The President Is Missing: A Novel (18 page)

H
ow long do we have?” I ask Augie. “When does the virus detonate?”

“Saturday in America,” he says. “This is all I know.”

The same thing the director of Mossad said.

“Then we have to go right now,” I say, rushing past Augie, grabbing his arm.

“Go where?”

“I’ll tell you in the—”

I turn too quickly, feeling like I overspun the room, a loss of balance, a sharp pain in my ribs, wood stabbing me—the edge of the couch—the ceiling flashing before my eyes and spinning—

I take a step forward, but something doesn’t work, my leg buckling, the ground not where it’s supposed to be—everything sideways—

“Mr. President!” Jacobson, his arms under me, catching me, my face only inches from the carpet.

“Dr. Lane,” I whisper, reaching into my pocket.

The room dancing around me.

“Call…Carolyn,” I manage. I hold up my phone, weaving back and forth, before Jacobson takes it from my hand. “She knows…what to do…”

“Ms. Brock!” Jacobson shouts into the phone. Instructions given, orders received, all in a faint echo, not Jacobson’s normal voice, in combat mode.

Not now. It can’t be now.

“He’s gonna be okay, right?”

“How soon?”

Saturday in America. Saturday in America will be very soon.

Mushroom cloud. Searing red heat sweeping the countryside. Where is our leader? Where is the president?

“Not…now…”

“Tell her to hurry!”

We have no ability to respond, Mr. President.

They disabled our systems, Mr. President.

What are we going to do, Mr. President?

What are
you
going to do, Mr. President?

“Stay down, sir. Help is on the way.”

I’m not ready. Not yet.

No, Rachel, I’m not ready to join you, not yet.

Saturday in America.

Silence, the soft ring of dead, endless, shapeless space.

“Where the hell is the doctor?”

And bright light.

V
ice President Katherine Brandt opens her eyes, snatched from the fog of a dream. She hears the sound again, knuckles rapping on her bedroom door.

The door parts slightly, and the knock is louder. The face of Peter Evian, her chief of staff, peering through her door. “Sorry to wake you, Madam Vice President,” he says.

She recognizes nothing around her for a moment, takes a second to get her bearings. She is in the subbasement, sleeping alone, though
alone
is a relative term, considering that agents are standing outside the door of this small bedroom.

She reaches for her phone on the nightstand and checks the time: 1:03 a.m.

“Yes, Peter, come in.” She speaks calmly. Always be ready. She says it to herself every day. Because it could happen any time, day or night, without notice. A bullet. An aneurysm. A heart attack. Such is the life of a vice president.

She sits up in bed. Peter, dressed in a shirt and tie as always, walks in and hands her his phone, open to a website, a newspaper article.

The headline:
THE PRESIDENT IS MISSING.

Sources at the White House, says the article, confirm that the president is not at the White House. And more to the point, they don’t know
where
he is.

The speculation is all over the place, ranging from plausible to implausible to downright ridiculous: a return of his blood disease, and he’s gravely ill. He left town to prepare for the select committee hearings. He’s huddling with close aides to prepare a resignation speech. He’s running off with ill-gotten money from Suliman Cindoruk, fleeing the country to avoid prosecution.

The president and vice president are secure,
the official statement said last night, after the explosion on the bridge, the shoot-out at Nationals Park. That was it. That was probably the right way to go. Tell everyone their leaders are safe and sound, but don’t specify their precise location. Nobody would expect or demand otherwise.

But this article is saying that his own people don’t know where he is.

She doesn’t, either.

“I need Carolyn Brock,” she says.

C
arolyn Brock, notes the vice president, is wearing the same suit as she was wearing yesterday. As if that weren’t enough, her bloodshot eyes confirm her lack of sleep.

It seems the indefatigable chief of staff never went home last night.

They sit inside a conference room in the operations center below the White House, at opposite ends of a long table. The vice president would have preferred to hold the meeting in her private office in the West Wing, but she was sent underground last night as part of the continuity-of-government protocol, and she sees no reason to rock that boat right now.

“Where’s Alex Trimble?” she asks.

“He’s not available, Madam Vice President.”

Her eyes narrow. That squint, her aides used to tell her, was what everyone feared the most, her steely but silent way of communicating her unhappiness with an answer.

“That’s it? He’s ‘not available’?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Her blood boils. Technically, Katherine Brandt is the second-most-powerful person in the country. Everyone treats her as such, at least officially. She must admit that, however much she resented Jon Duncan for leapfrogging her and snatching away the nomination that was rightfully hers, and however hard she had to bite her tongue and accept her place as second fiddle, the president has given her the role he promised, seeking her input, giving her a seat at the table for all major decisions. Duncan has kept up his end of the bargain.

