“What I have left,” said Praetorian, “Is all the dirty little government secrets I got off the prison ship. All these fireworks, Acevedo, the smoke bombs, even the nerve agent—they’re all pageantry.” He took something out of his pocket—a small tablet device, about half again as large as a phone. “Here I have absolute control over that information. From this device I can publish any and every secret Uncle Sam wants to keep secret. See, this is what makes the world go round. Information. It’s what people kill and die for. And it will do more to destroy the US government than any terrorist attack ever could.”
“You really like to hear yourself talk.”
Praetorian grinned. “Don’t you want to know what your government is doing? Let me tell you a little story about your friend General Strickland. It’s April 2003. The US Army has just taken Baghdad. A squadron of soldiers from the Third Infantry Division is scouring one of Saddam’s palace complexes when they come across a group of plainclothes Americans loading a cache of gold bullion into a truck. They confiscate the truck, bring the men in, and make their report. The truck and the men are taken away under Strickland’s authority. The men are transferred within the week to combat operations in Mosul, where on their first incursion, the entire squad, all eleven of them, are massacred in a booby-trapped insurgency hideout, during a raid personally ordered by General Strickland. Neither the gold nor the men collecting it are ever heard from again.”
Morgan’s hands balled into fists. So that was Strickland’s secret. Stealing Saddam’s gold and killing the witnesses—American soldiers—to cover it up. Morgan felt the righteous fire, the impulse to burn it all down.
“Does that paint a picture for you?” Praetorian scrolled through a list on the screen and then held it up for Morgan to see. “I have a whole file only on him. The original report, his personal order to reassign the squad. I have all of their names here, too.”
Morgan locked eyes with Centurion. Morgan’s MAC-10 was lying at his feet. He gave a nearly imperceptible nod toward the man flanking Morgan on his right. Morgan nodded back.
“What about you, Morgan? Are you in here, I wonder? Will I find a file on Cobra?” Centurion bent down to pick up Morgan’s submachine gun, examining it as if it were a scientific curiosity. “What skeletons do you fear will come out of your—”
Centurion slipped his finger against the trigger and opened fire against the man to Morgan’s right. Morgan went low to his other flank, sliding on his knees, grabbing the man’s gun as he fired and yanking it hard to the left so that the bullets sprayed against the stone walls. Centurion fired again, hitting the second guard several times in the chest. The guard tumbled to the ground next to Morgan.
Centurion then turned the gun on Praetorian.
The knife slipped into Centurion’s back before he loosed a bullet against Praetorian.
“Valkyrie,” Centurion croaked. His arms fell slack at his sides and he dropped to his knees, then on his side. The woman with the china-doll face stood there, with an expression of righteous wrath.
“That,” said Praetorian, “was unexpected.” He aimed Morgan’s PPK at his head. “I think I’m done with surprises from you.”
BANG—a handgun’s report, and Praetorian flinched, recoiling his arm. The PPK fell to the floor. Blood spread from Praetorian’s hand onto his shirt.
Morgan looked for the source of the bullet and saw Peter Conley coming up the stairs from the basement, his Colt .22 drawn on Praetorian and Valkyrie. Behind him was Lily and the one other remaining member of the tactical team.
“Maybe just one more,” said Morgan.
Praetorian’s eyes blazed with fury.
“I win,” said Morgan.
Praetorian’s lip curled into a smirk. Morgan saw why—he was manipulating the screen of the tablet, one-handed, without looking.
Morgan lunged, slamming him against the stone wall. The tablet slid across the floor. Lily ran to pick it up as Conley kept his gun trained on Praetorian, waiting for an opening. He tangled with Morgan without giving him any distance, giving Conley no clearance to shoot. He brought his fists like steel against Morgan’s side, knocking the wind out of him.
“In the end,” he said, between punches, “I’m just stronger than you.”
