by Barry Eisler
Manus looked at him, then at the other, whose tee shirt bore a large, faded print of an American flag, then back to Smiley. “I didn’t hear you.”
Smiley looked at Flag, then back to Manus. “What are you, deaf?”
One of Manus’s instructors at the CIA’s Military Operations Training Course had taught him there were five rules for avoiding impending street violence: Don’t challenge him, don’t insult him, don’t threaten him, don’t deny it’s happening, give him a face-saving exit. Manus had learned the rules the hard way in the institutions he’d grown up in, but being more conscious of them helped him commit fewer violations. And only when he wanted to.
The way he did right now.
He looked Smiley up and down and said, “You must be the brains of the operation.”
Smiley glanced at Flag again. Flag nodded. The nod said, Yeah. Good to go.
Their hands went to their pockets. Manus brought out the Force Pro, quick as a magic trick, simultaneously stepping offline to his right to line up the men more neatly while creating extra distance between their right hands and himself. He pointed the muzzle at Flag’s face and said, “Anything comes out of those pockets and you’re dead right there.”
The men froze and stared at him. Their hands drifted away from their sides, the fingers splayed. From the way they complied, Manus had the sense they’d been rousted by cops before and knew the drill.
Smiley glanced at Flag, then back to Manus. “Hey, man, we were just—”
“You’re under arrest. Use your left hands to take those knives out. I’d do it very slowly if I were you. Just ease them out and drop them.”
“Under arrest?” Flag said. “Come on, man, we were just—”
“You can either comply,” Manus said, “or I will shoot you.”
Of course the situation was odd. A deaf cop? Alone, on foot, not calling for backup? And not producing a badge? But there were always anomalies. The trick was to maintain the pressure, to keep things moving too fast for someone’s brain to catch up to his gut.
Smiley looked at Flag. When Flag reached across with his left hand, eased the knife out, and dropped it, Smiley did the same.
“Now step backward. Two long steps.”
The men complied. Manus kicked the knives away.
“Now on your knees, hands laced behind your necks.”
Flag laced his fingers together and got on his knees, and Smiley followed suit. Smiley was obviously the beta. Without Flag to show him the way, he’d hesitate, maybe even freeze. That suggested the proper order of operations.
Manus moved counterclockwise, going behind them. He switched the Force Pro to his left hand, and with his right removed a flashlight from his pocket—a SureFire Defender Ultra, close to six inches of mil-spec hard-anodized aluminum, with a sharp, crenelated bezel and tailcap. A great tool.
“Knees wide. Wider. Lace those fingers tight.”
To men of their apparent experience, it would feel like the familiar dance steps of being handcuffed. So Flag was probably surprised, or would have been, anyway, when Manus stepped in, brought the Defender high, and hammer-fisted the crenelated bezel into the top of the man’s head, caving his skull into his brain.
Flag pitched forward without a sound. Smiley turned his head and watched, his face aghast, trying to process what had just happened. Manus didn’t give him time. He put his boot heel into the back of Smiley’s laced fingers and stepped through hard, blasting Smiley’s face into the pavement. Smiley gave a muffled cry and managed to unlace his hands. He got them on the ground to push himself up, but before he could, Manus stomped the back of his neck again, crushing it.
He looked around. The area was still deserted. He glanced down at the two men. Neither was moving, not even a twitch. He clicked the Defender’s tail cap and the light came on. But there was tissue and hair around the lens. He’d have to replace it.
He would have liked to walk more, but obviously now he needed to leave. And besides, though his heart rate was up from adrenaline, his mind felt clearer. He was glad the men had wanted to hurt him. It was what he needed. He walked back across the parking lot and into the dark of the woods, where he wiped down and buried the Defender.
Back in his truck, he headed northwest toward his apartment in Ellicott City. Even at that hour, there were plenty of other cars on I-95, and there was nothing about his pickup or his driving that anyone would find memorable. He kept to the speed limit, just a workman getting an early start, on the way to a job in Baltimore or Frederick or Hagerstown. He saw no one and no one saw him.
