Power and Empire

“Very well,” Zhao said. He put a foot on the bottom step and then turned to the other two men. “Have either of you been in contact with Admiral Qian? I wish to speak to him, but his staff said he is incommunicado.”

General Xu shrugged. “Perhaps inspecting one of our submarines, Mr. President.”

“Perhaps,” Zhao said, and bounded up the stairs.

• • •

I must go,” Li said as soon as the paramount leader was out of earshot.

“What is this business with Admiral Qian?” Xu asked. “I have not been able to contact him, either. That man has disappeared.”

“I’m sure it is nothing,” Li said, turning to climb the stairs. The steward at the top waved him forward with a white glove, telling him, the foreign minister, to hurry. Li purposely slowed, taking his time up the last few steps, then noted the steward’s name as he turned to find his seat.

Li took his spot in premium seating directly aft of the paramount leader’s office and quarters. He took his mobile phone from the pocket of his suit jacket before handing it to a steward — not the idiot who had rushed him — and pressed the number for his wife. Oddly, there was no answer, even at this early hour. She’d been awake when he left. He tried his son, still reaching nothing but voice mail. He smiled a tight smile, fending off the inevitable worry of a man with many enemies who was leaving town.

The flight was just over three hours. He would try again when they landed.

60

If there was one fortunate thing about being tired all the time, President Ryan knew, it was that he could usually nap at any given moment. It hadn’t always been that way. The Threat Board being what it was — urgent and stacked — it had a tendency to keep thinking people up at night. But as he spent more and more time with the sword of Damocles suspended over his head, Ryan’s brain and body formed an uneasy truce, allowing thoughts on topics such as nuclear destruction or a fragile economy to simmer in the background instead of boiling over the moment his head hit the pillow. Cathy said he dreamed more now, tossing and turning and mumbling nonsensical things in his sleep. Ryan rarely remembered his dreams, which made him believe there was a God, and that He was merciful, because the dreams of a powerful man with any conscience at all were, by necessity, bad dreams.

He woke to the change in pressure in his ears as Air Force One began a gradual descent over Japan. Hopefully, the four-hour nap would get his body clock somewhere in line with Japan time. They would be wheels-down at Yokota Air Base at nine-twenty a.m. local — giving him a full day of meetings when his brain told him it was eight-twenty p.m. in D.C. It was going to be a long one, so he shaved and put on a clean shirt and a midnight-blue tie. Cathy said the color made him look serious, which, he thought, was appropriate considering his upcoming meeting with President Zhao.

Though surely terrifying for the crew, the business with RV Meriwether had proven a litmus test for the power struggle that appeared to be going on inside China. Either Zhao was a liar or he didn’t have control of his military. The former, Ryan had come to hope. The latter would be a nightmare.

• • •

Special Agent Gary Montgomery sat on the sofa outside the President’s office and gazed out the windows at the ocean below. He didn’t much care for water. It could kill you, but you couldn’t kill it back. POTUS would be up soon, so Montgomery buttoned the top button on his white shirt and straightened his tie. He always brought two ties to work, a red one and a blue one — so he’d not be wearing the same color as his protectee. It was weird, Montgomery admitted that, but it was something he did for luck — well, that and countless hours at the range and in the gym. The President had been wearing a red power tie when they left Andrews, and Montgomery was happy he’d chosen a blue Brooks Brothers for today. This was his first flight with President Ryan, and he wanted everything to be perfect. His years in the Secret Service had taught him that if something could go wrong, it would. Montgomery didn’t relish the idea of having a man he respected as much as Jack Ryan standing over his shoulder when things inevitably turned to shit.

The Japanese took a dim view of firearms and strictly enforced who could and could not carry for all but the agents immediately surrounding the President. Even these were warned of Japanese gun laws, but no one stopped the President of the United States or the dozen close-protection agents who arrived in the motorcade with him. Montgomery had been told it was a wink-and-a-nod sort of agreement, with the Japanese not doing very much winking — or nodding.

Yeah, Tokyo was touted as the safest city in the world, but the President of the United States had enemies, and it took only one devoted son of a bitch to ruin your whole day — especially if half your team was standing around holding nothing but air when they should be holding SIG Sauer pistols.