically. “Enough money will buy any level of discretion you need,” Brannan added. “And something tells me that this was definitely a well-financed operation.” “Shouldn’t this be reported to the Secret Service?” Suzanne asked. “That’s a bit of a problem,” Rodgers replied. “You know the guy who met the guy we followed from the Blauwe Lantaarn? Well, that guy is the Secret Service.” “Which means that some elements of the Secret Service are involved,” Brannan explained. “We don’t know who or

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how deep into the Secret Service this goes, but we know this guy is mixed up in the kidnapping somehow . . . which is why we won’t bother getting them involved.” “He was also present at the kidnapping,” Rodgers added. “He has Buck Peighton’s cell phone.” “And General Peighton works with you, right?” Suzanne asked. “Does that mean that you’ve been compromised?” “Buck goes through cell phones like some people go through chewing gum.” Brannan smiled. “But we are on our own.” “Are you . . . we . . . going in there to free Mrs. Livingstone?” Suzanne asked, looking around the room at these people who were obviously secret agents capable of something so audacious. “There are ten thousand cops and agents and gendarmes on this continent looking for her,” Brannan said. “The last thing I want to do is wind up in a crossfire with a bunch of them. Having said that, I think that we should definitely have a look at this place. With this in mind, everyone take a close look at the picture that Anne has on the screen.” The image was of the Maison Lièvre staff, posing in front of the building. It was the kind of image that is often used to put a human face on an otherwise faceless institution. “This man on the side is Dr. Gaspar Egtanden,” Anne said, pointing out a wispy little man with a beard. “He’s the director, there’s a head shot of him on another page. He’s standing next to Charlotte Pechoel, also a doctor, who is his assistant.” “The rest of the staff looks mostly young and Eastern European,” Suzanne said. “Good catch,” Jack said approvingly.

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“That’s where all the good help comes from these days,” Anne added sarcastically. “I count ten people,” Brannan said. “Assuming the maximum number of people who missed the group photo, let’s plan on a total staff of no more than fifteen. It’s a twentyfour/seven institution, so with three shifts, that suggests that there would probably be no more than five to seven people in the building at any given moment, plus or minus the doctors. What do you suppose the patient-staff ratio would be?” “Probably fewer than one nurse per patient times three shifts,” Anne said. “Minus the two doctors and a cooking and cleaning staff of approximately three,” Suzanne guessed. “If that formula is right, there should be around half a dozen at any moment. There were three cars other than the Mercedes when I was there. If both doctors have their own car, that leaves just one, or two if only one doctor was there. There was a garage there but I didn’t see any tracks in the snow.” “We’ll plan on there being around half a dozen,” Brannan said thoughtfully, the wheels turning in his head. “That’s awfully few to guard a prize like they’ve got down there.” “They seem awfully sure of themselves,” Rodgers added. “Awfully sure that nobody is going to find their prize.” “Nobody has yet,” Anne pointed out. “Half the world is looking for Joyce and they’ve come up empty-handed. They did a damned good job with their snatch and grab.” “So are you going to go and snatch her back?” Suzanne asked. “Like I said, it’s probably worth taking a look,” Brannan said. “But we have some even more pressing business before we get to that.”

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“Which is?” Suzanne asked. “We have to get a friend out of the hospital,” Brannan said. “How are you going to do that?” “His daughter just flew in from Denver to take him home.” Anne smiled as the big man with the auburn mustache helped her into a conservative, pin-striped blazer that matched her skirt.

October 22 8:58 P.M. Central European Time

J

OH N Jefferson Davis arrived at the Centre Hospitalier

Universitaire St. Etienne and entered through the emergency entrance. Getting through security with his Secret Service identification was a breeze. As he stepped off the sixth floor elevator, he hardly noticed the well-dressed couple filling out discharge paperwork at the front desk. His mind was elsewhere. He had loose ends to tie up and tie off. Everything had seemed in perfect order when Davis had arrived in Brussels last week. He slipped into the rhythm of the activities at the embassy and gradually immersed himself in the security preparations for the visit of President and Mrs. Livingstone. He had been, after all, a trusted high-level agent within the Secret Service for years. He had directly served former president David Wilcox for four years and his predecessor for three. When Thomas Livingstone was elected, he volunteered for and was assigned as lead agent for Vice President Warner Cushman. The two men hit it off right away. Indeed, the amiable Davis had that way with most people. He made

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friends easily and quickly went from being an outsider to being one of the guys—although not all the groups of guys with which he was one were at one with one another. Just the opposite. Within a day and a half of his arrival, Davis had the run of the embassy. Secretaries smiled and security staffers wanted him to go drinking with them. John Jefferson Davis had made himself at home. In a quiet moment, when no one was looking, he discretely made contact with the White Rhino and they discussed Kurketrekker. Not everyone at the embassy had become Davis’s pal. There was a European security analyst named Avery Anderson, a former U.S. Army man. He seemed suspicious of Davis. Then, the first couple, and with them, a man named Buckley Peighton. He used to be in the army as well. Peighton knew Anderson. It was too bad that they wouldn’t get much of a chance to talk. It was ironic, but really no coincidence that the two old friends had wound up at St. Etienne. In central Brussels, its trauma unit was second to none. Avery Anderson lay in a darkened room. Davis whispered to the Secret Service guard standing by outside the door. They had shared a couple of beers at the bar near the embassy where guys from the embassy went. They would do so again. They commiserated and Davis told him with a wink to “think good thoughts.” John Jefferson Davis looked down at Anderson and wondered what he had known. The whir, hiss, and click of the machines were the only sounds. The patient’s eyes remained closed and his breathing was shallow. Four days ago, he had asked Davis about Kurketrekker and had stared at him a little bit too thoughtfully when Davis was startled. Did he also know about the Blauwe Lantaarn?

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This was where things got out of control. Davis had not known how much that Anderson knew, but it was too much. He should have let the White Rhino take care of this, but Davis was sure he could do it. How hard could it be? A dark street, a clean shot, and a silenced automatic. The bullet tore through his left shoulder blade, ripped into his lung, but left him alive. Another man had been there too, but Davis was sure that the other man was merely a bystander. What had he seen? Davis was sure that the bystander had seen nothing useful—no more than a van with no rear license plate. Davis was a professional. Then Anderson’s stolen car turned up in the middle of nowhere. How could this have happened? Was it a coincidence that it was between Brussels and Ostend? Davis looked down at Avery Anderson and wondered how much he knew. Whatever it was, it was too much. A little more morphine in his morphine drip would help ease Anderson’s pain. A lot more morphine in Anderson’s morphine drip would help ease John Jefferson Davis’s pain. Davis whispered to the Secret Service guard again on his way out. They shared good thoughts for poor Avery Anderson. General Buckley Peighton’s daughter and son-in-law had arrived by cab and entered the hospital by the Belangrijkstraat entrance. They went directly to the sixth floor to meet with the discharge nurse. Anne had phoned ahead, but not too far ahead. She wanted them to know that she was coming, but not to have too much time to think about it. An efficient heavyset woman met them at the front desk with a clipboard. As with hospitals everywhere, they were anxious to release patients the moment they were able to

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move, and Monsieur Peighton was able to move. He had contusions over much of his body, but they would heal. He had some bruised ribs, but those would heal too. There were some stitches to be removed from his forehead, and there was a cast to be removed from his leg, but all this could be done in Denver. Poor old Mr. Peighton was going home, and another bed was available at St. Etienne. John Jefferson Davis reached room 3005W expecting to find Buckley Peighton. Davis had last seen Peighton on the cold morning of October 20. He had smiled and they had shaken hands. Davis had wondered why in the world that Peighton had suddenly arrived in Brussels, but he sensed that Peighton wasn’t sure why Livingstone had invited him. They had arrived at the Grand Place and Davis had stepped out of the car ahead of Peighton. There was the sudden squealing of tires, a gray Citroën, and Peighton’s body hurled high into the air. A man his age should not have survived a fall from that height onto cobblestones, but neither should have Anderson survived a fusillade of ninemillimeter rounds. John Jefferson Davis had two loose ends to tie up before he returned to Washington tomorrow night. One down and one to go. A little morphine to help Peighton rest. A lot of morphine to help John Jefferson Davis rest. He reached Room 3005W expecting to find Buckley Peighton, and found instead an empty bed. The vases of flowers, sent over from the embassy, remained. The bed linens were still rumpled. The Secret Service guard was gone. Had the old man died?

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October 22 2:58 P.M. Eastern Time

“

T

HAT would amount to deception,” Vice President Warner Cushman asserted. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea this close to the election. If Tom is seriously ill, keeping it from the electorate could backfire on us.” The vice president had been on a campaign swing through the Midwest when Joyce Livingstone was kidnapped and had arrived in Washington shortly after the president returned. Edredin and Faralaco had come to see him after their meeting with the president’s physician. As the two men walked into the West Wing and headed directly to Cushman’s office, all activity in the normally frantically busy place came to a halt. All eyes were on the two men. After last night’s debacle on national television, nobody was sure what they were going to discuss with Cushman, but the phrase “presidential succession” was being whispered in these halls. Steve Faralaco had announced to the staffers that the president was doing fine and resting, but his false smile assured no one. The fact that they hustled Cushman off to a secure conference room concerned everyone. “I think we need to keep it quiet,” Faralaco said. “At least for another twenty-four hours until we see how he’s doing.” “That’s a political decision,” Cushman cautioned. “The American people deserve to have us be straight with them. After last night, speculation is rampant. They’re losing confidence in this administration.” Cushman was right. It was political and the electorate was losing confidence. The overnight polls saw substantial erosion. Just yesterday, Darmader had been sinking like a

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stone, but now he was surging. If his numbers topped Livingstone’s, he would have momentum, and if the president didn’t substantially recover, that would carry Darmader to victory. “What do you propose?” Edredin asked Cushman. “I hate to say it because it sounds self-serving, but we could invoke the Twenty-fifth Amendment,” Cushman suggested modestly. “And make you president?” Faralaco said. “Technically, under the Twenty-fifth I’d be acting president,” Cushman clarified. “Under Article II of the Constitution, the vice president becomes the president if the president dies or resigns. Under the Twenty-fifth, he only serves temporarily as the acting president.” Ratified in 1967, the Twenty-fifth Amendment had created a mechanism by which a replacement vice president could be named in the event that a sitting vice president succeeded a deceased or resigning president. It also provided for the vice president to serve as acting president if the president was temporarily incapacitated. “How does that work?” Faralaco asked. “I’m a little fuzzy on constitutional law.” “There’s two ways,” Cushman explained. “Under Section Three, the president sends a letter to the president pro tem of the Senate and the Speaker of the House saying that he is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office. Under Section Four, a majority of the cabinet can remove him involuntarily.” “But he can take back the presidency,” Edredin added. “Of course,” Cushman said. “He just sends another letter declaring himself able to resume office. Reagan did it in 1985 when he had his adenoma surgery, and Bush did it in 2002 when he was knocked out during a colonoscopy.”

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“It sounds as though you’ve thought about this a lot,” Faralaco told Cushman. “I’m the vice president,” Cushman said. “Part of our job is to wait around and mull the ‘what if’ question over and over in our minds.”

FIVE

October 23 3:25 P.M. Central European Time

“

E

S ist ein Fehler,” Frau Dr. Pechoel had told her. “Ich dachten nicht.” She had screwed up and she was sorry. Ilse Borreria paced and glowered. She stared out the window and at the rolling hills lightly dusted with snow and the line of trees in the distance beyond the road. It was so peaceful, but it was a peace she could not enjoy. Dr. Gaspar Egtanden would not have made such a mistake, and for an operation like Kurketrekker, mistakes should not be made. Of course, for an operation like Kurketrekker, Egtanden should not have accepted that speaking engagement at the seminar in Liège, but the White Rhino had okayed it. Had they also made mistakes? Things had gone so well up to this point that even Egtanden had let down his guard. Ilse’s snatching of the

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“parcel” had gone so well—so blindingly brilliantly well— that everyone assumed that just keeping this package on ice would also go smoothly. Just as Egtanden had let down his guard, so too had Dr. Charlotte Pechoel. She had taken the call from the pleasant-sounding American woman. She had a father who was crippled and not at all right in the head. He was an expatriate American businessman, and his corporation was in merger talks. It would be best if he signed a power of attorney and just went away for a while. Could Maison Lièvre help? It was a familiar question beneath this roof. Dr. Pechoel thought for a moment. They had only three patients and eight empty rooms. Fraulein Borreria’s patient was the only patient on a separate wing. What could go wrong? Now they waited. The American woman and her sister would be arriving shortly with the poor old man. They’d take a cursory look around and they would be gone. If they chose to have him admitted, it would done and they’d still be gone. A helpless old man locked in a room in an opposite wing couldn’t possibly interfere with Fraulein Borreria’s patient. Even Ilse Borreria had to admit that on the continuum of things that could truly screw up their “corkscrew,” this one was very minor. Dr. Pechoel was right. The American women would be in and out in less than an hour, and people like this weren’t the kind that liked to come back often to visit their family members. It was just the opposite. Minor or not, Ilse Borreria didn’t like imperfections in a plan. They were like tears in a fabric. They invited unraveling. “They’re here,” announced one of the young Polish nurses as she raced to get a wheelchair ready to go out to

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meet the large BMW sedan that was lumbering down the long driveway toward the Maison Lièvre. Ilse checked her silenced Glock 26 and replaced it in the holster that was strapped into the small of her back beneath her black blazer. She truly loved the little gun. Just 160 millimeters long without the silencer, it was the ideal concealed weapon. The White Rhino had once teased that it was a lady’s gun, but she struck back by asking him where else he could get a weapon with such reliability that weighed just 180 grams fully loaded with a ten-round clip. She had gone on to prove to him the value of this pistol on more than one occasion. Dr. Pechoel went out to greet the Americans, and Ilse decided that she had better go out there as well. Best to appear as part of the welcoming committee. Best to fit in. Both of the American women were conservatively dressed. The older one wore a pinstripe suit, while the younger woman was wearing a gray tweed coat and a straight black skirt. They watched intently as the Maison Lièvre staff carefully removed the old man from the back of the car and got him into the wheelchair. The women obviously cared about him, but there was none but the most perfunctory demonstration of affection. They wanted him to be cared for, but they wanted someone else to do the caring. One of his legs was in a cast and looked to be in an amount of pain. He was pale and appeared to be only partially aware of his surroundings. His eyes stared off into the distance and a dollop of saliva trickled down his chin. He was, Ilse admitted, ideal Maison Lièvre material. “I’m Anne Sawyers, and this is my sister Suzanne,” the woman in the suit said, reaching out to shake Dr. Pechoel’s hand. “I’m so glad that you could fit us in with Dr. Egtanden out of town.”

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“But of course, we are very happy to oblige,” the doctor replied, casting a glance toward Ilse, whom she knew to be anything but happy with this turn of events.

October 23 9:25 A.M. Eastern Time

“

I

S there anything else?” Thomas Livingstone said, pushing the paper across the table toward the secretary of state. “No, it’s all very straightforward,” John Edredin replied. “I’ll deliver this up to the Hill personally.” “I wish I could see the looks on their faces,” Livingstone said. His mind felt groggy, and his eyes were so hazy that he could barely see the looks on the faces of the people in this room. President Livingstone had just surrendered the reins of his presidency to Warner Cushman. Once, Cushman had been one of Livingstone’s most bitter rivals within the party, but he’d come on the ticket after Livingstone had beaten him in the California primary four years ago. When they were elected, Cushman had been a cooperative and hardworking member of the Livingstone administration, but the two men had never become friends. Always cordial, but never friends. When Faralaco and Edredin had first come to Livingstone with the idea of relinquishing power under the Twenty-fifth Amendment, he had gone through the roof. Only when he realized that he had in fact gone through the roof did Livingstone understand that he really did need to step down. He felt terrible. He could see himself losing his grip and he knew that for his own good and for the good of the country, he needed to take some time off.

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He decided that he would wait for their briefing with Director of National Intelligence Richard Scevoles. What was the latest on the search for his wife? Scevoles would have the latest. If the news was good, perhaps that would be enough to snap him out of it. If the news was bad, he would wait no longer. The news had been bad. Scevoles showed satellite images, remarkably detailed satellite images, but they showed nothing useful. He listed the agencies involved in scouring the earth, but they had nothing useful. There was an outward appearance of hard work and progress, but that was a smokescreen, deliberately conjured up by the competing law enforcement agencies. A cynic might have said that it was to obfuscate their failures, but the agencies themselves would have said that it was done to keep the kidnappers on edge. The media had been told that the search was going well and substantial leads had turned up. A substantial number of leads had, in fact turned up, but that was the problem. Twelve hours after the incident, a group calling itself the Mujahidin Martyrs’ Brigade had claimed responsibility. No sooner than that, another group, this one calling itself La Partie Exigeant la Libération de la Corse—or the Party for the Liberation of Corsica—declared itself to be the perpetrator. There were more. Interpol had nearly lost track as their agents hustled hither and yon trying to track down leads. Unfortunately, they had all been dead ends. Several were pranks, a few were real groups wanting to look good to other terrorists, and one was a kid in Denmark who thought he could wring a million dollars out of the U.S. government. When Scevoles and his staff left the briefing room, Livingstone sadly asked Faralaco to hand him the one-

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paragraph letter that had been drafted personally by his White House counsel. As Edredin left to take the letter to Capitol Hill, Faralaco headed back to his office pondering what role, if any, he would have under Acting President Cushman.

October 23 3:48 P.M. Central European Time

“

W

OULD you like a tour of the facility?” Dr. Charlotte Pechoel asked. “Oh, certainly, if that wouldn’t be too much trouble.” The woman who called herself Anne Sawyers smiled. They’d been sitting in the doctor’s office discussing poor old Charles Sawyers, the expat business tycoon who’d lost his marbles and who was in need of a discreet private sanitarium. Anne and Suzanne had carefully rehearsed the details of old Charles’s maladies on the drive down from Brussels. Coffee had been brought in as Anne carefully ran through her “father’s” troubles, answering every question at length and trying not to act impatient. Pechoel explained that Maison Lièvre’s director, Dr. Egtanden, was away at a conference in Liège, but assured them that they were in good hands with his deputy. Not making herself part of the conversation, Ilse Borreria sat opposite the doctor’s desk and spoke only occasionally. Anne quickly ascertained that this woman in black with the short-cropped blond hair was not part of the staff, but almost certainly the confirmation that Joyce Livingstone’s kidnappers were here and in charge. Away from the conversation entirely, old “Charles

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Sawyers” merely sat by and drooled. He sputtered occasionally but said nothing. Despite the eight hundred milligrams of ibuprofen that he’d swallowed on the drive down from Brussels, the pain in his leg really was bothering him. “We’ll start with the kitchen and exercise area on this level and then go upstairs to the individual rooms,” Dr. Pechoel explained as she grabbed the ring of keys off her desk. Suzanne made note of this clanking mass, knowing that it would be important later. In the kitchen area, only one staffer was present. Anne distracted both the doctor and the woman in black with some questions about the nutritional content of the food, while Suzanne stepped aside to check the locks on the exterior door. Anne had deliberately addressed her question to Ilse Borreria. No better way to preoccupy someone than to ask them a question they cannot answer. While she was mired in the quandary over whole-wheat versus multigrain bread, Suzanne tried the back door and nodded to Anne. As they walked back toward the front of the building, only the woman in black noticed a young man with short hair parted in the middle who was standing in an alcove along the corridor. While waiting for the elevator to the second floor, Anne made note of the large spiral staircase. At one time, the building’s grand entrance foyer had been quite elegant, but the elevator shaft, probably added in the 1960s or thereabouts, really ruined the look. “This is the principal wing of Maison Lièvre,” Dr. Pechoel said as they stepped into a broad hallway. Anne counted a half dozen doorways—all with large, conspicuous locks. “It seems there are two wings,” Suzanne observed walking toward a turn at the end of the place where the main

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hallway intercepted another. “Are there patients here as well?” “That wing is not used so much,” Ilse Borreria said, her heels making an urgent clicking sound on the parquet floor as she hurried to corral the younger woman, who was wandering too far from the main group. “It seems as though there is someone down there—I see a tray on that table over there by the third door,” Suzanne observed innocently. “That wing is not used so much,” Ilse Borreria repeated with a bit more urgency. Suzanne calmly turned and walked back. No need to make this woman more uptight than she already was. “It’s very quiet here,” Anne said, making conversation with Dr. Pechoel. “Oh yes, we pride ourselves on maintaining a very calm environment here at Maison Lièvre,” the doctor said earnestly. “Our patients are here to rest.” “That will certainly be the case with our father. He’s had a very stressful career, and it’s his turn for a respite from the rat race . . . that’s an American metaphor.” “Yes, I’ve heard it.” “Do you suppose I could take a look at one of the rooms?” Anne asked. “Of course,” Dr. Pechoel replied. “Naturally, we can’t intrude on a patient’s privacy, but I can show you a room that is unoccupied. This could be the room we would prepare for your father.” Suzanne watched as the doctor picked the key. There were about a dozen on the ring that were long skeleton keys similar in shape, and one of these opened the door. The room was large room with a high ceilings. There was a large metal-frame bed that was made up with sheets

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and a pale green blanket that almost matched the paint on the walls. The two tall windows had ornamental grillwork on the outside. She made a mental note. Nobody gets in or out this way. “It seems a bit stark,” Suzanne said walking into the room as the woman in black remained in the hallway. “As I was telling your sister, our guests are here to rest,” Dr. Pechoel explained, deliberately speaking in a soft and soothing tone. “We pride ourselves on maintaining a calm environment. It is Dr. Egtanden’s philosophy that too much stimulation agitates them.” “I see,” Suzanne said. Anne looked out and across the field toward the main road. She looked down at the large BMW that she and Colonel Brannan had rented in Paris. She had parked it so that the rear could not be seen from the main part of the first floor. From up here, though, she could see tracks in the snow near the trunk. The passengers who had arrived inside had now disembarked. As they turned to leave, Suzanne caught Anne’s attention. Pointing in the direction of the other wing, she mouthed the words “third room.” “I’m quite satisfied with what we’ve seen here,” Anne said, smiling at Dr. Pechoel and the woman in black. The doctor looked pleased, but Ilse Borreria remained expressionless. “Wouldn’t you agree, Suzanne?” “Absolutely,” Suzanne said, glancing back into the room with green walls. “It’s very calm. He’ll certainly be able to rest here, which is, after all, what we’re looking for.” “I should call my husband and tell him the good news,” Anne said as they left the elevator and walked back to the main office. She had decided that it would be more straightforward to communicate with Brannan on her cell phone

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than to use an a Special Forces–issue intrateam communicator. Whispering into the collar of her blazer seemed unnecessarily cloak-and-dagger. “Hello, darling,” Anne said happily when Brannan answered. “Don’t you know I love it when you call me that?” “I think we’ve found exactly the place we were looking for,” she announced happily, telling the colonel exactly what he needed to know. “Dad will definitely be happy with this.” “Where? Front wing?” “Nnnn.” “Back wing then, which room?” “I would think about the third,” Anne said, continuing to smile calmly as Dr. Pechoel organized the paperwork on her desk. Smooth and peaceful. Suzanne was rummaging in her large purse to distract the woman in black. Old Charles Sawyers just sat in the wheelchair staring at his lap. “How many people?” “Dr. Egtanden is away, but we’ve been working with Dr. Pechoel, and a Ms. Borreria, who’s on the staff here. We also met one of the nurses and a nice young man in the kitchen. “We’re in the office now signing the papers,” Anne replied cheerfully, smiling at Dr. Pechoel and Ilse Borreria. “I’ll see you soon.” “Count on it,” Brannan promised.

October 23 9:48 A.M. Eastern Time

S

TEVE Faralaco didn’t have to wait long to see his role

in the White House rapidly diminish. Cushman’s own people were running the meetings now, Mark Teverone,

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Cushman’s top aide, had taken over the chief of staff role, and there seemed to be new Cushman staffers running around every time he looked up. Since Warner Cushman had assumed power, the West Wing had been a revolving door of briefings. Every cabinet secretary had been in, and every branch of the armed forces had been in. It seemed as though Director of National Intelligence Richard Scevoles was in constantly, and the secretary of Homeland Security, Wally Wallingford, was coming in now. Faralaco felt it strange that the Wallingford briefing would take place in the Oval Office without Livingstone. It still seemed very odd that Livingstone was suddenly not around, especially in his own office. Steve Faralaco was now a fish out of water, but he still attended the meetings. He used to have an ongoing dialogue with Livingstone, but Cushman scarcely knew who he was. There was a lot that Cushman didn’t know. He’d been the most hands-off vice president in half a century. He was almost never in his office. When Livingstone had been up all night dealing with domestic and international crises, Cushman had been off toasting someone or other at some rubber chicken event. He had been around the West Wing more in the last few days than he had been in the previous month. Cushman seated himself behind the president’s desk, Livingstone’s desk, while Teverone took his place near Cushman in the spot that Faralaco had occupied for the past four years. Wallingford and his staff, meanwhile, took their usual places. These people included a couple of affable senior aides who were political appointees short of any useful technical understanding of what the department was doing, and Jenny Collingwood, the bespectacled young staffer who always had a better grasp of the facts than her boss.

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Steve sat back, out of the way, as Wallingford made his introductory remarks and Jenny Collingwood stood by to fill in the facts and figures for him. When they had concluded, Cushman thanked them and asked several pointed questions about the role of the department in the Joyce Livingstone abduction investigation, at which Wallingford was visibly flustered. Collingwood caught the ball for him, explaining that such activities were outside the department’s mandate because they occurred abroad. “I think that this tragedy points up a serious shortcoming in the way we do business,” Cushman interjected. “The world is a smaller place and we clearly need to adapt to that reality. The people of the United States have suffered because of a perceived antagonism that exists between us and international cooperative organizations such as the United Nations. Both Tom Livingstone and I were originally very supportive of measures such as the International Validation Treaty, which fostered global unity. There has been a lot of talk in the media over the last few months that such support has been ebbing within our administration. We have to reverse this tide. This tragedy illustrates how much we truly need our international partners.” Faralaco was startled. The International Validation had been a thorn in Livingstone’s side when dealing with stateless terrorism and Cushman knew it—or he would have known it had he turned up for briefings. “Starting right now, and continuing after the LivingstoneCushman administration is reelected, the United States is going to be seen as moving closer to a full cooperation with the United Nations rather than apart from it,” Cushman said emphatically. Faralaco wondered what Livingstone would have said.

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October 23 9:48 A.M. Eastern Time

“

S

O, are we running against Cushman now?” Justin Underwood snarled as he stood with his arms folded, crisply starched sleeves rolled up to the elbows, staring at the bank of television screens that were carrying the breaking news. The manager of Senator Wilson Darmader’s presidential campaign was suddenly facing a challenge from an unexpected foe. He would have to switch gears to craft a new strategy for defeating a new opponent. “Get me everything you can on this bastard,” Underwood ordered. “He’s gotta have some cadavers in his closet somewhere. What have we got on him now?” “We ran those three targeted spots a while back,” Brooke Larderie, his senior assistant for policy matters, reminded him. “But our polling showed that Cushman wasn’t going to be much of an issue in the Livingstone-Darmader race, so we’ve been concentrating on Livingstone.” “Well, switch the concentration. Get me five hot-button negative items in one hour. Have some spots ready to go on the air tomorrow.” “But, sir . . . that will take time,” stammered a junior aide. “Take all the time that you need.” Underwood smiled sarcastically. “Just have two thirty-second spots ready to go on national media by the first thing tomorrow morning.” “What sorts of spots?” Brooke Larderie asked. She was the kind of ambitious young person he liked on his staff. If you said jump, she coolly asked how high. “Telling people that an untested man from the shadows wants to be their president?” Underwood shrugged. “Tell people to question his qualifications. Tell them that suddenly

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they’ve got a new candidate because of some legal loophole. There’s almost nothing with higher negatives than legal loopholes. Get creative. Do I have to do your job for you? Find out if Cushman is pro-firearms. If he is, remind voters in New York about it. If he isn’t, remind the voters in the NASCAR states. Then get his medical records.”

October 23 4:05 P.M. Central European Time

J

OYC E Livingstone was starting to consciously accept

the idea that she might not see her husband again for a very long time. What could have befallen Tom over these past hours and days? She had no idea how long she’d be here or whether she’d ever get out alive. She remembered stories she’d once read in supermarket checkout lines about people locked in attics for twenty years, and she shivered with the thought that she might become one of them. She shuddered slightly as a powerful gust of wind rattled the windows. She pulled the blanket tightly around her and fought off the urge to begin sobbing again. Suddenly, she heard scraping sounds at the door. It was somebody with a key. Who was it? Was it the person who had brought trays of food while she was asleep? Whoever it was seemed to be having difficulty opening the door. At last there was the metallic scrape of a lock turning, and the door swung open. It was a young woman in a gray tweed coat and a purple sweater. There was a glimmer of recognition in this woman’s startled eyes. It was as though she recognized Joyce, but was surprised to see her.

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“Who are you?” Joyce demanded. “What do you want? “My name is Suzanne Harris,” she said. “I’m a reporter. I’m here to get you out.” When Anne and Suzanne had gone down to Dr. Pechoel’s office to fill out the paperwork, the doctor had casually tossed her keys on an end table. Suzanne scooped up the keys as Anne deliberately stood between the table and the doctor while Pechoel opened a large file cabinet. The rumble and scrape of the file drawer buried the sound of the keys. The woman in black entered the room a split second later, but she had seen nothing. A few minutes later, after catching her breath, Suzanne excused herself to go to the ladies’ room. She hadn’t said that she was headed for the first lady’s room. For Suzanne Harris, the reporter’s dream of unraveling the mystery of the kidnapped first lady had just come true, but it wasn’t at all what Suzanne had expected. Joyce Livingstone wasn’t what she had expected. She was not the polished, well-groomed woman that Suzanne had seen on television a hundred times and once in person when Mrs. Livingstone was speaking at a convention in San Diego. Instead, she was a bedraggled woman in an old-fashioned nightshirt with hopelessly mussed hair. Nor was the first lady a rational, lucid woman, patiently awaiting her release. She was a frightened hostage with an instinct to distrust anyone from beyond the door. “How do I know that you’re telling the truth?” Joyce said, as much as a statement as a question. In her groggy, half-drugged state, the line between reality and fantasy had faded completely. It was improbable that a reporter would suddenly walk into this room in this place. Joyce was sure that this was some sort of trick. “Mrs. Livingstone, I’m not your enemy,” Suzanne in-

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sisted. “I’m honestly here to get you out of this place, and we have to move quickly.” Joyce looked around the room. She began to sense the agoraphobia that prisoners or caged animals sometimes feel upon their release from captivity. The impatient woman across the room had given her a choice. Joyce had to make a decision, to choose a course of action. “Okay, I’ll go with you,” she said at last. “I really hope you know what you’re doing.” The moment that she crossed the threshold to follow this woman who said she was a reporter, Joyce realized that she had made a dreadful mistake. So too did Suzanne as she saw the horrified expression on the first lady’s face. “I see that you got lost finding your way to the toilet,” came a voice from behind her, and Suzanne turned to find herself staring into the barrel of Ilse Borreria’s silenced Glock 26. “Obviously my suspicions were correct,” the woman in black hissed angrily. “Why?” Suzanne asked, trying to gather her composure while the lump rose in her throat. “Just explain to me what in the world motivated you people to do this.” “I do not answer to little swine like you,” the angry woman said, raising the gun and wrapping her finger tight on the trigger.

