A Heartbeat Away Read online

  To my editor at St. Martin’s Press, Jennifer Enderlin, and to my agent at the Jane Rotrosen Agency, Meg Ruley

  How blessed can a writer be?

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  When writing a novel, help comes in many, and often unexpected, ways.In addition to my editor and agent (see the dedication), deepest thanks to:

  Dr. David Grass, neurology

  Dr. Geoffrey Sherwood, hematology/oncology

  Dr. Connie Mariano, White House medicine

  Paul Weiss, power specialist

  Robin Broady, LICSW

  Jessica Bladd Palmer

  Pilot Dave Pascoe

  Steve Westfall, biocontainment

  And to my main men always and forever:

  Daniel, Luke, and Matthew, the McGuffin Guy

  To anyone I might have missed, thank you, too. Promise I’ll catch you next time.

  CONTENTS

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  United States of America Order of Presidential Succession

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Epilogue

  Also by Michael Palmer

  Copyright

  UNITED STATES OF AMERICA ORDER OF PRESIDENTIAL SUCCESSION

  1. Vice President

  2. Speaker of the House

  3. President Pro Tempore of the Senate

  4. Secretary of State

  5. Secretary of the Treasury

  6. Secretary of Defense

  7. Attorney General

  8. Secretary of the Interior

  9. Secretary of Agriculture

  10. Secretary of Commerce

  11. Secretary of Labor

  12. Secretary of Health and Human Services

  13. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development

  14. Secretary of Transportation

  15. Secretary of Energy

  16. Secretary of Education

  17. Secretary of Veterans’ Affairs

  18. Secretary of Homeland Security

  PROLOGUE

  The last thing Eddie Gostowski was thinking about on Thursday evening, the twenty-second of May, was that he was going to die.

  For the first hour or so of his 11 P.M. to 7 A.M. shift as a security guard for the NYISO power distribution giant, he had been thinking about the Yankees, and wondering if they had enough pitching to win the American League East Division again. For the second hour, he had debated whether to buy flowers or candy this year for his beloved Mary’s sixtieth birthday.

  Eddie had been patrolling this particular control facility for most of the eleven years the New York Independent System Operator had been in existence, and nothing out of the ordinary had ever happened—absolutely nothing … not once. He understood his job and he understood what was at stake should the NYISO somehow shed its entire load at once—a massive blackout of almost indescribable proportions, engulfing everyplace from Albany to New York City and Long Island. It was his job, along with others in the chain of virtually fail-safe checks and balances, to ensure such a disaster never occurred.

  But nothing out of the ordinary had ever happened at his control facility—absolutely nothing … not once.

  As he had every night at this time, Eddie set a timer for fifteen minutes and prepared to take a nap. But first, one last check of things. It took him a few seconds to realize that several of his gauges had gone out of whack. The unmanned substations serving Marcy to Albany and Albany to Leeds had gone off-line.

  Curious.

  Eddie began ticking off all the possible explanations for the weird happening, and came up with little. If the gauges were right, and there was no way they could be, there was no longer any power going to the capital district, which surrounded and included Albany.

  Still more bewildered than alarmed, Eddie moved to his left. His equipment told the same story for other substations. Dunwoodie to Long Island and Ravensbrook in Queens had also been tripped. Goethals and Farragut, controlling the power to large portions of New York City, was down as well. Assuming the readings were all correct, the whole system was unstable, and the largest city in the country was on the verge of something massive and horrible.

  Eddie’s first move was a call to the nearest manned station 150 miles north in Albany. Seven rings and an answering machine.

  Even an explosion at the facility in Albany would not cause this sort of power loss. Since its inception, NYISO had been closing loopholes in its system to the point where an almost inconceivable number of events had to occur simultaneously to cause any major degree of problems.

  But incredibly, those events were happening.

  As far as Eddie could tell, his control station was now the only thing standing against a blackout that would engulf most of eastern New York including Long Island and the five boroughs of New York City.

  He raced to the phone, got the emergency number of the FBI from a chart on the wall, and began dialing.

  That was when he felt the point of a knife press against the back of his neck.

  “Set the receiver down, sport,” a man’s husky voice said in an accent that sounded British.

  The knife point felt as if it were going to slice straight into Eddie’s spine.

  “P-please. That hurts.”

  “What’s your name, sport?”

  “Eddie. Eddie Gostowski. Please.”

  “I’m going to lower the knife, Eddie, but unless you do exactly as I say, you’re a dead man. Got that?”

  “Yes.”

  “I SAID, HAVE YOU GOT THAT?”

