So he didn’t have a choice. He would do what they wanted. The problem was, once they learned they could get him to do this, they would make him do other things, too.
Which meant that taking care of this woman would only buy him time. For what, he wasn’t sure. An opportunity. An opening. Something.
He reached the apex of the structure and looked down at the maze of concrete. They’d told him it had to look natural, or at least reasonably natural. Well, it wouldn’t be hard for someone running through here to fall. The pavement was wet, the stairs slick in places. The fall itself might be enough. If he had to do more, he would.
But he hoped he wouldn’t.
ONE WEEK EARLIER
chapter
one
HOBBS
All right,” the president said, coming to his feet. “See you all next week.”
As though a switch had been flipped, the attendees all rose, and the hushed room was suddenly filled with the simultaneous creak of dozens of leather chairs and a collective murmur of “Thank you, Mr. President.” To Hobbs, who had visited numerous black congregations when he’d been considering a run for Congress in South Carolina’s first district, the refrain always sounded like some weird cousin of call and response. Well, certainly there was enough ambient reverence in the White House Cabinet Room to make you feel you might be in church.
There was a moment of silence—another unconscious echo of religious devotion—as the president headed briskly toward his private exit at the south end of the room, his footfalls noiseless on the plush carpet. On those infrequent occasions when the president lingered, everyone else did, too, vying for a scrap of his attention. But the instant he was gone, all the august personalities who served at his pleasure would devolve into gossiping, backbiting courtiers, and as he closed the mahogany door behind him and the heavy brass latch clacked into place, the room erupted into a dozen scheming conversations. Power was like a magnet, keeping everything rigid and straight and proper. But without the magnet, it all collapsed into disorganized scrap.
The secretary of the interior saw his opportunity and zeroed in on the vice president, whose traditional position was directly opposite the president’s and on whose left it was Hobbs’s place as attorney general to sit. Hobbs caught the vice president’s wince at the Interior guy’s approach, probably in preparation for turning down a golf outing or some other invitation. Most of the time, the vice president would stick around after a meeting to enjoy the attention he received in the president’s absence, but if he left now it would be bad. It would elevate Hobbs himself as a beacon for the cabinet’s various lesser barons, and while ordinarily Hobbs was indifferent to their attention, today it would be a hindrance.
But no, the danger of the vice president exiting too soon was moot, because there was Devereaux, the director of National Intelligence, coming around the north end of the table, half a head taller than the people he was passing, a factotum on his heels. Perfect. Hobbs slipped past the small queue lining up behind the Interior guy and pulled abreast of Devereaux as he passed through one of the exits. Devereaux wasn’t walking particularly quickly, but the man had a long stride, and Hobbs struggled to match his pace.
“Pierce,” Hobbs said, keeping his voice low. “Have you got a few minutes? There’s something I think might interest you.” It wasn’t so much that Hobbs was worried about someone overhearing; more that he wanted to signal the delicacy of the topic he needed to broach. And of course, a conspiratorial tone was engaging in its own right—engaging to anyone, and especially to America’s top spy.
Devereaux stopped and glanced at his watch. Hobbs knew the reflex was theater. Information came with a price tag, and the shrewd players were careful to conceal their eagerness to buy.
Devereaux tilted his head lower and looked at Hobbs through a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles. “What’s on your mind, Uriah?”
Hobbs, the shortest male cabinet member, was used to people towering over him. He’d hated it when he was young. But now he was the country’s top lawyer, and that was the view that mattered.