At 7:12 a.m., the button served only to bring someone into the room.
It was square, ivory-colored, set beneath the edge of the desk exactly where Claire Danner’s right hand came to rest when she stopped writing. There was one in almost every room where a decision was expected of her: one press to summon the private secretary, another to ask for the secure line, a light to signal that the room could be interrupted. Nothing spectacular. The first time it had been shown to her, the day she took office, she had asked how many people started moving when she touched it.
The usher thought she was joking.
Since then, she knew. Rarely fewer than three.
That morning she pressed once.
Mara Calder appeared in the doorway less than twenty seconds later, a cup in one hand and three folders in the other.
“Tell me it’s the agriculture speech.”
“Situation Room. Five minutes.”
The chief of staff did not move. She looked at the clock, then at Claire.
“You have the governors at seven thirty.”
“Move them.”
“I can move them. I’m simply reminding you they’re the same ones you moved yesterday for a report Leila later called ‘probably misinterpreted.’”
Claire closed the file she was reading. The satellite map remained visible on the page below: three pale rectangles on Vostrie’s northern coast, each marked with a time, a confidence level, and a comment so cautious it was almost provocative.
“Three warning relays stopped transmitting within the same window.”
“And started again.”
“Seventeen minutes later.”
Mara blew on her coffee.
“Seventeen minutes is a long time for radar and a short time for war.”
Claire looked up. Mara had the irritating talent of clarifying a situation by making it less solemn.
“Five minutes,” Claire repeated.
This time Mara left.
End of excerpt. Discover the other stories in this universe.