A Heartbeat Away (18 page)

She knew who General Paul Egan was, but had only met him briefly at some sort of official affair. Almost certainly he wasn’t an Allaire supporter. Whatever it was, she sensed this package could only be good. Clutching it, she headed off in the direction of the ladies’ room.

CHAPTER 31

DAY 4
9:30 A.M. (EST)

General Paul Egan has nothing to do with this package. We used his name to be sure the security monitors took the delivery seriously and brought it to you. The members of Genesis believe that you are someone fit to lead this country. Reply to this message if you agree and would like to learn more. The code to open our messages will be the security login password of your Bank of Virginia online banking account.

Ellis took in a sharp breath as she read the text on the display screen of a handheld messaging device that had been carefully enclosed in protective wrap. It was as thin as a BlackBerry, but somewhat larger. The display on the screen was sharp.

Password?
The device prompted.

Impossible,
she thought. There was no way Genesis could have gotten ahold of her personal banking password. She purposely typed in an incorrect code, and the device immediately refused to proceed. She then typed in the correct numbers and was directed to two typed sheets, carefully hidden between the bubble wrap of the envelope and its manila outer shell. Printed on the first sheet were the words
GENESIS DEMANDS
.

Ellis took the package into a stall and secured the door. On first reading, the demands—radically antiestablishment—bordered on the absurd. But Ellis pushed aside her initial impression by reminding herself of the brilliance the organization had displayed thus far, as well as their unbridled ruthlessness.

Who is behind Genesis?
she typed.

The response appeared less than a minute after she pressed Send.

We represent everybody who values true freedom. That is all you need to know. These messages are encrypted and secure. These transmissions cannot be detected. Have you read our demands?

Ellis reviewed the sheet of demands again, and then sent a message, which read simply:
I have.

The device buzzed in her hand after Genesis returned a reply.

We have communicated these demands to the president and he has ignored us. The virus you have been exposed to is real and lethal. We alone have the treatment that will save your lives. The president, by not responding to our demands, has sealed your fates.

Ellis typed:
What do you want from me?

This time there was no immediate response.
Can this all be some sort of trick on Allaire’s part?
She had after all threatened him with impeachment. Could he be trying to set her up as one willing to negotiate with terrorists? It was possible.

If Allaire wasn’t behind this, then why were they reaching out specifically to her?

Ellis warned herself to tread softly until the picture became clearer. If the message were really from Genesis, then Allaire had not only ignored their communications, but kept them secret as well. If so, he had placed everyone in the Capitol in mortal danger. Suddenly, the device buzzed in her hand.

See to it that legislation is passed that will make our demands law. Do so and we will give you and you alone the antiviral treatment. You will be responsible for saving the lives of seven hundred of the most important people in America.

Ellis did not need Genesis to explain the potential impact of her being the one to end this crisis. She was more than fit to lead the country. It was her destiny to do so. What Genesis was offering was the path to that inevitability. She thought of William Jennings Bryan, who wrote:
Destiny is not a matter of chance, but a matter of choice
. At that moment, her choice was to prove that the opportunity indeed was for real.

What is this virus?
Ellis typed.

WRX3883.

What is that?

Ask your president. He’ll know. He made it.

Interesting,
Ellis thought. But the exchange proved nothing. Were she to confront Allaire with specifics about the virus, it might only confirm that she had taken his bait. She needed more certainty than that to proceed.

Ellis typed:
The president has brought in a virologist and tasked him to develop an antiviral drug. He may succeed before I get your bill passed, in which case, you have no leverage.

She wondered how Allaire, assuming he was behind this sham, would respond.

The virologist is dead. Killed when we blew up his transport helicopter. You have no other option.

Not only was that an interesting response, but a most unexpected one as well. Ellis knew all about the helicopter disaster. The explosion shook the chamber walls and incited some panic among an already jittery group.

“Nothing about the explosion will derail our plans for a rapid resolution to this challenge,” Allaire had told a meeting of the leaders of Congress.

Ellis wouldn’t believe him until she had questioned Sean O’Neil. It took a little prodding, but finally the agent revealed that the explosion had killed a pilot, copilot, and a decoy of the virologist who had been chosen to develop an effective treatment for the virus that was threatening them.

Clearly, the president had nothing. His iron-fisted quarantine was born out of panic, which meant that Harlan Mackey’s death was no accident.

Ellis tensed. This
was
Genesis who was contacting her. She felt absolutely certain of it. If they were to provide her with the cure, she would assume the stature of a savior.

Destiny.

Ellis studied the sheet of demands again. They were ridiculous—over the top. Under normal circumstances, any lawmaker championing a bill with these provisions would be committing political suicide. But these were hardly normal circumstances.

Genesis had organized the legislative demands into three broad categories: national security, immigrant rights, and privacy.

The national security mandates called for the immediate cessation of unchecked spying on ordinary Americans, as well as the abolishment of the Patriot Act, and a rewrite of the ECPA, the Electronic Communications Privacy Act. The impact of such a bill would be profound. It would make it illegal to monitor communication on the Internet. Wiretapping, in all but the most extreme cases, would be abolished. And the legislation currently in committee to establish a national ID program would be scrapped.

