“I’m fine,” she whispered back. “And you?”
“Okay for now, but they’re evacuating us.”
Sanders gasped. “What? Why?”
“They say the winds are bringing the radioactivity from D.C. toward us,” he explained.
“Where are you now?”
“I’m on a bus,” Ramirez said. “I have no idea where they’re taking us. I’m not even supposed to be using my phone. That’s why I’m whispering. Can I call you back later?”
“No. Listen — I’m right in the middle of this thing and I don’t know what to do. I’m in contact with the captain of a ship who actually saw the missiles launch from a container ship near him. He knows exactly which ship attacked D.C. We’ve got them, Tomas. I know where they are.”
“Really? That’s incredible. Have we sunk it yet?”
“No, not yet,” Sanders said. “That’s just it. I can’t get anyone to do anything.”
“Why not? What’s the problem?”
“Nearly all our communications have been knocked out. Power is out over much of the country. Most of the Guard’s ranking officers are dead. And my supervisor doesn’t know what to do. He’s panicking. But we’ve got to move fast.”
“I’ll say,” Ramirez said. “What if that ship fires again?”
“Exactly,” Sanders responded, relieved not just to hear her boyfriend’s voice but to find someone who shared the urgency she felt. “That’s what I’ve been saying. But no one’s listening.”
“Fog of war,” Ramirez said. “Textbook case.”
“So what do I do?” Sanders asked.
“What do you need?”
“I need a pair of fighter jets — fast.”
Ramirez suddenly got it. “Carlos.”
“Would you call him?”
“Absolutely — just hold on, and pray I can get through to him.”
“Will do, Tomas, and thanks. I love you.”
“Love you too, babe. Now stay safe, and I’ll see you soon.”
Sanders hung up the phone and bowed her head. Then she radioed the captain of the Double Dolphin. If they had any chance of success, she needed to have the latest intel and be able to pass it up the chain of command at a moment’s notice.
Had the Liberian ship moved? she asked the captain.
No, he said. Its engines were running but it didn’t appear to be going anywhere. Not yet, anyway.
Could he see any movement on deck?
Yes, he said. There were lots of people scrambling about. They seemed to be opening one of the containers on the bow. They seemed to be constructing something, though he couldn’t tell what and much of his view, he admitted, was obstructed by stacks of containers.
Could the crew be preparing to fire a third missile? Sanders pressed.
The captain said again that he couldn’t be certain. But something was happening, and he was worried.
Did he have his GPS system working yet?
No, not yet, he conceded, though he insisted his crew was working feverishly to get it fixed as quickly as possible.
The phone on Sanders’s desk rang. It had to be the CDO, or one of his deputies, but she wasn’t ready to answer. Not yet. She had one more question for the captain of the Panamanian frigate, and she knew it might be her last.
“Are you and your crew armed?”
“No, should we be?” the captain replied, the anxiety in his voice suddenly rising another notch.
“I think that would be prudent,” Sanders said, fearing for all their lives if the Liberian crew was listening in on their transmissions, which she now considered an increasingly likely scenario.
A priority-one call came into NORAD at 9:58 p.m.
It was handled initially by a desk officer, then by a senior naval officer, who immediately raced over to Lt. General Briggs with the news.
“Sir, you’ve got an urgent call.”
Briggs looked up from his computer screen, where he and two colleagues were frantically scanning the latest satellite imagery from the Atlantic and Pacific coastlines.
“From who?” Briggs asked, growing impatient with one interruption after another.
“Captain John Curry, sir.”
“Oceana?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Fine; put him on line six,” Briggs ordered.
He didn’t need to be reminded that Naval Air Station Oceana in Virginia Beach, Virginia, was the East Coast’s only master jet base running 24-7-365 and a critical component to the NORAD air defense strategy for the Atlantic seaboard. Home to seventeen strike-fighter units, NAS Oceana was a six-thousand-acre complex employing eleven-thousand-plus navy personnel and handling a quarter of a million takeoffs and landings a year. If its base commander called on a day like today and said it was urgent, it had to be. Besides, Briggs had known Curry for nearly a decade and trusted him implicitly.
Briggs grabbed the receiver and hit line six. “Jack, it’s Charlie. I’m swamped here — what’ve you got?”
“A Christmas present, Charlie. I just need permission to open it.”
“What are you talking about?” Briggs asked, glancing at his watch.
Curry quickly explained that he had in his possession the approximate coordinates of the ship that had launched the Scud missiles against Washington, D.C. He briefly summarized how he had received the information — from one of his fighter pilots whose brother was dating a Coast Guard communications specialist who was in direct contact with the captain of a Panamanian ship who saw the whole thing go down.
“Can you verify this guy’s story?” Briggs demanded, his pulse racing.
“We’re doing that now, sir,” Curry replied, informing the NORAD commander that he had already scrambled two F/A-18E Super Hornets on the hope that he would be able to give them authorization to fire en route. Both jets were inbound to the coordinates. Both were heavily armed. Both had orders to do a flyby over the deck of the Liberian container ship and report back immediately.
“If this thing checks out, General, do my men have permission to take this ship down?” Curry asked.
“Absolutely,” Briggs replied without hesitation. “I just wish I could do it myself.”
Briggs hung up and closed his eyes. He desperately wanted to get the U.S. on offense against somebody, anybody. But for that he needed a target. Was this the break he’d been waiting for, or the first of many false alarms?
20
Caulfield stared at himself in the bathroom mirror.
His eyes were bloodshot. His hands were trembling. His head was pounding, and now a Secret Service agent was pounding on the door.
“Mr. Caulfield, you need to take your seat, sir.”
“Just a moment,” he replied, fumbling with the lock on his briefcase.
“Now, Mr. Caulfield,” the agent said. “The pilot says we’re approaching some serious turbulence. We need everyone in their seats.”
“I said just a minute,” Caulfield snapped back.
He frantically worked the combination, knowing he hadn’t much time. The first time it failed to work. He had to slow down. He had to calm down. He tried again. This time the briefcase opened like a charm.
Caulfield fished past the briefing books marked TOP SECRET and folders crammed with policy papers. He reached past his digital camera and the yellow legal pads and his binder with the home, cell, pager, and e-mail information of every key figure in the American government. There it was. He carefully opened up the leather bag’s false bottom and quickly found the glass bottle, a small mirror, and a razor blade. Next he pulled out his wallet and rolled up a twenty-dollar bill.