King and Maxwell

by David Baldacci

  “YES, SIR, THANK YOU, SIR.”

  Sean clicked off the phone and looked up at Michelle.

  Keeping on the move, they were in another motel room they had paid for in cash.

  Sean had just gotten off the phone with President John Cole.

  She said, “Are we good to go with POTUS?”

  “I think so. At least with him behind us we can go pretty much anywhere and ask pretty much anything.”

  “I noticed you handled the question of Tyler Wingo very smoothly.”

  “I’m not looking to derail McKinney’s or Littlefield’s careers. They might prove useful. The president is expecting us to deliver Tyler at some point. We just have to executive-lag that.”

  “So where do we go first?”

  “Pentagon. We’re meeting with the head of procurement who was involved in the cash-in-Afghanistan program, and Colonel Leon South, who was Sam Wingo’s immediate superior in the field.”

  “Let’s roll then.”

  An hour later they were being escorted down a long corridor at the Pentagon. In fact, every corridor at the Pentagon was long. It was a labyrinth beyond all labyrinths. Indeed, it was rumored that employees from the 1960s were somewhere in the bowels of the place still looking for an exit.

  They reached an outer office and then were escorted into an adjacent conference room. Two men were waiting for them. One was in uniform, the other was not.

  Dan Marshall rose and held out his hand. “Mr. King, Ms. Maxwell, welcome to the Pentagon. I’m Dan Marshall, assistant secretary of acquisitions, logistics, and technology. I’m the one who spends a lot of the taxpayers’ dollars around here.”

  They shook hands.

  Colonel South did not rise to greet them. He merely nodded and said, “Colonel Leon South. I understand you’re here with the president’s blessing.”

  Sean, Michelle, and Marshall sat at the table.

  Sean said, “That’s right.”

  South said, “I’m not sure how private investigators figure into a classified mission, I’m really not. Can you explain that to me?”

  Marshall said, “Leon, surely with the president’s authorization we don’t need to get into that.”

  Sean said, “I can understand the query. We stumbled into the case mostly by accident. By a series of fortuitous events we ended up becoming close with one of the main players in this little saga. The president deemed that valuable, and that’s why we’re in the loop.”

  South nodded slowly but his features remained inscrutable. “So what do you want from us?”

  Sean said, “Some background on the mission? Some insight into Sam Wingo?”

  “Wingo is a traitor,” began South.

  Marshall held up his hand. “We don’t know that, Leon. We don’t know a lot of things, actually.”

  “A billion euros gone missing, along with Wingo? I think we know all we need to know.”

  “But he contacted you,” said Marshall. “And protested his innocence in the strongest possible terms.”

  “Of course he did, to throw us off,” retorted South.

  “When did he contact you?” asked Sean.

  “Shortly after the mission cratered.”

  “What did he say happened?” asked Michelle.

  “That there were strange men at the rendezvous spot. They said they were CIA and had the creds to prove it.”

  “Have you spoken with Langley about this?” asked Sean.

  South looked at him contemptuously. “No, I just took him at his word.”

  Sean said, “Okay, what did Langley say when you contacted them?”

  “That they had no idea what the hell he was talking about. They had no agents anywhere near this mission.”

  “How many times did Wingo contact you?” asked Sean, changing gears.

  “Twice. Both times to moan about being innocent. And about finding out who set him up.”

  “And you obviously didn’t believe him,” said Michelle.

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “Did you know Wingo before this mission?”

  “By reputation. Which was a solid one. Otherwise, he would not have been selected.”

  “And yet you just assume he’s guilty?” said Sean inquiringly.

  “Missing money and missing man, yeah, I do,” South replied in a curt tone.

  “Let’s assume for the moment that he is telling the truth,” began Sean. “Who would benefit from setting him up?”

  Marshall said, “Anyone who wanted a billion euros. I said all along that we should have at minimum sent in a three-man team, but I was overruled. It was too much for one person, even someone as skilled as Sam Wingo.”

  Sean looked at him. “Did you know Wingo beforehand?”

  “Just by reputation, like Leon.”

