It cost the general a lot to comply, and opening his briefcase felt like lifting an Abrams tank bare-handed. And yet he felt like a weakling in doing it. Forty years in the air force, combat missions in both Iraq wars and in Afghanistan, two Purple Hearts and a chestful of medals for actual courage, for defending his country from threats foreign and domestic. He had served with distinction no matter who was president, and he believed that true patriotism was putting the needs of the defense of America and all of its people ahead of any party’s agenda. Now he felt like he was betraying the trust of everyone in the country.
Maybe everyone in the whole blessed world.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
BROADWAY DINER
BALTIMORE, MARYLAND
We drove in separate cars to the Broadway Diner.
I ordered a Chesapeake burger, which comes topped with crabmeat and Old Bay sauce. Tomatoes if you want them, which I didn’t. Lots of golden French fries. Top got his favorite from when we were both stationed here—a Juicy Lucy burger, which is stuffed with cheddar cheese and chopped bacon. I ordered two cheeseburgers without bread for Ghost, who looked properly docile in his service dog vest. The waitress knew he wasn’t anyone’s emotional support animal, but she was a dog person and brought him three patties. Her attitude toward my dog is reflected in the kind of tips I leave.
We had a corner booth and I placed an Anteater bug-detection gizmo on the table to make sure it was all clear. The device is designed to look like a clicker for my car. The lights popped green and stayed that way. The place was pretty empty, so there was no one to hear us when we leaned together for a chat.
“Called Bunny on the way over here,” said Top. “He wants to come out.”
“Tell him not to bother. We can handle—”
“He’ll be here tonight.”
I knew better than to argue. Top had a bit of mother hen in him. If he was rattled enough on my behalf to want another set of eyes on me, then he was going to get his way.
“Thanks,” I said.
Despite my parting words to Harrald, I made a call to some old friends in the Baltimore PD, and they sent a car. The five agents from the mansion and the three from the cemetery were all being treated at a local hospital. The goons from the graveyard were admitted for observation. I made a notation on my calendar to cry about it the day after hell freezes over.
I called Church and conferenced Top’s cell in. “We anywhere with figuring this out?” I asked.
“We are not,” said Church. “Bug has been poking around inside the Secret Service computers. E-mails, voicemails, procedural and case files. Whatever this is, no one is making a record of it. Or, put it another way, they are being very careful to make sure there’s no record of it, which actually tells us a lot. It suggests that they know they are acting outside of the law. The Secret Service would not do that openly unless they had some offer of protection from higher up the food chain.”
“How far up?” I asked. “The goon at the cemetery said it came from the Oval Office, but I figured he was lying.”
“Maybe not.”
“Damn,” said Top.
“Yes,” said Church.
We batted it back and forth for a bit but there was nowhere to go with it for now.
“What do you want us to do?” I asked.
“Nothing,” said Church. “Sergeant Sims, you had some days off, I believe. Feel free to go back to doing what you were doing.”
“Maybe I should loiter around and watch his back,” suggested Top.
“No need. The captain can go to the Warehouse for a night or two and wait until we have something.”
“That doesn’t sound fun,” I said.
“Life is full of little disappointments, Captain,” said Church, and rang off.
The waitress brought our food and refilled our coffee cups. She started to say something, but then she caught the looks on our faces and retreated in hasty silence.
Top poured milk into his coffee, and without looking up at me, said, “And you got no idea why the G wants your head on a pike? You ain’t pissed on anyone’s shoes lately?”
“Not that I can recall,” I said.
Top sipped his coffee and leaned back against the cushions. “Not that you can recall. And I guess you can recall every single time you pissed someone off who you shouldn’t have? I mean, just this week?”
“You have a point, Top?”
“Me? Nah. I actually like you.”
“But…?”
“You been known to ruffle some feathers hither and yon.”
“‘Hither and yon’?”
“Being poetic.” He sipped and set his cup down. “Not like you been making a secret about your feelings on how things are being run in D.C.”
“I’m allowed to have an opinion.”
“Sure. And people are allowed to get their noses out of joint about it.”
