“General Lafferty, sir.”
General Lehman Lafferty, the new chairman of the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Kelly cleared his throat, took a breath, and reached out for the phone. “General, what can I do for you?” he said.
“Edward, we’ve got a little problem,” the chairman answered.
“The world is full of problems, General Lafferty.”
“You think?” The general wasn’t happy. Clearly not in the mood to laugh. “We’ve got a personnel issue we’ve got to deal with.”
Kelly checked the luminescent clock atop his ancient Roman nightstand. “They told me the president would be taken care of within the day.”
“She will be. That isn’t why I called.”
“Unless you believe in instantaneous resurrection, I can’t imagine what you’re so worried about.”
The general snorted. The phone hummed a moment, the military STU-IV secure voice encryption creating a quarter-second delay. “You remember my old friend General Brighton?” he asked.
Kelly had to think. “I’m starting to remember.”
“He worked for President—”
“Yes, yes, I know who you mean.”
Another half a moment of silence. “It appears he might have known more than we thought he did. It appears he might have talked.”
Kelly didn’t move, his white legs hanging over the side of the pillow bed. He studied a few strands of hair protruding from his shins. “Okay, that could be a problem, but hardly, I have to believe, one that would be impossible to overcome.”
“That depends on who he talked to, doesn’t it, Edward.”
Kelly brushed a hand across his face. His mouth was parched and tart from the nightly shot of whiskey and he wanted to spit the dryness out. “Maybe. But anyone he might have talked to is certainly dead.”
“To use your word, maybe. If we’re lucky. But there might be one we didn’t think about.”
“We didn’t think about. You know, Lafferty, I thought that was what we paid your group for. The people over here would be a little disappointed . . .”
“No, no, you can’t pin this one on me. It was never part of my contract to—”
Edward instantly shot back. “Listen, you snot-nosed little whit. Before we made you an offer, you were, what, some nameless three-star general counting tanks and training soldiers while looking forward to selling Amway when you retired to pay for some brat’s tuition there at Harvard. I hardly think, General Lafferty,” he spat out the general’s name, “you need remind me of responsibilities or any sort of financial arrangement that might be in place.”
The STU-IV hummed. The other man cleared his throat, a soft muffle through the line.
Kelly arched his back, feeling angry and impatient. “Look, okay, so Brighton might have suspected . . .”
“He way more than suspected. He was very close.”
“Okay. It doesn’t matter. Say he knew. Say he talked. Whoever it was he talked to, it couldn’t be that hard to take care of them. We killed General Brighton. We’ve killed others. Surely we can kill anyone else he might have talked to.”
The general hesitated before he responded, “What about his wife?”
Kelly didn’t move. “The blonde witch. The goody-two-shoes.”
“Yeah. That’s the one.”
“No freaking way Brighton confided in his wife. He wouldn’t have trusted her.”
“Apparently he did.”
“He wouldn’t do that to her, put her in such danger.”
“He might have if there was no one else to turn to.”
Kelly swished a wad of spit around his mouth. “Is she alive?” he prodded.
“We think so.”
“Have you looked for her?”
“Of course we have.”
“And . . . ?”
“Is it possible you’ve missed the newspapers, Edward?” The general’s voice dripped with deep sarcasm. “Maybe you’ve been busy with French wine and the lovely ladies down in Cannes, but things have been going kind of poorly over here. It’s proving a bit difficult to find her, under the circumstances, don’t you see? We can’t find Washing-freakin-ton D.C., let alone a missing person from the city. So no, we haven’t found her. If we had, she would be dead.”
“Don’t you know anything about her?” Kelly was incredulous now.
“We know she left the city.”
“Alone?”
“No, with her kids.”
Edward’s mind was spinning now. He had an incredible memory, more than photographic, he remembered nearly everything he saw, heard, or read. He wouldn’t have been worth a hundred thousand dollars an hour without extraordinary mental capabilities—and his brain was spinning now, sorting through his cerebral files. “She’s got a son who’s in the Special Forces.”
“He set out to find her. He might be with her too.”
Edward Kelly swore. Rubbing his feet against the leather floor, he thought. “Okay, let’s say that Brighton told her. Assuming you are right and that he knew . . .”
“Let me say it again, Mr. Kelly. He knew. That’s why we killed him.”
“Okay, whatever, let’s say he knew. I’ll even give you that he told her. Who’s she going to tell? Who would possibly believe her? I’m sorry, general, I still don’t see what’s got your shorts in such a wad.”
The general snorted angrily. “What if I told you that, over the past couple of months, General Brighton had developed a very close and personal relationship with that idiot Brucius Marino.”
“The Secretary of Defense!”
“Yeah. That’s the one.”
“We’ve been watching him! No way they could have been together and we not know.”
“But we do know. Which makes us a little anxious. Why were they meeting? Why were they keeping it a secret? And where is Brucius now?”
Edward Kelly stood up from the bed, his heart racing. He walked toward the window, looking out. The sun was four hours from rising, but he wasn’t going back to bed. He thought, pacing, his body casting a dim shadow across the soft floor from the moon. “We’ll take care of Brucius Marino,” he finally said.
