needed him. Aziz had told him it was standard procedure for this type of crisis. He would be one of dozens of ambulances waiting to rush people to the hospital if the need arose.
Rusan had time. The American assassins did not show their faces when the sun was out. They would wait until it was dark, and ifaziz’s timetable was right, they would come either tonight or tomorrow. As long as he had everything in position within an hour or two after the sunset, he would be fine.
DEEP IN THOUGHT, Anna Rielly sat, feet pulled close, arms wrapped around her shins, and her chin resting in the valley between her knees. Her shoulder-length brown hair was pulled back in its ponytail again. The long sleeves of President Hayes’s black sweatshirt were rolled up several times. She was comfortable, warm, and had a little bit of food in her stomach along with two Tylenol 3s, which helped dull her aching jaw and ribs. All things considered, she was doing pretty darn well.
How strange life could be, she thought to herself. One week ago she was in Chicago working at the station, living in her apartment in Lincoln Park. She was ready for a change, in both her career and her personal life. Since the rape, things had been jumbled. There had been the boyfriend who couldn’t handle what she had been through. He was a pharmaceutical rep, and when offered a promotion and transfer to Phoenix, he jumped at the chance and told Anna he couldn’t love someone who couldn’t love him back. She’d blamed herself for that one until she was healthy enough to realize that if he had really loved her, he would have given her more than seven months to recover.
It had actually turned out to be a blessing. Spending the last several years alone had allowed her to grow in strength.
Independence and self-reliance were great things. The best part about them was that the only person who could let you down was yourself. The down side, which she was now experiencing, was that you woke up one day and realized you had either pushed everybody away or not allowed anyone to get close enough. Either way, you were left with a lonely existence.
Rielly thought fate had to figure into the equation somewhere.
It always did for those large and defining moments in life. What kind of twisted fate had led her to this strange moment, this crossroad? If she hadn’t gotten the job as the new White House correspondent, if she had missed her flight to D.C.” if her alarm had failed to wake her up three days ago, if she had been released with that first group of hostages, if that pig hadn’t dragged her up to the president’s bedroom? Rielly’s eyes got big. If Mitch Kruse, or whatever his real name was, hadn’t stepped in when he did? Wow, Rielly thought as a shiver ran up her spine. The thought of Kruse not showing up when he did was horrifying. She owed him a lot. More than she could probably ever express.
Rielly stared blankly at the wall opposite her. Her thoughts settled in on the man named Kruse, and on the odds of him appearing exactly when he did and all of the possible outcomes in between. It was staggering. Call it fate, call it a guardian angel, call it what you like, but someone or something had stepped in and put him there at that exact moment in time.
A smile fell across Rielly’s face, and she looked upward to say a little prayer of thanks.
BEFORE PICKING UP the phone, Stansfield told Kennedy to listen in on a second phone located on the other side of the room. He then asked Generals Flood and Campbell to stay silent. Stansfield’s hand reached down and picked up the handset.
At the same time, he sank into his chair and brought the phone to his ear.
“This is Director Stansfield.”
At first there was only breathing, heavy breathing, and then the words hissed forth. “I know all about you. Who you are, what you’ve done, and all of the people you’ve sent your minions to kill.”
Stansfield looked down again at the readout on his phone.
The black letters said, “WH Sit Room.” The hostile voice he recognized as that of Rafique Aziz, and it didn’t even come close to riling the director of the Central Intelligence Agency.
Instead, Stansfield leaned back and asked, “What can I do for you, Mr. Aziz?”
“Do for me,” spat an obviously agitated Aziz.
“You can tell me what you have done with Fara Harut!”
It was a statement made with confidence; Stansfield was sure of that.
The director stayed cool and replied, “I have no idea what you are talking about.”
“Don’t insult me,” screamed Aziz.
“I know what you have done, and I want to know where Fara Harut is immediately, or you are going to have more dead hostages on your hands!”
Aziz was screaming so loud that Flood and Campbell could hear him from where they were standing. The two men stepped forward while Stansfield replied, “It is not my intention to insult you. I sincerely have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“You are a snake,” screamed Aziz.
“I should have known better than to have thought for a second that you would give me the truth! I swear I will make you pay for what you have done!”
Aziz was now yelling so loud Stansfield pulled the phone away from his ear and listened to Aziz ramble from a more comfortable distance of six inches.
The voice squawked from the earpiece.
“You give me the truth right now, or I will walk down the hall and put a bullet in the head of one of the hostages, and when I come back, if you do not have an answer for me, I will go back and kill another, and I will keep doing it until you tell me what you have done with Fara Harut!”
“Mr. Aziz,” replied an unflinching Stansfield, “I have no idea what you are talking about. If you would tell me what has got you so angry, I will do my best to find out where Fara Harut is.”
“Don’t toy with me! I know who you are, and what you do! You are a liar and a murderer of innocent women and children!”
Stansfield sat calmly in the chair, the phone still held several inches away from his ear. He had to think quickly, and he had to get Aziz to back down.
“Well, Mr. Aziz, if that’s the way you feel about me, we must have a lot in common. “Without giving Aziz a chance to reply to the shot, Stansfield continued, “By the way, I must commend you for your speech this morning. It really played well with the politicians. I tried to advise them that you were not serious. That you were performing. To and for what, I have not yet figured out, but I have my ideas.”
“Silence!” screamed Aziz.
“I want to know where Fara Harut is immediately, or someone dies!”
“Mr. Aziz, you don’t want to do that, and this is why.”
Stansfield glanced up at the two generals for a second and then said, “Right now you’ve done a very good job making certain people in my government think that you have turned over a new leaf and that you are a man who will actually keep his word. Myself and several others know this is all a sham. If you kill another hostage, I will take a tape of this conversation to the vice president and I will leak it to the media so everyone can hear that you are truly not the man you tried to portray yourself as this morning. And then… well… you know our rules of engagement. You were lucky we didn’t storm the place after you killed National Security Adviser Schwartz and his secretary. If you start killing hostages again, we will be left no alternative other than to retake the building… and that of course means you will die.”
“Your men will die!” screamed Aziz.
“You are a bigger fool than I thought. I will blow this whole building sky high and all of the hostages with it.”
“And you will die also, which just happens to suit my needs perfectly.
Things will be much easier if you cease to exist.” Stansfield leaned back in his chair.
“You are threatening the wrong man, Mr. Aziz, and you know? it.” Now came the time to lie, to really make Aziz think that he was everything Aziz thought he was and then some.
“I could not care less what happens to the hostages. I just want to make sure that you and your wretched
