“Holy Christmas,” Herbert said as he read the file.
“What have we got?” Stoll asked.
“A Get Out of Jail Free card for the McCaskeys, for one thing,” Herbert replied.
The intelligence chief thanked Stoll and sent the reluctant wunderkind back to the sulfur pit. He immediately got on the phone with Mike Rodgers. The “suspicious” Mike Rodgers. The big-leap-taking Mike Rodgers.
The correct Mike Rodgers.
FORTY-FOUR
San Diego, California Wednesday, 1:00 P.M.
Eric Stone had told the reception desk to let him know when Mike Rodgers arrived. Stone had not met Rodgers. But Kat had called to say she was concerned about his loyalties. That amplified the discomfort Stone felt over the fact that the general was still working with the people who were investigating the USF. Rodgers was a patriot, but not of the extremist mold like Senator Orr. Stone wanted to have a talk with him. More importantly, he wanted to look into Rodgers’s eyes and see where his loyalties lay. Stone was very good at reading expressions. It was a talent he discovered while working as a waiter. He knew the exact moment there was an opportunistic break in a conversation so he could offer a tray of hors d’oeuvres. He knew from partygoers’ expressions, from the way their eyes moved, who liked their egg rolls crispy, their meat skewers rare, and who did not like sushi. He could tell from the vaguely embarrassed manner who was going to take more than one or two cocktail wieners. He evolved those skills working for Admiral Link, watching the fearful or indignant or occasionally dangerous expressions of the servicemen and dignitaries, politicians and civilians who came to visit. Mike Rodgers was an unknown quantity to him.
Until Stone saw him in the corridor of the hotel. The general was just leaving his room. Stone wanted to get a quick sense of what he was about. From appearances, Rodgers was one hundred percent military. Admiral Link was that way, too. But the admiral was offense, and this man was defense. Stone could tell from the set of his head. It was not upright but tilted back slightly, presenting the chin. He was expecting a blow, yet the square set of his shoulder said he was ready for it.
“General Rodgers?” Stone asked as he approached.
“Yes?”
“Eric Stone,” said the young man.
“Pleased to meet you, Eric,” Rodgers said.
Stone offered his hand. The general shook it firmly though not too hard. He was a man who did not have to prove his strength.
“Did you have a good trip?” Stone asked.
“Yes, thank you.”
Rodgers is formal, guarded, Stone thought. He wondered why. “You know, General, I have a bunch of steaks on the grill right now, so I can only stay a minute. But I hope we will have a chance to talk before things get under way.”
“I look forward to that,” Rodgers replied.
“I also hope all of this will be a positive experience for you, a welcome distraction,” Stone went on. “I heard what happened at Op-Center. Just terrible. How long before operations can be resumed?”
“They’re running now,” Rodgers replied.
“At full capacity?”
“Full enough,” Rodgers replied. “Op-Center has always been about the people, not the technology.”
“Heart, not hardware,” Stone remarked.
Rodgers nodded once in agreement.
“That’s good to hear. We believe in that, too,” Stone said, raising a fist in a show of solidarity, “which is why the senator and the admiral are convinced you will be an enormous asset to the party and to a future Orr administration. I hope you are still enthusiastic.”
“More than ever,” Rodgers replied.
“Truly?” The general’s tone seemed a little too affirmative. It almost seemed like a challenge or a threat.
“Don’t interpret quiet observation as disinterest,” Rodgers said. “Contemplation moves power from here,” he held up a hand, “to here,” he touched a finger to his temple. “It does not lessen a man’s strength.”
“Ah. That is the scholar talking,” Stone observed. He knew that Mike Rodgers held a doctorate in world history. The general had obtained it after two combat tours of Vietnam.
“To tell the truth, Eric, it’s more of the soldier in me,” Rodgers said. “I have participated in a number of wars and conflicts. I learned that if one moves too enthusiastically, he could put his foot on a land mine.”
