Hidden Order: A Thriller (49 page)

“And what about the Federal Reserve?” the secretary of the Treasury asked.

“We’re not renewing their charter.”

“We’re not?” the man replied, stunned.

“No. The power to print money was intended for the Congress, not to be outsourced to some banking monopoly masquerading as a government agency. You’ve got twenty-four hours to get back to me with a plan on how we disentangle ourselves from the Fed.”

“But, Mr. President—” the man began.

“No buts. We’ve shut down central banks before in this country. It’s past time we do it again.”

“The shock to the economy could—”

“Be just what this country needs,” replied the President.

They went over a couple of additional items before the President thanked the Treasury secretary for coming and excused him from the balance of the meeting.

Harvath, Ryan, Wise, McGee, and Reed Carlton were all then shown into the Oval Office. It was the first time any of them had met the President. He directed them to the couches in the center of the room and asked them to sit down.

“We saw the secretary of the Treasury on his way out,” said Carlton. “He didn’t look so well.”

“Good,” replied the President. “Have you seen the state of our economy? The man should go to bed every night worrying that tomorrow he’ll be swinging from a lamppost if things don’t get better. I know I do.”

This President had been elected largely based on his common sense and a no-BS approach to problems. He was very charismatic and, unlike many of the slippery politicians in Washington, seemed to not only genuinely care about the condition that the country was in, but also to
be truly confident that things could be turned around and that collapse wasn’t inevitable.

“But you’re not here to talk about what keeps me up at night,” said the President. “First, I want to thank you for what you did. I understand there were a few others who helped you,” he said as he peered down at his notes. “A Ms. Sloane Ashby and Messrs. Chase Palmer and Matthew Sanchez. Please also extend my thanks to them.”

Carlton assured the President that it would be done.

“Excellent,” he replied. “Now, on to business.” Looking first at Ryan, then Wise and finally McGee, he said, “I don’t know what the hell is going on at CIA, but it’s going to stop now. It needs all of the deadwood cleared out and a brand-new culture instilled. It’s filled with patriotic men and women who would go to the ends of the earth for this country if the bureaucrats gumming up the system would just get out of their way and let them do it.

“This whole Phil Durkin situation never should have happened. I have already asked the DCI for his resignation.”

Ryan and McGee were shocked.

“Who’s going to replace him?” McGee asked.

“You are,” said the President. “Both of you.”

“Codirectors?” replied Ryan.

“Unless you think one person can handle turning that agency around in the next twelve months.”

The Old Man smiled.

“I take it you approve?” said the President.

“Yes, sir,” replied Carlton. “In fact, if I may say so, it should have been done a long time ago.”

“It’s being done now.” Turning to Wise, the President asked, “Do you have any desire to come out of retirement and serve your country again?”

“If my country needs me, I’m happy to come out of retirement.”

“I think Ryan and McGee are going to have their hands full. They’re going to need someone they can trust to help weigh who stays, who goes, what gets saved, what gets cut, et cetera. I can’t promise you it will be glamorous, but I can promise that you’ll have the appreciation of a grateful nation.”

Wise nodded. “Thank you, sir. It would be my honor.”

“Good. I have already spoken with His Majesty in Jordan. He, of course, feigned outrage that his intelligence service was blackmailing the CIA with an active terrorist plot in order to extract information about Durkin’s political destabilization team. He assured me that the bombers would be apprehended immediately and that any and all information they have on the plot will be shared with us straightaway. Ryan, I’d like you to review it and brief General Johnson, who will in turn brief me.”

“Yes, sir,” Ryan replied.

“What else?” the President asked as he flipped through his notes. “I’ve asked the attorney general to give me recommendations as to how Sal Sabatini and this Samuel character ought to be handled. I have to tell you that I’m less worried at this point about the legal process than I am at the prospect that there could be others like them running around out there. Dr. Wise, I’d like you to make Swim Club, as well as all the other black programs Durkin had kept alive, your immediate focus at the Agency.”

“Yes, sir,” said Wise.

“Speaking of Durkin’s black programs, I understand the last member of the destabilization team, a Tara Fleming, has been placed in FBI custody and is being debriefed. I expect to meet with the FBI director soon to discuss what, if anything, he believes should be done with her.

“Which brings me finally to Mr. Monroe Lewis of the Federal Reserve. The scandals be damned—he’s going to stand trial for what he did. His security chief is going to be charged as an accessory as well. I think that does it,” he said, glancing once more at his notes. “Am I missing anything?”

Carlton raised an eyebrow.

“I’ll get to your request in a moment,” the President replied. Focusing on the others, he said, “I want to thank you again for what you did. It took tremendous courage. It’s that kind of bravery and sacrifice that is going to bring this nation back to prominence. Remember that when things get tough up on the seventh floor at Langley, because they will get tough.”

“We will, sir,” said McGee as he stood and shook the President’s hand. “Thank you, sir.”

Ryan and Wise joined him, and after they both shook the President’s hand and said goodbye, they exited the Oval Office along with Bob
McGee. Harvath and the Old Man sat facing the Director of National Intelligence and the President.

The President looked at Carlton and said, “General Johnson debriefed me on what happened in Somalia and shared your request to pin the firefight and the casualties on Durkin. I’m going to grant the request. Run everything through the general’s office, and as long as it all has his approval, I’m okay with it. Technically, though, this conversation never happened. Understood?”

