The Last Days (10 page)

“Mr. President, you've got a call from the vice president.”

“Put him through. Bill, that you? What have you got?”

“Looks like Bennett and McCoy may be all right—we're trying to get them to Gaza Station. I'll let you know the minute they're secure.”

“Good. I want Bennett and McCoy on the NSC videoconference.”

“Yes, sir. Also, I talked with Doron. The Israelis are finalizing their mobilization. They're willing to hold off until they hear from you unless the fighting spills over. If Israelis start getting killed, Doron said they'll go in immediately.”

MacPherson didn't know quite how to react to that yet.

“We're getting reaction in from around the world,” the VP continued. “Morocco's king was the first to call. He's furious at the extremists and offered any assistance we might need. Also, President Aznar called from Madrid. Most of the NATO leaders are still there. We did a conference call with them. They sounded quite shaken up, actually, even the French. Paine was well liked, as you know. They're all ready to help. They just want us to hold back the Israelis from doing anything rash.”

“I bet.”

“That was echoed by President Mubarak. He's in Cairo until this evening. He's supposed to fly to Geneva tonight for a U.N. conference. King Abdullah called from Jordan. He's in Amman, also supposed to go to Geneva, but said he's going to cancel his trip and monitor the situation. Like Doron, he's worried the fighting could spill over. Both he and Mubarak condemned the attacks and offered intelligence and medical assistance. But both of them also insisted in very strong terms that we keep the Israelis from going in. They said an Israeli invasion of the territories would cause irreparable harm to the peace process.”

“What peace process?” asked the president.

“I know.”

“Fine, anything else?”

“Just condolences from the rest of Europe, Asia, Latin America. Russian president Vadim wants to talk as soon as you've got a spare second.”

“Set that up for my return. That, and a call to Doron.”

“You got it. Oh, I also just got a call from Achmed Chalabi in Baghdad. He said the new interim government is going to hold its first official news conference tonight. They'll probably do it from one of Saddam's palaces. Anyway, as you and I talked about at Camp David on Saturday, the interim government is ready to declare itself open for business, announce its members, its mandate, and its structure, and ask for a continued coalition presence to help stabilize the security situation, get the oil flowing and begin to establish civilian control. They're also going to denounce these attacks in Gaza and call for an immediate Palestinian cease-fire.”

“Really? That's a change.”

“Hold on, Kirkpatrick is e-mailing me something—she says Bud Norris at Secret Service is worried about possible attacks inside the U.S., particularly Washington, in the next few days.”

“Anything solid?”

“No, sir, just lots of chatter. But he's concerned about a possible larger operational concept at play here.”

“What does he recommend?”

“Threat Level Orange.”

“What does Lee think?” asked the president, referring to Secretary Lee Alexander James of the Department of Homeland Security.

“The e-mail says Secretary James is in full agreement, sir.”

“Then do it,” MacPherson said. “And put all U.S. forces at Threat Condition Delta. The last thing we can afford is to get blindsided again.”

 

He was known simply as Nadir, a.k.a. the Viper.

Mohammed Jibril had heard a great deal about the gaunt little man, all of five feet six inches tall. But the two had never met. Nor would they. It wouldn't be proper, much less safe. Jibril knew that Nadir was one of the most effective black ops specialists in all of Saddam's fedayeen forces, and one of the most fearsome killers on the face of the planet. He knew Nadir was thirty-nine, born just outside of Baghdad, the son of Palestinian refugees. He also knew that Nadir had been personally trained by Daoud Juma as an expert in the use of C4 plastic explosives. That much he knew for sure.

What he did not know—what Jibril wanted to know but couldn't seem to find out—was how the Viper had escaped detection, much less arrest, for so long. Practically speaking, of course, it didn't really matter. But it would be nice to know his secrets.

If he was only a fraction as good as Jibril's sources said he was, the Viper would be well worth the $150,000 in U.S. currency just wired to his father's Swiss bank account. He'd better be.

Nadir stared out the window of the Air France Boeing 777. Inbound to Mexico City from Berlin, after a transfer in Paris, he'd already been traveling for more than thirteen hours. It was dark and early and he was exhausted. But at 35,000 feet over the Caribbean, he found himself restless and unable to sleep. Soon he'd be on the ground, he'd secure a rental car, and stay for a night. He'd figure out how best to cross into the U.S. and reach his strike point on time. Theoretically, it couldn't be simpler, and in a few days it would all be over.

 

Air Force One landed amidst airtight security.

Three F-15s circled overhead. Humvees blocked each base entrance. Soldiers patrolled the perimeter. Bomb-sniffing dogs worked their way through the hangars and administrative buildings as Secret Service sharpshooters, SWAT teams, and surveillance teams kept a watchful eye over the tarmac and the woods nearby. News crews were asked not to broadcast the arrival live, though they were allowed to videotape the landing.

Surrounded by a phalanx of Secret Service agents, “Gambit”—the Secret Service code name for James MacPherson—soon boarded Marine One. Still recovering from the terrorist attack that had nearly taken his life less than a month before, the president was confined to a wheelchair. He'd quickly grown tired of it, but remained too fragile to do without it. Special Agent Jackie Sanchez directed her team to lift Gambit and his wheelchair and slide him into place through the side door of the gleaming green-and-white military helicopter and make sure he was secure. With the president was Press Secretary Chuck Murray, Defense Secretary Burt Trainor, and “Football,” the military aide carrying the nuclear launch codes.