“I guess I was lucky,” Stone said. “When I wore my country’s uniform, we were at peace. We were always wary but unafraid. We were also optimistic, whatever the situation, whatever the alert status.”
“I am always optimistic,” Rodgers assured the younger man.
“Really?” Stone clasped him on the shoulder and laughed. “Forgive me, General, but you look as though you came for a funeral.”
Rodgers fixed his eyes on Stone. “Actually, this is not my funeral face,” he said. “If you want to see that, you will have to be with me on Saturday.”
“Saturday? What is happening then?” Stone asked.
“We bury Mac McCallie,” Rodgers said. “He died in the e-bomb blast at Op-Center.”
“Oh. I am sorry,” Stone said, removing his hand. “I have been rather tied up here. I had not heard there were casualties.”
That was a lie. Stone knew everything about the explosion he had ordered. And he was furious at himself for the funeral comment. It proved Rodgers’s point about careless haste causing problems. It gave the general a moral victory.
It gave Mike Rodgers first blood.
“As for being unafraid, Eric, fear has never driven me to be cautious or watchful,” Rodgers went on. His tone was more aggressive now. What had begun as Stone sizing up the general had been turned around, like a classic military counteraction. “The apparent lack of chaos does that. It is always there, hidden. Disraeli said that peace has occasioned more wars than the most ruthless conquerors. Peace makes us complacent. We stop looking over our shoulder. One job of any leader is to sniff out that lurking danger. To stir it up if necessary, to free it so it can be crushed.”
“That sounds like warmongering,” Stone said.
“It is,” Rodgers replied proudly. “I have always felt it is better to flush out the enemy before he has a chance to power up.”
“While you are sniffing and flushing, do you also look over your shoulder?” Stone asked. “Do you know what is behind you right now?” His own tone was slightly confrontational now, but he did not care.
“I do know what is there,” Rodgers said. “A fire escape and a hotel security camera.” He smiled. “I like to know where the exits are.”
Stone did not like this conversation or the turn it had just taken. He could not tell if Rodgers was still being philosophical or whether he was baiting Stone with references to the chaos of the past few days. What Rodgers did not say was also informative. He had mentioned nothing about Op-Center’s investigation or the arrest of Darrell and Maria McCaskey. He knew, of course. When Detective Howell arrested the couple, he noted that the last number dialed on McCaskey’s cell phone belonged to Mike Rodgers. Stone wanted to find out more about that if he could.
Quickly.
“You know, General, this is not the conversation I expected to have the first time we met.” Stone laughed. “But it does interest me. In fact, if you have a minute, all I need to do is grab my laptop from the room. Then we can go over to the convention center together. I would appreciate your input.”
“I would prefer to meet you there,” Rodgers said. “There are a few things I have to do first.”
“I can wait if you’d like.”
“Your steaks will burn,” Rodgers said. “I’ll catch up with you. Maybe we can have a drink later.”
“I would like that,” Stone replied.
The convention manager continued down the corridor to his room. As he opened the door, he glanced to his left. Rodgers went to Kat’s door and knocked. He did not attempt to conceal it. Was that innocent or meant to inspire concern? Stone cou
ld not be sure, and that frustrated him. More than the conversation, Stone did not like the man himself. Rodgers had launched salvos from his moral high ground. When Link spoke, it was with persuasive authority. This man lectured, as if there was no correct opinion other than his own.
Not that it mattered. He had learned what he needed to learn.
Mike Rodgers was not an ally. And if he was not an ally, then moderate or not, war hero notwithstanding, there was only one thing he could be: an enemy.
FORTY-FIVE
San Diego, California Wednesday, 1:16 P.M.
