Blowback

The pilot launched the countermeasures. Bright flares and flaming pieces of chaff spewed in all directions, showering the motorcade with hot debris and forcing the security personnel not only to shut themselves back inside their vehicles, but also to throw them in reverse and back as far away from the Chinook as possible.

As Harvath prepared himself for a second run, the voice of the pilot came over his headset and said, “The tower has made contact with the motorcade. They are pulling back. I repeat, they are pulling back. Bomb technicians are on their way to examine the aircraft.”

Letting go of the grips of the M60, Harvath fell back onto one of the seats and wondered where the hell he could find a beer in this country.

NINETY-THREE

DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COMMITTEE H EADQUARTERS

WASHINGTON, DC

Just to prove that she could play ball, Helen Carmichael had abandoned her pantsuit in favor of a gray flannel Armani skirt that came just below mid-thigh, a crisp white blouse with French cuffs, black Jimmy Choo alligator heels, and a matching black alligator belt. Feeling not only on top of the world, but also a bit risqué, she had left the top three buttons of her blouse unbuttoned and had given her navel stud a good polishing before putting it in this morning. Today was going to be one of the most important days of her life.

She had sent Neal Monroe personally to Russ Mercer’s office with a peace offering of sorts. Inside the confidential file, which her assistant had been instructed to deliver only to the DNC chairman himself, was but a fraction of the proof she had uncovered, thanks to Brian Turner, that President Jack Rutledge had been running his own private black ops unit. The incendiary file was her ticket to the big leagues. There was no way the party could say no to her being on the ticket, not with what she had been able to uncover.

In addition to tampering with the supposedly “free” and “democratic” elections of several foreign nations, Rutledge had also authorized the assassination of at least half a dozen foreign officials hostile to U.S. policy abroad-and that was only the tip of the iceberg. Rutledge represented all that the world saw was wrong with America, and Helen Carmichael was going to take particular pleasure in watching him burn.

He had also been helping one of his private covert operators, Scot Harvath, avoid service of the subpoena she had prepared demanding he appear before her committee. As if monkeying around with American foreign policy wasn’t enough to incense voters, the fact that Rutledge was subverting the Constitution and flagrantly breaking several federal laws was going to send the populace of the United States into an uproar.

Sitting in the back of her town car as it made its way to the Democratic National Committee Headquarters, she had tried to decide where she should start in dismantling the Rutledge administration. Of course, she’d discuss it with Russ Mercer to show she was a team player, but in reality she’d already made up her mind. The world was still enraged about the senseless beating of the Iraqi fruit merchant by a faceless American GI. That was the most logical place to begin. She’d trot Harvath out in front of the cameras and throw the book and anything else she could get at him. It would go a long way in helping to repair America ’s image abroad, and she would be hailed as the woman who broke the case and made it all happen.

Once she had broken Harvath’s back, she could leapfrog right onto Rutledge’s and enjoy the ride down as his career and his presidency crashed and burned. Any designs she had had on slowly leaking the information she’d collected were now a thing of the past. It wasn’t enough to simply weaken him and cream his ticket in the election. They needed to force Rutledge to resign, or better yet to impeach him before the election, so that the Republicans would be forced to throw another candidate in at the last minute. It didn’t matter who they came up with, the American people would be so sick of the Republicans and so distrusting of their party that the Democrats would sail right into the White House. It was so close she could taste it.

As she now sat in Russ Mercer’s outer office, Helen Carmichael paid particular attention to how he had furnished the space and what it said about the DNC and its chairman. While her own office in the Hart Senate Office Building had been decorated with mementos from Pennsylvania in an attempt to make her appear fond of the state she represented, once she was in the White House she could finally do what she pleased. In fact, knowing what terrible taste both her future running mate, Governor Farnsworth of Minnesota, and his wife had, she was already looking ahead to what she could do not only in her office at the White House, but with all the other rooms as well.