Bloodstorm- a Dane and Bones Origin Story

by David Wood

  Jimmy Letson had not started out by trying to unmask the true owner of the Cape Cod. He had discovered its existence quite by accident while trying to pick up the trail of Bruce Huntley on behalf of Dane Maddock.

  There had been none of the customary banter regarding Jimmy’s usual fee, nor had Maddock made any demands of him with respect to secrecy. Whatever Huntley was involved in, and no matter who had given it official sanction, it was a story that needed to be brought out into the daylight. The public didn’t just have a right to know... They truly needed to know.

  Jimmy had started by checking all flights leaving Buenos Aires in the hours following Lia’s disappearance with Huntley. He had followed other lines of inquiry as well, since they did not know what Huntley’s next move would be. Would he seek refuge in the local enclave of Nazi descendants? Or would he attempt to get out of Argentina by the most expedient means available? There were many possibilities, and Jimmy followed up on all of them.

  Researching flight plans had yielded the best lead, though not because it provided confirmation that Huntley and Lia had been aboard one of the departing aircraft—a chartered air-freight plane with no passengers listed on its manifest, that had taken off the morning following Lia’s abduction. The critical clue had to do with the identity of the client that had chartered the plane—Black Spring Holdings. The innocuously named company was one that Jimmy had encountered before, on a Darknet discussion board purporting to list dummy corporations created by the CIA as fronts for a variety of questionable activities.

  Jimmy did not automatically accept as gospel everything he read there—most of it was paranoid conspiracy nonsense—but neither did he automatically dismiss the information out of hand. A cursory examination of the company was enough to convince him that it was a front for something nefarious even if he could not draw a definitive link to a government agency. It had been enough to convince Maddock as well.

  “They’re on that plane,” he had told Jimmy. “Where’s it going?”

  It set down in Bogota about an hour ago, but just to refuel. From there, it’s nonstop to Dulles.

  Dulles—Washington Dulles International—was one of three major airports servicing the DC metropolitan area, and one of the busiest air travel hubs in the country. It was also located just a few miles west of CIA headquarters.

  “Jimmy, you’ve got to get eyes on that plane.”

  Jimmy did not balk at the request. Although he preferred to operate in the realm of cyberspace, his career as an investigative journalist had many times obliged him to go undercover or sneak into places where he was not welcome—trespasses that, if discovered, might have resulted in his arrest or something much worse.

  A simple hack into air traffic control had provided him with the plane’s runway and gate assignment. The plane would be offloading at one of the cargo terminals and an expertly forged employee badge had gotten him past the security checkpoint and into the cargo terminal, where he found a place to unobtrusively watch the destination gate. Shortly before the plane’s scheduled arrival time, a white, unmarked delivery van pulled up near the gate. Upon landing, the plane taxied to the terminal where a single piece of cargo—a large, oblong box with the right dimensions to be a casket—was transferred directly from the plane’s cargo hold to the waiting van. A dark-haired man attired as a flight attendant also boarded the van. Jimmy didn’t have any pictures of Bruce Huntley, but the man matched the description Maddock had given him.

  Jimmy quickly returned to his car and headed out. He didn’t go far however. Just before the turnoff to rental car returns, he pulled into the breakdown lane and switched on his hazard lights. He fumbled in his trunk, pretending to search for his spare tire for the next five minutes until he saw the white van moving with the flow of traffic in the far-left, eastbound lanes.

  He had a pretty good idea where the van would go next, so over the course of the next few miles, he managed to catch up to and pass it. Better to keep an eye on it his rearview mirror, rather than risk being spotted trying to tail it.

  As they breezed along the Dulles Toll Road for several miles, Jimmy watched the van for lane changes. When they neared the Beltway split, he dropped back and let the other vehicle overtake him. He was mildly surprised when the van did not take either option, but instead continued along the highway a little further to take the next exit to Tyson’s Corner, where it immediately turned left, to head north on state route 123, also known as Dolley Madison Boulevard.

