by Chad Zunker
We sat with Jeremy Lynch at a booth inside a Popeye’s fast-food restaurant.
The rain was coming fast and furious now outside the windows, pounding the dirty pavement outside the restaurant.
Although he was no longer hysterical, the guy’s hands were still shaking. Natalie had purchased him a box of chicken strips and a drink. He was scarfing them down like he hadn’t eaten in weeks.
“How did you find me?” Jeremy asked.
“It’s not important,” I assured him. “Do you have the video, Jeremy?”
He peered up over his chicken. “What video?”
“Don’t play games.”
He shook his head. “No, I don’t have it.”
“Did you watch it, Jeremy?” Natalie asked.
He nodded. “But only after I found out Rick was dead.”
“I didn’t do it,” I assured him.
“I know that,” he said. “This is much bigger than you.”
“What happened?” Natalie asked. “I spoke with your girlfriend. She said you just disappeared. No one has heard from you.”
“I watched the video. But before I could download it, it just disappeared. Poof. Gone. Someone else was tracking it online. They pulled it down before I could get it. I tried to go hunting for it, but I keep getting blocked. Twenty minutes later, someone takes a shot at me in the parking garage by my car. I swear the only reason I’m still alive is because I’m a clumsy idiot. I dropped my phone, bent to pick it up and felt a bullet fly right past me into my car window. I ran. The guy took two more shots. I dove over the wall of the two-story garage, landed on an awning from a store below, nearly broke my back. I don’t know how I got away. I just kept running.”
“And you’ve been hiding?” Natalie asked.
“Yes! I have no idea who I can trust. I knew the minute the video got pulled from the server that there was much more to the story than some random political tracker killing my cousin over drugs. Maybe Rick knew that, too. And that’s why he sent it to me in the first place.”
“It’s possible,” I said, looking at Natalie. “Maybe Rick knew I was chosen for the job?”
“Why didn’t you get the CIA on this?” Natalie asked Jeremy.
“When you work for the CIA, you quickly learn to trust no one, especially when all hell breaks loose. I wanted to find out more on my own first.”
“Have you found anything?” Natalie asked him.
“Not much yet. I’m trying to be careful. I’d just pinpointed a location for the cyber-attack when you two showed up at the arcade.”
“Where?” I asked.
“Local. A remote location outside of Chesapeake, Virginia.”
Chesapeake? That sounded very familiar. My mind was cycling through images that I had stored away in my head. It finally landed on the ID security badge that I’d found inside Greg Carson’s wallet back in Austin. The military training facility.
Chesapeake, Virginia. Redrock Security.
THIRTY-NINE
Monday, 1:19 p.m.
Washington, DC
10 hours, 41 minutes to Election Day
The bullets came in successive fashion.
The first bullet hit Jeremy right in the left temple. His head whipped back, and bright red blood sprayed the fast-food table.
The second bullet hit the cup in Jeremy’s hand, spewing Coke everywhere.
The third one clipped my shoulder. I had Natalie on the dirty floor of the restaurant within seconds. There was a scream from one of the female Popeye’s employees, who was wiping a table down nearby. She dove to the floor. Jeremy had fallen over, limp, still in the booth. His eyes open, blood pouring down over the seat and pooling onto the floor right next to us.
The shots had come from out front, through a window. I didn’t have time to calculate from exactly where. My guess was the car parked on the curb. There was more yelling and screaming from people who were eating across the restaurant. They had hit the floor, too, ten feet from us. I heard yelling and frantic scrambling from behind the counter.
Two more shots. They pierced the window and landed in the wooden booth inches behind us, causing the booth to splinter.
More screams. More yelling.
We had to get out of there. We needed cover, though. We couldn’t just run for it.
I caught the eye of a guy on the floor ten feet from me.
“Do you have a lighter?” I asked.
“What?”
“A cigarette lighter!” I repeated.
