“I don’t get blindsided. I’ve been in this game far too long to let anyone sneak up on me.”
“All I’m saying is don’t get over confident. You’ve also been in politics long enough to know that the American people are a fickle bunch. One day they love you and want to name every new school, highway, and federal building after you; the next day, they want to pick over the bones of your corpse.”
“Spare me the moral tales, David. I’m going to be fine.”
Knocking interrupted their banter, which Michaels welcomed. Kriegel’s cautious approach was helpful when he was advising Michaels’ first campaign. But now Michaels needed tenacious partners who would go for the throat of his opponent—and Kriegel lacked the killer instinct.
“Why don’t you get that,” Michaels said, nodding toward the door.
Kriegel didn’t say a word as he marched over and allowed the visitor inside.
“Thomas Miller,” Michaels began, “how did you get past my secretary?”
Michaels intended his comment as a joke, but his White House aide didn’t crack a smile.
“I have an urgent matter I needed to let you know about,” Miller said.
“Well, enough with the dramatics,” Michaels said. “Out with it.”
“Sir, it’s—it’s kind of personal. I’m not sure you want any more people than necessary knowing.”
Michaels shrugged. “I’ve got nothing to hide, especially with David here. If you’ve got something to tell me, he can hear it.”
“In that case, sir, I came to tell you about a report we received through the Secret Service.”
“What? An assassination threat? A terrorist plot?”
“No, sir. There is a woman claiming to be the mother of your daughter.”
“That’s preposterous.”
Michaels cut his eyes over at Kriegel, whose eyes had widened as he stared back at the president.
“Don’t look at me like that,” Michaels said.
“As I was just saying . . .” Kriegel said.
“Thank you, Thomas,” Michaels said. “We’ll take it from here. And I appreciate your use of discretion in this instance. I don’t forget that kind of loyalty.”
Miller exited the room. Once the door latched shut, Kriegel stood up and started pacing.
“This is exactly the thing I was afraid of,” he said.
“You’re jumping to conclusions, David. This is a complete fabrication. Whoever this woman is only wants her fifteen minutes of fame and is likely being preyed upon by William Braxton’s nasty operatives.”
Braxton was more than just a political rival as he squared off with Michaels twice in U.S. senate races. Michaels had never lost, but the margin wasn’t a comfortable one in either election. And after Michaels won the White House, Braxton triumphed in the special election to refill the seat—and in the process, he became his party’s answer to Michaels with a strong opposing voice. The fact that they were fraternity brothers in college made the rivalry personal to Michaels. Braxton took their competition to another level when he became the opposing party’s nominee for president.
“You really think Braxton is behind this?” Kriegel asked.
“Your assumption is that I’m guilty, which is disappointing.”
“I didn’t mean to imply anything, I just—”
“Just go deal with it, okay?” Michaels said. “This doesn’t have to be an October surprise, and your job is to make sure it doesn’t turn into that.”
“I’ll do whatever I can.”
Michaels walked toward the door and opened it, gesturing toward the exit as he looked at Kriegel.
“I appreciate you handling this as quietly as possible.”
“Of course,” Kriegel said as he exited the room.
Michaels left his office and headed straight to his assistant.
“What’s the rest of my day look like?” he asked her.
She smiled. “You’ve got a briefing with your campaign manager in five minutes. Oh, and I also have a note for you.”
She handed Michaels an envelope. He opened it as he returned to his office. Inside, he found a handwritten note scrawled across a piece of ruled paper.
Everything is in place to make the deal happen, and all we need is your green light.
Michaels folded up the message and tucked it in the inside pocket of his coat. He smiled as he eased into the chair behind his desk.
Have I got an October surprise for you, Will Braxton.
CHAPTER 6
Brighton, England
ALEX RUBBED HER CALVES as they started to burn. She’d been perched on the toilet in a locked stall for nearly three hours. After she was convinced the office would be virtually empty, she eased onto the floor and dug into her purse for her wig, sunglasses, and gloves. She donned the disguise and ventured back into the hallway. Her assumption proved true as the floor was empty.
She approached the server room, using Wellman’s duplicated access card to gain entrance. As Goldman Financial’s cyber security chief, Wellman was in charge of making sure none of the company’s information was compromised through hacks. But she doubted he would ever anticipate an onsite hacking job, especially by someone he was fond of.
Wasting no time, Alex went to work. She hammered away on the keyboard in search of the truth about Michaels and Oliver Ackerman. Masking her location through a series of redirects, she eventually used a backdoor portal to hack into the NSA’s database. She broke through several firewalls and uncovered a treasure trove of information regarding Ackerman. She used a small digital camera to take picture after picture of documents about the private security head from Oman.
While Alex felt comfortable navigating around on the NSA’s server, she didn’t want to press her luck and overstay her welcome. Her best guess was that she had no more than two minutes to shut down her session and get out of there before someone at the NSA figured out where she was as well as what she was doing. In an effort to further cover her tracks, she searched for unrelated issues, some of which appeared to dig deep into Michaels. At a cursory glance, she wanted anyone looking at her breadcrumbs to be convinced that she was digging for dirt on Michaels and that Ackerman just happened to be an entry point into the search.