  “Ha!” Jimmy pounded his hands against the steering wheel, exultant. “Knew it.”

  About three miles further up the road from Tyson’s Corner, the highway would run right past the south entrance to CIA Headquarters. Huntley was heading home.

  But the van didn’t make the expected turn. Instead, it went through the intersection and continued to the next set of traffic lights, where it turned left onto a narrow country road that curved around a large white church. A tiny little blue sign identified the road as Savile Lane, and a larger yellow diamond sign proclaimed “No Outlet.”

  Jimmy frowned in dismay but kept going. Even though it might mean losing sight of the delivery van, he didn’t dare follow it through the turn for fear of betraying his presence. Instead, he accelerated to the next intersection—it was only another tenth of a mile—hooked a U-turn, and raced back to the Savile Lane turn-off.

  There was no immediate sign of the delivery van, but Jimmy decided that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. The unlined road was barely wide enough to permit two-way traffic, and the oversized van would have to proceed with extra care. Jimmy continued along at a sedate twenty-five miles per hour, scanning first the church parking lot and then each driveway he passed.

  Trees enfolded the road, hiding the houses from view, and for a moment, Jimmy feared he had lost his quarry. Then, about a quarter-mile from the highway, he spied the corner of a tall white vehicle, just barely visible down one forested driveway on his left. He made a mental note of the address, and then kept driving until he found a place to turn around, whereupon he hastened back to the road and headed home. He entertained no illusions of playing the hero, confronting the CIA officer, and rescuing the damsel in distress. Maddock would have to take care of that.

  Half an hour later, he was back in his apartment, safely ensconced behind the keyboard of his computer, doing what he did best. He was not the least bit surprised to learn that one of the shell companies named on the convoluted chain of ownership for the house on Savile Lane was Black Spring Holdings.

  Maddock closed his eyes, counted to ten, and then opened them again. The view had not changed.

  When they had first begun their surveillance, earlier in the day, there had at least been some activity inside the residence. Nothing definitive. Nobody emerged from its interior, but they could occasionally see indistinct figures moving behind the window panes, both on the main level and occasionally in the gabled attic windows—as was the case with many Cape Cod-style homes, it appeared that the attic had been finished to supply additional living space. After dark, there were lights burning in some of the windows on the ground floor, but those had gone out at around nine o’clock, leaving only the exterior porchlight to illuminate the house.

  Maddock and Bones kept watch from a concealed hide on the southeastern corner of the property, while Willis and Leopov observed from the northwest. After dusk, Maddock had continued to peer through his binoculars, which mostly limited his field of view to what was revealed in the glow of the porchlight. Bones had switched to a night-vision scope in order to monitor everything hidden in darkness, but ultimately, they both saw the same thing.

  Maddock blinked again, and then pulled back from the binos just enough to check the time. Almost midnight. Close enough, he thought.

  “Ready to do this?” he whispered.

  “I was ready two hours ago,” Bones replied, his voice, a low rumble, trailed off into a yawn.

  “You don’t sound very enthusiastic.”

  “Don’t ge
t me wrong,” Bones replied, a note of bitterness creeping into his tone. “I want to rescue Lia and kick Huntley’s ass as much as you do. Maybe more. But I don’t think we’re going to find either one of them in there. It’s Tradecraft 101. Don’t stay in one place any longer than you have to. They’re long gone by now.”

  Maddock couldn’t dispute Bones’ logic. There was no question that Huntley had brought Lia to this house, but that had been three days ago. It had taken Maddock and the others that long to make their way back to the States. During that time, there had been no way to monitor the house. Maddock didn’t dare confide in anyone in the SEALs’ chain of command. If even half of what Jimmy had suggested about the link between upper tier CIA officials and Nazi fugitives was true, everyone was suspect. Even those not directly involved in the conspiracy might be unknowingly reporting to someone else who was. Nor could he ask Jimmy to keep watch. In following Huntley to the house, his friend had already gone above and beyond, and Maddock couldn’t ask any more of him.

