Jack and Cathy put their foot down with Kyle, did their best to steer him toward something else—anything else — but as for Katie, the nine-year-old who didn’t like to operate the pooper scooper in the backyard was, in her parents’ eyes at least, well on her way to becoming a world-renowned zoologist or an exotic-animal vet.
Jack started heading back to his room to change to watch TV, but a steward let him know Mary Pat Foley was on the phone wishing to speak with him.
He took the call in his study. “Hey, Mary Pat. Anything wrong?”
“No, Mr. President, everything is fine. Sorry to disturb you like this.”
“Not at all. What’s up?”
Mary Pat said, “Mr. President, I think there is an opportunity here to get a human source inside North Korea, into the Chongju mine and refinery operations, to give us much better elucidation on the situation there. It won’t be easy, the officer will obviously be in great danger.”
“Wait. You said ‘officer,’ not ‘agent.’ You are talking about an employee of one of our intel agencies?”
“Yes, Mr. President. CIA. He’s a Chinese American, first-generation.” She offered the President no more information.
Ryan loosened his tie and leaned back. “You want a ‘go, no-go,’ from me. Is that it?”
“Yes, Mr. President.”
“The operation… how long in duration?”
“Open-ended. We don’t think it will be more than a couple months once our man is in country.”
“You are satisfied the backstopping of the officer’s legend is good? The infiltration plan is solid? You are convinced he has the best resources you can give him, and a clear understanding of the objectives?”
“Yes to all.”
“What about fail-safes if he gets in trouble?”
Mary Pat paused. “I could tell you about the training he has and the exfiltration options available to him if he is compromised, but I will be honest with you. If he is compromised while on the ground in North Korea, he will likely be captured and then killed, or else killed outright.”
“Is there a plan to coordinate with U.S. military in case of emergency? We have special operations troops near the South Korean border, of course. And the USS Freedom is in the Yellow Sea. SEALs on board the Freedom were the ones who found the launch tubes on that cargo ship.”
“We are going to play our cards very close to the vest on this operation, for purposes of OPSEC. If our man is compromised from over here it will be ruinous to him and to any future efforts we might have. But I will notify JSOC that a personnel recovery mission is a possibility.” Mary Pat knew JSOC would just ask for more information, and although she couldn’t blame them for that, she wouldn’t give any more information unless Yao was on the run in North Korea.
The very thought of this made her blood run cold.
Ryan was thinking, too. He pictured this unknown officer as a man standing at a precipice and facing a tightrope that led to the other side. There was no net below. And Jack Ryan was the one who had to tell him either to turn around and go home… or to start walking.
But he also pictured the future. A future where the West Coast of the United States was in range of North Korean ICBMs.
His deliberation was brief.
“Send him,” Ryan said. He wasn’t as sure as he made himself sound. It was his job to appear resolute, even to Mary Pat. If he vacillated it would add unnecessary uncertainty into her oversight of the operation. She needed to know she had his full support and backing, and even though the prospect of having a man on the ground in North Korea would probably lead him to redevelop his stomach ulcers in the next few weeks, his belief in the importance of this mission was without question.
Mary Pat said, “Thank you, Mr. President. Know we have our best people working on this, and I’ll meet with them daily.”
“I know you will, Mary Pat. You and I both know what’s at stake. For him, and for the U.S. Get the intelligence product we need, and then get his ass out of there.”
“Yes, Mr. President.”
Jack hung up the phone and went into the bedroom to change. Cathy was already there; she’d thrown on a jogging suit she liked to wear when lounging in the media room. She looked up at her husband and instantly asked, “What is it? What’s wrong?”
Jack faked a smile. “Nothing.” He sat down on the edge of the bed, suddenly very tired.
Cathy sat next to him. “Jack?”
“It was Mary Pat. She wanted my approval for an operation that will put a young officer in harm’s way.” He paused. “I gave that approval.”
Cathy hugged him. “It’s Mary Pat, Jack. She knows what she’s doing.”
He shrugged. “It feels like bullshit sometimes. I have to make decisions based on less information than the people who seek my approval. I know a fiftieth of what she knows, and I told her to go ahead. Maybe I should have spent a couple days looking at the operation.”
Cathy said, “You know, Jack, there are a lot of people who are paid to read all that raw data and put it into an easily digestible form for you. You are upsetting the natural order when you try and micromanage.”
Jack smiled, the lines around his eyes pronounced with his lack of sleep. “I know. And I trust the people we have working for us. I just feel like I should have as much information as I can get to make decisions as important as this.”
“You can’t know everything.”
“True. But I can always know more.” He sighed a long sigh and let his shoulders slump in a fashion that only Cathy had ever seen. “Two more years of this. Jesus. What was I thinking when I ran this last time?”
Cathy brushed her hand across the well-worn worry lines on his forehead, around his eyes. “You’ll miss this when it’s over. But when it’s over… we’ll have a lot more time to relax.”
He smiled now, took her hand in his. “Yeah.” He felt better. Just a little, but it was enough to get him off his ass. He stood and went to change out of his presidential uniform and into his dad uniform.
It was the best part of his day.
33
Having Dom Caruso up in New York, thereby giving Clark four sets of eyes instead of just three, had made a huge difference in the Campus operation to gain intelligence in the actions of Sharps Partners.
The other change to their operation that was proving helpful was that now they were primarily tracking the movements of Edward Riley. There was no question that he was in charge of the operation to influence the committee vote, and after the honey trap in the sleazy massage parlor the previous day, Clark and his men wondered if he’d managed to line up at least one vote in North Korea’s favor.
Tonight Riley took a cab to Chinatown at nine, so Sam, Domingo, and Dom followed him down. While Riley sat in a nearly empty dim sum restaurant on Mott Street, Sam took the eye in a nondescript charcoal-gray sedan. He had to circle the block four times to catch an open spot on the curb, but he found a place on Bayard near the corner that gave him a great backward view into the restaurant, as well as a fair angle of view to both the north and south on Mott. Once he parked, he pulled his camera from its bag and put it down between his feet.
Dom was on foot — he’d arrived by subway, then walked across Canal Street — and he remained two blocks up on Mott and out of direct view of the dim sum restaurant. He wore a black polo shirt and khakis and he sat alone at a fast-food restaurant on the corner of Mott and Canal, but he had earpiece comms with the team and was ready to move closer if Sam had to bug out for some reason, or if Riley left the restaurant with his contact on foot.