October 23 4:06 P.M. Central European Time

H

E NRI was always pleased when nicely dressed women

came to tour the Maison Lièvre. They were usually bringing old men and occasionally old women who had

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lived too hard and were all worn out, but the family members always had so much life in them. Of course they had so much life ahead of them and so much of the old man’s money to make them able to live life at the fullest. Maison Lièvre was so very exclusive and very pricy. Henri liked the energy of the younger people. Maison Lièvre was so damned tranquil that it was tedious. The nicely dressed, energetic people were such a break in the monotony. He especially like the women because of the way they smelled. Their fragrance was so invigorating—so expensive. Being a chef—he was more than just the cook— he was very attuned to aromas. He was just analyzing the aroma of the stew that he was preparing when there was a knocking at the back door. Who could it be knocking at the back door? It was a pair of men in blue coveralls. Tradesmen. Of course. The tradesmen would use the back door. Only the well-dressed and energetic young clients come in the front door. “Nous représentons la compagnie de téléphone,” the big man with the auburn mustache announced as Henri opened the back door. “Nous venons pour installer des fils.” Henri asked whether the men from the telephone company had an appointment to do their wiring, and they assured him they did. He let them in. It was none of his concern. Dr. Egtanden and Dr. Pechoel were always calling tradesmen without consulting him, so it was none of his concern. He just directed them to the rear staircase that led up to the second floor and went back to chopping garlic and tarragon. This was his concern, his art. Dave Brannan and Jack Rodgers ascended the stairs into the secondary wing of the building in two-step strides,

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moving as quickly and as quietly as possible. Rodgers had his Heckler & Koch P2000 SK nine-millimeter automatic and Brannan carried a MK23. Both weapons were equipped with silencers. “Just explain to me what in the world motivated you people to do this,” they heard Suzanne ask as they topped the stairs. Crouching, they peeped around the corner to see what was going on. Three women were standing in the hallway. Suzanne was in the middle with her hands partially raised. A woman in black with short blond hair was in the foreground with her back to them. She was holding a gun on the other two women. It took a moment to recognize the bedraggled third woman as Joyce Livingstone. “I do not answer to little swine like you,” the woman in black said. At exactly that moment, Joyce moved slightly, momentarily distracting the woman with the gun. “Get back,” she demanded. “Get back in your . . .” She was interrupted by two projectiles hitting the back of her head. The neat hole made by the nine-millimeter round from Jack’s P2000 SK existed for a nanosecond before it was swallowed within the big, bloody splash made by the low velocity .45 slug from Brannan’s MK23. Suzanne glimpsed the two men a split second before they fired and she closed her eyes. She felt the warm wetness of Ilse Borreria’s head coming apart, and the sting of the compression as the exiting rounds passed about a foot from her left cheek. Suzanne opened her eyes to see what was left of the woman in black toppling toward her. Joyce Livingstone just screamed. It was a natural and unavoidable reaction to the shower of blood, brain, and

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bone. The silenced gunshots had been essentially inaudible, so the sight of a person’s head exploding was as incongruous as it was horrifying. The tall man with an auburn mustache grabbed her just as she started to feel rubbery all over. When she fainted, Dave Brannan had her. He lifted her and held her as a father holds a child. “A second time?” Suzanne said, staring at Jack Rodgers. Impulsively, she reached out and hugged him as tight as she could. “I hate to interrupt your fun, kids,” Brannan said. “But I think it’s time to get the hell outta here.”

October 23 4:06 P.M. Central European Time

D

OWNSTAI RS at Maison Lièvre, Ilse Borreria ob-

served that Suzanne seemed to be taking a long time in the WC. She nodded to Dr. Pechoel and left the room. “Ms. Borreria was suspicious of you from the first,” Dr. Pechoel told Anne as she stood by nervously, watching the woman in black as she walked toward the staircase. “I would have to admit that I thought you really were who you said you were. I am very disappointed. I know that I am too trusting of human nature.” Anne turned to see that the doctor had retrieved an old Webley revolver from her desk. “As I told you earlier,” she explained, “Dr. Egtanden is very strict about the processes and procedures here at Maison Lièvre. Discretion is one of the cornerstones of this institution. Like clients of Swiss banks, our clients must be able to depend on us with unwavering faith in our commit-

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ment to keeping their secrets . . . regardless of what those secrets are.” “Even when it involves the imprisonment of the victim of a high-profile kidnapping against her will?” “She is not our client,” Dr. Pechoel said simply. “She was brought here by our client and you’re interfering. We cannot and will not tolerate anyone who interferes with the wishes of our clients.” “Even when a crime is obviously being committed?” Anne was exasperated. “Would you expect your Swiss banker to ask you where you got the money that you are depositing?” “I don’t have a Swiss banker,” Anne replied just as a bloodcurdling scream was head coming from upstairs. “I see that the younger Ms. Sawyers has been located.” Dr. Pechoel smiled. There was the sound of running on the stairs, and both Anne and the doctor were taken aback as Suzanne burst through the large double doors that separated the main foyer from the reception office where Dr. Charlotte Pechoel had her desk. She was drenched in blood, but it was not immediately apparent that it was not her own. Anne McCaine gasped. Dr. Pechoel was distracted momentarily, and was unable to react as Jack Rodgers entered the room behind Suzanne and pointed his Heckler & Koch at the doctor’s head. “Don’t make a mistake,” Rodgers told her. “Put it down.” The doctor was suddenly nervous. Pointing a gun at an unarmed woman was one thing. Facing down a scruffylooking man in phone company coveralls with an automatic was another.

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“You put down your gun,” said a voice from behind them. It was a young man with short blond hair parted in the middle. He was pointing an Uzi with a thirty-two-round clip directly at Dave Brannan, who was still holding Joyce Livingstone. It seemed like checkmate. Brannan had his hands full and could neither get to his own weapon nor make a move to disarm the man with the Uzi. Rodgers was across the room, with several people between him and the gunman. At this range, the Uzi’s fully automatic firepower would be devastating. Rodgers could almost certainly kill the man, but not before he did a lot of damage—too much damage. It was time to play for time. Rodgers slowly took his finger off the trigger and gently laid his gun on the corner of Dr. Pechoel’s desk. “What are we going to do with them?” Dr. Pechoel asked. The blond man entered the room, but didn’t answer. He seemed unsure of himself. Rodgers tensed to make a move when he got close enough. One split second of uncertainty was all he needed to disarm this punk—if he just got close enough. The man walked through the room cradling the Uzi and nervously surveying the growing number of hostages. A split second later, there was a popping sound and his elbow suddenly twisted at an extreme angle. Jack was startled—he hadn’t even touched the guy. As the Uzi tumbled from the blond guy’s grasp, Dr. Pechoel raised the old Webley, unsure of what to do or how to react. A bullet impacted her left clavicle, propelling her backward into her big filing cabinet. Rodgers recovered his weapon, but there was nothing left to do. Both the blond guy and the doctor were down.

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In all that had been going on, nobody had paid any attention to poor old “Charles Sawyers,” who had been sitting in the wheelchair staring at his lap since he had arrived. Nor had anyone—especially the man with the Uzi—noticed that beneath the blanket spread across that lap was a Heckler & Koch MK23 loaded for bear. All eyes turned to General Buckley Peighton, who was grinning the confident grin of an old soldier who had made good on a promise to a friend. He had promised Tom Livingstone that he would look after his wife in Belgium. He had suffered a setback, but that had been reversed. The old soldier was back in action, and he had done his duty.

SIX

October 23 5:42 P.M. Central European Time

A

S Leo Verstegen drove toward Maison Lièvre, he

could see that the front door was open slightly, which was out of the ordinary. Things that were out of the ordinary usually made him suspicious and he had long ago learned that being suspicious usually meant staying secure. He put his hand on the pistol in his pocket and entered slowly and quietly. Inside, he was greeted by a fantastic aroma wafting from the kitchen that reminded him that one day he planned to lure the cook Henri away from Dr. Gaspar Egtanden. Today, however, mixed in with the tarragon and garlic were faint traces of burnt gunpowder. There were murmuring sounds coming from within the reception office where Dr. Charlotte Pechoel had her desk. Quietly and carefully, Verstegen stepped across the foyer

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toward the large double doors that led to this room. Inside the office, it was a bloodbath. Two of the Polish nurses crouched on the floor near the body of Dr. Pechoel looked up as he walked in. Across the room lay the body of Hans, the diligent young man with short blond hair parted in the middle. Verstegen’s immediate impulsive reaction was that they couldn’t possibly be dead. However, he quickly observed that each had a neat bullet hole in the forehead, delivered precisely and professionally at close range. Kurketrekker was compromised! How could this be? It had gone so flawlessly. How could this be? Joyce Livingstone! Leo Verstegen turned and dashed toward the elevator. He pushed the button. The motor whirred. This is not fast enough. He took the stairs. Despite his bad leg, he practically flew up the once-grand staircase and down the hall. He rounded the corner to see Henri—the brilliant chef— standing over the body of Ilse Borreria. “Que s’est produit? What happened here?” Verstegen demanded. Henri was white as a sheet and his eyes were as big as the dishes on which he served his vichyssoise. After several stammering false starts, Henri explained that he had heard one of the nurses scream and he had come running. He hadn’t heard any gunshots. Of course not, Verstegen observed, they would have used silencers. The nurses had found Dr. Pechoel and the other man in the office, and Henri had discovered Fraulein Borreria here. He told Verstegen about the well-dressed women and the men in the telephone company coveralls. They had all come and gone.

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“Did you see the telephone company vehicle?” Verstegen demanded. “No.” “Did you see the car in which the well-dressed women arrived?” “No.” “Who were these people?” Verstegen demanded rhetorically. Henri simply shrugged. Kurketrekker was compromised! How could this be? It had gone so flawlessly. How could this be? His sources within Interpol and the Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure—the DGSE, France’s external intelligence agency—had assured him that the search for Joyce Livingstone was going nowhere! He even had his ace in the hole within the U.S. Secret Service itself! Verstegen looked in the room where Joyce Livingstone had been. Of course it would be empty, but he had to look. He felt the pulse of Ilse Borreria. He knew what he would find, but he had to check. Who were these people? Henri thought they were American. Could they be Secret Service? FBI? Special Forces? None of these, he thought. It seemed to be too small an operation for any of these organizations. They would have sent an army to take down Maison Lièvre, and they wouldn’t have just faded away afterward. Whoever they were, he couldn’t imagine why the place was not still swarming with police. He glanced out the window, half expecting to see the sky black with Black Hawk helicopters. It wasn’t, but it could be at any moment. Leo Verstegen had to put as many kilometers as possible between himself and Maison Lièvre. He dashed down the stairs, climbed into his Mercedes,

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and headed down the long driveway for the last time. As soon as he reached the main road, he began thumbing his cell phone. His first call was to Dr. Gaspar Egtanden. His second would be to a man with a tinge of east Texas around his vowels.

October 23 11:42 A.M. Eastern Time

“

T

H IS could really backfire on us,” Justin Underwood

said soberly as he pondered the draft that an aide had just handed him. Underwood was had a reputation for—indeed he was notorious for—going to any lengths to get his candidate elected. For him, winning wasn’t everything, it was the only thing. The aides in the room were dumbstruck. They had never seen the manager of Senator Wilson Darmader’s presidential campaign hesitate. “You asked for something that would bury Cushman, something that would destroy him,” Brooke Larderie reminded him. Secretly, the aides were delighted with having come up with a scheme that caused even the king of chicanery to take pause. “I’m not above a friendly knife in the back.” Underwood chuckled nervously, deliberately accentuating his east Texas drawl in an effort to appear unruffled. “But this could really recoil and hurt us big time. A palace coup? Don’t you think that planting a story accusing Cushman of trying to overthrow the presidency is really going too far?” “We’re not actually planting the story . . . it’s already a rumor,” said the young man who had handed him the memo. “The fact that he assumed the presidency so quickly under the Twenty-fifth Amendment is suspicious in and of

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itself . . . if it’s spun right, and people are already spinning it. In any case, it would be impossible to disprove in the time left before the election. He’d spend all his time fighting that off and not campaigning.” “Darmader could just stand back and say nothing,” added another aide. “Just like he’s been doing since Cushman became acting president. Let the media carry the ball. Even if the media doesn’t crucify him, they’ll debate it ad nauseam and that’ll sow doubt in the minds of the voters. They’ll be like, ‘I’m not so sure, but I don’t want to take a chance on this guy.’ ” “If Cushman actually did it, wouldn’t it constitute treason?” Brooke Larderie scowled. The young woman was standing near the door, her arms folded across her chest. “Wouldn’t Cushman be theoretically culpable of one of those high crimes and misdemeanors that they still execute people for? It’s not like copping a feel in the Oval Office while your wife’s out of town.” “Well, the fact that it is a truly extreme capital crime would put a serious burden of proof on any special prosecutor that handled the case,” Underwood said thoughtfully. “You couldn’t use circumstantial evidence to actually convict the guy in court like you can in the media. It certainly would take time to get an indictment and a helluva lot of effort to prove. It might even be one of those cases where you’d never get an indictment because all the federal prosecutors worked for the Livingstone administration at the time.” “So what should we do?” asked the man who gave Underwood the memo. “Let me just hang on to this for a few days.” Underwood smiled, folding the memo into sixths and slipping it into

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his pocket. “Let’s follow what they do in the media. Let’s just continue as we have been and see how things play out.” “Is there something you have going that you haven’t told us about?” Brook Larderie asked with a raised eyebrow. Underwood just looked her. What did she think he had “going”?

October 23 6:04 P.M. Central European Time

B

E FORE John Jefferson Davis had taken the call from the White Rhino, he had sensed that the corkscrew was unwinding—but only a tiny bit. He had seen to it that Avery Anderson would rest in peace—forever. But when he had tried to do the same for poor old Buckley Peighton, he had discovered that the general was on his way to Denver. Davis didn’t like it that Peighton was in the wind, but this was only a tiny hiccup in the plan. Davis was monitoring the entire search for Joyce Livingstone from the Secret Service desk at the United States Embassy in Brussels. Had Peighton actually known anything, then certainly Davis would have known, and certainly Peighton would not have been released to his daughter to fly home. Davis would have to alert someone to flights arriving in Denver over the next day or so. Aside from this, Kurketrekker had seemed right on track. Then Verstegen had called. Kurketrekker had unwound. The bird, Verstegen told Davis angrily, had flown. Davis felt as though he was going to be sick. What kind of operation had liberated Joyce Livingstone? How could this have

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happened? Who did it? Between them, Verstegen and Davis were capable of monitoring every entity—whether overt or covert—that had been called into play in the search for the missing first lady. Yet there was no indication from any of them that they knew about Maison Lièvre or that anyone was planning a rescue mission. Just as the world had been oblivious to who had kidnapped Joyce in the first place, Verstegen and Davis had no guess as to who had done it the second time. Davis went back to the operations room at the embassy and casually asked around. There was no indication—not even a rumor—that an operation had been or was now imminent, much less that it had already gone down and that it had succeeded. Joyce Livingstone had been snatched a second time and nobody except Verstegen and Davis knew it! When Davis met the old Belgian at a little tavern on a Brussels side street, it was not in the self-congratulatory— almost jolly—spirit of their meeting two days ago at the Blauwe Lantaarn. They were in crisis mode. Verstegen recounted—as he could not previously on his cell phone—all the gruesome details of what had gone down at the private sanitarium. Davis debriefed Verstegen on what he had learned from the Maison Lièvre staff about the Americans, but it was all very hazy. They couldn’t agree on how many, but the cook had seen some men in coveralls and there were two well-dressed women. The best description seemed to be of these well-dressed women. Leave it to a Frenchman, Davis thought, to fixate on the well-dressed women. “I can’t believe that it was an American Special Forces grab,” Davis said when Verstegen suggested that. “They would have been all over that place with at least a platoon— if not a full battalion—backed by choppers and gunships.

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They’d have attacked in force, and they wouldn’t have used well-dressed women.” “The CIA then?” Verstegen suggested. “No,” Davis said thoughtfully. “If it was a U.S. operation, it would have been much larger, there would have been a medevac chopper on standby and they would’ve left a sizable force to secure the site after Mrs. Livingstone was extracted—and I would have heard about it at the embassy.” “Then that leaves a most disturbing possibility,” Verstegen replied. “Which is that she was discovered and captured by a terrorist organization that was somehow able to penetrate our operation.” “You need to get to work on this,” Davis said insistently. “In a few hours, I’m due on a flight back to Washington, where I’ll have to tell those to whom we both answer that our bird is out of her cage and that Kurketrekker has been compromised. I need to assure them that you are unscrewing this screwed-up corkscrew . . . or you and I are both very, very screwed.” “It is a matter of pride,” Verstegen said confidently, amused by Davis’s string of metaphors. “We will see to it that this is done.”

October 23 9:17 P.M. Central European Time

“

W

H E RE the hell have you been for the past three days!” Max Schaier demanded. “I filed my story about the soiree at the embassy in Brussels immediately after the kidnapping,” Suzanne Harris insisted. “I worked in all the reaction. I couldn’t cover

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the reception at Versailles because the first couple never made it to Paris.” “I’ve been trying to reach you,” the managing editor of the San Diego Herald insisted. “I got your message, but I was out of cell reception until now.” She couldn’t tell him that until now, her cell phone had been in the pocket of a scruffy mystery man with a gun. “I need you to get back here. There’s a gala at the art museum in Balboa Park that I need you to cover.” “When is it?” “Next weekend.” “I’ll be there.” “I need you here before that, there’s a major benefactor . . . what the hell’s his name? I need you to do an interview. They like to be interviewed. It’s important to them that their name gets in the paper.” Suzanne rolled her eyes. This is exactly what she didn’t like about the society desk. “I’m working on an angle about the Joyce Livingstone kidnapping,” she explained. “What angle?” Schaier replied. “That’s not what you’re there for. That’s why I sent Seamus Gilmour over there. I don’t pay him a hundred-plus grand a year to have somebody from the society page duplicate his efforts.” Schaier had sent his colorful lead columnist to cover the Livingstones in London and Paris. He had run Gilmour’s columns from London on the front page, and he planned to continue running them on the front page all week. It would be good for at least a 15 percent boost in circulation. Like nearly everyone else in the media, Gilmour had flown to Paris on Monday to be on hand for the Livingstones’ dramatic arrival, and like nearly everyone else in the media,

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Seamus Gilmour’s morning epistle from Paris on October 20—filed the night before—had been upstaged by the kidnapping. Schaier had chartered a private jet to hustle Gilmour back to Brussels, but the flamboyant columnist had run into the same impasse as several thousand other journalists and an equal number of cops. “Has Gilmour gotten any leads, yet?” Suzanne asked, anticipating the answer. “He’s got an exclusive with the head of the French Secret Service,” Schaier replied. “He’s taking him to lunch or dinner or something. The French have a theory.” “I’m following another lead . . .” “Whatever it is, email the details to Gilmour and get yourself back to San Diego,” Schaier said as he hung up. “Whatever it is,” Suzanne said as she closed her cell phone. “I will not email anything to Gilmour.” She looked across the vast expanse of the air freight hangar at Luxembourg’s Findel Airport. While Seamus Gilmour was dining with the French spies, and as the world’s reporters and the world’s police were searching for Joyce Livingstone, Suzanne was standing about forty yards from the first lady, who was sitting on a packing crate chatting with General Buckley Peighton. Along with this mercurial band of soldiers of fortune into whose midst Suzanne had fallen, the general and Mrs. Livingstone were preparing to board the huge Apex Air 747-200F freighter that was parked here in this hangar. Apex was the “quiet company” of the air cargo business, having long ago earned a reputation for being a reliable contractor who met schedules and asked few questions. Apex had numerous clients around the world, and among these was the United States special operations community. Buck Peighton had known the owner of Apex Air

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since they had served in the Army together long ago. When the general had called to say that he needed transport, arrangements were made for him and his entourage to hitch a ride on a previously scheduled cargo run that Apex had going between the air freight hub at Findel and Baltimore-Washington Airport. Email the details to Gilmour? Not hardly. Suzanne was in the midst of the story of the decade, and this one was hers.

October 23 3:17 P.M. Eastern Time

“

M

R. Faralaco, may I speak with you for a moment?”

Steve Faralaco glanced back down the crowded corridor toward the briefing room. “Mr. Faralaco . . .” Who was it trying to get his attention? Steve craned his neck to see who it was. It was Jenny Collingwood, elbowing her way though the West Wing’s main hallway with her armload of briefing folders. “Sure, Ms. Collingwood,” he said, moving to the side of the hallway away from the surging traffic. “Um, could we speak privately?” “Sure, let’s go to my office.” As he cleared a spot for her to sit in the hopelessly cluttered room, she removed her glasses to clean them with a pale gray lens cloth from her purse. Faralaco hadn’t noticed her eyes before. He saw her around at briefings quite a bit, but he hadn’t noticed how really attractive she was. He wondered why he hadn’t noticed. Maybe it was the way

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that her eyes usually swam in distorted pools behind the thick, black-rimmed lenses of her glasses, or maybe it was the way that he had been so busy when Livingstone was in the Oval Office. He was much less busy now. “What’s on your mind, Ms. Collingwood?” Steve asked as the large, heavy lenses once more swallowed and distorted the appearance of her eyes. “I want to talk to you about Mr. Teverone,” she said. “What about him?” “Today was the first briefing that I’ve had with him, but I recognized him immediately.” “Well, he’s not exactly a stranger in the West Wing.” “I am,” she explained. “I’ve only been in the White House about eight times. It wasn’t here that I saw him before.” “Where was it, then?” “It was up in the Alleghenies. I like to hike up there. It seems a lot safer than the woods around here. Women have been murdered in Rock Creek Park. I stopped into this little cafe for coffee, and there were three men in there talking about replacing President Livingstone.” “It’s an election year,” Faralaco remind her. “There’s a lot of talk going around about replacing this office holder or that.” “This wasn’t about the election. It had a lot more sinister tone. I assumed at the time that it was just loose talk. You do hear that from time to time. Not threatening exactly, but methodically anti-Livingstone. We run across this a lot in the DHS, and it’s ninety-nine percent more smoke than fire. It’s a person’s right to speak his mind, especially in a private conversation, but this was sort of scary. Still, I let it go. I didn’t think any more of it until I walked in to that briefing room and saw him sitting there.”

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“When was this?” Steve asked. She was getting his attention. “About a month ago. I can tell you exactly when. I would have made a note of my hike in the day planner in my BlackBerry.” “Are you sure that it was him?” “Oh yes, Mr. Faralaco,” she assured him. “I’m very detail oriented.” “I’ve noticed,” Steve observed as she pulled her BlackBerry out of her large, cumbersome purse. “Here it is,” she said. “It was on a Sunday. The second weekend in September. It was in the coffee shop . . . the only coffee shop . . . in Brewster’s Knob, West Virginia.” “Did you recognize the other men who were with him?” “No, I didn’t recognize any of them. I didn’t recognize Mr. Teverone until today.” “Would you recognize them if you saw them again?” “Of course,” Jenny replied in a perturbed tone. “If not by sight, then by their voices. Seeing is not my strongest sense. I would know their voices. One man spoke with a Spanish accent.” “From Spain?” Steve asked. “Or was he Mexican?” “Neither,” she said thoughtfully. “It was more South American Spanish.” “And the other guy?” “He was American. He had a Gulf Coast accent. Almost a New Orleans accent, but not exactly.” Faralaco pondered the situation. The principal aide to the vice president is talking about getting rid of the president and a month later it happens. What the hell was happening? Was he getting paranoid or what? He had the word of one person who couldn’t see very well, but he had the

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word of someone who was perhaps the most meticulous person he’d worked with recently. “Have you discussed this with Secretary Wallingford?” Steve asked. “No, should I?” “Why did you approach me?” Faralaco asked without answering her question. “Because nobody I know is closer to the president than you are,” she said pointedly. “Well, I guess I’m not all that close to the acting president,” he smiled. “That’s what’s worrying,” she said. “It really troubles me that the vice president’s chief of staff is talking like that with people out of government. Should we alert the Secret Service?” “Don’t mention this to anyone just yet. Let me make some phone calls,” he promised. “In the meantime, could you talk to Mr. Teverone? Make small talk and get a sense of what his opinions of the Livingstones really are. You know, the scientific method. Think of it as a experiment to see whether the results of your earlier observation are repeated. Get friendly with him and see if he would open up to you and admit that he has negative feelings about President Livingstone. If not, then it’s all a misunderstanding.” “How should I approach him?” “Be charming.” Steve smiled. “Get him off guard, get him to talk to you,” he explained. “You’re a beautiful woman. Men are disarmed by beautiful women.” “Thank you, Mr. Faralaco,” she said, surprised and a little taken aback by his choice of words. She had been eyeing Steve for some time—ever since last spring when she had first come over to do her first briefing at the

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White House. Since then, she had always been anxious to volunteer whenever Wallingford came over. She convinced herself that doing a briefing in the Oval Office was the main draw, but she was just as interested in Steve Faralaco. She had tried and failed several times to catch his attention. Now, suddenly he’d called her beautiful. Every woman likes a compliment, she thought, but getting noticed by a man you’re trying to get to notice you is a big deal. She knew it was the damned glasses. Just as she could hardly see without them, nobody could see her face with them. Steve hadn’t sensed until that moment that she probably was trying to get him to notice her. Maybe it was the fact that she had taken her glasses off during their conversation, or the bashful way that she smiled when he called her beautiful. “After you’ve had a chance to find out something, maybe we could go get coffee?” he asked. “Sure . . .” Jenny said tentatively, trying not to blush. “That would be good.”

October 23 3:17 P.M. Eastern Time

“

W

E have a problem, John,” Warner Cushman said,

taking Secretary of State John Edredin by the arm as they walked through the White House after a meet and greet in the East Room. “We have a great many problems,” Edredin said sadly, referring to the gloomy briefing session they’d had yesterday with Secretary of Homeland Security Wally Wallingford and his team. There was a ripple of uneasiness in the

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land. The first lady had been kidnapped and the kidnappers were not yet identified, much less caught. Rumors abounded. The president had fainted on national television, and rumors of his having had a stroke had been capped by his relinquishing the presidency. Rumors compounded. “The campaign is in serious trouble,” Cushman confided. Since the president passed out, Wilson Darmader’s candidacy was gaining ground. “There’s too much uncertainty in this ‘acting presidency’ business. People don’t want to be asked to elect a president who’s on sabbatical.” “You want to have him resume the presidency? He’s not ready for that.” “No,” Cushman explained. “I think that he should resign completely. That would remove all the ambiguity. I’ll head the ticket and bring Morrie Sminturo in as veep.” “Sminturo?” Edredin knew that the senior senator from New York was the ultimate party kingmaker. If he was involved, everyone who was anyone within the party would automatically snap into place. “Have you talked to him?” “Yes,” Cushman admitted. “He said he’ll pull out all the stops to get the ticket elected.” “What about Tom Livingstone?” “He’s been though hell,” Cushman said sympathetically. “He deserves a rest. He deserves time to concentrate on what’s really important.” “I’m not so sure . . .” Edredin said. “I sure would like you on board with me on this, John,” Cushman said with a wink. “I really do want you to stay on as part of my team come January.” Edredin was dumbfounded. He felt like he was in the middle of a coup d’état.

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October 23 6:22 P.M. Eastern Time

“

I

need to speak with you,” Steve Faralaco explained. “I know that you’ve briefed the president a time or two, and I know that he thinks highly of you.” “Sure, what can I do for you?” FBI Special Agent Rod Llewellan replied. He had met Faralaco a time or two at the White House and certainly knew of him because he was a very public part of Tom Livingstone’s inner circle. “Actually, I was hoping we could get together,” Faralaco replied. “Maybe someplace like Edie’s in Georgetown. You know, up there on Wisconsin Avenue?” “I suppose,” Llewellan said. “Name a time.” Llewellan was in from the field, doing a rotation at FBI headquarters in Washington. He’d been on his way to work on the morning of October 20 when he first heard the news of the Joyce Livingstone kidnapping. By the time he got to the office, the whole place was on heightened alert and the director was picking a team to dash over to Brussels to aid in the search. Rod had not been picked, so he was tasked with picking up the slack for the guys who were going. Then he saw it. One of the first items that came across after the kidnapping mentioned Buckley Peighton. The general had been there. The general had been injured. Several Secret Service guys had paid with their lives, but Buck Peighton was lying unconscious. Rod Llewellan knew General Peighton as the hidden door into the world of the Raptor Team, a world so secret that Llewellan was the only man at the FBI who knew it existed. The first time he had met Peighton, the general took him aside and said “the president needs you.” The rest had been the strangest trip of Llewellan’s life—his double life.

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Everything that he did for Peighton and the Raptor Team would have been illegal had the orders not come from the president himself. When the Raptors had secretly gone to war against the Mujahidin Al-Akhbar, Llewellan had been tasked to act as their liaison with the national intelligence establishment. Overnight, he had become a double agent, pilfering intelligence from his own agency—and others— so that the president of the United States could fight a secret war against the most malevolent of terrorist threats. Rod knew that he was serving his country at the highest level, but nobody outside of this secret insular world could know that. He also knew that if he was ever nabbed stealing FBI secrets, the president could—and probably would—disavow all knowledge and hang him out to dry. The mission took precedence over any individual, even Rod Llewellan. When Llewellan had seen Peighton’s name in the same sentence with Joyce Livingstone’s, he imagined that the Raptors were at it again. Now Faralaco had called with something he couldn’t discuss on the phone. Oh boy, Llewellan thought, here we go again. Edie’s in Georgetown was one of those chic young places where the chic young staffers came to mix and mingle. Most of the faces in Washington change every two years, but the more they change, the more they remain the same. Every congressional election brings a new crop of twentysomethings into congressional offices, executive departments, and bars like Edie’s. They flow in from the best colleges. Stanford. Wharton. All the “Ivys.” They do their two years and most recede like the tide on the Chesapeake, replaced by a new crop. Some remain and get promoted, but most move on. Steve Faralaco had been one of the former. He bounced around, bounced up, and found himself

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doing eighteen-hour days in his top staff job in the West Wing. Then an abrupt toppling of dominos and he was adrift again. Tonight, he walked into Edie’s just like he had walked into whatever it called way back when. Faralaco saw Llewellan trying to look inconspicuous in his navy-blue nylon windbreaker and nodded across the noisy bar. The noise. Even if someone tried to eavesdrop on them, the noise in here at Edie’s would bury it. “Can I buy you a drink?” Steve asked as he shook Llewellan’s hand. “Diet Coke, thanks. What’s up? Is this about the Joyce Livingstone abduction?” “No, I wish it was,” Faralaco admitted. “That would be a helluva lot more straightforward. This is something that a friend of mine on the homeland security staff brought to my attention.” “Okay . . .” “Mark Teverone, Cushman’s chief of staff. Back on the second weekend in September, he was observed in a coffee shop in Brewster’s Knob, West Virginia, with two other men talking about getting rid of the president.” “It’s an election year,” Llewellan reminded him. “A lot of people talk about this sort of thing. A couple of weeks from now, the American voters themselves may decide to get rid of the Livingstone administration.” “That was my first reaction,” Faralaco explained. “But she insisted that their tone was conspiratorial, and we both find it odd that Teverone was one of the people in the conversation, and suddenly Livingstone is out and Teverone’s boss is in.” “Sounds more like a coincidence than a conspiracy,” Llewellan cautioned. “Wilson Darmader has a lot more to gain from Livingstone being out of the way, although the polls seem to be bouncing around a lot the last few days.”

