Garcia stood at the driver's door, leaning into the open window, forearms resting on the sill, repeating the instructions he had given the driver-an ex-Special Forces staff sergeant-before they had reached the Mena airport. "Make it look like a robbery," Garcia said. "And arrange the scene so that it appears to have been the result of a homosexual tryst."
The driver nodded, then drove off with Donahue's body.
"You think that's going to work?" Blackstone said.
Garcia nodded. "You can always count on the FBI for one thing, and that's to do whatever is necessary to protect its own image. When they hear that the ASAC of the Washington Field Office was found dead in a park with his pants around his ankles, they're not going to look too hard for whoever killed him."
"What about the ceramic bullet rattling around inside his skull?"
"The gun has a smoothbore barrel," Garcia said, "so it doesn't leave ballistic fingerprints."
"Don't you think an unusual round like that might draw some attention?"
Garcia shrugged. "Just one of life's many mysteries."
"That easy, huh?"
"What?"
"To kill a man on your own side."
"It's never easy," Garcia said. "Just necessary."
One cold motherfucker, Blackstone thought. But he didn't say it. Instead, he said, "What's next?"
"We go to Dallas."
"What's happening in Dallas?"
The Cuban gave him a hard stare. His eyes didn't blink. Blackstone could see tiny flecks of yellow in his dark irises.
"Regime change," Garcia said.
Chapter 40
"It was during that long ride to Dallas that I became convinced he was telling the truth. Either that or he was the biggest psycho in history...and I was the biggest idiot."
***
Jake caught a glimpse through the side window of a red, white, and blue 'Welcome to Texas' sign reflected in the glow of the headlights as the motorhome rumbled south through the darkness on US Highway 271. It was 9:30 p.m. He was sitting in the cabin facing Favreau across the coffee table. Gordon was driving with Stacy sitting beside him in the passenger seat.
"Mad Jack Gillard went to prison in 2004," Favreau said. "Since then, I've run a café in Marseilles. Two or three times a year, the CIA uses the apartment upstairs as a safe house. Three months ago, a man came to see me. An American. He asked me to review a plan. He showed me a very detailed satellite picture of downtown Dallas. Two buildings were circled in red, with a line connecting them. He also had photographs of the buildings taken from the street. There were some handwritten notes on the photographs and on the satellite picture. I recognized one of buildings right away. It was the old School Book Depository. The other building was a...tall rise?" He pantomimed a tall building.
"A high-rise?" Jake suggested.
Favreau snapped his fingers. "A high-rise. The second building was a high-rise. With lots of balconies."
"Like an apartment building?" Stacy asked. She had turned around in the passenger seat and was looking back at them.
"I'm not sure," Favreau said with a glance at her. "Possibly."
"Go on," Jake said.
"This man, he wanted me to look at the satellite picture and at the photographs carefully, to study them. But I refused. I walked away. I didn't want to see any of it. I told him I didn't want any part of whatever he was planning. But he wouldn't take no for an answer. He insisted I study the plan."
"The plan to kill President Omar?" Jake said.
Favreau nodded.
"He wanted you to do it?" Stacy asked.
"No, I'm too old," Favreau. "To make that kind of shot takes a very steady hand. They have another shooter. A German."
"What kind of shot are you talking about?" Jake asked.
"At least a thousand meters," Favreau said. "Maybe more."
Jake wasn't a firearms expert, he knew a lot more about spreadsheets than guns, but he wasn't a total tenderfoot either. The M-4 carbine he had trained with at the FBI Academy had an effective range of five hundred meters, and that was pushing it, he knew. The farthest targets they had shot in training were three hundred meters away. The Marines shot targets out to five hundred meters, but even that was only half the distance Favreau was talking about. "A thousand meters is a very long shot," he said. "There aren't many rifles that can do that."
"Or shooters either," Favreau added.
Gordon looked at them in the rearview mirror. "You're not talking about a mediocre shooter like Lee Harvey Oswald or a mail-order Mannlicher-Carcano rifle."
"The CIA bought that rifle for Oswald because it fit the legend they were creating," Favreau said, "that of a man with deep psychological problems, living on the fringes of society, a man with big dreams but little money. It was a cheap surplus rifle anyone could order from the back of a magazine, exactly the kind of weapon Oswald could afford."
"What rifle did you use?" Jake asked.
"The same kind as Oswald," Favreau said. "So the bullets would match."
"But the ballistics wouldn't match," Jake said, thinking he had just discovered a giant hole in Favreau's story. "Even if you used the same model rifle, you couldn't frame Oswald as the lone gunman because there would be bullets from two different guns at the crime scene."
"You're right," Favreau said. "The original plan was to use only one shooter, but that shooter turned out to be unreliable. So they worked around that by arranging for a second shooter. Me. And my ammunition was the same as Oswald's, even taken from the same box, but it was modified so that there was no way to prove it had not been fired from the same rifle."
"How?" Jake asked.
"Oswald's bullets were full-metal-jacket military rounds. They were designed to stay intact when they strike the target to achieve maximum penetration. My bullets had the copper jackets stripped off and the noses drilled out so they would burst on impact. In Algeria we called them dumdums."
