The American rk-1

by Andrew Britton

  She was standing next to the van, on the bare cement surrounded by straw. He looked around quickly to see what she might have touched before examining her face, which was almost lost in the shadows of the barn.

  She had come to please. He could tell that from her tight jeans and stomach-baring halter top, from the light touch of strawberry-colored lipstick to the way her honey-blond hair carefully framed her high cheekbones. It was also clear that she had seen too much.

  “Hi.” She was uncertain, he saw with some amusement, because her planned argument had been ruined. He tried to remember her name. Nicole. “I was just… I just wanted to stop by because… Well, you know.”

  “Hi, Nicole. You don’t have to explain anything. I’m glad you came.” He flashed a winning smile and moved forward without missing a beat. She took two steps back, but there was nowhere to go. Pulling her close, he kissed her on the lips and let his hands slide down the length of her back. She didn’t respond to his touch, and he immediately registered that she was too afraid to move. Interesting.

  Vanderveen pulled away abruptly and walked over to closely examine his worktable. He couldn’t be sure, but he thought that the light to his optical magnifier had been off, and now it was on, clearly illuminating the contents of the desk. He felt a trickle of annoyance.

  “I–I was only in here for a second. I ju — just wanted to see you again… If you don’t want me to come back, I–I won’t. I’m sorry, I really am…”

  The words were getting farther away. He thought that the conduit had been resting in a wooden crate, and now several pieces were sitting next to the crate. The trickle turned into a steady stream of anger.

  “I–I didn’t touch anything. I’m… Well, I’m so sorry I just walked in here, I–I should have knocked. I should have come up to the house first, I know…”

  He thought, and he was almost certain, that his detonators had been in a tight group of four, and now one was separated from the pack, resting on the other side of a. 40 caliber pistol. The stream gave way to a river of rage. He picked up the weapon, feeling its reassuring weight in his palm.

  She was almost at the door, walking backward and still talking. “I–I — I didn’t see anything, I sw — swear…” Her voice began to rise when he turned and she saw the gun. “Please let me go. Please! I’m sorry! I didn’t see ANYTHING, I SWEAR TO GOD!”

  He lifted the pistol and shot her once in the stomach, then watched with satisfaction as she collapsed to the cement.

  They were seated in Harper’s seventh-floor office, lounging in the same chairs they had occupied a few weeks before. Naomi was at home recuperating, at Harper’s insistence. She had shown up that morning at Langley, hunched over with the pain. Harper had ordered her home to get some rest, but her initial refusal to leave had impressed Ryan. He didn’t want to think about what that meant.

  The deputy director was in a glowing mood. The Bureau had already managed to track down a taxi driver who had taken the Iranian woman to National Airport several days in a row during the first week of November. Since she had never actually boarded a plane, it wasn’t hard for the agents tasked with the investigation to figure out what she had been doing there.

  “She was using a locker,” Ryan said.

  “That’s right.” Harper leaned back in his chair. He looked pleased with himself. “They never found any ID in the apartment, but the locker was under the same name she gave to the landlord: Theresa Barzan. They found Saudi passports for her and her minder inside.”

  “Did those names come to anything?”

  Harper’s jovial mood seemed to fade a little. “Not yet. The investigation is drawing a lot of resources, though. They’re going to start looking at banks — that’s a lot easier to do since the passage of the Patriot Act. The Bureau thinks she might have been moving money for Shakib.”

  Kealey looked skeptical. “It’s going to take forever to go through the banks, John. They’ll fight the Feds every step of the way. What about Vanderveen? Was she supposed to be moving money for him as well?”

  The deputy director shrugged. “Who knows? It’s certainly possible. Anyway, there’s been a development you need to know about. The director has been stuck in meetings all week — one of the upshots is that the visit by Chirac and Berlusconi is getting the NSSE designation.”