She glanced at her watch—less than a minute.
Alex typed furiously, rooting around in one final folder. Her mouth fell agape as she read the details of the documents in front of her. Her hunch had been right.
She took a few final pictures before terminating her access. Before logging out, she deleted all of the security footage from earlier in the day that could’ve linked her with any piece of clothing she wore.
Placing her camera back in her purse, she slung it over her shoulder and slipped into the hallway. As she moved down the corridor, the only thing she heard was the low hum of the fluorescent bulbs. But as she neared the elevator, she heard something else—a squeaky wheel.
Alex rushed over to the wall and stood flush against it. She peeked around the corner to assess the situation. About twenty meters away, an elderly man with his head down wheeled a yellow bucket down the hall using the mop’s handle to steer. Though unaware of Alex’s presence, he guided his pail in her direction.
Think, Alex. Think.
She’d managed to glide through Goldman Financial after hours as if she was a virtual ghost, but she was about to be exposed by the one thing she hadn’t considered—a janitor. She spun on her heels and eased back down the hall, trying door after door. They were all locked.
Come on, come on.
With each handle she jiggled, the results remained the same. The doors didn’t budge. Alex felt her pulse quicken with each squeak emitted by the old man’s bucket. The sound echoed off the empty walls.
Alex concluded that she would have to wait out the old man and pray that the security guard wasn’t watching the cameras closely enough. Her movements would create suspicion, but she felt powerless to change that. She walked backward until she came to another in
tersection and hid around the corner.
The noisy wheels then fell eerily silent.
Alex leaned against the wall, resisting the urge to sneak a peek.
What’s going on?
She couldn’t look, at least not yet. There were a number of reasons why the custodian had put on the brakes. Perhaps he’d run into a security guard or another employee, though she hadn’t seen either. Maybe he was resting. At the rate he moved, she was surprised that he was still employed, much less that he could accomplish his assignment efficiently, if at all. Alex felt a conflicting mix of pity for the man as well as anger that he was meddling in her plan, albeit unbeknownst.
The silence was replaced with the jangling of keys, followed by the creak of a door opening. Alex mustered up the courage to look around the corner and watched as he drove his bucket in a nearby room. The door shut with an echoing thud.
Alex darted down the hall and entered the stairwell located next to the elevators. She descended the steps, exiting the building in the second level of the parking garage. She eased along the wall, well out of the view of the sole security guard roaming the premises. She slipped out onto the sidewalk and checked her surroundings to see if anyone had spotted her.
“Finally,” she muttered under her breath. “In the clear.”
She sauntered down the street as if she was coming back from a night of shopping, though a fruitless one based on the lack of bags draped off her arms. With hunger pangs gnawing at her, she decided to go to her favorite restaurant.
Confident that danger had subsided, she hadn’t checked over her shoulder for a few blocks on the sparsely populated Brighton streets. But it didn’t matter, as the person who grabbed her surprised her by coming out of one of the alleyways.
The attacker clamped a gloved hand over her mouth and dragged her off the street.
Alex wanted to scream but something made her reconsider, something about the man’s smell. He turned her around and Alex was face to face with J.D. Blunt.
“You were careless tonight,” Blunt said.
“How did you—” she stammered.
“Never mind that, but we shouldn’t be seen walking together on the street. It’s too risky. Meet me around the corner at the café, Winston’s Place, in fifteen minutes. I’ll be at the table in the back corner.”
Alex nodded and gave him a hug.
“Don’t ever scare me like that again,” she said. “You don’t know what I could’ve done to you.”
“I’m sure I would’ve been able to handle it.”
“Even with that limp of yours?” she asked, gesturing toward his leg.
“My limp isn’t a handicap, but it is a great way to make sure everyone underestimates me.”
“So your limp is faked?”
Blunt smiled. “See you in fifteen minutes.”
He hobbled out of the alley and started in a direction that was a circuitous route.
* * *
WHEN ALEX SAT DOWN in the booth across from Blunt, she expected him to be excited about the information she’d uncovered on Ackerman and Michaels. She explained how Hawk believed that Ackerman’s security firm was involved with the DOD in some way. But he barely flinched when she told him.
“I didn’t know they were connected, but I would’ve guessed it,” Blunt said. “If there’s a sketchy American in the Middle East who has ties to someone in Washington, my money would always be on Michaels.”
“You don’t look surprised,” she said.
“Not at all. I’ve been around far too long to get genuinely shocked by anything. Speaking of things I’m not shocked by, I’ve got something else I want to talk with you about.”
“Have you heard from my brother?”
Blunt shook his head. “Sadly, I haven’t heard anything on Samuels yet. I’m not sure what’s going on with him. I’ve placed calls to several of my more reliable sources, but so far I’ve come up with a big fat goose egg.”
“So what is it you want to tell me?”
“It’s the real reason I wanted to meet with you.”
