The Wrong Man (Complete 3-Book International Thriller Box Set)

by Fritz Galt

  Even though he had served eight years in the Marines, throwing a salute wouldn’t work while wearing civvies.

  “I’m Harry Black, reporting for duty,” he said to the female yeoman, and handed over his orders.

  “Welcome to Camp America, sir,” she said without looking up.

  She examined the papers briefly, and a worried look crossed her face. “Were we expecting you?”

  “Yes, my company has a contract to interrogate one of your detainees. I arrived as soon as I could.”

  “Very well. Come with me.”

  She led him to a closed office door and knocked.

  “Enter,” came a smart, if curt, response.

  She smiled and handed Harry the orders. “Good luck,” she whispered.

  What could he do but enter?

  A tall, dark-haired young commissioned officer rose behind the desk. Harry repeated who he was and why he was there.

  “I’m Commander Jack O’Shay,” he said, offering his hand. “I’m in charge of setting up the interrogation teams at Camp Delta. I understand that you have been assigned to the Cooper case.”

  “That’s correct, sir.” He shook the officer’s bony hand.

  “Well, we have all sorts of teams coming and going…CIA, DIA, State Department, Israelis, interpreters. It’s like Grand Central Station around here.”

  “I hope that Sean Cooper is kept well away from the other prisoners.”

  “Yes, we got word. He is in one of the vacant detention blocks in Camp 3. We haven’t had many new detainees recently. Maybe we’ve mopped up all the terrorists.”

  “Or can’t sort out the terrorists from the insurgents.”

  “That could be, too. Thank God they don’t send them all here.”

  Harry looked around uncomfortably. “How do I get started?” he asked.

  “Okay, first the ground rules. All interrogators such as you must have taken the Military Rules of Interrogation course.”

  Harry had anticipated this requirement. “I took that back in the Marines,” he lied.

  “Good.”

  Harry wasn’t surprised that the commander didn’t bother to double-check this fact in his service records. Which explained a lot about how things got so screwed up in the prisons of Afghanistan and Iraq, not to mention Guantánamo. And showed how little had changed since then.

  Commander O’Shay went on to his next point. “Second, no use of MPs as any part of your interrogation process, that is, to soften up the prisoners before you interrogate them. The MPs are under a separate command and there’s a firewall between them and us.”

  “Understood.” At least that new rule had been hammered home.

  “Good. Now about your housing. I understand that you have requested bunks for ten men.”

  “That’s correct.”

  “Well, I’m sorry, but all the refurbished housing facilities at Tierra Kay are occupied at the moment. We’ve been gradually moving troops out of the sea huts to make room for offices and storage. However, we do have a nice unit just two doors down that will house ten soldiers comfortably.”

  “Are you talking about barracks?”

  Commander O’Shay nodded. “We call them sea huts, with a great view of the sand and breaking waves.”

  “That’ll do.”

  As if rushing to bolster the image of the place, he added. “We’ve got food served daily at the Seaside Gallery, with air-conditioning.”

  Free food. That made up for the substandard accommodations.

  “There’s a large mini mart in the parking lot of the mess hall. We’ve got a Navy Exchange down the road and complete workout facilities in one of the bubbles, a telephone and Internet hut, a bar and lounge hut…”

  He wasn’t about to live the life of a private, making three free fifteen-minute morale calls per week and standing in line to get onto the Internet. “And office space?”

  There the captain winced. “You’ll have to work out space with Camp Delta Facilities Command for that. Sorry.”

  Harry understood.

  “Now, can someone show me to my quarters?”

  Two minutes later, he stood at the front door of his building that smelled of fresh plywood. There was something wrong with the place, but he couldn’t put his finger on it. Then he realized what was bothering him—there was no lock on the door. He pushed the door open and scanned the dark room. It was in fact dormitory-style barracks. He and Badger and the men were about to get to know each other very well.

