“Does the pain go away?” Mason asked.
He couldn’t remember the sun shining this brightly in a long time. The dog walkers and joggers in their skintight fluorescent spandex getups were out in force in the park across the street.
“No, son. It just becomes a different kind of pain. It’s yours to keep. Part of what makes you who you are.”
Mason nodded. He worried that if the pain faded, he would forget Angie. He didn’t want to relinquish the pain.
Even though he had basically turned his old man’s life upside down, his father had come back to Colorado to be at Mason’s side. They’d gone through the house and cleared it out one room at a time. It was both good and bad that he and Angie seemed to have accumulated so little, and yet it was amazing how many memories were attached to every little thing. He kept the stuff that mattered most—the pictures, the sentimental trinkets, the notes and cards—but let everything else go. His father had made the arrangement for the rest to be carted away, and Mason had no idea where it all ended up, but he hoped Angie’s belongings would find new life and make some young women who might not have been able to afford them happy. She would have wanted that.
Mason was glad his father did things like that without his having to ask. His old man made sure he pulled all of his pictures and maps off the wall in the guest room. Stood with him in the yard as he burned them all on the grill. He never asked what had happened at the AgrAmerica complex, and Mason never volunteered the details. Besides, as a senator, he had access to all of the documents and debriefings through formal channels. He probably already knew more than Mason did.
Sometimes he lost sight of the fact that J. R. Mason was a human being. Not just his father. Not just a senator. Not just the politician who one day might be the president of the United States. He’d been silent when all Mason needed was his physical presence, and had cheered him up when he sensed Mason needed him to. He’d handled Mason’s not insignificant portion of the AgrAmerica inheritance without asking for more than a signature from time to time. He’d also helped Angie’s mother unload her shares so she could distance herself from the nightmare that had claimed her entire family. And he’d even surprised Mason with a turkey club sandwich on Thanksgiving.
Maybe he’d never be the perfect father, but he was Mason’s, for better or worse, and he’d been there when it mattered most. Even with prominent members of his party taking their lumps in the media for their various levels of investment in Global Allied Biotechnology and Pharmaceuticals and their incessant calls for public displays of support, even with the media hounding him personally for his involvement, he never laid it at Mason’s feet. He just took the abuse on the chin with that patented smile on his face.
As far as the world knew, Paul Thornton, president of AgrAmerica, and his son, Victor, heir to the agricultural empire, had died in a fire inside their new corporate headquarters, along with three security guards, Paul’s personal assistant, and an unidentified male believed to be an undocumented construction worker. No foul play was suspected, but the investigation turned up some improprieties that necessitated the seizure of some assets and computer files by a litany of three-letter agencies and put the final nail in Global Allied Biotechnology and Pharmaceutical’s coffin. Mason made sure the contribution that had cost Angie her life received the proper recognition. The media was going to have a field day following up on all of the shelf companies housed in Commerce City. He looked forward to seeing just how many crooks they shook out of that tree.
He only hoped his relationship to the Thorntons and the subsequent destruction of their family name and company wouldn’t taint his father’s reputation. He’d worked way too hard and sacrificed way too much to put himself in this position, only to be undone by his son’s actions.
To his credit, he’d never once mentioned it.
“Come back to Washington with me,” he said. “Start fresh.”
“This is my home, Dad.”
His Town Car rolled to the curb, where it idled patiently.
“Your hearing still set for tomorrow?” he asked.
“I’m not sweating it.”
“I could make a few calls on your behalf.”
“No. Thanks, though. I’m fine with the outcome, whatever it may be.”
His father clapped him on the knee and stood up. Set his empty beer bottle on the porch and shrugged into his overcoat.
“The offer stands.”
“Thanks for being here for me.”
His driver emerged and opened the back door for him.
He was nearly to the car, when he abruptly stopped and turned around.
“I’m proud of you, son.”
He nodded to himself and climbed into the backseat. The driver closed the door, sealing him behind the tinted windows, and assumed his station at the wheel. With a wink of the sun from the chrome hood ornament, they were gone.
Mason stood on the sidewalk for a long time, staring at what remained of the life he’d never be able to lead again, before finally heading for his new Grand Cherokee.
It was all he could do not to look back.
NOVEMBER 27
Denver Division Field Office
Mason wore a bespoke suit to his hearing. He had no doubt the FBI would reinstate him, but nothing would ever be the same. It wasn’t until he was sitting in a conference room across from the special legal counsel from the U.S. Attorney’s Office, a representative from the Internal Affairs Division, another from the Department of Justice, SAC Christensen, and the associate deputy director of the FBI that he understood the degree to which things were about to change.