  Ryan was not at all surprised. NSSE stood for National Special Security Event, and the Secret Service, under Presidential Decision Directive 62, was the government agency primarily responsible for security planning and implementation at such events. He realized they’d be completely sealing off the Gangplank Marina on the 26th and that the FBI, FEMA, and the Washington, D.C., Metro Police Department would all be called in to help.

  “The only problem with that, John, is that the designation will find its way into the hands of the press. Vanderveen will find out about it and make adjustments accordingly. There’s no way he’s going to back out now.”

  Harper’s face dropped a little bit more. “I don’t see what else we can do, Ryan. I know the banks are a long shot, but we’re running out of time. Besides, we still don’t have definitive proof that he’s even in the country, let alone Washington, D.C.”

  “He’s here, John. I’d stake my life on it.” Kealey was thinking hard. “What about property?”

  “What about it?” Harper asked. Then he caught on. “You mean a stable base of operations.”

  “That’s exactly what I mean,” Ryan said. There was a long pause. “Listen, I think it’s time to make some assumptions. I know it’s risky to do that, but I don’t see that we have a choice. We have a lot of little leads, but we’re not tying them together fast enough. We have to assume that Vanderveen is definitely going after all three of them: Brenneman, Chirac, and Berlusconi.”

  Recollection flickered in Harper’s eyes. “From what Gray said to you in Cape Town.”

  “Exactly. Vanderveen was trained as a sniper, but he is an engineer first and foremost. To take out all three of them at the same time, he would almost invariably use a bomb. So if we assume that that’s what he’s doing, the question becomes: where is he building it?”

  Harper thought for a moment. “Not in the city.”

  “No.” Ryan was shaking his head. “Not in the city. Too congested, too many potential witnesses. At the same time, he wouldn’t want to be too far away. When it’s done, he has to travel with it. That’s a risk in and of itself.”

  “So, what then? Virginia, Maryland…?”

  “That’s where I would start. Recent rentals would be a good place to begin. If we go with the idea that he’s storing explosives, he’s going to need access to a house. Of course, that’s a huge area to cover, so we have to limit the search parameters. He’ll need a decent amount of land, not to use, but to ensure his privacy. We have to look in rural areas; start from farms, then move out to the suburbs. He’ll want access to escape routes, and that means major roads — anything more than five miles from an interstate highway won’t be a consideration.”

  Harper was staring at him. “Where is all this coming from, Ryan?”

  “It’s called OPSEC — operational security. The whole point is to minimize the chance of discovery. Vanderveen understands it as well as I do, but there are no guarantees and it requires a lot of guesswork on our part. It’s why I was hesitant to suggest this in the first place… If we commit resources and I’m wrong, we’ll be giving him a huge advantage.”

  The deputy director was nodding slowly. “All the same, at this point I think we have to take the risk. I’ll talk to Andrews about making this a priority at Tyson’s Corner. Of course, that will serve a second purpose by getting the Bureau and the Secret Service involved.” Harper smiled wearily. “I have faith in you, Ryan, but I don’t want the Agency running solo on this. We don’t want to be the ones left holding the bag if it all goes to hell.”

  Vanderveen was intently focused on the most delicate part of the process, hunched over the magnifying glass and carefully examini
ng his mechanical joints. It would take only a touch of solder, but the wiring would have to be thoroughly tested to ensure that his heat sinks had functioned as intended. Otherwise, it was possible that the heat of the solder gun might have damaged the sensitive components of the cell phone’s ringer.

  Frowning, he turned when he heard a noise behind him.

  Nicole Milbery was contorted in the fetal position, her arms clenched fiercely over the wound as if to squeeze out the terrible pain. She had managed to drag herself perhaps four feet. The route was marked by an erratic trail of blood leading back to the glistening pool, but she was still no fewer than five feet away from her cell phone.

  Vanderveen had searched her soon after she fell, a task made much more difficult by the fact that she was slippery red, screaming, and writhing in agony. He found the phone almost immediately, then felt a sweet rush of relief when he checked her outgoing messages and saw that the last one had occurred more than three hours earlier.

