Jack followed his boss into the large hall, painted in government-issue grey, filled with Secret Service agents, FBI agents and local law enforcement. Anyone who had anything at all to do with the security arrangements for the inauguration occupied a seat in the room. He’d known there was going to be a wide variety of agencies represented here, but this was not what he expected.
At the head of the massive hall was a large scale model of the inauguration route right down to every building, street, and alley between the Capitol and the White House. Every bush, garbage can and street lamp on the actual route had its miniaturized duplicate on the model. Even the street signs and storefronts were perfectly recreated.
Doyle and Collins silently took their seats at one end of the table next to Cavanaugh and Doyle’s top aide, Agent Diane Johansen. Seated at the opposite end of the table was Arthur’s Chief of Staff, the FBI’s Director Matt Barnes, and D.C.’s recently sworn-in police chief. The chief looked like you would expect someone to look on their fourth day in a new job with so much on the line.
Nervous as hell, Jack thought. Well, Chief, welcome to the club.
As Jack took up his position behind the table, Doyle quickly rose from his seat and held up his hands. The steady murmur of voices that had filled the room instantly trailed off into silence.
“Good morning, ladies and gentlemen,” Doyle greeted as he lowered his hands. “Thank you for attending today’s briefing. We will begin with FBI Special Agent Jack Del Rio’s report on the inaugural route.”
Jack felt the weight of every set of eyes centering in on him. A small handful of people in the room were well aware of what his involvement had been in preventing the London terror attack on the Royal family, despite every effort having been made to keep the story classified. He’d been the only man in position to stop the terror plot and had single-handedly accounted for all six terrorists ending up being dead, and not one member of the Royals suffering so much as a scratch, with the additional bonus of having done so and remained alive in the process.
As for those in the room who had no idea that he’d been a part of that incident they were all too aware of his recent exploits out west in the Four Corners region. He’d brought down an international serial killer—one that no one in law enforcement anywhere on the planet had even been aware of in the first place—despite being very seriously wounded.
No matter the level of their knowledge, to everyone in the room, the record of Jack Del Rio was one to be respected and made him a man to be listened to in these matters.
For a brief moment Jack paused, his thoughts tapping him a few months back in the past and the terrible price paid to bring an end to a serial killer’s reign of terror.
Collins saw the haunted look flash across Jack’s face and knew it for what it was. He knew he was equally helpless to do anything more than offer whatever verbal support he could, knowing it was of little comfort to his friend. Jack caught Collins’ looking at him, gave him the slightest smile and nod of appreciation before shaking himself free of the memory and resumed concentrating on something he could do, worry about the now.
“Director Doyle,” Jack said in a tone one never uses on a Director of any federal agency and definitely not the Secret Service, drawing Doyle’s attention and a harsh look along with it. “I assume you've begun sealing up all of the mailboxes, dumpsters, manhole covers and any other point of ingress or egress within the area?”
“Of course,” Doyle all but growled in reply.
“Remove them,” Jack barked right back. “All of them. Today.”
“What!” Doyle replied. “Why would we waste our time doing that?”
“Director Doyle, you know full well that the types of terrorist we deal with today are capable of putting a bomb anywhere. Not only in a suicide vest on a human body, but in the lining of a trash can, a false panel on a mailbox, a pressure cooker in a backpack or even within a manhole cover as well. Remove them and replace all of the manhole covers with new ones, then weld them shut. Then have a cop standing on top of every single one of them until after the ceremony is over.”
Looking out at the sea of faces, Jack saw many heads nodding in approval.
“Do the same with any below surface access points,” Jack added, fully on a roll. “Do the same as well with any container located within a five-mile radius of the route. And thoroughly sweep the area, above and below ground, at least once a day, if not more often.”
“Do you have any idea of the kind of disruption to the area that you would create by doing that?” Doyle asked.
“Which do you prefer, Director,” Jack countered, his tone brutally sharp, “a postal customer that has been slightly inconvenienced or dealing with a dead president?”
The room was deadly silent as Jack’s words sank in…and he wasn’t done yet. “Have we truly forgotten the lessons of Beirut? Saudi Arabia? Oklahoma City? 9/11? Boston? Terrorists with an eye on slaying the President of the United States aren't content with single-shot rifles or revolvers. They aren't worried about getting away either. Their only concern is the elimination of their target. If you've got some groups out there seriously planning an attempt on the President, you can bet they have their pieces into place. Sweep the area clean every day.”
“The security we already have in the Federal buildings here in D.C.—” Doyle protested.
“Is not adequate,” Jack interrupted harshly. “Your best line of defense is the people you have deployed. Staying suspicious activity in the area is your best chance to prevent a disaster…and that means everything and everyone.” Jack addressed the audience at large. “You cannot assume that the man in a black suit and tie with an earpiece is actually a real member of the Secret Service.”
Jack paused as a murmur passed through the crowd. Apparently, word of his exploits at the parade run-through had leaked out. Doyle’s face turned crimson.
