Against All Enemies Read Free

it’s Kyle, he’s gone.”
    Durant shook his head. Kyle Broderick had only given words to what the President was thinking. Chasing the chief of staff out of the room had been enough to set things right. He looked at his hands. “I’m not in contact with Meredith. We have no common interests.” The President was stunned. It was a tacit admission that Jonathan Meredith was beyond Durant’s influence. “And Meredith is running for President,” Durant added.
    “You’re not telling me anything I don’t already know,” the President replied.
    “Jim, Meredith fancies himself an American Caesar, and he’s about to cross the Rubicon.” Durant’s analogy to Caesar taking the fateful step and ordering his army to cross the Rubicon in his quest to become Rome’s emperor hit home. Nelson Durant stared at his President. “All of Rome couldn’t stop Caesar. Can you?”
    1:00 A.M. Friday, March 5,
San Francisco
     
    “It was Oklahoma City all over again,” Marcy said. She was sitting beside Sutherland in the hospital’s waiting room, which had been turned into a makeshift emergency ward. The room was filled with walking wounded from the explosion. “The doctor said you’ve got a bad concussion,” she told him. “They want to hold you awhile for observation.”
    Sutherland reached for her hand, needing human contact. She responded, her hands clasping his. “The other people on the roof?” he asked.
    She shook her head, and he could feel her tremble. “We were the only ones. Hank, you saved me. I was going over the side, you grabbed me…” She lost her voice.
    “The waitress?”
    “She’s going to be okay.” Then, stronger, “Thanks to you. I could’ve never gotten her off the roof or gone down that stairwell by myself. If you hadn’t been there…”
    The enormity of it all came crashing down on him. “Oh, shit,” he moaned as a new emotion swept over him, driving him into deep despair. “The hostess, she jumped me to the head of the line, if she had sat us at any other table…” That was all he could say as guilt claimed him, demanding a penance for being alive.
    “It was just one of those things,” Marcy said, understanding what he was going through. “It was just coincidence.”
    Sutherland lay his head back. Just coincidence , he thought. We’re alive and they’re all dead because of coincidence . He tried not to think about it and focused on the TV in the corner.
    “The FBI is now certain,” the commentator said, “that this was a calculated act of terrorism gone wrong. The bomb exploded prematurely while being moved down Market Street. So far, the death toll has reached four hundred twenty-two and is expected to go higher. We’re awaiting the arrival of the President, who is due to land at any moment.”
    “Screw the President,” Marcy grumbled.
    As if on cue, the commentator held his hand to his ear to be sure he heard right. “The video coverage we are about to show was taken by a tourist moments after the explosion.” The screen flickered and the back of a fireman appeared as he ran toward the collapsing building. The camera came to a stop and Meredith appeared running out of the building with an unconscious girl in his arms. Sutherland pulled himself into a half-sitting position. The movement made his head hurt. “That’s the waitress,” he said. “Holy shit, it’s Meredith!”
    Marcy waved a hand at him, commanding him to be quiet as the scene played out. Meredith’s face filled the screen as he uttered, “I had to do something…. I was there.” The scene cut back to live coverage. Meredith was being interviewed by Liz Gordon, CNC-TV’s premier reporter. In the background, floodlights lit the façade of the Shopping Emporium. Sutherland had to concentrate as his mind reeled.
    Meredith was forty-six, handsome, six feet tall, with dark hair that was lightly streaked with gray. His lean body was taut and conditioned, the result of countless hours of exercise. But it was