He nodded, dug in his jeans pocket, and slid it across the floor to me. Right beside me was a plastic trash container inside a painted wooden box. Like you’d find in every fast-food restaurant. I reached up, opened the door, pulled out the trash can from inside the box.
“What are you doing?” Natalie asked.
“Getting us out of here.”
Another shot whizzed right past me, hit the wall. More screaming.
I found a paper bag on top. I flicked the lighter, lit the paper bag on fire, and then put it back inside the trash can. Within seconds, flames erupted, as it quickly caught the other thin paper contents inside the trash. I shoved it toward the front of the store. Smoke began pouring out the top, filling up most of the room. Most importantly, clouding the windows in front. I grabbed Natalie by the hand, we stood and rushed behind the order counter, where I found two gals in uniform huddled closely together, frightened out of their minds.
“Back door?”
They pointed. We moved.
Two seconds later, we pushed through the back door of the building into an alley. I knew better than to take for granted that we were safe. They could have circled, as they had before, anticipating an escape. I peered both ways. Rain was still coming down hard, and I could hear sirens. Someone had dialed 9-1-1. The police were close. We could not hang around.
We stepped out into the rain, splashed our way down the alley, and ran.
I told Natalie to text Tommy and then dump her phone.
My shoulder was throbbing. Blood was soaking my sleeve.
FORTY
Monday, 4:20 p.m.
Washington, DC
7 hours, 40 minutes to Election Day
We huddled in a motel room near the DC-Virginia border.
I sat on the bed with my shirt off, medical tape wrapped around my shoulder, blood seeping through. The bullet had clipped me good. It hurt like hell, but the damage wasn’t too bad. We’d cleaned it up pretty good, and Natalie had done a valiant job playing nurse. She mentioned a hospital visit, but we both knew that was not an option. Tommy Kucher was in the room with us on a laptop, pecking away. Natalie was on the phone with her editor. Tommy had brought us both new phones. The curtains were pulled tightly together.
Natalie got off the phone.
“What did he find?” I asked.
“Did you follow the Ankara debacle in the news last year?”
“The embassy bombing in Turkey?”
“Yes.”
“Sort of. Not closely. Fill me in.”
“If you’ll remember, several embassy staff were killed that day along with U.S. Ambassador Thomas Patterson. Islamic terrorists. Lots of finger pointing from both sides of the political fence about the breakdown of communications and security. There’d been heated debate about who knew what and when. And why more was not done from the top to protect the embassy. Redrock Security was also there with private agents. They’d been given a lucrative contract to provide additional security to dozens of embassies around the globe. So Redrock has been taking a lot of heat about their security services and practices. A congressional investigative committee is currently being formed to investigate deeper. Redrock stands to lose billions of dollars in future government military contracts should they somehow be made the scapegoat and shoulder the blame on Ankara, which some politicians seem bent on doing.”
“But I don’t get it. Roots is spending all of that super PAC money to beat Mitchell. You said a dozen prominent TV ads in primetime the past
two weeks and an hour-long documentary. Not to elect Mitchell. So why would Mitchell’s team contract out Redrock Security guys to protect Mitchell on the campaign trail? Isn’t that a contradiction?”
“My guess is they didn’t know they were Redrock guys. They thought they were Stable Security guys out of Dallas. Only now we know by digging deeper that Stable is a subsidiary of Redrock. I think Redrock has dozens of these private outfits around the country. You’d never know it. A lot of smoke and mirrors with these guys. There’s more," she said, punching on her phone and then showing it to me. “This was taken at an intimate high-dollar political dinner in San Antonio just four nights ago.”
I studied the clear digital photo. Lucas McCallister was smiling and shaking hands with a distinguished looking man in a black tuxedo. They looked like old pals. I recognized him but wasn’t sure from where. “Who is he?”
“Victor Larsen, founder of Redrock.”
“You think McCallister’s team is in bed with Redrock Security?”