  He was safe, but she had almost ruined everything.

  In his anger, out of spite, he had placed it next to the straw on the edge of the cement. As the pool of blood continued to spread around her, she had questioned him, begged him, screamed obscenities, but every word had been met with silence. Then, when the realtor was all but forgotten, he had turned again to watch in fascination as she pulled herself toward the phone, moaning in anguish as each little movement sent jagged spears of pain racing through her abdomen.

  He shook his head. Where did she think she was going? Surely she must know that he would never allow her to actually reach the phone.

  She was much stronger than he would have imagined, but it was clear that she had finally given up. The determination of the dying woman had given way to pitiful sobs almost ten minutes earlier. Now she hardly made any noise at all, and the light was already beginning to fade from her soft brown eyes.

  Once approved by the National Security Council, the NSSE designation put things into rapid motion on Water Street and the surrounding area. Around the marina itself, wire fencing was rapidly installed by a company whose twenty-five full-time employees had been thoroughly screened by the Secret Service advance team, which was already on the scene and working hard. The Sequoia was scoured from top to bottom for hidden weapons and explosives, and background checks were ordered for the residents who lived in the buildings that lined the waterfront.

  It was determined, after heated debate, that the White House press office would take care of developing and distributing passes for the event. The list of people with access to the presidential yacht was reserved to a few choice aides whose pictures, backgrounds, and fingerprint cards were sent by diplomatic pouch from Paris and Rome to the head of the advance team. She examined the pictures and made sure that her people saw them. Then they went back to their preparations.

  He would not be satisfied without first test-firing the device. It was already laid out across the cement. Standing in the shadows cast by the late afternoon sun, he quietly examined the work that had cost him the better part of the morning.

  From the battery, the bare copper wire separated into two distinct paths, then came back together at the exposed terminals of the toggle switch. Conduit would be used to insulate the wire from the sheet metal of the van, but it would not be necessary here, as the cement served the same purpose. The wire split from the switch and reunited after 10 feet at the exposed circuit board of the cell phone. From there, it began to resemble a ladder. There was nothing unusual about the rails, but each of the four rungs was covered by a five-pound sandbag. Each sandbag, in turn, concealed a number 6 blasting cap. He had wanted the number 8 caps: the seismic detonators were both more powerful at eight grains of PETN per cap, as opposed to six, and safer, with a lower chance of hydrostatic discharge. All the same, he was relatively satisfied with what he had. It would do the same thing in the end.

  He hadn’t taken any chances, though. He had used the digital ammeter for the first time that morning to check the resistance over each blasting cap. It came out to roughly 1.9 ohms per cap, and a little more than 2 ohms over the switch itself.

  The calculations had appeared in his mind like a sudden gust of wind on a calm summer day. The reciprocal of the sum gave him the total resistance in the circuit, 0.384 ohms, which in a parallel circuit is always less than the resistance over each component. From there, 12 volts divided by the reciprocal provided him with the total current moving through the circuit: 31.26 amperes. This translated to a little over 6.31 amps moving through the legwires of each electric cap. Using the ammeter to check his calculations, he had allowed himself a small smile at the numbers that appeared on the LCD display. Everything was working out perfectly.

  Vanderveen understood how dangerous a test fire could be. Even now, with nothing more dangerous than four blasting caps at his immediate disposal, he took all necessary precautions.

  After all, he didn’t need to see the detonation. He only needed to see the effects.

  He stood behind the bulk of the Econoline van and pulled the second cell phone from his pocket. The number to the first was on his speed dial. His breath came faster than usual, despite the fact that nothing important was about to happen. His finger hovered over the button. All around him, still air and dust particles floated in the dim light of the barn.