Who are these people?
Ellis wondered again.

In addition to the security demands, they called for the dismantling of the immigration and naturalization service, ending all discrimination against immigrants, along with sweeping changes that would essentially erase our borders with Mexico and Canada. They also insisted on the installation of consumer privacy protections, which would make surveillance camera footage a civil rights violation unless it was related to preventing robbery.

This was truly toxic legislation.

But what we have all been exposed to was equally toxic as well.

These demands were coming from Genesis, Ellis concluded. And although she did not personally support any of their proposals, given the circumstances and the stakes she could champion the effort nonetheless. Flexibility was at the very heart of good politics. Once she was sworn in as president, the country would see only a hero—a hero who had done what their elected leader could not.

Even if I were to succeed in passing this legislation, Ellis typed, you could not meet your obligation. I am not the POTUS and therefore, not elected to lead the country, or sign this bill into law.

You are third in the succession order,
came the reply.
With our help, there will be no one for you to succeed.

Ellis felt another jolt of adrenaline. Her mind danced with images of her taking the presidential oath—images of such vivid and glorious detail that she believed, for just a moment, they had actually occurred. Genesis sounded as if they had the resources to make it happen. She had to take the ride. There was, however, one glaring problem that still needed to be addressed.

It must be me who secures the treatment,
she typed.

The exchange that followed occurred in rapid succession.

Genesis:
Your job is to get the legislation passed. We’ll provide the drug. You can decide how to explain where it came from.

Ellis:
But this will take work. What if Allaire’s virologist succeeds before my legislative work concludes.

Genesis:
We told you, the virologist is dead. We saw to that.

Ellis:
That is incorrect. He is very much alive. You succeeded in blowing up a helicopter. But with a decoy on board, not him.

Genesis:
Interesting. In that case, we know the man’s location. The matter will be resolved. And you will become the president. Bank on it.

CHAPTER 32

DAY 4
1:30 P.M. (CST)

Matt Fink had been a pilot in the South African Air Force before he became a mercenary, opting for more close-up work and much more money. Now, he banked a sharp right turn, extended the Learjet 40XR’s landing gear, and then rechecked his instrument panel for any needed course corrections. He slowed to 140 knots and extended the wing flaps to decrease the aircraft’s stalling speed. The Lear was a joy to fly compared to the stiffer JAS Gripen fighter he had piloted in the service.

Clear skies and no strong crosswinds made for perfect flying, and a bright Kansas sky gave Fink a clear view of the runway. He repositioned his headset microphone to continue the arrival sequence with air traffic control at the Garden City Regional Airport.

“Garden City Tower, LXJ183 is eight miles out entering a left downwind for the visual three-two,” Fink said.

“LXJ183 is cleared to land runway seventeen, winds three-four-zero at five to ten.”

“Cleared to land, LXJ183,” Fink repeated the instruction.

The wheels touched down with barely a bump and Alex Ramirez, who had passed the flight from Baltimore in the copilot’s seat, stood with the aircraft still in motion.

“I’ll head back and get the weapons and gear ready,” he said.

“The Cessna’s waiting for us,” Fink answered. “I want to be airborne within an hour.”

The two men had worked together for years, and had handpicked the team for the Genesis job. Ramirez, who’d had his face cut nearly in two in Rwanda, was sharp and dependable, and the absolute best with any sort of electronics, or any kind of garrote. He was also a vicious infighter, who had disposed of the Capitol security guard Peter Tannen quietly and efficiently, thus earning himself this trip to Kansas.

Fink taxied to a smooth stop at the location assigned to him by the controller. Then he powered the engines down and confirmed the cockpit radio was off as well. Cain expected him to check in, and that conversation was not one he could afford to inadvertently broadcast to Garden City’s air traffic tower.

He made contact with his employer through a high-tech push-button phone.

“We’ve landed at Garden City Regional, ready for phase two,” he said.

Seconds later he heard a beep and Cain’s baritone voice.

“What’s your ETA to Kalvesta?”

“We’re forty miles west. Once we get the paperwork done, we should have our first visuals of the facility within an hour.”

“Very good,” Cain replied. “You’ll be able to send me photographs?”

“Yes. Cain, let me go in. I know I can get to Rhodes and finish this once and for all.”

“Negative,” Cain said. “This is a reconnaissance mission only. We dismantled our surveillance of the facility after the lab was closed down. I need to see how it’s been resurrected before we make our next move. But I promise you, Fink, you’ll get your chance soon enough. We can’t have Rhodes messing things up at this stage.”

“Roger and out.”

The mercenary snarled and returned the phone to the front pocket of his fleece-lined flight jacket. The blown missile strike at the Capitol wasn’t totally his fault, but he was the one with the visual, and he was the one who pulled the trigger. He took great pride in his near-perfect record of mission successes. He would wait for Cain’s kill order, but not for too long.

Ramirez had unloaded the duffel bags of equipment and weapons, and was waiting for Fink on the tarmac when he deplaned.