  He entered and shut the door. The insulated walls muffled the sound of the waves against rocks. It was hot in there, so he flipped on the light, found the air conditioning unit and turned it on full blast. With a loud creak, he sat down before the cool breeze it created.

  He was sitting on one of ten wood-framed beds that stood side-by-side and filled the entire room. He knocked over a stack of white pillows behind him, lay back and stared at the crossbeams above.

  Could he operate covertly, expose Cooper to the public and get off the base alive?

  He hadn’t felt the restrictions and single-minded purpose of boot camp in over twenty years. Yet the sensation came back to him in all its dehumanizing crudeness, constricting his chest. His fingertips rubbed against the coarse wool blanket beneath him.

  Under the circumstances, with the lack of privacy, the surrounding razor-wire fence and the flood of memories of his youthful devotion to his country, it would be doubly hard to commit an act of treason.

  Sandi dragged herself into her cozy Georgian townhouse in Ballston, Virginia. It was only a short Metro commute from Rosslyn and an equally quick walk from the station to her quiet street, but she felt like she had been running a marathon and getting nowhere.

  She turned on a table lamp, threw off her overcoat, flopped into the first armchair she found and stared at the blank, white wall that confronted her.

  It had been a long day. The sun had risen at midnight, mid-flight between Manila and Los Angeles. And she had eaten lunch somewhere over Kansas.

  In her office that afternoon, she had learned that she would have to become an expert in military tribunals in order to gain access to Cooper. Then she had learned that the military claimed no knowledge of Cooper’ whereabouts.

  She was being stonewalled by the Pentagon. She had ordered her staff to fire off a freedom of information act request to ascertain his whereabouts. But knowing where he was didn’t guarantee that she could visit him.

  In that regard, she was even more stymied. If he were at Guantánamo Bay, there was no way she could enter the base, much less interrogate Cooper and get his deposition in the Chinagate case.

  She had only two options left. She could try to represent him and thereby gain access to the base, or she could search for a legal maneuver to spring him from military custody and bring him to the United States where his full rights as a citizen would have to be observed as he faced a civil trial.

  Her mind spun with the enormous roadblocks to both of her solutions. If she were allowed to represent Sean, she couldn’t possibly learn the ropes in time to represent him at a military tribunal. Like her friend Charlie Swain, she hadn’t even cracked the Military Law book open to the first page.

  Or, how could she bring him to the States? She had absolutely no experience in extradition matters, and her client would be an American prisoner of war possibly facing charges of treason. If anything, she would be a liability to her client and might even get him the electric chair. Even bringing down the president wasn’t worth executing a decent, innocent man.

  As she unpeeled her winter coat and kicked off her wet boots, she remembered how simple life had been at the resort in Hainan.

  She had reclined by the pool alongside Cooper discussing his company’s “asshole hustlers” as he had called them. He couldn’t hide his bitterness.

  He had blamed them for corporate scandals as well as corruption reaching “all the way up to the White House.”

  She had felt a tingle of delight when he had
said those words. He was her man. He had much to tell, and enough anger to tell it, under the proper circumstances. Unfortunately, being held by the military and subject to their justice system effectively prevented him from testifying against the commander-in-chief.

  At last, she stood and checked her mail slot. Many newspapers, envelopes and packages had spilled onto the floor behind the front door. But first, she needed a bath.

  Hauling herself upstairs, she pulled off one item of clothing after another. She turned on the hot and cold water faucets and watched steam begin to rise from the Jacuzzi. She emptied a few drops of bath oil into the tub and inhaled the aroma of jasmine that subsequently infused the room.

  The water ran slowly, and she had a few minutes to kill. In her bra and panties, she returned to the living room and made herself a martini from the wet bar.

  Sean Cooper had liked to drink…what was it? Some hopelessly tame drink.

  She sipped from her triangular glass and screwed up her face with pleasure. It was nice and dry.