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“What can you do?” Steve asked. He was starting to feel really sheepish about calling Llewellan out here. The agent was right, the whole thing sounded very preposterous when you really thought about it. “There’s really nothing that I can do with what you’ve told me,” Llewellan said sympathetically. “I’d really need what we in my game call ‘actionable intelligence.’ That means . . .” “Yeah, I understand, something that is substantive enough to really take action.” “If you . . . or your friend at homeland security . . . come up with anything else that connects to this, or anything else, let me know.” “Thanks . . . and one more thing . . .” “Yes?” “Please keep this under your hat for the time being.” Under his hat? Llewellan felt as though he was walking a line with too many secrets to keep, secrets that he had promised to keep, even from others within the FBI. He had promised to guard the existence of the Raptor Team with his life, and now Faralaco had come to him with something completely different to “keep under his hat.” To the best of Rod’s knowledge, Faralaco had never been briefed on the Raptor Team—and Rod would keep that secret from Faralaco. Now, Faralaco had information on something else that was potentially explosive that he expected to be held in confidence. Rod Llewellan felt like the proverbial “man who knew too much,” but enough was enough. Faralaco had tossed him a hot potato and he’d tossed it right back. It was just an innuendo without substance—wasn’t it?

SEVEN

October 24 10:11 A.M. Eastern Time

W

H E N Steve Faralaco’s secretary announced that Ms.

Collingwood from Homeland Security was on the line, he caught himself practically lunging for the receiver. Ever since that day in his office when he had seen her for half an hour without her glasses, he hadn’t been able to get her off his mind. Seeing her face without that dreadful mask had been like a revelation. It was like a theatrical curtain coming up, or seeing somebody face-to-face with whom you had only communicated by email. When he had seen her face, everything else came together. He could now appreciate everything else about her that he found attractive—from her perfect analytical grasp of every facet of Homeland Security operations to the shape of her perfect legs. “Ms. Collingwood, this is Steve Faralaco,” he said. He wanted to call her “Jenny.” He wanted to call her in the

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middle of the night. For the moment, though, they were officials of the federal government who had official business. “Thank you for taking my call,” she said, taking a deep breath. She had been thinking a lot about him as well, and about his having said that she was a beautiful woman—and his suggesting that they meet for coffee. She didn’t often get called beautiful, nor get invited to coffee. The invitations to coffee usually went to other girls without Cokebottle glasses, and there were a lot of them among the young women who worked in Washington. Now he had called her “Ms. Collingwood” again. Okay, so much for her schoolgirl notions and his mixed messages. They had business to discuss that transcended anything she had concocted in her imagination. “Mr. Faralaco,” she continued. “At our last meeting, you asked me to follow up on the topic of our discussion and to report back to you if I got any further information. Well, I have further information and I would like to arrange a follow-up meeting.” “That’s a good idea,” Steve replied. “There’s a Starbucks about two blocks from your building.”

October 24 10:11 A.M. Eastern Time

“

Y

OU’RE looking well, Mr. President,” Warner Cushman smiled, taking a seat in the bedside chair in Thomas Livingstone’s bedroom in the White House living quarters. “I feel like hell, Warner,” Livingstone said. “I’m just groggy as hell and I can’t put two thoughts together to save my life. I’m glad to have you filling in for me.”

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“Certainly.” Cushman smiled. “Dr. Iconiche tells me that you’re suffering from acute stress disorder, which can really take its toll. It may be weeks, or even months before you can resume your duties.” “Oh God! Please tell me that they’ll find Joyce by then,” Livingstone moaned. “They will, Tom, absolutely. And when she’s back, you’ll want to have some time alone with her. You should plan for that and that will help you keep your spirits up.” “That’s a good idea.” “As for taking some time, I’ve been talking with John Edredin, and we’ve been discussing that it might not be a bad idea for you to step down.” “What do you mean?” Livingstone asked, wrinkles creasing his brow. “I have stepped down. I signed the letter. I invoked the Twenty-fifth Amendment.” “What I mean is that you should resign entirely. The campaign is in serious trouble, and you probably won’t be reelected. People are worried. If you resigned, it would remove the uncertainty. I’ve got the energy to lead the ticket for the party and beat Darmader.” “I can’t. What about my duty to the people who elected me?” “My point is that it looks as though those people may not reelect you. You also owe a debt to the party who nominated you and I. And you owe a debt to yourself and to Joyce. You deserve a rest.” “I can’t.” “Sure you can. We can draft a letter and issue a statement. You’d be doing it selflessly for the sake of the party and for the people who elected you.” “I can’t.” “Sure you can, we’ll . . .”

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“Dammit, Warner, why are you doing this? I can barely think straight, but I can think clearly enough to know that this is not a choice I should make while I’m half out of my mind.” “That’s the point, Tom.” “No, Warner. I’ll think about it . . . I’ll take it under advisement . . . don’t ask me again. Drop it!”

October 24 2:02 P.M. Eastern Time

“

T

HANKS for meeting me,” Jenny said, closing her

umbrella. “Of course,” Steve told her. “It sounded rather urgent.” Steve Faralaco had reached Starbucks about five minutes early, but Jenny Collingwood was punctual to the minute. “I did as you suggested in our meeting at your office,” she began. “I purposely arranged a specific briefing for Mr. Teverone. He requested a report on security screening equipment contracts. I could have just sent it over by courier, but I took it personally. He appreciated the special service.” “I can imagine,” Steve added. “I was at his office for about an hour. He kept getting interrupted and at one point he had to go into a meeting for about twenty minutes. In any case, to make a long story short, he got sort of used to me being there and I overheard some things he might not have wanted me to hear if he had been paying closer attention.” “Such as?” “The man with the South American accent phoned,” she

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said urgently. “I couldn’t believe it! I really freaked. I don’t know if he could tell from my expression or not. I don’t think so. I pretended to shuffle through the paperwork.” “Good. What did he say?” “I could overhear enough to tell that it was a man with a South American accent. It could have been someone else, but what are the odds?” “I don’t know. What did they discuss?” “It was hard to tell. Something about money and something about a meeting. What can be done? You said that you were going to talk to someone at the Secret Service.” “I talked to an FBI agent,” Steve said. “Please don’t tell anyone about this. I spoke with him off the record.” “Okay, and what did he say?” “He said that there was nothing he could do and nothing the bureau can do without what he calls ‘actionable intelligence.’ In other words, there isn’t enough information on which they can take action. Like I said before, lots of people talk about getting rid of the president during an election year. That’s clearly not enough for the FBI to get involved. That’s pretty much it.” “I know about actionable intelligence,” Jenny said impatiently. “What can we do?” “You said there was going to be a meeting?” “That’s what they seemed to be saying.” “In this place in West Virginia where you saw them?” “It was the town of Brewster’s Knob where I saw them,” Jenny explained. “In the conversation that I overheard, Mr. Teverone made reference to ‘the Knob.’ I extrapolated that this meant Brewster’s Knob.” “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Faralaco said. “You want to go to Brewster’s Knob?”

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“Yes,” he said. “You know exactly where to go. You’d recognize the men if they were who you saw before. It may well be a wild goose chase, but what if it isn’t? What if it provides the actionable intelligence that I can take to the FBI? If we don’t do this, we’ll wish that we had. I’ll drive.”

October 25 1:58 A.M. Eastern Time

T

H E following day, Jenny Collingwood climbed into

Steve Faralaco’s Audi at a bus stop about a half block north of Constitution Avenue. They crossed the Theodore Roosevelt Bridge and headed west on Interstate 66, passing the Beltway and Dulles Airport on their wild goose chase into the hills and hollers of West Virginia. Neither had told anyone about what they planned to do. Both had said they were going on errands to another building and they wouldn’t be back by the end of the day. With their cell phones, nobody would know the difference. They might be on the Monongahela or in Mongolia and they would both still have cell phones that reported them calling from area code 202. “You come out here to go hiking?” Faralaco asked, making conversation as they passed the signs that welcomed them to the Mountain State. They had left the interstate at Harrisonburg, taking Highway 33 into the Appalachians. “Yeah, things are pretty intense at the Department of Homeland Security. After eighty hours a week of that, I like to get far away. I go down to the Chesapeake Bay sometimes . . . or come out here to smell the air and hear the birds.”

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“It certainly is pretty country, especially in the fall,” Faralaco agreed. “Mainly I don’t come for the view . . . it’s nice, but seeing at a distance isn’t my strongest sense. I come more for the feel of the air on my face and the absence of street noise, and the feel of ground instead of pavement under my feet.” “It’s been a long time since I did that,” Steve admitted. “I guess it’s been at least four years since I’ve really had a chance to stop and think about missing it.” “Speaking of missing it, you have to watch carefully to avoid missing the turnoff. It’s easy to miss.” They drove for a while, making small talk, both waiting for the opportunity to push open the door to a more complicated relationship that had been left ajar in their earlier encounter. It had been years since either had had any such relationship and they were both awkwardly out of practice. Finally, they made the turn and Faralaco slowed to forty to negotiate the winding country lane. A light drizzle was in the air as they entered the tiny hamlet of Brewster’s Knob. Jenny scanned the mostly vacant storefronts. They passed the True Value hardware store and the Dairy Queen, and suddenly Jenny exclaimed that she recognized the coffee shop where the earlier meeting had taken place. It was one of those long, narrow, diner-type places where there was a counter and a line of booths that all faced the windows. “When was Teverone saying that he was going to meet the South American?” Steve asked. “We have about thirty minutes,” she replied, looking at her watch. “Well, we can’t wait for them inside, Teverone would recognize both of us,” Faralaco said thoughtfully. When he

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impulsively suggested that they just drive out here and observe the meeting, he really hadn’t been giving much thought to how they would do it. Steve was really out of his element when it came to this sort of detective work. He wished that Rod Llewellan were here. The FBI agent would know what to do. “Let’s go back to the Dairy Queen and get some coffee or something and find a place where we can watch them from a distance.”

October 25 4:39 P.M. Eastern Time

“

W

H E RE’S Mark?” Warner Cushman asked, look-

ing into the West Wing office adjacent to Mark Teverone’s. “He had to run out to a meeting,” the young woman in the room replied. “Do you want me to get him on his cell?” “No, I’ll talk to him when he gets back. Have you seen the news?” “Yes, it’s on all the channels,” the woman said, nodding to the television set in her office. It was tuned to CNN, but the audio was muted. The acting president stepped into the office and looked at the screen. The crawl across the bottom was reporting on the speculation that Livingstone would resign. “Turn it up,” Cushman insisted. “. . . but reaction is mixed to the unconfirmed reports that President Thomas Livingstone will step down for health reasons. Sources are quoting an unnamed administration official that . . .” “Who the hell in this administration is telling reporters such a thing?” Cushman demanded rhetorically.

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“Not me,” the woman replied nervously. “It’s probably just speculation. The rumors are all over town.” “Tell Teverone to call me,” Cushman said as he left the room. As the woman reached to push the mute button again, the talking head had moved on to the kidnapping story. A graphic with the image of Joyce Livingstone and “Day Six” in big bold letters dominated the screen. The newscaster explained that each of the minor splinter groups in Middle East and Europe who had claimed responsibility for the kidnapping had been investigated. “The trail,” said the man on the screen in a dour tone as she thumbed the mute button, “is rapidly growing cold.”

October 25 4:39 P.M. Eastern Time

F

ARALACO found a spot across the road from Junior’s Coffee Shop where he could park the Audi in such a way that it wasn’t obviously apparent from the booths inside. He and Jenny Collingwood didn’t have to wait long. Mark Teverone arrived early and parked an inconspicuous Chevy Impala near the entrance to the cafe. He was wearing an equally inconspicuous raincoat rather than his usual high-end Scottish wool topcoat. He glanced around, possibly looking for the South American, possibly to see that he hadn’t been followed. On the narrow deserted road that led to Brewster’s Knob, it would be hard to follow someone, but he seemed not to be taking any chances. “See,” Jenny whispered. “He’s acting suspicious.”

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“Seems that way to me,” Steve replied as Teverone walked inside. At exactly the appointed moment, another car drove up and a tall, dark-haired man got out. He saw Teverone inside the diner and nodded slightly. Steve grabbed his little point-and-shoot digital camera and pushed the button for telephoto. “Turn off the flash,” Jenny said urgently. “When you use telephoto, the flash on those things always goes off because they don’t think there’s enough light.” “Good idea, thanks,” Steve said as he clicked two shots of the dark-haired man. “Is that him?” Steve asked as they watched the man enter the cafe and join Teverone at his booth. “I’m sure it is,” she said nervously. “I can’t see very well at this distance, but he was tall and he had dark hair. Yes, I’m about ninety percent sure. At least eighty percent. I wish I were more certain. I know how important this is.” This was the analyst in her, calculating the scope of probability. The two men met for less than ten minutes, paid their tab, and walked out. Steve took several pictures of the pair of them before they got into Teverone’s car and drove away. “Are we going to follow them?” Jenny asked. “We’ve come this far.” Faralaco shrugged as Jenny began scratching into her purse for a pen and paper to write down the license number. The Chevrolet took one of the two roads leading out of town in the opposite direction from Washington. About a mile outside of Brewster’s Knob, Teverone signaled for a left turn into what looked like a driveway. Steve slowed and just drove past.

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“We’re in over our heads following them up there,” he said. “We’d be seen and recognized in no time.” “I guess you’re right,” Jenny said, craning her neck to look back toward the place where the car had turned. “Oh look, up on the hill. There’s a big house that looks like a castle.” Steve glanced back, glimpsing the house out of the corner of his eye, but he didn’t slow down. He was much more concerned with not being seen following the Impala. He drove for about two miles before turning back toward Brewster’s Knob. As they backtracked, they both got a good look at the big stone house in the gloomy, drizzly late afternoon light. Driving through Brewster’s Knob, they slowed long enough for Jenny to jot down the plate number of the car the other man had left parked near Junior’s. From there, they pulled into the nearest gas station to top off the tank in Steve’s Audi. “That’s quite the house back up there on the hill,” Steve mentioned to the attendant as he paid for the gas. “Yup, that’s the old Claymore place,” the man in the coveralls explained. “I reckon he was the first guy up in these parts to get to be a millionaire in the coal mines. That was more’an a hundred years ago though. He’s long gone. Some of the mines he had are still goin’ though.” “Who’s living up there now?” “I don’t rightly know. There was some members of the family up there until round about the fifties. Then it was abandoned for a long time. Folks always called it the ‘Castle.’ Said it was haunted. When I was a kid, we used to sneak up there sometimes.” “So there is somebody there now?” “Yeah, but I don’t know who. They’re not from around

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here, though. Rich people from the cities come up here and buy up these places that local people can’t afford.” “Yeah, I know. It’s always a shame when that happens,” Steve said sympathetically. “Well, that was that,” Steve said as they left Brewster’s Knob, heading back toward Highway 33. “I’m not sure what we just witnessed, but I suppose I can at least give the license plate numbers to my FBI contact.” “Do I note some skepticism in your voice?” Jenny asked. “I don’t know. I’ve never done anything like this before. In my job, and yours too, when we see ‘actionable intelligence,’ it’s satellite photos of Iranian missiles or terrorist compounds or something like that. This was just two guys meeting at a coffee shop. For all we know, Teverone and this guy are gay or something.” “You don’t think that all of this is suspicious?” Jenny asked. “I just don’t know whether what we’ve seen is actionable.” “Do you think this was just a wasted trip?” “I don’t know,” Steve said, realizing after he said it that a drive into the mountains with Jenny Collingwood couldn’t possibly be a wasted trip, regardless of what Mark Teverone and his South American friend had done or were doing. He regretted conveying disappointment in his tone of voice, and he was about to discover that she regretting his tone as well. “Okay, am I just imagining all this?” Jenny said in an exasperated, almost desperate tone. “Do you think that I’m just making it up about what I heard them say last time I was here? I have never in my life been involved in anything like this either. I don’t know. I don’t know how to interpret

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nuances in what people are saying. I’m damned good with facts . . . facts and figures, that’s me. I guess when people beat around the bush and don’t say exactly what they mean, I can’t interpret that. It’s like when a guy that you kind of like tells you that you’re beautiful and he wants to take you to coffee and then the next time you talk to him he calls you ‘Ms. Collingwood.’ I guess I blew it trying to interpret actionable intelligence.” Steve Faralaco was dumbfounded. The presidential chief of staff who was used to crafting statements twelve hours a day didn’t know what to say. Did she just call him a guy who she “kind of liked”? Jenny Collingwood was petrified. She could feel her face turning beet red. Cold and calculating Jenny Collingwood who never let her emotions intrude into her briefings and official conversations had just scolded the president’s chief of staff for insufficient flirting. This was the kind of inappropriate workplace tirade that often led to a prompt termination. “I’m sorry,” she stammered. “I really lost it. I didn’t mean that. I was just . . .” “I was wrong to give you the idea that I thought that driving out here was a waste of time,” he said. “And I was doubly wrong to just leave it hanging there when I said I thought you were beautiful, and not saying it again, because I think you are beautiful.” There. He had said it. It turned out not to be so hard after all. He glanced over at her. It was hard to do more than glance because the winding road demanded his eyes be on it rather than the brilliant young analyst for whom he had developed such an attraction. She had removed her thick and heavy glasses and was wiping a trickle of tears from her eyes—her beautiful, but crippled eyes. He couldn’t stand it, he had to look at her, so he pulled

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over into a turnout along the road and stopped the car near some trees about twenty-five feet off the road. “You said that you ‘kind of like’ me, but something I should have said long before now is that as I’ve gotten to know you, I have come to really like you, Jenny,” he told her. “There, I called you by your first name, Jenny . . . something I was too damned nervous to do on the phone. And I’m sorry that you doubted for a minute that I took what you told me seriously.” He could tell that she was about to cry, so he reached out and took her in his arms and held her tightly. She sobbed once or twice and then stopped. She withdrew from his embrace, opened her purse, and put her glasses in a hard case. “Can’t see very well in this light anyway.” She smiled nervously, taking his hand in hers. She was right. It was getting dark. It was late in the day and overcast, but the deep shadows of the forest had yet to close in so much that he couldn’t see her beautiful face, so tantalizingly near to his. At last, Jenny broke the ice. She slipped her hand inside his jacket, pulling him slightly toward her, and kissed him on the lips. He found her lips warm and moist—and amazingly eager. The breaking of the ice became the crumbling of a polar-ice cap. They both wanted the ice broken, crumbled, pushed away. They wanted each other. They wanted each other badly. As they separated to catch their breath, she paused to unfasten the buttons of her coat. As she struggled to pull it off in the close confines of the front seat, Steve caught an enticing view of the contour of her breast as she stretched her arm upward, pulling her pale gray button-front shirt tight. She moved her body toward his, snuggling into his

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embrace and reacting with obvious pleasure as his arms closed around her. Jenny kissed him lightly on the lips and slid her arms beneath his jacket. Smoothly, but bashfully, she ran her hands up toward his shoulders and began to pull it off. He responded to the cue and finished the job. As his arms were entangled in the sleeves, she caressed his chest beneath his tie. “I have a confession,” she said as she started to untie his necktie. “I’ve fantasized about doing this.” “What? Taking off my tie?” “There was a time at a briefing a couple of months ago when I couldn’t take my eyes off you and I kept going over in my mind that I wanted to take off your necktie. It was just one of these weird things that I would never have admitted to anyone.” “Go ahead.” He laughed as she pulled the tie from around his neck and ran it across her face to smell the traces of his aftershave.” “Mmmm.” She sighed. “So sexy.” Just watching her in the half light admiring his necktie struck Steve as one of the most sensual situations that he had ever been in. The top two buttons of her shirt were undone, and with his hands now free of his jacket, Steve reached out with a trembling hand to unbutton the third. As he did, she reached up to take his hand and press it against her breast as she quickly unfastened the remaining buttons with her other hand. “Here, let me help,” she said as he started to unbutton his own shirt. With each button undone, she reached her hands deeper beneath his shirt, deeply stroking him eagerly. As she

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pushed his shirt open, she moved toward him, pushing him against the car door and kissing his chest. “You smell so nice,” she said, nuzzling her head into his body. That is the last thing that Steve would have thought of or hoped for, but if she thought so, that was all that mattered. Her hair smelled sublime in that fresh, yet perfumed, way that a woman’s hair smells. As she caressed his chest, her tongue lightly tasting his nipples, he ran his hands across her smooth and perfect back and struggled to unfasten the tiny hooks that held her bra in place. At that, she sat up, giving the gear shift a disgusted push. Tossing her hair slightly, she pulled off her bra. Steve could barely see her breasts in the darkness, but he could feel them, their smoothness in contrast with the rigid, almost brittle feel of the little nipples. He now felt that he had entered her world, a world of smell and touch, where sight was unnecessary. “This damned thing is in the way,” Jenny said, shaking the gearshift. Trapped beside the steering wheel, Steve had to agree that things were pretty crowded. “Last one in the backseat has to give me a back rub.” She giggled. There was a flurry of action as her small body tumbled easily over the seat. He felt and smelled her hair caress his face like a cloud. He felt the touch of one of her feet against his cheek. He was amazed at how much he could “see” in the near darkness. As he leaned down to move the front seats forward, he smelled the strange aroma of the shoes she had abandoned in the front seat, a strangely enticing scent that was so unlike the stench of his own shoes that he was almost embarrassed to remove them.

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There was, indeed, more room in the back. She had carefully moved a stack of documents from the seat to the floor and was waiting to resume her sensual exploration of the world that had once lay hidden by the shirt that Steve had jettisoned in the front seat. As she crawled atop him, he did as she had suggested and began kneading the trapezius muscles where her lovely neck flowed into her shoulders. She began purring, almost catlike, and slowly started moving her body against his in a gentle and rhythmic way. He was totally aroused and she knew it. So was she. For Jenny, it was a head-spinning amusement park ride of long-pent-up feelings and desires. It was a mixture of having gone for way too long without the time or opportunity to truly flirt with a man, and having gone for way too long without being around men who were worth it. Mostly it was her genuine captivation with this man. He rubbed her back as deeply as he could and her purrs turned to moans. His hands moved lower and lower, to her narrow waist—where she giggled slightly as he tickled her—to the waistband of her wool slacks. He could feel her take a deep breath as he eased his fingers between the rough wool and the shiny silkiness of her bikini briefs. Jenny sat up, and began kissing him passionately on the lips as she wriggled herself into a position where she could unfasten her pants. Having done that, she turned to Steve. She was kneeling over him now, straddling his body with hers and pulling at his belt buckle and zipper. As she dug deeper, he realized that his body was a ticking time bomb of physical reality. He reached up, slid her pants off her hips, and reached inside.

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At last, the two writhing bodies became one. Steve was in a world where sight was not only unnecessary but where it would have been almost an intrusion to have it interfere with the unimaginable joy that was being delivered by way of his other senses.

EIGHT

October 26 9:43 A.M. Eastern Time

“

D

O you know who this guy is? This guy who’s with Teverone in the photos on the memory card you gave me?” Rod Llewellan asked. “No, I don’t . . . that’s why I gave it to you,” Steve Faralaco said, stifling a yawn. It wasn’t that he was bored, it was that he’d only slept for a couple of hours last night. He and Jenny Collingwood had dozed off in the car, but when they awoke, there was barely time to drive back to Washington in order to shower and change and get to work on time. Whatever else she was—and Steve had discovered that there were a lot of dimensions to the young intelligence analyst—she was obsessively punctual. Two hours ago at the Starbucks on Pennsylvania Avenue near Thirteenth Street, in almost melodramatic fashion, an exhausted Faralaco had handed Llewellan the memory

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card from his digital camera, along with the scrap of paper on which Jenny had so neatly and precisely lettered the two license plate numbers. Llewellan had asked for “actionable intelligence.” Maybe the intelligence on his memory card would be actionable, Steve hoped. Apparently it was. “This is Enrique Quintara,” Llewellan explained. “That sounds familiar,” Faralaco said. “If it sounds familiar, it’s because he’s a high-level staff assistant to Secretary General Baudouin Mboma of the United Nations!” Llewellan said. “He’s Mboma’s sort of enforcer. He’s thought to be the guy who runs bribes and payoffs for Mboma . . . and leans on people for him.” “Don’t tell me,” Faralaco said. “He gets away with being a goon because of diplomatic immunity.” “The cops can’t even think about touching him unless he kills somebody, and even then he’d just have to leave the country.” “Did you run the plates?” Steve asked. “No surprise after I IDed Quintara. His car is registered to the United Nations International Validation office although these are not actually diplomatic plates. That doesn’t mean anything except that he gets to drive around with anonymous New Jersey plates and he has to pay his parking tickets. The other car was registered to a girl on Teverone’s staff. He obviously took it in order to be less noticeable in rural West Virginia than he would’ve been in his Lincoln Town Car with his driver. “Is this guy Quintara South American?” Faralaco asked. “Chilean.” “Good girl.” “What girl?”

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“Ms. Collingwood, that girl from Homeland Security who brought this whole thing to me in the first place. When she overheard the three of them, she identified this guy as having a South American Spanish accent.” “Good, indeed,” Llewellan said. “I’m impressed. You said there were three. What was the third guy’s accent?” “Gulf Coast. Ms. Collingwood said it was more east Texas than Louisiana.” “That could be a problem,” Llewellan said. “Lots of people have that kind of accent, but one of them is Justin Underwood, the campaign manager for Wilson Darmader.”

October 26 9:43 A.M. Eastern Time

“

T

H E average of the polling shows a dead heat between Darmader and Cushman if Livingstone actually resigns,” one of Justin Underwood’s young aides reported, handing him the tracking polls. “The only candidate with higher numbers is our old friend ‘Undecided.’ ” “What are the odds that Livingstone will actually throw in the towel?” Underwood asked. “The oddsmakers in Vegas give it three-to-one odds,” Brooke Larderie said, her nose twitching slightly. Underwood’s senior assistant for policy matters, she was inherently irritated by Underwood’s insistence on knowing Las Vegas odds for various questions. She had a master’s in statistics from Duke and did not care for the inexactitude of data that was compiled in a smoke-filled room in a desert. “About seventy to seventy-five percent of those asked by the major polls in the past twelve hours say it is

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very likely or better that he’ll resign. As you know, I’m more inclined toward traditional polling.” “I know you are,” sneered Underwood. “But the Vegas odds are compiled based on what people are willing to back their opinions with real money.” “I suppose that is a valid criteria,” she admitted. “Now that the odds have spoken, it’s time to help them come true.” Underwood smiled. “I thought that you were nervous about playing the palace coup card.” “That was then,” Underwood said. “That’s when we were going to take the lead in getting a rumor started. In the past couple of days, the rumors have taken on a life of their own. The proposal then was to suggest that Cushman was trying to topple Livingstone. Now, when it looks like a done deal that Livingstone will topple, it’s fair game to start talking about the bad blood between them. The people who are going to be going to the polls in a couple of weeks don’t like the idea of voting for a candidate who seized power by pushing somebody out. It’s not the American way.” “How exactly do we paint this picture . . . ?” “No innuendoes or half truths.” Underwood laughed. “Just the facts. Dig up everything there is on the bad blood between them. I want a transcript of every argument they ever had . . . going back to when they were wet-behindthe-ears junior congressmen. I want everything they ever voted opposite on, a whole list. Bullet points.” “It’s well known that Cushman is an internationalist, while Livingstone is a nationalist,” one of the staffers suggested. “They argued about these differences like cats and dogs when they were running against each other for the

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nomination four years ago. That’s gotta be something that we can use.” “But for the past four years, they’ve compromised,” Brooke Larderie countered. “Livingstone may distrust the United Nations, but he embraced Cushman’s point of view and he supported the International Validation Treaty. That’s a very big deal for a nationalist, being seen to surrender once-sovereign power to an international organization.” “During those four years, Cushman has continued as a staunch advocate of international cooperation, while Livingstone has been known to grumble publicly about International Validation,” rebutted the first staffer. “We could probably find something. Before the campaign four years ago . . . when they were both in the Senate . . . they used to really go at it.” “That’s it,” Underwood exclaimed. “I’ve got another good idea. Get me quotes from the Congressional Record. Every nasty exchange that they would have exchanged on the floor will be recorded for all time in the unimpeachable Congressional Record. Have somebody do a LexisNexis search or whatever. Just the facts, but just the right facts. We’ll give the people the facts and let them draw their own conclusions.”

October 26 12:24 P.M. Eastern Time

E

VE RYWH E RE he went in the West Wing, people were talking. The tone was clear. The end of an era had come and gone. Steve Faralaco wondered if he was the last man standing who thought that Thomas Livingstone would ever again work in the Oval Office. The rumors that

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his resignation was imminent were the talk of the town. One cable channel was even reporting that he had already resigned. At first, the rumors were just whispered, but it seemed that practically overnight, the probability of Warner Cushman becoming president of the United States were spoken of in a matter-of-fact way—even here, practically within earshot of where Livingstone lay. Meanwhile, several news channel talking heads were already starting to speak of Joyce in the past tense. The conventional wisdom was that neither she nor her husband were ever coming back. Faralaco made his way through the security gate that separated the West Wing from the White House and took the elevator directly to the president’s personal living quarters. He continued to brief the president on a daily basis, even though Livingstone had been barely lucid the last couple of days. “How is he today?” Steve asked Walter Meril, the chief of the president’s personal Secret Service detail, who was sitting in a chair near his bedroom door reading the newspaper. “About the same, Steve. He ate a pretty good breakfast, but he’s been napping quite a lot.” “Where’s the major?” Steve asked. He noticed that the military officer who usually was standing by with the nuclear football was conspicuously absent. “He’s in the West Wing,” Meril explained. “Ever since Mr. Cushman took over, the major stays with him.” “I see. Has anybody been in to see the president yet today?” “Just Dr. Iconiche and me. I took his breakfast in and the doctor has been in a couple of times to make sure that he’s taking his medication.”