He tried to think things through again. And realized there was only one chance. One hope. He had to do now what he should have done the first time. Go to the director, and tell him everything. Everything that had happened, everything he had done.
And pray the director would forgive him.
CHAPTER . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . 28
Evie arrived at the Walgreens on Twin Knolls Road at just before seven, a few minutes before they opened. She had called Digne at five, apologizing for waking her but could Digne come early and take care of Dash? An emergency at work.
The problem was that she didn’t know what time the mailbox place in Rockville opened. Seven? Eight? Later? Later than eight and she wouldn’t be able to get there before work, and she didn’t want to try to go later because she thought it would be emptiest in the morning, and empty was going to be critical for what she had planned. She’d sat down at her computer to check, and realized a search would leave a trail. She might have called the store and gotten the information from the store’s recorded message, but that would have created a trail, too. It was bizarre to be so stymied on something so basic, but she had become reliant on the Internet and her cell phone for almost everything. She considered the payphone at the mall, but she’d heard rumors that DEA monitored every public phone in the DC area. An Apple Store or an Internet café? Maybe, but that was a one-off. What if she needed a secure means for something after that?
What about a prepaid smartphone?
Right . . . what television drug dealers called a burner. Flexible and anonymous. She could pay cash, use the burner to access the Internet and make any calls she needed, and dispose of it when she was done. Nothing that could ever be traced back to her.
She was waiting outside the doors when a store employee unlocked them, and was back in her car less than ten minutes after that. She pulled the packaging off the prepaid and was about to activate it when she paused, horrified. She had her own cell phone with her—if she turned on the burner and then drove off, the two would move in sync and enable someone to determine who had just bought the “anonymous” phone.
Only if they’re looking, Evie. Only if they’re looking.
But she had to assume they were looking now. Security through obscurity was no longer an option.
She realized she should have turned off her own phone until she was done with everything she had to do. But . . . she could turn it off now, head toward Rockville, activate the burner when she was close, turn the burner off as soon as she had the information she needed, then turn on her own phone again when she was back on her normal route to the office. Not perfect, but still pretty good.
What if they track the burner back to its point of purchase?
She supposed that was possible. But so many things would have to go wrong for them to be looking for the burner. And even if they found it and tried to get a match, there must have been hundreds of phones in the vicinity of the Walgreens when the unit had been purchased. Maybe now that she’d thought the whole thing through properly, it would have been better to do it later, but with everything going on she didn’t know when she’d get another chance.
A little weird, your phone just going dark and then coming back online, no?
Yeah, that would look a little weird.
She got out of the car and looked around. There was a gap between the parking lot curb and the grass. She switched her phone to sile
nt and slid it into the gap. There. Unlikely it would be discovered in the next hour or so. Even if it were, someone might return it to the store’s lost-and-found. And if not? She must have dropped it somewhere, and someone carried it off. It happened.
She turned back to the car, then hesitated.
Sure you don’t want to wait until tomorrow morning? Better to do it right, no?
It was a seductive thought. Too seductive. It was the thought of someone in denial, someone who wanted to believe she had all the time in the world when in fact she might have very little.
What about the cameras? There would be store footage from when the phone was purchased.
She’d have to live with the risk. But she thought it was manageable. She was in charge of the system, after all. Any requests to query it would go through her. She could decide how to deal with it at that point.
She headed south. Once she turned onto Route 28, she felt she was far enough from where she’d left her phone to activate the burner. She turned it on, called the 800 number, read them the purchase code, and a minute later was Googling the shipping center in Rockville.
If Dash ever surfs while driving, I’ll kill him. But she didn’t have time to pull over.
The store opened at eight. Thank God. The morning rush-hour traffic wasn’t great, but she had a good shot of getting there not much after that, and maybe earlier. With luck, she’d be the only customer, at least for a few minutes. She powered down the phone and fought the urge to go through every red light she hit.