“The kind of reason you think was worth taking this kind of chance?”
Blunt nodded. “I know the owner here, but even if I didn’t, I would’ve tried to meet with you.”
“Now you’ve got me worried.”
“You should be, though we also all have a reason for hope as a result.”
“This ought to be interesting.”
Blunt smiled. “I got a tip from one of my insiders about what Michaels is planning on doing next—arming Al Hasib.”
Alex’s mouth fell agape. “You’ve gotta be kidding me.”
“I wish I was, but that bastard thinks selling arms to Al Hasib is the way to keep this conflict fresh in the minds of the American people. The more firepower Al Hasib has, the more damage they’ll be able to inflict on us.”
“And how does this help Michaels?”
“He gets to ride in on the white horse and save the day, just in time for the election.”
Alex crinkled her nose and narrowed her eyes. “That man makes me sick.”
“Well, he’s going to make us all dead if we let him continue this reckless display of leadership.”
“Don’t demean the word leadership by associating it with Michaels’ actions.”
Blunt chuckled. “You seem so indifferent about this whole subject, Alex.”
“If he were here right now, I’m not sure anyone could stop me from taking Michaels out.”
“You’re starting to sound like an assassin. Let’s leave all the dirty work for Hawk since he’s so efficient at it.”
Alex sighed. “This is not right. It’s a heinous crime against the American people. Someone should out him for that right now. Our country deserves to know the truth about the man sitting in the Oval Office.”
“They will—but in due time. We don’t want to alert everyone about this just yet.”
Alex could feel her face getting warmer and was undoubtedly turning red with rage.
“And why not?” she asked.
“This is also our way out, the way we’re going to get our lives back.”
“You’re gonna have to explain that one to me because from where I’m sitting it seems like Michaels is just gonna get what he wants without any fallout or consequences. I swear if that sonofabitch was sitting where you are right now, I’d—”
“Why don’t we put him in that chair then?” Blunt said.
“Is he tied up outside in a van? Because if that’s the case, I say let’s do it.”
“No, he’s still hidden in the Middle East. But if you put your computer skills to good work, we’ll have a decent shot at stopping him.”
“And how do you know that?”
“I know when and where they’re going to meet—and now thanks to you and Hawk, I know who they are planning on meeting with.”
“Suppose we’re able to stop this sale. What exactly do you hope is going to come out of such an operation, aside from the natural consequences?”
Blunt shrugged. “Ultimately, I hope I regain my freedom, though nothing is a given at this point. Knowing Michaels, he’s liable to turn us into heroes. But at least we’ll have the truth.”
“Possessing the truth isn’t the same as acting on it day after day.”
“Let me ask you a question, Alex. Suppose you have the opportunity to get your life back in exchange for a small lie. Would you do it?”
“Depends on how small and what the lie is about.”
“Good,” Blunt said, slapping the table. “Your moral relativism might just be what we need to snare the man and expose Michaels—two birds with one stone.”
Alex flashed a sly grin. “And you’re sure we can do that?”
“I’m sure of nothing except that I’m on the side of truth and justice. But if we can expose this right before the election, it just might be enough to make him lose.”
“And you think that will keep him from coming after us?”
“It will
if he’s behind bars.”
Alex rolled her eyes. “A U.S. president in prison? That’ll be the day. Besides, he’s not going to lose the election. He’s the Teflon man, remember? No scandal ever seems to stick to him.”
“You be ready because we’re not only going to make this one stick, we’re going to make it swallow him whole. Michaels will forever be remembered as the most traitorous president in American history.”
“I’m not sure if I share your faith, but I’ll be ready. Anything to get out of this life of pushing numbers and back to doing what we all do best.”
Blunt nodded. “All I need you to do is get him on record talking about this weapons sale. It’s that simple.”
“I’ve got the perfect technology for that.”
“Make it happen, Alex. And don’t miss. We’re only going to get one shot at this.”
Blunt threw some cash on the table and got up, leaning heavily on his stick.
“Do you really need that thing?” she asked, gesturing toward Blunt’s cane.
“Define the word need,” he said with a wink before he hobbled toward the door.
The brief moment of levity was a welcome respite for Alex after her heavy conversation with Blunt. The task ahead of her was grave, as would be the consequences if everything didn’t go off without a hitch.
CHAPTER 7
Muscat, Oman
HAWK OPENED THE JOINT email account and read over the note Alex had posted in the draft folder. The instructions posted seemed odd given that she warned him that they shouldn’t speak on the phone. But she swore it was an emergency and time was of the essence. Most of all, she promised no one would be able to listen in on their conversation since she would be utilizing a protocol that would be impossible to trace or listen to without a filter. Though Hawk felt uneasy about Alex’s last request—use a program to mask your voice.
Despite his misgivings, Hawk decided to go along with the plan. After all, he’d just be following her directions, which he assumed had to be issued by Blunt since she would never act alone. Plus, he had a way to make sure that she was really Alex and not someone who’d just gained access to the joint account somehow.
Brady Hawk 10 - Into the Shadows Page 4