A never-ending stream of rabble-rousers want to see me out of office. Or worse. They hate the Senate’s Liberal Ice Princess.
The tram lurched to a halt. Her assistant, Walter Brandow, waited for her under the Senate building. He was thin, almost abnormally so, and she clucked her tongue.
“Walter,” she said as the Capital Police checked her identification. “You need to eat a bowl of pasta or a sandwich, for God’s sake. You’re wasting away to nothing.”
Brandow rolled his eyes. “Yes, ma’am.”
She turned her glare on the officer still inspecting her ID. “Is this necessary? You know my face by now, Glen.”
The man glanced up from the card. “Just doing my job, Senator.”
“Well, how about you do your job a little faster?”
The man kept his face carefully neutral and handed her the card. “You’re cleared, Senator. Have a great day.”
She grunted and stepped through the checkpoint. He did that just slow enough to irritate me but not slow enough that I could complain. I’ll bet Glen is a Republican.
“What’s on today’s agenda, Walter?”
“You need to clear your day,” Brandow said. “I’ve already started canceling appointments.”
Walter was usually the calmest person in the room, but she noticed the dark stains under his armpits and the sweat trickling from his brow. “What’s happened?”
“A video was released early this morning. You need to get ahead of it.”
She hurried after her aide, unused to following her staffer madly through the halls of the Senate. “What kind of video?”
“You’ll see.”
She wondered what new horrors AQ had committed. “Another beheading?”
Brandow shook his head and picked up the pace as he led her to her office. “It’s hard to explain. You’ll have to watch for yourself.”
Hers was the second-biggest office in the capital, a perk of being the Senate Minority Leader, and only slightly smaller than her previous Senate Majority Leader office. But the recent elections had shifted the balance of power and she had been evicted the day after the elections.
Moving defeated senators out and newly elected senators in is the only thing they do quickly in this town.
They entered the inner chambers of her office, and Brandow waved the other staffers out. As her staff members filed out, they cast worried glances their way.
Brandow sat at her desk and hit play on the video clip on his laptop. She watched as the man threw the hospital equipment through the window, then jumped, his descent slowed only by the drone he clutched. The man slammed into the pavement, then a transit van slid to a halt. A woman helped the man into the van and they sped off. “What the hell is that?”
“What’s your first impression?” Brandow asked, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down.
“I’m not in the mood, Walter. What is this?”
“Footage from Zürich. It was released on a hackers’ forum this morning, and it’s spreading like wildfire. They claim it’s an operative.”
“Who is claiming that?”
“The Digital Freedom Alliance—”
“The DFA?” she asked. “Don’t they hack banks?”
Brandow shrugged. “Maybe their priorities have changed.”
She stood and walked around her desk. “This was in Switzerland? Could it be true?”
“There are confirmed reports from Zürich. There was a bombing, and a man did die.”
“Have they identified the victim?”
“Klaus Holzinger.”
“Holzinger,” she murmured. “He’s the CEO of… Dynoson. I met him, once, at a gala in Munich. Why would anyone want him dead?”
“Is the DFA correct?”
She whipped around. “It’s not us. Why on earth would we assassinate the head of a multinational oil company? Besides, I would have been briefed.”
Brandow quickly looked away. “Are you sure?”
She turned her glare on him. “Yes, Walter. I’m sure.”
Brandow nodded. “If you say so, Senator.”
“Get Simmons. I want to speak to him.”
Brandow nodded and dialed the phone. She turned back to her fireplace until Brandow said, “Ma’am? I’ve got Simmons on the line.”
She grabbed the phone from Brandow’s hand. “I just watched a video—”
“We are aware of the video,” Simmons said.
“This wasn’t us?”
“Of course not.”
“You’re sure?”
There was a pause before Simmons said, “As sure as I can be.”
He… hesitated? “What does that mean?”
“It means that officially the US isn’t behind it, and the man in the video isn’t an American citizen.”
“You’re the CIA Director’s right-hand man,” she said. “How could you not know?”
The phone was silent, and she almost wondered if Simmons had hung up. Finally, he said, “I promise you, Senator, that’s all I know.”
“But?” she prompted.
“You might try the DNI,” Simmons said. There was a click as the phone went dead.
She sat there, dumbfounded, then turned to Brandow. “Get me an appointment with Kellerman.”
Brandow Adam’s apple bobbed up and down again. “That might—”
“Do it, Walter. I want to see him. Today.”
Walter nodded. “Yes, Senator.”
She harrumphed, then stormed across the office and threw open the door. Her staffers were standing around texting people or engaged in chitchat. “Get back to work,” she yelled. “Don’t forget we have that banking vote coming up.”
As her staff got back to work, she tried to put the video out of her mind. The banking vote was important, both to her personally and to the country, and she needed to get at least a few Republicans to break rank and vote for it.
But, as the day progressed, her mind kept wandering back to the odd catch in Simmons’s voice.
The sun was barely up, and the traffic was light when Deion pulled the transit van into the IKEA parking lot. The store was still closed, and the lot was empty.
Perfect.
He held up the C-4 charge. With the right placement, the small IED would make a suitable distraction. He had two more just like it in the passenger seat. Attached to the windows of a few local businesses, they would make Zürich seem like it had become a war zone.
He pulled out his phone and tapped the entry for Clayberg’s burner phone.
“Miss me, baby?” the pilot whispered.
“Funny,” Deion growled. “Is the Gulfstream ready?”
“The candle is ready to light.”
“How’s the security around the airport?”
“Um,” Clayberg said. “About that. There’s military here.”
“What?”
“Yeah. They’ve surrounded the C-17. It’s not going anywhere.”
“Damn it.” Without the C-17, they couldn’t get the van or their gear out of the county. “Did you—”
“I yanked the boxes from the C-17 and loaded them into the Gulfstream before things got hot.”
Thank God.
The last thing they needed was the Swiss Army finding John’s Battlesuit or VISOR. “Good job, Hot Dog.”
“Don’t get all teary-eyed yet. They’re inspecting every plane.”
Deion slammed his fist against the steering wheel. “What about the gear?”