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“Sir, it’s Steve Faralaco,” the chief of staff said, rapping on the bedroom door. “Are you ready for your briefing?” There was no answer, so he paused a moment and knocked again. “Yeah, okay, hi, Steve,” the president said at last. “I was just in the bathroom. Come on in.” Thomas Livingstone was just a pale ghost of himself. He made his way across the room with more of a stagger than a walk, and sat down on the edge of his bed in his rumpled pajamas. He hadn’t shaved in an least a day and he had apparently cut himself when he did. “How are you?” Steve said with a smile, ignoring the obvious answer that Livingstone was not doing well. “I just can’t seem to wake up, Steve. The doc says I can’t have coffee because of my heart. I guess I must be getting enough to eat though, I just feel bloated all the time. And I have these damned headaches. Aspirin helps a little bit, though.” Faralaco began the briefing with domestic issues, providing an honest overview, but spinning things in such a way as not to cause Livingstone any unnecessary anxiety. The president interrupted him twice to ask whether there was any progress on the search for his wife. “I try to watch the damned news on television, but I just can’t seemed to make my eyes focus. I just can’t concentrate,” Livingstone said. “I’m really screwed up. I just can’t focus. I get all jumpy and distracted.” “Dr. Iconiche has prescribed some things to treat your hypertension and help you rest,” Faralaco said sympathetically. “I’m resting too goddam much. I need to clear out my head and get back to work. I gotta find Joyce, that’s what I really have to do.”

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“Let’s see what meds you’re taking,” Steve said, stepping over to the large, dark wood nightstand. Amid the wads of used tissue, there were several halffilled water glasses, the president’s reading glasses, an aspirin bottle with the cap off, and two prescription vials. Steve looked at each of these. It was like reading the Moscow phone book. At first glance all the words appeared alien and unpronounceable. In short, they were typical prescription vials. “Okay, let me write this down,” Steve said, taking his pen and notepad out of his jacket pocket. “This one says the pills are ten milligrams. How often do you take these?” “Those . . . those . . . I take two in the morning and one at bedtime. Maybe it’s one in the morning and two at bedtime . . . and a couple of other times in between.” “Okay, and these bigger ones are fifteen milligrams of something else . . .” “Yeah, these I take two at a time in the morning and at night and with lunch. I think that once he had me take a couple in between when I was getting really rattled about Joyce being gone. When the hell are they going to find her, Steve? I’m scared to death that she’s dead.” “It will all be okay, Mr. President, I promise.” “Do you promise?” “Yes, sir.” “Thanks,” Livingstone said with a sigh as he reached for his aspirin. “When did Dr. Iconiche first prescribe this medication?” “It was right after we landed, coming back from Europe. He said I needed something to settle my nerves. Oh boy, he was right. I really did.” “Was that before you passed out during your speech?”

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“I guess so . . . yeah. Do you think that the drugs had something to do with me fainting?” “I don’t know,” Steve said. He didn’t add that he intended to find out. As soon as he finished with the president, he took a walk and made a phone call on the new disposable cell phone that he had started using. Maybe he was just being paranoid, but maybe they really were out to get him. “Jenny, it’s Steve.” “Hi, Steve. I was just thinking about you.” “Good thoughts, I hope.” “What color tie are you wearing today?” Jenny Collingwood asked. At first, it was hard to rationalize her intense interest in neckties, but he decided to just go along for the ride. It made her happy, and in turn, she made him happy. It was amazing to Steve that he had discovered this erratic, yet fascinating alter ego hidden within one of the most methodical, by-the-numbers analysts in Washington. “Blue with little reddish stripes,” he replied. “Horizontal or diagonal?” “Diagonal.” “Hmmm,” she said in a breathless, almost seductive tone. “That sounds really nice.” “On another topic, I’m wondering if you could do me a little favor?” “Business or pleasure.” “Both, but business at the moment.” “Okay, what is it?” Jenny asked, suddenly adopting her customarily precise tone of voice. “In that amazing reference library of facts that you have, do you have a way to look up the properties of various pharmaceuticals?”

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“Like a physician’s or a pharmacist’s desk reference?” “That sounds right.” “Yes, I can do that. What do you need looked up?” “I have a friend who’s taking both mirtazapine and nitrazepam,” he said, pausing to spell both of the strange words. “Mmmm,” Jenny said. She knew immediately what friend Steve meant. “Is your friend having some side effects?” “Yes. Let’s just say that he’s not feeling himself these days.”

October 26 2:31 P.M. Eastern Time

“

W

HAT’S this that I’m hearing all over about Liv-

ingstone and Cushman?” Wilson Darmader asked Justin Underwood. “I was just up on the Hill. Everyone is talking about Cushman exploiting the president’s incapacity and Joyce Livingstone’s kidnapping in order to take over the government.” “That’s a darned shame, isn’t it?” Underwood chuckled. “But they have an animosity that goes way back. It’s in the Congressional Record, the unimpeachable Congressional Record. It must be true.” Senator Darmader had been making one of his rare visits to Capitol Hill, not to cast a vote on behalf of his constituents nor to attend the meeting of one of the committees to which he was assigned, but to do some politicking. He was running for president, and first things came first.

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Darmader had been spending a great deal of time away from the nation’s capital during the presidential campaign, because polls showed that voters liked seeing their candidates out on the hustings, not in Washington. However, amid the national crisis perpetuated by the kidnapping, and exacerbated by President Livingstone passing out on national television, Underwood had thought it a good move to pull his candidate back to the capital. Tall, stern, and impeccably dressed, Darmader was on all the cable channels overnight with the majestic columns and arches at the Capitol building as a backdrop. Even as his candidate was up on the Hill looking majestic, Underwood was further setting him apart by surreptitiously circulating stories about past animosity between Warner Cushman and Thomas Livingstone. “The tracking polls are turning in our favor, thanks to your visit to the Hill yesterday,” Underwood continued. “It was a great photo op. You looked ‘presidential.’ That’s what we want. We also want Cushman to look nonpresidential. That’s why it’s good for us that the buzz around town is that Cushman and Livingstone are a couple of backbiting mongrels. “We’ve found their weakness and we’re going to run with it,” Underwood said confidently. “Livingstone sure as hell doesn’t look presidential. We make Cushman look like a nefarious scoundrel rather than a president, and who’s the only choice left? You. That’s why you need to be up there with all those Corinthian columns looking presidential.” “You’re making it seem as though Cushman is deliberately trying to seize power from Livingstone,” Darmader insisted. “It’s just a difference of perspective on the same set of

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facts.” Underwood shrugged. “The Livingstone and Cushman people want the world to believe that Cushman’s doing this in the interest of maintaining stable continuity of government in a time of national crisis. That’s boring, but people bought into it. All we had to do was spin it slightly and Cushman comes off looking as though he’s kicking poor Livingstone when he’s down.” “Well, that’s certainly the way it’s looking on the late night and morning talk shows,” Darmader said. “And who’s the beneficiary of that?” Underwood asked. “We are.” “That’s right,” Underwood said, putting his hand on Darmader’s shoulder in an almost fatherly way. “If you were John Q. Voter out there in Peoria or Podunk, who would you want as president? Would you want somebody like Cushman, who you aren’t sure you could trust, or Livingstone, who isn’t up to the job? Or, would you want someone who shows up on Capitol Hill looking like the kind of man they want their president to look like?”

October 26 2:31 P.M. Eastern Time

S

TEVE Faralaco felt the disposable cellphone vibrating in his jacket pocket. Who could that be? Who knew this number? It was Jenny Collingwood. She was the last person he’d called on the phone and she had just dialed back to the same number. “Steve, I have that information that you needed.” “Great. Let me get out my notepad.” “Okay . . . both of these drugs that you gave me to look up are prescription-only sedatives,” she explained. “As it

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says here, they’re both part of a group of drugs that depress the central nervous system in order to produce ‘calmness, relaxation, and the reduction of anxiety.’ They also cause ‘sleepiness, slowed breathing, slurred speech, wobbly movements, poor judgment, and unsure reflexes.’ It says that ‘at high doses or when they’re abused, many of these drugs can cause unconsciousness and death.’ ” “Except for the last two, that’s him . . . pretty much exactly.” “Nitrazepam is a hypnotic tranquilizer prescribed for the treatment of insomnia, so that would be your basic ‘little something to help him sleep.’ The usual dose for adults is between two-point-five milligrams and ten milligrams, and it is supposed to be taken at bedtime.” “Oh shit,” Steve cursed. “What?” “He’s taking one at bedtime all right, but he’s also taking some in the morning and some during the day, so he’s at about four times the usual max.” “Taking it in the morning will really wipe you out,” Jenny agreed. “Here’s something else interesting. Nitrazepam has an elimination half-life of between fifteen and forty hours. The elimination half-life is how long it takes for it to be reduced to half of its original level in the body.” “Which means that it builds up and lasts.” “Apparently.” “Okay, what did you find out about the other pill?” “Well, mirtazapine is an antidepressant that’s used for the treatment of mild to severe depression, which is a legitimate application in your friend’s case. It’s classified as a ‘noradrenergic and specific serotonergic antidepressant.’ The usual starting dose for mirtazapine is from seven-

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point-five to fifteen milligrams once a day. You’re supposed to take it at bedtime because it’s a sedative and it causes disturbed visual perception. They say that the dosage can be increased every couple of weeks up to fortyfive milligrams, with the maximum daily dose being ninety milligrams.” “Well, he’s already doing the max.” “During the day like the other one?” Jenny asked. “Yes, morning, noon, and night.” “Whew! Okay then, in addition to obviously drowsiness and dizziness, the side effects include headaches, swelling . . . and visual hallucinations if it’s taken during the daytime.” “He’s got headaches and can’t see straight, he feels bloated and I noticed that his ankles were pretty badly swollen. I thought that was just because he’s off his feet most of the time.” “What about the hallucinations?” “I haven’t noticed, but he keeps interrupting to ask about his wife,” Faralaco said thoughtfully. “If he starts to really see things, we’re in big trouble.” “Oh, that’s just to start with,” she added. “That doesn’t sound so good.” “It’s not,” she continued. “It says that due to the sedative effects of mirtazapine, extreme sedation may happen when it’s used with other tranquilizers, such as benzodiazepines, and nitrazepam is a benzodiazepine tranquilizer!” “Which explains why, on top of everything else, he can’t wake up.” “He’s on a drug cocktail that’s turned him into a vegetable, and which could ultimately do irreparable damage,” she said emphatically. “If something isn’t done, those

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bastards will have their way. He will be gone . . . and the whole country will be chirping ‘good riddance.’ ” “Well, then, I guess I’d better do something,” Steve agreed. Easier said than done, he thought.

October 26 2:31 P.M. Eastern Time

“

H

OW are you, young fellow?” the older gentleman on

crutches asked as he approached the younger man sitting on the park bench in Franklin Park, just off K Street. “I’ve been better,” Rod Llewellan said. “Things have been pretty hectic around here lately, but I’ve been doing a lot better than I heard you’ve been doing.” Llewellan had just about jumped out of his skin when the voice on the other end of the line turned out to be General Buckley Peighton. He had read about Peighton’s having been badly injured in Brussels when Joyce Livingstone had been kidnapped, but the last thing he heard before he heard the general’s own voice was that Peighton was lying in a hospital unconscious. When Peighton asked for a meeting, Llewellan would have readily agreed even just out of curiosity to see the old soldier again. As the two men between President Tom Livingstone and his Raptor Team, they shared a unique bond, even if they didn’t share all of one another’s secrets. “Oh, the reports of my demise are greatly . . . or at least somewhat . . . exaggerated.” Peighton smiled, nodding that they should sit down on a park bench. “And I have really good caregivers.”

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“Don’t tell me,” Llewellan said wryly, assuming that Peighton meant the Raptors. He glanced around the park. At least one or two members of the Raptor Team were no doubt watching them at this very moment. “Yes, it’s them.” “I heard that you were pretty badly injured,” Llewellan said sympathetically. “You heard right, but the Belgian medics did a great job of patching me back together. They have a really first-class trauma outfit over there, and I’ve had a couple of days to rest up here since we got back. Meanwhile, Brannan has been getting his people together.” “I hadn’t heard that you’d been released.” “My daughter came over to take me home and the hospital was glad to have their bed back. I sort of slipped through the cracks. They’ve had a lot of bigger things going on over there in Belgium over the last few days.” “So it seems,” Llewellan said, playing into Peighton’s understatement about the Joyce Livingstone kidnapping. “I didn’t know you had a daughter.” “I don’t, but if I did, Anne’s the kind of gal I’d be proud to have for one.” “I also know that you’re from Colorado,” Rod continued. “So if you’re going home, you’re still a few miles short. Just as I know that it’s no accident that you were in Brussels, I know that it’s no accident that you’re here with the Raptors.” “As much as I’m happy to just sit down and shoot the breeze with you, I’d have to say that we’re actually here on business. We’re going to need your help.” “Sure, but I need to know what’s up,” Llewellan said. “I had thought you were lying near death in a hospital bed in

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Belgium, and suddenly you’re sitting on a park bench in Washington. I need to know the whole story. Please fill me in.” “Well, let me start this way,” Peighton said. “I have some good news and some bad news. Which do you want first?” “After this week, I could use some good news,” Llewellan said. “What’s your good news?” “You guessed correctly about my arrival, and the good news is that I came over with Joyce Livingstone.” Peighton smiled. “We’ve liberated her.” “Good lord,” Llewellan gasped after a moment of speechlessness. “That’s the best possible news that I could hear. Where . . . ?” “She’s safe at an ‘undisclosed location,’ which is safe precisely because it’s undisclosed.” “What do you mean?” “I said there was good news and bad news,” Peighton continued. “The bad news is that those responsible for the scheme to kidnap her are still at large. The especially bad news is that the Secret Service may be involved.” “That’s impossible,” Llewellan said emphatically. “There were agents killed during the abduction. They wouldn’t compromise their own. Would they?” “I wouldn’t be so swift to rule it out, Rod,” the general cautioned. “From where you are at FBI headquarters, what have you been hearing about the search for the first lady?” “It’s hit a brick wall. The Bureau hit a brick wall, despite having our best forensics and abduction people over there working twenty-four/seven.” “Honestly?” Peighton asked. “Is that the real word from the darkest depths of the J. Edgar Hoover Building?” “Yes,” Llewellan said. “Until this moment, I honestly knew of nothing, no concrete leads. Nothing but dead ends.

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There is some complaining about lack of cooperation and grandstanding on the part of some European agencies, but there has been no sign of anything malevolent . . . especially involving the Secret Service. What do you know?” “It’s very complicated, and we still haven’t pieced it all together. That’s why I need your help.” “What are the pieces that you do know?” “Well, I know a bit about the actual kidnapping because, dammit, I was there. It was done by a team of European mercenaries under the code name Kurketrekker, which is Dutch for ‘corkscrew.’ They were under the control of another group that includes a senior Secret Service agent whose name is John Jefferson Davis. Apparently he’s a big fish over here in Washington.” “I’ve seen Davis around,” Llewellan said. “He is a pretty big fish over at the Secret Service. I can’t imagine him being involved in kidnapping the first lady. That’s not only just about the most serious possible breach of his sworn duty, it’s a capital crime. On top of that, agents lost their lives in this corkscrew thing. Are you sure about that . . . about Davis?” “Jack Rodgers stood next to him at a bar in Ostend when he was discussing Kurketrekker with the guy who later led Brannan and his team to the place where Joyce was being held.” “How did Rodgers wind up a bar in Ostend?” Llewellan asked. “Better still, let’s back up. Maybe you should bring me up to speed on how you happened to be there in Brussels when the first lady was kidnapped.” “The president called me and said that he had a feeling about some kind of threat . . . something about a possible threat to his wife. He had a feeling that it might be an inside job, so he called me. He told me that he wanted me

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there because he didn’t know who else he can trust. He asked me to be Joyce’s escort that morning. I blew it . . . but I redeemed myself.” “I wouldn’t say that you blew it, considering that you didn’t know what to expect,” Llewellan said, cutting the old general some slack. “Well, the one thing I did right was to call Brannan and to get his people involved,” Peighton said. “The president did not specifically order me to get them involved, but I figured it would be good to have some backup . . . at least by the time they reached Paris. Brannan and his professor friend were going to rendezvous with us in Paris, but Rodgers was close enough that he was able to get to Brussels the night before. I should have been more aggressive. I should have had Jack with me that morning, but instead, I just asked him to stand by.” “What about this ‘corkscrew’ thing?” “I was at the United States Embassy in Brussels,” Peighton began. “The president was in and out of meetings and Joyce was off talking to reporters or something so I was twiddling my thumbs. That’s when I ran into Avery Anderson. He’s a guy I knew at Bragg. He was colonel then. Later he became a State Department analyst. He told me that there was some weird message traffic coming and going on the secure lines used by the Secret Service. He mentioned Kurketrekker and said that he wanted to meet me offsite later to talk about it.” “What did he say?” “I got whacked before I had a chance to meet him, but Rodgers kept the appointment. That’s what led him to Ostend and that in turn led the team to Joyce. In the meantime, somebody shot Anderson the same day that I got hit. He was in the same hospital as me.”

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“Is he out now?” Llewellan asked. “He’s dead. We heard about it after we got back here. It was in the hospital. Officially it was natural causes, but I’m sure he was murdered. I think that I was probably next, but Brannan and his professor got me out in the nick of time.” “Who did it?” Llewellan asked. “Who killed Anderson?” “Davis . . . or somebody close to him. I’m pretty sure. With Secret Service ID, he would have had easy access to the hospital and to both Anderson and to me.” “Shit.” “Shit is right,” Peighton agreed. “We don’t know how far into the depths of the Secret Service this thing goes . . . which brings us back to why Joyce stays under wraps . . . this and because old Tom seems to be sidelined . . .” “There is more to that than meets the eye.” “Now it’s your turn,” Peighton said, raising an eyebrow. “Tell me more.” “At first, the president seemed to be having a nervous breakdown, and it seemed to be a good idea to invoke the Twenty-fifth and get Cushman in as acting president.” “And now it doesn’t?” “There’s a lot of buzz around town about President Livingstone being called on to resign and let Cushman just face Wilson Darmader as an incumbent.” “That’s kind of last minute,” Peighton observed. “The election is practically around the corner.” “But as I said, there’s more than meets the eye.” “As you said,” Peighton said, his curiosity fired up. “As long as we’re telling stories, I’ve got a tale of intrigue of my own to share,” Llewellan said. “I’m intrigued.” “You know Steve Faralaco, President Livingstone’s chief of staff?”

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“We’ve met.” “Well, he came to me a couple of days ago with a crazy story about a young staffer over at Homeland Security who ran into Cushman’s chief of staff, Mark Teverone, in a coffee shop over in West Virginia.” “So what?” “My reaction exactly.” “She told Faralaco that Teverone was with two other guys discussing the removal of Tom Livingstone from the presidency.” “Well, it’s an election year.” Peighton shrugged. “This is what happens in an election year.” “Also my reaction,” Llewellan agreed. “But then Faralaco and this woman from Homeland Security went over there and came back with snapshots of Teverone meeting with one of the two guys from the earlier meeting.” “And . . .” “It was Enrique Quintara,” Llewellan said. “The enforcer and bagman for Baudouin Mboma . . .” “Of the friggin’ United Nations,” Peighton said with surprise. “If I was a paranoid . . .” Llewellan said thoughtfully. “You’d be thinking that Mboma’s trying to get rid of the American president who’s been a thorn in his side since day one.” “If I was a paranoid . . .” Llewellan shrugged. “As an unrecovered paranoid myself,” Peighton said, “I’d have to ask who the third man was.” “Still a mystery man, but Faralaco’s friend said that he had a Gulf Coast accent,” Llewellan explained. “Justin Underwood, the campaign manager for Wilson Darmader, is from Beaumont.”

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“Well, my fellow paranoid,” Peighton said. “It sounds like we got our work cut out for us.”

October 26 12:39 P.M. Eastern Time

“

I

understand that the colors of the chrysanthemums in the White House gardens complement the fall colors of the leaves of the trees rather nicely,” John Jefferson Davis said, stepping into the office of Mark Teverone. As one of the senior agents involved in the Joyce Livingstone abduction case, Davis had the political equivalent of an all-access backstage pass when it came to the West Wing. “If you say so,” Teverone replied. “I’m sure that the colors are quite lovely.” “I think we should take a look at those mums,” Davis drawled, exaggerating his east Texas intonation. “I really need to take a leisurely stroll in the White House gardens.” “I agree,” Teverone said. Like Davis he knew only too well that walls could often have ears, and that any ears listening to this conversation would be the wrong ones. “I do feel like a little fresh air.” “You said that this was important,” Teverone said as they exited the West Wing and strolled south toward the Ellipse. “But do you think it’s a good idea to meet here of all places?” “We have a problem,” Davis said, getting down to business. “Somebody snatched the package that we were going to keep in storage until November.” “What?” Teverone gasped.

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“I heard from the Rhino just before I left Belgium. Somebody got in and shot up the place.” “Who?” Teverone demanded. “Why didn’t you tell me this when you got back?” “I wanted to give the Rhino a day or so to figure out who. They took out a couple of his best people. It was personal.” “Well, certainly it had to be the cops . . . right?” “I don’t think so. We would have heard it on the news by now,” Davis assured him. “I’m sure any cops who broke this case would be crowing from the rooftops at the first opportunity, but they haven’t.” “Well, who was it then?” “It could have been some jihad outfit, but it was almost too slick and professional. The Rhino thinks it must have been some other gang operating in Europe. There are some Russian drug gangs that use ex-Stasi goons as enforcers. He figures they’ll approach him to sell the package back to us.” “Sell her back? This is bad.” Teverone grimaced. He felt a sickening, sinking feeling. “We were in complete control. We had every piece of Kurketrekker covered. With the queen, we controlled the king. It was like checkmate. With her, we had the winning hand. Without her, anything can happen. Has anybody approached the Rhino to sell her back?” “Not yet,” Davis said. “They may be taking bids. They’ll be approaching other parties.” “You mean they’d sell our package to the highest bidder?” “Not if the Rhino can help it.” “Get this fucking thing under control,” Teverone snarled. “Find out where our goddam package is! Who knows what? Find out.”

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“The Secret Service is in the dark,” Davis assured him. “I’ve been over there for the past two days. They have nothing.” “What does the FBI have on this?” Teverone asked. “They have boots on the ground in Belgium. Would they keep it from the Secret Service if they did?” “Probably not, but I’ll find out what the FBI knows,” Davis promised. “We’re not in control anymore,” Teverone said. “We’ve got to get ahead of the curve on this thing. We have to speed it up. We have to wrap Kurketrekker up before November. We have to achieve the transaction this week. Can you do this? Are your people ready?” “I have a team,” Davis said. “For security reasons, I’ve kept them apart, but I’ve arranged to get most of them together at the safe house the day after tomorrow for a briefing. They’re all professionals. They’re all Secret Service. They know their way around. When push comes to shove, they won’t let us down.”

NINE

October 27 7:34 A.M. Central Time

“

Y

OU got another woman somewhere, big guy?” Julia Girod asked, jabbing her hands in her hip pockets and leaning her shoulder on a doorjamb as Greg Boyinson tossed his gear into a duffel bag. “Hell no! Not with you around, mon petit sauvage,” Boyinson said emphatically, slipping from English into Cajun for emphasis. Carl Carruthers hadn’t wanted to give his ace chopper pilot a week off on short notice, but Greg Boyinson had earned it. Boyinson had risked his life in impossible rescue missions that saved the boss whole worlds of hurt. Carruthers could not have sanctioned a lot of what Boyinson had done, but he was thankful time and again that Boyinson’s skill saved his ass and saved his people. He owed

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Boyinson more than money could buy, so if Boyinson needed time off, he got it. No questions were asked. Julia Girod was another matter. She asked questions, and she was somewhat more reluctant to see Boyinson go. She had been the reporter for the local paper who had wanted to make Boyinson into more of a hero than he wanted to be after that night that he rescued Bobby Girardeau from that oil rig during a Category 3 hellstorm. He had successfully avoided the foxy little journalist until that night that he beat up the guys who had tried to mug her in the parking lot at Marie’s, the local shrimp shack. A few days after that night, she called to invite him over for jambalaya. He told her that he had no interest in being interviewed, and she promised she wouldn’t. He enjoyed the meal and she didn’t try to interview him. She hadn’t scrimped on the Tabasco, but it wasn’t nearly as hot as the jambalaya they wound up making in the bedroom later that night. He had seen her a time or two after that, and soon it had become a habit. She had found out about his Special Forces background, and when he left town right before the coup in Brunei, her shrewd nose for news had put two and two together. “Then, where are you going, mon enfant mauvais?” He looked at her long slender body coiled in the doorway and at her long red hair and at her perfect cleavage. He pondered the way that she looked in her skintight jeans and his Washington Huskies baseball cap shading her large, gorgeous eyes, and he wondered whether just this time, he could let Dave Brannan down. No, that was not an option. “I’ve got an out-of-town job.” He shrugged. “Are you overthrowing another third-world demagogue?”

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“You know I can’t talk about that shit.” “Oh, screw you, Boyinson,” she whined. “All right, I’ll be here waitin’ for your ass when y’all come marchin’ home.” Boyinson hefted his duffel bag onto his shoulder and headed toward the doorway, expecting her to stand aside and let him pass, which she did not. “I’m going to let you off, boy,” she said as she grabbed him roughly and slid one of her hands inside the waistband of his jeans. “But I’m not going to let you off easy. The kitty likes to tease, but she likes her . . . you know . . . too.” Boyinson knew. He let his bag tumble to the floor as he pulled her tank top off over her head. Boyinson would make it through the door, but he was going to have to pay the toll.

October 27 8:34 A.M. Eastern Time

S

EC RETARY General Baudouin Abuja Mboma chuckled. A simple email would have been adequate, but he supposed his importance as a world leader—the world leader—required an engraved thank-you card in response to his gesture of sympathy to President Thomas Livingstone on the tragic circumstances that had befallen his wife. The poor man. The intercom interrupted Mboma’s moment of musing. Who the hell? It was Enrique Quintara. There was always time for Quintara. “Buenos dias, Enrique.” He smiled, shaking the younger man’s hand. “You sounded urgent on the phone. To what do I owe this visit?”

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“I just wanted consult you on the progress of one of my assignments,” Quintara said earnestly, handing Mboma a scrap of paper. They chatted for a moment, mainly small talk, as Mboma scrutinized the memo. Even in the office of the secretary general, which was swept for listening devices daily, one could never be sure that the walls did not have ears. Mboma was troubled, deeply troubled, by what he read. Moments ago, he was relishing a self-congratulatory moment, but now things had gone badly. He cursed to himself. The best laid plans. The best laid of the most complex of plans. Whatever can go wrong, does go wrong. “Enrique, I know that you were down there just two days ago, but I need you to make contact with our friend again. As I have read, there has been an unexpected turn. We can’t lose this unique opportunity we are offered to take a major step toward global peace. I need you to ask . . . I need you to go back down and personally convey our insistence that the timetable be accelerated. We cannot afford to stand by passively and wait until November for things to take their course.” “I understand completely, sir,” Quintara said.

October 27 8:34 A.M. Eastern Time

“

I

’M taking a beating in the polls,” Warner Cushman said angrily as he closed the door to the chief of staff’s office. “I was ahead, but now Darmader has surged. What bloody good is getting Livingstone to resign, if I lose the damned election? So what if I’m president until January 20? What damned good is that? Is it worth it?”

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“Justin Underwood is exploiting your differences with Livingstone,” Mark Teverone replied. “The buzz about your disputes is all over town these days and he’s using it against you. It’s the stuff about International Validation.” “That’s not the point,” Cushman scolded. “It’s not that I’m an internationalist or not, it’s that I’m perceived to be squabbling with a man whose wife is being held by terrorists. There is enormous sympathy for Tom right now, and a few days ago it was spilling over on me. We have to get the focus back on that. Do what you have to do. Get somebody from the campaign staff on this. Use one of Livingstone’s people. Get the sympathy vote back on track.” “I’ll do what I can.” “Underwood’s playing with fire. Make it backfire on him,” Cushman said. “Is there anything new on the kidnapping?” “Officially or unofficially?” Teverone questioned, raising an eyebrow to the fact that the vice president was getting into matters that should not be discussed inside an office within the West Wing. “Officially, of course,” Cushman replied. “No, there’s nothing. The manhunt continues, but there are no leads.” “That’s a damned shame,” Cushman said. “That poor man. I don’t know how he’s holding up.” “Have you been up to see him?” “Not for a couple of days,” the vice president said, shaking his head. “I suppose I should, just to keep up appearances, although it’s like the tree falling in the forest. If there’s nobody to see me doing it, why waste time keeping up appearances? Faralaco sees him regularly, and he keeps me up to speed on his condition.” “How is he?”

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“He’s about the same. He’s a mess,” Cushman said. “Even if they sympathize with the guy for all the shit he’s been through lately, I can’t imagine that the voters would want someone like that as their president.”

October 27 8:34 A.M. Eastern Time

“

G

OOD morning, Agent Davis,” Rod Llewellan said,

forcing a casual smile. It was an unnerving experience to walk into the assistant director’s office at FBI headquarters and come face-to-face with John Jefferson Davis, the man whom General Peighton had just yesterday described as the probable archvillain of the Joyce Livingstone abduction. “Agent Davis has just come back from Belgium,” the assistant director explained. “He’ll be coordinating things on this end between the Secret Service and the FBI. I’m afraid that he has some rather disturbing news.” What, Llewellan thought, could this be? “This is not ready for public consumption,” Davis cautioned. “We’ve just had a tip from a reliable source in the European underworld that Mrs. Livingstone has been abducted from her kidnappers by a second group.” “By whom, from whom?” Llewellan asked, pondering the faint traces of a Gulf Coast accent in Davis’s voice. He had only crossed paths once or twice with Davis previously and he had forgotten that Justin Underwood was not the only person involved in this affair who had such an inflection. “We don’t know,” Davis admitted. “The reports are quite vague.”

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“Could it have been that she was freed by one of the law enforcement agencies involved in the search?” Rod asked innocently. Apparently he was the only person in the room who knew the identity of this second group. “Maybe one of them got her out and we just haven’t been informed yet?” “No, we’re in touch with all the agencies on the ground, and that can be ruled out,” the assistant director interjected. “How can you be so sure that she passed from one group to another if you don’t know the identities of any of the groups?” Llewellan asked pointedly, trying to put Davis on the spot. “That’s a good question,” Davis acknowledged. “It seems like a logical question,” Llewellan replied. “How can you know for sure that she’s been kidnapped from one set of kidnappers if you don’t know who any of them are?” “What I’ve told you is all that the Secret Service knows at this point,” Davis said defensively. “That’s all we’ve got. But regardless, there is no question that this is an ominous turn of events.” “How is it more ominous than the original kidnapping?” the assistant director asked. “I understand that she was roughed up pretty bad in that one.” “Because . . .” Davis said, grasping for the right choice of words. “Because the first kidnappers had to have taken her for a reason. The second group . . . who knows?” “I understand that we have never been informed of a reason by the original bunch,” the assistant director replied quizzically. “This is true,” Davis agreed. “But the further into the underworld she slips, the greater the danger. I . . . the Secret Service . . . needs your help. I would really appreciate the Bureau putting its ears to the ground and keeping me

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informed of anything you hear . . . anything . . . no matter how trivial it may seem.” “I thought we already were,” Llewellan said. “The Bureau’s had more than a hundred agents working around the clock over there.” “Yes, and we appreciate your efforts,” Davis said. “But we’d like to ask that you redouble your efforts. And anything you turn up, any lead or shred of a lead, especially on this side of the Atlantic . . . you should bring it directly to me and I’ll see that it is acted upon immediately.” “Absolutely,” Llewellan said, noting a sense of desperation to Davis’s manner. Of course he wanted to know what the FBI knew as soon as the Bureau knew it!