It was Trapp’s complaint that had set into motion the sequence of events that led to Mason suspension. Since his former partner had been killed in a head-on collision, which left his incinerated body all but unidentifiable, before he was able to commit his account to record, the charges were dismissed. No one wanted a situation where it was Mason’s word against a dead man’s. Especially since the dead man was a highly decorated operative whose portrait now hung in the lobby beside those of the other fallen agents. Mason elected not to tell them just how far Trapp had actually fallen. Nor was it in his best interests to volunteer the information that someone had done a pretty good job of staging Trapp’s death. That would only lead to conversations he wasn’t ready to have. Not yet, anyway. Not until he had a better understanding of what had actually happened.
There were holes in Mason’s story that even he couldn’t fill.
And he had lived it.
Chief among them was the fact that the last two agents with whom he’d been partnered had served interests other than their country’s. Not to mention the fact that they’d both gone out of their way to try to kill him, and a whole lot of other people. He didn’t think he’d be able to find the answers he needed within an organization that had been compromised to such an extent, either.
Mason had his resignation speech all formulated and rehearsed, but when it came time to stand before the five people who held his future in their hands, he decided not to pull the trigger. Wild Bill Hickok had taken far more criminals off the streets as a lawman than as an outlaw. Justice was better served from within the constraints of the system, no matter how restrictive, especially given how easily the Bureau had been infiltrated, and how long ago that infiltration had begun.
He accepted his badge and his Glock with the appropriate contrition. Promised to meet all the conditions of his reinstatement—of which there were many—and again swore his allegiance to a flag that might not have flown as high as it once had, but one he would personally ensure did so once more.
Christensen collared him on his way out the door. The special agent in charge of the Denver Field Office guided him down the hallway to his office, closed the door, and sat in the chair behind his desk. He took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes.
“You going to tell me what’s really going on?” He sighed and looked straight through Mason in that way he had. “I’ve been doi
ng this far too long not to recognize when someone’s blowing smoke up my ass.”
“Not a lot to tell, Chris. Maybe someday.”
“Make that someday sooner than later.”
“I know you went to bat for me. I appreciate—”
“I didn’t do anything for you. I went to bat for an agent with the potential to make a difference. If he can find a way of unscrewing his head from his sphincter, that is. Something’s starting to stink around here and I could probably use some help sniffing it out.”
“I suppose I could be talked into doing that, but I should probably point out that my nose isn’t as sensitive as I once thought it was.”
“Then be back here for assignment tomorrow morning. Oh eight hundred. Sharp. I expect bells, Mason.”
Chris put his glasses back on and opened a file folder on his desk, as though he’d forgotten Mason was even there.
“Runway’s down the hall, Giorgio.”
“Thanks, Chris.”
“You still here?”
Mason closed the door behind him with a smile on his face. It might not have been as fancy as his Sigma, but he had to admit it felt good to have his Glock back. And even better to have his shield, but it made him think. When it came right down to it, his badge was little more than a piece of pounded tin. The power it bestowed upon him was nothing compared to that wielded by the men who’d orchestrated the entire ordeal—the thirteen—who’d stripped him of it without the slightest effort. They’d infiltrated the Federal Bureau of Investigation and, in doing so, compromised the entire law-enforcement arm of the federal government. If he intended to root out that corruption, he was going to have to bend a few rules and he was going to need the help of a couple of friends accustomed to working in just that manner.
DECEMBER 1
Downtown Denver
“What’s the password?”
“Don’t be a dick, Ramses.”
“Bzzzt. Try again.”
Mason looked directly into the camera, batted his eyelashes, and gave him the finger.
“Just let me come up already.”
“You got a warrant, Special Agent?”
“No, but I just dropped a small fortune on a Dartz Nagel Dakkar. Black. It’ll take a while to get it here from Latvia, though. Thought you might appreciate the upgrade from the Hummer.”
“Turns out ‘I just bought you an armored SUV’ is the password.”
“I had a hunch it might be.”
The doors whispered shut behind Mason and the cab started to rise. He leaned the dry-erase board he’d brought with him against the wall, which appeared to have been recently remodeled to exchange the mirrored surface for something a little more bulletproof. He was actually beginning to appreciate Ramses’ vigilance; he was developing a healthy amount of it now himself.
Gunnar was waiting for him when the door opened. A big old grin on his face. He gestured toward his right foot with a flourish.
“Well? What do you think?”
“It’s a foot, Gunnar. I have two of my own. You just can’t see them because I’m wearing shoes. You know, like human beings do?”
“I got the cast off. Good as new.”
“Not quite. The whole room smells like cheese you’ve been keeping in your armpit.”
Gunnar’s right ankle had been badly broken when he was strung upside down by the chain. An orthopedic surgeon had used two titanium posts to stabilize the bones in a procedure called a “rodding,” which Ramses was never going to let him live down. The scar that ran from the crown of his head all the way through his hair, down his forehead, and over his left eye was a little more unsightly, but, Mason had to admit, it did give his face character. It kind of drew the focus to his blue eyes. Made him look a little dangerous. It probably would have made for a great story, had they not agreed never to speak of their experience to another living soul. At least not yet.
Not until they were ready to do something about it.
“How’s that dump of yours coming along?” Gunnar asked.
