casualties, each situation starts, builds, and ends. For someone who thrives on out thinking an adversary or on extrapolating short- and long-term results from quiet decisions, the Oval Office is the ultimate challenge. It clears the game board every few minutes and offers new contests with new rules. Some presidents are aged and drained by the process. Other presidents thrive on it. There was a time until very recently when Michael Lawrence was invigorated by the problems that crossed his desk. He was undaunted by crises, even those that required quick military action and possible casualties. That was part of the job description. A president's task was to minimize the damage caused by inevitable aggression. But something had changed over the past few days. Lawrence had always felt that however stressful situations got, he was at least in control of the process. He could chair meetings with confidence. Lately, that was no longer the case. It was difficult for him even to focus. Lawrence had worked with Jack Fenwick and Red Gable for many years. They were old friends of the vice president, and Lawrence trusted Jack Cotten. He trusted his judgment. Lawrence would not have selected him as a running mate otherwise. As vice president, Cotten had been more closely involved in the activities of the NSA than any previous vice president. Lawrence had wanted it that way. For years, the CIA, the FBI, and military intelligence had had their own agendas. The Executive Branch needed its own eyes and ears abroad. Lawrence and Cotten had more or less appropriated the NSA for that task. The military could still utilize the NSA's chartered assets, which were the centralized coordination and direction of U.S. government intelligence technical functions and communications. Under Cotten, its role had quietly been expanded to increase the breadth and detail of intelligence that was coming directly to the president. Or, rather, to Fenwick and the vice president and then to the president. The president stared at the open laptop on his desk. Jack Fenwick was talking about Iran. Data was downloading quickly from the NSA. Fenwick had some facts and a good deal of supposition. He also had an edge. He appeared to be going somewhere, though he had not yet indicated where. Meanwhile, Lawrence's eyes stung, and his vision was foggy. It was difficult to concentrate. He was tired, but he was also distracted. He did not know who to believe or even what to believe. Was the data from the NSA real or falsified? Was Fenwick's intelligence accurate or fabricated? Paul Hood suspected Fenwick of deception. Hood appeared to have the evidence for it. But what if it were Hood's evidence that wasn't trustworthy? Hood was going through an extremely stressful time. He had resigned his post at Op- Center, then returned. He had been at ground zero of the explosive UN hostage crisis. His daughter was suffering from an extreme case of posttraumatic stress disorder. Hood was in the process of getting a divorce. What if it were Hood who had the agenda, not Fenwick, the president wondered. When Fenwick had arrived at the White House before, he admitted that he had been to the Iranian mission. He admitted it openly. But he insisted that the president had been informed. The vice president corroborated that fact. So did the calendar on the president's computer. As for the call regarding the United Nations initiative, Fenwick insisted that was not placed by him. He said the NSA would investigate. Could it have been placed by Hood?
'Mr. President?' Fenwick said. The president looked at Fenwick. The national security adviser was seated in an armchair to the left of the desk. Gable was to the right, and the vice president was in the center.
'Yes, Jack?' the president replied.
'Are you all right, sir?' Fenwick asked.
'Yes,' Lawrence replied.
'Go on.' Fenwick smiled and nodded and continued. The president sat up taller. He had to focus on the issue at hand. When he got through this crisis, he would schedule a short vacation. Very soon. And he would invite his childhood friend and golfing buddy. Dr. Edmond Leidesdorf, and his wife. Leidesdorf was a psychiatrist attached to Walter Reed. The president had not wanted to see him officially with this problem because the press would find out about it. Once that happened, his political career would be over. But they had played golf and gone sailing before. They could talk on a golf course or boat without raising suspicion.
'The latest intelligence puts the Russian terrorist Sergei Cherkassov at the scene of the explosion,' Fenwick continued.
'He had escaped from prison three days before the attack on the rig. His body was found at sea. There were burn marks consistent with flash explosives. There was also very little bloating. Cherkassov had not been in the water for very long.'
'Do the Azerbaijanis have that information?' the president asked.
'We suspect they do,' Fenwick replied.
'The Iranian naval patrol that found Cherkassov radioed shore on an open channel. Those channels are routinely monitored by the Azerbaijanis.'
'Maybe Teheran wanted the rest of the world to have the information,' the president suggested.
'It might turn them against Russia.'
'That's possible,' Fenwick agreed.
'It's also possible that Cherkassov was working for Azerbaijan.'
'He was being held in an Azerbaijani prison,' the vice president said.
'They might have allowed him to escape so that he could be blamed for the attack.'
'How likely is that?' the president asked.
'We're checking with sources at the prison now,' Fenwick said.
'But it's looking very likely.'
'Which means that instead of the attack turning Iran against Russia, Azerbaijan may have succeeded in uniting both nations against them,' the vice president said. Fenwick leaned forward.
'Mr. President, there's one thing more. We suspect that creating a union between Russia and Iran may actually have been the ultimate goal of the Azerbaijani government.'
'Why in hell would they do that?' the president asked.
'Because they are practically at war with Iran in the Nagorno-Karabakh region,' Fenwick said.
'And both Russia and Iran have been pressing claims on some of their oil fields in the Caspian.'
'Azerbaijan wouldn't stand a chance against either nation individually,' the president pointed out.
'Why unite them?' Even as he said it, the president knew why. To win allies.
'How much of our oil do we get from that region?' the president asked.