Morgan gritted his teeth and brought his forehead hard against Praetorian’s nose. Praetorian flinched back just enough for Morgan to break free and return with a left jab and an open palm to his solar plexus. Praetorian staggered back.
A gun fired.
Conley. He’d gotten his opening. He hit Praetorian in the abdomen. Conley raised the gun to fire again.
“No!” It was Lily, holding Praetorian’s tablet. “Whatever he did,” she said, “it’s started and I can’t stop it. It’s uploading the files to the cloud. Once it’s out there, there’s no way to put the lid on it.”
Morgan pushed Praetorian against the wall, elbow at his neck. “How do you make it stop?”
Praetorian just giggled.
“I swear, if you don’t stop it, I’ll—”
“Do what?” It was Valkyrie, held at gunpoint by Lily. “He won’t talk. He withstood the worst torture your government could devise for weeks. You know you can’t make him do what you want in the seconds you have left.”
She was right. Morgan couldn’t make him talk.
He picked up his PPK and set it against Praetorian’s temple.
“But suppose I want to make you talk.”
This threw her. Her mouth fell slack. “He didn’t give me the password.” She set her jaw. “It’s no use asking me.”
“But you know how to stop it.”
She clammed up, but her eyes told Morgan everything he needed to know.
“Can you stand watching him die?” he said. “Being without him forever?”
She wouldn’t. He saw it in her. He was everything that she was, and without him she was no one.
“Do not do it!” Praetorian screamed.
He depressed the trigger, a millimeter. She flinched.
“Okay!” She cast her eyes down in shame. “Damn it. Okay. Let me do it.”
“Valkyrie,” Praetorian said through gritted teeth. “If you do this, I will kill you.”
“If that transfer isn’t cancelled, he dies,” said Morgan. “Understand?”
She nodded. “Sorry,” she said. “I’d really rather die.” Lily handed her the tablet. Her fingers moved deftly over the touchscreen. She was finished in about five seconds. She gave it back to Lily.
“Lily, is it done?” Morgan asked.
“Yes. The transfer’s been cancelled.”
Morgan took a few steps back from Praetorian and gestured to Valkyrie. “Over there. With him.”
She ran over to him, wrapping her arms around him.
Faster than Morgan could react, Praetorian pulled the knife out of Centurion’s back and plunged it into Valkyrie’s heart. She gasped, eyes wide, and crumpled to the ground.
Morgan fired twice into Praetorian’s chest. He stumbled against the wall, sliding down against the rock until he came to rest in a sitting position.
“Then fall Praetorian,” he whispered. He was still alive, but he was never getting up again.
“We’re done here,” said Morgan. “Conley, can you call in the chopper?”
Morgan surveyed the bloodbath, the corpses all around him. And the cause of all this, still gasping his final breaths. Justice? Maybe. Maybe not. But necessary.
Praetorian’s tablet began emitting an incessant beep.
“What is that?” said Morgan.
“I don’t know!” Lily said.
Praetorian laughed, showing bloody teeth. “Open the flashing tab and see,” he said.
“Oh my God.” She gave it to Morgan.
It read, Incoming missile.
“That’s straight from the DOD,” he said. “Your own people are bombing this place because they’re afraid of what I might release. How do you feel about being their agent now?”
M
organ pivoted toward the door. “Run!” He pulled the wooden bar from the door and held it open for Conley, Lily, and the last operative, following them out into the dawning day. They ran as fast as they could downhill, over snow and between trees.
The missile tore the air as it passed. The house exploded into splinters and flying masonry, sending a shock wave that knocked Morgan off his feet. He rolled behind a tree to escape the rain of debris that followed.
As the ringing in his ears subsided and his eyes refocused, Morgan called out. “Is everyone okay?”
“Aye!” Lily called out.
“Roger,” said the operative.
“I’m here,” said Conley.
Morgan looked at the house, now a foundation and a smoldering pile of rubble to mark Praetorian’s grave.