"That's clever," Gordon said. "Because there wouldn't be enough left of your bullets to compare to Oswald's. So no ballistic match, but also no way to prove that they didn't match. And since only one shooter would ever be identified and only one gun ever recovered..."
"Everyone would assume all the bullets were fired from the same gun," Stacy said. "Oswald's gun."
"Exactly," Favreau agreed.
"And since the FBI could trace all the bullets to the same manufacturer, the same batch and lot numbers, even to the same box..." Gordon looked over his shoulder at Favreau. "What about the half-full box of bullets the Dallas police found at Oswald's apartment?"
"Planted," Favreau said.
"And the casings?" Jake asked. "There were hundreds of people who heard the shots. The number of casings left at Oswald's hide on the sixth floor would have had to match the total number of shots both of you fired."
"He had spent cases from his rifle in his pocket," Favreau said. "If I fired, he was supposed to count my shots and drop that many more cases."
Gordon caught Jake's eye in the rearview mirror. "It's a lot simpler plan than most of the conspiracy theories, including some of mine. But it sounds like it would work."
"It did work," Favreau said.
Jake looked out the window, at the darkness rolling past. After a long moment he focused on Favreau. "What do you want? Redemption?"
Favreau held Jake's gaze. "No."
"Forgiveness?"
"No."
"What then?"
The Frenchman was silent for a moment, but he didn't look away. Finally, he said, "To keep it from happening again."
"Even if you're right about this plot to kill President Omar, there's no statute of limitations on murder," Jake said. "You'll still go to prison for the rest of your life for killing President Kennedy. You might even get the death penalty."
"I know that," Favreau said.
"So what do we do, Jake?" Stacy asked. She was still half-turned in her seat and looking back at him. Gordon was eyeing Jake in the mirror. And Favreau was starin
g at him across the coffee table. They were all looking at him for the answer, a twenty-five-year-old rookie FBI agent now on the run from his own agency, being chased by a bunch of mercenaries, and probably on some kind of CIA kill list. He had never felt so small in his life. Or scared. But he was also mad. Madder than he'd ever been. Mad at what he was starting to believe had really happened in Dallas on November 22, 1963, and mad at what might be about to happen in Dallas tomorrow. Sometimes mad was enough. He hoped it was enough this time.
Jake looked at his three companions. "We're going to find the shooter and stop him."
Chapter 41
President Noah Omar stood behind the lectern in the banquet room of the Ritz Carlton Hotel in Dallas waving goodbye to the three hundred people, members of the Petroleum Club and their guests, who had ponied up $10,000 each to have a "private" dinner with the president. The lectern stood beside the president's table, on the podium at the front of the banquet hall. During dinner the president of the Petroleum Club sat beside the president of the United States in the middle of the table. All of the chairs at the president's table were on one side and faced outward, toward the rest of the hall, so that everyone had a view of the president during dinner.
President Omar had given his opening remarks while the drinks and appetizers were being served and was now wrapping up the event with his post-dinner remarks. Richard Finch was seated five chairs down from the president and was now coming to his feet, as was everyone else in the room, to give the president another standing ovation. His second of the night.
Judging by the applause, Finch thought, one might get the impression that the president was very popular in Dallas. That wasn't true, of course. Texas was just about the reddest state in the entire country and had voted overwhelmingly for the Republican candidate in every presidential election since 1980, when it helped send Ronald Reagan to the White House. Finch had a list of all the guests in the room and knew that more than half of them were Republicans. They were contributing in the hopes that the president wouldn't slap a host of new EPA regulations on the oil industry the way he had the coal industry.
"Thank you," the president said over the applause. Then he gave a double thumbs up. "And God bless America."
Then they were off, the president, the first lady, the rest of the president's party, and a team of Secret Service agents, stepping off the podium and exiting the banquet hall through a back door screened by a curtain. The first lady walked on one side of the president, and Finch walked on the other side as they made their way down the corridor to the steel fire door at the far end and the presidential limousine waiting on the other side.
"Did you have the fish?" President Omar asked Finch.
"No, sir. I had the chicken."
"I wish I had picked the chicken," the president said. "The fish was awful."
"I hate fishy-tasting fish," Mona Omar said.
"We raised three million dollars," Finch said.
The president smiled. "In that case, the fish wasn't so bad."
The secure cellphone that Finch carried for the president rang in his suit coat pocket. The presidential party was ten feet from the fire door. Finch pulled the phone from his pocket and checked the number. It was from Langley. "CIA," he said.
"I'll take it in the car," the president said.
Finch answered the call. "Richard Finch," he said, hoping it wasn't who he thought it was.
"Mr. Finch, Allan Chessman here," the deputy director of operations said in his fine Southern drawl. "Is he available? I'm afraid it's rather urgent."
It was exactly who Finch had hoped it wasn't. But he played the part he was assigned. "Mr. Chessman, we're just getting to the car. Can you hold on a minute?"
"But of course," Chessman said. "I serve at the pleasure of the president."