October 28 12:40 P.M. Eastern Time

I

T was cold and drizzly as Enrique Quintara drove into West Virginia. Had it been a sunny day, the golden foliage of the trees might have been the sort of thing to make a tourist want to stop and take a picture, but it wasn’t sunny and Quintara was no tourist. Brewster’s Knob was a typical Allegheny Mountain coal town, poor and run-down by some peoples’ standards, cozy and quaint by others. Quintara passed the True Value hardware store and the Dairy Queen. He made note of the coffee shop where he had stopped on his two previous visits to this town, and took the next road on the left. A mile farther along, he turned into the gravel driveway of the huge stone Victorian mansion built here in the 1890s by one of West Virginia’s coal kings. If Quintara had ever been told the man’s name, it had gone in one ear and out the other. He didn’t care.

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Whoever the man was, he’d be disappointed with the way the place looked now. The grounds were overgrown with weeds and brambles and at least two layers of paint were flaking from the building. Quintara walked up to the massive front door and rang the bell. Mark Teverone answered and they exchanged terse greetings as they made their way to the large living room where a smoldering fireplace offered the only warmth in the cold, damp one-time trophy home. “I’ll get right to the point,” Quintara said. “Secretary General Mboma has learned that Mrs. Livingstone is no longer in the custody of the whoever it was who had her. He is very upset . . . upset is too mild a word . . . he is furious.” “So am I, Enrique. Believe me, I’m as angry as the secretary general. And I’m baffled. Kurketrekker seemed to have worked perfectly. The abduction went off without a catch, and the biggest manhunt in history failed to find her.” “Somebody found her,” Quintara shouted. “How did they do it?” “I don’t know. Davis doesn’t know. It wasn’t any of the European services or Interpol. If they had, they’d be beating their chests and she’d be all over Sky News and all the other cable channels. Davis says that it wasn’t the FBI either. Apparently it was freelancers.” “What will they do?” “Davis told me that the Rhino promised he’d track her down and get her back. He’s mad because he lost some of his best people.” “This is a very big problem,” Quintara said sternly. “Your people have lost your hostage and your control of events. Joyce Livingstone could turn up at any moment . . . ether dead or alive.” “In the meantime, this part of Kurketrekker . . . on this

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side of the Atlantic . . . is still going exactly to plan,” Teverone promised. “Livingstone is so heavily sedated that he couldn’t hold on to the presidency if he wanted to. Everybody wants him replaced. There’s a groundswell of support for Cushman to just take over. It’s only a matter of time before Livingstone consents to signing a letter of resignation.” “Then you had better get that letter signed immediately before something else goes wrong,” Quintara insisted. “The secretary general has told me explicitly to tell you that he wants the timetable to be accelerated. He doesn’t want this to drag out until after the election. He wants to see Cushman sworn in within forty-eight hours.” “Don’t be making demands,” Teverone said angrily. “May I remind you that we planned this operation . . . not you . . . not the secretary general.” “Don’t raise your voice with me,” Quintara said. “When you approached the secretary general, you sold him on what you Americans call a win-win deal. Both the secretary general and the vice president saw elimination of Livingstone as president to be desirable and you proposed that a Cushman administration would bring the United States into alignment with the secretary general’s vision of global unity. You said that it would cost money and the secretary general agreed to make those resources available through his discretionary fund.” “Yes, that’s correct, but . . .” Teverone started to say. “But you gave me your assurance that there was someone within the Secret Service who could execute the transition seamlessly,” Quintara asserted. “In short, the secretary general agreed to let you execute the operation, while he stood back to underwrite the costs. Now that things are starting to go wrong, he wants to protect his investment.”

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“Okay, we agree,” Teverone said, throwing up his hands. “We’re already moving forward to complete the transition sooner rather than later. Cushman is ready, even anxious, to take over as soon as we can evict Livingstone. Now that our people overseas no longer have Joyce Livingstone in a cage, he is ready to take over sooner rather than later. I’m going back to Washington now. I’ll talk to Davis. We’re going to speed this thing up as much as possible. He has thirteen agents who are on board to serve as the security detail for the transition. They won’t let anything or anyone stand in the way. Livingstone is as good as gone right now.” “Trece afortunados . . . mmmm,” mused Quintara. “Right, they’re our ‘Lucky Thirteen,’ ” Teverone agreed. “There’ll be an operational planning meeting involving nine of those men here at this location tomorrow evening. They’ll be going directly back to Washington afterward, where they’ll be ready to prevent anyone from interfering with Cushman as he takes full charge of the government. We had not planned for this until after the election, but there is no reason to wait. It could happen tomorrow night . . . sure, it will happen tomorrow night . . . we’ll have our Lucky Thirteen on the ground. We’ll make sure that the letter of resignation is signed by the time that the city wakes up the next morning.” “As I said, the secretary general wishes to see that his investment is protected,” Quintara said warily. “I plan to be present at your meeting tomorrow, and I will accompany those nine agents to Washington.” On a side road about a hundred yards from the Castle, Rod Llewellan grimaced slightly as the big door slammed shut.

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He kept his headphones connected to the large directional microphone of the remote listening device as Teverone made a phone call. This was followed by bangings and scrapings as the vice presidential aide got up from his chair and moved about the room. There was the sound of a toilet flushing, and of the big door slamming again. Llewellan watched through his high-power binoculars as Teverone walked to his borrowed Impala and drove away. The FBI agent reached across to his big heavy-duty tape console and pushed the “rewind” button for a moment. Turning to the “play” button, he heard a crisp, easily audible voice saying, “. . . desirable and you proposed that a Cushman administration would bring the United States into alignment with the secretary general’s vision of global . . .” With that, Llewellan began disassembling his equipment and wondering where to stop for coffee and a bathroom break on his way back to the nation’s capital.

October 28 5:35 P.M. Eastern Time

T

H E tall, blond woman walked through the big doors of the Rayburn House Office Building and turned her collar against the cold October wind. Justin Underwood’s ambitious senior assistant for policy matters had been working hard and sleeping little. Brooke Larderie was on a mission, and her mission was to demonstrate that she too could play the ruthless game of politics with a brutality that matched that of her boss. She had a reputation to build, and a lot to prove. Down the road there would be other

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campaigns, and they would need campaign managers. Playing a pivotal role in a successful presidential campaign could get her hired nearly anywhere. She had thrown herself zealously into the task of bolstering the rumors of the serious rift between Thomas Livingstone and his vice president. She had spent long hours circulating the highlights of the Congressional Record transcripts that shed an unflattering light on their bickering. She slipped into the cloakrooms of the congressional office buildings to hand off sizzling gossip to staff members of handpicked opposition legislators who craved anything that could hurt the floundering Livingstone-Cushman ticket. She met with her most underhanded and malicious media contacts and found them greedy for mud to sling— regardless of which ticket was on the receiving end. “Ms. Larderie?” Brooke turned. A well-dressed middle-aged man was hurrying to catch up to her. “My name is Abackern, I need to speak to you,” he said, showing her credentials that identified him as Agent David Abackern of the Secret Service. “Obviously you know me, so I won’t introduce myself,” she said arrogantly, her haughty demeanor hiding a bit of nervousness that anyone might be expected to feel when accosted without warning by the Secret Service. “What can I do for you?” “It’s been brought to my attention that you’re the source of some information that is being spread around town with regard to relations between the president and the vice president.” “Who’s the source of that being brought to your attention?” Brooke demanded. “I’m not at liberty to reveal confidential information.”

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“Well, neither am I,” she said as he blocked her from walking toward the curb on Independence Avenue to hail a cab. “Get out of my way.” “May I remind you that the Secret Service is charged with the protection of these individuals, and . . .” “You’re not charged with protecting them from their political rivals,” she interrupted. “It’s a free country. There’s something about free speech.” “Anything that can potentially endanger these individuals, especially in a time of crisis . . . especially when the first lady is still in the hands of her kidnappers . . . can and will be considered as a serious breach of federal statutes.” “Since when does circulating excerpts from the Congressional Record constitute a federal crime?” Brooke said angrily. “Thank you for confirming that you’re the source,” Abackern said coldly. “I would strongly suggest that you watch your step, Ms. Larderie. We can and will hold you personally responsible should anything happen.” “Go to hell,” she said defiantly as she finally reached the curb to flag an oncoming taxi. “The Darmader campaign refuses to be intimidated. You can tell that to Livingstone and Cushman.” As the car pulled into traffic, Brooke glanced back. The agent was gone. She shivered slightly. As bold as she had tried to be, she was actually quite freaked out by her strange encounter. The Secret Service was not in the habit of trying to coerce candidates. In her experience, the service was always professional and unemotional. Even Wilson Darmader had Secret Service protection. They did their job without betraying even a hint of bias or preference for one candidate or another. What she had been doing over the past day or so—what Underwood had been doing for

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the past year—was often underhanded and dirty, but it wasn’t illegal. Underwood always said that he didn’t mind breaking the rules, but he was careful not to break the law. That’s why they had a major law firm on retainer. If Abackern had been out to intimidate or frighten her, it had worked. Despite the brave front that she had put up, she was scared. What, she wondered, was this guy up to? Why was he so brazen about pushing the edges of what was legal for the Secret Service itself? What was he likely to do? Who sent him and why?

October 28 5:35 P.M. Eastern Time

“

H

I, it’s Steve.”

“What’s up?” Rod Llewellan asked. He was driving back to Washington from Brewster’s Knob, keeping the needle nine miles per hour above the speed limit and praying for no traffic congestion. “I’ve got some troubling news,” Faralaco explained. “Our sick friend has been taking too much medication.” “How much too much?” “A lot too much.” “How’s that happening?” “I think that his doctor is overprescribing.” “You need to get that taken care of,” Llewellan said emphatically. “Get it stopped. Do what you have to do, but get it stopped. His health is of paramount importance.” “I already did that . . . I just wanted you to know that it had been going on,” Faralaco agreed. “How was your trip?” “I heard some interesting things,” Llewellan confirmed. “You were absolutely right. Absolutely.”

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“Nice to be vindicated.” “I wish you hadn’t been,” Llewellan said sadly as he signed off from his call to Faralaco. Riding next to him was the taped evidence of the most serious threat to the presidency since he had been privy to the secret things that the public can never know. And now Steve Faralaco had just told him that Dr. Joe Iconiche was doping the president. When he asked himself—rhetorically, of course— what could possibly go wrong next, he had no idea how short a time it would be before the question would be answered. “Oh no!” He caught the red-and-blue flash out of the corner of his eye, and in his rearview mirror, Llewellan could see the distinctive dark blue hood of a Virginia State Police patrol car. “Goin’ a little fast there, weren’t you?” asked the man in the Smokey Bear hat who finally ambled up to the side of Llewellan’s car. “Officer, I’m an FBI agent in the midst of a critical situation,” he explained. “We’ll getcha on your way in a minute,” the cop said, studying Rod’s Bureau identification. “License and registration.” “Oh brother,” Llewellan muttered. He guessed he’d better do as he was told. That would probably get him on his way fastest. “I beg your pardon, sir?” “Nothing, officer.” “You weren’t being disrespectful of authority were you, sir?” “No, officer,” Llewellan replied as he handed his driver’s license and registration to the man.

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The minutes ticked by as the cop sat in his car doing whatever it is that the highway patrol does when they take your license and registration back to their car. He could have rewritten the entire state vehicle code by now, Llewellan thought. On the seat next to him, Rod Llewellan had the key evidence in a massive conspiracy and this guy is wasting all this time over nine miles an hour! Finally, the Smokey returned, ambling slowly. “Step out of the car, sir.” “What?” “Step out of the car.” “What’s wrong?” “Step out of the car, sir. We have a problem.” “And what is that?” Llewellan asked as he complied with the order. “Don’t get assertive with me, sir,” the man said calmly. “Your registration doesn’t match your plates.” “Listen, this is an FBI car. We use these vehicles for surveillance and various operations. Things get switched around. You can contact FBI headquarters and . . .” “We’re going to have to impound this vehicle, sir.” “What?” “We’re going to have to impound this vehicle,” the officious Smokey explained. “When this sort of irregularity occurs with official vehicles, Homeland Security regs require us to impound the subject vehicle. Please step away from the car.” “I need to get . . .” Llewellan started to say, reaching toward the door handle. “Please step away from the car and surrender your car keys, sir. Do you need me to call you a cab?” Rod Llewellan stared in disbelief at the car that was heading to an impound lot with the key evidence in a mas-

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sive inside conspiracy to use the United Nations to finance the overthrow of the United States.

October 28 5:35 P.M. Eastern Time

A

few miles from where Llewellan twisted on the horns of his dilemma at the side of the interstate, the vice president’s chief of staff turned off the Beltway and drove into Washington D.C. At times like these, when he was in a hurry, Mark Teverone wished the safe house was closer, but picking something that far away from Washington had been his own idea. What if he was seen? He couldn’t have prying eyes observing him as he met with Quintara or the others. In Washington, and in the neighboring Virginia and Maryland counties, there was always the chance that he’d be seen. At Brewster’s Knob, nobody would recognize him. He was sure of it. At least the drive back had given him time to think. At first, the thought of Mboma muscling in to assert a measure of operational control had been a numbing proposition. Even though the secretary general’s demands coincided with what he already recognized as an obvious need to get Kurketrekker over with soon, Teverone felt like an entrepreneur whose company had just been seized by the venture capitalist who writes all the checks. As in such cases, Teverone had counted on Mboma being a silent investor, but when things started to go wrong, he had intervened to protect his investment. Teverone didn’t like it, but Mboma and Quintara were right. They were only acting with the same sort of due diligence that Teverone would have exercised if the tables were turned.

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Gradually, the chief of staff came to discern the fact that neither he nor Mboma was really in control. Whoever had snatched Joyce Livingstone had left them in a precarious position, a position in which they would remain as long as her husband was technically still the president of the United States. Cushman had directed Teverone to meet him on a quiet street off Wisconsin Avenue near American University that was not far from the vice president’s official residence. When you’re the vice president of the United States you can’t just meet at any all-night coffee shop. When Teverone arrived, one Secret Service agent was standing on the curb near Cushman’s town car and another was in the driver’s seat. The seated agent got out, opened the door for the chief of staff, and joined his colleague outside on the curb so that the two men could have their confidential conversation. “You’re in good hands tonight,” Teverone smiled, nodding to the two men. “Yes, the Secret Service is always there, always seen, and barely noticed,” Cushman said. “Like shadows. Although we’ll be counting on Agents McLaury and Clanton to be more than shadows as we reach the climax of the transition.” Both Frank McLaury and William Clanton were members of the Lucky Thirteen. “When the time comes, they’ll be ready, and if all goes smoothly, they’ll step back into the shadows, barely noticed.” “I’m impatient for that time to come,” Cushman said. “The suspense is killing me.” “I was also thinking that the time should come soon,” Teverone said. He was glad that the vice president was

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anxious to get on with it. “I think that we should plan for the transition right away. You complained about the polls . . . well, part of the reason that you’re down in the polls is the uncertainty. We’ll just move now and take away that uncertainty. Then you’ll have plenty of time to square off against Darmader . . . just enough time to get ahead and stay ahead until the finish line. We should just do it.” “When? “Tomorrow night.” “Tomorrow night?” “Sure, everyone is as ready as they’ll ever be. Nine of the agents will be returning from the operational planning session and they’ll have it all fresh in their minds. The other four will be here and on duty. Two of them are standing just outside at this moment. If we do it at night, there will be a lot fewer people around the White House, and the media will be mostly asleep. By the time the cable news hounds wake up, it’ll be a done deal. We should just execute the operation!” “Dammit, Mark, that’s the kind of decisiveness that I hired you for!” “Thank you, sir,” Teverone said modestly. “But what if Livingstone still refuses?” “He won’t. He knows how bad he feels, and as much as he argues, he knows that he can’t govern like that. Dr. Iconiche has diagnosed him with post-traumatic shock, and that takes months, if not years, to treat. He still has enough wits about him to know that the uncertainty could be devastating for the country. We’ll remind him of what happened back in 1919, when Woodrow Wilson was incapacitated by his stroke. He was paralyzed on one side and blind in one eye. He could never even walk by himself afterward.”

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“The country was essentially without a president for nearly a year and a half,” Cushman recalled. As an ambitious vice president, he was naturally an avid student of presidential succession. “But they kept it all hushed up after he left office . . . until after he died in 1924.” “You can’t keep that sort of thing hushed up today,” Teverone said. “And Livingstone knows that.” “I’m ready,” Cushman said. “I’ll draft the letter myself and just take it in to him.” “We’ll get it behind us and blow Darmader out of the water in November.” “Oh, one more thing,” Cushman said, and Teverone leaned forward to grab the door handle. “You didn’t tell me about your meeting with Quintara. Did you brief him on your idea to move things along faster?” “He was a little nervous that we were moving so quickly,” Teverone lied with a wink. “They do things a little more slowly and methodically at the United Nations . . . but he came around.”

October 28 9:19 P.M. Eastern Time

“

W

HAT a strange world we live in,” Rod Llewellan said as the inspected trunk slammed shut and the guard gave him the high sign to proceed into the secured White House parking area. “Well, right now, I’d say that our corner of it is pretty ‘corkscrewed’ up,” mused General Buckley Peighton. “Actually, what I was thinking . . . is how funny it was that the same FBI ID that couldn’t get me off the hook with

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the Virginia State Police just got us past the perimeter security at the White House.” “Don’t forget they saw that your passenger is a retired four star,” Peighton grinned. “Oh yeah, and that too,” Llewellan smiled. He had grown to like the unflappable old soldier, developing that bond that grows between men who’ve survived dangerous operations about which they could tell no one who hadn’t been there. “Good evening, gentlemen,” Steve Faralaco said, greeting the two men at the North Portico entrance to the White House and helping Peighton manhandle his crutches out of the car and get situated. “Hello, Steve,” Llewellan said. “I’d like to thank you for that call you made to Homeland Security. The trooper let me off the hook faster than it takes for pizza to disappear at a Super Bowl party. You must be pretty well connected over there.” “It’s not what you know,” Steve smiled, thinking of the strings he’d asked Jenny Collingwood to pull, “it’s who you know.” They made their way to the elevator as quickly as Peighton’s injured leg permitted, and Faralaco swiped the pass card that would take them to the White House living quarters. Walter Meril, the president’s Secret Service man, took one look at Peighton and rose instinctively to salute him. He was ex-Army, and Peighton was so well respected that it was automatic that he receive a salute even though neither man was still in uniform. “At ease, soldier.” Peighton grinned broadly, returning the man’s salute and shaking his hand. “General Peighton is here to pay his respects to the

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president,” Faralaco explained. “Agent Llewellan of the FBI is escorting the general.” “Buck, damn, it’s good to see you,” Thomas Livingstone said, climbing out of bed as Faralaco secured the door to the presidential bedroom, leaving Meril at his post outside. The president was amazingly more lucid than the last time Steve had been here. The placebos were obviously doing their job. “It’s good to be seen, sir,” Peighton said, shaking his old friend’s hand. “Before anything else, I’d like to apologize for letting you down over there in Brussels. You asked me to look after Joyce and I . . .” “Dammit, Buck, you took a hit for her,” Livingstone said. “Don’t think for a minute that I blame you in any way, shape, or form. When she gets free of those bastards . . .” “Pardon me for interrupting,” Peighton said. “But on that subject, I wanted to be the first to tell you . . .” “Tell me what?” Livingstone demanded. His face went white as though he was expecting the worst. “She’s free,” Peighton said with a smile. “We got her out.” “What? How?” Livingstone stammered. “To make a long story short, we lucked out and got some intel and did a snatch and grab.” “Where is she?” “She’s safe, and she’s nearby,” Peighton assured his old friend. “But those who are behind her abduction are still very much at large, and we don’t dare bring her out until we’ve put them out of business. I just wanted you to know that she is safe.” “What the hell is going on?” Livingstone asked. “To start with,” Steve Faralaco said, reaching for the two vials of medication. “Do you know why you’re feeling

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better tonight than you have in a while?” Steve asked, picking up the vials of medication on the end table near the president’s bed. “Something to do with the meds?” “Yes. To put it succinctly, you were being overprescribed.” “What do you mean?” “I mean that you were taking enough of this stuff to put you into a potentially fatal twilight zone.” “That’s how I felt,” Livingstone admitted. “I’m better now. Who did this? Iconiche?” “Yes.” Faralaco told him. “Why? What the hell is going on?” “There’s a full-fledged coup d’état in motion,” Llewellan interjected. “Warner Cushman and Mark Teverone are running a complicated venture to overthrow you that’s being financed out of the office of the secretary general of the United Nations.” “Cushman? Teverone? The damned United Nations?” Livingstone asked in disbelief. “Let me try to understand. This is beyond imagination. It’s bizarre to the extreme. Are you sure?” “I’m afraid so,” Steve Faralaco said grimly. “I personally saw Mark Teverone meeting with Mboma’s right-hand bagman.” “I was incredulous when Steve brought this tale to me,” Llewellan interjected. “But I’ve seen them as well, and I just bugged a follow-up meeting. I heard things that curled my hair, and I’ve got it on tape.” “Kidnapping Joyce was only the tip of the iceberg,” Peighton added. “That was just the first domino in the series that was supposed to lead to your resignation. Doping you up so you passed out on national television was the next.”

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“Where is she?” Livingstone repeated. “Why can’t you just bring her here? She’ll be safe in the White House.” “That’s a problem,” Peighton said. “She wouldn’t be. The Secret Service is involved.” “The Secret Service? The whole Secret Service?” “No, but we don’t know how far it goes,” Peighton said. “Fortunately, we identified one man. Unfortunately, we don’t know who else.” “Who is he?” Livingstone asked angrily. “John Jefferson Davis.” “Davis? He’s Cushman’s guy, but he was with us in Europe,” Livingstone said. “He was involved in the European part of the operation, including the kidnapping,” Peighton explained. “But he’s here now.” “He . . . they . . . must know that Joyce has been freed . . .” Livingstone said. “Yes, they do, but they don’t know who did it,” Llewellan said. “Davis knows that it wasn’t the Secret Service or the FBI because he’s on the inside, but he doesn’t know who. This has got Mboma in a panic. Apparently, they were going to wait until after the election to ease you out, but they are accelerating their timetable.” “When?” “Tomorrow night.” “What can we do?” Livingstone asked. “If not the Secret Service, can we get the FBI involved? What about Delta Force, or the SEALs?” “The military cannot operate within United States borders,” Llewellan said. “And using the FBI against elements of the Secret Service might be problematic for obvious reasons. That would really look like a coup d’état to all concerned. There’s no telling what might happen. And then

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there would be issues of diplomatic immunity if United Nations personnel are involved. It could be extremely messy.” “Messy will be just half of it when this hits the media and later as these Secret Service people end up going on trial,” Faralaco said, shaking his head. “There could be a disastrous crisis of confidence. There is no precedent for this kind of thing, either legally or historically.” “It could take the Justice Department lawyers months just to sort out what to do,” Livingstone said. “We’ve got to act fast and decisively. What would Theodore Roosevelt have done, Buck?” “Permission to speak freely, sir?” Peighton asked. He recalled previous discussions that he’d had with Livingstone about the twenty-sixth president. “Of course.” “Well, Tom, as you know, Roosevelt also lost his wife . . . not when he was president, but back in 1884, and he experienced some of what you’ve been going through these past days. Unlike you, though, he never got a chance to get Alice Hathaway Lee back from beyond the dark curtain. If he’d had that chance, he would’ve done everything within his power to avail himself of it. If he had seen people doing to Alice Hathaway Lee what I saw people doing to Joyce Livingstone on that street in Brussels . . . if Charles Fairbanks, his vice president, had the audacity to try to overthrow the U.S. government . . . if there was a question that federal lawyers might gum the works . . . I think that Roosevelt would have gone to that bunch of incorrigible cowboys that he called ‘Rough Riders’ and he would have turned them loose . . . that’s what I think.” “That’s what I think, as well,” Livingstone said. “We do have assets at our disposal,” Peighton said.

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“Can they . . . ?” Livingstone asked, knowing exactly who Peighton meant. “If anyone can.” “Can you?” “They’re ready,” Peighton told him. “Can you authorize the use of lethal force against American citizens on American soil by ‘Rough Riders’?” Steve Faralaco asked cautiously. “When I took the oath of office, I promised to defend the Constitution of the United States against both foreign and domestic threats. I think that heading off a goddam coup d’état comes under the heading of defending our country . . . besides which, these bastards roughed up my wife!” Livingstone looked at Faralaco, who just shrugged and nodded. “You have my blessing . . .” Livingstone told Peighton, “and I’ll put it in writing right now . . . to use lethal force on all of these assholes. In fact, the fewer left standing the better. This country is better off with the Secret Service people being dead heroes than defendants in a divisive criminal trial.” “Yes, sir,” Peighton said, happy to see a politician behaving decisively. “Oh, but there is one exception,” Livingstone said as he reached into his nightstand for some presidential letterhead. “What’s that?” Peighton asked. “Cushman,” Livingstone replied. “I want you to bring that sonuvabitch to me!”

TEN

October 29 7:41 A.M. Eastern Time

R

OD Llewellan realized he was probably being watched as he drove his car up the narrow, rutted dirt road through rural Prince William County. He was barely thirty miles from the White House, but it seemed like a thousand. He was less than a half dozen miles from the Manassas Battlefield and the ghosts of 1861 and 1862 still walked these woods. Water dripping from the trees made a hollow popping sound as it drizzled into the fallen leaves that lay ankle deep on the walkway. The Raptor Team was using several small dwellings in a long-mothballed cabin camp as safe houses, and Llewellan made his way to the one in the front where he had been told that Colonel Brannan had his command post. “Hi.” Professor Anne McCaine smiled as she answered

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the door with had a slice of toast in her hand. “Would you like a cup of coffee?” She was wearing a gray tank top and a pair of faded jeans. She had bare feet, but she was wearing a loosely draped black nylon shoulder holster with a Heckler & Koch MK23 in it. Hers was among the most flawless female bodies Rod had ever seen up close. It was tanned and ideally proportioned from her narrow waist to her perfect breasts. Her arms were slender and feminine, but beneath their smooth surface, they had the rock-hard appearance of solid muscle. She was nearly a decade older than Rod was, but he could easily have fallen for her at the drop of a hat. She had the face and body that women half her age would die for. Except for the distinctive gray streak in her long dark hair, she was the closest thing to timeless beauty that he had ever met in a living, breathing woman. “No, thanks, professor,” Llewellan assured her. “I’m fully caffeinated.” He looked around the room. The bed looked like it had been impacted by a tactical nuke. Even the mattress was askew. Apparently the provocative rumors he had heard about the private life she shared with the colonel had a basis in fact. Aside from that, though, everything was in flawless order. All the mission equipment and documentation was laid out on the table and floor with meticulous precision. Col. Dave Brannan was across the room talking on his cell phone. Like the professor, he was wearing jeans, as well as black military boots and a dark blue T-shirt with a black animal skull silkscreened on it. With his massive arms bulging beneath the shirt, his huge hands, and his intimidating height, the big guy with the auburn mustache was obviously the perfect mate for this woman. If nothing else, their bed stood in silent but eloquent testimony to this fact.

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Llewellan thought of Brannan as a modern-day Robin Hood, with McCaine as his Maid Marian. This was not so much in the robbing-from-the-rich cliché, but in the sense that the swashbuckling hero of medieval legend inhabited the shadows, an outlaw who was loyal to King Richard, fighting for his righteous rule even as Prince John and other royal rascals schemed to steal his throne. “Good to see you again, Rod.” Brannan smiled as he ended his call and shook Llewellan’s hand. His grip was firm, but not bone crushing. The colonel knew his own strength. It was a morning for metaphors, Llewellan mused, as the other men—the “Merrie Men” to Brannan’s Robin Hood—entered the room. Llewellan recalled his conversation in the White House when Peighton told the president that Teddy Roosevelt would have turned to his “Rough Riders.” During the years that he had spent living on his ranch in North Dakota, Roosevelt had become fascinated with the capabilities of the rugged westerners whose skills with horses and firearms had been honed to unrivalled excellence, and whose ability to adapt to harsh climates was second nature. During the Spanish-American War, he helped form and lead a volunteer regiment of such Rough Riders, a unit that did not disappoint those who had expected it to excel. Now, as he had been several times before, Llewellan was surrounded by Tom Livingstone’s Rough Riders, an uncouth-appearing collection of characters who looked like the last men standing after a horrendous brawl. Indeed, this had been the case on many occasions, and that was precisely why they were here. Once the cream of the U.S. Special Operations Command, they now enjoyed smoky old poolrooms and clear mountain mornings in places from New Mexico to Montana.

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Brad Townsend and Ray Couper literally worked as cowboys and hunting guides down around the Mogollon Mountains and the Sangre de Cristo. Those who refer to American Special Forces personnel as “snake eaters” often recall that Couper became so used to eating vipers that he developed an acclaimed recipe for rattlesnake sausage, which was now a popular barbecue meat at gatherings of former and active duty special ops personnel. The jolly man with the huge black beard was Jason Houn, the Lebanese-American tech wizard, and Will Casey was arguably the best marksman in the world. The short, stocky fellow was chopper pilot Greg Boyinson, whose short-fused temper was as well known—and respected—as his skill at the controls of anything with rotors. Not present was Jack Rodgers, who often worked alone, and who was already at his duty station for the upcoming operation. Aside from the technology of their gear and the sizes of their respective forces, two things distinguished Roosevelt’s Rough Riders from Livingstone’s Raptors— Roosevelt’s men were widely celebrated in the media, while Livingstone’s always worked on the unheralded dark side of black ops; and the Raptors weren’t all men. Scarcely more than five feet tall, the professor was an unlikely addition to this group, but her skills on horseback were unquestioned, and most archeology professors have never cut open the throat of a mujahidin with a ten-inch knife. Llewellan handed the president’s memo to Brannan, who scanned it quickly and read it out loud. “Shoot to kill and kill ’em all,” Couper observed, having heard the memo. “I guess we won’t be reading any of these clowns their rights.”

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“I suppose you could say that the legal theory holds that they all know their rights well enough to know that they’ve waived them by taking a paycheck from a foreign power and becoming traitors,” Llewellan said. All of the men in the room were soldiers. Each one had signed on to fight wars, not to arrest people, and they all seemed satisfied that they would be going into action with neither hand tied behind their backs. Llewellan glanced at Anne McCaine, the lone female in the room and the only nonsoldier. “What?” Anne said, catching his glance. “Are you wondering whether the ‘girl’ in the bunch might have a different point of view? Listen, I’m just as pissed off at these people as the guys are. I’m no fan of showing ambivalence instead of decisiveness when dealing with a threat to the institutions of this country. I’ve immersed myself in the intimate details of civilizations that span four millennia and encompass geographical locations from the Gobi Desert to the Andes . . . and I’ve seen over and over that giving in to indecision and hesitation has never served anybody well. Besides that, I saw what they did to Joyce Livingstone and how she looked when we got her out of that rabbit hole over there. That really got my feminist fury boiling. Why is it that these punks think it’s okay to push women around?” Nobody spoke, and finally Anne broke the silence. “Okay, class,” she began, pulling some large rolls of paper out of a bag. “Let’s plan our trip to West Virginia. One of the things that I really love about working around Washington is the resources for research they have around here. While the boys were cleaning their guns, I took a little run over to College Park, Maryland, yesterday. A few hours at the National Archives and I came up with the blueprints for the Van Cleave mansion in Brewster’s Knob. Let’s have a look.”