  “And you don’t think he’s guilty?” asked Michelle.

  “I haven’t formed a conclusion one way or another. I know he went through a tremendous vetting process and had to endure a year’s worth of setting up an arrangement with another field agent that impacted his private life.”

  “That would be Jean Shepherd,” said Michelle. “His supposed second wife.”

  “Yes.”

  “And she’s disappeared too,” said Sean.

  “Right,” interjected South. “Maybe they’re on the Riviera right now enjoying the fruits of their theft.”

  “So you think they were in on it together?”

  “Why not? They had a year to plan it. A billion euros sets them up for life.”

  “I might agree with you but for one thing,” said Sean.

  “What’s that?” asked South.

  “Tyler Wingo.”

  Michelle added, “We don’t think he would ever abandon his son. By all accounts they were incredibly close.”

  South shrugged. “Maybe he plans to come back for the kid.”

  “So that also makes his son an accessory after the fact. A fleeing felon at age sixteen,” said Michelle.

  “That much money will make people do strange things,” replied South.

  “We understand that the money was intended for certain Muslim freedom fighters to use to purchase weapons. Is that true?” asked Sean.

  South and Marshall exchanged nervous glances.

  “Is that a yes?” asked Michelle.

  Marshall cleared his throat. “It’s not untrue.”

  “Good, because that’s what the president told us,” added Michelle.

  “So why ask us?” South groused.

  “Just making sure everyone’s on the same page,” said Michelle.

  “So a mess for the White House?” said Sean.

  “Not just the White House,” said Marshall. “Technically, such funds are not to be conveyed in that manner. So we’re all in the same boat. I doubt whether Congress will take a scalpel to this.”

  “More like a meat cleaver,” said South.

  “So you mean technically it might be illegal?” said Michelle.

  “That argument could be made,” said Marshall. “The freedom fighters may be fighting against a regime that is not our ally. But it’s not as though most of those rebels are knights in shining armor.”

  “Many of them want to bring sharia law to prominence in the secularized Arab countries,” added South. “And in the countries that already have sharia law they could still be as bad as or worse than the regimes in power now. So it’s a shitty situation all the way around.”

  “Like us supporting Osama bin Laden and the mujahideen in Afghanistan against the Soviets in the 1970s,” noted Sean. “They later used the weapons we bought them against our troops.”

  “Geopolitics is not and never will be an exact science,” noted South.

  “Some might say common sense might be enough,” said Michelle.

  “Well, they’d be wrong, wouldn’t they?” snapped South.

  “So your career will take a hit over this, right?” said Sean, staring at him.

  South’s face turned red. “I’m more concerned
about making this right than whether my next promotion will come through.”

  “So if the mission had gone according to plan, what was Wingo’s role?”

  South said, “To accompany the money to its end source. The freedom fighters. There was a group of them who were supposed to meet him at the drop spot. He was to follow them with the money out of the country. We had the route planned out and the proper authorizations needed with the tribal chiefs along the way.”

  “Why Afghanistan? Why not just bring the money directly to the freedom fighters?” asked Michelle.

  “We couldn’t be that transparent,” said South. “In fact, the money technically wasn’t going directly to the freedom fighters. There was an intermediate step where the funds were going to go to purchase weapons and ammo.”

  “From whom?”

  South and Marshall exchanged another glance but said nothing.

  Sean said, “Unless my memory fails me, there’s one big country directly next to Afghanistan that isn’t exactly our friend.”

  “And that would be Iran,” said Michelle.

  Sean looked squarely at South. “Please tell me we weren’t dealing with freedom fighters to overthrow the government in Tehran?”

  “Neither confirm nor deny. And I doubt the president gave you a direct answer on that,” added South.

  Sean looked at Marshall. “We really need to know.”

  Marshall nodded and rose.

  South put a restraining hand on his arm. “Dan, think about what you’re doing.”

  “Leon, they have the president’s blessing. And how can they figure this out without knowing the whole story?”

  He went to a wall where there was a paper map of the world. He pointed to several spots. “The actual plan was to loop north. The euros would be laundered in Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan.”

