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“Really?” he asks. “Do you have in your possession a memorandum from me, authorizing you to shoot wounded and unarmed prisoners in your custody?”
Noa is trapped. She knows it and the president knows it. If she were to go to the press now and reveal all, it would be the president’s word against hers, and he has the video evidence—slippery bastard that he is—to prove his point.
Noa Himel executed a wounded prisoner in cold blood.
The president says, “Noa? Anything to say?”
“No, sir.”
He puts his hands together and leans toward her. “We’re taking abreak for a little while. You, me, and Liam Grey and his team. And when we start up again, you’re going to continue to be a valued member of my domestic team. Do you understand?”
Noa hates how faint her voice has become. “Yes, sir.”
“To make it even more clear, so even a woman like you can understand, I own your ass. You will continue to operate in the United States, and screw the laws, and screw Congress.”
A weird, odd laugh comes from the president. “That’s funny. You know why? Because you do have a cute ass, and I could take you now, toss you over my desk, and screw you six ways to Sunday, and you couldn’t do a damn thing about it. Because I’ve got evidence that you’re a stone-cold killer, Noa Himel, safely kept in my hands.”
Noa can’t say a word, can’t move, can’t even bear to look at the man.
“But that’s beneath me, as you said. So think of this. You leave the White House and if I feel like doing it, within the hour, I’ll come for you. You will no longer exist, your records will be wiped, you will become an un-person.”
“Are … you threatening to kill me?”
“Worse,” he says. “I’m threatening to make you disappear. Like you never existed. You think I can’t do that?”
Noa’s mind is a blank.
“Now I will allow you to leave,” he says. “So do so.”
Defeated, face warm with humiliation, Noa gets up and tries to walk leisurely to the door leading out and away from this man, but she feels like running.
God, she feels like running out of this place.
CHAPTER 50
LIAM ISN’T SURE what time it is, consumed as he is by an internal struggle to prioritize two sworn duties: to uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States and to keep confidential—forever—his work within the Central Intelligence Agency.
He’s sitting on a park bench, nearly in the dark, waiting. He’s in Maywood Park on 22nd Street North, in Arlington, waiting, his senses at high alert, looking and listening and just feeling.
It took him more than an hour to get here, going dark, doubling back and checking and rechecking, and he’s convinced he’s “gone black,” avoiding all surveillance. Liam has left his cell phone at home and he’s wearing new clothes and sneakers he bought at a local Walmart. So unless he’s got a transponder implanted in his skin, he’s sure he’s clean.
He hears traffic whiz by and then spots a shape coming in through the open gate of the small park. The woman’s stride is instantly recognizable, and in a few seconds, his ex-wife, Kay Darcy, sits down on the bench next to him.
Liam says, “You left your phone, iPad, anything electronic back at your condo?”
“Hey, nice to see you, too, Liam,” she says. “The answer is yes, and my question is, what the hell is going on here?”
“Besides me violating my oath along with a number of federal statutes, just a little meet and greet to see how single life is treating you.”
Even in the dying light, he senses a change in Kay’s attitude and body language. “Got it, Liam. Sorry. Go on.”
He keeps moving his gaze around, checking and rechecking the landscape. They are under a grove of trees, meaning no drone surveillance. Scanning the traffic, he doesn’t see any repeats, like a white van going by again and again.
Liam says, “Thanks for meeting me. Means a lot.”
His ex-wife says, “It was interesting to be in your world for a while. The anonymous text message. Me going to a Barnes & Noble, picking up the latest Lincoln biography, turning to the page number associated with our wedding date and finding a note with the time and place of this meeting. Liam, what’s this all about?”
“I need to ask you some questions.”