  “Yes! Yes! Now pl—”

  “Okay, sport, we don’t have much time. You’re going to turn around and look me in the eye. If you fuck with me in any way, any way at all, I’m going to slit your throat. Is that clear? Okay, now swing around.”

  Eddie did as he was ordered. Towering above him was a man—six foot three, maybe more, with shoulders that seemed t
o block out the room. He was dressed in black—watch cap, jeans, and a turtleneck—with black greasepaint covering his face. His eyes were dark and cold. In his hand was a bowie knife—broad and curved at the tip—ten inches long at least.

  Behind the man and to his right, arms crossed, feet apart, stood a second man in identical dress and greasepaint.

  As frightened as he was, Eddie couldn’t get the notion out of his head of the disaster that would ensue should the brownout that was already in effect be allowed to progress. As if responding to his thoughts, the big man placed the tip of the bowie knife beneath Eddie’s chin and lifted his face up.

  “No arguing with me now,” he said. “I want you to use whatever you have here to trip this unit off-line.”

  “But—”

  The huge man drew the razor-sharp blade across Eddie’s gullet like a violin bow, slicing open a shallow gash from one side of his jawbone to the other.

  “I said don’t argue with me, sport! Now, do as I tell you and you won’t be hurt any more. Mess with me and you’ll die in pieces, and we’ll still find the trip switch to take this place off-line.”

  He pulled a handkerchief from his back pocket and passed it to Eddie to stanch the flow of blood.

  Shakily, Eddie crossed to the adjacent room, hesitated, and then threw the trip. Instantly, the substation went black. Moments later, a generator kicked on and the lights returned.

  “Anything else we need to do?” the big man asked the other.

  “All four teams have reported in. No problems at all.”

  They motioned Eddie back into the control room and down onto his chair.

  “That your emergency line, sport?” the man asked, gesturing to a red wall phone.

  “Yes,” Eddie managed, continuing to put pressure on the gash. The handkerchief was sodden with blood.

  “Is it monitored?”

  “Yes, but with the blackout I’m not sure anyone is there.”

  “I’m sure this call will be recorded, though, right? I said, ‘RIGHT?’ ”

  “R-right.”

  “Okay, then. This the number?”

  “Yes.… Yes, sir.”

  Only then did Eddie realize the man was wearing latex gloves.

  The intruder fished out a sheet of paper from his back pocket and unfolded it. Then he dialed. Eddie could hear the taped message go on. At the beep, the man held up the paper and read, with some unevenness, what was typed on it.

  “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Then God said, ‘Let there be light.’ Now, Genesis has taken that light away. This is the beginning.”

  “Okay, sport, you’ve been a big help—a real big help.”

  “Thanks,” Eddie said meekly.

  The man turned to go. Then, with a sudden, vicious backhand swipe, he slashed the huge bowie knife through Eddie Gostowski’s throat.

  “Maybe I should have told him that sometimes I can’t be trusted,” he said.

  CHAPTER 1

  DAY 1

  8:30 P.M. (EST)

  “Madam Speaker, the President of the United States.”

  At the words from the sergeant at arms of the House of Representatives, the audience rose to its feet as President James Allaire entered the House Chambers to thunderous applause, mixed with cheers. Allaire glanced at the two Secret Service agents stationed opposite each other just inside the entryway, standing as straight and still as the black and gold Ionic columns dividing the wall behind the tribune. Sean O’Neil, head of the presidential Secret Service unit, shadowed Allaire as he glad-handed his way down the long, royal-blue-carpeted corridor.

  The president’s heart responded to a rush of adrenaline as the clapping neared the decibel level of a jet engine on takeoff. He stopped every few steps to shake hands or exchange modest embraces with men in dark suits wearing carefully chosen ties, and with impeccably dressed women who smelled of exotic perfume. Ahead of him, he could just see the nine justices of the Supreme Court, and the five members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

  Allaire sensed O’Neil move a step closer behind him as a congressman from Missouri exuberantly pumped his hand and then shouted, “Go get ’em, Mr. President! You’re going to wow ’em tonight!”

  That’s right, Allaire thought. I am going to wow them.

  There had been many occasions during the beginning of the first term of his presidency when Dr. Jim Allaire privately wondered about a decision he was forced to make. The weight of a single act, benign as it might at first seem, often carried with it surprising ripples and unintended consequences that added to his graying hair and the crow’s-feet at the corners of his gray-blue eyes.

  However, delivering the first State of the Union Address of his second term was not one of those moments of self-doubt. He had won reelection by a fairly wide margin over Speaker of the House Ursula Ellis, and now, despite lingering sub rosa enmity between the two of them, it was time to cast aside politics and get some business done.