“Stay here, sport,” the older man ordered. “I’ll go sign for the Cessna.”

Five minutes later, the killer was seated in a small wood-paneled office in an outbuilding near the air traffic control tower. The portly rental agent across from him, Jim Kinchley according to his desk plate, turned down a small portable television that was broadcasting the latest CNN news report from the Capitol.

“Crazy stuff happening out there,” Kinchley said.

“Crazy,” Fink agreed.

“Well, I got your fax and was able to get started on the paperwork. Just need to finish up the rental agreement is all.”

The documents Fink had used to rent the Learjet from Baltimore-Washington airport included his own pilot’s license with the name changed, and a master forgery of one for Ramirez, who couldn’t fly anything more complex than a paper airplane, but was needed to fulfill the requirement for two pilots. Only one would be needed now for the Cessna 172 Skyhawk.

This was a stealth operation and Fink took every precaution to ensure there were no mishaps.

“So, Mr. Keegan,” the agent said, “how long will you be using the one-seven-two?”

“I don’t know,” Fink replied. “Does it matter?”

“Have to put a specific time on this here form.”

“Well then, put down two days.”

Fink fixed the man with a baleful look that made him agree to the vague answer without objection.

“Mind if I ask what sort of business you’re in?” Kinchley quickly pointed to a line on the rental agreement. “It’s required, you see.”

Another hard stare.

“Debt collector,” Fink said.

With the papers signed, and an inspection completed, he taxied the aircraft over to where Ramirez was waiting. The Cessna was airborne forty-five minutes from when they had touched down. Not wanting to burn fuel on a long ascent, Fink leveled out at four thousand feet, and proceeded on an easterly course that took him over a barren, flat patchwork of square and rectangular brown fields flecked with snow.

The Kalvesta facility came into view forty minutes after takeoff. Ramirez peered through the lenses of his high-powered Brunton binoculars and made some initial observations while they were still several miles away.

“I’ll need to get closer to take any useful pictures, but from what I’m seeing we’ve got ourselves a mini Fort Knox,” he told Fink. “Lots of manpower, lots of guns, and lots of fencing.”

Fink retrieved his phone to report that initial assessment to Cain, when his cockpit radio sparked to life.

“Unidentified aircraft, you are flying in restricted U.S. military airspace. Alter course heading two-seven-zero and maintain at least ten miles from point north thirty-eight degrees, three minutes, thirty-four seconds; west one hundred degrees, seventeen minutes, eleven seconds.”

It was not a smart move to have passed so close. Clearly with so much at stake, including his own life, Allaire was moving quickly.

Fink altered their course without hesitation.

“Roger that and all apologies,” he said into his headset. “Was unaware of any military activity here. Changing to a heading of two-seven-zero as instructed.”

“Thank you, aircraft. And have a pleasant day.”

Fink switched the radio to intercom mode, cursed out loud, and then spoke to Ramirez via their headset microphones.

“For now is right, there, sport,” he said. “We’re going to have to make this a ground operation.”

“No problem,” Ramirez replied, with the binoculars still pressed to his eyes.

The Cessna completed its sharp turn to course correct and again leveled off. Ramirez no longer had visual of the facility that was now directly behind them. But moments later, he tapped Fink on the arm because something else had caught his attention.

“Take a look,” Ramirez said, passing over the binoculars.

The heading change had put the Cessna directly above a red Ford Taurus that was pulled over on a particularly barren stretch of road, just five miles from the entrance to the Kalvesta facility. Fink piloted the plane with his knees as he studied the scene below through the binoculars.

“You see?” Ramirez asked.

Fink nodded.

“Not a lot of traffic on this road at this hour,” he said.

“Or any hour, I would bet.”

“Not every day you see somebody being helped out of the trunk of a car either.”

“Not every day,” Ramirez agreed. “Doesn’t look like she was in there unwilling either.”

“Not if after you get out of the trunk, you jump into the front seat like she just did.” Fink handed the binoculars back to Ramirez. “Can you get a plate number from here?” he asked.

“I can.”

Fink took out his phone.

“Cain, it’s Fink. You read me?”

“I’m here,” Cain answered.

“Can you run a license plate for me?”

“Give me the numbers.”

Fink kept the Taurus in view while he recited the plate numbers to Cain. The Taurus had pulled back onto the road and was continuing west on Route 156. A few minutes later, Fink’s phone beeped.

“The car is registered to the Kalvesta lab tech Melvin Forbush,” Cain said. “What’s going on?”

Fink explained the situation.

“Follow him. The no-fly zone tells me enough about security. Getting to Rhodes is going to take some planning.”

“Roger that.”

Fink increased the plane’s altitude, but not so much that he lost sight of the car as it traveled past Garden City and turned south onto U.S. 50.

“Anything of interest on Fifty South?” Fink asked.

Ramirez checked his map and said, “The only thing between here and Cimarron is Garden City Regional Airport.”

“Well then,” Fink said, “it looks like we’ll be returning the plane sooner than we planned.”