Ever since following the fifty million dollars to the vanilla name and eventually linking it to John Jackson Coyote, Cordelia wanted answers. What was the purpose of breaking into the largest brokerages on Wall Street? For riches? To send a message? To prove it could be done? Something more dastardly? Whose bidding was he doing? Or was he a lone wolf? Now new questions. How was he able to hack his own organization without detection? Why had he stolen top secret information? What possessed him to collaborate with a reporter? And what was his endgame? One fact was clear. Coyote wasn’t just another handsome face.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Browne went on, “but please be assured. We’ve thought it through from every angle. As hard as it is to accept, it’s the only answer that makes any sense. I’m ... we’re ... heartbroken that it has come to this. A man we liked and trusted has betrayed us. And betrayed his country.”
Taggert grinned. It was all very amusing to him, though Cordelia didn’t appreciate the humor. She wanted to believe Langdon was just fluff and no substance, Browne all pretense and showiness, and Howden removed and affectatious. Theirs were pleasing demeanors and elegant carriages but tough personalities, everything Cordelia was not. To a one, they probably used their considerable strengths to worm just about anything they wanted from anybody.
“Frankly,” Browne said, “we’re running scared. You may have heard Congress is coming for our throats. Threatening to remove our funding and clamp down on our activities. No one wants that, from the President on down. But the public is clamoring. Even our strongest allies are raising concerns. The press is the only voice being heard, and right now, they have the upper hand. We can’t hold up much longer. If we don’t come up with something concrete, and soon, our agency will be on the blocks to the highest bidder.”
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Howden said calmly. “We wouldn’t want to scare off these fine folks.”
“Then you don’t think Coyote is a lone wolf,” Taggert said.
“Far from it,” Howden said.
“Proof?”
“None that we’re authorized to share at this time. But you must accept, as we have already accepted, however reluctantly, that Coyote couldn’t have done this alone. If we find him, we can shut down his organization, neutralize his co-conspirators, and go after the big fish, the person or persons pulling the strings.”
“Inside or outside government?” Taggert’s tone was casual and mild, but his cross-examination was anything but.
“We don’t know. Definitively. Until we do, we’re not going off half-cocked.”
Taggert sat back, joining his hands into a steeple, head bowed, pondering. “I believe what you’re saying ... and what you’ve avoided admitting ... is that Coyote has disappeared from your radar.”
“From law enforcement as well,” Browne said, her back up.
“Rumor has it he was spirited off to a black site,” Taggert said.
“Not one of ours.” Browne cleared her throat as if embarrassed. “He’s a threat to national security, that much is certain. Irrespective of his current status, we believe the answer to his whereabouts can be traced through the money trail. The banks are screaming to get it back. And they want their pound of flesh. To be honest, so do we. The FBI and DOJ are eager to bring him in and throw the book at him.”
“For what?” Taggert asked. “Espionage? Treason?”
“Both.”
It was quite an admission. They had been skirting around the issue, but now it was out in the open for all to witness.
Browne looked furtively toward Howden, who gave her unspoken permission to tell all. “Here’s the thing. We have another casualty. The same night Coyote killed Ms. Whitney, another of our colleagues went missing. We believe he was taken to a black site for reasons undetermined. The President is aware of the situation. As is the National Security Council.”
“And the CIA?”
“Goes without saying. If we were to make an official statement―” She took in a steadying breath. “Well, you can see why we don’t want it to get out. We’re trying to protect him. And ourselves.”
“And Sessions?”
“We can only think ...” She looked to her fellows for support. “... the newspaper article must have pushed him over the edge. Quite literally, I’m sorry to say.”
“Why? Because of something he should have known but didn’t? Or because he knew something and said nothing?”
Browne went on the defensive. “That’s very pointed.”
“It was meant to be.”
“You think we brought this on ourselves?”
“I think you’re hiding something.”
With a defeated sigh, Browne looked toward her associates for support before going on. “There are things we can’t say for national security reasons. This we do know. Coyote is on a one-man killing spree. We’re certain he’s behind what happened to our missing man. As well as other suspicious events. A woman murdered in her Virginia home. A man found hanged in his home. Another woman run over by a Metro train.”
“Connected with the Firm?”
“We’ve been looking into it.” There was a pause, as if she were hiding something. “You may as well know. It’ll eventually come out. The hanging victim was a contractor of ours.”
“Working on classified information?”
“Everything we do at HID is classified.”
The grey-tinted windows became darker. A front of ominous clouds was rolling in from the northwest. Cordelia could almost smell rain in the air. Dark clouds were also building inside the conference room.
“We have to find Coyote,” Browne said. “Before he strikes again. Liz will be your liaison. We want her to work with your designated correspondent. I assume that would be Cordelia. Coyote is clever. He retains more information in his frontal cortex than any one of us will ever forget. Which brings us to the reason we came here on such short notice. And on such a terrible day. We want to know what you know. Everything. No holding back.” Hers were fighting words.
Taggert rose to his full six feet height with measured elegance, removed his suit jacket and hung it over the back of his chair. He sat again, patting his tie into place, and sending a message that he was here for the long haul. His actions also said something else. They communicated very clearly and very loudly that she had stepped out of line.
