Oath of Loyalty (Mitch Rapp #21)(14)

“True. But it can also be the start of a new one.”





CHAPTER 6


THE WHITE HOUSE

WASHINGTON, DC

USA

CATHERINE Cook avoided her normal path across the lawn, staying to the pavement. Temperatures had risen into the eighties, but the grass was still soft from the torrential rains the eastern seaboard had suffered. Most important, though, was that the flooding in the Carolinas had subsided quickly enough to make her husband’s lack of interest more a missed opportunity than a weapon for the opposition.

A man with more sensible footwear than her own overtook her to the left, sweating in black tactical clothing behind a German shepherd. He spoke briefly with a group of similarly clad men—these holding assault rifles—before continuing on his way. Manifestations of her husband’s increasingly oppressive security.

Outside the gate, traffic was being diverted around recently installed barriers, exacerbating Washington’s already significant traffic issues. The additional security personnel were augmented by hastily erected checkpoints and scanner stations, giving points of ingress a distinct airport feel. Further, much of the personnel not directly involved with security had been deemed nonessential and sent home to work until further background checks could be done. She herself had lost a full third of her staff.

Her husband had always been seen as a risk taker. He knew what he wanted and went after it with a level of aggression that was unusual even in her world of high finance. That passion and the destructive impulses that sometimes came with it were what made him so relatable to the common man.

It was also what made them such an effective team. Her dispassionate, analytical nature tended to work as a foil. In the end, their hard-won compromises formed the best of all worlds—carefully calculated strategies wrapped in the messianic flair humanity needed from its leaders.

What she’d missed was that her husband had never been faced with a physical threat. The passion that she’d mistaken for strength was turning to terror as he realized that losing to Mitch Rapp wouldn’t be the same as a political loss. In politics, there were opportunities even in defeat. Ways to lie, spin, and blame. With Rapp there would be no second chances. His defeated enemies didn’t return stronger for the experience. Nor did they come back to fight another day.

To make matters worse, her ability to sway her husband seemed to be slipping. As his paranoia grew, he was increasingly looking to others for counsel. To people who promised him something she couldn’t: protection.

Finally, there was the threat posed by Nicholas Ward. He had returned to the public arena the day before, announcing that his death had been faked as part of a strategy to defeat a plot against him. A strategy that hadn’t just saved his life, but had allowed Mitch Rapp to wipe out one of the world’s most brutal terrorist organizations in the process. The story had hijacked the news cycle so completely that anything short of a war with Iran would be insufficient to get it back.

So, while her husband hid behind his increasingly elaborate security apparatus, the world’s first trillionaire was out in public, looking poised, brilliant, and decisive. Worse, he now had the backing of Mitch Rapp and Scott Coleman’s organization. With the nearly inevitable addition of Irene Kennedy, he would have more power than most countries.

The fact that Ward was shamelessly taking credit for what had happened in Uganda was telling. He knew that she and her husband had moved against him and was making a show of pushing back. Sending the message that while he preferred to stay out of the spotlight, he understood how to use it as well as anyone.

Of course, the conspiracy theorists were having a field day and their ideas were already beginning to surface in the mainstream media. Ward’s paramilitary win in Uganda and subsequent resurrection were being conflated with the increased security at the White House. Elaborate stories about a shadowy war between the billionaire class and the political elite were springing up everywhere. The only variant was which side was good and which evil.

Fortunately, that was something that could be turned to their benefit. The value of Ward’s companies had plummeted during his temporary death and the inevitable rebound could be used to generate accusations of profiteering, tax fraud, and stock manipulation.

Even better, Ward’s actions in Uganda seemed to have caused the death of numerous minors. The fact that these children were butchers could be glossed over. With a little sleight of hand, they could be portrayed as innocents who could have been rehabilitated if their lives hadn’t been snuffed out by Ward in his single-minded pursuit of safety and ever more wealth. With luck, they might even be able to conjure a faint odor of racism.

These were the problems that would be the focus of her imminent meeting with her husband. Just the two of them and their lead political strategist. No distractions, no tangents, and no other considerations. They needed to regain control of the narrative and reestablish Anthony Cook as the only reliable purveyor of strength, truth, and stability. Because if they didn’t do so quickly, everything they’d worked for would collapse. Without a shepherd, the sheep quickly became lost.



“Good afternoon, ma’am.”

Catherine gave a nearly imperceptible nod to her husband’s secretary as she passed the woman’s desk. Her mood darkened when she opened the door to the Oval Office and saw that their political strategist was nowhere to be seen. Apparently he had been replaced by the director of the Secret Service and Darren Hargrave, the man they’d chosen to take Irene Kennedy’s place at the helm of the CIA. They were standing close to one another near the room’s seating area, speaking to her husband in rushed, muted tones.