The Last Jihad by Joel C Rosenberg

approval from Washington. And several moderate Arab countries like Jordan, Egypt, and Morocco were clamping down on terrorist cells within their borders or just passing through. It wasn’t perfect. But it was progress. Overall, the good guys were winning.
    In the meantime, not only had natural gas reserves been discovered off the Israeli-Palestinian coastlines. Medexco and PPG geologists and engineers had recently, quietly, and unexpectedly discovered massive tracts of oil reserves as well. The Israelis and Palestinians were sitting on a gold mine, and it was time to move decisively. Every light looked green. All systems seemed go. They’d better be. So much hung in the balance.

     
    Barshevsky popped his head in the door of the restaurant.
    He caught Bennett’s eye. The car was ready. It was time to go. Bennett looked at Galishnikov.
    “Well?”
    Galishnikov straightened up, took off his glasses for a moment and rubbed his eyes. Then he cleaned his glasses with a white cloth napkin, and carefully repositioned them on his pale, gaunt face.
    “ Tov ,” he said quietly, in his newly acquired Hebrew. Then he picked up Bennett’s Mont Blanc pen and signed his name.
    “Good,” said Bennett, looking Galishnikov square in the eyes. “It’s a pleasure doing business with you.”
    “You, too, my friend.”
    Bennett slipped the papers into his briefcase, and slipped quietly out the door and into the waiting black Mercedes. This was no time for celebrating. Not now. Not in public. The deal of the century had just been signed. It was going to change everything. Not more than two dozen people in the entire world had any idea, and Bennett’s job was to keep it that way for a little while longer.
    Galishnikov watched his young friend leave, sighed, then stared down at his plate of cold, untouched breakfast. He’d awoken with no appetite whatsoever. Now he felt famished.
     
     
    Bennett leaned back into the leather seat of the black Mercedes.
    He rolled down the tinted window beside him to get some fresh, cool air. The drive to Ben Gurion airport wouldn’t take long. But the flights ahead of him would feel like a lifetime. Why hadn’t he simply taken the company’s private jet? He closed his eyes and tried to imagine MacPherson and Iverson’s faces when he told them the good news. Suddenly, his digital cell phone rang.
    “Bennett.”
    “Mr. Bennett. This is the White House operator. I have Treasury Secretary Iverson on the line. I remind you, it is not a secure line. Stand by one.”
    A crackle of static, and then…
    “Jon, it’s Stu.”
    “Hey, Stu, er—Mr. Secretary—I’ve got good news.”
    “I don’t.”
    “Why? What’s going on?”
    “Mac may be dead.”
    “What?”
    Bennett sat bolt upright.
    “His motorcade was attacked a few minutes ago.”
    “What?”
    “I don’t know. A plane. A kamikaze. Something. I don’t know.”
    “Oh my God.”
    “I don’t know anything yet. The Secret Service just woke me up.”
    “Where are you?”
    “The Brown Palace…we’re…we’ve got a dinner tonight…later tonight.”
    “Who’s with you?”
    “Everybody. Bob just walked in. He came on some earlier flight to schmooze some donors. It’s a nightmare, Jon. We don’t know any details. Not yet.”
    “Oh my God. I can’t believe this.”
    “I know. I know. It’s 9-11 all over again. Look, where are you right now?”
    “Uh, I’m, uh…I’m in a caron the way to the airport.”
    “New York?”
    “No, no—Jerusalem.”
    “Right, well, just get here as fast as you can.”
    The line went dead.
    Bennett’s mind went numb.
    James “Mac” MacPherson—the Vietnam vet turned Wall Street wizard turned two-term governor of Colorado turned President of the United States—was poised to be Time ’s “Man of the Year,” the chief architect of America’s dazzling economic comeback.
    Now…he might be dead.

THREE
     
    The acrid stench of blazing jet fuel and thick, black smoke overwhelmed him.
    Three