  Bones was right. Huntley could have moved Lia almost anywhere, and if he was half the spy he claimed to be, almost certainly had. But the house on Savile Lane was their only lead. If Huntley wasn’t there, maybe the person inside would—with a little gentle persuasion—tell them where he had gone.

  There was one other thing—not a clue so much as a coincidence—that led Maddock to believe the house was more than just a conveniently located Agency safe house.

  Professor had been the one to pick up on it.

  He had regained consciousness shortly after Maddock and Bones headed out across the dunes, but as Bones had surmised, he had sustained a serious concussion. Hours later, he was still seeing double and complaining of a “skull-splitting headache,” but his mind was as sharp as ever.

  When Maddock had relayed the update from Jimmy regarding Huntley’s flight from Buenos Aires, Professor had chuckled—or rather started to chuckle before grimacing in pain. “Somebody has a sense of humor.”

  “How so?”

  “Black Spring. It’s the name of a Henry Miller novel. The second in his autobiographical trilogy that starts with Tropic of Capricorn.”

  Bones made a face. “And that’s funny why?”

  Maddock caught it immediately. “Henry Miller is the anglicized form of Heinrich Müller.”

  “You’re telling me the Nazi we’ve been chasing came to America and started writing novels?”

  “Good heavens, no,” Professors said, wincing again. “Two completely different people. Actually, I think Gestapo Müller would have found Henry Miller’s writing deeply offensive. Him and most other straight-laced Americans of the period. Black Spring was actually banned in the United States until the 1960s.”

  “Banned?”

  “It was considered pornographic. Miller wrote explicit accounts of his sexual liaisons.”

  Bones sat up a little straighter. “Why have I never heard of this guy?”

  Despite his obvious discomfort, Professor managed a wry smile, but refrained from further comment. “It could just be a coincidence,” he went on. “Like I said, about the only thing Henry Miller had in common with the Nazis was an abiding dislike for American society. But for very different reasons. I’m sure it’s just a coincidence.”

  Three days later, reflecting on the conversation, Maddock was acutely aware of Professor’s absence. He had come to rely on the other man’s comprehensive knowledge and insights over the course of the last few years. But Professor’s head injury meant he wasn’t fit to travel—not for a few days, at least—and so, over his protests, they had left him to convalesce at a Buenos Aires hotel with orders to check in by phone every four hours. If he missed a call, they would contact emergency services and request paramedics.

  Now, it was just the four of them.

  He put aside the binoculars and took out his cell phone. Cupping a hand over the screen to keep the glow from revealing their position, he dialed Jimmy’s number.

  “Yo!”

  Eschewing the customary and utterly unnecessary exchange of greetings, Maddock simply said, “Throw the switch.”

  There was only a slight pause and then Jimmy answered. “It’s done. You’ve got five minutes.”

  Maddock ended the call and then switched the phone out for a handheld radio—an off-the-shelf Motorola Talkabout equipped with a headset. He keyed the mic. “We’re moving.”

  Willis’ voice sounded in his ear. “Roger, out.”

  Together, Maddock and Bones rose from their hide and started toward the front of the house, moving quickly but without a sound. When they were just thirty feet from the front porch, a spotlight flashed on, shining out on the patch of lawn where they were standing. Both men froze in place, and despite the fact that Jimmy had hacked into the house’s security system and put it in diagnostic mode—a five-minute temporary shutdown—Maddock braced himself for the shriek of an alarm, but other than the light, nothing changed.

  “Motion sensor,” he whispered. “Must be independent of the security system.”

  “Or it’s a silent alarm,” Bones replied.

  “Well aren’t you just a ray of sunshine.” If there was a silent alarm, they wouldn’t know until patrol cars with armed security guards showed up to investigate. “Let’s go.”

  They quick-stepped to the porch where Bones immediately went to work picking the deadbolt lock. Maddock kept one eye on the sweep second hand of his watch.