A minute later Finch was in the limousine with the president and first lady. He held the muted cellphone out to the president.
"Who is it?" President Omar asked.
"Deputy Director Chessman," Finch said.
The president shook his head and waved the phone away.
Finch kept the phone extended. "He says it's urgent."
"To the CIA, everything is urgent."
The presidential motorcade pulled away from the hotel. President Omar shrugged and gave a little sigh. "Put him on speaker."
Finch glanced at the first lady. Technically, presidents' wives did not have security clearances. Neither did presidents, for that matter, but by the act of being sworn in as president and assuming the role of chief of the executive branch of the government and commander-in-chief of the entire US military, the president didn't need a security clearance. First ladies were another matter, a touchy matter and one that no one in the history of the country had ever wanted to address. Everyone assumed that, rightly or wrongly, first ladies were privy to a lot of highly classified material.
"It's all right," the president said. "She's my unofficial chief of staff." He was smiling when he said it, but Finch knew it was a warning not to undermine the first lady, especially not in her presence. Finch unmuted the call and pressed the speaker button. Leaning toward the phone, the president said, "Allan, what can I do for you?"
"I'm sorry to bother you, Mr. President, but—"
"By the way, Allan, just so you know, I have you on speaker with Richard." The president didn't bother mentioning his wife, who was busying herself on her iPhone.
"That's fine, Mr. President," the CIA man said.
"So what's so urgent?" the president asked.
As Chessman cleared his throat, the president rolled his eyes. Then Chessman spoke, slowly and clearly, the way he did when he did not want his drawl to obscure any of his words. "I'm calling to try to persuade you, Mr. President, to reconsider extending the timeline on the withdrawal of our troops from Afghanistan."
"I'm afraid you're wasting your time, Allan." And mine, Finch heard in the president's voice. "I've spoken to the DCI at length, and my decision is final."
"But, sir, the government of President Karzai is still too unstable."
"Karzai has been president since 2001," Noah Omar said, letting the sarcasm seep into his voice. "How much more time do you think he needs?"
"I'm just afraid that when we pull out, we're going to leave a huge vacuum that the Taliban will simply step into. We'll be back to pre-9/11."
"Next year will be thirteen years we've been in Afghanistan, Allan. Longer than the British, the Russians. Hell, longer than Alexander the Great."
"We only need one more year," Chessman said. "Two at the most."
"That's your opinion, Allan."
"No, sir. Not just my opinion, but the learned opinion of our entire Southwest Asia Analysis Group."
"When I ran for re-election I promised to get our troops out of Afghanistan, just like I did in Iraq."
"But the facts on the ground have changed since the election, Mr. President."
"The facts on the ground haven't changed in more than a decade. We're getting out. That's final. Have I made myself clear?"
There was a pause.
"Allan?" the president asked.
"Yes, sir, I'm here," Chessman said.
"Was I clear enough?"
"Yes, Mr. President," Chessman said with the hint of an edge in his voice. "Perfectly clear."
The president signaled Finch to end the call. Finch pressed the end button and slipped the phone back in his pocket.
"I don't know if I can take another three years with him as DDO," the president said. "Can we send him overseas? Pakistan, maybe."
"I think he has a price on his head in Pakistan, sir."
"North Korea then."
They rode in silence for a moment, just the police sirens and the flashing lights.
"The speech is at noon, right?" the president asked.
"Yes, sir."
"What's my tee time?"
"Two o'clock," Finch said.
"When we get back to the hotel let's have a drink."
/> Finch nodded. "Sounds good, Mr. President."
***
Blackstone left the Gulfstream V cockpit and took a seat in the main cabin in a chair opposite Max Garcia. "Pilot says we'll be wheels down in thirty minutes."
Garcia glanced at his watch. It was 10 p.m., exactly twenty-four hours since a surprise telephone call from his former employer had interrupted his bedtime reading and turned his life upside down. He still hadn't slept. "Which airport?"
"Dallas Executive. Twenty minutes south of downtown. I have a team meeting us there at first light."
"Let's hope this team is better than the last one."
Blackstone's face tightened but he said nothing.
"Can you find us a place to crash for a few hours?"
"Already taken care of," Blackstone said. "We're booked at the business hotel on the airport grounds."
Garcia nodded.
"Can I ask you something?" Blackstone said.
"I may not answer, but go ahead."
"You said you were retired."
"That's not a question," Garcia said, "But yes, I am retired."
"Then shouldn't you be playing golf or fishing or doing whatever it is that retired spooks do?"
"Gardening," the Cuban said. "My wife and I are certified master gardeners."
"That's right," Blackstone said, nodding. "You mentioned that before. That you were supposed to be at some kind of garden show instead of here."
"I was."
"So why aren't you?"
"I didn't ask to be here."
"Then why are you?"
"Because they needed someone on the ground who knows how the Frenchman thinks."
"And you're the only one?"
"I trained him."
Blackstone was quiet for a moment. Then he said, "Who exactly are they, and what did you mean by regime change?"
The Second Shooter Page 17