Still, they both know that Carolyn is the one with the real power in this room.

“Where’s the president, Carolyn?”

Carolyn opens her hands, ever the diplomat. Brandt can’t resist a grudging respect for the chief of staff, who has twisted arms in Congress, kept the trains running on time, and held the West Wing staff in line, all in service of the president’s agenda. Back when Carolyn was in Congress herself, before that unfortunate stumble she had on a live mike, a lot of people had her pegged as a future Speaker, maybe even a presidential candidate. Well spoken, well prepared, quick on her feet, a solid campaigner, attractive but not beauty-queen gorgeous—the perpetual tightrope women in politics must walk—Carolyn could have been one of the best.

“I asked you where the president is, Carolyn.”

“I can’t answer that, Madam Vice President.”

“Can’t or won’t?” The vice president flips her hand. “Do
you
know where he is? Can you tell me
that
much?”

“I know where he is, ma’am.”

“Is he…” She shakes her head. “Is he okay? Is he secure?”

Carolyn’s head leans to one side. “He’s with the Secret Service, if that’s what—”

“Oh, Jesus
Christ,
Carolyn, can’t you give me a straight answer?”

They lock eyes for a moment. Carolyn Brock is no pushover. And her loyalty to the president transcends all else. If she has to take a few bullets for the man, she’ll do it.

“I am not authorized to tell you where he is,” she says.

“The president said that. He said you can’t tell me.”

“The order wasn’t specific to you, of course, ma’am.”

“But it includes me.”

“I can’t give you the information you want, Madam Vice President.”

The vice president slams her hands down on the table, pushes herself out of her chair. “Since when,” she says after a moment, “does the president go into hiding from
us?
”

Carolyn stands, too, and they stare at each other again. She doesn’t expect Carolyn to respond, and Carolyn doesn’t disappoint her. Most people would wilt under the gaze, under the discomfort of silence, but Brandt is pretty sure that Carolyn will stare back at her all night if that’s what it takes.

“Is there anything else, Madam Vice President?” That same cool efficiency in her voice, which only unnerves the vice president all the more.

“Why are we on lockdown?” she asks.

“The violence last night,” says Carolyn. “Just a precau—”

“No,” she says. “The violence last night was an FBI and Secret Service investigation, right? A counterfeiting investigation? That’s what was announced publicly, at least.”

The chief of staff doesn’t speak, doesn’t move. That story always sounded bogus to Brandt.

“That violence—it might require a brief lockdown initially,” she continues. “A few minutes, an hour, while we sort it all out. But I’ve been down here all night. Am I supposed to remain down here?”

“For the time being, yes, ma’am.”

She walks toward Carolyn and stops just short. “Then don’t tell me it’s because of the violence in the capital last night. Tell me why we’re
really
on lockdown. Tell me why we’re in a continuity-of-government protocol. Tell me why the president fears for his life right now.”

Carolyn blinks hard a few times but otherwise remains stoic. “Ma’am, I was given a direct order by the president for a lockdown, for COG protocol. It’s not my place to question that order. It’s not my place to ask why. And it’s not—” She looks away, curls her lips inside her mouth.

“And it’s not
my
place, either—is that what you were going to say, Carolyn?”

Carolyn turns and looks her in the eye. “Yes, ma’am. That’s what I was going to say.”

The vice president slowly nods, doing a slow burn.

“Is this about impeachment?” she asks, though she couldn’t imagine how.

“No, ma’am.”

“Is this a matter of national security?”

Carolyn doesn’t answer, makes a point of remaining still.

“Is this about Dark Ages?”

Carolyn flinches but doesn’t, won’t, answer that question.

“Well, Ms. Brock,” she says, “I may not be president—”

Yet
.

“—but I
am
the vice president. I don’t take orders from you. And I haven’t heard a lockdown order from the president. He knows how to reach me. I’m in the phone book. Anytime he wants to ring me and tell me what the
hell
is going on.”

She turns and heads for the door.

“Where are you going?” Carolyn asks, her voice different, stronger, less deferential.

“Where do you
think
I’m going? I have a full day. Including an interview with
Meet the Press,
whose first question I’m sure will be ‘Where’s the president?’”

And more important, and before that: the meeting she scheduled last night, after receiving the phone call in her personal residence. It could be one of the most interesting meetings of her life.

“You aren’t leaving the operations center.”

The vice president stops at the doorway. She turns to face the White House chief of staff, who just spoke to her in a way that nobody ever has since the election—since long before that, actually. “Ex
cuse
me?”

“You heard what I said.” The chief of staff is done, apparently, with any semblance of deference. “The president wants you in the operations center.”

