“Gentlemen,” he said. “If I may interrupt, I’m Special Agent Smith with the Central Intelligence Agency. I was sent here to participate in these discussions, but I haven’t felt I had anything to offer until now. I’m receiving real-time updates indicating that in the past several minutes, the President’s daughter may have been located. No one is sure yet. But if it’s really her, she is in the mountains of northwestern Iraq, she is alive, and ad hoc rescue attempts are already underway.”

He paused and looked at Mark Baylor.

“Sir, I’d like to suggest that we stand down from a nuclear war footing for the time being, and focus our deliberations on…”

Baylor nodded, not even missing a beat. One minute he was ready to bring about Armageddon, the next, he was ready to discuss a rescue operation. He was a chameleon. They all were. It made Lawrence Keller sick.

“Yes, of course,” Baylor said. “That’s very good news. Let’s get Elizabeth out of there.”

A silence drew out. It seemed to last a long moment. Keller was still standing, frozen in place, his finger pointed like a gun at General Stark. Stark’s mouth was open as if he was about to speak.

“Are you gentlemen okay with that?” the CIA agent said.

“I’m fine with it,” Keller said. “Of course. I welcome it.”

“General Stark?” the agent said. “We need to act fast and assist the rescue attempt in any way we can. At the very least, we need to put the assets in place to secure the region where we believe she might be. We need to do that now.”

Stark shrugged. He turned the paper over in front of him.

“Okay,” he said. “But I think we’re losing an opportunity.”

CHAPTER THIRTY

7:12 p.m. Arabian Standard Time (11:12 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time)

Sinjar Mountains

Nineveh Governorate

Northwestern Iraq

Run!

The thought repeated itself like a mantra.

Run!

Over and over again. It was all she could think.

She had lost the sandals that were on her feet. They had been too big, and now they were gone. She ran as fast she could in bare feet, stumbling over sharp rocks. Her legs pounded, her arms churned, her lungs screamed for air.

RUN!

It was cold out, but she was hot. They were right behind her. Her feet screamed in pain, cut to ribbons on jagged stone. It was dark out. The cliff was up ahead somewhere. She would run straight off the edge, rather than let the men catch her again.

Ahmet was dead. She was sure of it. She had seen it happen. After he freed her, she ran out of the stone building and immediately headed west. But the men saw her right away. There was a group of them down the ridge. They chased her, but then Ahmet came out and started shooting at them.