“We have to assume everything and everyone is a threat. No matter how crazy or unlikely it seems. If you pass off something as unlikely, that could be the one thing an attacker has decided to try this time. All they have to do to succeed is be right just one time and have us be wrong just that one time, too. Keep an eye on the crowd and assume a threat is likely at every moment. Keep an eye on everyone in the procession and assume each one of them is a threat. Don’t even discount the unlikely scenario that the person just sworn into high office is a direct threat in some way.”
Out of the corner of his eye he caught a startled look pass between Collins and Cavanaugh. But before he could begin to try to figure out why, his attention was drawn elsewhere.
“Isn’t that taking things too far?” someone called out from the audience.
“Is it?” Jack replied in dead earnest. “The point is, if you remain open to any possibility, no matter how unlikely or crazy it may seem in this room, you will be more likely to respond to whatever threat does manifest itself a lot quicker than you will if you are standing there thinking everything is covered and nothing could possibly go wrong.
“Those precious seconds of reaction time will make the difference in everyone going home alive and a body lying in state in the Capitol Building next week.”
Johansen, who’d been alternately eying the model and Jack as he’d been speaking, looked up at her boss. Jack realized only at that very moment that she had played the role of Mrs. Arthur in his destructive demonstration earlier.
“Director,” she said quietly. “I think he may be right.”
Doyle looked down at his aide with the air of a man bitten by a puppy he’d just rescued. He looked back down at the model for a few moments, visibly assessing it in light of what had just been said.
“Any more insights, Agent Del Rio?” he asked with only the slightest hint of annoyance in his voice.
“Just this,” Jack replied as he pulled a sheaf of seven white pages from his jacket pocket. They were stapled together and folded in half. Each page had a photograph of a building and several paragraphs of typed notes on th
em.
“This model is complete in every detail, including the buildings along the route,” Jack said as he handed the pages over to Doyle. “But what about the high-rise buildings beyond that lie within three thousand yards of the route? They are not depicted here yet there are seven buildings within that range where a sniper with a high-powered rifle or, god-forbid, an RPG can easily target the procession from any one of dozens of rooms.
“I checked, Director, none of your agents has even checked these buildings nor has anyone been assigned to watch them during the inauguration. I have included adjustments to your security arrangements to neutralize any threat from those buildings.”
Doyle leafed through the pages before handing them over to Johansen. Collins looked like he was having trouble keeping a straight face, while Cavanaugh was staring at Jack intently. The rest of the room seemed poised on edge, waiting to see if Doyle was going to turn any redder than he already was.
“Thank you, Agent Del Rio,” Doyle finally said, so quietly that Jack had trouble hearing him. “If you'll excuse us, it would appear that we have some work to do.”
Hearing the dismissal, Jack nodded and quickly departed, seeing many nods of approval aimed his way from the audience as he left.
“I told you he knew his stuff, Jeremy,” Collins said, allowing as much of a smile as he thought Doyle would tolerate.
Doyle opened his mouth to retort, but whatever he was about to say died before it got out when his cell phone flared to life. Doyle had set certain tones so that he could immediately judge if the call was important enough to take or ignore. The tone that filled the air was one he did not want to hear. He snatched the phone out of his pocket.
“Doyle,” he answered. As Cavanaugh and Collins watched, Doyle’s face turned an alarming shade of white. “Is it confirmed?”
After hearing the reply, Doyle ended the call and slipped the phone back into his pocket. For a few moments, Doyle stood there in silent shock. Cavanaugh knew what the call had been about and merely looked at Doyle in faux concern.
“What is it, Jeremy?” Collins asked.
“Norman Cashman’s plane crashed a few hours ago,” Doyle replied quietly. “It was confirmed he was on the flight, and there were no survivors.”
“Do they know what happened?”
“Not yet. There was no mayday. I hope to god it was mechanical failure and just a run of the mill accident.”
“Why?” Cavanaugh asked.
“Because if it wasn’t,” Doyle replied, turning to see Del Rio exiting the building, “then Baker’s wunderkind there was right, and we failed to do our job.”
Unaware of what was unfolding behind him, Jack exited the building happy that he had jolted Doyle and his people. He hoped that his shock therapy would have them examining everything with a renewed commitment. Maybe, just maybe, they’d stumble across whoever was behind the conspiracy he was working against and could help him stop it.
That had been the hardest part of it all, being in a room filled with people who could be of valuable assistance to him and not being able to reach out to any of them for help. Conversely any one or more of those same people could also be a part of the plot and would instantly know he was on to them and attack him without ever showing their faces.
At least now he was free to focus all of his energy on the problem at hand. Doyle wouldn’t think twice about not seeing Del Rio around, not after the verbal beating he’d just absorbed, and no one in the Bureau would expect to see Jack around as he had been attached to the Secret Service.
Once outside and away from prying eyes, Jack pulled out another folded piece of paper from his jacket pocket that was a near match to the seven he’d handed over to Doyle inside. This page held a photograph of the eighth building Jack had identified as a potential threat to the procession.
He’d inspected the roof of the building personally and discovered a small half shed near the elevator shaft on the rooftop. That shed provided perfect cover for a sniper from any eyes in the sky or the nearby buildings. It also provided a perfect window to open fire on the Presidential party as it made its way up Pennsylvania Avenue.