“You’ve been saying that, Edward . . .”
“Shut up! You hear me, General Lafferty. Shut up and listen to me now. We will take care of Brucius. Now you go find that woman. We can’t have her out there talking around, not until we’ve taken care of Marino. How many historic corners have been turned because of some meddling, wenchy wife? We’re not going to let her turn this corner because she’s messing with things out there.
“So take care of her, okay? We’ve got other problems, much more urgent and demanding. Smash this little fly so the group can concentrate on more important things.”
Chapter Seven
Raven Rock (Site R), Underground Military Complex
Southern Pennsylvania
President Bethany Rosen sat uncomfortably at her large office desk, her broken leg stretched out before her. She was tired and irritable and, worst of all, terrified—for her country, her countrymen, her staff around her, herself. She felt the crushing responsibility of the presidency and wondered, deep inside, if she was up to the task. Leading the country, even at the best of times and under the best of circumstances, was a nearly impossible task. Leading them out of the darkness that enveloped them now . . . well, she simply didn’t know. Could she do it? Could anyone do it? She took a breath and sat back, looking at the crowded desk around her. She had a pile of security papers on her left, another pile on her right, two piles right before her, another stacked against the wall behind her chair. She popped an antacid in her mouth and glanced down at her watch. It was impossible to keep track of time inside the artificial environment of Raven Rock and she was shocked to see that it was 2:05 a.m.
She moved her back painfully. She had no feeling in her broken leg. She’d been working for almost twenty hours straight and she desperately needed rest. So did her staff. She’d been driving them ve
ry hard. For every hour she worked, they worked two, and some of them had been without sleep now for almost three days.
Leaning back, she rubbed her eyes, feeling the strain against her forehead and down her neck. She stood and reached for her crutches, then looked over as her chief of staff, a former campaign manager and close friend, entered the private office. “How are the fallout readings in D.C.?” was the first thing she asked.
The chief of staff glanced at his notes and then looked up. “I’m not sure, Madame President. I could find out very quickly.”
The president frowned. It was the answer he had given her this morning when she had asked the same question. “What about the results of the EMP? Is there any residual fallout or other health considerations?”
The COS glanced down at his clipboard once again. “Ma’am, from what I understand there are not now, nor will there ever be, fallout considerations from the warheads that were exploded over the United States. The detonations took place too high to settle through the upper atmosphere. But Bethany, you’ve got to remember, we are treading on virgin ground here. I’m not convinced anyone really understands . . .”
“I’m leaving Raven Rock first thing in the morning, then. I won’t hide down here any longer. We’ll stay away from D.C. for the moment—heaven knows there’s nothing there to go home to anyway, not with the White House and Congressional complex and office buildings completely destroyed. We’ll move the nation’s capital to . . . where, Tom? I don’t care, you and the staff pick a place. Richmond might be as good a spot as any; we’d be close enough to the remains of the government in D.C. that we could have access to whatever we have left. But if you want to go to New York or Philadelphia, I’m okay with that, too. Either way, I won’t stay down here any longer. I want to be up there and see for myself what’s going on. I want to be up there with my people. I want them to see me and hear me and know that something, someone is still there, that the government hasn’t completely folded and we are going to move on.”
The COS dropped his clipboard to his side, his face concerned. “I’ll check it through the Secret Service. They’ll have to clear it first.”
“Fine. Talk to them. Get it cleared. But tell them I will not take no for an answer. I’m not going to hole up here in Raven Rock forever. Three days have passed now since the EMP attack. I want to get up there and it’s critical that I do.”
More scribbling on the clipboard, the chief of staff’s brow creasing as he wrote.
“And I want to address the nation as soon as possible,” the president said. “Have the Emergency Communications Center set it up. I want to stand before our people and assure them that we are still here.”
The COS looked around, almost laughing with sarcasm, but managed to hold it back. We are here! Yeah, there was a little truth in that, but it was pretty hard to sugarcoat the fact that the government had pretty much been destroyed. The nation was about to hear from their new president, a woman 95 percent of them didn’t know and fewer of them could have even identified. And what was she going to tell them? Hope you all got some food and water stuffed away because it’s looking pretty grim.
Hard to be optimistic when things had already crashed down on their heads.
Still, he kept his face straight, holding the sarcasm in. “I’ll talk to the communications coordinator,” was all he said.
“How many stations . . . what kind of coverage across the nation can we get?”
“I’m not sure, Madame President. I would think, based on the afternoon briefing, we can cover almost everywhere. A few remote pockets out west might be out of range, but it’s my understanding you’ll have pretty much coast-to-coast coverage, at least on the AM frequencies. The larger consideration is, how many people have access to working radios? Not too many, I am thinking, and even fewer will have working television sets. We’re going to have to provide them. It’s going to take some time.”
The president nodded, then rubbed her eyes again. The chief of staff waited, his own knees feeling weak.