“So, you think this is a proportional response to me mouthing off?”
He sighed and rubbed his eyes. “Nothing’s proportional anymore, Cap’n.”
“Yeah, damn it,” I said.
We ate our burgers in a shared, troubled silence.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
THE OVAL OFFICE
THE WHITE HOUSE
WASHINGTON, D.C.
TWENTY-ONE MONTHS AGO
Jennifer VanOwen spent an hour discussing the names on the list provided by General Ballard. “Well,” she said, “no to the first four, right off the top. They’re not political appointments and don’t work in government, but they’re outspoken about politics.” She shook her blond head. “We need team players, not idealists.”
VanOwen similarly eliminated most of the other scientists on the list. Some were cut because they were in the camp of climate change, which was politically inconvenient as long as petro-dollars ran the world. Others were axed because of their voting records or party affiliation; or for content on their social media pages.
“Well,” said VanOwen again, this time almost as a sigh, “there’s really only one good prospect. Donald Carpenter, CEO of Carpenter Systems out of Pasadena. His company has done extensive work with the guidance systems of the latest generations of stealth aircraft and drones, and he’s built surveillance satellites for us. However … there is someone who knows the Majestic Black Book and all of its various technologies better than anyone else.”
“Who?” asked the president then he stiffened. “No … wait a damn minute. You’re not actually suggesting we hire Yuina Hoshino, are you? She’s a convicted felon and a traitor.”
“You can look at it like that, Mr. President,” said VanOwen with a reptilian smile, “or you can look at it like she’s one presidential pardon away from being the person who can put us so far out in front of the arms race that no one will ever catch us. The person who could make you—inarguably and without question—the most powerful man on Earth.”
“Mr. Church won’t like it,” he said. “So, there can’t be anything on the Net. No e-mails. Nothing.”
“Of course, Mr. President, I know how to manage the DMS. Leave all the details to me.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
THE WAREHOUSE
DMS FIELD OFFICE
BALTIMORE, MARYLAND
12:31 P.M.
I sat in what used to be my office, in a visitor’s chair on the other side of the desk. The current head of this station was Sam Imura, who used to be the sniper on Echo Team. Sam and I were veterans of some of this world’s more bizarre battlefields, and more or less friends. But after he got hurt during the Kill Switch affair, something had changed the dynamic between us. We stopped being friendly and operated with a kind of strained civility that I did not understand. I’ve seen that sort of thing happen sometimes when someone gets close to the edge of the big drop-off into the deep black. They turn sour on life, sometimes they pick someone to blame because every bullet needs a target.
Or, maybe that’s me trying to carry someone else’s emotional baggage. My best friend
and therapist, Rudy Sanchez, says that it’s likely me being a bit narcissistic while also making enormous assumptions about what’s going on in someone else’s head and heart. Whatever the reason, there is palpable distance between Sam and me these days. I can’t reach him and he seems to only tolerate me as a necessary inconvenience.
We sat in our chairs, both of us with feet on the desk, both of us drinking coffee from oversized mugs. Top had gone back to his lady friend with a promise of joining me later on. Ghost was sprawled on the floor, dreaming doggy dreams.
“They’re legit Secret Service,” said Sam. The eight sets of identification were spread out on his desk along with the weapons and personal effects I’d confiscated. “All relatively new hires, though. Post Linden Brierley.”
I nodded. Brierley was the former director of the Secret Service. He was the best example of the phrase “a good guy but not a nice guy.” During his tenure on the job, the Service had been a tightly run department, with a zero-tolerance policy for screwups. Like a lot of us in this biz, Brierley was largely apolitical because political affiliations were a distraction, as the occupants of the White House tended to change with the whims of elections. Brierley was nobody’s fawning toady, though, and the new POTUS didn’t like that, and gave him the boot in favor of a spectacularly unqualified ass-kisser. The Service is in danger of becoming a circus act as a result, and that’s a damn shame. Some of my oldest and most trusted friends have worked that job, and this feels like a deliberate slight to their integrity.
I said, “Knowing that they’re legit doesn’t tell us why they tried to arrest me and were willing to draw guns to do it.”