“And
you
hear
me,
you unelected flunky. I only take orders from the president. Until I hear from him, I’ll be in my office in the West Wing.”

She walks out of the room into the hallway, where her chief of staff, Peter Evian, looks up from his phone.

“What’s happening?” he asks, keeping pace with her.

“I’ll tell you what’s
not
happening,” she says. “I’m not going down with this ship.”

T
he calm before the storm.

The calm, that is, not for him but for them, for his people, his small crew of computer geniuses, who’ve spent the last twelve hours living the good life. Fondling women who normally would never bother to glance in their direction, who screwed them ten different ways, showed them delights they’d never experienced in their young lives. Drinking Champagne from bottles that typically reach the lips of only the world’s elite. Feasting on a smorgasbord of caviar and paté and lobster and filet mignon.

They are sleeping now, all of them, the last of them retiring only an hour ago. None of them will be up before noon. None of them will be of any use today.

That’s okay. They’ve done their part.

Suliman Cindoruk sits on the penthouse terrace, cigarette burning between his fingers, smartphones and laptops and coffee on the table next to him, pulling apart a croissant as he lifts his face into the morning sunlight.

Enjoy this tranquil morning,
he reminds himself.
Because when the sun rises over the river Spree this time tomorrow, there will be no peace.

He puts his breakfast to the side. He can’t find peace himself. Can’t bring himself to eat, the acid swimming in his stomach.

He pulls over his laptop, refreshes the screen, scrolls through the top news online.

The lead story: the aborted plot to assassinate King Saad ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia and the dozens of arrests and detentions of suspects in its wake. The possible motives, according to the newswires and the supposedly “informed” pundits who fill the cable channels: The new king’s pro-democracy reforms. His liberalization of women’s rights. His hard-line stance against Iran. Saudi involvement in the civil war in Yemen.

Story number two: the events in Washington last night, the firefight and explosion on the bridge, the shoot-out at the stadium, the temporary lockdown of the White House. Not terrorism, the federal authorities said. No, it was all part of a counterfeiting investigation conducted jointly by the FBI and the Treasury Department. So far, the media seems to be buying it, only a few hours into the story.

And the blackout at the stadium immediately preceding the shoot-out—a coincidence? Yes, say the federal authorities. Just mere happenstance that a stadium full of people, and everyone within a quarter-mile radius, happened to experience a massive power outage just a heartbeat or two before federal agents and counterfeiters lit up Capitol Street as if they were reenacting the famous gunfight at the O.K. Corral.

President Duncan must know that this ludicrous story will not hold forever. But he probably doesn’t care. The president is just buying time.

But he doesn’t know how much time he has.

One of Suli’s phones buzzes. The burner. The text message traveled around the globe before reaching him, through anonymous proxies, pinging remote servers in a dozen different countries. Someone trying to trace the text message would land anywhere from Sydney, Australia, to Nairobi, Kenya, to Montevideo, Uruguay.

Confirm we are on schedule,
the message reads.

He smirks. As if they even know what the schedule is.

He writes back:
Confirm Alpha is dead.

“Alpha,” meaning Nina.

In all the stories online about the violence last night at the baseball stadium, the shoot-out and explosion on the bridge between the capital and Virginia, there was no mention of a dead woman.

He hits Send, waits while the text message travels its circuitous route.

A flutter runs through him. The sting of betrayal, Nina’s betrayal. And loss, too. Perhaps even he didn’t fully appreciate his feelings for her. Her revolutionary mind. Her hard, agile body. Her voracious appetite for exploration, in the world of cyberwarfare and in the bedroom. The hours and days and weeks they spent collaborating, challenging each other, feeding each other ideas, offering up and shooting down hypotheses, trials and errors, huddling before a laptop, theorizing over a glass of wine or naked in bed.

Before she lost interest in him romantically. That he could live with. He had no intention of remaining with one woman. But he could never understand how she could take up with Augie, of all people, the homely troll.

Stop
. He touches his eyes. There’s no point.

The reply comes through:

We are told Alpha is confirmed dead.

That’s not quite the same thing as confirmation. But they’ve assured him of the professionalism and competence of the team they dispatched to America, and he has no choice but to believe them.

Suli sends back:
If Alpha is dead, we are on schedule.

The response comes so quickly that Suli assumes it crossed paths with his message:

Beta is confirmed alive and in custody.

“Beta,” meaning Augie. So he made it. He’s with the Americans.

Suli can’t help but smile.

Another message, so soon after the last one. They are nervous.

Confirm we are on schedule in light of this development.

He answers quickly:
Confirmed. On schedule.

They think they know the schedule for the detonation of the virus. They don’t.

Neither does Suli at this point. It’s now entirely in Augie’s hands.

Whether he realizes it or not.