Gideon's Sword (92 page)
Authors: Douglas Preston
“What? If he were a dungeon-master, wouldn’t he know all the other players?”
Barry stops laughing, realizing I’m not in on the joke. “You don’t even know, do you?”
“Know what?”
“Be honest, Harris—you haven’t figured it out?”
I try my best to act informed. “Of course—I got most of it… Which part are you talking about?”
His foggy eye looks right at me. “There is no game. There never was one.” His eye doesn’t move. “I mean, you know it was all bullshit, right? Smoke and mirrors.”
As his words creep through the receiver and into my ear, my whole body goes numb. The world feels like my personal gravity’s just doubled. Sinking down—almost through—the seat of my orange plastic chair, I weigh a thousand pounds.
“What a punchline, huh?” Barry asks. “I almost fell over when they first told me. Can you imagine—all this time spent looking at coworkers, trying to figure out who else is placing bets, and the only people actually playing the game are you and Matthew?”
“Two minutes,” the guard behind Barry announces.
“It’s brilliant when you think about it,” Barry adds. “Pasternak talks it up; you believe him because you trust him… then they send in a few pages, fill out some taxi receipts, and you guys think you’re in on the biggest secret Capitol Hill has to offer. It’s like those flight simulator rides at Disney World, where they show the movie on-screen and shake your car a bit—you think you’re flying up and down a roller coaster, but you really haven’t moved an inch.”
I force a laugh, my body still frozen.
“Man, just the thought of it,” Barry adds, his voice picking up steam. “Dozens of staffers placing bets on unimportant legislation without anyone knowing? Please, what a dream—like anyone here could even keep their mouth shut for longer than ten seconds,” he teases. “Gotta give Pasternak his credit, though. You thought you
were playing a great joke on the system, and the entire time, he’s playing the joke on you.”
“Yeah… no… it’s definitely amazing.”
“It was humming like clockwork, too—until everything with Matthew. Once that happened, Pasternak wanted out. I mean, he may’ve signed up to convince you—that’s part of any lobbyist’s job—but he didn’t want to hurt anyone.”
“That’s… That’s not what I heard,” I bluff.
“Then you heard wrong. The only reason he put this together was for the exact same reason anyone does anything in this town: Ever have a small country for a client? Small countries bring in small fortunes, which small businesses are in desperate need of—especially when billings are down thirty-six percent this year alone. After the first year of failing to get the gold mine transferred, Pasternak eventually decided to go with the more inventive backdoor. Say hello to the Game—the most harmless way ever to sneak an earmark into a bill. But then Matthew got curious, and Janos came in, and, well… that’s when the train jackknifed off the tracks…”
The guard looks over at us.
We’re almost out of time, but Barry doesn’t show the slightest sign of slowing down. After all this time in jail, he’s finally having fun.
“You gotta love the name, too—the Zero Game—so melodramatic. But it
is
true: In any equation, when you multiply by zero, you always wind up with nothing, right?”
I nod, dumbfounded.
“So who told you anyway?” he asks. “FBI, or did you figure it out yourself?”
“No… myself. I… uh… I got it myself.”
“Good for you, Harris. Good man.”
Stuck in my seat, I just sit there, looking at him. It’s like finding out a year of your life has been a staged production number. And I’m the only putz still in costume.
“Time,” the guard says.
Barry keeps talking. “I’m so glad you—”
“I said,
Time,
” the guard interrupts. He pulls the receiver from Barry’s ear, but I still hear his final thought.
“I knew you’d appreciate it, Harris! I knew it! Even Pasternak would be happy for that—!”
There’s a loud click in my ear as the guard slaps the phone in its cradle. He pinches the back of Barry’s neck and yanks him from his seat. Stumbling across the room, Barry heads back to the steel door.
But as I sit alone at the glass partition, staring through to the other side, there’s no question Barry has it right. Pasternak said it the first day he hired me. It’s the first rule of politics: The only time you get hurt is when you forget it’s all a game.