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October 29 10:11 A.M. Eastern Time

J

OYC E Livingstone felt as though she had been trapped either on a desert island or in a bad dream for about six months. It had been just a little more than a week since that terrible morning in Brussels, but it felt like months. She had lost track of how long she had been a guest in this comfortable home. She knew it was somewhere in the United States, but nobody had explicitly told her that it was actually in the rolling hills of Prince George’s County, Maryland. She had flown to Europe aboard Air Force One, one of the most comfortable aircraft in the air, and she had arrived as a much-photographed celebrity. She had returned to the United States strapped into a jump seat in a drafty 747-200F air freighter, arriving in darkness, seen by virtually no one. She had asked to be taken to see Tom, but Peighton had brought her up to speed on why that could not happen. She was shown the newspapers with the headlines that told of her husband’s nervous breakdown and of his fainting on national television. With that, she had again demanded to be taken to see Tom immediately, but her husband’s old army buddy explained that the same people who had gotten her were in the process of trying to depose him. A coup d’état is afoot, Peighton had told her. Later, she found out that Tom had been drugged, and she begged to be taken to him. Stay put, Peighton said, he’d let her know when it was safe. Joyce remained a prisoner. She sensed that the people who liberated her from that

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horrible, cold place in Belgium were part of the secret she had long suspected existed, a creation by Buck Peighton on her husband’s behalf. Peighton had more or less confirmed this, but she understood that the less she knew about all that, the better. Joyce Livingstone had traded one prison for another. The first had been cold and lonely. Her current place of incarceration was just the opposite. She was sleeping in the guest room at the lovely home of General Peighton’s sister and her husband—himself a retired Air Force major general—and it was anything but cold and lonely. Yet, as long as she could not communicate with Tom, it was a prison. As long as she had to watch the dreadful stories on television of his worsening condition, the more she felt herself still trapped in that nightmare. She turned off the television, shutting up a talking head in midsentence, and looked out the dining room window at the idyllic autumn foliage. In the adjoining room, she heard the metallic tinkle of a cell phone ringing. She heard as Buck Peighton answered it and she stood as he wobbled into the dining room on his crutches. “It’s for you,” he said, laying one of his collection of disposable cell phones on the table. “Hello,” she answered as the crippled general tottered away. “Mrs. Livingstone, this is Steve Faralaco.” “Hello, Steve . . .” “Hold the line,” he said, interrupting her. “Hello?” It was Tom! Her Tom! “Tom, is that you?” Joyce asked with disbelief, just to be sure. “Dammit, Joyce,” he said. “It’s so good to hear your

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voice after all this . . . after everything . . . I missed you so much. Buck says they got you away from the kidnappers. Are you all right?” “Yes, I’m fine,” she confirmed. “Buck has been keeping me safe and well fed, but I sure want to see you. How are you? I heard that they were doping you.” “They were. Steve fixed that. I’m okay now.” “What in the world is going on, Tom?” Joyce pleaded. “They don’t tell me anything. When will I see you?” “I don’t know exactly, myself,” Livingstone explained. “They don’t tell me too much either, but Buck’s people are on it and I promise you that it will be okay.” “Are you sure?” “Yes, absolutely,” her husband told her, not really sure at all, but knowing that if anyone could pull them both out of this nightmare, it would be these men he’d never met— Buck Peighton’s Rough Riders.

October 29 10:11 A.M. Eastern Time

S

UZANNE Harris sat in the busy reading room at the Library of Congress, the earplug pressed into her ear, listening to the tape that the man she knew only as Jack had handed her a half hour before. The contents were devastating. It was beyond anything she could imagine. It was beyond Watergate. It was beyond all the “Gates” that there had ever been. It was like hearing Rudolf Hess conspiring with the Duke of Windsor. It was like Fidel Castro and Sam Giancana planning the Kennedy assassination. It was like Area 51 being discussed in secret by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.

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She glanced up. Jack had excused himself to make a phone call. Now he was back. “It’s set,” he said. “Steve Faralaco has arranged for your interview. “You just have to show up fifteen minutes early at a quarter to eight.” “Thank you,” Suzanne said, still in awe of what had just happened and what was about to happen. “Thank you so much.” For more than a week, she had been living in a corkscrew tunnel that descended into the depths of a rabbit hole worthy of Lewis Carroll’s nuttiest fantasies. She had been privy to a story so incredible and so unbelievable that she could not write it. True, she had promised to protect her sources—including the man who’d saved her life twice—but mainly she could not write her unbelievable story because, simply put, nobody would believe it! Now, unimpeachable proof of an even more astonishing aspect of this conspiracy was within her grasp. All she had to do was reach out and take it. She had been handed everything she could need to present Max Schaier and the San Diego Herald with the story of the year—if not of the decade.

October 29 10:11 A.M. Eastern Time

A

S Suzanne Harris anticipated filing the story that would catapult her career, Brooke Larderie was about a dozen blocks away, walking into the Starbucks on Pennsylvania Avenue near Thirteenth Street, preparing to place a story that would end a career—that of Vice President Warner Cushman. She made eye contact with the reporter from the Washington Post across the crowded room and

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smiled. She had known him for nearly two years, an eternity in Washington. If he hadn’t been gay, Brooke might even have taken a shine to him. Nevertheless, he had been good for her causes, and she had provided him with hot slices from the pork barrel that had frequently made his day. Today would be the prime cut. “I have what I promised,” she said. “I can hardly wait,” he replied as she lifted a file folder from her purse. As he took it into his hands, the man in the Nationals baseball cap reading the Washington Post at the next table lowered his paper and removed his dark glasses. “Sir, you have been observed in the act of accepting stolen government property,” Agent David Abackern said. “You are under arrest for this action. You have the right to remain silent . . .” “What the hell is this, Brooke?” the reporter demanded. “Am I being stung? Am I being entrapped?” “No,” Brooke replied, dumbfounded. “This asshole has been harassing me all week. He has no right . . .” “I had no idea that this was stolen,” the reporter said nervously. “Look . . . I didn’t even open it. See. I’ve no interest in getting mixed up in any kind of theft. She never told me anything about it being stolen . . .” “Okay, you can go,” Abackern snarled. “I’ll let you off this time, but don’t ever let me catch you with your hands dirty again.” “Really? Thank you,” the man said in disbelief, grabbing his coat and scrambling out of the coffee shop as fast as he could. “What kind of crap was that?” Brooke demanded angrily when the young man had disappeared up Thirteenth Street. “It was the felony arrest kind,” Abackern said as he used

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a plastic stirring straw to push the bulging folder between the pages of his newspaper. “I’m expecting a wonderland of fingerprints on this.” “What will that prove?” Brooke asked. “It proves only that Warner Cushman has had a vendetta against Livingstone for decades. That fact is being whispered all over town anyway.” “I warned you. I guess you didn’t want to listen. Big girl too smart to listen to an old gumshoe,” Abackern said sadly. “I’ve been watching you. I saw you take this from a certain congressional staffer, who took it illegally from classified files at your request. The fingerprints will only confirm what I’ve already seen and photographed.” “What? This is a violation of freedom of the press.” “Contrary to what you insinuate, Ms. Larderie, I think an indictment of one of Justin Underwood’s most ambitious aides will provide the press with a great story. Especially if the indictment comes a day or so ahead of the election.” “You bastard!” “Better a bastard than a felon.” Abackern smiled. “Even in minimum security, federal time can be a bit more difficult than doing time at Smith or Vassar.” “You wouldn’t!” “Oh, but we will, Ms. Larderie. We most certainly will.”

October 29 8:16 P.M. Eastern Time

A

NNE McCaine crossed the broad, sloping lawn, ap-

proaching the Castle from the side opposite the driveway and the large living room area where the meeting was

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taking place. In the summer, it would have been a tangle of tall grass, but most of the vegetation had died back during an early frost, and it had been matted down by the rain. During the afternoon, she and the colonel had observed the Castle in detail from one of the many hiking trails that crisscross the Alleghenies, and they had planned her nocturnal approach to the backside of the building. She folded the eyepiece of her STS AN/PVS-21 lowprofile night vision goggles into place and studied the trellis that was bolted to the back of the massive building. As she had determined as she and the colonel had strolled past on the nearby trail, the trellis was rusted steel, rather than wood, and quite sturdy. Most of the vines that had once clung to it were dead, so climbing it was relatively easy, although she moved slowly to avoid stepping on anything that might make a loud sound. When she reached the top, she stepped to the side closest to a cracked window, and attached herself to the metal trellis with a nylon strap so that she had both hands free. Brannan had pointed out the cracked window, which indicated that the bad guys hadn’t installed motion sensors, at least not in this room. The woman who had read Modesty Blaise when she was a girl reached up into her right sleeve for a glass cutter. She had taken the extra step of strapping it to her wrist. The last thing she wanted at this point was to drop the small tool two stories into the brush. She reached out and sliced the base of the broken window glass and lifted out the huge shard that constituted most of the remaining glass in the lower half of the window. She carefully placed the shard on a ledge where the first strong gust of wind would send it crashing to the ground below, unfastened herself from the trellis, and slithered through the window. In the weird light of the night vision goggles, she found

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herself in a damp and musty room that had once been a young woman’s bedroom. The walls were covered with nineteenth-century flowered wallpaper and there was the badly weathered remnants of a flamboyant Empire-revivalstyle bedframe. She imagined what it might have been like to have been that young woman, born into the privileged world of the upper crust, with nothing to worry about but clothes and cotillions. She thought of the young woman in ribbons and lace, and wondered if she could have imagined the woman now standing in her room wearing jeans, a flack jacket, and a strange contraption on her head. Modesty Blaise, meet the Brontë sisters. With the thermal imaging feature of her night vision goggles, Anne caught sight of two fast-moving objects in the far corner of the room. Just rats. She had seen larger rats. Indeed, there were much larger rats downstairs at this very moment. In an instant, she was outside the room and into the hallway with her Heckler & Koch drawn. She could see no lights burning on the second floor and the only sounds were the loud voices coming from the conversation below. They were talking excitedly about “taking down” someone. They had no idea how soon their world would be upended. Anne took a deep breath and tiptoed down the hall, peeking into the rooms with her thermal imaging, looking for bad guys. Finding none, she paused at the head of the staircase, listening to the brief snippets of conversation on her earpiece. Suddenly, she heard Brannan shout the word “Now.” From below, there was a flash of white-hot light followed immediately by an earsplitting eruption of noise. The M84

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stun grenades, with their million-candlepower flash and 180-decibel ka-booms were followed by the rattle of Uzi submachine guns hosing the rooms from two sides. Trying not to think about the man she loved in a hail of bullets spattering around the place at ten rounds per second, Anne crouched and waited for the cacophony to subside. There was the scuttling sound of somebody running. He dashed up the stairs, paused and crouched on the landing, and then began inching backward up the steps from there. Enrique Quintara had slipped out of the room at the first blinding explosion and had eluded the people who had attacked the Castle. They outnumbered and outgunned him, but if he could somehow get to higher ground, maybe he could get away. Maybe he could get to the roof and wait until the terrorists left the building. Then he could make his escape. Keeping his Glock .357 Magnum pointed down the staircase, he moved as quickly as he could while keeping his eyes peeled for the attackers. He was not prepared to suddenly feel a ring of cold steel pressed against his neck, and he was extraordinarily unprepared for the sound of a woman’s voice telling him to throw his gun as far as he could. There was nothing he could think of to do but to comply with her demands, although he dropped, rather than threw, his gun. Nevertheless, it bounced down the stairs to the second step below the landing. She told him to lie facedown on the stairs and clasp his hands behind his head, and this he did. It was an awkward position, with his body at a forty-five-degree angle on the staircase. He tried to figure out what he could do to reverse the situation and overpower this woman.

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He was just beginning to seethe with anger at the humiliation of being captured by a female when she compounded the degradation by shoving the muzzle of her gun not into his back, but his crotch. If she pulled the trigger, he might not die, but there would be the dishonor of being shot in the ass, and they both knew that the exit wound would obliterate all traces of his manhood. Followed by Brad Townsend, Col. Dave Brannan was in the foyer a split second later. They both grinned broadly to see Quintara in such a compromised and awkward position. Brannan climbed the stairs, kicking Quintara’s Glock to the bottom as he came. He grabbed the Chilean by the collar, jerked him to his feet, and shoved him downstairs. “Who are you?” Quintara asked. “Are you American police? I’m Enrique Quintara. I’m an executive official with the United Nations, and I have diplomatic immunity.” “What’s a United Nations official doing with a Glock 33?” Brannan inquired. “Protection. Clearly I have much to protect myself from.” “I understand that you and John Jefferson Davis have been doing a little scheming,” Brannan explained, using Davis’s name. “But I don’t see him here tonight.” “Mr. Davis is elsewhere.” “Where?” “I’m not at liberty to say.” Brannan raised the automatic pistol he held in his gloved hand and pointed it directly at Quintara’s face. “I have diplomatic immunity.” “Okay, tell me what I need to know and I’ll see what we can do.” “He’s working with other people in Washington,”

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Quintara admitted. The American obviously was in the mood for a deal. They would probably handcuff him and rough him up a bit, but with diplomatic immunity, Enrique Quintara would be on the street by noon tomorrow. “What people?” Brannan asked. “An official of the U.S. government.” “What’s his name?” “I’m not at liberty to say. I want an attorney.” “Of course you do . . . what’s his name?” “I’m not at liberty to say.” Brannan raised the gun again. “He is Mr. Teverone of President Cushman’s staff,” Quintara said. He’d thrown the American a bone. He hadn’t wanted to admit this fact, but within hours it wouldn’t matter. “President Cushman?” Brannan questioned. “By morning, Livingstone will have resigned, and Cushman will be your president. Things are in motion that cannot be stopped.” “What’s your interest in all of this?” Brannan asked, shoving the automatic in his waistband. Quintara noticed that he also had a Heckler & Koch in a holster on his belt. “Would I be correct that your boss is involved in this scheme to overthrow the Livingstone administration?” “That is such a crude description of the secretary general’s noble desire to further the ideals of orderly international cooperation,” Quintara replied. “I think that the way Mrs. Livingstone was treated was awfully crude,” Brannan replied. “You can’t do this to me,” Quintara said angrily. “I have diplomatic immunity. I wish to contact our attorneys in New York immediately.” “Oh, I’m sorry, Mr. Quintara,” Brannan said remorse-

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fully. “You did say that, didn’t you. I’m sorry. Of course you have diplomatic immunity.” Leaning on the bannister a few steps up from where Quintara and Brannan were facing off, Anne McCaine nearly burst out laughing. She knew her colonel’s wry sense of humor, and she could have scripted what came next. “But . . . there’s an interesting thing about diplomatic immunity,” Brannan said sympathetically. “It’s a lot like International Validation . . . which is another concept of global interaction that I know is held in very high esteem up there in the big building on the East River. They’re both applicable to nations and their governments and their personnel. International Validation is circumvented all the time by people who are not associated with nations and governments. I guess you’d call these people international terrorists, or pirates or something. We had a conversation with a gentleman like that one time, didn’t we, Professor?” “That we did, Colonel,” Anne smiled. “I remember a very nice apartment in Paris overlooking Quai Louis Blériot and the Seine. You could see the lights of the Eiffel Tower from the balcony.” Quintara grimaced. It was common knowledge that Fahrid Al-Zahir, the mastermind of the Mujahidin AlAkhbar terrorist organization, had been gunned down in such an apartment, and that this apartment had belonged to Muhammad Bin Qasim, the head of the United Nations International Validation organization. Bin Qasim either jumped or was pushed from the balcony that this woman just described. Nobody ever ascertained who exactly had killed Al-Zahir. Now, Quintara could guess who it had been. “You see, Mr. Quintara, diplomatic immunity only

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applies when you’re dealing with agents of a government,” Brannan explained. “We’re not agents of any government. We’re just freelancers. I guess you’d call us pirates or something.” Quintara saw the smirk on the face of the tall American with the auburn mustache and a chill gripped his spine. Diplomatic immunity had not saved Muhammad Bin Qasim in Paris, and it would not be the thing that would save Enrique Quintara on the hill above Brewster’s Knob, West Virginia. “I see your Glock lying on the floor right there,” Brannan told Quintara as he put the gun in his belt. “I’m not psychic, but I’ll bet that more than anything right now, you’d like to pick it up and shoot me with it . . . go ahead.” Quintara froze. The Americans were going to kill him. The big man had said as much. Now they had given him a chance. He just might be able to make it work. Against these people, diplomatic immunity would not be his salvation, but this might. He would drop, roll, and shoot this American before he could get to either the automatic in his belt or his holstered H&K. Quintara knew it was his only chance, but at least he had a chance.

October 29 8:16 P.M. Eastern Time

“

I

really appreciate you taking the time on short notice and at such a late hour to speak with me,” Suzanne Harris said, sitting down across the desk from Mark Teverone in his office in the West Wing. “It’s the least I could do for Steve Faralaco,” Teverone smiled. “He spoke highly of you and I owe him a lot for

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offering to do his best to make the transition as smooth as possible under these terrible circumstances.” Teverone expected that there would be a lot of interview requests over the next few days as the transition played out. He had already been getting the calls, and he had both CNN and the Washington Post on his schedule. The San Diego Herald wasn’t really what you’d call major media in that league, but Steve Faralaco had asked, and the least he could do was be gracious to poor Steve. Steve’s sun was setting, while Teverone’s was ascending. He’d give this little girl reporter from California a few moments. It would be good practice, it would be like trying out a play out in the sticks before bringing it to Broadway. The questions would be similar. It would be a chance to craft some phrasing. “It must be exciting to be chief of staff to the man who could very soon take over as more than simply the acting president,” Suzanne began innocently. “The circumstances, however, are tragic and unfortunate,” Teverone said sadly. “With Mrs. Livingstone missing, and with Tom Livingstone’s health as it is, no one can relish taking the reins of government. But Warner Cushman is ready to accept the challenge . . . whatever the nature of that challenge. The nation needs a strong and steady hand, and if he is needed, Cushman will be that man. Naturally, we would all be happier to see Tom Livingstone get well.” “Naturally,” Suzanne said, letting the perfunctory remark slide. Teverone smiled. This was going nicely. “Over the last few days, a lot has been discussed on the op-ed pages . . . and the streets here inside the Beltway . . . about the disagreements between the president and the vice

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president over the issue of the United Nations and the International Validation Treaty,” Suzanne said. “How do you and the vice president characterize these differences?” “Well, certainly they are more differences than disagreements,” Teverone began. “All of us in the administration have been on the same page regarding International Validation. Reasonable people often have reasoned opinions, and differing opinions are compromised in the interest of achieving consensus. After all, Livingstone signed the International Validation Treaty. Strength comes from consensus.” “But wouldn’t you agree that President Livingstone is a nationalist, while Mr. Cushman is an internationalist?” Suzanne asked. “You have been quoted often as saying that allowing the United Nations to apply a global test to actions of nations is a prerequisite for global peace and harmony.” “That was the ideal of the United Nations when the charter was written and signed in 1945 by more than fifty countries, including this one,” Teverone insisted. She had started off with fluff, but she was getting a bit pushy for a society-page girl. “There are nearly two hundred countries now that agree with the United Nations’s global role in facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, and social equity.” “Candidly, don’t you think that the United Nations oversteps its mandate when it unilaterally intervenes in the internal affairs of member nations?” “Where?” Teverone asked. “Cypress? Lebanon? Kosovo? Darfur? These were peacekeeping operations. Lives were saved.” “Could you imagine a circumstance under which the

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United Nations could or should intervene within the United States?” Suzanne asked. “I don’t think that would be relevant,” Teverone said cautiously. “But we should wrap this up, I have matters that require my attention this evening.” “Sure.” Suzanne smiled. He was getting jittery. This was where she wanted him, but she fought to control her own nervousness. “Before I go, I’d like to play a statement by a United Nations official and ask for your comments.” “Okay,” Teverone said impatiently as she set a tape recorder on the edge of his desk and pressed the play button. “Don’t raise your voice with me,” the voice of Enrique Quintara rattled out of the small machine. “When you approached the secretary general, you sold him on what you Americans call a win-win deal. Both the secretary general and the vice president saw elimination of Livingstone as president to be desirable and you proposed that a Cushman administration would bring the United States into alignment with the secretary general’s vision of global unity. You said that it would cost money and the secretary general agreed to make those resources available through his discretionary fund.” “This almost sounds like the secretary general made a deal with Warner Cushman to help overthrow the president of the United States,” Suzanne asserted as she touched the pause button. “It’s out of context . . .” Teverone gasped. He was so stunned, he could barely talk. How did she get this? “Who do you suppose he was speaking with?” Suzanne asked rhetorically as she released the pause button. “Okay, we agree,” Teverone heard himself say. “We’re already moving forward to complete the transition sooner

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rather than later. Cushman is ready, even anxious, to take over as soon as we can evict Livingstone. Now that our people overseas no longer have Joyce Livingstone in a cage, he is ready to take over sooner rather than later. I’m going back to Washington now. I’ll talk to Davis. We’re going to speed this thing up as much as possible. He has thirteen agents who are on board to serve as the security detail for the transition. They won’t let anything or anyone stand in the way. Livingstone is as good as gone right now.” “Trece afortunados . . . mmmm,” Quintara was heard to say. “Right, they’re our ‘Lucky Thirteen,’ ” Teverone said on the tape. “There’ll be an operational planning meeting involving nine of those men here at this location tomorrow evening. They’ll be going directly back to Washington afterward, where they’ll be ready to prevent anyone from interfering with Cushman as he takes full charge of the government. We had not planned for this until after the election, but there is no reason to wait. It could happen tomorrow night . . . sure, it will happen tomorrow night . . . we’ll have our Lucky Thirteen on the ground. We’ll make sure that the letter of resignation is signed by the time the city wakes up the next morning.” “As you well know, Mr. Teverone, this was recorded yesterday,” Suzanne said, shutting off the machine. “Who are the ‘Lucky Thirteen’ and what are they going to be doing tonight?” “Where did you get this?” Teverone screamed as he grabbed the tape recorder, threw it on the floor, and stomped on it. “Where?” “There are many copies of the tape,” Suzanne said as calmly as she could under the circumstances. “Including the original.”

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“What do you want?” Teverone demanded. “Money? How much?” “An explanation of why Joyce Livingstone was kidnapped.” “Nobody was supposed to get hurt.” “Why?” “You little bitch,” Teverone shouted. “Who put you up to this? Darmader?” “No, actually, I really am a reporter, and I really am writing a story about you, the United Nations, and the American presidency. I had hoped to include your comments on the content of the tape, but my editors will have the tape with or without further elaboration. I’d have thought you’d want to . . .” “McLaury, we have a problem,” Teverone said, pushing his intercom key. A split second later, Frank McLaury entered the room. “I heard shouting,” he said. “Is everything okay?” “This little darling has gotten some information that she ought not have,” Teverone seethed, pointing a shaking finger at Suzanne. “She may be working for Darmader. I don’t know. I don’t fuckin’ care. We just have to get her the hell out of here.” McLaury motioned and Agent William Clanton also stepped into the room. “Ma’am, please come with us,” Clanton said, taking hold of Suzanne’s arm as she rose from the chair. “You’ve been asked to leave the building and we’re going to escort you out.” As the two men urged the San Diego Herald reporter toward the West Wing’s side exit, Teverone silently drew his forefinger across his throat. Clanton nodded.

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October 29 8:16 P.M. Eastern Time

“

H

OW in the hell could this have happened? I cannot

fucking believe that you’d do something like this and get caught by the Secret Service,” Justin Underwood harangued Brooke Larderie as she stood sheepishly in the entrance to his office. “This is the last thing I need in this campaign . . . to have one of my people get caught with pilfered paperwork.” She knew that Underwood was ten times angrier at her for getting caught than for convincing the congressional staffer to steal the classified documents. “We can get into damage control,” she said hopefully. “There are a number of things that we can do . . .” “What do you mean we?” Underwood asked. “The Darmader campaign is hereby disavowing any knowledge of your actions on this, Brooke. What you did, you did on your own.” “But you said . . .” “I said that Wilson Darmader would run an honorable campaign, sticking strictly to the facts, and . . .” “This information was factual!” Brooke shouted. “Yes, perhaps it was,” Underwood said. “I don’t know. I never saw it. But stealing the information wasn’t honorable.” “Fuck you,” Brooke said angrily. “When in the hell have you ever let stealing or being dishonorable stand in the way of winning?” “When it comes to a fucking indictment on the eve of a fucking election,” Underwood spat back. “You know damned well they won’t pursue this,” Brooke said. “In order to try this case, they’d have to release the content of those documents, and nobody in a Livingstone or

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Cushman administration would allow that to happen. They probably would drop the charges within a week.” “Maybe.” Underwood shrugged. “But to have a staffer on the Darmader campaign . . . on my campaign staff . . . busted and handcuffed a few days before an election is a political gun to the head. It doesn’t matter what happens two or three days or a week after the election. You know that.” “So you’re blaming this whole thing on me?” “One of the overzealous former staffers on the Darmader campaign made a mistake and . . .” “What do you mean by former staffer?” Brooke asked. “Because you don’t work for the Darmader campaign,” Underwood said. “You resigned three minutes ago. Here, take this sheet of paper and write it out. Be sure to use today’s date.” Brooke was speechless. She had watched the ruthless Underwood hang people out to dry countless times before. She had watched people with thirty years’ experience sobbing and begging and grovelling at his feet. She had seen careers end just as fast as Underwood could quip “I don’t recall that I ever worked with that person, check the personnel files.” She had seen it before. She never expected to see it be her.

October 29 8:21 P.M. Eastern Time

E

NRIQUE Quintara dove for his Glock, dropping to the

floor to make himself as small a target as possible. As he grabbed his Glock, there was a blinding pain in his neck, and then nothing.

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Dave Brannan handed the gun he’d used to shoot Quintara to Brad Townsend and checked the United Nations man’s pulse. He then carefully removed the Glock from Quintara’s death grip with his gloved hand and walked from the foyer into the room where moments before, a thirty-second firefight had left seven turncoat Secret Service agents dead and sprawled in pools of their own blood. Two others had been taken alive and were kneeling on the floor with their hands clasped behind their heads. “You two are the most miserable pieces of shit that I have ever seen,” Brannan said, addressing them with disgust. “Each of you men swore an oath to protect the president of the United States, sacrificing your own life, if necessary. Am I correct?” “Yes,” one man stammered. “I didn’t hear you!” Brannan shouted angrily at the other man. “Yes, sir,” the other man said, staring at the floor. “It looks like seven of your fellow agents have given their lives in an operation aimed not at protecting the president of the United States, but at overthrowing him. Am I correct?” “Yes, sir,” the two men answered in unison. “Is the president of the United States safer because of what you were scheming here tonight?” “If you’re talking about Livingstone,” one man replied, “he won’t be the president after tonight.” “Why is that?” “By tomorrow, he’ll have resigned. Warner Cushman will be sworn in and he’ll acknowledge our role in—” “Your role in overthrowing the presidency,” Brannan interrupted. “This is a fucking coup d’état. Don’t you jokers know that conspiracy to overthrow the government is a fed-

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eral capital crime? That’s capital . . . as in death sentence. Don’t you realize that three of your fellow Secret Service guys paid with their lives in Brussels because of this lunatic corkscrew that you’re mixed up in?” “Who do you work for?” asked one of the men, sidestepping Brannan’s questions. “Are you cops? FBI? Special Forces?” “None of the above,” Brannan replied. “What are you then? Bounty hunters? Mercenaries? What are you getting paid?” “What are you getting paid?” Brannan countered. “Now you’re talking,” one of the men said. “We’ll see that you get cut in. How does a quarter of a million . . . each . . . sound to you guys?” “That sounds like the kind of thing that would make this big guy with the mustache really angry,” Anne McCaine interjected. “He’s one of those people who hates traitors, but he really hates traitors who do it for money.” “Better go for your guns,” Jason Houn told the two Secret Service agents. The two men glanced at each other. It took them only a split second to size up the situation. The big guy with the auburn mustache had Quintara’s Glock shoved into his waistband and his own weapon was holstered. The other mystery men in the room had lowered their weapons. Both of Secret Service agents were as highly trained with weapons as anyone in the world. Their sidearms were within reach. They were far enough apart that at least one of them stood an excellent chance of getting off a clean shot. There was a flurry of action as they scrambled for their weapons, but each of the men fell dead with his hand on his own gun and a bullet from Quintara’s Glock in his skull.

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Townsend dropped the Secret Service–issue gun that Brannan had used to kill Quintara next to one of the dead agents as the colonel calmly walked back into the foyer. He returned Enrique Quintara’s gun to his death grip, making note of the gunshot residue on the Chilean’s hand. Perfect. Quintara now appeared to have managed to get off a shot or two himself during the earlier firefight. Brannan surveyed the scene on the Castle floor. When the Pendleton County sheriff worked this crime scene, with FBI backup no doubt, the forensics would tell the story. It would look as though the Secret Service had been involved in a shoot-out with persons having ties to the upper echelons of the United Nations organization. These persons had been armed mainly with Uzis, standard gear for international paramilitary forces—and not for U.S. Special Forces. They had gotten away clean. The Secret Service had lost the gunfight, but forensic evidence would “confirm” that they had managed to kill one of the attackers, namely Quintara. Meanwhile, two of Quintara’s shots would be forensically identified as having killed two of nine men who had each been paid a quarter of a million to be here tonight. As Thomas Livingstone had said, it was better for the country that these men were remembered as dead heroes than defendants in a criminal trial that would disgrace an agency and stun a nation.

ELEVEN

October 29 9:17 P.M. Eastern Time

“

J

AC K, I’m in the trunk of a car,” Suzanne Harris

gasped. Jack Rodgers had insisted that she hide a second cell phone in her pocket and that he duct tape it into the “on” position. She had taken his advice, although she hid it on her person in a somewhat more intimate and less likely to be searched place. She thought she might be getting too paranoid, but she was wrong. Instead of merely escorting her out of the West Wing, McLaury and Clanton had produced some duct tape of their own. Their efforts to bind her had been thorough, although she had managed to use her chin to pull down the piece they’d put across her mouth. “I know, I’m about two cars behind you,” he assured her. “They don’t know that I’m here.” “Where are we?”

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“Heading into Virginia on Arlington Boulevard.” “Where am I being taken?” “Someplace quiet, I suspect.”