Sam shrugged. “Maybe they know you.”
“Ha,” I said without emphasis. “Ha, ha.”
“Bug’s people hacked the Service’s system,” said Sam, “and there’s no official order on file. So, figure VBO.”
Verbal order only was becoming more common in D.C., especially in departments where people knew about MindReader. Fair enough. If I was going to try and kick the DMS in the wrinklies, I’d make sure there was no paper or digital trail. Mr. Church tends to get cranky about such things, and he is not the person you want to make cranky. Trust me on this.
“Shame we can’t grill those agents,” said Sam. He gave me a scowl of disapproval. “You know, you could have called in to have them arrested.”
I sipped my coffee and manfully did not tell him to go stick it up his ass.
The clock on the wall above his desk ticked loudly for two full minutes.
When I’d been installed here it was a shrine to the Orioles, with balls, bats, gloves, and shirts signed by Cal Ripken, Jr., Frank Robinson, Jim Palmer, Eddie Murray, Boog Powell, Melvin Mora, and other gods of my personal pantheon.
Sam, however, was more culturally retro and had a matched pair of very old Japanese swords—katana and wakizashi—on a stand behind his desk, and photos of his parents in California and relatives back in Osaka on the walls. There were framed certificates from rifle competitions, and none of them were for second place. A shadow box on a stand had a deconstructed CheyTac M200 Intervention sniper rifle that I knew had been the one he’d used to win the International Sniper Competition at Fort Benning.
We drank coffee and the clock ticked. Then Church teleconferenced and Sam sent it to the big flat screen on the wall.
Church is a big man. Somewhere in his sixties; blocky, with dark hair streaked with gray, tinted glasses that hide his eyes, and black silk gloves over hands damaged by frostbite during the Predator One case. I don’t know much about his life before he started the DMS. Rumors and strange tales, mostly. I am inclined to believe even the weirdest stories people tell about him, and I suspect they don’t even scratch the surface. Anyone who could read power would immediately know that this was someone who was two or three levels above apex predator. He scares the people who scare me, and I’m pretty goddamn scary myownself.
“Gentlemen,” Church said quietly, “it seems we have a problem.”
“Well, gosh, boss, I kind of figured that,” I said. “Who is it and when do we start kicking ass?”
Church gave a small shake of his head. “It’s more complicated than that. The pickup order did indeed come from POTUS, or someone high up acting on his orders.”
“Why?”
“Unknown at this time. POTUS has declined to take my call. Aunt Sallie is reaching out to her friends in Washington to see what she can find.”
Sam gave a sour snort. “Do we even have any friends left in Washington?”
It was meant as a joke. Kind of. “Not many, I’m afraid,” said Church. “Maybe not enough anymore.”
“What’s the call?” I asked. “How do you want me to go after this?”
“The call, Captain,” said Church, “is to do nothing. Stay off the radar until further notice.”
“Now wait just a goddamn minute,” I roared. “The Secret Service just tried to arrest me. Twice. No way am I—”
Church hung up.
I said a lot of very loud, very ugly things. Ghost got to his feet and barked at the blank video screen. Behind his desk, Sam Imura turned his face away to hide the fact that he was laughing his ass off.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CITADEL OF SALAH ED-DIN
SEVEN KILOMETERS EAST OF AL-HAFFAH, SYRIA
TWO DAYS AGO
Harry Bolt lay at the entrance to hell and felt himself die.
The pain in his chest was astounding, almost beautiful in its purity. It allowed no other sensation to intrude, to interrupt the orchestra of agony that played through every single nerve ending. He opened his eyes and stared up at the deep shadows that clung to the lofty ceiling. Around him, outside of his peripheral vision, people fought and cursed and screamed. There were gunshots and the unmistakable and horrible sound of blades cleaving through meat and bone. The sounds were faint, though, as if the battle was happening far away.
He was going into the light. He was sure of it. What he did not understand, though, was why the light was green. Wasn’t it supposed to be white? Purity of heaven and all that shit? Or, considering how many of the commandments he’d cheerfully and repeatedly broken over the years, hellfire red?
