Chapter 3 - The Corridors of Power
The air conditioning inside the White House was freezing, smelling faintly of lemon wax, ancient timber, and unfiltered power.
General Vance fell into step beside me, his long strides matching mine as our heels clicked rhythmically across the polished checkerboard marble of the Cross Hall.
"You took your time getting here, Kate," Vance remarked without turning his head. "The President’s already been through two drafts of the opening remarks. The defense lobby is swarming the State Dining Room like blowflies."
"I took the metro from the Pentagon," I replied calmly. "Gives me time to read the operational audits without my staff trying to manage my blood pressure."
Vance let out a dry, humorless chuckle. "Well, your family was quite the welcoming committee. Arthur looked like he was about to suffer a coronary right there on the East Lawn."
"Arthur has spent the last three decades believing the world is an auction where he owns the gavel," I said. "Seeing someone he discarded hold the veto stamp doesn't compute in his balance sheets."
"Can’t blame him for being terrified," Vance said, his voice dropping an octave as we passed a pair of Marine guards stationed at the entrance to the Green Room. "If Mercer Defense loses the Aegis contract, their stock drops thirty percent by the closing bell tomorrow. Arthur leveraged the company’s entire liquid reserve to build the manufacturing plant in Huntsville. He’s underwater, Kate. Deep."
"I didn't place the contract on hold out of spite, Marcus," I said coldly, stopping beside a portrait of George Washington. "The telemetry data from the Aegis field tests in Syria came back corrupt. Two weeks ago, a prototype unit experienced a guidance failure outside Erbil. It didn't hit the target. It hit an abandoned shepherd's outpost."
Vance’s face darkened instantly. "Was that Mercer’s hardware?"
"Trevor Mercer signed off on the quality control bypass," I said, pulling a encrypted tablet from my leather portfolio. "He cut the redundant sensor array to save twelve million dollars per unit and padded the quarterly profit margins. He knew the optical chips were defective. He shipped them anyway."
Vance swore softly under his breath. "That’s treasonous negligence."
"That’s standard operating procedure for Mercer Tech," I countered. "When Arthur disowned me for leaving Wharton, he didn't just throw me out. He systematically purged every engineer who had an ethical spine and replaced them with Trevor’s frat brothers and yes-men. My brother doesn't know the difference between a pulse-doppler radar and a toaster. But he knows how to manipulate SEC filings."
Before Vance could respond, the double doors leading from the Grand Foyer opened, and the VIP reception attendees began filing into the East Room.
Among the high-ranking diplomats, senators, and aerospace executives, Arthur Mercer entered.
He had recovered some of his composure, but his eyes were darting feverishly across the room until they locked onto me. Flanking him were Evelyn—who was fanning herself with an embossed program, her eyes glittering with venom—and Trevor, who looked pale, sweaty, and entirely out of his depth.
Arthur handed his half-empty champagne glass to a passing waiter and whispered something to Trevor. Trevor hesitated, swallowed hard, and shook his head, but Arthur shoved him forward with a sharp, hostile gesture.
They were heading straight for me.
"General," Vance whispered, leaning in. "Do you want Secret Service to escort them to the overflow holding area?"
"No," I replied, feeling the cool, familiar stillness that always settled over me right before an ambush. "Let them come. I want to see what twenty-six years of unchecked greed looks like when it runs out of road."
Arthur reached us first. He had forced that oily, multi-million-dollar grin back onto his face, though the sweat gathering at his hairline betrayed him.
"Katherine," he said, opening his arms as if expecting a hug. "Good God, what a scene outside! You really should have warned me. We’re family! There shouldn't be secrets between a father and his little girl."
I stood perfectly still, my hands resting behind my back in parade rest.
May you like
"Mr. Mercer," I said, my tone as sterile as an operating room. "You have sixty seconds before I have you removed for violating protocol. Make it count."
***