  Yeah, Sean had ordered them both daiquiris, without even asking her. Almost as if she were his wife and he was used to ordering for them both.

  Well, she wasn’t his wife, and the daiquiri nearly made her vomit, but she had stuck with him and played along long enough to glean a few more vital details from him and plant the idea of his retaining her legal services, although he had no idea that she actually worked for the independent prosecutor.

  In fact, drinks had lowered the inhibitions of both of them. Flipping through her mail as she sprawled on her divan, she sorted her bills from her personal mail.

  What had she asked him pointblank? “Do you believe the president’s guilty of taking kickbacks?” Boy, she had been bold. In retrospect, she may have blown her cover.

  A smile crept across her lips. Sean had nearly choked on his drink when she had mentioned the kickback scandal.

  Two players heavily involved in the Chinagate affair, both tiptoeing around the subject, neither admitting to be a part of it, was a pretty funny scene. But, luring a man out of China and into the lion’s den of Washington was proving to be a challenge.

  Sean had left no doubt that he had incontrovertible proof of the president’s guilt. What had Sean said? Something about making Saddam Hussein blush. And at that point, he had divulged that he had worked for Core Petroleum.

  And that was as close as Sean had gotten to confessing his involvement in the crime.

  She thought she had him on the hook by then, and the Academy Awards bash thrown by the resort had served to bring them even closer. Looking down her long, slender limbs, evinced a wistful thought or two. Sean would have made a move on her that evening, but something had held him back.

  Most single men wouldn’t have turned her down, but Sean had. Did he know that his family was still alive and that jumping her would be an act of infidelity? Probably not. He was bitter and suffering, not busy trying to track them down.

  If she had known at that time that his wife and kids were still alive, she wouldn’t have made a move on him. She would have broken her cover and told him who she was and why she needed him. After all, he had touched a sensitive spot in her, a vulnerability for mistreated souls. And in the end, she was glad that they hadn’t coupled the night away, and just left it with a tender kiss.

  Curled up around a throw pillow, she found herself squeezing it for warmth and comfort. Suddenly, prosecuting the president no longer seemed important. She merely wanted to help Sean get his family back.

  Just then, her eyes fell on a buff envelope the size and shape of a Hallmark card. The name on the return address read, “The White House.”

  She tore it open at once and pulled out a wedding invitation. President Bernard White wished to invite her to his nuptials with Loretta Blythe Crawford that August.

  Sandi had never expected to receive any invitation to the White House for any reason. Bernard White was masterful at charming his adversaries and throwing them off balance.

  But what floored her was the name of his fiancée. Lori Crawford had been her roommate at Columbia!

  What was that tart doing with the president?

  Then it hit her. Lori was an intern at the White House. Of course, that’s how she would have met the old man. And knowing Lori’s fresh-faced innocence combined with her considerable talent at displaying her charms, the president’s fate must have been sealed the moment she walked into 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

  A smile came to her lips. So Bernard White wasn’t inviting her to the wedding. It was Lori, rounding up old college chums to fill her half of the church.

  She almost overlooked one other letter that she had sorted with the bills. It was in a plain white envelope, had no stamp, and bore some official seal that she usually disregarded. But not finding a return address, she examined this one more closely. The Defense Legal Services Agency name struck a chord. These were the guys she was up against. The JAGs.

  She tore open the envelope and found a hand-written note inside. It was a personal invitation for her to meet with Ivan Nemroff, General Counsel to the Secretary of Defense. The note requested that she meet him at 6:30 the next morning at Pierce Mill for a jog through Rock Creek Park.

  How did he know she was a jogger? She vaguely knew the meeting place from infrequent weekend workouts in that area. The District wasn’t her normal territory, but it might be where Ivan lived. In any case, she would jump at the chance to interrogate him directly and to hear him out.

  At that moment, she remembered her bath running upstairs.

  She threw down the pillow and invitation and charged up the stairs to the bathroom. Steam was billowing into the hallway.