Then Harry took a breath and actually felt himself inhale and exhale. Felt the pain in his chest, in bone and flesh. Frowned. If he could still feel the pain, did that make sense? Did the dead and the damned have to feel the pain of the wounds that had killed them? Well … sure. Hell. Everything in hell is supposed to suck, so why not?
He tried to turn away from the light, to look at darkness. Tears leaked out from under his closed eyelids and it made him feel weak, small, stupid. Alone.
Lost.
“I’m sorry,” he said in a tiny voice, directing it to God, to the Devil. Or to anyone or anything who could hear him. “I’m sorry. Please give me another chance. I swear I’ll be a better person. I swear. No more drinking. No Internet porn. I’ll give half my money to charity. Save the whales or trees or some shit. Whatever. I swear. Just don’t let me burn.”
Harry’s whole face scrunched up and he began to sob.
Suddenly Violin slapped him so hard that his eyes popped wide and he stared up at her scowling face. “What the hell is wrong with you? Why are you just lying there?”
“Wait … What? I’m not dead?”
Violin pulled him roughly to his feet. “We’re wasting time,” she said sharply. “Ghul is getting away.”
“I don’t care,” shouted Harry, then touched his body, feeling body armor instead of a sucking chest wound. “Oh,” he said. “Shit.”
Violin crouched at the top of the stairs, her face a mask of dark concern. “I was hoping Professor Nasser was wrong. I was hoping they wouldn’t find any hidden doorway. I was hoping this would be nothing more than a training exercise for you. Truly, Harry … I never thought they would find…”
Her voice trailed off.
“Find what?”
A sound came from below. A hissing
noise and then a rumble of guttural words and growls that Harry couldn’t understand. If they were words, there weren’t enough vowels. It was loud, too. As if blasted from massive speakers rather than from any human throat.
“Iä! Iä! F’ nafl’fhtagn!”
“Goddess, no…,” gasped Violin, and she made a strange warding symbol in the air. The voice boomed out again and now dust fell from between the tightly pressed ceiling stones. The light streaming up from below changed in hue and intensity, becoming a luminescent green. It stung the eye to look at it, and the very sight of it made Harry’s skin crawl.
“Y’ ahor h’ mgr’luh ahororr’e. H’ nwngluii ah mgahnnn.”
“Impossible,” cried Violin. “They can’t be that crazy. They’ll kill us all. Come on, Harry, we have to hurry.” She stepped down onto the top step, then—despite everything—threw him a wild grin. “What’s wrong? Do you want to live forever?”
“Actually,” he began, but Violin ran down the stairs before he could finish.
Harry licked his dry lips, tilted his head, and cut a sideways look heavenward. “Look,” he said reasonably, “if I cut the porn stuff down but not out, you still let me live, right? Is that fair?”
There was no answer from the heavens. Harry saw his gun lying on the fourth step down, picked it up, and went down the stairs.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
THE HANGAR
DEPARTMENT OF MILITARY SCIENCES HEADQUARTERS
FLOYD BENNETT FIELD
BROOKLYN, NEW YORK
“He is a criminal and you will surrender him.”
The words were not spoken, they were yelled. And the man yelling them was small, wrinkled, and livid. Red splotches bloomed on his cheeks and his eyes bugged out of his head. He seemed to lean out of the flat screen toward the two people seated at a table in the conference room.
Mr. Church, cool and comfortable in his Ermenegildo Zegna bespoke suit, Stefano Ricci Formal Crystal silk satin tie, and hand-sewn Brunello Cucinelli leather shoes. Beside him, Aunt Sallie—a black woman in her late sixties—wore a Nigerian block-print dress and had colorful beads strung between her gray dreadlocks. A carafe of spring water stood between them and each had a glass. There was a large plate of assorted cookies near the carafe. Auntie had a smaller plate in front of her. Every few seconds she would take an animal cracker from the pile, bite the head off, and drop the rest into a growing mound. Church slowly nibbled at a vanilla wafer. Neither spoke.
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