“Understood,” the Old Man replied, pleased that he’d be able to put the
Sienna Star
issue to bed and get their agency paid.

“I also understand that your firm lost its DoD contract and since that time has been struggling a bit.”

“I wouldn’t say we’ve been—”

“That’s correct, sir,” Harvath replied, cutting off his boss and answering the President’s question.

“I also understand, Mr. Harvath, that you worked for a prior president and helped chalk up some big wins. How come the next administration didn’t hold you over?”

“They had a different worldview, sir.”

The President thought about that for a moment. “I am very bullish on America’s future; I make no secret about that. But before we return to prosperity and abundance, I believe we are going to face profound darkness and be tested like never before in this nation’s history. When that happens, the United States is going to need its very best and very brightest to push back the darkness and take the fight to any enemy that would see us destroyed, both foreign and domestic.

“I’d like to be able to count on your organization. I want you to be part of that fight. With some of the reorganization that General Johnson and I are planning for the intelligence community, we believe a place can be made for you. Would that be of interest?”

Simultaneously, Harvath and Carlton replied, “Yes, sir.”

“I’m glad to hear that,” said the President as he rose, signaling that the meeting was over.

As he walked them slowly to the door, he left them with one final thought. “A man who occupied this office years ago once said that freedom
is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States when men were free.”

He then shook their hands and said, “I’m glad to know that you’ll both be with me in this fight.”

C
APE
C
OD

M
ASSACHUSETTS

“I
promise you,” said Harvath. “I’m not going to let anything happen to him. Trust me.”

“Says the guy who lied to me about not being able to swim.”

Harvath smiled and pulled her close. Her skin felt warm and smooth against him, her body perfectly fitting with his. He kissed her neck, just below her ear, and then gave her a playful bite. She squealed and tried to get away, but couldn’t. He was holding on just tight enough to make it impossible.

They had been at the beach for a week and Harvath couldn’t remember ever being this happy. It had been a long time for Lara Cordero as well.

Harvath and Marco had been inseparable. They had walked the beach together, picking up buckets full of rocks and shells along with piles of sticks and huge pieces of driftwood. The little boy laughed when Harvath would pretend the pieces were too heavy and struggled to pick them up. They built sand castles with enormous moats, went for ice cream at least once a day, and rode bikes everywhere.

It was a perfect vacation, and Harvath and Lara had both needed it.
But the question bubbling to the surface was if they needed more than just a vacation.

As far as he was concerned, Lara was not only gorgeous, tough as hell, and accomplished in her own right, but she was also very smart. Though he’d been dead set against her plan for taking down Sal Sabatini, she’d been right and he had been wrong. A fact she found no end of joy in reminding him of.

Lara hadn’t wanted a shootout in her apartment that could have killed her son or her parents. In fact, she had rightly put their safety above everything else. Neither of them had known for sure if Sabatini would still be in her apartment when they got there, but her instincts had told her he would be.

She had given Harvath the key for the apartment’s back door and had made him promise that if he could get to Marco and get him out safely, he would do it. Harvath had honored that promise, waking up the first-floor tenants, giving them the boy, and telling them not to open the door for Sal as he returned upstairs to help Lara.

To her credit, she had instructed her parents to run as soon as Sal led her out of the living room and down the hall to Marco’s room. He had come completely unglued by that point, and she was seriously worried that he might kill her. The only thing that gave her any comfort was knowing that Harvath had saved her son, and even if he couldn’t get back in time to save her, at least her little boy would survive.

But Harvath had come back and he had in fact saved her. He had also honored the other half of the promise she had sworn him to, which was that he wouldn’t kill Sal unless he had no other choice.

When asked why he hadn’t simply taken the man by surprise and knocked him out with the butt of his weapon, Harvath replied, “You said I couldn’t kill him. You didn’t say I couldn’t shoot him.”

His sense of humor was just one of the many things about him that she had grown increasingly attracted to.

The second night on Cape Cod, after they had put Marco to bed, they opened a bottle of wine and talked. Or more to the point, she had asked questions and Harvath had talked. She wanted to know everything about him and he had told her, more than he had ever told any woman before.

Harvath wasn’t
a soft man, but he also wasn’t so hard that he couldn’t make room for someone like Lara Cordero and her son in his life. He was scared to admit it, but he’d fallen in love with that little guy the moment he saw him, and he was quickly realizing that the same might be true for Lara as well.

He didn’t know where any of this was going. All he knew was that he wanted the two of them to be in his life going forward. As long as he could lug huge pieces of driftwood up and down the beach, he knew he could count on Marco being on board. Lara, though, was another question.

She had been slow to open up about her past and he hadn’t pushed her. He didn’t really care what was behind them. He cared only about what might be in front of them, and today was a watershed moment.

Harvath hadn’t wanted to come to this stretch of beach. It had been Lara’s idea. “I need to finally say goodbye,” she had told him, and he had been okay with that. Closure was important, especially when someone so important in your life had died.

They had spent the afternoon doing all the things Marco liked doing on the beach, but they hadn’t been in the water. Coming back to Cape Cod was a big enough deal as it was. Going into the water where she had lost her husband might be a bridge too far.

Harvath smiled at her again and, scooping up Marco in his arms, leapt to his feet. “I promise,” he repeated. “It’ll be okay.”