  Jimmy’s search of the security company’s records had indicated external sensors only, which meant that once they were inside, they would be able to move about the house without triggering an alarm, but if they weren’t all inside with the doors closed before the diagnostic cycle was complete, their rescue attempt would be stillborn.

  “Three minutes left,” he murmured.

  “You want to do this?” Bones shot back. “Don’t rush me... Ah, there it is.”

  He gave the tension wrench a little tug and the lock cylinder rotated. He removed the picking tools and quickly inserted them in the keyhole above the thumb-lever on the entry handle set. This lock yielded more quickly, and before the second hand completed another circuit, the door swung open to admit them.

  Only now did they unholster their pistols. Maddock carried his Walther P99, Bones had his Glock 17—both were outfitted with suppressors. Had they been accosted by guards from the security service or worse, the police, they would have either fled or surrendered without a fight but anyone inside this house was either a hostage or a hostile. Guns at the ready, they swept into the entry foyer, ready to engage any targets of opportunity—there were none. They kept going, clearing the open rooms of the main floor of the house all the way to the rear where Bones quickly unlocked the back door. Willis and Leopov were waiting there and hastened inside, after which Bones closed and locked the door.

  They had made it inside—first objective complete. Now for the hard part.

  Moving single file, they did another sweep of the first floor, opening every closed door. There was a single bedroom—the queen-sized bed was neatly made, the closet empty—along with a bathroom, two more closets—also empty—a laundry room, and a pantry, which surprisingly was stocked with an assortment of canned and dry goods. The empty bedroom was a little disconcerting since they had earlier observed movement and lights through the window, but that was a mystery that would have to wait until they had found and dealt with the house’s occupants who, by process of elimination, had to be upstairs.

  But the attic rooms were also empty.

  “What the hell?” Bones wondered aloud, no longer bothering to whisper. “Where’d they go?”

  “There’s no one here,” Leopov said. “Never was. It’s like a Potemkin house,”

  Willis shook his head. “No way. We saw people moving around in here. Don’t tell me that was all smoke and mirrors.”

  Maddock tried to recall exactly what they had seen. Backlit silhouettes behind curtains, blinds that occasionally moved as if someone was looking out. It
wasn’t impossible that all of that had been done remotely with automated special effects devices, but if that was the case, where were the projectors and wires necessary to pull off the illusion?

  “We’ve missed something,” he said. “Search it all again. Top to bottom.”

  They did and soon discovered a false wall in the back of the closet under the staircase. It opened to reveal another flight of stairs descending to a sublevel.

  Maddock touched a fingertip to his lips, signaling a return to stealth mode, and then started down, his Walther leading the way.

  The steps went down further than he expected, with a landing and switchback at the midpoint, and ended in an open area too large and elaborately decorated to be merely a finished basement.

  “Holy crap,” Bones murmured as he stepped down beside Maddock. “What is this place?”

  “Beats me,” Maddock admitted.

  They were in what appeared to be a hallway, but with cavernous dimensions. Maddock judged it to be at least fifteen feet wide and a good fifty feet long. The floor was carpeted with a rich burgundy Berber. The walls and the high ceiling were paneled with squares of burnished mahogany, softly lit by the glow emanating from art deco brass- and frosted-glass wall sconces, spaced at eight-foot intervals to either side.

  The others joined them a few seconds later. “Damn!” whispered Willis. “I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore.”

  Maddock nodded slowly. “Let’s go meet the Wizard.”

  At the far end, the hallway opened into a rectangular room with a wide arched opening in the middle of the wall to their immediate left, and closed French doors centered on the walls to the right and directly opposite their position.

  Maddock gestured toward the arched passage and then headed toward it with the others filing behind him. There were no lights in the space beyond the arch, but there was sufficient ambient illumination to discern that the floor beyond was uncarpeted concrete. About ten feet in, there was something that looked to Maddock like a line of golf carts linked together in a train. Harder to see were the parallel lines that ran out ahead of the carts to disappear into the gloom.