Through the silence, he reflected on the highly classified report sitting in the secure safe back in his office. The National Intelligence Brief was short and terrifyingly clear. And it was hot. Boiling hot. He felt his safe would explode. The picture that it painted of the country was as depressing as anything he’d ever seen. Many Americans had not eaten since the day of the attack. Most of them didn’t have any drinking water. Perhaps half a million had died already from lack of emergency medical care. And the devastation was just beginning. It was going to go downhill. The United States didn’t have a stockpile of food, not nearly enough to feed them all, and no way to distribute it anyway. They didn’t have medical supplies, not to speak of, beyond the few days of inventory stockpiled on pharmacy and hospital shelves. They had no electricity, no sanitation or clean water; the list was so long and overwhelming it was crushing even to think about.
Worst of all, of the three hundred some-odd million Americans, two hundred and ninety-seven million of them were completely unprepared, expecting the government to take care of them. Not a highly accurate expectation, it turned out.
He cleared his throat and looked around, thinking of the president’s request to get out of Raven Rock. Yes, they might be able to leave the underground command post for a few days, a few weeks even, but they wouldn’t be up-ground for long. Conditions on the surface were deteriorating so quickly, they would soon be driven back to the safety of the secret command post. Within a few weeks, mass starvation was going to sweep across the nation. There would be food riots and chaos unlike anything ever seen before. Once that started—and his estimate of it being a few weeks away might be an overly optimistic one—they would need the security of Raven Rock once again, the food supplies and clean water and medications, everything the underground complex could provide.
It killed him to have to face it, but the truth was, they would end up back inside the Rock.
He looked around at the heavily paneled walls, thinking of the cold stone and thick cement that surrounded him two hundred feet beneath the surface. Putting the image aside, he turned to the president. “We’ll set up the broadcast to the nation as soon as possible, but I have to ask you, Madame President, what are you going to say? What will you tell the people? How can you give them any hope?”
The former Californian senator closed her eyes and thought, almost wincing at the weight of the pressure on her shoulders. What can I tell them? she wondered to herself. What can I tell them that they don’t already know? They’re not stupid; I can’t fool them. But I can’t just give up and lead them down a road of death and despair.
She considered a moment, exhausted, her leg in real pain. Breathing slowly, she almost slipped into micro-sleep before the sound of the COS’s body movements brought her back to the room. She opened her eyes and looked around, then turned to him. “All I can do is tell them the truth. It is ugly now. It will get worse. But we have to keep our faith and go on. Most of all, I want to remind them that we are not alone. God has guided our nation in the past and He will guide us even now. This greatest of all nations is still His magnificent cause, and the only thing we can do now is put our faith and trust in Him.”
The COS stared, his mouth open. It wasn’t what he expected, not from a woman who, outside of weddings and funerals, hadn’t been inside a church in many years. Funny, he thought, how the situation had a tendency to refocus one’s heart. Still, he understood it. Truth was, he was feeling a bit of religion himself.
“I will tell them that help is on the way,” the president continued. “We have allies and friends across the globe. None of them were impacted by the EMP attack. They will stand by us now as we stood by them in the past.”
No, the COS wanted to counter, we are friendless and alone and we must recognize that now. But he held his tongue, keeping his eyes on the floor.
“We have indescribable challenges,” the president concluded. “We all know that. But we’ll work together. We’ll stand together
. And yes, we will rise again.” She hesitated, thinking. “The one thing I won’t do,” she concluded, nodding toward a red binder on her desk, “is shred the Constitution as we begin to rebuild.”
* * *
The president slept inside a small apartment off the main command post. Twenty minutes later, as she lay atop her bed, her eyes closed, the stillness of the night around her, she was amazed at the almost perfect silence. Rock walls. Cement floors. Thick, blast-proof steel doors. All of it combined to
stifle every sound and vibration, leaving the air unnaturally soundless and dull.
The night passed and, though she was exhausted, sleep was slow to come. Too many thoughts. Too many worries. Her chest was tight and every time she thought about the next day her heart raced again. Rolling to her back, she breathed deeply and, starting with her lower body, stretched her muscles to relax. Her toes. Her feet. Her legs. Her abdomen and arms. Everything was limp and soft now . . . her breathing was growing heavy . . . the tightness in her chest was gone . . . she was falling into darkness as she drifted off to sleep.
A final thought ran through her mind just before she fell asleep: Her husband and son were still out in Sacramento. She’d already made arrangements to send out a military jet. Soon they would be with her. Things would be a little better then.
With that thought, the president smiled lightly, then drifted off to sleep.
Twenty minutes later, she was dead.
* * *
The potassium chloride had been administered in the herbal tea she had swallowed just before slipping into bed. As expected, it was a perfect hit, leaving no trace of foul play behind.
Because both potassium and chloride are naturally found within the human body, the forensic pathologist had no evidence that an assassination had taken place. Later, during the autopsy, when examining the dead woman’s heart, the pathologist noted all the classical indications of a massive heart attack: discoloration and swelling in the aorta, pockets of clear liquid throughout one chamber. His notes were textbook clear:
The Great and Terrible Page 119
