The Last Days (6 page)

There it was, in black and white. The “dots” were “connected.” Radical Muslims in Gaza and the West Bank were soul mates with their brethren in Afghanistan, not to mention those in Tehran and Riyadh. They saw the world the same way. They fought for the same objectives. They'd supported each other in the same struggles. This was an alien world into which she and Bennett had just been submerged. It was an alien world out of which they now had to fight.

McCoy fought back a flood of emotions. Her own father had died fighting radical Islam. Was she destined to do the same? Sean McCoy had worked for the CIA. Now she did, too. He'd been a senior advisor to the president of the United States. Now she was, too. Despite his strong marriage, he'd struggled with putting his career ahead of love. Wasn't she doing that, too? “There are only two places for a woman,” a Taliban leader once said. “In her husband's house, and in the graveyard.”

Erin McCoy had no husband, and she didn't want to die.

Not here. Not yet.

MacPherson's head was pounding.

He hung up the phone and shut his eyes. In a few minutes, Jackie Sanchez of the United States Secret Service would be knocking on his door. She'd move him into the next room where he'd be patched through to the National Security Council via a secure satellite video teleconferencing system. But there were too many questions to answer. Could they mount a rescue operation? Should they ask the Israelis to? Could all this really be the work of one man? Why, then, the gun battle? And were these attacks isolated to the Palestinian territories? Or were they likely to see new terrorist attacks unleashed throughout Israel, and/or against American interests all over the globe?

 

The motorcade was ready.

Now all they needed was the vice president. Special Agent in Charge Steve Sinclair—head of the VP's protective detail—was edgy. His orders had been clear. Get Checkmate to the Situation Room quickly and without incident. Most of the principals were already on their way to the White House. The NSC meeting was scheduled to begin in less than ten minutes. Given that the VP was supposed to chair the meeting in the president's absence, it wouldn't do to be late. Not tonight.

 

MacPherson simply couldn't believe it.

He and Secretary of State Tucker Paine had hardly been kindred spirits. But they'd known one another for more than a decade, and they'd become useful to each other.

MacPherson couldn't really remember exactly how they'd met, but he was pretty sure it had been in Denver. A middle-class kid, MacPherson had grown up in Lakewood, Colorado, graduated from Harvard, then joined the navy, went to Top Gun school and headed to Vietnam. When he'd come back to the States, MacPherson moved to Manhattan, made a fortune with Fidelity, then moved back to Denver where he was making quite a name for himself—and an even more impressive fortune—as founder and CEO of Global Strategix, Inc., and the Joshua Fund, two of the premier institutions in the financial services industry.

Somewhere along the line, he'd met Paine, an old-money gazillionaire whose family seemed to own half of Colorado and wanted to run for the state's open U.S. Senate seat. Paine wasn't the sharpest knife in the drawer. He was a bit too moderate for MacPherson's liking—good on taxes and growth, bad on education and the life issue, horrible on defense and national security issues. But if Hollywood was going to make a movie about a crusty old patrician senator with a penchant for French wine and a good pipe after dinner, Tucker Paine was direct from central casting.

GOP control of the Senate hung in the balance at the time and it wasn't a tough call. MacPherson was nothing if not a loyal Republican, and even then he'd had his own political ambitions. He was planning a run for governor and his chief political advisor—Bob Corsetti, now the White House chief of staff—made the case succinctly: to blow through the primaries and win the nomination in a landslide, MacPherson needed to find a way to unite the state's conservative and moderate factions. It wouldn't be easy.

As a pro–flat tax, prolife, former navy fighter pilot, MacPherson could count on strong support from the conservative political base in and around Colorado Springs in the south, Fort Collins in the north, and the more rural congressional districts in the mountains and on the plains near Kansas. But Denver itself, MacPherson's hometown, would be tougher. Republicans there tended to be wealthier and more moderate, and though his Wall Street successes had helped him build inroads among the country club crowd, Corsetti concluded that if MacPherson strongly backed Tucker Paine, it certainly couldn't hurt. And it hadn't.

MacPherson took Corsetti's advice. He helped Paine raise more than $2.5 million in less than six months, as Paine was too cheap to spend his own money. Unfortunately, Paine went on to lose the Senate race—though he soon was named U.S. ambassador to the U.N.—but MacPherson picked up a boatload of goodwill and a pocket full of chits. A few years later, he went on to win the GOP nomination for governor without opposition, winning Paine's much-desired endorsement along the way. And in the process he'd laid the groundwork for two successful terms in the governor's mansion, and a storybook run for the White House in 2008 after two Bush terms.

