Dr. Irene Kennedy grabbed her briefcase and headed for the truck. Her shoulder-length brown hair was pulled back in a ponytail, and she was wearing a crisp blue shirt.

Kennedy clutched the lapels of her tan suit against the cool air. When she reached the Suburban, an army officer extended his hand. «Welcome to Camp David, Dr. Kennedy.»

The forty-year-old employee of the Central Intelligence Agency took the officer's hand and said, «Thank you, Colonel.»

Kennedy's official role was as director of the CIA's Counterterrorism Center. Unofficially, she headed up the Orion Team, an organization born in secrecy out of a need to go on the offensive against terrorism. In the early eighties the United States was stung hard by a slew of terrorist attacks, most notably the bombing of the U.S. embassy and Marine barracks in Beirut. Despite the millions of dollars and assets allocated to fight terrorism, after the attacks, things only got worse. The decade ended with the downing of Pan Am Flight 103 and the deaths of hundreds of innocent civilians. The Lockerbie disaster moved some of the most powerful individuals in Washington to take drastic measures. They agreed it was time to take the war to the terrorists. The first option of diplomacy wasn't doing the job, and the second option of military force was ill suited to fight an enemy that lived and worked among innocent civilians, so America 's leaders were left with only one choice: the third option. Covert action would be taken. Money would be funneled into black operations that would never see the light of day, much less congressional oversight or the scrutiny of the press. A clandestine war would be mounted, and the hunters would become the hunted.

The ride took just a few minutes, and no one spoke. When they arrived at Aspen Lodge, Kennedy got out and walked up the porch steps, past two Secret Service agents, and into the president's quarters. The colonel escorted Kennedy down the hall to the president's study and knocked on the open door frame.