“Yeah, well, they were still on his staff,” I said. Actually, I was glad Wiseman hadn’t been implicated. That would have been a disaster. A couple of guys going down from his staff was only half a disaster. “What about Landon Fry?”
“He put in his resignation as White House chief of staff,” Tom said as our coffee was served. “He’s running for the U.S. Senate in Ohio. And after all the praise the press has been heaping on him, he’s a shoo-in.”
“Terrific.”
“He stayed true to his word, though. He got your intel on the president’s desk.”
I smiled out of the side of my mouth. “He got the intel on the president’s desk, Tom, because only a fool would have ignored it. It was politics from the get-go, and you and I both know it. We sat in that meeting with him at the Old Ebbitt, and he tried to make us believe that he was all in. Behind us all the way. Hell, he might as well have said, Hey, listen, Jake, you bring me back evidence even my mother couldn’t ignore, and I’ll get it in the hands of the president. And then, if the bombers are already in the air, I’ll make sure the president takes your intel seriously.”
“Hope you’re not expecting me to give you an argument.” Tom looked over the rim of his cup at me.
I caught the look in his eyes. “So the bombers were already in the air, weren’t they?” I said.
“Well, more or less.” He held his cup out to me, and I clicked it with mine. He said, “We made heroes of them all, Jake. We made heroes of them all.”
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
We would like to thank the following people for their enthusiastic support, superior talents, and unbridled energy: Brendan Deneen; Peter Rubie; Lt. Gen. Tom McInerney; Lt. Col. William V. (Bill) Cowan; Mario Acevedo; Mark Stevens; Kerry Patton; Keith Urbahn; Jed Babbin; Carrie Nyman; Dave Payne; Gerald R. Molen; Clare Lopez; Judge Andrew Napolitano; and all of Wayne’s buddies of the U.S. Air Force Special Tactics Squadrons, the 1st SFOD-D, and the CIA. This book would not have been possible without every single one of you.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
WAYNE SIMMONS spent twenty-seven years as part of an Outside Paramilitary Special Operations Group for the CIA. He worked throughout Central and South America, Europe, the Far East, and Central Asia combating terrorism, narco-terrorism and narcotics trafficking, arms smuggling, counterfeiting, cyber-terrorists, and industrial and economic espionage.
MARK GRAHAM is a critically acclaimed author who has been writing and editing professionally since 1988. He has written and published three critically acclaimed full-length novels.