Jack unfolded the paper and looked long at hard at the photograph before folding it up again and putting it back in his pocket. He’d withheld it from Doyle for a reason that he fervently hoped he’d never see come to fruition.
It had struck him on the way over to the briefing that there was a chance that he could uncover whoever the conspiracy’s man was, Arthur, Cashman’s replacement, or perhaps even both, and still not be able to prove it enough to put a stop to it.
If it came right down to it, in order to stop the plot and save his country, Jack had come to the conclusion that he might have to do in real life what he’d just recently done in a mock scenario. Against all of his training and against all he had sworn to uphold, he realized that he just might have no other choice but to kill the President and Vice-President of the United States of America himself.
EIGHT
“Thank you very much, Mr. President,” President-elect Bill Arthur said into the phone. “I’ll be sure to pass that along to Norm’s family. Thank you for calling.”
Arthur hung up the phone and stood silently looking out his hotel room window, suffering greatly from this loss. Cashman had been more than just a running mate to bring in key electoral votes in November and to serve as a critical tie-breaking vote in a bitterly-divided Senate. Arthur had counted Cashman as a longtime friend as well. When Arthur had made the decision to make a run for the White House, Cashman had been the first to encourage him to do so. Cashman had been the first to endorse him and had been his first choice as Vice-President despite the objections, some quiet strident, of many of his advisors.
Kellen Paxton, the sitting Governor of Virginia, had been the pundits’ clear choice to run with Arthur. He’d been the choice of a few of his inner circle as well, those same strident opponents of Cashman he’d noted, and it had seemed as if their view would prevail. But Arthur had rejected that choice and taken Cashman in his place.
In the days, months and years to come Arthur knew he would need someone he could trust above all others. Cashman was, as he had been for some time, that someone.
“What do we know so far,” Arthur asked as he turned away from the window to face the room full of people who all wore the same look of shock on their faces; the same one he knew to be on his own. Every face save one, which held a look of anger and shame, the face he’d addressed his question to.
“We have very little to go on regarding the crash itself, sir,” Doyle replied quietly. “The plane went down in a very remote area in the mountains that is nearly impossible to get to. We still don’t know why it went down since there was no mayday from the pilots before it dropped from the radar. It may be some time before we can determine exactly what happened but until we do we are going to heighten security, just in case.”
“Dear God,” Arthur murmured. “You don’t think the plane was deliberately brought down do you?”
“We just don’t know, sir,” Doyle answered, feeling the bitter irony of echoing Del Rio’s admonishment to take nothing at face value from the briefing less than an hour ago. “Right now we aren’t taking anything for granted until we have definite answers…” Doyle paused, “Sir, can you think of any reason why Cashman was coming back from Atlanta ahead of schedule? Did he contact you or anyone on your staff last night?”
“I have no idea,” Arthur answered before turning to his Chief of Staff. “Michael?”
“No one here had heard a word from them other than they were eating a late dinner, then calling it a night. They weren’t supposed to fly back from Atlanta until tomorrow afternoon. Whatever the reason was, no one on that plane seemed to have told anyone else they were coming or why.”
“Damn,” Doyle said softly. “I’m sorry, sir, but until we get to the crash site, all we know for sure at this time is that Mister Cashman and everyone that had flown down to Atlanta boarded that plane
last night in a hurry, heading for D.C., and the plane never made it here.”
“I was told there isn’t much left of the plane,” Arthur said. “What answers do you expect to find there?”
“I honestly don’t know, but I sincerely hope we find that this was just a tragic accident and that they didn’t suffer before the end.”
“I’ll second that, Director,” Arthur said. “Please keep me advised the minute you have any new information.”
“You can count on that, sir,” Doyle said as he turned to leave the room.
“Bill, there is something we do need to discuss…”
“Damnit, Georgina,” Arthur exploded, happily venting some of the grief that threatened to overwhelm him, “can’t you at least wait for the bodies to get cold?”
“This close to the inauguration?” Soors asked without missing a beat. She had been one of Arthur’s largest donors and had played a huge role during the campaign in getting him the nomination and winning the November vote. “A new president has never been sworn in following an election without a vice-president. Under the circumstances you could easily name Paxton to replace Cashman and no one would object.”
“Isn’t this a little too cold-blooded?” Arthur asked, sick of political maneuvering invading even this tragic event. “Even for you?”
“Yes, it is cold-blooded.” Soors brushed aside the rebuke like it was nothing more than a gnat. “It is also practical and prudent. Let’s say, god forbid, something should happen to you before you named Cashman’s replacement. Then the Speaker of the House becomes President of the United States. Do you really want someone from the other party residing in the White House after spending over a year making sure they didn’t add the Oval Office to their holdings? Bad enough they have control of the House and the Senate—”
“Alright,” Arthur broke in, throwing up his hands in disgust to stop Soors from going off on another of her tiresome partisan rants. Arthur actually intended to work with both parties equally, despite Soors self-declared holy war. “But we will wait at least a few days before doing it, out of respect for the grieving families, if that is quite alright with you?”
Jack Del Rio: Complete Trilogy: Reservations, Betrayals, Endgames Page 29