Page 172

This starts now. As soon as she gave the word, the planes would take off. Mirabel—she almost laughed.

She took out her phone and sent a text: Pret?

Ready?

Isabelle Lacoste and Shona Dorion parked five hundred meters from the airport and slowly made their way forward.

They could see activity on the airfield. Trucks and planes.

And people moving between them with long trollies.

“What’re you doing?” Lacoste whispered. Shona had brought out her phone.

“You have your weapon, I have mine.”

“For God’s sake, you’re not live-streaming this?”

“Not to everyone, just sending it to Paul. He’ll know what to do with it.”

It was, Isabelle had to admit, a good idea. Whatever happened to them, the world would know. Though she hoped her secret crush, the journalist Paul Workman, had a good place to hide. They’d be coming after him next.

Workman was having lunch at the Queen Mother Café on Queen Street in Toronto with the head of Reuters North America. She’d flown up from Washington as soon as she’d seen Paul’s feed from Parliament.

The two old friends and comrades had covered conflicts all over the world together, rising to the top of their profession. Now the Reuters woman needed to hear everything Workman knew.

“The events in your Parliament, hard on the heels of the attack in the White House, smell like a concerted attack on both our ‘houses,’” she said.

“Did you look up War Plan Red?” he asked.

“Of course. It was put aside in 1939. I don’t know what that cop was yelling about.”

“There’s more to it. It’s been quietly updated over successive Presidencies.” Workman pulled a napkin over and wrote .family, then a series of numbers and symbols. He shoved it toward her. “Follow that, then put in War Plan Red.”

“There’s no such thing as .family. The deepest the web goes is .onion.” She looked at Workman, then down at the napkin. “Even if this domain exists, we both know whatever is down there is highly suspect.”

“True. But where else would you hide a truth except among a bunch of lies?”

“Look, the narrative has changed since this morning. Even legitimate news outlets are airing the new version from your Parliament, showing that the PM was physically threatened. They say that the video you sent out was doctored to show your PM in the worst light—”

“Doctored by me. Yes, I know what they’re saying. Do you believe that?”

“No. That’s why I’m here. People who know you trust you.”

“And the world trusts Reuters,” said Workman.

The saying among reputable journalists was “Reuters for writers.” If the news service reported something, it was true.

“I’m willing to stake my reputation and that of the agency on this,” she continued. “But I need proof.”

“You need the original files,” he said.

As they made their way back to his home office, he checked a new flagged message.

“What is it?”

Workman had stopped dead on the sidewalk and was staring at his phone. Then he quickly hit record.

“Oh, thank God you came.”