Paine wasn't MacPherson's first choice to be the Secretary of State, nor his second, though thankfully the press hadn't ever picked up on the behind-the-scenes intrigue surrounding the selection process. Paine didn't have Colin Powell's military experience or international stature. But with several years at the U.N. under his belt, he was certainly a safe choice, and MacPherson knew he wasn't going to run foreign policy out of the State Department anyway. He and the VP and Marsha Kirkpatrick would take the lead from the White House.

Paine chafed at the arrangement from the beginning. But he wanted the job and didn't want to be left out of the administration. He'd tried to negotiate for more power. But MacPherson never budged. The president wanted a Rockefeller Republican at State for political cover. But he simply didn't trust the bureaucrats at Foggy Bottom, and he certainly had no intention of giving them free rein over the future of U.S. relations with a rapidly changing world.

Still, despite their sometime prickly alliance, Paine and his wife, Claudia, had just spent Christmas Day at Camp David with the First Family. MacPherson smoked a cigar. The secretary smoked his pipe. The two talked about Bennett's “oil for peace” strategy and reviewed the blowout they'd had over going to war with Iraq. Now he was gone.

 

Agent Sinclair stood on the porch of the Residence.

Agents were positioned around the lead limousine, in the lead Suburban and the two that would follow. Vice President Bill Oaks was still inside on the phone with Israeli prime minister David Doron. The motorcade would wait, as would the NSC meeting, if need be. Doron had just ordered the IDF to prepare for a massive ground invasion of Gaza and the West Bank. It would take a few hours to get all the men and machinery in place. But the Israelis were offering to rescue the Americans and begin to restore order. All they wanted was a green light from Washington. Would they get it?

Oaks was an old Washington hand. He'd risen through the ranks of naval intelligence, then got out, made some money, and got into politics. He'd once been the governor of Virginia, then served four terms in the U.S. Senate from the Old Dominion, much of that time as the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. He knew the game. He knew what Doron wanted. He just wasn't convinced the United States should say yes.

 

MacPherson took off his reading glasses and rubbed his eyes.

The phone rang. It was Kirkpatrick again.

“Mr. President, we're picking up indications that the Syrians are going on full military alert. Air raid sirens are going off in Damascus. One of our Keyhole satellites is showing all kinds of activity at their forward air bases. Military radio traffic is picking up. I'll have transcripts of some of our intercepts soon.”

“What are the Israelis doing?”

“They're mobilizing as well, sir. The VP just got off the phone with the prime minister. They're putting their forces along the northern borders with Syria and Lebanon on full alert. They're also preparing for a massive ground invasion into the West Bank and Gaza. They're offering to rescue our people. They've just put their best counterterrorism units on high alert. The Sayerat Matkal and Ya'ma'm will be ready to move within the hour. Doron would like to talk with you as soon as possible.”

“Does he think the Syrians are behind this?”

“He doesn't know what to think, sir. None of them do. Seems Shin Bet was completely caught off guard, as well.”

“What about you?”

“I don't know, sir. Bashar Assad doesn't have much use for Arafat. But there's no reason I can see why he'd kill him. Assad isn't a religious man. Khalid al-Rashid was. I can't see how Syrian intelligence could have persuaded him to blow up Arafat and Mazen and Paine and himself for the glory of the Ba'ath party. It doesn't add up.”

“God help me, Marsha,” said the President, “if Assad is behind this…”

“Mr. President, I know what you're saying, and I feel the same way. But things are very early. It's far more likely that there's a religious angle here than that this is the Syrians.”

“Who then—Iran, the Saudis?”

“It's just too early, sir.”

MacPherson tried to refocus.

“All right, here's what I want you to do. Put CENTCOM on alert. Start moving air and ground assets toward the Syrian-Iraqi border. Watch for more Iraqi officials trying to flee for Damascus and make Assad feel the heat. Then tell our ambassador over there to get this message to Assad—quote—‘The president advises you to stand down your forces. The U.S. will not tolerate Syrian interference in the crisis in Palestine. Any attempt to exploit the situation or provoke hostilities with the State of Israel or any regional player will be considered a hostile act against the United States. On these points there can be no misunderstanding. The U.S. will protect our vital national interests, and the interests of regional peace and security.' End quote. Got it?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then get me the VP right away.”