October 29 9:17 P.M. Eastern Time

A

S soon as McLaury and Clanton had hustled Suzanne out of the West Wing, Mark Teverone sat down to catch his breath. He was hyperventilating and sweating like a pig. He loosened his tie and took a deep breath. He grabbed a warm, half-full water bottle and drained it. How in the hell had that woman gotten a tape of his conversation with Quintara? That mattered less than making sure that the transition was completed, but he ached to know who compromised the best laid of plans. The two agents would beat it out of her if necessary and make her death look like an accident. That loose end would get tied up, albeit clumsily. Teverone assured himself that everything was still on track. Teverone left his office, heading toward the water cooler. He needed a cold drink. The vice president was not in his office. Where was he? He was planning to go up to Livingstone’s bedroom at around ten o’clock. Was he headed there already? The resignation documents had been drafted and Cushman was primed to not take “no” for an answer. Teverone got his drink and thumbed his cell phone with Cushman’s direct number. It rang and rang and rang. He dialed it again and it rolled over to voice mail. Where was he? Maybe he had it turned off. Where were the Lucky Thirteen? Teverone looked at his

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watch. The nine men that Davis said would be here had not yet arrived. Taking out his cell phone again, Teverone dialed the direct number for John Jefferson Davis. “Hello, Mark,” Davis said calmly. “Where are you?” Teverone said. “Your guys aren’t here yet.” “What?” Davis suddenly sounded concerned. “I talked to them around eight or so. They should have been there by now. Let me check. I’ll call you right back.” Teverone took another drink of water and ambled toward the men’s room. The West Wing was nearly deserted and Teverone suddenly felt alone. Tonight, there was nothing to do but wait. Tomorrow would be the longest day of his life. He was just zipping his fly when Davis called back. “I got hold of them,” Davis told him. “They were just crossing the Beltway. They’re twenty minutes out at the most. Terrible connection for being that close, but I did talk to them. How many are there now?” “I asked McLaury and Clanton to take care of something for me. They’ll be back in an hour or so.” “Okay,” Davis replied. “Keep me posted.”

October 29 9:17 P.M. Eastern Time

S

TEVE Faralaco’s heart was pounding like a V-8 engine about to throw a rod. He imagined that the sound was so loud that it could be heard by the Secret Service agents positioned near the passage from the West Wing offices and the White House proper. Llewellan had told him to be with the president, to get to Livingstone’s room and

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stay there. Llewellan had not told him exactly why. He had just told Steve that ‘something’ was going down tonight, and that Livingstone shouldn’t be alone. Steve understood. When Steve arrived at the elevator that led to the White House living quarters, it was in motion. Someone was descending from the president’s floor. The doors opened. “Oh, good evening, Steve,” Dr. Joseph Iconiche said, greeting him calmly. “How are you?” “How’s your patient?” Steve asked, leaving Iconiche’s question unanswered. “He’s fine.” “I think that he’s been a bit overmedicated.” “Overmedicated?” “Just for my edification, could you please explain what you’ve been prescribing, and why?” “Technically, that’s between a doctor and his patient,” Iconiche began. “But you know the why. He’s exhausted and suffering from PTSD, or at least ASD.” “I’ve seen the medication vials, and I’ve seen the labels.” “Then you know that he’s taking mirtazapine as an antidepressant to treat his depression, and nitrazepam to help him rest. That’s all.” “How much of it is he taking?” Faralaco insisted. “I don’t know what qualifies you to speak to me in that insinuating tone,” Iconiche said defensively. “How much? How many milligrams?” “The dosages of both are within approved parameters.” “Isn’t your patient getting two sleeping pills in the morning and several through the course of the day? No wonder he’s been so damned muddled.” “That’s the opinion of a layman,” Iconiche growled indignantly.

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“These drugs he’s on are also the cause of his headaches and his general disorientation,” Faralaco shouted. “On top of that, the cocktail you’ve got him on compounds the deleterious effects . . . the reaction of the two drugs on each other put the poor man into a stupor.” “It can if it’s not administered properly!” Iconiche admitted. “It can if you’re overdosing your patient,” Faralaco replied. “He told me that he was thinking more clearly.” “He’s thinking more clearly because I replaced his damned pills with diet supplements,” Faralaco said. “What?” Iconiche gasped. “I replaced the mirtza-whatever-peen with vitamin E. I replaced the other one with a protein supplement . . . pills that are about the same size and shape. I got ’em at a health food store over on Eighteenth Street. I replaced them one for one and he’s feeling better because he’s being weaned off a massive dose of downers.” “I’ve had quite enough of your accusations,” the doctor told him, buttoning his overcoat and turning toward the North Portico. “Good night!”

October 29 9:17 P.M. Eastern Time

J

OH N Jefferson Davis had not gotten where he was by taking chances, so when the alarm bells started to ring in the back of his head, he listened. Things were not lining up as they should. Teverone had sent McLaury and Clanton off somewhere to take care of something. What? Where? Why? That was not part of the plan. The nine should have

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been here by now and they weren’t. What was the delay and why the bad cell connection? Would they all be on hand at the White House when Cushman arrived at ten for his final showdown with Livingstone? Was he just being paranoid, or could anything and everything go wrong at this turn in the spiral of the Kurketrekker? Davis was mulling the situation and walking through the hallway that connected the West Wing to the White House when he heard the sound of two men arguing. It was Steve Faralaco and Dr. Iconiche. Faralaco was mad as hell. Iconiche was being indignant. Oh shit, Davis thought. This sounded like trouble. Finally, Iconiche stomped off and Faralaco stepped into the elevator. The Kurketrekker was rapidly unwinding. Something had to be done! Teverone! He needed to talk to Teverone and get control of this damned thing before it unwound completely. He had to alert Cushman that Faralaco would be with Livingstone. Davis walked quickly back to the West Wing and found Teverone pacing near his office. “What’s going on?” Davis asked. “Nothing,” Teverone said. “I don’t know.” “Let’s go look at those chrysanthemums,” Davis suggested. “Let’s.” Teverone grabbed his laptop, but not his overcoat, and the two men stepped out into the night air, not in the direction of the garden, but in the direction of Lafayette Square. Teverone watched Davis’s face turn white as a sheet as he heard about the Suzanne Harris interview, and how Teverone ordered the two agents to deal with her.

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“Why didn’t you tell me about this?” Davis asked. “There hasn’t been time.” Teverone shrugged. “Things are moving so quickly and I haven’t had a chance to talk to you until now.” “A reporter has a tape of you talking to Quintara about overthrowing the government . . . and Cushman is about to walk into Livingstone’s bedroom and twist his arm to resign?” Davis asked rhetorically. “Do you have any idea what will happen if she already sent a copy of that tape to her newspaper?” “I doubt that she did it,” Teverone said nervously. “We’ve got to salvage this thing,” Davis suggested. “We need to get control of this thing. I’ll take care of it. Why don’t you take a walk and clear your head. I’m going back to the White House to wait for the nine agents. They should be there by now.”

October 29 9:20 P.M. Eastern Time

D

AVI D Abackern was part of John Jefferson Davis’s

Lucky Thirteen, but he wasn’t feeling very lucky. He had been told to “hurry up and wait,” but as of yet, Davis hadn’t given him any specific orders. The stakes were high, unimaginably high, in this peculiar corkscrew of a mission with the peculiar Dutch name. He had agreed to go along partly for the money and partly for the thrill. If all went well tonight, he’d still have his job tomorrow and he’d be a lot richer for having played a part in the game of the century. If things did not go well, that was a very big problem, and a problem that was starting to weigh heavily on his mind.

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Abackern waited in his car on F Street, close enough to double back to the White House, but not close enough to be noticed by people who would be coming and going there tonight. His cell phone hummed. It was Davis. “We have a problem,” the voice with the Beaumont brogue explained urgently. “Mark has fucked up. He’s taking a walk. He shouldn’t speak with anyone and he shouldn’t show up back at the White House.” “Where is he now?” “I just left him near the square . . . headed toward G Street near Fourteenth.” “I’m very close,” Abackern said. “I’ll take care of it.”

October 29 9:52 P.M. Eastern Time

“

I

T’S Vice President . . . I mean Acting President Cush-

man,” Walter Meril said, rapping on the door to the president’s bedroom. Steve Faralaco stood as Warner Cushman pushed past the Secret Service agent and barged into the room. Tom Livingstone remained seated. “You’re up and about I see,” Cushman said, glowering at Livingstone. “I’ve been feeling much better since we discovered that Iconiche was overprescribing the meds,” Livingstone said sternly. “Was he?” Cushman asked. “That’s too bad. Glad you’re better. Listen, we have to take the bull by the horns here and deal with our race against Darmader. Five days ago, we discussed this and you refused to accept the idea

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that you’re in no shape to face Darmader in the election. The polls are showing that the people don’t like the uncertainty. They’re back and forth between me and Darmader, but they don’t want you. They’re ninety percent on sympathy for you because of Joyce . . . and all the trouble you’ve had . . . but they don’t want you as president anymore. You’ve got to stop stalling and resign . . . now.” “Now?” Livingstone asked, rising from his chair. “Now,” Cushman insisted. “Tonight. The people will it and the party demands it. You have no choice. If we’re going to win in November, I’ve got to head the ticket . . . sooner rather than later. I’ve got the resignation documents with me. You can sign them tonight, take a load off your mind and—” “But what about our differences, Warner?” Livingstone interrupted. “The newshounds have been making a big story of our differences over the past few days . . . especially our apparent disagreement over the role of the United Nations in guiding our international policy.” “Bygones are bygones as far as I’m concerned,” Cushman said, taken aback by Livingstone’s apparent lucidity. “We’re both patriotic Americans. You signed the International Validation Treaty, and I supported you. Well, I supported International Validation before you did, but that’s that. The United States is part of the world community and that’s a good thing. The more that we can be part of that, the more stability there’ll be in this world of ours . . .” “You’re sounding like one of your own speeches, Warner,” Livingstone said. “Save that crap for the campaign stump . . . or for your friends at the world body.” “My friends . . . ?” “Yes, your friends. You seem to have been getting awfully close to the United Nations recently.”

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“What exactly . . . ?” “Let me play you a tape, Warner,” Livingstone said as Steve Faralaco handed him a small recorder. Cushman stood in slack-jawed bewilderment as he heard his chief of staff discussing the secretary general’s having financed the elimination of Livingstone as president and how the Cushman administration would bring the United States “into alignment with the secretary general’s vision of global unity.” “Cushman is ready, even anxious to take over as soon as we can evict Livingstone,” Teverone explained on the squeaky but easily audible recording. “Now that our people overseas no longer have Joyce Livingstone in a cage, he is ready to take over sooner rather than later.” “Joyce Livingstone in a cage?” Livingstone said, quoting Teverone. His face had turned beet red with anger. “Our people? Who are our people?” “It’s not what it seems,” Cushman stammered. “It seems like your people kidnapped my wife,” Livingstone screamed. “It seems like you and your people are trying to stage a goddam coup. Steve figured out that Iconiche was doping me and got me off the stuff. Who else is mixed up in this thing?” Walter Meril had entered the room, having heard Livingstone shouting. “Mr. President . . .” Meril said. Both Cushman and Livingstone turned to look at him. “Walter, he’s delusional,” Cushman said. “He’s off his meds . . . call Dr. Iconiche.” “Agent Meril, there’s a coup d’état in progress,” Steve Faralaco said. “You should know that the vice president . . .” “Take Faralaco into custody, dammit,” Cushman shouted.

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It was like a scene from one of those silly confusedidentity movies, but far more serious. “Davis said you’d be here to back me up,” Cushman said, turning to Meril. “Take Faralaco into custody and help me get the resignation signed.” “Et tu, Walter?” Livingstone asked incredulously, quoting the line from Shakespeare where Julius Caesar faced his unexpected betrayer. “Are you part of this? You’ve been with me for years. Are you now involved in this attempt to overthrow the government?” “I’m sorry, Mr. President,” Meril said. “It was for the best of the country that Mr. Cushman take over . . .” “This is a crime,” Faralaco interjected. “It’s a capital crime. Don’t you realize that agents of your own service died protecting Joyce. You’ve got their blood on your hands . . .” “It wasn’t supposed to have gone like that,” Meril said remorsefully. “That’s all you have to say when it goes so horribly wrong?” Livingstone said. “I cannot even grasp what could have made a man like you . . .” “Arrest Faralaco. Shoot him,” Cushman ordered. “We’ve got to get this thing done. We’ve got to get these papers signed!” “It’s not going to happen Mr. Cushman,” Meril said. “I can’t arrest Mr. Faralaco for intervening in a coup, and I’m sure as hell not going to shoot him. There’s not going to be any transition here tonight. Not with that tape. Not with President Livingstone knowing what he knows.” “What then?” Cushman demanded. “We can walk out of here,” Meril said, thinking on his feet. “We can get out to Andrews Air Force Base. You’re

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still the vice president. We can drive right onto the base. They always have a VC-32 fueled and on standby out there. We can get on the plane and be outside United States airspace forty-five minutes from right now. We can get to the Bahamas. Any place but here. You’ll have time to sort this out, to assess your options.” “Okay,” Cushman said, realizing that his options were rapidly diminishing. “Get their cell phones and rip the landline out of the wall.”

October 29 9:59 P.M. Eastern Time

A

S Walter Meril was realizing that Kurketrekker was at the end of its spiral, his brother agents Frank McLaury and William Clanton were driving westward on a mainly deserted Virginia country road. It was horse country, a world of rolling hills, whitewashed fences and long distances between houses. It was also safe house country. Among these widely separated colonial revival homes were the discreet safe houses managed by America’s intelligence services. The FBI used to break Soviet spies out here. The CIA was here as well, and the NSA and the DEA, and of course, the Secret Service. McLaury and Clanton had a familiar venue in mind. When Davis and Teverone had recruited their Lucky Thirteen, they had done so in order to have an adequate team on hand to deal with any contingency. A reporter with too much inside information was clearly such a contingency. “What’s that?” McLaury said as Clanton steered the Lincoln around a tight curve into a long straight stretch. “Who’s that?” Clanton answered.

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It was a woman in a long coat in the middle of the road, walking toward them waving her arms. Clanton slowed to a stop, framing her in the headlights. Cautiously, McLaury stepped out and approached her. “You’ve got to help me,” she said in frightened tone. “There was a deer. I swerved to miss her . . .” “It’s okay, ma’am,” McLaury said. “Where’s your car?” The woman just gestured down the long straight section ahead. The agent squinted into the darkness. He saw a flicker of movement and a large object. At first he thought it was a car driving onto the road from the ditch, but it was too smooth and too quiet. As the object moved onto the road, he heard the muffled whish-whish-whish-whish of nearly silent rotor blades and beheld, bathed in the headlights, the distinctive profile of an MH-6 Little Bird special operations helicopter piloted by Greg Boyinson. It was equipped with a forward-looking infrared turret, a pair of launch tubes for AGM-114 Hellfire missiles and a pair of M134 7.62-millimeter, six-barrel, Gatling-type twin machine guns. Instinctively, McLaury reached for his sidearm, but before he could, he felt a muzzle pressed into the base of his skull. “Don’t do it,” Anne McCaine told him. “Get out, spread your hands and get on the ground.” At the sight of the chopper, Clanton popped the Lincoln into reverse and floored the accelerator. There was a clicking sound, a slight jolt, the squealing of tires, and the smell of burning rubber. The car barely moved. The agent looked in the mirror. While he was distracted, another car had literally parked itself on his rear bumper. There was a tapping on the window. Clanton looked. A large man with an auburn mustache was pointing a gun at

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his head. Clanton quickly calculated the time and motion required to duck, grab his gun, and nail the guy. The windows of the Secret Service car were theoretically bulletproof, but at this range and depending on the caliber of the guy’s weapon, he wasn’t so sure. “Think 7.62-millimeter armor-piercing,” the man shouted through the theoretically bulletproof glass, nodding toward the chopper and anticipating Clanton’s next move. “Think two thousand or so rounds per minute.” Clanton didn’t have to think long. At this range, with a few seconds of attention from the M134, Clanton’s body would have to be recovered with Handi Wipes. As he climbed out of the car with his hands on his head, the big man with the gun reached down to remove the gun Clanton had strapped to his ankle and pop the trunk. Dammit, he thought. He had momentarily forgotten the woman back there. They never would have hosed him with the machine guns with her there. Suzanne Harris had felt the light clunk as Jack Rodgers drove his car into the bumper of the Lincoln, and was terrified by the jolting, tire-squealing, rubber-burning attempt by Clanton to escape. In the darkness of the trunk, the sounds were near and frightening. What would happen to her next? Suddenly, the trunk lid flew up and she saw Jack staring down at her, his face bathed in the ruby glow of the Lincoln’s taillights. “You reporters will do anything for a story,” he said as he rolled her over to pull the duct tape off her wrists. “What you’ve put me through over this past week . . .” she scolded. “You asked for it,” he said as he freed her ankles and she pulled the remnants of tape from her mouth and chin.

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Indeed, she had. From that first morning in Ostend when she told him that she wasn’t going to let him walk away, she had, indeed, asked for it. Even if she had known then what she would be going through, she probably would have done it again. At least she would know that this man with the scruffy salt-and-pepper beard always seemed to be there to save her life—it was up to three times and counting now. He was the most unlikely guardian angel in the world, but he was hers.

October 29 9:59 P.M. Eastern Time

R

OD Llewellan exhaled, slowly took his finger of the trigger of his Glock, and opened the closet door. “I never would have believed it,” President Thomas Livingstone said, shaking his head. “You didn’t when we told you,” Llewellan said, holstering his weapon. “But Meril? He’s been with me, right next to me, for all this time . . .” “He’s the thirteenth of the Lucky Thirteen that Teverone talks about on the tape,” Faralaco said grimly. “Well, I’d love to chat with you guys, but I have a car to follow,” Llewellan said as he hurried out of the presidential bedroom. He had been prepared to shoot the Secret Service agent to protect the president. How ironic was that? To shoot a Secret Service guy to protect the president. What a turned around, screwed up world it was. Maybe that’s why they used the word Kurketrekker?

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Cushman and Meril raced toward the West Wing, planning to use this exit rather than the North Portico because it opened out into the parking lot. They reached the door, which Meril instinctively reached ahead to hold open for the vice president. Suddenly Cushman stopped in his tracks. “What’s wrong?” Meril asked. “I just thought of something that I forgot.” “What’s that?” “The football . . .” “What?” “I ordered Major . . . what’s-his-name . . . the Army guy . . . to stand by in my office when I went up to see Livingstone. Let’s get him. You were talking about options. The football will give us plenty of options.” “You can’t be serious,” Meril said. “This damned corkscrew is unwinding,” Cushman said as he turned and walked toward his office. “You said as much yourself. If I’m running out of options, I need to add some more to my column. I think that a bagful of nuclear go-codes would be a useful option, don’t you?”

October 29 9:59 P.M. Eastern Time

M

ARK Teverone walked eastward on F Street. He

wasn’t sure exactly where he was going, he just knew instinctively that he needed to put some distance between himself and the White House. There was nothing to go back for. His career was over. Everything had fallen apart. He didn’t even have anything in his office that mattered. Everything of real value was on his laptop and he

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had thought to grab that when he and Davis had left the White House. His instinct again. It had made him one of the most powerful men in Washington, and it had saved his ass a thousand times. Had it also told him that he might not be going back tonight? He wondered what was happening back there, what was happening with Cushman. Should he go back and be there for his boss? Was he a coward for succumbing to the urge to just get away—or was self-preservation his overriding need tonight? Who else had that reporter’s tape? Would McLaury and Clanton actually kill her? What would happen when all of this came out? How long would it take? What would happen to Cushman? What would happen as the roof came crashing down? How long would Teverone have to distance himself from Cushman and the White House before the roof came crashing down? With every step, Teverone was getting farther away from the White House and feeling more like a fugitive in this city where he had been a major power broker for more than two decades. Everywhere he looked was an office building where he’d maneuvered or manipulated massive deals. Those days were now over, or would be very soon. For years, he had glided through these streets in an airconditioned limousine. Tonight, he walked in the cold, late October wind, with only his suit jacket to keep him warm. It was almost humorous how cold you can be in a thousanddollar suit. He passed Tenth Street and glanced down the block toward Ford’s Theatre. It was ironic on a night like this, he thought, to be this close to the venue that was the centerpiece of the 1865 conspiracy to topple an American government. Booth had succeeded in killing the president, but

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the parallel efforts to assassinate the vice president and the secretary of state had failed, dooming that scheme to decapitate the U.S. government. Would the one scheduled for tonight be doomed as well? Would Cushman succeed in wresting a resignation from Livingstone only to face an investigation and impeachment? Teverone decided that he needed a plan. He thought about going back and grabbing the Impala, but the girl who owned it was off today, and beside that, he had already decided not to go back. Where could he go? The answer was that he could go anywhere. As with most high-powered political operatives in Washington, he had access to bank accounts that could never be traced. He realized that every step he had taken since leaving the White House had brought him a step closer to Union Station. Trains were leaving from there nearly all night long. He could be in New York before sunrise, check into his favorite little hotel over on Lexington—or, he could head down to Atlanta. He had choices. He had options. Mark Teverone had a plan, and his step quickened.

October 29 10:09 P.M. Eastern Time

L

I KE Mark Teverone, Brooke Larderie was walking the streets tonight, lost in thought, and feeling cold and alone. Yesterday, she had been one of Washington’s hot young political stars riding an express elevator to the top. She was smarter and better looking than average, and used both to her advantage. She was using the Darmader campaign to build a reputation that would take her eventually to the top job in a congressional campaign, and after that, who

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knows? Every four years there are at least a dozen people betting serious money that they’ll be the next president. Like Mark Teverone, Brooke Larderie had reached a fork in the road. Her old life was suddenly gone. Underwood had taught her to play the ruthless game of politics with brutality, then he had brutally hung her out to dry— and to face federal charges. If she beat the rap, as she probably would, how far down would she have to descend in order to restart her career? Was that even an option? A blast of cold wind hit her as she cut across the corner at Judiciary Square and she glanced up. Where could she walk that it wasn’t so damned windy? Then she saw him, and the sight of him hit her with an icy coldness that rivaled that of the wind. David Abackern was practically within shouting distance, walking quickly eastward on E Street. He hadn’t seen her. Was he headed for the Metro’s Red Line or just walking? Abackern passed the entrance to the Metro and kept going. She wanted to scream out angrily—something like “Damn you, Abackern . . . you got your way!”—but she didn’t. He seemed purposeful and engrossed. Was he following someone? Brooke decided to find out, so she followed him. As they neared the center of Judiciary Square, she could see that he was in pursuit of a man in a suit. It looked like Mark Teverone. Could that be? For the old Brooke, for the old Brooke who was absorbed entirely within the Justin Underwood organization, Teverone had represented the archenemy, the chief of staff to a political rival. He had the job most coveted by Justin Underwood, the job that Underwood expected to have if— or when—Wilson Darmader raised his right hand on January 20 next. Brooke suddenly realized that Underwood’s enemy was

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no longer her enemy. Who better to approach on the rebound than Justin Underwood’s archenemy? “Mr. Teverone,” she would say. “I have information from deep inside the world of Justin Underwood. You’d like access to that? How about a job? How much? Keep adding zeros.” Brooke Larderie no longer felt so cold. She walked more quickly, wondering why Abackern would be following Teverone. She’d let Abackern have his say and then she’d approach Teverone. Abackern overtook Teverone and put his hand on the startled man’s shoulder. There was a moment of recognition, and then they turned into the square. They stopped near a statue of a woman with a deer and began arguing. Shielding herself with some short trees, Brooke approached them as closely as she dared. She was trying to make out what they were saying when Teverone abruptly slumped to the ground. He didn’t so much as fall, he just sank. Abackern looked around, then bent down, picked up Teverone’s laptop and hurried away. She ran to Teverone’s side and knelt down. He didn’t seem to be breathing. Somewhere above her, Brooke heard a whish-whish-whish-whish sound. She looked up. With the glare of the street lights, it was hard to see.

October 29 10:13 P.M. Eastern Time

W

I LL Casey took careful aim. One shot, one kill.

Greg Boyinson held the Little Bird steady in the night sky over the nation’s capital as Casey carefully followed his target through his eight-power infrared sniper scope.

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Casey held his breath and Boyinson gripped the stick a trifle more tightly. Rod Llewellan had vectored them in the direction of Judiciary Square after Steve Faralaco had observed Mark Teverone leaving the West Wing and walking eastward. He had not been hard to follow. Landing the MH-6 Little Bird on the broad lawn in the hills above Brewster’s Knob, Greg Boyinson had extracted the Raptors from outside the Castle just nine minutes after Brannan tossed the first stun grenade. Down below, they had watched a set of flashing red-and-blue lights about a mile away and coming fast. Somebody had phoned in the sound of automatic weapons fire up at the Castle. As they crossed into Virginia, Boyinson took the chopper up to the altitude where its incredibly quiet engine would be inaudible from the ground, but not so high that it would appear on FAA radar. With his night vision goggles, he wasn’t worried about power lines or transmission towers. When he crossed the Beltway and dashed toward Washington, he was careful to avoid the aircraft exclusion zone near the Capitol and the White House. Nobody monitoring the zone tonight had any idea that this one little helicopter was one of the few things that stood between the president of the United States and a coup d’état. The man that some people claimed was the best sniper ever to serve with American Special Forces squeezed the trigger and grabbed the bolt. The bolt action of the Remington M40 was so well lubricated that the sound was like the hiss of compressed air. A split second later, a spent cartridge bounced onto the floor of the MH-6 and Casey squeezed off a second round. One shot, one kill. The second explosive round pulverized the hard drive within Mark Teverone’s laptop. Being explosive, neither round would be traceable. No muss, no fuss.

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As Boyinson grabbed the throttle, Casey caught a glimpse through his scope of a blond woman standing near Teverone’s lifeless body straining to see something in the sky.

October 29 10:13 P.M. Eastern Time

A

few blocks from where Mark Teverone and his laptop had breathed their last, John Jefferson Davis tuned his car radio to WTWP news radio. They were playing a bulletin. West Virginia police had been called to the scene of a shoot-out. Details were still sketchy. There would be more at the bottom of the hour—or the hour after that. The weather? Unsettled. The walls would soon be closing in. Davis hoped that Abackern had a plan. He hoped that Cushman did as well. As for John Jefferson Davis, he always had a plan. The Beaumont boy casually reached into the glove compartment and pulled out a cluster of auto club roadmaps held together by rubber bands.

October 29 10:38 P.M. Eastern Time

“

W

HY are we stopping?” Warner Cushman asked nervously. “Where are we? Is this a good area?” The acting president had breathed easier when they had quietly and effortlessly exited the West Wing parking area. The guard was extremely familiar with everyone in the car, and he simply nodded and waved them through. He had no

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idea that momentous events of staggering scale were in motion here tonight. Almost nobody did. Cushman and the major with the football sat in the large rear seat, while Walter Meril drove, heading out South Capitol and crossing the Anacostia Bridge. Cushman assumed that they would simply hop on the Suitland Parkway for the easy drive out to Andrews AFB. He had been driven on the route a thousand times, so he didn’t give it a second thought. Instead, he allowed himself to lean back and close his eyes. It had been a very long day—and it was not yet over. Now, Meril had stopped and Cushman didn’t know where in the hell they were. He rolled down the heavily tinted window and looked out. It was a tree-lined street somewhere in the suburbs. Again, he asked Meril why they had stopped. “I’m sorry, sir,” Meril said, turning around to face the rear seat. “I’m afraid we aren’t going to be going to Andrews. We won’t be going to the Bahamas either.” Through the open window, they heard the sound of a car door slamming. Cushman jerked his head around to see who it was. “Hello, Warner,” the man said. He was limping badly and using a cane, but his voice was strong and direct. At first, Cushman didn’t recognize the man, but as his face came out of the shadows into the dim glow of the dashboard lights, he saw General Buckley Peighton. He had only met the general a time or two, but once you meet Buck Peighton, you don’t forget him. With him, Cushman recognized Special Agent Rod Llewellan of the FBI, another man whom he’d seen around and knew by reputation. “At ease, soldier,” Peighton said, looking past Cushman to the Army major with the football. The man had also

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recognized Peighton, and his first instinct had been to snap to attention. Long after leaving the service, Peighton was still a man who received almost universal respect and admiration from those in his former service. “General, I’m the acting president of the United States and I’m ordering you to stand down and watch us drive away,” Cushman told Peighton, trying to project forcefulness despite a slight nervous quavering in his voice. “Meril, I’m ordering you to keep driving. Get me the hell out of here.” “Bullshit, Warner,” Peighton said, calmly leaning against the car door. “I’m not in uniform. You do not order me to do anything. In fact, we’re just a couple of old acquaintances meeting in the woods. As you have probably figured out, a number of people have figured out about your corkscrew, and it’s time to wind it up. You can see by my leg that I’ve got a personal interest in seeing that happen. The next thing you’re going to do is—” “You do not dictate to me . . .” Cushman interrupted. “You have run out of choices, Warner,” Peighton scolded. “You will do what you’re told. Agent Llewellan and I will get back in our car and we’ll escort this vehicle back to the White House. Am I making myself clear?” “Major, I know that your orders are to guard that damned thing with your life,” Peighton said, turning to the officer with the football. I’m asking that you do not deviate from those orders tonight. Do not relinquish that object to anyone unless and until you are absolutely certain in your own mind of who’s your commander in chief. As you’ve probably ascertained, this man who was hoping to make a break for an offshore island tonight is not your commander in chief.”

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“Yes, sir,” the major replied. “Meril,” Cushman said, turning back to the Secret Service agent. “Do something.” “No, sir,” Meril said. “I can’t go along with this anymore. Nether can you. When I saw those Secret Service guys go down in Brussels, and when I learned that you guys were doping President Livingstone, I knew I couldn’t . . .” “This will be the end of the line for you too.” “My career is already over,” Meril said sadly. “For twenty-seven years, I was a straight arrow, never deviating from the damned strait and narrow. Then I made a really bad decision that I’ll always regret. I know that my career is over, but at least for the next half hour I can make up for it by doing the right thing again.”

October 29 11:52 P.M. Eastern Time

F

OR Warner Cushman, it was both very strange and

very familiar to walk through the West Wing. It was both very strange and very familiar to be walking toward the door to the Oval Office again. Cushman had come and gone into this room countless times over the past four years, first as vice president, then as acting president, and finally as the man who truly believed that he was finally just moments away from becoming the president of the United States. He had sat behind the big desk as acting president, and he fully expected that he would greet the opening of this very business day sitting behind it as president. Rod Llewellan opened the door for Cushman and let

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him enter the room alone. The sight of the person sitting behind the big desk this morning gave him a jolt. “Joyce . . . Mrs. Livingstone,” Cushman stammered. “It’s good to see you.” “What a goddam duplicitous lie, Warner,” the first lady said, clinching her fists. “You are the vilest, most twofaced person on this earth. I got clobbered by terrorists and went through hell in a Belgian nuthouse because of your idiotic lust for power . . . and you have the shameless audacity to come in here and say that it’s good to see me.” “Listen, Mrs. Livingstone, I can explain,” Cushman said, approaching the big desk. “May I sit down?” “No, you may not. Don’t get too comfortable. Explain standing up.” “Okay, it’s like this . . . first of all, nobody was supposed to get hurt . . . just a little sedation and a smooth transfer of power.” “Why?” Joyce demanded angrily, tears beginning to well up in her eyes. “Because the United States has become isolated in the world,” Cushman said nervously. The sight of crying women greatly unnerved him. “We needed a change. People all over the world distrust us. We need to become an integrated, seamless part of the world community.” “What do you suppose those people out there are going to think of this little stunt of yours?” the first lady asked. “Well, I . . .” “Well? You’re really showing the world what America is all about with this little caper of yours. Did you and your little coconspirators ever think about what the people in this country think about you killing and kidnapping people to remake the their country according to what Baudouin Mboma thinks we should be?”

