“One minute!” their pilot said.
Rapp and Coleman took positions on either side of the bomb. It was too long to point directly at the open door, but it was more or less angled in that direction.
“Get ready… On my mark… Now!”
The plane banked hard, tilting down on the door side to provide a gravity assist as they started pushing the weapon. Even with the incline, it was heavy as hell. Progress was slower than expected, right up to the moment that the nose cleared the aircraft’s fuselage. Despite the fact that they’d slowed to barely above stall speed, the wind caught the front fins and spun the weapon like it was made of papier-maché. It hit Coleman about calf height, knocking him down and fouling his safety line in one of the rear fins.
Rapp dove on top of him as the line went taut, pulling a switchblade from his pocket and snapping it open. In the end, though, it was unnecessary. The fin cut through the line before they could be dragged out and the bomb disappeared into the darkness. Suddenly free of its weight, the plane jerked back to level and their pilot throttled up. Rapp lifted Coleman and dragged him toward the video console, starting a silent countdown in his mind. Approximately thirty seconds to impact.
The former SEAL’s nose was pouring blood and he looked dazed, but with Rapp’s help he managed to get his hands on the joystick. At first, the screen was dark.
Twenty-five seconds…
Coleman manipulated the stick and a moment later the image of Marroqui’s security lights appeared.
“Twenty seconds to impact!” Rapp shouted.
Coleman brought the crosshairs into the middle of the circle and depressed a button. Words appeared on-screen that Rapp assumed confirmed a target lock and Coleman’s legs collapsed beneath him. He tied the man off with what was left of his safety line and started for the door but was blinded by a powerful flash before he could close it.
The old Soviet piece of shit had actually worked.
He dropped to his stomach and slid toward the edge of the door again. The aftermath of their attack wasn’t exactly subtle. The small ring of electric light had been replaced by a raging fire probably twenty times the diameter.
He’d wanted to make a statement and it looked like he’d succeeded. They’d blown the entire top of the mountain off.
CHAPTER 19
THE WHITE HOUSE
WASHINGTON, DC
USA
ACTING CIA director Darren Hargrave strode past the president’s assistant, feeling the same sense of euphoria he always did. No, that wasn’t true. It had become even more powerful. More intoxicating.
The office had been completely transformed both in a literal and figurative sense. When he’d first started doing legal work for the Cooks so many years ago, their political aspirations were little more than dreams. Whispers. But Anthony’s potential was impossible to ignore. He combined the alpha quality of Teddy Roosevelt with John F. Kennedy’s good looks and FDR’s uncanny ability to exude strength and compassion simultaneously. To that he added the understanding that the constraints holding his power in check were imaginary. A faded dream of men long dead.
Cook was finally where he was meant to be. And as CIA director, Hargrave was in a position to keep him there for four years, eight years, and beyond. He’d always known that Cook would lead him to greatness, but the reality had now exceeded even his wildest expectations.
He opened the door to the Oval Office, not bothering to ask permission or to wait for his arrival to be announced. Cook was alone, sitting at his desk, speaking on the phone. A rare opportunity for a private audience. His wife—the demon whispering in his ear—was in Ohio trying to cover for her husband’s increasingly obvious absence from public life.
Cook finally put down the phone, focusing his attention on Hargrave but not offering any kind of greeting. It wasn’t a surprising reaction. He’d undoubtedly read the CIA’s preliminary report about the recent disturbance in Guatemala.
“What you sent me wasn’t worth the paper it was printed on,” the president said finally. “Just a bunch of speculation from corrupt Guatemalan politicians.”
“It literally happened only a few hours ago and in an extremely remote part of the country. We’re learning more every minute.”
“Learning more,” Cook said, his stare intensifying in a way that was equal parts thrilling and terrifying. “Over the course of a few days, Mitch Rapp seems to have done something the combined intelligence agencies of the world couldn’t: kill Gustavo Marroqui. And not only that, he also managed to vaporize the mountain the man lived on.”