“Redrock’s headquarters are in Virginia. It’s very big business in that state. Lucas McCallister’s father is a senator from Virginia and my editor says that he’s a private ally of Victor Larsen. There’s a very strong connection there.”
“You think it was quid pro quo? Secretly help get Lucas McCallister elected using this super PAC, or whatever means necessary. In return, Lucas gets appointed to the congressional committee investigating Redrock and shows political favor?”
“Yes. My inside congressional sources say it’s a split house right now regarding opinions on Redrock and whether the U.S. should continue contracting with them. It could go either way for them next year. Victor Larsen is clearly not satisfied with those odds. I think the so-called domestic threats made toward Congressman Mitchell recently were a ruse created by Redrock, geared at getting the Mitchell campaign to hire more independent security guys. So they went to their standby, Stable Security in Dallas, where Square Jaw and Elvis were waiting. I think they were intentionally planted by Victor Larsen and McCallister on Congressman Mitchell’s team as eyes and ears into the Mitchell campaign.”
“But then the game completely changed when I showed up and caught McCallister with his pants down.”
“Yes, their objective changed. Some of these guys are ruthless. There are stories of assassinations by Redrock guys all over the globe, including the slaughter of fourteen innocent civilians in Afghanistan three years ago. It’s not a big leap for some of these guys to go from private security contractor to shadow assassin. Redrock also has a highly-trained cyber team. A team that my sources say has been contracted out regularly by the U.S. military, the CIA, as well as other government entities around the globe. A team completely capable of the attack that Tommy mentioned.”
My mind was so tired I could hardly keep up. “But then what’s the connection to William Alexander and the gray-bearded man?”
“I still don’t know. That’s a missing link for me.”
I dropped back on the bed, grimaced, my shoulder throbbing. I had just gotten off the phone with David Benoltz, who strongly urged me to come in. Even though he admitted that the FBI had a stacked deck, he still insisted he could get me out of this mess. But he said it was not going to be easy. As much as I liked him, I was not ready to put my life in someone else’s hands.
I stared at the ceiling. “If Redrock really has the video, wouldn’t they have destroyed it by now? Gotten rid of the evidence?”
“Doubtful,” replied Natalie. “Think about it, Sam. If you’re Victor Larsen, that video has just become your ultimate blackmail, as long as it remains only in your possession. It’s a lethal source of powerful leverage against Lucas McCallister. A way to get McCallister to do whatever Larsen wants. I’m sure Victor Larsen is now hoping to ride McCallister all the way to the top.”
“Good point. It’s not just about this election. Now it’s about future elections, too.”
“Right.”
“So we really need to change the outcome of this election, before it ever gets started. And we’ve only got a few hours to do it. No pressure there.”
Natalie sat on the bed next to me. “How’s the shoulder?”
“I stopped feeling anything twenty minutes ago. I’ll probably need the arm amputated.”
She gave a curt smile, knowing I was being overdramatic. “You’re going to need a serious vacation when this is over, aren’t you?”
“And so will you.”
She nodded.
“Great, go ahead and book the reservations. The beach, maybe Aruba, a tray of fruity drinks with little umbrellas, you in a bikini next to me. Sounds perfect.”
“I think I got it,” Tommy suddenly announced. He was sitting at the small desk in the room.
We both bounced up, hurried over, studied the laptop in front of him. The gobbledygook on the laptop screen made absolutely no sense to me.
“You seriously found it?” I asked.
“Yes, it’s there.”
“How do you know what’s what?” I asked.
“Trust me, Duke. This is my world. I’m inside the private server at Redrock Headquarters. Chesapeake, Virginia. Just a surface hack. But I’m sure it’s there. All of the online threads confirm it, I promise. I identified its exact location on the server. You said it was five minutes and twenty-seven seconds in length, right? I got that bad boy.”
“You’re incredible, Tommy.”
“Can you get it?” Natalie asked.