  For the past hour, Allaire had paced inside the office of the minority leader of the House, sipping Diet Pepsi and having makeup reapplied for the cameras, all while trying to contain his nervous energy. The feeling he got before a speech of this magnitude reminded him of his days playing quarterback for the Spartans of Case Western Reserve, where he also earned his M.D. degree.

  Between his college football career and years spent working as an internist at the Cleveland Clinic, Allaire had learned the importance of balancing confidence with a respectful fear of failure. Viewed as a man of the people, the genuine caring that had made him a respected physician contributed to his consistently elevated job approval rating as president. With the world’s problems getting progressively more complex and domestic terrorism on the mind of every American, the people needed a leader they could believe in—a man of poise and dignity in whom to invest their trust. Tonight, Allaire vowed to reaffirm that he was that man, and to give them a speech they would all remember.

  The president reached the podium, where his head speechwriter, visibly more nervous than he was, had placed two leather-bound copies of tonight’s carefully guarded address. He turned and presented the first copy to Vice President Henry Tilden in his capacity as president of the Senate, and then the other to Ursula Ellis, who strained to maintain eye contact, and whose handshake held all the energy of a mackerel on ice. The president stifled a grin, although he suspected Ellis knew what he was thinking—fifty-three to forty-four—the margin by which he had beaten her in the election.

  Allaire had practiced the speech dozens of times and could probably have delivered it flawlessly without the aid of the transparent teleprompters set on either side of his lectern. The crowd kept up its applause. With the American flag serving as his backdrop, he faced the people and waved his appreciation. Then he set his hands on the sides of the podium as a signal he was ready to begin. His eyes met briefly with those of his wife of twenty-seven years, the much-loved first lady, Rebecca Allaire, and next to her, their only child, Samantha, whom he still could not believe was a senior at Georgetown, already set for Harvard Law.

  The clapping continued. Speaker Ellis rose from her chair and banged her gavel several times. At last, a profound hush fell over the seven hundred in attendance.

  On the cornice overhead, the clock read exactly 8:00 P.M. Allaire’s thoughts flashed on the motto inscribed in the frieze—IN GOD WE TRUST. It was a running joke about doctors that their M.D. degree really stood for M. Diety. Allaire had a deep faith, and had never felt comfortable with the notion of physicians as gods. But he did know that at that moment, he was closer to being God than any doctor had ever been.

  Thanks to the recurring deadly attacks by the apparently domestic group calling itself Genesis, the first order of business for the night had to be terrorism. People were on edge. The four attacks orchestrated by the group had been bold, ruthless, arrogant, and very dramatic. Still, there had as yet been no demands made—only the damage and the deaths. He was going to start strong with a
warning to Genesis, whoever they were, of American solidarity, and a promise that their capture and successful prosecution was the top priority of his second term.

  Allaire had been assured by Hank Tomlinson, chief of the fifteen-hundred-officer Capitol Police force, that security for tonight’s speech was the most extensive ever, employing state-of-the-art magnetometers, camera after camera, and manual bag checks in addition to advanced X-ray screeners. Now, it was up to the president and his speechwriters to convince the American people that they were as safe and secure in their homes and personal lives as those here with him in the Capitol of the United States.

  Allaire’s speech materialized on the virtually invisible teleprompters.

  “Madam Speaker, Vice President Tilden, fellow citizens: As a new Congress gathers, I am reminded of and humbled by the sacred honor you, the American people, have invested in all of your elected officials. So, before I begin tonight’s State of the Union Address, on behalf of all who have been blessed with your trust, I want to offer my bottomless thanks for another term of what my father would have called good, steady work.”

  Allaire paused, waiting the perfect number of beats to let the laughter subside before resuming. It was a strategic opening that he had argued for with his speechwriters, all of whom felt it important to start on a more somber note. As usual, he was right. The State of the Union was a wonderful opportunity to showcase his humanity, in addition to imparting to the electorate his resolve and courage to do what was right and necessary.

  “But with this responsibility comes great challenges that we must strive together to overcome. Our economy is growing stronger now, but there is much to be done. Unemployment is at its lowest level in more than a decade. Slowly, we are winning the war against poverty. Our optimism that we as a people can master any difficulty and achieve unparalleled peace and prosperity throughout the world has never been greater, and the state of our union is strong.”

  Allaire beamed as those on both sides of the aisle, and in the gallery, rose to their feet as one, cheering loudly. He could hear whistles over the applause, and hesitated long enough to draw in a slow, deep breath. The next several crucial minutes of his speech would focus on international and domestic terrorism. The crowd settled down. Allaire scanned their faces. He would know when they were ready for him to resume.