He noticed something in his hand. Praetorian’s tablet. He had never let go of it. A device that could single-handedly bring down the entire US government.
He didn’t know what was in there. He didn’t know what kind of leak could bring down the whole government.
For a moment, he was tempted. Damn it all. Burn it to the ground, if it means the truth will come out. That prospect called to him. It was seductive.
But he had a responsibility. He selected all the files and his finger hovered over the Delete button. Thinking better of it, Morgan unselected one of them, and then deleted.
Then he selected the one that was left and hit Send. A progress bar crept to the right of the screen.
Folder “General Alan Strickland” had been successfully published.
Morgan sat down in a snowbank to watch the sunrise. Conley approached with a limping gait and sat next to him. Lily smoked a cigarette a ways off.
“Beautiful, ain’t it?” Conley said.
“Bright new day.”
Chapter 120
Lisa Frieze parked in a puddle of slush in front of her apartment, which splashed onto the shoes of a man standing on the sidewalk. She got out of the car, an apology forming on her lips when she saw that it was Peter Conley.
“I know you want me to ask how you know when I’m coming home,” she said. “I’m not going to.”
He grinned. “I haven’t said anything.”
She reached into her car to get out her briefcase. “If you’re here for a favor, so help me I—”
“No favors, no requests. I’m just saying thanks for sticking your neck out for us yet again.”
She squinted against the sun. “It’s you guys who ended up saving the day again. I don’t think I’ll ever put any kind of personal feeling above that.”
“I’m only half glad to hear you say that.”
“And the other half?”
“Was hoping you’d say you couldn’t resist my charm.”
She had to smile at that. “You aren’t half as charming as you think you are, Peter Conley.”
“That’s still pretty charming.” He flashed his perfectly aligned pearly whites again.
She unlocked the door to her building. “Well, it’s not going to work on me anymore.”
“If you say so. You want to go get a drink?”
“Now?” she asked. “Nah. But maybe I’ll call you sometime.”
Lily pulled the Porsche up to the Hilton, where Scott was already waiting for her, wearing a peacoat over an untucked button-down shirt and black trousers.
“Hey big boy,” she said, drawing off her shades. “Looking for a good time?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “You look like trouble.”
“Get your arse in the car.”
He hopped into the passenger seat, kissing her. “Hello you.”
“Hello you.”
She pulled out of the hotel, tires squealing. “So,” he said, “Any new revelations for today? Are you secretly a werewolf? Time traveler from the future? Cavewoman frozen in ice for fifty thousand years?”
She laughed. “I think you know all there is to know.”
“Sweetheart,” he said, “I don’t know a fraction of what I want to find out about you.”
An exuberant smile erupted on her face as she drove them west, toward California and the sunset.
Chapter 121
Morgan walked off the elevator on the fifteenth floor of the Hampton Building, where Zeta Division was housed after the headquarters was blown up. The place was bland and boring, but Morgan felt that he could use a little bit of that.
Bloch waved to him and told him to take a seat in her office, no longer the glass and chrome consumed in the fire but a more ordinary wood and faux leather.
“Good to see you got released,” he said.
“Well. Jail did not agree with me. Not very sanitary. And people are loud.”
“The new digs—”
“Are fine for now, but we are procuring alternative solutions.”
Morgan eyed the copy of the Globe on her desk—the front page reading, Top General Arrested After Document Dump.
“The fruits of your little piece of rebellion.” Morgan turned his eyes to her face, expecting stern admonition, but instead he found something that could almost be called a smile.
“Bastard had it coming.”
“No comment,” said Bloch. “But meanwhile, Zeta lives on. In no small part thanks to your extraordinary daughter.”
“I wanted to talk to you about that,” he said. “I know the deal here. The way it worked with Shepard and O’Neal. Kirby and you, too, for all I know. Charges get dropped, and people come work here as very loyal agents.”