B
RAD
M
ELTZER
is the author of the #1
New York Times
bestseller THE BOOK OF FATE and five other
New York Times
bestselling thrillers:
The Tenth Justice, Dead Even, The First Counsel, The Millionaires,
and
The Zero Game
. He is also the writer of the #1 selling graphic novels
Identity Crisis
and
Justice League of America
. A graduate of the University of Michigan and Columbia Law School, Meltzer currently lives in Florida. To learn more interesting things about Brad than could fit in this space, you can visit
www.bradmeltzer.com
.
Books by Brad Meltzer
The Tenth Justice
Dead Even
The First Counsel
The Millionaires
The Zero Game
The Book of Fate
The Book of Lies
MORE ACTION-PACKED NOVELS BY BRAD MELTZER!
BOOK OF FATE
Washington, D.C., has a two-hundred-year-old secret.
Six minutes from now, one of us would be dead. None of us knew it was coming
. So says Wes Holloway, a young presidential aide, about the day he put Ron Boyle, the chief executive’s oldest friend, into the president’s limousine. By the trip’s end, a crazed assassin would permanently disfigure Wes and kill Boyle. Now, eight years later, Boyle has been spotted alive. Trying to figure out what really happened takes Wes back into disturbing secrets buried in Freemason history, a decade-old presidential crossword puzzle, and a two-hundred-year-old code invented by Thomas Jefferson that conceals secrets worth dying for.
BOOK OF LIES
In chapter four of the Bible, Cain kills Abel. It is the world’s most famous murder. But the Bible is silent about one key detail: the weapon Cain used to kill his brother. That weapon is still lost to history.
In 1932, Mitchell Siegel was killed by gunshots. While mourning, his son dreamed of a bulletproof man and created Superman. The gun used in this unsolved murder has never been found. Until now. Today in Fort Lauderdale, a young man named Cal Harper encounters his long-missing father—who has been shot with the same gun that killed Siegel. But soon after their reunion, Cal and his dad are attacked by a killer tattooed with the ancient markings of Cain. What does Cain, history’s greatest villain, have to do with Superman, the world’s greatest hero? And what do two murders, committed thousands of years apart, have in common?
FIRST COUNSEL
John F. Kennedy, Jr., was Lark. Amy Carter was Dynamo. Chelsea Clinton was Energy.
Meet Shadow.
Shadow is the Secret Service code name for First Daughter Nora Hartson. And when White House lawyer Michael Garrick begins dating the irresistible Nora, he’s instantly spellbound, just like everyone else in her world. Then, late one night, the two witness something they were never meant to see. Now, in a world where everyone watches your every move, Michael is suddenly ensnared in someone’s secret agenda. Trusting no one, not even Nora, he finds himself fighting for his innocence and his life—the price for falling in love with the world’s most powerful daughter.
THE ZERO GAME
They play the most lucrative—and dangerous—game.
And they will have to bet their lives on it.
Matthew Mercer and Harris Sandler are playing a game almost no one knows about—not their friends, not their coworkers, and certainly not their powerful bosses, who are some of the most influential senators and congressmen on Capitol Hill. It’s a game that has everything: risk, reward, and the thrill of knowing that—just by being invited to play—you’ve become a true insider. But behind this game is a secret so explosive it will shake Washington to its core. And when one player turns up dead, a dedicated young staffer will find himself relying on a tough, idealistic, seventeen-year-old Senate page to help keep him alive...as he plays the Zero Game to its heart-pounding end.
THE MILLIONAIRES
What would you do to get rich?
What would you steal if you couldn’t get caught?
Charlie and Oliver Caruso are brothers working at an ultra-exclusive private bank when they’re faced with an offer they can’t refuse—three million dollars in an abandoned account no one even knows exists. Almost as soon as they take the cash, a friend is killed and the bank, the Secret Service, and a female P.I. are closing in. Now the Caruso brothers are on the run and about to uncover an explosive secret that will test their trust and forever change their lives.
Contents
Title Page
Dedication
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Epilogue
About the Authors
A Conversation with Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child
By Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child
Page-Turning Thrill From Preston And Child!
Gideon’s Sword Copyright Page
Title Page
Acknowledgments
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