“It’s being gutted and remodeled as we speak. I think. Whenever I stop by, I seem to arrive right in the middle of break time. How about you? Find a place you like yet?”
Upon being discharged from the hospital, Gunnar had discovered that his list of clients had shrunk to a handful. His access to the secret network with the pretrading volatility index had been terminated. It took him all of about five minutes to hack back in, only to find that all user activity had ceased. He’d been ostracized from the business not for his involvement in bringing down a criminal enterprise, but for breaking the cardinal rule. He’d betrayed a client’s trust.
Mason figured that was penance enough for his participation in the chain of events culminating in his wife’s murder. They’d spent hours talking through it in the hospital with Gunnar’s leg in traction and his face puckered with stitches. He knew his old friend never would have deliberately done anything to put his wife in harm’s way and understood why he’d elected to attend her funeral via satellite. Mason had no doubt Angie would have felt the same.
“I’m taking my time,” Gunnar said. “Believe it or not, I’m actually enjoying my current situation. For the time being, anyway.”
“If there’s one thing Ramses knows, it’s how to entertain his guests.”
“True, although I have to say I am a little disappointed. I expected a whole lot more Thunderdome than Neverland.”
Mason rolled his eyes.
“Give me a hand with this whiteboard, would you?”
They carried it across the room through the maze of terrariums, which cast a brilliant bluish glow over the interior, while far to the west, the red sun set behind the snowcapped Rockies.
Getting the dry-erase board up the spiral staircase took some doing. The interior door from the waterfall room was already open. Ramses was sitting at his computer in the raised living room. He’d added components since Mason was last here, turning that entire corner of the room into what looked like the bridge of a starship.
They leaned the dry-erase board against the wall beside him.
Ramses was so lost in whatever he was doing that he didn’t notice them. Alejandra did, though. Her face lit up and she bounded across the room in her bare feet to give Mason a hug. She’d grown comfortable enough around them that she no longer felt the need to hide her face. She seemed to wear her scars like a badge of honor, which was probably exactly what they were. It helped that she and Ramses had a little something going on between them. Probably nothing that would last, especially since she was preparing to head back home to Oaxaca.
Thanks to Ramses and some connections Mason would probably rather not know about, the land surrounding her village had been returned to the people and the cartel presence had vanished overnight. Mason’s contribution had come in the form of establishing a supply and distribution channel between the agricultural co-op he financed for Alejandra and the entity once known as AgrAmerica—and almost as Global Allied Biotechnology and Pharmaceuticals. He also used what little clout he had at the FBI to help smooth things over for her with the Mexican army. While they had no intention of welcoming her back with open arms, they certainly weren’t going to turn her away, either.
For helping Mason rid himself of the AgrAmerica mess, his father’s reward was getting stuck with the majority of the shares as the price plummeted. He never once griped, though, even as the company teetered on the brink of financial ruin and threatened to take him with it. He simply took the helm, changed the name to AGRInitiative, and started steering the ship back onto course. The things a father will do for his son.
“Saw your old man on the tube today,” Ramses said. He didn’t take his eyes off the bank of computer monitors. “He’s really rocking that whole silver fox look.”
“Tell me the media wasn’t torching him again.”
“Nah. Nothing like that. It was just a quick teaser for the five o’clock news. They’re doing a feature on the most likely presidential candidates
. You just might have to start watching the people you associate with. Can’t have the most powerful man in the world’s son hanging out with anyone of questionable moral character.”
“Your morality doesn’t concern me as much as your business interests.”
“I was talking about Gunnar, Mace. Why do you always have to be such a prick?”
Mason looked over Ramses’ shoulder at the setup. Each of the monitors displayed a different function: stock indices, global satellite positioning, different network feeds, and screens on which data and conversations scrolled past. He’d designed it to replicate the home page of the network Gunnar had once been able to access, the one hidden in the deep web that they’d taken to calling the Extranet.
“I’ve almost got this thing working like I want it,” he said. “Another two minutes and this setup will be completely undetectable and untraceable.”
“Where do you want me to hang this whiteboard?” Mason asked.
Ramses waved vaguely over his shoulder. Mason removed a painting from the wall and hung the dry-erase board in its stead. At the very top he wrote two words.
THE THIRTEEN.
Below them he drew the symbol Gunnar had used to access the Extranet: a cross with a diagonal line connecting the end of the right horizontal bar to the vertical line below it, then drew a half circle underneath it.
Off to the left, he wrote the words Thornton (Paul, Victor) and crossed them out. He drew an arrow from his in-laws to another name: Thomas Elliot Richter, the man who’d invested in the pig farm with Wesley Thornton and gone on to make billions. Beneath his name Mason wrote two others: the Hoyl (Fischer F1, F2, F3, and F4) and Spencer Kane. He drew an arrow from Richter’s name to another on the right: R. J. Mueller, his partner in the penicillin coup. Mason wrote the number 1 above Richter’s name.
The Extinction Agenda Page 40