Bloch leaned forward, elbows on the table, fingers interlocked at chest height. “What has Alex told you already?”
“Nothing,” he said. “But I know she’s always wanted to work here, so—”
“Smith has already arranged for her charges to disappear,” said Bloch. “Free of any obligation. He said he considered it more than earned for her service.”
“So that’s it? She’s scot-free?”
“On her part, yes. But she did make a similar deal to the ones you brought up.”
Morgan frowned. “What do you mean?”
“She did bargain something for her involvement in Zeta for the boy. Simon. The only condition she gave for working with us was for his criminal record to be expunged. Did she have a special connection to him?”
“Maybe,” Morgan said. “Maybe she’s just learning when to listen to her conscience.”
Morgan arrived at home a half an hour later and shut off his cell phone. No calls, nothing else. For a week, at least, he’d be a civilian.
He kissed Jenny, who was sweaty, having just come in from a run. He pulled her close, perspiration be damned, “You wouldn’t believe how much I missed you,” he said in a throaty whisper.
“I think I have some idea.”
He found Alex reading a rainforest survival guide lying on the couch, bare feet up on the armrest. He sat in the armchair opposite her.
“We need to talk about you joining Zeta.”
She sat up, countenance gone serious. “Look, Dad, I don’t want to get into another fight, but I’m a grown-up now. I can leave the house if you want, and I’ll take care of all my own finances if it comes to that, but—”
“No,” he said. “I want to apologize. I wasn’t being fair to you. I don’t know if you were born for this, or I raised you this way without realizing it, or even if that’s got nothing to do with it. But this is you, Alex. It’s who you are, and I can’t get in the way of it anymore.”
She beamed and practically leapt off the couch at him, wrapping her arms around him and kissing his head.
“On one condition,” he said as she pulled away. “I want you to finish college.”
“About that. I, uh—I just saw the e-mail yesterday. They kind of... asked me not to come back next semester. Turns out all the excitement wasn’t very healthy for my grades.”
Morgan sighed and sat down at the dinner table. “You know about this, Jenny?”
“She’s your daughter,” she said from the kitchen.
“You deal with it.”
“But Dad!” said Alex, with uncontained excitement. “It’s happening! I’m going to get to do what I’ve wanted for so long.”
“Yeah, yeah. Just don’t look so damn smug about it.”
“Aren’t you happy, Dad? We’ll get to work together.”
“Yeah,” he said. “Thrilled.”
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
First of all I need to thank my editor at Kensington Publishing Corp., Michaela Hamilton, for being so patient with me and for her support and faith in me over the past four years. She has always been there for me when I have had questions or needed direction and has become a great friend.
Special thanks are due to Mayur Gudka, who is not only my social media guru, but a colleague who takes time to listen and help me in any situation. His advice for promoting my books has been invaluable.
I want to recognize Caio Camargo, who has been my right hand while writing the Dan Morgan thriller series. Our relationship has grown through the years and I look forward to continuing to work together.
To my dear wife, Linda, I wish to express deep appreciation because her encouragement and enduring support have helped me realize my dream of becoming an author.
Finally, I sincerely thank all my loyal fans and supporters who continue to buy and read my novels.
Special bonus!
In case you missed the first Dan Morgan thriller by Leo J.
Maloney, keep reading to enjoy the opening pages of
Termination Orders . . .
Available from Kensington Publishing Corp.
Chapter 1
Three sharp raps at the door yanked young Zalmay Siddiqi from uneasy dreams, and the adrenaline hit him like a kick in the face. He froze with the primitive instinct of a rabbit cornered by a fox, hoping against hope that whatever predator had come knocking would go away of its own volition. He listened. The knocks came in a familiar pattern of three shorts and three longs: Cougar’s signal. As his blazing panic subsided, he realized that he had been holding his breath. He exhaled, but the smoldering dread remained. Even friendly knocks were unwelcome in the middle of the night.
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