Capitol Betrayal by William Bernhardt Page A

felled assassin. His leg was twisted behind him at a bizarre angle. Seamus didn’t need a surgeon to tell him that leg would never function again. The guy probably died when—
    Wait a minute. He wasn’t dead. He was spitting blood, coughing. His face was racked with pain.
    Seamus got right down in his face. “No promises, you son of a bitch. But I think it’s just possible you might live. If I call an ambulance immediately.”
    The man teared up. His eyes were pleading. “P-p-please—”
    “I know you and your friends used this kid to hack into the defense computers. I know you came here to kill him to cover your tracks. What I don’t know is: Where’s your base of operations? The one you’re using to control the satellite.”
    The wounded man’s head was shaking. His whole body began to tremble.
    “You’d better tell me, if you want any chance whatsoever to live. ‘Cause if you’re thinking you’re headed to some afterlife with wine and honey and virgins, all I can say is, you’ve got a hell of a lot of misery between you and that.” He paused. “I can make that misery last a good long time. Longer than you can endure without going stark raving mad. And just FYI, there’s no heaven for filthy terrorists who try to shoot college kids when they’re not looking.”
    Truth was, the man was fading and would probably be gone in thirty seconds or so. But he didn’t know that. “So talk! Where’s the base?”
    “D-don’t… I—I d-don’t know….”
    Seamus leaned forward, pressing his knee down on the broken, twisted leg. The man screamed.
    “Last chance, chump. Where’s the base?”
    “I don’t… know….” He was crying, spitting out blood between syllables. He wasn’t lying. Seamus was sure of it. He didn’t have the capacity to bear this kind of pain without trying to end it. Probably no one did. Damn.
    “What about the missile?” Seamus pressed. “What’s Zuko’s target for the missile?”
    The man looked up at him pleadingly, not answering.
    “Answer me or my thumb goes into that gaping gash in your leg! I’ll pull the bone out with my bare hands!”
    “Nooo! Please, no!”
    “Spit it out! Or I’ll start putting bullets in your appendages one at a time!”
    “It—it—it—”
    “Tell me!”
    His eyes and mouth opened. He was giving up the ghost, almost literally letting all the fight seep out of him.
    “J-J-Jeffffff…”
    “Jeff? Who the hell is Jeff?”
    “The J-J-Jefffff…”
    “The Jeff? What in the hell?”
    Behind him, Seamus heard the rustling of grass and then Arlo’s voice. “Don’t you get it, man? He’s not saying Jeff. He’s trying to say Jefferson. As in the Jefferson Memorial.”
    Seamus grabbed the man’s collar and hauled him upward. “Is that right? Is that what you’re saying?”
    The man’s lids were heavy and he was beyond speaking, but his head trembled up and down in a manner that approximated a nod.
    “Jesus God.” Seamus threw him down, then stared up at the sky. “I should’ve known. First Washington, now Jefferson.”
    “Why would they want to do that?” Arlo asked. “It’s just a big hunk of marble.”
    “It’s a symbol, kid. A very important symbol. And more to the point, it’s a symbol visited by thousands of people every day. Thousands of people who will be slaughtered as soon as that missile hits.”
     
     
     

Chapter

12
     
     
9:48 A.M.
     
     
    The room was silenced by Ben’s disturbing but inescapable conclusion.
    “If there’s a mole in here, who can I trust?” President Kyler asked.
    “That’s the key question,” Cartwright said, arms folded across his portly chest.
    “And the question none of us knows the answer to,” Ruiz added. “Well, maybe one of us does.”
    “Or more,” Secretary Rybicki said.
    “If Kincaid is right and there is a mole down here,” Cartwright said, “who the hell is it?”
    All those seated at the table began to look closely, too closely, at the people sitting around them.