Steve Berry - The Jefferson Key

He realized the authorities would love to clear the hotel, but that could prove impossible. There were simply too many people on the twenty-plus floors. With the usual six months of prep time for a presidential visit, the Secret Service would have been able to handle this. As it was, they’d barely had eight weeks, their main tactic secrecy since no travel announcement had been made until this morning, when the White House simply said that Daniels would be in New York on a personal visit. The precedent for that came from a past president who’d made an unannounced trip with his wife to see a Broadway production. That jaunt had gone off without a hitch, but Danny Daniels was probably kicking himself right now, provided his organs weren’t failing or he wasn’t losing large quantities of blood.

Wyatt loved it when people screwed up.

It made things so much easier.

More than likely Malone had fled upward, at least initially. He’d yet to exit any of the elevators Wyatt could see. He certainly would not be using the stairs, as the police would have those sealed first thing. But the note he’d left in the room should drive Malone forward. He’d be the Lone Ranger, as always. Good and faithful to his beloved Stephanie Nelle.

He liked being back in the fray.

It had been a while since his last contract. Work had come less frequently the past few years, and he missed his job as a full-time agent. Eight years now since he’d been forced out. Still, he’d made a living peddling his services, which seemed the future of the intelligence business. Fewer agents on the payroll, more hired by the job-independent contractors who offered deniability and required no pension. But he was fifty years old and should have risen, by now, to deputy administrator, or maybe even head of an agency. He’d been called one of the best field agents ever.

Until-

“What are you going to do?” Cotton Malone asked him.

They were trapped. Two gunmen had them pinned from above, and another two were positioned in the dark recesses that stretched before them. He’d suspected a trap and now that fear had been confirmed. Thankfully, he and Malone had come prepared.

He reached for the radio.

Malone grabbed his arm. “You can’t do that.”

“Why not?”

“We know what’s out there. They don’t.”

They were three agents told to watch the perimeter.

“We have no idea how many guns are here,” Malone said. “Four we know of, but there could be a lot more.”

His finger found the SEND button. “We have no choice.”

Malone yanked the radio from his grasp. “If I agreed with that, we’d both be wrong. We can handle this.”

More rounds came their way. They kept low, among the crates.

“Let’s divide,” Malone said. “I’ll take the left, you the right, and we’ll meet in the center. I’ll keep the radio.”

He said nothing.

Malone stared out into the blackness, seemingly assessing the danger, readying himself to advance.

Wyatt decided on another course.

One swipe of his gun across the temple and Malone slumped to the concrete, out cold.

He retrieved the radio and ordered the three men to move in.

A loud voice snapped his mind back to reality.

Another wave of police had invaded the lobby. People were now being herded toward the exits, the hotel staff assisting. Apparently, somebody had finally made a decision.

His gaze raked the mayhem.

The main elevators opened on the ground floor and people streamed out. One of them was Cotton Malone.

Wyatt smiled.

Malone had ditched his jacket, just as Wyatt knew he would. That would be one of the things agents would be looking for. He watched as Malone melded into the crowd and hustled across the lobby to the escalator, riding it down toward the hotel’s main entrance. Wyatt stayed back, using a tall curtain for cover. The agents and police were making their way toward where he stood, gesturing for everyone to leave.

Malone stepped off the escalator and, instead of leaving through the center doors, turned right and headed for the exit that led into Grand Central Terminal. Wyatt drifted toward one of the hotel meeting rooms, closed for the evening, and reached for the radio in his pocket, already set on the frequency being used by the Secret Service.

“Alert to all agents. Suspect is wearing pale blue buttondown shirt, light trousers, no jacket at this time, presently exiting Grand Hyatt hotel from main lobby into tunnel that accesses Grand Central Terminal. I’m headed in that direction.”

He waited an instant, pocketed the radio, then turned toward the lobby.

Malone disappeared through the exit doors.

Secret Service agents elbowed their way through the crowd in pursuit.

KNOX LEFT THE PLAZA HOTEL. HE KNEW AT LEAST THREE MEMBERS of the Commonwealth were bordering on panic. As they should be. What they’d authorized came fraught with risk. Too much in his opinion. Always before they’d worked with the encouragement and blessing of the government, their actions and authority sanctioned. Now they were renegades, sailing stormy, uncharted waters.

He crossed the street and entered Central Park. Sirens blared in the distance, as they would for hours to come. Still no word on the president’s condition, but the whole thing had happened less than an hour ago.

He’d always liked Central Park. Eight hundred plush acres of trees, grass, lakes, and footpaths. A backyard for an entire city. Without it Manhattan would be one unbroken block of concrete and buildings.

He’d made a call from the Plaza and requested an immediate meeting. His contact had likewise wanted to talk-no surprise there-and was nearby, so they chose the same bench past the Sheep Meadow, near Bethesda Fountain, where they’d met before.

The man who waited for him was unremarkable in nearly every way, from his forgettable features to his plain manner of dress. Knox walked over and sat, immediately disliking the smug look on Scott Parrott’s face.

“The man hanging out the window,” he asked Parrott. “One of yours?”

“I wasn’t told how it would be stopped, only that it would be.”

The answer raised more questions than it resolved, but he let it go. “What now?”

“We want this to be a message to the captains,” Parrott said. “We want them to know that we know everything about the Commonwealth. We know its employees-”

“Crew.”

“Excuse me?”

“The crew works the company.”

Parrot laughed. “You’re a bunch of friggin’ pirates.”

“Privateers.”

“What the hell’s the difference? You steal from anyone you can.”

“Only from the enemies of this country.”

“It doesn’t matter what you are,” Parrot said. “We’re all supposed to be on the same team.”

“It doesn’t look that way from our perspective.”

“And I sympathize with your bosses. I know they’re being squeezed. I get it. But there are limits. You have to understand that. They have to know that we would never allow them to kill the president. I’m shocked that they’d think we would. Like I said, this is a message.”

Which the National Intelligence Agency apparently wanted him to personally deliver. Parrott was Knox’s contact with the NIA. A year ago, when it became apparent that factions within the intelligence community had decided to destroy the Commonwealth, only the NIA had stood with them.

“The captains will wonder why you’re sending them messages. Why you interfered.”

“Then tell them I have some good news. Good enough that they should thank us for what we did today.”

He doubted that, but he was listening.

“The solution to your Jefferson cipher should be loading on my laptop as we speak. Our guys solved it.”