Code of Honor

29

Baltimore Homicide Detective Emmet Ryan taught his son Jack early in life to listen to experts. The two United States Secret Service special agents sitting across the Resolute desk certainly qualified. Together, Gary Montgomery and Maureen Richardson had almost forty years of experience in dignitary protection. A GS-15, akin to an assistant special agent in charge in other government agencies, Maureen Richardson reported directly to the special agent in charge of PPD. Mo, as she preferred to be called, served as lead agent for the satellite detail that protected the First Lady. Much smaller than the big show surrounding POTUS, the FLOTUS detail was low-key and fluid. Mo and her Secret Service agents followed Dr. Ryan wherever she went, and then blended seamlessly, amoebalike, with Montgomery’s larger detail when the Ryans traveled together. They integrated but stood ready to go their separate ways if the schedule or situation dictated it.

It was a dance, and Montgomery and Richardson were experienced and savvy enough to make the intricate steps look easy.

Jack Ryan generally steered well clear of specifics regarding his own security. Where Cathy was involved, his instincts as a husband stomped back those of the nation’s chief executive.

Hundreds of agents from Protective Operations, Protective Intelligence and Analysis, and Uniformed Division officers conducted travel advances, executed logistical plans, liaised with medical personnel and Air Force and Marine support, and formed multiple concentric rings of electronic, structural, and personal security around the President and his family. Though he didn’t get into their business, Ryan made it a point to know everything he could on the agents assigned to the inner circle. Inside the bubble, within arm’s reach of the President, they lived under the constant eye of the television camera, not to mention the active threat of people who wanted to see their boss with a bullet in the head. Threats came in daily on social media, over the telephone, or in written communication. These men and women were, by necessity, the cream of the crop.

Ryan hadn’t handpicked Maureen Richardson to protect his wife, but he would have, had he been given the opportunity. She was a shooter — which he liked. Her record showed she’d had two OISs — officer-involved shootings — during her time as a uniformed officer with the Denver Police Department, once with her AR-15 rifle, the last with her Glock sidearm. Both times she’d fired four shots and hit her intended target with each round. She’d been cleared after each shooting and commended by her department and her community. Ryan found it particularly noteworthy that on both occasions she’d left cover, advancing toward violence when she saw others under attack. A good quality to have in someone you wanted to watch over your wife. This propensity also fit perfectly with the mission of the Secret Service — who were trained not to take cover during an assault, but to make themselves the larger target while getting their protectee out of danger.

Cathy liked her, too, and that didn’t hurt.

Mo’s mouse-brown hair was cut just above strong shoulders. A perpetually rosy complexion made her look as if she’d just come inside from a brisk wind — no matter the weather. A prominent chin and roundish cheeks gave her face a resting smile, even when she was upset. The look was more than a little disquieting, which Ryan counted as a plus, considering it was her job to put people off guard. Secret Service agents had to exude a certain gravitas. A collegiate judo champion, Mo Richardson moved with the centered grace of an accomplished martial artist. Her husband was an agent on the FBI’s elite Hostage Rescue Team, and one got the impression that the two of them spent hours in the dojo each day, trying to kick each other’s ass, when they weren’t on duty. While not as tall or imposing as Gary Montgomery was, Mo still possessed the don’t-screw-with-me persona that caused would-be attackers to stutter-step before taking any action, buying time.

Gary Montgomery was listening to her plan.

Sort of.

“We’ll send in a larger advance team than usual,” Mo said. “They’ll filter in with local agents by onesies and twosies, so we’ll establish a significant boots on the ground presence before SURGEON arrives—”

Arnie van Damm knocked and then stuck his head in the door that led directly across to the Roosevelt Room. His office was to the left, down that same hall.

“Mr. President,” van Damm said. “Senator Chadwick is here to discuss that new information we were talking about.”

It shouldn’t have been this way, but Secret Service personnel were accustomed to their meetings being interrupted by seemingly more important business. Code name CARPENTER, van Damm also had Secret Service protection, albeit a small detail of mainly portal-to-portal security. He often said to his detail that if he ignored them, it meant he trusted them to do their jobs without his input. Fortunately for the agents, Ryan didn’t see his wife’s security as taking a back burner to anything. Ever.

“Go ahead and have the senator brief you,” Ryan said. “See if this mysterious constituent of hers has anything we don’t already know. We’ll be done here in a few minutes.”

The chief of staff ducked out as quickly as he’d come in, shutting the door behind him.

Ryan motioned for the agents to continue.

Richardson laid out the rest of her plan to keep Cathy safe while getting her close to General Song.

“You’re planning a tarmac pickup in Detroit?” Montgomery asked.

“Of course,” Mo said. “We’ll take an Airport Police vehicle from the plane but move the First Lady to an armored Jeep Cherokee once we get her inside the hangar, out of sight. Local law enforcement will be present but hanging back. The entire package will be covert vehicles, moving with the flow of traffic but ready to go overt lights and sirens immediately, should the need arise.”

Montgomery nodded. “She shouldn’t be on the ground long.”

“We’ll arrive at four a.m.,” Mo said. “The operation will be that same morning, minimizing SURGEON’s time on-site.”

“There’s a bridge over the Huron River across the road from the Eye Center,” Montgomery said. “And the Amtrak station is right there, no vagrants to speak of, but plenty of opportunity for people to loiter and say they’re waiting on the Wolverine to Chicago. And no underground parking at the Eye Center. She’ll have to walk in from the open.”