When Mike Rodgers was thirteen years old, a local Connecticut YMCA organized chess games against a local grand master. Rodgers got to play one of those games, and won. The reason he won was simple: apart from knowing how to move the pieces, Rodgers had no concept of chess strategy. As his opening move, he developed the pawn that sat in relative anonymity in front of the queen’s rook. He liked rooks—or castles, as he preferred to call them. That sounded more militaristic. He liked their sweep, their power. He wanted to get them out of their corner and ready for the fray. The grand master responded with Sokolsky’s opening. But Rodgers’s unorthodox move, located so far from the center of the board, unbalanced virtually every classic attack pattern for black. The grand master resigned the match after sixteen chaotic moves.
As Rodgers knocked at Kat’s door, he had to admit that what Eric Stone had just mounted was the clumsiest, most amateurish psy-ops probe he had ever experienced. In and of itself, it made Rodgers doubt that these people could be responsible for any kind of conspiracy. Yet, in a way, that was also what made them dangerous. They fit no profiles. They were unpredictable.
Kat answered the door. She was impatient, from her eyes to the cock of her hips. “Yes, General?”
“I need to talk to you,” he said. He walked around her and entered the room.
“By all means,” she said sarcastically. “Come in.”
“Sorry, but I did not want to stand there discussing this with Eric Stone watching and possibly listening.”
Kat let the door shut. “Why would Eric be listening? Could it be he is worried that you’re a loose cannon, dangerous to have at the convention?”
“No. He thinks I am concealing information. And he’s right.”
“What information?”
“That Detective Howell is being framed, and Stone may be involved in that,” Rodgers said.
“Framed how, and to do what?”
“He was tipped off to be at your apartment,” Rodgers said. “As for how—about fifteen years ago, he had an affair with a fellow coast guard cadet.”
“So he’s gay. Who cares?”
“That isn’t quite the entirety of it,” Rodgers said. “The other young man obviously had second thoughts and claimed he was seduced. Howell took the rap. Because Howell had seniority, the affair was deemed consensual by virtue of force majeure, a mild reprimand, but it went on Howell’s psych profile, which was sealed.”
“Until someone opened it.”
“Yes,” Rodgers said. “Someone who had access to military files.”
“Meaning Admiral Link.”
“Perhaps,” Rodgers admitted. “Since I doubt the admiral would tell us whether this is true, there is only one way to find out. We have to ask Detective Howell.”
“Why do you need me to do that?” Kat asked.
“I am not convinced he is playing entirely on Op-Center’s side,” Rodgers said. “If I call him, he probably won’t say anything. If you call, he may. Especially if you call saying that you decline to press charges against Darrell McCaskey and his wife.”
“Why would I do that?” Kat asked. “They broke into my apartment.”
“They did not really have a choice,” Rodgers pointed out. “They thought you might be involved in this.”
“And now they don’t? You don’t?”
“I am hoping you are not,” Rodgers said. “This would be a good way to strengthen that hope.”
“You know, I was supposed to be downstairs five minutes ago, meeting with reporters about the campaign,” she said. “But you made me so upset I couldn’t even do that. Now you want me to help you with this mad chase of yours. I really wish all of this would just go away.”
“Me, too,” Rodgers said. “I was supposed to be downstairs auditioning for secretary of defense. Instead, I’m up here begging you to help me fight a battle that is not even mine.”
“Nor mine, General,” Kat said. With an angry huff she walked to the bed and fished her cell phone from under her coat. “Let’s be done with this damn thing. What is Howell’s number?”
Rodgers pointed to the phone on the night table. “Would you mind using that one, on speaker? I would like to hear.”
“Fine,” she said. “Why the hell not? Let’s really humiliate the guy.”
Rodgers gave her the main switchboard of the Metro Police, which was the only one he knew. They put her through.
“Detective Howell, this is Kat Lockley,” she said. “I’m on a speaker phone. General Mike Rodgers of Op-Center is here with me.”
She made a point of emphasizing Op-Center, to show the general that she did not consider him to be on her team. Rodgers had taken many rough knocks in his career. He would survive this one.
“Ms. Lockley, I was going to call you,” Howell said. “I suppose you have heard we found two Op-Center agents in your apartment. We arrested them for breaking and entering.”
