The Beginning of the End (Book 2): Toward the Brink II by Craig A. McDonough

pulled up a chair at the middle of the brown boardroom table. There was no point in getting pissed about who sat in which chair. It was no longer a time to care about privilege.
    “Let’s cut to the chase. You know who and what I am, and that I practically control both major parties. We don’t have time to dance around. I’m here to offer you, your family, and two of your staff with their families a chance to live. Take it or leave it.”
    The president was aware of the rumors about the Chamber, like everyone else. He didn’t live under a rock. However, being president didn’t grant one all-powerful knowledge. Sometimes information that’s hidden from the public is just as hidden from the president. Especially when the president has a strong policy on social reform and accountability.
    “Join you and your cohorts and abandon the American people, you mean?”
    “If you wish to put it in such a manner, Mr. President. Richard Holmes informed you of the evacuation. We wanted to see where you stood and …”
    The president smiled as he interrupted. “You only wanted me to lend legitimacy to your plans, but you went ahead without me anyway. Then, when I sank to your immoral levels, you thought you’d try once more. Is that it?”
    “Mr. President!”
    “Don’t fuck with me, Etheridge. You might be the biggest rat in the cheese factory, but in case you’ve forgotten …” The president was on his feet, nostrils flared, brow creased, and eyes wild as he leaned over the table toward Etheridge. “This, you son of a bitch, is my playground. I’ve already ordered the assassination of one man, which I’m sure pleased you no end, and I don’t have to stop at one!”
    “You wouldn’t dare.” The inference wasn’t lost on Etheridge, and the reality of the threat hit like a ton of bricks. Here he was, underground, in a secret meeting with a man who had just ordered the execution of another, and was angry enough to kill again. Etheridge’s estimated wealth of around five hundred billion, and the power that gave him a say in every political decision that mattered, wouldn’t help him now. Never before had such a high-level member of the Chamber put himself in such jeopardy.

Twenty-Seven
    Prior to the turn of the twentieth century, the wealthy of Europe, along with a handful of members from the new market that was the United States of America, had met in Vienna in a plush hotel ballroom. Lavish dining tables had replaced the old wooden seats for the event, with a select and discreet waiter for each table. An oath had been sworn by all of the staff never to reveal what they heard or who they saw at the gathering. Representatives from the royal families were present, along with influential military commanders. A well-respected string quartet played soft chamber music all weekend long, and the guests were often heard remarking how they wished they could “have them play in my chamber.” The music became the most memorable part of the gathering and soon entered the language of the participants. It followed, then, that when they referred to themselves or to the meeting, the word “chamber” arose, and it soon became synonymous with the inaugural meeting and its members.
    There were many topics for discussion, all business- or industry-related, about how they could be monopolized by this new group. The European financier Henry Stewman gloated to all and sundry of how he had locked up the political system of the “emerging market,” and the future looked prosperous. The market he referred to was the United States of America.
    Had the men who fought the Revolutionary War known that financiers from the very country they sought independence from had colluded in the outcome for economic control, they would have rolled over in their graves. All the fighting, the deaths, amounted to little. It had been arranged.
    It was rumored that Stewman’s great-grandfather had financed the final push by the revolutionary forces when it