  “And the Russians were okay with that?” Sean asked quickly.

  Marshall looked at South. The colonel said, “They were on board. It’s complicated geopolitics for a neophyte like yourself, but rest assured that they’re as tired of Iran’s chest-thumping as we are.”

  Sean shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

  “What?” snapped South.

  “The Russians like saber-rattling particularly when it gives us grief. Prime example, Syria. In addition, Russia’s economy is based largely on oil and gas, of which they have a ton. If the hardliners in Tehran get ousted and their oil comes back on the world market, the price goes down. That would hurt Moscow big-time. Their economic stabilization plan is actually destabilization in the region. The more fragile things are the more money they make on their natural resources.”

  Marshall smiled and Michelle looked impressed. She said, “How do you know all that?”

  Sean shrugged. “Hey, I enjoy the Economist as much as the next neophyte.”

  Marshall continued, “The weapons were to be purchased through intermediary arms dealers in Turkey and then brought over the border there and into Syria and then onward to the freedom fighters.”

  “In Iran?” said Sean. “The freedom fighters were from Iran?”

  Marshall nodded.

  “Okay, and Wingo was to ride shotgun over all of it?” asked Sean.

  “That’s right,” replied Marshall as he sat back down.

  “An Army solider involved in something that smacks of the intelligence world?” observed Michelle.

  “Talk to us about the DIA,” said Sean.

  “I’m with DIA,” said South. “So was Wingo. Most people don’t realize that DIA dwarfs CIA in manpower and resources. We’ve been recruiting and training thousands of new field agents for missions worldwide. We drop them into regular Army units that are dispersed worldwide and then keep them there after the units pull out. It’s terrific cover, actually. Our enemies have long since caught on to the fact that State Department cover is for intelligence operatives. We work with the CIA on many joint ops. But this one we were heading up.” He paused. “And we blew it big-time, which means it might be our last mission lead.”

  Sean looked at him curiously. “Which means Langley would be the boss in any future operations?”

  “Probably.”

  “So they have a motive to blow this up?”

  Marshall shook his head. “I highly doubt that. Before this is over everybody will have egg on their faces. And if they did and the truth came out, the CIA would be emasculated for decades to come. Far too risky.”

  “What steps have you taken to track Wingo?” asked Michelle.

  “Every step we could think of,” said South.

  “And you think Wingo is a lone wolf on this?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then we know he’s innocent,” said Sean.

  “How?”

  “There’re quite a few people involved in this, actually. Several of them have tried to kill my partner and me. And not one of them was Sam Wingo.”

  “Well, with the money he has now he can hire whoever he wants to do his dirty work,” replied South.

  “My gut is telling me otherwise,” Sean said.

  “Oh, well, that makes all the difference to me,” said South sarcastically.

  Marshall said, “Do you think you can find Sam Wingo?”

  “We’re going to do our best. And we have great incentive.”

  “You mean because the president is counting on you?” said Marshall.

  “No,” said Sean. “Because it means we’ll probably get to keep living.”

  CHAPTER

  56

  SEAN SAT IN HIS CAR and gazed over at the building. A voice crackled in his earwig.

  “Vista Trading Group is on the sixth floor,” said Michelle, who was sitting at an outdoor café near the next intersection.

  “Got it.”

  “Edgar was very helpful in getting us so much information so fast.”

  “Yeah, but it wasn’t all that helpful,” said Sean. “Vista is a legit business. Alan Grant comes from a good family. His dad was in the military, then in civilian government. And Grant doesn’t have a blemish on his record. Former soldier too. Now a successful businessman. Not even any parking tickets.”

  “Yeah, he’s clean. Too clean in my opinion.”

  “Can’t convict a guy for being too law abiding.”

  “But one of the men who works there has Sam Wingo’s interest for some reason.”

  “We don’t know what that interest is. It would be nice to ask Wingo directly.”

  “Have you emailed Tyler?” she asked.

  “Twice. No response yet.”

  “Someone might be monitoring the new Gmail account.”