Put in her place, Browne glanced around the table, suddenly unsure of herself. “It would be taken as a professional courtesy if you were to reveal what you have. In the interest of agency cooperation. We’ve heard he’s in the Cayman Islands. We sent someone down there to scope him out.”
“Ah. I see.” Taggert turned his eyes toward his boss.
Frances Hynes presented the evidence in methodical fashion, using neither hyperbole nor grandiosity.
“Back in July, Cordelia found four transactions coming out of four Wall Street brokerage houses ... the ones you spoke off ... totaling roughly twelve million dollars each and adding up to the fifty million in question. The funds were transferred within milliseconds of each other through a succession of wire transfers that hit several financial institutions around the world, before again being transferred within days. The packets remained relatively intact, making the paths easy to follow, as if someone wanted them to be discovered. But I digress. Eventually the funds wound up in select offshore tax havens. We haven’t yet been able to fully understand the means or the mechanics of how this money was extracted from under the noses of supposedly secure institutions. This we do know. It appears the heist was pulled off by one ingenious individual.”
“Jack?” It was the first syllable Liz Langdon had uttered.
“Unknown.” Further delineating the facts, Frances exaggerated nothing, her delivery subdued, her focus keying in on where the funds landed and the actions being taken.
The conference room became subdued, everyone listening with enrapt attention. No one was moved to ask questions. They were too busy taking it all in.
“
We intend to pursue further and if pressed, enlist the cooperation of Treasury and Justice. The State Department can also employ trade sanctions in the countries of receipt, which have worked in similar situations. But let me say this. The matter before us is of great significance. Consider the consequences. If a select cabal can infiltrate our financial institutions with such impunity, think of what they can do, what forces they can exert, and what demands they can make.”
“You’re saying blackmail,” Howden put in, to which Frances responded with a curt nod. “And Coyote?”
“Do we think he’s the mastermind?” Frances said. “We don’t know, but we mean to find out.”
In a way, Cordelia had to admire the gall of her superior. Whether her supposition was true as stated or embellished for her audience, it had given her the upper hand to stunning effect.
“I’m not a wild-eyed conspiracy theorist. I’m a pragmatist. But let me state this,” Frances said, taking in the room with a sweep of her iron eyes. “The world could be threatened with the complete collapse of its monetary system. May I emphasize this point. With the capability of porting millions, perhaps billions of dollars around the world in the blink of an eye, absent transparency or the ability to stop it, nations can be brought down in a silent coup.”
Taggert was the dispassionate pessimist behind Frances, yet theirs was a collaborative relationship. He was the yin to her yang. Together they made a formidable pairing. Frances would not have laid out a theory of imminent financial Armageddon as she had done without the full support of her reports and superiors, all the way up to Prentiss Hancock. Taggert had known what was coming.
“Maybe I’m being too hasty in my assessment,” Frances said. “But let me be clear. We at MonCom believe the Coyote affair reflects something larger than meets the eye. We’re following the situation very closely. Nevertheless ... and I don’t mean to accuse anyone personally ... it is our considered opinion that by focusing on a single man the way you have, you’ve missed the obvious. Like you, we don’t believe this is the work of a lone wolf. We believe this plot can be laid at the door of our old adversaries in the east. The Russian government would like nothing better than to bring us to our knees. Make no mistake, it can happen.”
A pall fell over the group. Minds were spinning. Cordelia sniffed fear in the air.
“As we see it, a free exchange of information would be beneficial to us both.” She swung her eyesight around. The table was quiet, even morose. The members of HID silently contemplated the challenge. After making a full circle of everyone, including her own contingent, Frances brought her gaze back to Camilla Howden, and there rested, a direct challenge.
After several seconds ticked by, Howden lifted her clear blue eyes. “I don’t know if you’ve heard, but arctic icebergs are melting into the oceans.” Tittering circled the table. The statement wasn’t meant to be funny. It was meant to be illustrative. And quite serious. She continued. “Now that the ice has figuratively broken, rest assured that the Coyote affair is our top priority. Our investigation goes deeper into the bowels of government than you may think, and straight into the hearts of lying men. It’s bigger than we can admit to you or anyone else. We know what we’re up against. And it’s no less than what you suspect. You may think I’m being dramatic and hyperbolic. I’m not.” Her sweeping eyes checked in with her associates. “But let me also be clear. The reputation of our agency is at stake, it’s true. But it’s also a personal matter. We worked with Coyote’s victims. They are our people. You cannot say the same.”
“We are all family.” Frances pushed back her chair, went around to the other side of the table, and proffered her hand. “Cordelia is our designated lead. If you need anything from her or we of you, she will be our go-between.”
The meeting had drawn to a close. Once the HID team left and was well out of earshot, Cordelia said. “Are they using us? Or are we using them?”
“What do you think?” Frances said.
“We work for the same government.”
“If you really thought that, my pretty one, you’d be naïve. And I know you’re not naïve.”
17
Seven Mile Beach, Grand Cayman
Monday, August 11
JACK LET HIS guard down. God knows it wasn’t the first time. And it wouldn’t be the last.