The store was in a strip mall that occupied the first floor of an office building. She went past, pulled into an adjacent townhouse lot, and parked. She looked at herself in the rearview mirror.
Come on, Evie. You can do this.
She unbuttoned an extra button on her blouse and spread the collar wide. She checked the mirror again, nodded in satisfaction, and headed out. She was at the door even as the employee inside, a college-age guy in a brown company shirt, was unlocking it. She caught him stealing a glance at her cleavage from the other side of the glass and thought, Okay, good.
“Morning,” the kid said as she strolled in past him. She sensed his eyes on her legs.
“Morning,” she said, turning to give him an appreciative smile. He was actually kind of cute. Which was good. She didn’t think she was much of an actress, and the less she had to strain for the right performance, the better.
The kid straightened and tried to return the keys to his pocket, but kept missing. He blushed, glanced down, got them in, and looked up at her. “Something to mail, or . . . ?”
She started walking toward the counter, her head sweeping back and forth. Mailboxes on the left wall; copying machine and shipping supplies on the right. Counter and cash register alongside the mailboxes. “Actually,” she said over her shoulder, “I was thinking about renting a box.”
He hurried to catch up with her. “Sure, of course. Well, as you can see, we have three sizes. All different prices, of course.”
They paused in front of the mailboxes. She scanned them left to right, then down . . . there, 406, Hamilton’s box. As far from the counter as possible, naturally. But still. It was right there.
The large boxes were at the bottom, and she leaned forward as though examining them. She noted the kid enjoying the view. “I think a big one would be best for me,” she said, hoping the double entendre wouldn’t be too over the top.
“Uh, sure. The big ones aren’t as popular, so we have plenty. Are you looking for a month-to-month, or something longer term . . . ?”
She straightened and walked over to the counter. “Do you have any literature?”
“Sure, I can give you a brochure,” he said, heading around to the other side of the counter. “Or, it’s all on the Internet. Whatever you like.”
“Oh, a brochure would be great. And you are . . . ?”
“Hugh,” the kid said, with an automatic glance at the name badge on his shirt. She had already noticed it, but wanted to keep him talking.
She offered her hand. “Hugh, I’m Jane. Nice to meet you.”
He smiled and shook her hand quickly, almost nervously. “Nice to meet you, too. Here, let me get you one of those brochures.”
“Thanks. And Hugh, would you mind if I used your restroom?”
The kid glanced around as though she had offered to sell him drugs and federal agents might be watching. “Uh, it’s not really for customers . . .”
She smiled. “Well, it’s just the two of us in the store, right?”
“Yeah, but my boss will be here soon.”
“If I promise to be fast? Less than a minute, honest.”
He peered over at the entrance, then gestured to a door behind the counter on his left. “Um, okay. Right over there.”
“Thanks. I promise not to tell.”
She headed past him and closed the door behind her. Damn it, she really did need to pee. Well, all right, that would make it even more realistic. She pulled her skirt up and her panties down and sat. While she peed, she took all the paper from the dispenser to her right and rolled it up into a large ball. When she was done, she stood, fixed her clothes, dropped the rolled-up paper into the bowl, and flushed.
There was a loud rush of water, and the bolus of paper was instantly sucked away.
She blinked and looked at the toilet, dumbfounded at the power of the thing. That ball of paper would have choked the one in her apartment. What the hell kind of plumbing is this? Rocket-powered?
She glanced around the room. A few cleaning items, boxes of shipping supplies, a row of cabinets. She tried the cabinets. They were locked.
Oh my God, who locks restroom cabinets? Is someone going to steal the toilet paper?
She looked around again. She didn’t see a spare roll.
You have got to be kidding me.
This was bad. She needed more paper to make this work.
You should have brought your own. You shouldn’t have assumed. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
She looked behind the toilet. Nothing.
Come on, come on, think of something. Improvise.
She had a tampon in her purse. She pulled it out and got the wrapping off. It looked woefully inadequate—she figured this toilet could vacuum down three at least, maybe four.
