“Next,” Pryce said after thirty minutes, acknowledging General Gordon Reid.

The NSA Director nodded. His craggy face looked almost… uncomfortable. Something Pryce wasn’t used to seeing on the career Air Force cryptographer.

“In the matter of Director Barnes’s suicide, we’ve found evidence that his home’s security system was indeed penetrated by a hostile attacker.”

Pryce felt a small jolt of surprise.

Was I wrong? She wondered. Was the President right? Was Barnes murdered? His confession a fabrication?

“Can you track down who the intruder was?” she asked.

Reid spoke again. “Dr Pryce, our forensics team found telltales of an attack developed by China’s Advanced Electronic Brigade, launched by an attacker from within China.”

Everyone started talking at once.

Pryce sliced her hand through the air. “Quiet!”

They all fell silent.

“China?” Pryce asked the NSA Director. “Are you sure?”

Reid looked at her. “As you know, one hundred percent doesn’t exist in this business. But the telltale matches an attack AEB’s used twice before, and while the attacker took steps to hide their tracks, we successfully traced it back to the PRC.”

Pryce leaned back and exhaled softly. China. Her eyes drifted to the Situation Room’s digital threat board, with the Chinese coup listed prominently, the hardliners back in power. Could they be doing this to distract the US? To keep the President from responding to what was happening there? But the risk! The provocation!

It made no sense. Rationally, the risk/payoff ratio was absurd.

Everyone else was staring at her, waiting.

“Dr Pryce,” Reid said, “I need to add something here. The Chinese don’t know that we know about this attack technology, or have a way to detect it or trace it.”

Pryce’s eyes snapped back to Reid’s, the wheels in her mind spinning.

“I appreciate,” the NSA Director went on, “that this is a very important moment for the President, politically…”

And now Pryce understood the unease she was reading from him.

“…but if we reveal to the American people that we were able to detect a subversion of Barnes’s home security system, even if we don’t mention China, then we’ll be tipping our hand to them, and giving away an intelligence advantage that we have.”

Pryce held Reid’s eyes. “The President will have to make that decision.”

“Can I count on you,” the NSA Director asked, “to counsel the President in the direction of maximizing US national security?”

“I don’t think he’ll need that counsel from me, General,” Pryce told him.

Then she turned to the others. “Reactions?”

It was another twenty minutes before she came to the last item on her agenda.

“Finally,” she said. “The President has tasked me with investigating the allegation that the PLF was created as a black op inside the Jameson Administration.”

She looked around, saw the different expressions, some blank, some openly dubious.