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“Probably Deputy Director Swantish, either late tonight or early tomorrow morning,” she says. “Any news about Bruce?”
Ralph works his massive jaw. “In surgery at the moment. Months of rehab ahead of him. But he’ll bounce back, if it takes months or years.”
Hannah stands up, briefly touches Ralph’s shoulder. It’s like touching a cloth-covered chunk of granite. “Thanks for the update.”
Even though it’s late in the evening, Hannah needs to check in on her overnight guest. Up on the second floor she gives the guest bedroom door a quick knock, and opens it and slips in. Noa isasleep on one of the two guest beds. Her friend, Gina Stasio of the Office of Technical Services, is sitting on the other bed. She stands up and Hannah gently raises a hand.
“No, don’t bother,” Hannah says. “How’s she doing?”
Sitting back down on the bed, Gina says, “She’s woken up a couple of times, but has slipped back into sleep. What did the doctor say?”
After Noa arrived, bleeding and injured, Hannah arranged for one of the Agency’s medical teams to come in and treat her. Hannah says, “The wound on her wrist has been stitched and bandaged, as well as the bullet wound to her left side. It was a through and through, and the doctor cleaned and stitched that as well. Gave her an IV to replenish her lost fluids.”
Gina says, “She should be in a hospital.”
“She will be,” Hannah says. “Once I talk to her.”
“Director, that’s—”
“Hold on, hold on,” Hannah says, walking closer to Noa, whose head is moving back and forth on the pillow. The room is small but Noa notices that Gina had arrived with two large pieces of rolling luggage.Talk about overpacking,she thinks.
Hannah sits on Noa’s bed, gently strokes her forehead. “Noa, are you awake?”
Her eyelids flutter open, her eyes move, and then focus.
“Director,” Noa whispers. “You’ve got to … hear what I have to say …”
Hannah leans in. “Go. Tell me what you found out.”
“Kay … Darcy. Is she alive?”
“Yes,” she says. “Wounded but alive. She’s at GW, and we’re guarding her. But currently unconscious. What else?”
Noa licks her lips. “Donna Otterson … the financial officer … she was telling Kay Darcy about … illegal payment requests from the president’s Special Access Account.”
“Like what?”
“I’m so thirsty, can I get something to drink?”
Gina says, “On it.”
She leaves the bedroom and Noa says, “The fund … it’s been used to pay the salaries of Barrett’s teams, so it was hidden from standard oversight.”
Gina comes in with a glass of water. She holds up Noa’s head and Noa takes a healthy drink.
“God, that tastes good,” she says. “Director … the president has been buying other things as well. Automatic weapons. C-4. Even a damn Lincoln Town Car.”
“A Town Car? Wait—”
Noa nods. “Yes … the Iranian Quds unit we ambushed. They had C-4, AK-47s, and they were in a Town Car. All provided by President Barrett. A setup. But that’s not the worst of it.”
Hannah feels the temperature of the room seemingly plummet. “Go on.”
Noa says, “He’s illegally transferred millions of dollars to FEMA, for upgrades to the continuity of government bunkers at Mount Weather in Virginia and the Raven Rock Mountain Complex in Pennsylvania.”
She coughs and catches her breath for a cold moment.
“Ma’am,” Noa says. “He’s preparing to go to war.”