In the hotel bar, where he was nursing a drink, he caught sight of the bank officer from CapTrust. Keri Parris. The prissy clerk with the crooked front tooth and conceited airs. She seemed to be out of her element and slightly edgy, probably having spotted him well before he noticed her. A swarm of talkative patrons separated them. She smiled winningly in his direction before unfolding her long legs and hopping down from a barstool, bringing along her drink. She sidled up to his small table set in a dark corner of the saloon and lowered her eyes. “I hope I’m not intruding. If you’re meeting someone, I can always ....” She gestured back toward the bar, giving him an easy way out.
He swept out a hand of invitation. “Not unless you have other plans.”
She glanced around as if looking for anyone else of her acquaintance, but Jack wasn’t fooled. He knew why she had come. To seek him out, possibly on her own initiative or possibly at the behest of someone else. In either case, she wasn’t here because she found him attractive. Nor was it to have him sign an official form or provide a businesslike answer to a pointed question. No, she was here to draw him out or draw him in, the spider having already woven her web despite her timid smiles, nervous tics, and patrician mannerisms.
Jack surveyed the room, skimming his eyes as if taking in everything at random while searching for anyone interested in what was going on in the far corner, allies of hers but enemies of his. He didn’t see any suspicious characters, but then again, he was new to the spy game. Bringing his eyesight around full circle, he smiled at her pleasantly, putting her at ease. She was still dressed in the same business suit from earlier in the day, a tailored navy-blue affair, the jacket cut in a bolero style, the skirt stopping just short of her knees, the heels showing off her shapely legs. She was even taller than he remembered. More graceful. Less severe. The only accommodation she made was to spread apart the white blouse at the collar and expose a modest amount of flesh below the suprasternal notch at the base of her throat.
He reached over and pulled out an adjacent chair, inviting her to sit. She did so with grace, sliding onto the cane chair and setting her drink onto the tabletop. She had schooled herself to move her body in calculated ways, conscious of the nuances her gestures conveyed, as if she were in control and no one could manipulate or persuade her. Her fingers were long and graceful but manicured like a boy’s, with stubby fingertips and clear nail polish. She removed the jacket and shrugged it over the back of her chair, a nimble effort that enhanced her slim figure but also conveyed a blatant sexual signal. She wasn’t wearing a bra. Once again she gripped the drink she brought along with her and lifted it to her mouth but did not drink, instead smiling broadly.
“Can I order you a fresh one?”
“I wouldn’t say no.” She seemed more at ease than she had been at the bank. In the darkness of the bar, her eyes were hazel colored. The mismatched tooth along with the slightly curved nose imparted a vulnerability that made her seem more human and less robotic.
“Did we make a date?” Jack asked.
“You left the impression your evening was available. Or was I mistaken?”
“You had other plans.”
She shrugged embarrassment. “He stood me up.”
“You must be hungry then.” He extended his hand across the small table and covered one of hers, the skin silken to the touch.
“Ravenous.” Her British accent was curt but her underlying meaning clear. She was practiced in hiding her emotions, those telltale indicators of what she was thinking and feeling. Her smooth brow rarely creased in joy or in consternation. She possessed the classic British stoicism that revealed little. She tilted her head, allowing her cropped hair to s
wing forward. It made her come across as slightly spoiled and inauthentic, as if she were playing a part, in this instance the role of an ingénue with coquettish charm and posh bearing.
Compliments cost nothing, and he gave her one. “I like your smile. You should smile more often.”
“Should I?” The comment seemed to throw her. She didn’t know what to make of it. Or else she knew precisely what to make of it.
“Well then,” he said, “shall we go eat?”
They retired to one of the hotel restaurants. Candlelit and swank, it was also intimate and soft-focused, and catered to locals as well as tourists. The cuisine was Caribbean with a hint of high-brow that would satisfy the most discriminating of tastes. They started with a rum cocktail (her choice) and locally brewed beer (his choice). For the main course, Keri suggested a conch stew fricasseed with vegetables, mangoes, and a hint of honey. Afterwards came fried crab with rice and beans, the dish searing to the pallet and spicy on the tongue. Over the meal, they exchanged pleasantries of the flirtatious kind. Eventually they engaged in a conversation about the island’s main commodity: financial services. She was eager to talk about her job so long as it steered away from Mr. Fox’s immediate business concerns. He had heard it all before. The laundering of money meant to conceal ill-gotten gains and avoid taxes wasn’t new. Neither were the winks and nods that allowed drug trafficking, terrorism, human trade, corporate malfeasance, and a thousand and one other sneaky enterprises to avoid detection. In the parlance of bankers, a financial service was just a Ponzi scheme designed to maximize profit. The smart profiteers got away with it. The reckless criminals often didn’t since there was a line to be drawn between dirty money and elite money.
Keri discussed the ways of detecting suspicious behavior. “For instance, clients who deposit funds and almost immediately withdraw or transfer the money to another institution. Or a client who advises that the funds will come from one source but they arrive from a different source. Or a client requesting the return of funds only days after receipt.”
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