3

WASHINGTON, D.C. —16 NOVEMBER

Marcus got up early and went for a run, past the Capitol and down the Mall.

When he got back to his apartment, he showered, dressed, and headed to Manny’s Diner, just a few blocks away. Pete wasn’t there yet, so he grabbed a booth, ordered coffee, and began reading the Washington Post.

By twenty minutes after nine, Pete still hadn’t arrived. When Marcus checked his phone and found no text messages or emails from him, he began to worry. Just as he was about to call Pete and read him the riot act, however, a woman he’d never seen suddenly dropped into the seat across from him.

“Hey, old man,” she said, grabbing a menu. “What are we having?”

Marcus tensed, though he didn’t take the woman for a threat. “And you would be?”

“Your new partner,” she said without looking up.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Wow, Ryker, you really are old —lost your hearing, have you?” she quipped, now looking up as the waitress approached the booth. “Coffee —black; scrambled eggs —dry; and . . . do you have asparagus?”

“’Course,” said the waitress.

“Good —then a side of asparagus instead of the hash browns, if that’s all right.”

“You got it.” The waitress smiled and turned to Marcus. “And you?”

“Give us a minute, okay?” he said, and she shrugged and headed to the kitchen.

Marcus turned back to the mystery woman across from him. Younger than him by nearly a decade, she looked to be about thirty or thirty-one, with light-brown skin, chocolate-brown eyes, and jet-black hair tied back in a ponytail. She had an athletic build and struck Marcus as a runner. She wore no rings —no jewelry of any kind, actually —and her hands were calloused and strong. Her nails were unpainted and carefully trimmed. She wore a jean jacket over a black turtleneck, and he had no doubt that under the jacket was an automatic pistol.

Before he could speak, she slid a leather case across the table. Marcus recognized it immediately, as he’d recently been given one of his own. Sure enough, when he opened it, he found the woman’s badge and ID. Her full name was Kailea Theresa Curtis, and she was a DSS special agent.

“Your buddy Pete won’t be coming. He’s in a meeting,” she said.

“With whom?”

“The director.”

“Why?”

“I’m afraid he’s getting some bad news —he’s not cleared for field duty.”

“Why not?”

“His arm isn’t healing properly. He needs another surgery. It’s scheduled for Wednesday. So I’ve been assigned to you. We’ve got three days to prep for the NSA’s trip to the Middle East, and we fly out Tuesday night.”

She was referring to the president’s national security advisor, General Barry Evans. This was the first Marcus was hearing about any trip. Neither the director of DSS nor his real boss, CIA director Richard Stephens, had said a word. But for some reason he believed her.

Suddenly his phone buzzed. He was getting a text.

“That’s me,” Kailea said. “Now you’ve got my number.”

His phone rang. This time it was Pete.

“Where are you?” Marcus asked. “I thought we were supposed to —”

But Pete cut him off, and Marcus just listened as Pete relayed the same information Kailea had. A minute later, Marcus set his phone down on the table.

“You see, old man? I really was telling the truth.” The woman smiled. “Now try to stay with me. We’ve got a briefing at Langley at eleven with the rest of the general’s detail. So get yourself some breakfast and let’s hit the road. Got it?” Then, raising her voice as if she were talking to someone in a retirement home, she said, “GOT THAT? BREAKFAST NOW. BRIEFING LATER.”

Marcus held his tongue and sipped his coffee. “So, Agent Curtis, what’s your story?”

Before she could answer, though, an explosion pierced the morning calm.

“Just a car backfiring,” the waitress said as she arrived with a mug and pot of coffee. “Happens all the time.”

But Marcus knew better. It wasn’t a car backfiring. It was a Glock semiautomatic pistol firing a 9mm round. It was a sound he had heard a million times before, and it was close.

“Check the back door,” Marcus said as he quickly slid out of the booth. “And make sure the manager locks it.”

Kailea nodded and walked immediately to the kitchen. As she did, Marcus noticed her right hand move almost imperceptibly toward the bulge under the back of her jacket where she kept her weapon.

Brushing past the waitress, Marcus unzipped his leather jacket, giving him quick access to his Sig Sauer, though he didn’t draw it yet. As he headed to the front door, he scanned the eyes of the various customers seated about the diner. None of them looked nervous. None of them seemed alarmed. Apparently none of them had even noticed the shot or cared, or they assumed like the waitress that it was a car backfiring. They were simply eating their omelets or reading their papers or doing their crossword puzzles or lost in their smartphones, oblivious to the danger or just numb to it, having lived in the southeastern section of D.C. all their lives.

Marcus stepped out onto Eleventh Street and looked left.

It was now almost nine thirty on a brisk, cloudless, spectacular Sunday morning, the kind of day that made him love living in the nation’s capital, especially in the fall. The leaves still clinging to their branches were vibrant gold and maroon and yellow and orange. But nature would have her way. Even those were falling to the ground, swirling along the sidewalks and spinning down the streets amid stiff breezes that signaled winter was coming soon.

Seeing nothing out of the ordinary, Marcus looked right.

Again, nothing was obviously amiss. All was quiet. No cars were moving. No trucks. Barely anyone was on the streets, save a few young girls playing jump rope nearby. Marcus heard no pounding of running feet, no yelling, no screeching tires or approaching sirens. The only sound was that of an American flag, its colors now a bit faded, snapping sharply atop a tall steel pole outside the diner.

“All clear out back,” Kailea said, coming up behind him. “What’ve you got?”

Marcus just stared up Eleventh Street, then started walking northward.

“What is it?” she pressed.

Marcus said nothing, but his pace increased. Soon he was jogging, with Kailea hastening to catch up. When they reached East Capitol Street, Marcus stopped abruptly in front of a dry-cleaning shop. He swept left to right, then turned his attention to the nearly barren trees of Lincoln Park. That’s when he heard the Glock again. This time four shots rang out in rapid succession. A moment later, an automatic rifle erupted. It was an AR-15, or perhaps an M4, and the burst was followed almost immediately by bloodcurdling shrieks like nothing he’d heard since Kabul and Fallujah.

“The church!” yelled Marcus, and he broke into a sprint.