Three helicopters thumped in the gray sky overhead, two peeling off while the third hovered over the hotel roof, settling in for a landing. Marine One. Jack felt his gut twist, knowing that his father was stepping into some serious unknowns.
“You needn’t worry about the President,” Yukiko said. “The Wadakura fountains and ponds form a natural barrier to the south of this venue and the police have closed the roads around the entire block.” She nodded toward a large white tent at the end of the street. “Any delivery or staff support vehicle—even those of the police—must be screened with mirrors and explosive-detection canines. Pedestrians, including security, must show their credentials at that point, and then again inside the building, passing through metal detectors at both locations. It is like the layers of an onion. Concentric rings, countermeasures to thwart bombings, armed assailants, missiles, biological and chemical attacks, and crazy people with samurai swords. You see, it appears that every conceivable attacker has been covered.”
“Even kebukai yabanjin?” Jack said.
“Especially the hairy barbarians,” Yuki said.
Sirens yelped and a motorcade of fifteen cars turned off Uchibori and into the security tent half a block down.
The black Toyota sedan behind the police lead vehicles bore the red flags of the People’s Republic of China.
“Zhao,” Ryan mused.
The motorcade proceeded under the hotel portico, out of the rain. Men in dark suits sprang from the two follow-up sedans, facing outbound as they surrounded the limousine. Some of them would be Japanese SPs—Security Police—but like the United States, China preferred to bring a relatively large contingent of her own personnel.
Ryan took a half-step forward in order to get a better look. It was hard to be certain in the rain from so far away.
“Do those two guys look familiar?”
Yuki moved up beside him. “I . . . think so.”
President Zhao exited his limo, purposely shielded from clear view by the vehicle and the pillars in front of the hotel entry. He and several members of his security detail disappeared into the hotel. The motorcade pulled forward and then stopped again. More security men got out and surrounded a second protectee.
“Foreign Minister Li,” Yuki said. “I know who those men were.”
“Me too,” Ryan said into the microphone on his neck loop.
“Hey, guys . . . We got a problem.”
61
Jack looked up at the twenty-three-story hotel. His father was somewhere up there right now. He fought the urge to pace back and forth. “Everyone going in has to be credentialed, right?”
“Correct,” Yuki said. “We can check the photo database.”
She took out her cell phone but a barked command from one of the policemen sent her and Jack to the end of the block.
Ryan held her umbrella while she worked.
“Are you sure they were Li’s guys?” Midas asked over the radio.
“Pretty sure,” Ryan said. “At least two of them were with him at the restaurant bombing in Argentina.”
Chavez weighed in. “All the ChiCom bigwigs get protection from the CSB. It’s like our Secret Service and Diplomatic Security Service combined.”
“True,” Ryan said. “But the change at this point is too big a coincidence. Chen’s getting paid to whack people, maybe even by Li, and then Li’s protective detail moves over to Zhao—on the same day he’s meeting with my dad. Yuki’s right. This place is completely buttoned up—from everyone except the close-protection agents. It’s impossible to guard against the guards.”
“You’re right,” Chavez said. “We need to alert the Secret Service.”
“Wait!” Ryan said. “Let’s think this through a second. Yuki might be able to get us upstairs.”
She shook her head. “I am not credentialed to go in. I could get approval, but it would take time.”
“That’s a no-go, then,” Ryan said. “But if it is an assassination plot, these guys smell an alarm and they’ll just open fire. The Secret Service won’t know what’s going on. No matter who the target is, everybody in the room will be sitting ducks.”
Yuki held up her phone. “You are correct,” she said. “Three new officers from the Central Security Bureau were credentialed for President Zhao’s protective detail, including a man named Long Yun, the former agent in charge of Foreign Minister Li’s security team.”
“Bear with me here, guys.” Jack passed the umbrella to Yuki and began thumb-typing feverishly into his cell phone. He copied the text, then hit send. Pasted the text, hit send again. Pasted the text once more, then sent it a third time. “Okay,” he said, heaving a tense sigh once he’d sent the last text. “When I was a kid, my dad missed one of my baseball games because he had to work. It really tore him up. He made this deal with all of us that if he was physically able, it wouldn’t matter if he was with the Queen of England herself, he’d answer a call after three hang-ups in quick succession.” He blew out a heavy breath, nerves wound tight. “Trust the guy on the ground, right, Midas?”
“Roger that,” Midas said.
“Well,” Jack said, “Dad’s the guy on the ground.”
“What did you send him?” Adara asked.
“‘Three bad guys new to Zhao’s detail. Violence likely.’ He’ll know what to do . . . I hope.”
? ? ?
The two presidents had elected to conduct the short bilateral meeting alone, but for a single Security man each. Gary Montgomery had forty pounds and five inches on Zhao’s man, but the Chinese Security agent appeared to vibrate with intensity. Neither were about to let anything—even a slight—happen to their respective charges.
The two other members of each protection detail waited in the slightly larger anteroom beyond a set of double doors. Ryan was seated in one of two chairs to the right of the Chinese leader. They were close, less than three feet apart, quartering away from a floor-to-ceiling window. A washroom was to Ryan’s immediate right in the corner of the small, ten-by-ten-foot room.
Interpreters and other staff would assist them later, but for now, each saw the necessity of sitting down face-to-face and speaking candidly. Advance staff from both delegations had agreed to a small room off the back of one of the larger ballrooms. Politicians from around the world met in this hotel often, and there were several such private spaces, small enough for quiet conversation, and with a slightly larger, private antechamber beyond double doors that could be opened to form a room large enough for interpreters, additional staff, and photographers requisite for such a meeting.
Zhao had spent a year at Dartmouth and spoke excellent English. Ryan found him to be quiet, with the almost impenetrable fa?ade common to people who must always guard their words. The best way to break through something like that was a direct approach—something Ryan had always preferred to pussyfooting around.
“Your assistance with our research vessel was appreciated, Mr. President,” Ryan said.