Tommy laughed. “Sure, it’s possible. If I had six months. And if you could fly me around the world on a secure private jet to avoid being hunted and somehow keep me from being shot. This thing is protected by the most sophisticated anti-piracy software I’ve ever seen in my life. Better than the latest I’ve seen from the Chinese military. Plus, it looks like it’s even linked to a super complex GPS system.”
“What does that mean?” Natalie questioned.
“It means that even their own people can’t access it remotely. You have to be onsite.”
“You mean inside Redrock Headquarters?” I asked.
“Yep. Inside their computer center.”
“So how do we get it, Tommy?” Natalie said.
“We can’t. Unless…”
“Unless what?” I asked.
Tommy shrugged. “Unless we go get it from the inside.”
“I’m a dead man.”
FORTY-ONE
Monday, 7:12 p.m.
Chesapeake, Virginia
4 hours, 48 minutes to Election Day
The global private security empire was on four-thousand remote acres in Southern Virginia. It was heavily wooded, swamp land. Perfect for an exclusive, private military base. Along with a headquarters building, it was supposed to include some of the highest level military training facilities in the United States. Shooting ranges. Obstacle courses. Bombing sites. The works. I’d learned that Redrock got its start two decades ago training Navy SEALS for special operations.
It was hard to find much information about Redrock’s property. There were press photos of the headquarters building, which looked like any other corporate office. A stone-and glass-encased building with a spacious parking lot. It wasn’t like Redrock had built their facilities underground or anything crazy like that. While their product was unique, this was still a business with accountants, sales people, and administrative assistants. Although, the tanks in the parking lot did stand out in the press photos.
Perhaps that was only for the media. I hoped.
We knew that a tall chain-link fence with barbed wire circled nearly the entire four-thousand acres. The photos also showed men with machine guns and security dogs roaming the property. We were working with two opposing theories. The first was that this place was like Fort Knox, locked down to the highest level, protected from any possible type of terrorist attack, foreign or domestic, with tanks at every corner, snipers in every other tree and a dozen unmanned drones flying overhead. The second theory was that it was not
overly secure, being that it was hidden deep in the woods in Virginia and that Redrock had a certain reputation — with the understanding that only a foolish man with a clear death wish would ever even consider trying to break into a property belonging to such a lethal agency with more than one hundred trained killers living onsite.
I was going to be that foolish man.
It was ridiculous. A twenty-five-year-old law student was going to break into one of the most badass places on the planet and steal top level secrets. But what choice did I have? My attorney had made it pretty clear that without the video, I was rolling the dice with poor odds, a reckless gambler. With the video back in my possession, I likely had my get-out-of-jail-free card. It was the necessary proof and linchpin connection behind all of my other crazy stories about what had played out over the past three days.
So there you go. It was a no brainer. I was going after that damn video, even if meant getting shot at by snipers, blown up with a grenade, or taken out by a missile from a Blackhawk helicopter in the process.
Tommy suggested the only way to bypass so many complex outer layers of cyber security walls, at least on our rushed timeline, was to simply physically go inside of them. Okay, so it wasn’t going to be simple. Not in the least. But he said there was no way that the military cyber techs working inside the physical walls of the computer center would have to jump through as many security hoops as a hacker on the outside.
Tommy suggested that if I could somehow get inside Redrock’s computer center, and if I could somehow log in to the main system, it might simply be a point and click of the mouse. Drag, drop, download, and run like mad.
Those were big ifs. But that was my plan at the moment.
Which was why I found myself perched on top of a hill overlooking a guarded security booth in the distance below, near a gated entrance into the property. I mean, this wasn’t the first time I’d broken into some kind of secure facility. I’d slipped into shipping warehouses, loading docks, and even into shopping malls in the middle of the night. But they were usually not patrolled by Navy SEALS or former Marine snipers who took shots from a mile away at Al Qaeda targets in Afghanistan.