“What about Doron, sir?”

“What do you think?”

“For the moment I'd tell them to get their forces ready for ground operations in the West Bank and Gaza. But I'd recommend you advise Israel not to actually move in—or engage in any armed contact with the Palestinians—until we gather more facts and you can get back to the White House.”

“All right, have the VP call Doron back and give him that message. Have him tell Doron that as soon as I land in Washington, we'll talk by phone. Then have the VP call me.”

“Roger that, Mr. President. By the way, not that you need anything else on your plate right now, sir, but we've gotten word that there have just been two massive earthquakes in the past hour. The first was in southern Turkey, about forty-five minutes ago. Looks like a six-point-nine on the Richter scale. Death toll already appears to be over a thousand, with the number of wounded closing in on three thousand.”

“My God.”

“I've spoken twice with Ambassador Rebeiz in the last few minutes. He just called the Turkish foreign minister to offer our sympathies and full support. Our military forces in the country—including our base at Incirlik—all appear unaffected so far. But I should be getting an update at the top of the hour from DoD.”

“Good. Get Rebeiz back on the phone. Have him call President Sezer and Prime Minister Gul and give them my personal condolences. Let them know I've authorized the full resources of our government to provide anything he and his people need—search and rescue, medical facilities and personnel, the Army Corps of Engineers, whatever.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And make sure the Red Cross and other groups are doing whatever they can.”

“We'll get right on it, sir.”

“What about the second quake?”

“It happened in northwestern India, near Kashmir, about eighteen, maybe nineteen minutes ago. That one hit eight point one—casualties are mounting fast but we don't have any solid numbers yet.”

Kirkpatrick could hear the president gasp.

“We've just established an open line with our embassy,” she continued. “I haven't had a moment to talk with Ambassador Koshy yet, but same drill as Turkey?”

“Absolutely. Get State involved right away, and get somebody on the horn with the Pakistanis. The last thing we need is a humanitarian rescue operation near Kashmir to be perceived as provocative by General Musharraf or the ISI.”

“You got it, sir. Anything else?”

“Just tell me Bennett and McCoy are safe.”

“I can't, sir. Not yet.”

 

The president couldn't get his mind off them.

McCoy was practically a third daughter. MacPherson and his wife, Julie, had known her all her life. They'd known her father since Vietnam. He and Sean McCoy had been close friends. MacPherson was flying F4 Phantom fighter jets off the decks of aircraft carriers in the Sea of Japan. McCoy was a SEAL team commander, and one of the most decorated commandos in the navy. He'd eventually joined the CIA and worked his way up to the deputy director of operations.

When Sean married Janet, the executive assistant to the Secretary of the Navy, MacPherson was the best man. When little Erin was born, he and Julie were at the hospital with flowers. When Sean was killed, it was MacPherson who'd given the eulogy. When Janet died of ovarian cancer in '91, he'd done so again. Now, as he put his head down and clenched his fists, he prayed to God he wouldn't have to do so for Erin, their only child.

And Bennett? He was the son the MacPhersons never had. He was a little too old for the MacPherson twins—they were half his age—and that was too bad. But it felt like he'd been part of their family forever.

Bennett was an only child, and his parents were always traveling. He rarely spent holidays with them and almost seemed without a family. So the MacPhersons took him under their wing, inviting him to birthday parties and cookouts and Christmas and political conventions. The girls loved him. Julie loved him. And why wouldn't they? Bennett always seemed to have time for them. Or to make time. He brought them gifts, helped the girls with their homework. He teased them about their latest boyfriends, and always enjoyed playing basketball or volleyball. His favorite, of course, was Monopoly night, with pizza and popcorn and root beer floats. Every fourth Friday, for years, it had been a family tradition, until the MacPhersons moved into the White House and everything changed.

Bennett's first real job after Harvard was as MacPherson's personal assistant. Along the way, he developed great sources and great instincts. His Rolodex was a who's who of the wealthiest people on earth, and their personal secretaries, assistants, drivers, and caddies. He ran his network of corporate spooks with the zeal of the KGB. And he'd made MacPherson a very wealthy man.