The short hop from Andrews to the South Lawn of the White House would only take a few minutes, but it would be bumpy. The weather was rapidly worsening, and having just read the latest forecast from the National Weather Service, Sanchez was anxious. An ice storm was descending from the Northeast. In New York and New Jersey, temperatures were plunging into the teens and could drop to single digits overnight. Ice and snow were making airports and roads treacherous. Across the mid-Atlantic, temperatures were hovering just around the freezing mark, but were expected to drop precipitously overnight. For now, a nasty freezing rain was battering much of the coast, beginning in Delaware and extending as far south as Richmond. Road crews were already spreading salt and sands on the roads to keep them open, and Virginia Power was bracing for falling limbs, downed lines, and possible blackouts.

It was time to get Gambit out of harm's way.

 

“Prairie Ranch, this is Snapshot.”

Bennett revved the engine again.

“Go ahead, Snapshot,”
Kirkpatrick responded.

Bennett watched McCoy reach down on the floor by her feet to pick up her Uzi and check its clip. It was full. She clicked off the safety and set the submachine gun on her lap. Then she reached under the seat and pulled out a spare Uzi, double-checked the clip, and handed it to Bennett.

“Prairie Ranch, we've got a dark brown VW bus approaching at twelve o'clock,” McCoy radioed to the Situation Room. “Can you see that from your angle?”

“Roger that, Snapshot,”
said Kirkpatrick.
“It's the Batmobile.”

Bennett looked at McCoy but said nothing. The Bat Cave? The Batmobile? Maybe it all seemed clever to Kirkpatrick and her world, but Bennett was in no mood for kiddy code names and James Bond wannabees. For her part, McCoy couldn't care less what Bennett thought at the moment. She'd done her job. She'd kept him safe this far. And she was glad for backup, whatever it was called.

She turned away from Bennett and looked back at Galishnikov and Sa'id.

“Saddle up, gentlemen. Our ride is here.”

A few minutes later, the driver knocked on Bennett's window with the butt of a loaded pistol. He was young, twenty-five-ish, clean-shaven, muscular, and wearing jeans, dirty white sneakers and a Bir Zeit University sweatshirt. He was soaked to the bone in the torrential downpour that still refused to let up. His dark face and eyes were suddenly illuminated by several intense flashes of lightning, and more thunder boomed overhead. He and McCoy talked in Arabic. The only thing Bennett caught for sure was the driver's name—Tariq—and a palpable sense of urgency.

A split second later, McCoy was out of the limousine, helping Tariq open the back doors. Together, Bennett, Tariq, and McCoy moved Donny Mancuso's body into the back of the van and covered him with a sheet. Then, apologizing to Sa'id and Galishnikov that the place where they were going next they were not authorized to see, McCoy handed black cloth hoods to both men, and directed them to move quickly into the van. McCoy then asked Bennett to guide the two older men and make sure they got there safely while Tariq got into the VW's driver's seat and cranked up the heat for his shivering guests.

With a nickname like the Batmobile, Bennett was half hoping for some kind of state-of-the-art spy vehicle right out of a Hollywood special-effects shop. But as he glanced around at the shabby interior, it quickly became clear that nothing could have been further from the truth. The VW had no bulletproof shields, no front-mounted machine guns. It had no ejector seat or night-vision front windshield. There was no satellite dish on the roof, or racks of high-tech weaponry to play with. It was just an ugly old van, strewn with recent Arabic newspapers, empty soda cans, a rather generous supply of cigarette ashes, and four new passengers, all of whom felt hunted and alone.

Galishnikov and Sa'id stayed low in the back, unable to see a thing even if they'd been allowed to. Bennett got in the front passenger seat. His eyes were riveted on McCoy, still outside. She was gathering all the weapons, ammunition, and electronics gear she could and transferring them from the limousine to the van. She popped the limo's trunk and opened a steel box. Bennett saw her grab several small objects, stuff them in her pockets, and then back away several yards from the car. Then she gave Tariq a signal and he revved the VW's engine.

Bennett glanced back down the road. No one was approaching, but time had to be running out. What in the world was McCoy up to?

 

“Let's go, let's do it!” Sanchez yelled.

“You got it, ma'am—we're out of here,”
the pilot shouted back over the
thwap, thwap, thwap
of the rotors and the chopper's three-thousand-horsepower engines.

MacPherson knew full well Marine One was virtually impregnable. It bore a stunning array of cutting-edge combat avionics—all of which were highly classified—including protections against the electromagnetic pulse of a nuclear blast and against attacks by multiple surface-to-air missiles. But it wasn't missiles that gave him pause. It was the ice building up on the rotors. Nevertheless, he saw the pilot give the thumbs-up to the ground crew, and the Sikorsky Sea King lifted off and headed northwest.

McCoy held up her right hand.

Five, four, three, two, one.

She plunged her left hand into one of her pockets, pulled out what looked like a hand grenade, pulled the pin, and tossed it into the open side door of the limo. Then a second. Then a third. Then she jumped into the side door of the van and slammed it shut. Tariq floored it and they were gone.

Perhaps they weren't typical grenades. Perhaps they were on a timer or a delay of some sort. Bennett had no idea. Nor did he ask. He was just grateful that the VW was picking up speed. It had opened up a distance of at least a few hundred yards. Then they heard it. The first explosion blew out the limousine's windows. It blew off the doors and the roof. It sent glass and shrapnel flying in every direction. A fraction of a second later came the second explosion, louder than the first. This one engulfed Snapshot in a fireball that could be seen for miles.

Flames roared from the chassis, from the engine block, as billows of thick smoke poured into the sky. Tariq braked hard and spun the VW hard to the left, down a side street and out of visual range of Snapshot. Then came the third explosion, louder than either of the other two. It shattered windows a block and a half away. They could hear it echo up and down the coast.

McCoy didn't look back. She fiddled with her wireless radio gear and tried to connect with the DSS agents still pinned down. Nothing. She kept switching frequencies. Still nothing.