“Of course not, but they will. Just be careful.”
“I will — you know me.”
“Exactly. I know you — so be careful.”
Flynn tried to pretend like Osborne’s words hurt, but they didn’t. Osborne served as Flynn’s handler long enough to know that if there was trouble to be made, Flynn would make it.
Flynn slipped his phone into his pocket and joined the crush of people trying to get through the tight security checkpoints leading into the U.N.’s general assembly hall. He wondered if he could still stop an assassin — and if he could tie the Kuklovod to JFK’s assassination plot, capture them in the same day, and save the President’s life, then his assignment at today’s event just became far more interesting.
CHAPTER 21
Perhaps the mere suggestion that the President might get shot motivated the press corps to attend the Friday afternoon speech more than usual. Though Flynn didn’t regularly attend U.N. speeches, he couldn’t imagine this was the regular crush of reporters. Bodies jammed tightly together, shoving and pushing toward the closest entrance near press seating. Most would never see the inside of the general assembly hall, instead relegated to overflow rooms. For the lucky ones who grabbed seating inside, they sat a long distance from the podium. The U.N. placed diplomacy far above accommodating the media.
Despite his assignment to cover the speech, Flynn considered his unofficial assignment more important. He squirmed through the crush of reporters vying for the few seats in a high stakes game of musical chairs. Where he decided to watch the speech from required no seating.
Flynn walked into the room for a moment to scout it out. The U.N.’s general assembly hall was cavernous if anything. What it lacked in character it made up for with volume and innovative technology. The fact that 1,800 people could sit in this room and listen to a speech — and each person hear it in their native tongue — was remarkable if anything. Dozens of translator booths lined the back wall of the room. It was also heavily guarded and easily swept. Flynn doubted the Kuklovod had the ability to infiltrate such a guarded area that allowed only heavily vetted and credentialed translators.
The only other place that seemed more easily penetrable was the domed ceiling. Though Flynn suspected it had been swept, his CIA training taught him that hiding in such a place wasn’t impossible. If the Kuklovod contained the world’s best covert operatives, Flynn recognized the dome as being a possible location for a shooter — if that’s how they intended to kill President Briggs.
Now Flynn only had one problem: getting past security.
He scurried around the outside of the room, looking for access to the top. Security looked tight and he needed some luck if he was going to get by. And he had to do it fast. The speech was scheduled to begin in fifteen minutes.
To get to the catwalk area inside the dome, Flynn needed to get to the roof. No other location seemed more daunting as it was always heavily guarded. On his way he needed to think of something fast.
Away from the main entrance to the room, security was more lax if not non-existent. Flynn eyed a service stairwell entrance accessed only with a security card. With a drinking fountain nearby, he began gulping down water. Flynn kept an eye fixed on the door located just ten feet away, ready to grab it once a staff worker opened it. He didn’t have to wait long before someone opened the door. The heavy door nearly flung shut before Flynn could grab it, but he slipped his fingers in just in time. Before opening it all the way, he looked around to see if anyone noticed him. Everyone was too busy, lost in the minutiae of the day, to even notice him. That was the easy part.
Flynn waited until the person who opened the door disappeared through a door leading to the third floor, the highest floor adjacent to the main assembly hall. He causally walked up the steps while listening for the door. Once he passed the third floor, only two doors remained — one to the catwalk and one to the roof. He was all in now.
As Flynn continued to climb, he noticed a member of the Secret Service guarding the door to the catwalk. This isn’t going to be easy. He climbed quietly, looking up, until the agent heard his footsteps about one flight away from the landing.
“Hey, you can’t be up here!” the agent said.
“Relax, I’m CIA. Just came up here to check out what you’re doing,” Flynn said.
Once his face came into full view, the agent immediately recognized him.
“I know who you are and you’re not CIA!”
Before the agent could alert the rest of the team what was happening, Flynn struck the man’s throat before landing a left and right haymaker along each of his temples. He crumpled to the ground and tumbled down several steps before coming to a stop.
“Well, I used to be CIA,” Flynn said as he lifted the agent’s gun and walked back up the stairs. The agent was out cold.
Flynn checked the clip of the Sig Sauer P229 .357 handgun. The last thing he wanted was to get in a gunfight atop the general assembly hall, though it would make for great theater. He simply wanted to stop the Kuklovod — if he was right. And since he had just neutralized a Secret Service agent, Flynn was betting his career that he was right.
He quietly pulled open the door leading to the catwalk. Here we go.
CHAPTER 22
Sandford watched CNN’s live coverage of President Briggs’ speech from the U.N. He felt somewhat guilty for not caring about the content. A famine in Central Africa? Really? We’ve got Russia constructing missile silos along its eastern coast — just miles away from Alaska — and we’re worried about starving Africans. Gimme a break. Sandford took the President’s compassion as weakness.
President Briggs wore a tailored black suit with a non-descript blue tie. He clearly wanted the focus of his speech to be on the content, not on his appearance. It was a welcome change from the previous President who treated his position in the White House as if it were more about celebrity than statesmanship. Nevertheless, Sandford thought President Briggs had lost his way. Small points became large points of emphasis for his administration, yet he ignored the looming threat from Russia.
There was a time when African famines mattered to Sandford, too. His compassion ran deep for those in need. When he first sought to run for office, such issues drove him. He wanted to be the kind of statesman who leveraged American money and power into a force of global goodwill. It’s something he learned from his compassionate-hearted daughter.
When Sydney was six years old, she heard about an orphanage in India that would be shuttered if enough generous donations didn’t pour in. More than $40,000 was needed to keep the orphanage from sending its children back to the impoverished streets all alone. Sydney begged her father to build a lemonade stand so she could help. She raised $37 one Saturday and had her father mail off every penny to the orphanage. So moved by his daughter’s compassion, he added $1,000 of his own money. Along with a few other generous donors she had inspired to give as well, it was all just enough to keep the orphanage open. That was the kind of effect Sydney had on people, especially Sandford. Yet he realized that she was likely going to die in captivity — where she had been for the past sixteen years — if he couldn’t figure out a way to bring her home.
Lost in reminiscing about the past, Sandford’s ringing cell phone whisked him back to the present.
“Ready to become President?” the voice on the other end asked after he picked up.
“Who is this?” he demanded.
The caller ignored his question. “When you take office, the first thing you need to do is authorize a new missile defense system and show Russia you mean business. If you do this, I’ll know where your allegiances lie — then you must meet our other demands.”