“Yes. I do not think I want to press charges, however,” she said.
“Pardon me?”
“We can discuss that later. Right now, the general feels there is something more important we need to talk about.”
“What is that?”
“Please excuse me for asking, Detective, but General Rodgers says he has reason to believe that you are being blackmailed.”
There was a long, guilty hesitation. Kat looked at Rodgers. She was sitting on the pillows beside the night-stand, and he was standing at the foot of the bed. The distance had seemed vast a few moments ago. Now it evaporated.
“General, I have another call,” Howell said. “Can you give me a moment?”
“I can.”
Whether there was or was not another caller did not matter. Rodgers gave him the “moment.” Howell returned in under half a minute.
“What makes you think I’m being blackmailed?” Howell asked.
“Are you?” Rodgers asked.
“Would you answer my question, sir?”
“We wondered about the snare Mr. and Mrs. McCaskey walked into,” Rodgers said. “The timing was too neat. Someone went to the apartment with evidence to frame Ms. Lockley, our team entered, then you showed up.”
“You assume we were not watching the apartment.”
“If you were, you would have nabbed the first person who went in,” Rodgers pointed out.
“General, this is not a conversation I wish to have.”
“I understand,” Rodgers said. “But you have to understand something as well. Op-Center was attacked. A coworker died—”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
“Others have died as well. We are going to stop this. I do not have to tell you what will happen if you are implicated in any way.”
There was a soft snicker on the other end. “Who was the one just asking me about blackmail?”
“This is internal affairs followed by due process,” Rodgers said. “That’s very different.”
“Detective, I have always thought highly of you. I need you to tell me something, truthfully,” Kat said suddenly. “Is General Rodgers hallucinating, or am I the one who is not seeing reality? Am I involved with bad people?”
For the third time, Detective Howell was silent. Kat’s brow creased, and her mouth sagged at the edges. Rodgers shifted his eyes to the painting over the bed. It was a lithograph of a Spanish vessel in San Diego Bay when it was still a Spanish settlement. There were people gathered onshore as a bumboat approached. The name of the
painting was Aguardar Noticias Del Hogar.
Awaiting News from Home.
Rodgers marveled at how different the world was, how different life was, when people had to wait weeks for an answer to a question like that. It was the reason men of great wisdom and even greater instinct had to be put in the field.
“I think that answers my question,” Kat said sullenly.
“Detective, talk to us,” Rodgers said. “If Ms. Lockley is correct, let us help. Whatever this is, we can fix it.”
“No,” Howell said. “I made my choices. I will live with them. But I do want you to know that I had no idea Op-Center was going to get hit.”
“Did the same people do it?” Rodgers pressed.
“I don’t know,” he admitted.
“What do you know?” Kat asked.
“Only that someone, a man, phoned one day.”
“When?” Rodgers asked.
“Two and a half weeks ago. He had information about my service record that could have ended my police career if it were revealed. I was told the information would be removed from my record if I cooperated.”
“What did this cooperation entail?” Rodgers asked.
“He didn’t say,” Howell replied.
Of course not, Rodgers thought. That might have made him an accomplice to murder, far less desirable than a career scandal. “What did he ask for when he did say?” Rodgers asked.
There was a final silence, but it was brief. “At first, just a level-one autopsy,” Howell replied.
“What is that?” Kat asked.
“The body goes in and out, no fine-tooth comb,” Howell said. “Your people wanted Wilson off the slab and out of the country, Ms. Lockley. They said it was to get attention from the senator as soon as possible. That sounded reasonable. It was apparently a heart attack. I saw no harm in helping to rush things along.”
“You said ‘at first,’ ” Rodgers pointed out.
“Yeah. I did that one as a favor. Then your Mr. McCaskey came along and found out it was murder,” Howell said. “At that point, I had already committed a departmental infraction. I might have been able to smooth that one over. But then they hit me with the other thing.”
Call to Treason (2004) Page 30