She rifled through her purse and found one more, and a travel-size package of tissues, too. She balled it all together. Close, but it didn’t look like a sure thing.
All right. She slid her panties down over her shoes, wrapped them around the tampons and the tissue, and jammed the entire mass into the mouth of the toilet bowl until it would absolutely go no further. Then she took a deep breath and flushed. A tremendous sound came from deep in the toilet, a vacuum, a roar, an angry dragon. But the blockage held. The bowl began to fill rapidly, and in seconds it was overflowing.
Evie shook the water off her hand and forearm and opened the door. “Oh, my goodness,” she said, “I think your toilet is overflowing!”
For a second, the kid was paralyzed and did nothing but gape. Then he rushed to the bathroom.
The instant he was past her, she strode to the sorting area behind the mailboxes, her heart hammering. The back was numbered just like the front. Well, of course it was, how else would they know how to sort the mail? She scanned—404, 405, there it was, 406. With a single envelope inside, the very one she had watched Hamilton mail from Istanbul.
She heard the entrance door chime—someone was coming in. She grabbed the letter, shoved it in her purse, and raced back to the counter. She reached the area behind it, and saw a tall man with dark, Brylcreemed hair straight out of the fifties closing the door behind him. He was wearing a brown shirt identical to Hugh’s—the boss, apparently. Her heart went into overdrive and she fought to keep her breathing steady.
“Hi there,” she said with a bright smile.
The boss stared at her suspiciously. “What are you doing back there?”
Shit, had he seen her emerge from behind the mailbo
xes?
She said the first thing she could think of: “Oh, just looking for one of the brochures Hugh mentioned. About the mailboxes. He’s in the bathroom. I think—”
On cue, the kid emerged from the bathroom, holding a damp pair of panties. “I think this is what—” he started to say, then saw his boss and froze.
The boss frowned. His eyes went from the panties to the generous amount of cleavage revealed above her additional undone blouse button. He shook his head in disdain and disbelief. “What the hell do you think you’re doing, Hugh?”
The kid blinked. “I, I didn’t, I just . . .”
Come on, Evie, you need to get out of here. Now.
She walked over, retrieved the panties, dropped them primly in her purse, and kissed the kid on the cheek. “Thank you, Hugh,” she said. “You were great.”
The kid stood there, stupefied. She walked past the boss, who was equally nonplussed.
“It wasn’t his fault,” she said. “I took advantage.”
She was out the door before he could even respond, and back on the road only a minute later, breathing hard, giddy. She’d done it. She’d done it. She couldn’t believe it. She’d just . . . done it. She’d gotten the letter. Right under their noses, she’d gone in and taken it. And with just a bit of luck on the traffic, she’d be at Fort Meade in less than an hour, no one the wiser. And didn’t she deserve a little luck, after that beast of a toilet?
She got the giggles. And just as she wrestled them under control, she imagined herself whispering to the director, Oh, and I’m not wearing panties, either, and broke up again so hard she almost had to pull over.
Okay, girl. Okay. Take it easy now. The hard part’s done.
At a red light, she opened the envelope. Inside were two strips of cardboard. In between them was a thumb drive. Almost certainly encrypted.
What was that about the hard part being done?
Well, she worked at NSA. If she couldn’t figure out how to decrypt a damn thumb drive, she’d practically be a disgrace to the organization. She knew a few people. She’d find someone who could help her. Tell them it was a personal issue. A cheating boyfriend who was hiding things from her and who she was checking up on, something like that. The practice of illicitly using NSA tools to monitor romantic interests was widespread enough that employees even had a jokey word for it: LOVEINT. The thought of bringing the thumb drive directly into the belly of the beast was unnerving, but she’d never been searched before and there was no reason to think today would be the first time. And even if she were mistaken, so what? She’d found an encrypted thumb drive and wanted to see what was on it. Thin, okay, but better than nothing. The main thing, though, was that it was unlikely ever even to come up.