Page 58 of Air Force One (Miranda Chase #16)

General Liú Zuocheng pulled out his chair, but he didn’t sit. Instead, he placed his palms flat on the table. “All hands where I can see them.”

Everyone placed their own hands on the table without hesitation. Those who’d had their hands beneath the table had been cradling no weapon. So there was no immediate physical threat.

The lack of hesitancy, despite his frankly rude and abrupt command, offered him no insights. He inspected each man carefully. He knew no persons better except for the President and, of course, his Black Jade warrior/lover, yet he saw no deceit in their eyes.

He nodded an apology and sat in his chair, resting his hands on the padded arms. Perhaps the direct approach was the best.

“An unimpeachable source has informed me that one of you is a traitor.”

Again no sign of anything beyond genuine shock—shock first, then denial. From a traitor he would expect the opposite—denial, then a sham of surprise.

“As I know it isn’t me, that leaves the five of you. We are remaining here until I am certain of the truth.” And he would find who threatened his life’s work if it was the last thing he ever did. His fury ran so deep that his hands began to shake. Clutching the chair arms tighter didn’t stop them.

A breath. A calming breath. He would not give them the satisfaction of him dying from a heart attack.

One of them wiped at their mouth as if they were feeling nauseous. Two were sweating. Others’ hands were shaking.

He tried to speak…but instead clamped his jaw for fear he too would be ill.

General Liú Zuocheng managed to jab the button to call his bodyguard into the room. The man burst through the door with Zuocheng’s secretary close on his heels.

Zuocheng tried to speak. To warn them. For now, at this moment, he fully understood. But unable to speak, he could only observe as his bodyguard and secretary touched him, his chair, the table—and sealed their own fates.

One of the committee members clasped his chest and collapsed face down onto the table.

Zuocheng remembered Wang Daiyu circling and circling the committee’s conference table during her final trip to his office before departing for America.

He had turned his back on her as she continued her course…

circling to spread a nerve agent that would linger on every surface.

She would know that he only used this table for meetings of the CMC.

He’d otherwise preferred the commanding power of sitting behind his desk.

And he recalled her final question, as she stood in the doorway to leave for America with his blessing. She’d asked who knew of her relationship to him. They were all in this room and—he saw his bodyguard’s hand begin to shake—they were all dead.

His final thought was that his Black Jade had indeed become a weapon too dangerous to wield. She was Fei’s tiger turned to consume its master.