11

Parliament, London

The largest door of the Robing Room opened and Gina Hayes stepped inside, accompanied by her ubiquitous assistant Matthew, two Secret Service, and a steady stream of staffers coming in and out with questions and updates.

Salem, Charlie, and Stone all stood when they saw the president.

“Salem!” Matthew said, waving, indicating she should leave the table and join the president.

Salem smiled. She remembered Matthew as having a gift for putting everyone at ease and remembering names. Salem had met him only once, at President Hayes’ inauguration last January. “Hi, Matthew, Madam President.”

Gina Hayes was a formidable woman, solidly built, her eyes steel gray. She was as smart as she was efficient. “Update me on Gaea.”

Salem tipped back on her heels. She should have anticipated the question, but her mind was as blank as a sheet. Charlie appeared at her elbow to rescue her. “Agent Thackeray of MI5, Madam President. I’m Ms. Wiley’s partner. Gaea has amazing potential, but I’m afraid Ms. Wiley hasn’t been given enough dedicated time for it. With all due respect, it should be her full-time job.”

Salem flushed with gratitude. President Hayes reminded her of her own mother, cold and authoritarian. The similarity made it difficult to keep her wits in her presence. And Vida Wiley and Hayes shared more than a demeanor. They were both connected to the Underground at depths Salem hoped never to know.

The president arched an eyebrow at Charlie. Instead of responding to his defense, she strode toward the nearest painting, Matthew, Salem, and Charlie following. “I’m a fan of William Dyce’s.” The painting depicted a man on a white horse returning to King Arthur’s court, the king stretching a sword toward him in welcome. The painting was titled Hospitality, and the plaque below it read, The Admission of Sir Tristram to the Fellowship of the Round Table.

Hayes tipped her head toward the words. “Dyce was a Scotsman, did you know? My grandmother emigrated from Scotland.”

“That explains how well she held her whiskey,” Matthew said, not glancing up from his ever-present iPad.

The president’s chuckle was surprisingly warm. “Possibly.” Her eyes grew faraway. “‘The best laid schemes o’ mice and men, gang aft agley, and leave us nought but grief and pain, for promised joy!’”

“Robert Burns,” Charlie said, admiration apparent on his face.

“Yes,” President Hayes said, turning her attention to Salem. “Luckily, Salem, we are neither mice nor men. What do you think would be the best use of your time with the FBI?”

The question caught Salem off-guard. Quitting it. “I’m not sure.”

“Don’t be modest,” Charlie interrupted. “You’re brilliant. Once you’ve built her, Gaea will revolutionize computers.”

The president and Matthew exchanged a look. Hayes moved on to the next painting, this one featuring a man kneeling before a queen and her ladies. It was named Mercy and was half the size of Dyce’s hospitality painting. Its plaque read, Sir Gawaine swearing to be merciful and never be against Ladies.

“This one has always looked to me more like justice than mercy,” Hayes said, hands behind her back as she studied the art, “but of course there can be no justice without mercy.”

A loud bang interrupted their meeting.

It sounded to Salem like a very large door being slammed, but Lucan Stone, Charlie, and both Secret Service agents were in motion before the sound faded. All four of them shielded the president with their bodies and escorted her out.

The door to the hallway opened. It was chaos outside. “Bomb!” someone yelled.

Salem’s knees gave way, and she reached for the wall below the painting. She was suddenly alone in the Robing Room. A bomb had just gone off somewhere close enough to hear. Where were Mercy and Vida?

Heart thumping, she rang her mom, frantic to make sure she and Mercy were all right. When there was no answer, she called Bel. “I’m in Parliament. I was talking to the president when a bomb went off somewhere.”

Bel had never allowed lag time in her reactions. “Is anyone hurt?”

“Not that I know of.”

“Vida and Mercy?”

“I don’t know where they are. Mom isn’t answering her phone.” Saying that out loud made Salem nauseous.

Bel hung up without question. She called back two minutes and forty-five seconds later.

“They’re fine. They’re on their way to their hotel. The news hasn’t gotten wind of anything yet. Start researching.”

Salem didn’t know she’d been holding her breath until the aching in her chest signaled her. She sucked in a mouthful of air, staring at the B&C. Of course. “Thank you,” she said, but Bel had already hung up, likely to follow up on her end.

Salem set down her phone and clicked on Gaea, talking to the program in soothing tones. “I need SIGINT on what’s happening, honey.”

She typed on the industrial laptop’s keyboard, her fingers flying like a concert pianist’s. Gaea may be a baby, but she was a genius child. She could manage the terrorist networks, at least when looking for something as loud as a bomb. Within five minutes, Gaea had established a terrifying fact: the marquee terrorist groups were as surprised by the bomb as the president and her team had been, so caught off-guard that they didn’t even bother to code their communications.

Gaea wasn’t needed; a simple language translator would do.

Salem commanded ECHELON to run in the background before tapping Gaea to scour the major news networks.

Thirty-seven minutes later, she had it.

A man believed to be Saudi Arabian and in his early twenties had set off the bomb while sitting on a bench near Westminster Pier, only about a thousand feet from where she now sat. The act was being treated as a suicide bombing, his ties still buried, two tourists killed and eleven injured in the attack.

The rest of the afternoon and the night ticked away. Charlie checked on her sometimes, reporting on the lack of action outside. Salem stayed at the B&C in the Robing Room, running and tweaking Gaea, listening for any SIGINT tying the attack to a specific group. She was the best in her field, she recognized that without ego, and she couldn’t find anything. Three groups had publicly claimed the bombing, but their backdoor communication put the lie to that.

Something was way off.

A bombing in London with so many heads of state gathering would be a jewel in the crown of any known terrorist organization. The internet was alight with talk of it, but no one in the surface web or dark web knew who had done it.

“Hey.”

Salem glanced up. Charlie was standing there, looking as though he’d been there for a while. “Sorry. Hey.”

“Have you left your computer today?”

She glanced at her phone. She’d been sitting in the same spot for seven hours. “No.”

He wrinkled his nose. “That’s what I thought. Everyone else is off—everyone who works for the president, that is.”

“Agent Stone?”

Charlie nodded, his eyes hooded. “And his three field agents. We’re all going out for a pint. Care to join us?”

Salem blinked, still not oriented to reality after spending the afternoon in a rabbit hole. “Did they identify the group for the bombing?”

Charlie had shrugged. “No. And even if they had, it doesn’t change standard operating procedure. Security is tight. Scotland Yard is on the case. The summit moves forward as planned. And tired men need a drink.” He ran his hand through his hair and slapped on a smile. “Women as well. You’re joining us?”