  She had to fight through the perfumed cloud to find the faucet. She could turn off the cold handle, but the hot side nearly burned her hand. She reached for a towel and wrapped it around the handle and managed to turn it off.

  Thankfully the water hadn’t overflowed. She stripped completely, waded through the steam and dipped her toes in the water. It was just perfect. The humid air clinging to her skin, she slowly slipped into the scented water.

  And then the questions began to flood her mind. Why did the General Counsel of the Defense Department want to meet with her? What kind of man was Ivan Nemroff? And should she wear her sexy pink shorts?

  Rolling a two-wheeled cart in front of him, a prison guard entered Sean’s block from the darkness of the evening.

  Sean unstuck himself from the bed and watched through the white mesh as the soldier walked down the corridor.

  “How long are you going to keep me in this cage?” he asked as the guard approached his cell.

  “We don’t call these cages,” the guy said tersely. “They’re enclosures.”

  “Okay, enclosure then. How long?”

  “I am not at liberty to discuss your case with you,” he said by rote, then stopped the cart and began to work on Sean’s meal.

  He peeled back the paper cover of the dinner, which Sean recognized as an army-issue MRE, a Meal, Ready to Eat. The guard set to work inspecting the contents of the box, picking off any suspicious looking flecks from the meat and dusting off the plastic juice cup. He removed some folded squares of toilet paper and threw them away in a plastic bag.

  “Hey,” Sean said. “I might need that.”

  The guard shook his head. “You wouldn’t guess what people try to kill themselves with.”

  That shut him up. Suicide by toilet paper? What could make one that desperate?

  The guard removed the plastic wrapper from the spoon and threw away the vinaigrette dressing.

  “Choking hazards?” Sean asked.

  The guard looked at him, but wouldn’t reply.

  Next, several packs of salt went into the trash, leaving one for Sean. He supposed that prisoners could induce vomiting and get themselves taken out of jail to a hospital.

  “Where’s the nearest emergency room?” he asked. “Havana?”

  “Funny. We have a twenty-bed medic
al facility right here in Camp Delta. It’s got all the latest equipment. So don’t try anything.”

  He let out a low whistle. Twenty beds. There had to be far more prisoners stashed away in the camp.

  “Why am I all alone in this cell block?”

  The guard pushed what remained of the package through a slot and handed it to Sean. “I’ll pick that up when you’re done.”

  He took the hot dinner and stood there. He didn’t want to let the guard go. It was the first human he’d seen since his detention began. “Just tell me what kind of routine I can expect.”

  The guard stopped his cart. “You get three culturally appropriate meals a day. You get exercise in the recreation/exercise area once a day. You get two fifteen-minute showers a week at which time we issue you a new suit. That’s the routine.”

  “What do you want me for? Why are you even holding me?”

  “I’m an MP. If you want to chat, talk with the interrogators.”

  “Is someone coming to ask me questions? I’ve got plenty to say.”

  The guard moved on without response. Sean would just have to satisfy himself with his dinner.

  “I’ll be back to account for the material in your meal,” the guard called, and departed into the blur.

  Sean had no table and had to settle for eating the meal on his bed. The chicken breast and noodle dish, accompanied by green salad, dinner roll, margarine and fruit gelatin dessert reminded him of airline food. He took a few nibbles. It wasn’t Thai Airways. More like China Eastern. But as long as he ignored the decor, it was almost palatable.

  The guard had only stirred up more issues in Sean’s mind. Foremost was the question, why was he alone?

  He looked around at the empty cells and began to imagine Afghan Taliban and al-Qaeda terrorists hanging by their bed sheets.

  Maybe he had better just count himself lucky to be alone.

  He took a bite out of his roll. It was a bit dry, but he couldn’t complain…and he could use real butter.

  He had plenty to tell an interrogator. He had reason to believe his family was still alive. The terrorists had captured him; he hadn’t joined them. And he had been robbed of all his money.