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“Mboma? How did you . . . ?” Cushman asked nervously. “How did I know that Mboma financed your little corkscrew?” Joyce asked, wiping away her tears. “Well, I learned a lot of things as your ‘guest’ over there in Belgium. How will the world know that Mboma was involved? As you’ll learn very soon, a tape of your chief of staff discussing this very subject is being listened to in newsrooms all over the world at this moment.” “Sometimes the ends are justified by the means,” Cushman said, trying to regain his composure. “What about these ends,” Joyce said angrily, holding up her wrist, which still bore a dark purple bruise. Tears were flowing down her cheeks. “Is that the closest thing to an apology that I’m going to get from you . . . that ends are justified by means? You are a mean monster, Warner Cushman.” “I’m sorry, Mrs. Livingstone. I’m really sorry that you were injured, but it was a cause that I felt was justified.” “You’re mad!” Joyce said, her voice cracking. “It’s a goal worth pursuing, and I will. You know, I’m still the acting president.” “Actually you’re not.” Cushman wheeled around at the sound of the voice. It was Jon Muhlenberg, the Speaker of the House of Representatives. Richard Langdon, the president pro tem of the Senate, was with him, and so was Thomas Livingstone. They were followed into the room by Rod Llewellan and another FBI agent. “We executed the paperwork while you were out of the building,” Livingstone told Cushman. “I’ve resumed the presidency under the Twenty-fifth Amendment. You’re the vice president again.” “We’ve also drafted your letter of resignation as vice

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president,” Langdon explained. “That would make you private citizen Warner Cushman, and subject to arrest.” “Thank you for doing this,” Muhlenberg said to Joyce as Livingstone tearfully embraced the first lady. “I know that it was rough to have to face him alone, but we all had to hear him for ourselves.” “No,” Joyce said, still clinging to her husband. “Thank you. I wanted to face him. I needed to look him in the eye. There are other victims of this lunacy who didn’t get the chance to face the people who did these things. I still can’t get the thought of those poor guys in Belgium out of my mind.” Without saying another word, Cushman angrily scrawled his signature on the resignation and handed it to Muhlenberg. “Well, it’s time for us to get back up to the Hill,” Langdon smiled as the two men from the legislative branch shook hands with Livingstone and the first lady, and as Llewellan and the other agent escorted Cushman out of the room. “This is the beginning of a very long day.” “Well, I guess we’re back on the campaign trail,” Joyce said after the first couple had taken a few quiet minutes of alone time to get reacquainted. The last time that she and Tom had been alone in the Oval Office it had been for a frank discussion of whether he should run for reelection. He knew that she’d had second thoughts, and so had he, but they had decided that if the American people wanted him, it was his duty to serve two terms. There had been a lot of water under the bridge since then. “I suppose,” her husband said. The last thing that he had thought about tonight was the campaign. “I just want you to know,” she said. “That even after everything that has gone down, I’ll still support you doing

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this. I guess I feel more strongly than ever that you should not be a quitter, that you should not quit because there are bullies in this world. I’m still that girl in the room when you announced for mayor so very long ago. I’m still your number one supporter.” “Thanks, Joyce,” he said, hugging his wife. “I still love that girl in the room from very long ago.” “Who are you going to get to replace Cushman?” Joyce asked at last, changing the subject away from something that was making them both dewy-eyed. “I don’t know,” Livingstone told her. “Buck Peighton has already turned me down.”

TWELVE

October 30 8:57 A.M. Eastern Time

J

AC K Rodgers gave the kid from room service a ten,

gently closed the door, and set the tray of pastries and steaming coffee on the table. He looked down at Suzanne’s smooth, rounded face. The faint traces of peach-colored lipstick made her lips look like rose petals against a snowdrift. Her eyelash flickered and a deep brown eye blinked open. “Bonjour, mon enchanteresse.” He smiled. “Are you ready for some coffee?” After he pulled her from the trunk of the Lincoln, Jack had reunited her with her laptop and driven her to an allnight diner in Alexandria that had a wi-fi connection. He bought her a cup of coffee and told her that it was time for her to go to work. She had asked for it. On the first day they met, she had

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asked for an entree into his world to get the story that would change her career. He told her that he would take her through the curtain into a dark and forbidding place, but that he would allow her to write her story only when that story was over. She asked for it and she had gotten it, but the story had changed her life before she had a chance to write it. He had kept his word and so would she. Powered by a high-octane blend of adrenaline and caffeine, Suzanne’s fingers scampered across the keyboard with blinding speed. She had been composing this story in her head for days, committing blocks of notes to the laptop from time to time so that when this moment came, the story would almost write itself. At last, Suzanne finally spell-checked it one last time, attached the file to an email to Max Schaier, and pushed “send.” She apologized to the managing editor of the San Diego Herald for being hard to reach, but added that this would be worth the wait. Suzanne waited five minutes, then called Schaier’s cell phone. He was still at his desk and he scolded her for being impossible to reach. Then he scolded her for sending in this wild and unthinkable story. He had only read the top two paragraphs, but nobody, he assured her, would believe it. She was fired. She calmly told him to listen to the taped conversation between Teverone and Quintara that she had attached as a digital audio file. After a couple of minutes, she heard him screaming at someone to kill everything on the front page and run her story. She was rehired. Suzanne wriggled herself out of a sleeping position and looked up at the man with the scraggly beard who was pouring her a cup of coffee. He was naked from the waist

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up, and quite an eyeful. She had long concluded that Jack and his gang kept themselves in excellent physical condition, but it was pleasurable to Suzanne to be able to relax and ponder exactly how excellent. “That’s what I call service.” She giggled as she sat up. The sheet fell away from her bare breast and she instinctively reached to pull it back. She too was naked from the waist up—and from the waist down for that matter. The sheet fell again as she took the cup, but this time, she let it go. “You’re going to enjoy the papers this morning.” He smiled, holding up copies of the Washington Post and USA Today that had been left outside the hotel room door. The headlines read “Cushman, Aides Planned Coup,” “Acting President Involved in Abortive Coup.” A subhead on one of the papers mentioned that a United Nations official was involved. “This should be especially gratifying,” Jack said, pointing to a line in the lead paragraph where in said that the story was broken by Suzanne Harris of the San Diego Herald. “I don’t know how to thank you for making this possible,” Suzanne said, reaching up and grasping her hands behind his neck. “And for saving my life time and again like a white knight.” “I think you already have,” he said, effortlessly lifting her body out of the bed and kissing her on the lips. “As I’ve told you, it benefits everyone to have the real story and the whole story aired in the broad daylight.” “When you said I already had, I thought you were talking about last night,” she said, wrapping her legs around the small of his back. “Oh, yeah, that too.” He laughed as they tumbled onto the bed.

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October 30 2:57 P.M. Central European Time

A

C ROSS the world in Belgium, Leo Verstegen had al-

ready decided that the tide of events, like the tides that came and went on the North Sea, required a change of direction. Like the captain of a small boat on a large and unpredictable sea, Verstegen knew from experience that all weather was unsettled, and sniffing out the changes was always the difference between success and failure—and often between life and death. Using the small inexpensive cell phone that he had just purchased, the cunning old Belgian dialed the Paris number for the International Herald Tribune and waited for the recorded message. He pushed the numbers of a three-digit extension and a man answered. “Laat me u een verhaal vertellen,” he said, promising to tell the man a story. The White Rhino knew that the best way to stay ahead of the curve was to control the flow of information. He may have met his match in the field this time, but there were other fields ahead and controlling the spin was always an essential part of moving forward. “Het is het verhaal van een Kurketrekker . . .”

October 30 10:23 A.M. Eastern Time

T

WO miles north of the hotel room registered to

Suzanne Harris, Dr. Joseph Iconiche was at home, reading the same papers and not feeling like laughing. In fact, the doctor was becoming quite ill the more he read. The headlines screamed of Cushman having been caught

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in a coup d’état. His chief of staff had been found shot to death in Judiciary Square. There was a witness, a woman who had worked for the Darmader campaign. The police were grilling her as a possible conspirator. Anyone left alive at the scene was a suspect. There was a piece on the op-ed page about President Livingstone’s medical condition and his apparent recovery. It was only a matter of time before Steve Faralaco was interviewed. It would probably be in the afternoon papers. What could he do? There would be questions. Both of the medications that he had prescribed were legal, but there would be questions about dosage and the side effects of taking them as a cocktail. It would be hard for them to prove that the dosage was out of bounds, but there would be lots of questions, and no good answers. Iconiche popped open a vial of pentobarbital with his own name listed in the patient’s line on the label. He placed two tablets on his tongue, took a sip of club soda and leaned back in his chair. As a Schedule II drug, pentobarbital is in limited distribution and carefully monitored by the DEA in the United States, but in France, it is still used to treat insomnia. Iconiche always took two when he needed to take the edge off his hypertension. He yawned and reached for the television remote. He cringed as the picture came on. It was his worst nightmare, or at least one of them. It was Faralaco. He was talking about Teverone. They asked him about Cushman. On and on. At last, there came a question about the president’s health. Iconiche heard him say the word “overprescribe” and he turned off the television. He reached for the vial and took four tabs. He washed them down with the club soda and took four more. No good answers. He closed his eyelids. They felt so heavy. Was it

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exhaustion or pentobarbital? Probably exhaustion. Faralaco was probably still being interviewed. The phone would start ringing in five minutes. What would he say? Anyone left alive at the scene was a suspect. He reached for the vial again and poured a small pile of pills into his hand.

October 30 10:48 A.M. Eastern Time

T

H E West Wing was in chaos. Cushman staffers came to work unsure whether they still had a job, or whether they’d be arrested. Livingstone staffers came to work excited that the president was back, and generally none the worse for wear. The press room was a circus. Every media outfit with a Washington bureau—and a lot who flew stringers in from somewhere else—were clamoring for an interview. They didn’t care who they interviewed, they just wanted sound bites. Steve Faralaco was high on the A list of people that everybody seemed to want to interview. He actually had something to say. He seemed to know more than most. He gave all the cable news channels their five minutes, and sat down for a longer session with the New York Times. Finally, he told the Des Moines Register that enough was enough and begged off. He had noticed that among the people who had pushed their way into the West Wing madhouse on this historic morning was Jenny Collingwood. “It’s good to see you,” he said, squeezing her hand. He meant it. “What brings you into the maelstrom?”

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“I had some briefing papers to drop off,” she lied with a broad smile. “Listen, I’ve been up most of the night, and nobody will complain if I duck out of here,” he said, returning the smile. “What do you say we grab some lunch?” “I’d love to.” She smiled. “What do you say that we take the rest of the day off?” he asked. “We’ve got an election in less than two weeks. Tomorrow I’ll be back to twenty-two-hour days. Let’s go over to my apartment in Alexandria and pull the shades. I have some furniture over there that’s a lot more comfortable than the backseat of the Audi.” “Will you be wearing that necktie, Mr. Faralaco?” “Yes, I suppose”—he said, caught slightly off guard. “But I also have a lot more at the apartment to choose from.” “That information”—she smiled, taking off her glasses and putting them in her purse—“sounds like intelligence that’s both intelligent and actionable, especially actionable.”

October 30 10:48 A.M. Eastern Time

S

UZANNE headed for the shower as Jack turned on the television. She paused as pictures came on showing Speaker Muhlenberg briefing reporters on the Capitol steps about Warner Cushman’s confession. That story ended and the news channel flashed a picture of a smiling young woman. It was the San Diego Herald stock headshot of Suzanne Harris. Suzanne barely recognized herself, and she barely heard the newsreader explaining how the story

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behind the first abortive coup in the United States since 1865 had been broken by the young woman from California. “I better see if anyone has called,” Suzanne said, reaching for her cell phone. “I’ll bet your guy Schaier has called to thank you for doubling his circulation,” Jack said. “Oh my God!” Suzanne said as she scrolled through her message list. “He’s called four times, but there are about two dozen other calls.” She jumped as the no-longer-dormant cell phone suddenly rang. “This is Suzanne Harris.” “This is Paul Gaunacis, I’m a producer at CNN. We’d like to get you on the air to talk about this. Are you still in Washington? How soon can you be in our Washington studios?” “I can probably be there within an hour or so. I’ll call you back in five minutes as soon as I’ve checked my schedule.” “It sounds like you’ve got a busy day.” Jack smiled, climbing out of the bed and pulling his pants back on. “Are you . . . are you leaving?” Suzanne asked with an expression of concern furrowing her brow. “I’ll drop you over at CNN,” he said. “I mean, is this it? I don’t even know your last name. Will I see you again?” “Sure, I’m reachable. I’d like to see you again, but as you’ve probably figured out, your life changed when the sun came up this morning. You had wanted a story that would change your career and you have it. You’ve become an overnight celebrity. By the end of the day, you’ll be a household word. You, my dear, are headed into the spotlight,

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and you are talking with a guy who has lived his life staying out of the spotlight, and who plans to keep it that way.” “But, there has to be room for . . .” “If that’s what you want, you’ll find a way.” Jack grinned. “I’ve seen you find the way to get what you want, and I don’t plan to make myself hard for you to find . . . as long as you do your looking on the far side of those spotlights that you’re about to enjoy.” “I hope you’ll let that happen,” Suzanne said, embracing him. “You’ve been my guardian angel these past days and I don’t want to have you—” Her cell phone suddenly peeped again, catching her in midsentence. “This is Suzanne Harris,” she said, making it obvious that she was perturbed to be interrupted. Oh, the frustrations of fame, Jack chuckled to himself. “Miss Harris, this is Joyce Livingstone, am I catching you at a bad time?” “Oh no, ma’am,” Suzanne said nervously. “I was just . . .” “I realize that you’re probably exhausted. Believe me, it’s you and me both. I just got up myself.” “I totally understand, I was running on adrenaline last night when I wrote my story . . . and I just crashed.” “I see on the news that you’ve become quite the public figure,” Joyce said. “I don’t know exactly what to think . . .” “Welcome to the club, Suzanne. Welcome to the club.” Suzanne knew that the first lady understood. Life in a fishbowl. Be careful what you wish for. “Listen, I know you’re probably busy, so let me get to the point of my call,” the first lady explained. “My secretary has been deluged this morning with requests for comments

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and interviews. I’m being absolutely hounded by the media and I don’t feel like telling my story over and over. I think after what we’ve been through together, I’d like to offer you the exclusive interview. Does that interest you?” Suzanne was stunned. It took her a moment to say, “I’d be honored.”

EPILOGUE

October 31 9:22 A.M. Eastern Time

S

EC RETARY General Baudouin Abuja Mboma glanced

out the window of his spacious corner office high in the United Nations Headquarters overlooking First Avenue in New York City. It was a warm autumn day down there, but behind the huge rosewood desk, the most powerful man on earth felt dark and gloomy. He had been watching the talk shows and devouring the morning papers. Yesterday, Warner Cushman had gone down in spectacular fashion, and that had consumed the media for twentyfour hours. Today, news items around the fringes of the “Big Story” were starting to pop up with some prominence. The health of the president disappeared from the op-ed pages. Now, the opinionated set was starting to ask questions about the United Nations. The conservative talk

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shows were starting to talk about Cushman’s internationalism. For Mboma, things were getting a little too warm. The intercom hummed. Normally, he demanded that his secretary screen his calls. Today, he wanted to know if anything happened. It was one of his aides. Mboma longed to hear Enrique Quintara’s name mentioned on the intercom, but he sensed that it was not to be. There had been a gunfight in Brewster’s Knob. Ten men were dead. Nobody in the media had connected it to the “Big Story” yet, but it was only a matter of time. “I thought you’d want to see this,” the young man said, entering the room and tuning Mboma’s huge high-definition television to CNN. The breaking news confirmed his fears. The bodies in Brewster’s Knob had been identified. Quintara had been one of them, shot by a Secret Service agent. The other nine deceased were all identified as Secret Service agents. The obvious conclusion being drawn was that they had been killed in a gunfight by confederates of Enrique Quintara. Brave Americans had been gunned down by foreigners— by agents of the United Nations—on American soil! Mboma cringed, longing to be able to ask Quintara what really happened down there. Officials were being asked for comments. The nine agents were being called heroes. There should be an investigation, someone said. There should be a fallen hero monument, said someone else. Mboma cringed again. He would have to make a statement. Should he make it or simply issue it? He’d better make it. He had sent a personal note to Livingstone congratulating him on the safe return of his wife, but he knew he should do this one live. There was still time to get ahead

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of the afternoon talk shows. The United Nations will deny and decry. The United Nations celebrates the heroes and denounces Enrique Quintara. The Chilean was a loose cannon at best. Mboma wondered what would happen next. In a day or two, he thought, the American election will creep back onto the front pages. Within a week, the DarmaderLivingstone race will be the “Big Story” once again. In a few weeks, Brewster’s Knob will—hopefully—have migrated to the back pages and the fringe blogs. Just to be on the safe side, Mboma decided to hedge his bets and fly over to Paris for a week or so—just until things blew over. His sumptuous Seventh Arrondissement apartment was, if anything, more comfortable that his one on East Sixty-sixth, and the food was always better in Paris. He could pack tonight and fly out first thing in the morning. Mboma looked out again at the New York skyline and contemplated this strange and violent country, and the world body that sought to control it. Things would get worse before they got better. Mboma knew this, but he also knew that things would get better. He was still the most powerful man in the world, and he would remain— regardless of whether Livingstone or Darmader was in the White House.

October 31 3:22 P.M. Central European Time

L

EO Verstegen finished his glass of Westmalle trappist

ale, left a few euros on the bar at the Blauwe Lantaarn, and stepped outside. The slap of the cold, clean breeze blowing in from the North Sea was refreshing, but in the

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distance, cumulus clouds were building up. Soon the fury of another storm would lash the ancient port city. The weather was unsettled. He paused in the doorway to button his coat collar and adjust his hat, then he reached a gloved hand into his pocket and took out his father’s gold pocket watch. The ferry would be departing in fifteen minutes. There would be other fields, but they would be farther afield.

October 31 8:07 P.M. Eastern Time

“

I

’LL have a Chardonnay.” John Jefferson Davis smiled.

He’d spent the night with a very off-the-radar friend near Richmond and had a leisurely day watching the news. Everything he saw told him that he had made the absolutely correct decision to leave the nation’s capital when he did. Cushman was behind bars. Teverone was dead and so were a dozen of the Lucky Thirteen. News reports said two of them were killed in a traffic accident in which there may have been foul play. Abackern was gunned down in Judiciary Square holding the weapon that had killed Teverone. That was definitely foul play, but the FBI had no leads except a Darmader staffer who claimed to have seen it go down. Meril would talk, but he had known less about Kurketrekker than had already been discussed on the news. Davis prided himself on having kept the operation well compartmentalized. He wondered about the White Rhino, but he knew the old Fleming had a robust survival instinct. People were starting to ask questions about the Brewster’s Knob gunfight. With the United Nations connection,

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the conspiracy theorists would soon be having an orgy with it. Meril would sing like a macaw, but Davis had kept everything so compartmentalized that his song would have little substance. Only Teverone knew the whole story, and he was definitely not going to talk. All things considered, John Jefferson Davis was quite pleased with himself. Things would never be the same, but he had gotten away clean—in the nick of time. He would be in big trouble— capital-crime trouble—if he was ever caught, but he would never be caught. Like Verstegen, he had a very well developed survival instinct, not to mention a very well developed escape route. He left Richmond after rush hour to beat the traffic, but he still had plenty of time. As he crossed the North Carolina line, he decided that it was time to wheel into a roadhouse for a quick one. You could always tell how deep you were into the South by the quantity of NASCAR memorabilia on the walls of the bar. It was All Hallow’s Eve, and a jack-o’-lantern with a flickering candle leered at him across the bar. A week ago, the lantern was blue. Tonight, it was orange. So much had happened between those lanterns, but John Jefferson Davis was still in control of his next move, and of which lantern he would follow with the next phase of his life. He would never be caught. There were as many American flags as Confederate flags here in this bar, but plenty of both. Davis had grown up in the Confederacy, taking the Union with a grain of salt. Last night, that Union had dodged another bullet. The last bullet of that sort that the Union had dodged had been at Ford’s Theater in April 1865. That bullet had convulsed three or more generations in the nineteenth century. Tomorrow, the Union would wake up not realizing how really close it came. But John Jefferson Davis would not be there. He

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would be far away and ready to fight again another day— another day of his own choosing. He would never be caught. Davis took a sip of wine and cocked his head. He heard a familiar and pleasing sound. It was a female voice with the tabasco-flavored vowels of that neck of the “Guff” Coast where the Sabine River feeds itself into the “Guff” of Mexico. She was young—not too young in a jailbait sense, but probably too young for him. She had long red hair, a short leather jacket, and jeans that were tight enough to leave nothing about her perfect legs to the imagination. Mostly, he couldn’t take his eyes off the narrow band of bare flesh immediately above her belt buckle. He was trying to ascertain whether she had a pieced navel when she turned. Her eyes met his and she smiled a flirty little smile before turning to accept the mug of copper-colored beer that the man handed across the bar. “I couldn’t help but hear your accent,” Davis said, lifting himself from his bar stool and moving a little closer. “Where are y’all from?” “Down around Lake Charles.” She smiled. “And you?” “Grew up in Beaumont,” Davis nodded, allowing his own Guff accent to fully reveal itself. “Your people in the oil business?” “No, real estate, but that was a very long time ago. Yours?” “Fishing . . . shrimping,” she said, taking a sip of her beer that left a little foamy mustache on her upper lip. “My whole family earned their living out in the Guff.” “What are you doing up this way?” Davis asked, watching as she moved her tongue seductively across her lip to clear off the foam. “Oh, I just came up to hang out with some friends.”

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“Headed back to Lake Charles?” “Yup.” “What’s your name?” “Julia.” She smiled, shaking his hand. “Julia Girod. Yours?” “Davis, John Jefferson Davis,” he said, feeling the sensuousness of her small, narrow, so incredibly female hand, and thinking how sexy, how very sexy, thumb rings are on a woman. In the world where he had lived and worked, there were no women with thumb rings. He would soon be living a new life in a new world. Maybe it would be a world with women who wore thumb rings. “Jeff Davis.” She giggled. “Like the president.” “Yes, my family were from the old school.” “You’re a bit of a rebel then?” “Well, maybe.” Davis shrugged. Well, maybe if the redhead with the thumb rings liked rebels, he’d be one. After all, he was named for the confederate president and last night he’d almost overthrown the president of the United States to install another rebel president. “Speaking of presidents,” she said, continuing the earlier line of discussion. “I saw on the news that like old Tom Livingstone really lucked out up there in Washington this week.” “He was damned lucky,” Davis agreed. “We almost ended up with Warner Cushman as president.” “You sound like you’re sorry that he’s not president,” Julia said suspiciously. “He had his point of view. Livingstone had his.” “But Cushman was part of a conspiracy to overthrow the government,” Julia replied. “Technically, he was part of that same government,” Davis observed.

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“That’s kind of a technicality, dontcha think?” “But it’s true, isn’t it?” Davis said. “If he deliberately subverted the presidency to take over, that’s kinda Machiavellian, isn’t it?” “I’m kinda intrigued to be sitting here discussing politics with an attractive redhead who’s heard of Niccolò Machiavelli.” Davis smiled. “Can I buy you another drink?” “Are you sayin’ that I’m not as dumb as I look?” Julia blushed. “I spent four years at LSU. Sure, I’ll have another beer.” “No, I didn’t mean that at all,” Davis said defensively, not wanting to turn off this woman with the thumb rings. Geez, he had a weakness for women with thumb rings and he was feeling that weakness tonight. He ordered another Chardonnay. “Wasn’t it Machiavelli’s idea that the end justifies the means?” Julia asked, turning toward him on her barstool and tossing her leather jacket across the back rest. “Didn’t his prince use everything he had to keep himself in power?” “That phrase about means and ends sure comes up a lot in politics, doesn’t it?” Davis said somewhat defensively as he tried not to stare at the way her pale green tank top barely covered her fantastic breasts. “I think that what Machiavelli was really getting at was that the prince did what he had to do for the ultimate good of the state.” He couldn’t believe that he was having this kind of conversation with a woman with thumb rings. “So if a prince convinces enough people that what he is doing it for the good of is country, then anything goes?” Julia said, taking a sip of beer and leaning close to make her point. “Well . . .” he said, too distracted by her cleavage to be ready with a fast comeback.

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“By your interpretation, then, Cushman would be justified ’cause he says he did it for the good of the country?” Julia said crossing her legs in a way that served to further distract Davis. “Theoretically.” Davis shrugged. “That’s one way of looking at it.” “What do you think?” Julia asked. “What’s your way of looking at it? Was Cushman justified, even if he would have gained personal power for doing something that he says is good for the country?” “Cushman believed that it was in the best interests of the United States to be part of the world community,” Davis said. “A lot of people think that this would be desirable.” “And a lot of people don’t,” growled a voice from over Davis’s shoulder. “A lot of people, especially in these parts are just not too happy with this world-community bullshit.” Davis looked around. A short, powerfully built man with a dark beard and a Washington Huskies baseball cap dragged his barstool next to his. “Pardon me for bustin’ in on y’all’s conversation,” the man explained. “But I just couldn’t help hearin’ when you started talking about subverting national interest to international interest. How can it fit that Cushman is willing to subvert the sovereignty of his country to the goddam United Nations?” “Well, I suppose that Cushman’s end . . . which justified his means . . . was that the good of the global community trumps the interest of any state,” Davis said, trying to think on his feet. So much for the theory that all the rednecks hanging out in NASCAR bars are stupid. The guy was wrong, but not stupid. “Whose job is it to decide what’s right?” Greg Boyinson asked.

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“In a democracy, it’s the people,” Julia said, answering the big man in the Huskies cap with a flirty smile. “In democracy, the electorate picks the prince equivalent, and he acts on the will of them who elected him, making him a servant of the people . . . which is different from the princes and committee-elected dictators that Machiavelli was used to. Y’know, democracy was not so common in the fifteenth century.” “In the twenty-first century, the common good of the people can be extrapolated to mean the global common good,” Davis insisted. “So could we extrapolate from what you’re saying that the sovereignty of a nation with an elected government should be subverted to an unelected international entity?” Julia asked. It was All Hallow’s Eve, and Davis thought the jack-o’lantern with the flickering candle seemed to be laughing at him. “If it’s for the common good,” Davis asserted. He was noticing that the bar patrons were eavesdropping on their conversation. Disagreements about hot-button subjects like this were often not decided verbally when debated in bars in North Carolina. “I see,” Julia said thoughtfully. “Could I buy you a glass of wine?” “I really should be heading down the road.” “What about a bottle of wine,” Julia asked with a wink. “Sure,” Davis said, looking into her large, sexy eyes. He had interpreted her words as a seductive offer that could not be refused. How could he refuse to share a bottle of wine with a woman with thumb rings? Maybe he was luckier than he thought? “Would you need a corkscrew to open that, or would

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you rather use a Kurketrekker?” Julia said with a wink when the bottle was handed across the bar. An evening in bed with a bottle of wine was not exactly what she had in mind. Davis looked around. The jack-o’-lantern with the flickering candle was still laughing. Where was the guy with the Huskies cap? “How did you get that word?” Davis asked nervously as she took him by the arm, and they started walking toward the door. “Where did y’all get that word?” She smiled. “It is yours, isn’t it? It is your operational code name. Right?” Someone had put a quarter in the jukebox, and Julia smiled and nodded toward it. Merle Haggard was singing: “Runnin’ down the way of life. Our fightin’ men have fought and died to keep . . .” Haggard growled, seeming to be speaking directly to Davis. “Let this song I’m singin’ be a warnin.’ If you’re runnin’ down my country, man, you’re walkin’ on the fightin’ side of me.” “I think old Merle is speaking to you,” she said as they stepped through the door into the night. “Everyone is entitled to his opinion,” Davis said. “Kurketrekker is going a bit too far, though, dontcha think? Runnin’ down our country is one thing, but overthrowing it is another, dontcha think?” The man with the Huskies cap was outside, leaning on Davis’s car. “How could you possibly know about Kurketrekker?” Davis asked. His head was spinning. How could this be happening? “The cat’s kind of out of its bag,” Boyinson said, crack-

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ing his knuckles menacingly in a “walkin’ on the fightin’ side of me” sort of way. “What was all that talk about Machiavelli back in the bar?” Davis said angrily. “You were both just playing me, weren’t you? If you want to try to beat me up, why didn’t you just go ahead and try?” “That’s no fun.” Julia sighed, deliberately making a purring sound. “The cat likes to play with the mouse a little bit. Kitty likes to be a tease . . .” Davis looked back at Boyinson, who put his big, powerful hand on the Secret Service man’s shoulder. “Trick or treat, buster,” Boyinson said. “How’d you like to go for a little helicopter ride? Do you like to swim? Ever try it with two broken arms?”

October 31 8:07 P.M. Eastern Time

T

H E cab wheeled to the curb and halted its uptown

dash at the corner of Madison Avenue and East Sixtysixth Street. The man in the long, well-tailored overcoat and the Burberry scarf held the door for the lady in the sable-trimmed coat and then paid the driver. “You’re looking nice tonight, Colonel.” She smiled, brushing a stray snowflake from his collar. “You’re looking good enough to kiss, Professor,” he said, toying with her delicate silver earring and pecking her teasingly on the wrist. The spot that he chose for this light, but seductive, touch sent a shiver of electricity crackling through her body. He knew it would. It always did. She smiled and took the colonel’s arm as they turned

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eastward on Sixty-sixth. The doorman at the posh high-rise nodded and smiled as the well-dressed couple nodded, smiled, and walked toward the elevator. The JamisonRutledges were having a dinner party tonight. The way this pair was dressed, the doorman was sure they were guests. Their overcoats probably cost as much as he got paid in a month. Actually, they were just stopping by for a quick visit to a very important gentleman who was packing for a trip in the morning. Maybe he wouldn’t be going to Paris as he had planned. He might be going elsewhere. In the background, the doorman’s radio was tuned to Q104.3. As the elevator door opened, Jim Morrison—the self-styled Lizard King, whose death on Rue Beautreillis in Paris in 1971 is still the subject of whispered innuendo—lamented hauntingly from beyond his grave at Père Lachaise: “This is the end, my only friend, the end . . . of our elaborate plans . . . The End!”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Bill Yenne is the well-established author of numerous nonfiction military histories. Publishers Weekly has described his work as “eloquent.” The Wall Street Journal recently called another of his military histories “splendid” and went on to say that he writes with “cinematic vividness.” Gary Sheffield, professor of War Studies at the University of Birmingham in England, wrote that one of his earlier Berkley novels, A Damned Fine War, “succeeds triumphantly. . . . It is an excellent read.” Corkscrew is the third book in his Raptor Force series.