Mo’s lips perked into an impish grin. “Mrs. Ryan has agreed to go in full Marvel Comics disguise.”

The President raised a brow.

“A ball cap, sir. She’s more recognizable than Captain America, but, as I said, it’ll be dark, and the less fuss we make, the less we stand out.”

Mo Richardson went on to explain where she’d have rovers and post-standers, “looking chill, but armed and ready to react.” Advance agents would personally contact Ann Arbor PD and the local office of the FBI late on the evening before arrival.

Gary Montgomery, who’d received his undergraduate from the University of Michigan, quizzed her at every turn, peeling back the layers of her plan and giving inside information from recent trips to watch Wolverine football.

“I’ll scrub up with SURGEON,” Mo went on, “going into the operating room with her. General Song travels with four security people. One of those will stay with the cars. According to State and CIA, he’ll travel with one aide, and a minder from Department Two, or possibly the Ministry of State Security. My money is on a Two man from military intelligence, though. The minder changes periodically, so we’ve not identified him yet. Director Foley is assisting with that. Besides me, I’ll have four agents dressed as hospital techs. And two more behind the nursing station. Shoulder weapons will be staged there, in the event of any escalation. We’ve already tried it and the scrubs are loose enough to hide sidearms. The team watching from the operating theater viewing window will have radios. They’ll have me and the First Lady in sight at all times. It goes without saying — but I’m going to say it anyway. We all plan to stay out of the way and let the doctors do their jobs, but my number-one priority is to keep Dr. Ryan safe.”

Ryan mouthed a silent Thank you.

“You should be good security-wise in the operating room,” Montgomery pointed out. “It’s after that when it gets touchy.”

“I agree,” Mo said. “Dr. Ryan will attempt contact when the general is allowed in to see his granddaughter in recovery. It’s a small area, so that minimizes the number of his people present while maximizing ours. If the general cops an attitude, we’ll be outta there with SURGEON before any of his people even know what’s going on.”

“I appreciate your work, Mo…” Ryan leaned back in his chair, coffee in hand. “It sounds as though you have every conceivable scenario covered.”

“Mr. President,” Gary Montgomery said. “I lived in Ann Arbor for four years while I was in college. I’m familiar with the layout of the city and the campus. Perhaps…”

He stopped.

Special Agent Richardson bristled.

“Perhaps what?” Ryan set his cup on the desk.

“Nothing, Mr. President,” Montgomery said. “The First Lady is in excellent hands.”

“Very well, then,” Ryan said. He stood, shaking each agent’s hand in turn.

“I won’t let you down, Mr. President,” Richardson said.

Ryan swallowed hard, feeling more than a little emotional. “Cathy trusts you, Maureen, and so do I. You and Gary both have our full trust and confidence.”

With one problem mitigated, if not solved, the President picked up his phone to call Arnie and let him know he was ready to move on to Chadwick. That would be interesting, to say the least…

Maureen Richardson paused outside the Oval, digging her heels into the thick carpet.

“What the hell was that all about, Gary?” She kept her voice low, in keeping with the decorum of the White House, but there was plenty of force behind it. “You were on the verge of, what? Taking over the trip to Ann Arbor. If you can’t trust me, then you may as well relieve me.”

“I trust you,” Gary said. “You know that.”

“Do you?” Richardson said. “Because it sounded like you were going to play the ‘I went to Michigan so I can do a better job’ card.”

“Well,” Montgomery said. “I checked myself.” He leaned in closer, lowering his voice even more. “Look, Mo, I don’t apologize very often, because I’m hardly ever wrong…” He grinned, but she was having none of it. “Seriously. I’m sorry. I trust you, and, more important, so does the boss.”

“Thank you,” Richardson said. “Apology accepted. I got this, Boss. Really. No one will know we’re there.”

“Okay.”

“And, just to show my ego isn’t so large I don’t know when to ask for assistance, didn’t you say you used to live near Kellogg Eye Center?”

Montgomery looked up to find Senator Chadwick loitering in the doorway just a few feet away, waiting on Arnie van Damm. She gave them a nonchalant smile, like a cat ignoring its prey. Claws out, but seemingly disinterested. She couldn’t have heard much, but it didn’t take much. The good senator had a habit of making up the details when she wasn’t sure about something.

“Let’s move this down to W16,” Montgomery said, turning away from the woman he knew to be his boss’s bitter political enemy.

Fifteen feet away, Michelle Chadwick made a mental note to check and see where the Kellogg Eye Center was and what it had to do with the White House. She recognized the big guy, Mathews, or Montgomery, or something like that. He was Ryan’s chief Ray-Ban-wearing head-smasher. The woman looked familiar, and since the Secret Service was tribal and stuck with their own, she was surely a head-smasher as well. Chadwick had seen her with the First Lady, which raised some very interesting questions. David Huang had been right about one thing. She could learn a hell of a lot as Jack Ryan’s new best friend. All she had to do was connect the dots — and then figure out what she wanted to do with the information.

“Ready?” Arnie van Damm said, giving her a start as he came out of his office at a half-gallop, heading for the Oval.

“I am,” she said.

“You look like someone just stomped your big toe. You okay?”

“Not really,” Chadwick said. “I’m kind of in the belly of the beast here.”

Van Damm gave her a wary side-eye. “And from my point of view, you’re giving the beast a bad case of heartburn. If it were up to me…” He stopped, took a deep breath. “But it’s not up to me. Come on. We don’t want to keep the President waiting.”