  There was no sound from the woman. Why not? He peeked around the corner of the van to examine her still form. He realized, with a start, that he had not heard her move for at least twenty minutes. She must have died when he first started to run the wire out over the cement.

  He was a little surprised that she had gone so quietly, but it didn’t really matter. He returned to his position, completely focused on what was about to occur. His back was against the cool metal of the van, the number was on his screen. He breathed deeply, felt the dry air of the barn enter his lungs.

  He pushed the button.

  Joshua McCabe, the assistant director of the Secret Service’s Office of Protective Research, arrived at midday to confer with the head of the advance team. Jodie Rivers was a petite, pixie-faced woman with inquisitive hazel eyes and shoulder-length auburn hair. At thirty-two years of age, she was young for her position, but a sharp intelligence, combined with the ability to spot problem situations long before they developed into full-blown situations, had earned her rapid escalation through the ranks, along with the grudging respect of her superiors.

  After instructing his driver to wait with the Lincoln Town Car, McCabe followed her along the gangplank as she pointed out the various implementations that had been made. The assistant director knew her reputation within the Service as a go-getter with unparalleled energy, but he thought Rivers now looked tired and overwhelmed by the magnitude of her task.

  “As you can see,” she was saying, “the security fencing closes off the end of Water Street underneath the bridge. It’s a dead end anyway, but we’re waiting on concrete barriers that will go up on the other side of the fencing. We’ll have at least three, and probably five checkpoints for pedestrian traffic moving through the area — I haven’t finalized those arrangements yet, but we’re taking a hard look at the spots where 6th, 7th, and 9th streets run into Maine. Those areas worry me because they’re so open. We’ve designated 4th Street as the eastern edge of our perimeter, and we want to use Arena Stage as the command post. I have to talk today with the artistic director to see if that’ll work… The main thing is keeping vehicles out of the area. Explosives are the big concern, so that’s where we’ll focus our efforts.”

  “What about the background checks?”

  An agent was calling for her attention. She gestured for the man to give her a minute, and then focused on the assistant director’s question. “It’s going well so far — nobody’s come up on our radar yet. We still have a long list to run through, though. We started with the business owners, because they’re the ones who are going to give us the most grief over the vehicle restrictions. From there, we’ll concentrate on the peopl
e who have boats docked at the marina. We’ve already gotten a lot of cooperation from the GPSA… That’s the Gangplank Slipholders Association.”

  McCabe nodded. “That was a good call, getting them involved. You’ve closed off the marina parking lot, right?”

  “Of course.” She hesitated. “Sir, pulling all civilian craft out of the marina is not a realistic option. In fact, that would crowd up the channel and work against us. We need to clear out all the slips within about a thousand feet of the Sequoia, though. Even a thousand isn’t good enough to serve as a standoff, but we won’t get much more than that. Keeping vehicles out is the easy part — it’s these boats and the channel itself that have me worried.”

  “If you weren’t worried, Rivers,” McCabe said, “then I’d say you weren’t doing your job.” He gave her a little smile to show her he was joking. “Besides, that’s the navy’s baliwick. They’ll bring in their minesweeping equipment tomorrow. One other thing I want you to do is coordinate with the Coast Guard. I want to see cutters positioned at the entrance to the channel and at least two other points on the Sequoia ’s route, in addition to our own personal escort. Also, make sure we have a designated UHF channel on marine radio. Apart from that, everything looks good to me. What about the motorcade?”

  With McCabe’s words, she felt a little bit of the tension start to drain away. Jodie Rivers had always tried to place herself above the politics of her job, but praise from her superiors felt as good to her as it did to anyone else. “We’re going to stay with the route we’ve got. If we take Maine through the tunnel to 12th and follow it north to Pennsylvania, we can limit the number of sharp turns and push the speed up. Furthermore, 12th will be a whole lot easier to close than 7th, and we don’t have too many options; most of 14th and 12th north of Pennsylvania are shut down for construction, so we have to detour on 13th Street-”