Lethal Agent (Mitch Rapp #18)(47)

“We could have a life, Mitch. If you get bored, you can do some jobs with Scott. You could finally get your knee worked on. Heal. Maybe do a triathlon again.” She leaned forward and gazed intently at him. “I admire everything you’ve done. You’re the best at what you do. Maybe the best who ever lived. But there has to be an end to it one day. And that day seems to have come.”

A ringtone sounded, but this time it wasn’t his cell. He glanced at a bank of security monitors and saw one of the FBI agents charged with surveilling him. He was standing at the front gate, repeatedly pressing the call button. After thirty seconds or so, it became clear that he wasn’t going to give up.

Rapp stood and opened the intercom. “What?”

The man’s expression turned a bit sheepish. “The president requests that you take his call, sir.”

Then he got in his SUV and drove off. But not back to his normal post at the edge of the road. Instead, he and his colleagues disappeared down the hill.

Rapp’s cell started ringing again and this time he picked up. Claudia normally left the room when Irene or the president called, but this time she stayed put.

“Yeah.”

Normally, his greeting would be one more respectful of the office, but on that particular day he couldn’t conjure it.

“Has Irene briefed you on the latest developments?” Alexander asked.

“Why would she? I’m out and you posted guards to make sure I stay that way.”

Alexander ignored the comment. “The DEA found a shipment of anthrax mixed in with the drugs they confiscated at that mall in San Ysidro.”

“Nice work. Give Bob Woodman my compliments,” Rapp said, hovering his thumb over the disconnect button.

“It’s just blind luck that we intercepted it,” Alexander rushed to say. “NASA stumbled on it. And it’s even luckier that one of the random samples they took was from the package containing anthrax.”

He could feel Claudia’s eyes drilling into him. “That’s very interesting, sir, but with all due respect, what’s it to me?”

“We’re not going public,” the president said, clearly committed to dragging this out for some reason. “The hope is that we can trace the drugs back to the traffickers Halabi’s using.”

“Good luck,” Rapp said, but again Alexander spoke before he could disconnect the call.

“You understand my position, don’t you, Mitch? A few days ago, Halabi’s anthrax was nothing but a bunch of propaganda videos on the Internet. On the other hand, I see Christine Barnett as a clear and present danger to the country. Now the situation’s changed. We’ve been attacked with a biological weapon and it’s not going to be the last. All other considerations—including doing something that could inadvertently help Barnett get into the White House—are secondary. And that’s the kind of playing field you work best on.”

“Is it? Next year you’ll be playing golf and signing a multimillion-dollar book deal. Irene and I will be running from five different Senate investigations.”

“Maybe. But you’re not going to turn your back on your country. And neither am I.”

Before he could answer, Claudia did it for him. Her shrill scream nearly shattered his eardrums in the tiny bunker.

“He doesn’t want your fucking job!”

Both he and the president fell into stunned silence as she climbed the ladder and disappeared through the hatch.

Alexander was the first to speak. “Is that true?”

Rapp sat back down. In many ways everything Claudia had said to him that day was right. America was tearing itself apart with hate and rage that had no basis in reality. Christine Barnett would be the next president of the United States and come out gunning for Rapp, Kennedy, and anyone else she couldn’t control. What Claudia couldn’t see, though, was that America’s core was unchanged. The United States was a country of extremes. It had moods. Phases. Eras. But in the end, it always eventually got its shit together and remembered what it was.

“Mitch? Are you still there?”

“Yeah, I’m here. But I’ve got a question.”

“Ask it.”

“How much is it worth to you?”

“What do you mean?”

“We had a conversation just like this one a while back. You made it clear that it was my neck on the chopping block, not yours. I’m not in the mood to play that game again.”

“I assume you have demands?”

“You assume right. I want a pardon.”

“You haven’t done anything yet.”

“Then just start it with ‘I pardon Mitch Rapp’ and end it with your signature. The middle can be blank. And you should probably leave a fair amount of space.”

When Alexander spoke again, his voice had turned a bit cold. “Anything else?”

“A letter saying that you were kept fully informed of my actions and approved of all of them.”

“Are you actually going to?”

“What?”

“Keep me informed.”

“No.”

“Then how can I sign documents like that?”

“That, sir, is not my problem.”





CHAPTER 23


SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA