“What exactly are you suggesting, Mr. President?”
“I am simply asking questions, Mr. Bennett.”
Bennett weighed his words carefully, but he had to respond. “I must tell you candidly, Mr. President, that your questions sound like veiled accusations, and I want to make sure I clearly convey to my government both the letter and the spirit of our conversation.”
Vadim said nothing.
“Are you suggesting,” Bennett continued, “that my government shot down an unarmed civilian passenger jet without provocation?”
Vadim leaned forward and set his hands on his desk. “I am suggesting nothing, Mr. Bennett. I am simply asking questions. But let us be candid. There are many in my country, and some in my own government, who believe your president has gotten — how shall we say? — a bit ‘trigger happy’ in recent years, even when the evidence for the use of military force is, well, let us just say a bit thin.”
“That’s a serious charge to make of a friend,” Bennett said. He could feel the blood rising up the back of his neck. His ears burned. His face felt flushed.
“These are serious times,” Vadim replied.
Keeping quiet wasn’t his strong suit, but Bennett tried to hold his tongue anyway. Where was the friend he had known so long? How many hours had he and McCoy spent with Vadim, trying to make peace in the Middle East? Now the man was trying to extort cash out of the American people for a crime they hadn’t committed. How was that possible? And what had happened to Golitsyn in the hours since his last e-mail? Why was nothing being said of the threat posed by Al-Nakbah, or the manhunt for Gogolov and Jibril?
Storm clouds had again gathered over the city, but rain was not expected until Sunday. From where he sat, Bennett could now see shadows moving through the gardens. His sense of unease was growing, and he glanced at McCoy. Did she feel it too?
Vadim motioned to Zyuganov, then whispered something in the man’s ear. Zyuganov picked up one of the phones on Vadim’s desk and punched a button to get an open line. It didn’t work. He punched another button, then a third and a fourth.
And suddenly there was a high-pitched whistle piercing the quiet.
16
“Jon, get down.”
Before he realized what was happening, McCoy grabbed his shirt and tie and pulled him to the floor, covering him with her body as a massive explosion rocked the building, sending chunks of plaster and concrete and shards of glass flying everywhere.
All power in the building suddenly went down, plunging them into darkness.
Soon flames engulfed the room, and the air filled with smoke.
Then came a second deafening explosion, and a third and a fourth. Bennett could barely see, but he could hear someone screaming in pain, and through the haze he thought he saw Golitsyn giving Vadim mouth-to-mouth as two bodyguards burst into the room.
Bennett could hear others shouting through the halls and over their radios for help. He could hear automatic gunfire in the courtyard, and then machine-gun rounds began ripping through the walls and furniture.
Agents dragged Vadim into Zyuganov’s office, locked the three principals inside, and called for reinforcements.
Bennett felt a searing pain in his chest, but his first concern was for McCoy.
“Erin, you OK?”
“I’m fine, Jon,” she whispered as she rolled off of him and scanned the room for a way of escape. “Just stay down.”
McCoy reached for her Beretta.
It wasn’t there, of course. For security reasons, she hadn’t been allowed to bring it into the building. She grabbed her phone and tried to speed-dial the U.S. Embassy’s emergency ops center, but there was no service. She reached for Bennett’s satellite phone, but it was too damaged to use.
A half dozen more agents now rushed into the room, weapons drawn. They barricaded the two sets of French doors with as much furniture as they could find, then took up positions at the windows and opened fire at dozens of armed men who had appeared on the grounds.
Bennett and McCoy were ordered into a far corner, out of the line of fire. The news coming in over the agents’ handheld radios was chaotic, but it was increasingly clear to McCoy that the compound was being overrun.
She could hear men screaming in pain and shouting curses at each other. Twice she heard someone shout for his colleagues to fall back as the building shook with more rounds of explosions. She could hear the rumbling of tanks in the streets, and she wondered whose side they were on.
Bennett covered his mouth with his hand.
He tried to keep the smoke and dust from filling his lungs. He began coughing violently. His hand was suddenly filled with bright red blood. He tried to call out but could barely breathe.
“Erin…”
McCoy carefully turned him over. It was as if his chest were on fire. The pain was excruciating. He saw McCoy recoil in horror. He moved his hand to his chest and felt his shirt soaked with blood. He wasn’t sure if he’d been shot or had punctured a lung when she’d pushed him to the ground. All he knew for sure was that once again, Mordechai had been right.
The coup was under way.
Marine One lifted off from the south lawn of the White House.
The president sat just behind the lead pilot, with the First Lady at his side. Behind them were Chief of Staff Bob Corsetti and Secret Service Agent Jackie Sanchez.
As the chopper banked north, MacPherson waved to a group of onlookers, then turned to a leather folder with their schedules and weekend call sheets.
Corsetti’s phone rang first.
“This is a FOX News Special Report.”
Marsha Kirkpatrick briefed Corsetti from the White House Situation Room on one phone as she took updates from Director Jack Mitchell at CIA on another. But for the moment the best information seemed to be coming from a FOX reporter broadcasting live from the roof of a hotel near the Kremlin.
The images were horrific. Hundreds of bodies lay in the streets. Tanks were on the move. Much of the city was on fire, and heavy machine-gun fire and explosions continued almost nonstop.
Kirkpatrick turned up the volume and put Corsetti on speakerphone.
“A feverish gun battle is under way in Moscow at this hour,” the correspondent yelled as she crouched behind a brick wall. “No word yet on the whereabouts or safety of President Vadim or his senior ministers. But I can tell you that many of the security forces brought in to protect the capital are actually leading the fight against the current regime.
“Information is sketchy so far. Power and phone lines throughout the city have been cut off. All Russian radio and TV stations are off the air. We’re operating on generator power, but it’s not clear at this point how long we’ll be able to continue.
“Hold on…. I’ve just been handed… FOX News has just learned that the American Embassy has been attacked…. I repeat, the American Embassy in Moscow is under attack and is presently on fire…. We have unconfirmed reports that rocket-propelled grenades…”
The president came on the line. “Marsha, it’s Mac.”
Kirkpatrick grabbed the receiver and clicked off the speakerphone.
“Mr. President, the rebels have seized the airports. They’ve taken over the main terminals and are driving eighteen-wheelers across the runways to keep any planes from landing or taking off.”