“The last time I let a man slip that one past me I ended up pregnant with twins.”

“I’m being serious. People’s lives are at stake here.”

Carolyn thought for a moment. Harvath was clearly violating the chain of command. He had come to her as a shortcut, which meant that either time was of the essence or other avenues were unavailable.

He was a legend in the Secret Service, and his heroism and patriotism were above reproach, but Harvath was also known as a shoot-from-the-hip maverick who often chucked the rule book in favor of expediency. His “ends justifies the means” way of doing business had also become legendary in the Secret Service and was always held up as an example of what not to do.

Often, Harvath was characterized as having more balls then brains, and agents were admonished not to follow his example. It had been made crystal clear throughout the organization that Harvath’s success as a U. S. Secret Service agent had been due more to luck than anything else.

Leonard’s ass was on the line. Her job was to protect the president, not to decide what phone calls should get passed through to him. Going to the president with this would clearly be overstepping her bounds and could very well lead to a demotion, transfer, or worse.

“Scot, I could get fired for this,” she said.

“Carolyn, the president is not going to fire you. He loves you.”

“As did, supposedly, my ex-husband who left me with said twins, a mortgage, and over twenty-five thousand in credit card debt.”

“For all I know, Jack Rutledge may be on this whackjob’s list as well. Please, Carolyn, this guy is a killer and he needs to be stopped. I need your help.”

Leonard had always liked and admired Harvath. Regardless of what the powers that be said about him, he was a man who got things done, and never once had his motives been questioned. Everyone at the Secret Service knew that he put his country before all else. If there was ever someone more deserving of a favor, Leonard had never met him. “Hold on. I’ll see what I can do.”

WHITE HOUSE SITUATION ROOM

Four and a half minutes later, Jack Rutledge picked up the phone. “Scot, I heard about your mother and I want to let you know how incredibly sorry I am.”

Harvath let his silence speak for him.

“Agent Leonard tells me you have information about today’s bombing that I should know about,” continued the president. “She says you know who’s behind it.”

“It’s the same person who shot Tracy Hastings and who put my mother in the hospital.”

Rutledge’s blood began to boil. “I told you to stay out of this.”

Harvath was incredulous. “While this guy continues to prey upon the people I care about? Two are in the hospital, two more are dead, and plenty of others who were just in the wrong place at the wrong time have been killed or injured. I’m sorry, Mr. President, I can’t just stay out of this. I’m right in the middle of it.”

Rutledge struggled to remain calm. “Scot, you have no idea what you’re doing.”

“Why don’t you help me? Let’s start with that group of detainees you released from Guantanamo Bay a little over six months ago.”

Now it was the president’s turn to be silent. After a long pause, he spoke very carefully. “Agent Harvath, you’re treading on extremely thin ice.”

“Mr. President, I know about the radioisotope that was supposed to track them and I know it was found in the blood above my doorway. One of those men is sending a message by targeting the people close to me.”

“And my word that the people I have on this are doing all they can isn’t good enough for you?”

“No, Mr. President. It isn’t,” replied Harvath. “You can’t shut me out any more.”

Rutledge bowed his head and pinched the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. “I don’t have any choice.”

Harvath didn’t believe him. “You’re the president. How’s that possible?”

“I’m not at liberty to discuss any of this with you. You need to obey my orders or else you and I are going to have a very big problem.”

“Then it looks like we’ve got a very big problem, because there’ve already been three attacks and they’re going to keep coming unless I do something.”

The president paused as his chief of staff slid him a note. When he was done reading it he said, “Scot, I need to put you on hold for a minute.”

Clicking over to the line where the director of Central Intelligence, James Vaile, was waiting, Rutledge said, “You’d better be calling me with some good news, Jim.”

“I’m sorry, Mr. President, I’m not. Actually, we’ve got a bit of a problem.”

“That seems to be par for the course today. What is it?”

“Are you alone?”

“No, why?”

“This has to do with Operation Blackboard.”

Blackboard was a codename the president had hoped never to hear uttered again, but ever since Tracy Hastings’s shooting it seemed to be all he and the DCI talked about.

Placing the receiver against his chest, Rutledge asked his chief of staff to clear the room and close the door behind him.

Once everyone was out, the president said, “Now I’m alone.”

The CIA director got right to the point. “Mr. President, you’ll recall that one of the Gitmo detainees exchanged in Operation Blackboard was a former Mexican Special Forces soldier turned Muslim convert who was helping to train Al Qaeda operatives. His name was Ronaldo Palmera.”

Though the president normally remembered only the most significant names in the war on terror, the names of the five men released from Guantanamo had all stayed with him. At the time, it was because he harbored a fear in the deepest recesses of his soul that the names would one day come back to haunt him. Suddenly it looked as if that fear was about to become reality. “What about him?”

“Palmera was struck and killed by a taxi cab in Querétaro, Mexico.”

“Good.”

“His wrists were Flexicuffed behind his back when it happened,” replied Vaile.

“Not so good, but from what I recall the man had a lot of enemies. He was an enforcer for some of the big drug cartels down there, correct?”

“Yes, Mr. President, but that’s not the problem. Apparently, Palmera jumped through a window and then ran out into the street. Three men, three white men,” Vaile added for emphasis, “were seen coming out of Palmera’s residence immediately afterward. One of them removed Palmera’s boots and then they disappeared.”

“Removed his boots?”

“Yes, sir. You’ll recall that Palmera was rumored to have made a pair of boots from the tongues of the Special Forces and CIA agents he killed in Afghanistan. When he was captured, we looked but never found the boots. He obviously had them stashed somewhere and picked them up after he was released from Guantanamo.”

“Obviously,” replied the president, who could feel an intense headache coming on. He looked down and saw the blinking light of the line where Harvath was sitting on hold. “So according to your information, three gringos were responsible for Palmera exiting his home, through a window, with his arms Flexicuffed behind his back, at which point he ran into traffic and was run down by a taxi cab.”

“Yes, Mr. President.”

“Then one of these men removed Palmera’s boots and the trio fled the scene?”

“Exactly,” replied Vaile. “We think they may have come in via Querétaro’s international airport, and we’re working on getting hold of the aviation logs as well as customs information and security tape footage now. I don’t need to tell you what this is starting to look like.”

“I know exactly what it looks like. It looks like we broke our word. None of those men from Gitmo were supposed to be touched. Ever.”