by Tim Tigner
“But we have proof, Ayden. These headsets ... my testimony as a Federal Agent ... those are proof.”
“Right,” Ayden said, looking up from the floor. “Now do you understand why I’m so afraid? Now do you comprehend just how much danger we’re in?”
Chapter 17
Alexandria, Virginia
STUART LISTENED INTENTLY to the complementary voice streams coming from the two speakers. Timing was everything in an operation like this, so he was glad to have bugs both inside the daycare-center office and out in the hall.
Both were quiet now. Cassi had just finagled Sal’s name. She was a clever one. Stuart had to give her that. If she were just three inches shorter she would be a valuable asset rather than a critical liability. Wiley had that right. Unfortunately, those three inches meant everything. It was just one more way Washington politics resembled professional sports. The difference between winning and losing often came down to fractions and milliseconds. In this case, three inches meant that he had to cut Cassi from the team—the only way that he could.
Stuart wished that there were another way. Wiley would not cooperate. Violence was never his first choice. It was too primitive. But he had no other. Cassi should not have gone and gotten herself pregnant. She had painted him into a corner and this was his only way out.
Wiley would go berserk, of course, but that would change nothing. No spark of vengeance could outshine the luster of the Oval Office. Truth be told, Stuart had been secretly pleased to see Wiley show a little spine and stand up to him on Cassi’s account. The edge he displayed would serve them well in the campaign. Of course, Stuart had to ensure that Wiley never forgot his place again. Today, he would solve both issues—with the simple push of a button …
Chapter 18
Alexandria, Virginia
CASSI FELT A jolt of excitement run through her as she considered Sal’s nobody-gets-hurt proposal. Cracking a hostage situation was not unlike cracking a safe. You had to find the right combination. As soon as he said the word helicopter, she felt the first tumbler fall squarely into place. “You seem to have thought this through,” she said, keeping the dial turning.
“Damn straight,” Sal replied.
Giving a hostage-taker a helicopter was out of the question, but she could not let Sal know that. “If you want me to consider releasing you, Sal, you’re going to have to convince me that you’re a small fish. No danger to society.”
“You want a reference? A note from my guidance counselor?”
Cassi was pleased to hear Sal exercising his sense of humor. That meant both that he was looking for approval and that he was not freaking out. “Tell me about this job. It was obviously well planned and highly sophisticated. Who set it up? What was the plan? Stuff like that. We’ve already caught you red-handed, so you’ve nothing to lose—except this last chance to get your freedom back. Don’t try to bullshit me though. If I think you’re lying, I certainly won’t trust you with a helicopter, a pilot, and two kids.”
Sal met her request with silence. Either he was thinking, or she had pushed too hard. “I’m throwing you a lifeline, Sal. You’ll be regretting it for twenty-to-life if you don’t grab on with both hands.
Finally Sal replied, his tone softer than before. “I’m just a wrench.”
“A wrench?”
“A tool. Hired help. It wasn’t my idea. He called me.”
“What did he say?”
“He said he’d give me a million cash if I could get him the Vermeer.”
“What Vermeer?”
“The one undergoing restoration on the other side of this brick wall.”
“What else did he tell you?”
“Everything. He planned it out for me. Told me about a gap in the security system I could use.”
“And what gap was that?”
“What’s it matter? Didn’t work.”
“I’m trying to work with you here, Sal. You’ve got to work with me back. Give me the details.”
Sal sighed loud enough for Cassi to hear through the door. “The art restorer uses a hyper-sophisticated security system. Detects vibration, body heat, shit like that. I can’t disable it locally because it arms and disarms according to a remote timer. On at eight every night. Off at eight every morning. Every morning. Since they open late on Sundays, there’s a ninety-minute window before anyone shows up. Nothing to worry 'bout from eight to nine-thirty but the normal door and window whistles. The brick wall the studio shares with the daycare center gave me a foolproof way to get around them.”
“Go on.”
“I broke into the daycare center last night and hid in the storage room, that’s where the shared wall is. Eight-fifteen I start drillin’ brick, knowing that all them kids running and screaming below will cover up the muffled noise. I’d almost got a hole big enough to wriggle through when I sees colored lights reflecting off the wall. I go to look and see the pigs pulling into the yard. There’s nowhere to run so I snatch a couple kids. The rest you know.”
Cassi did know. Sal had been set up. There was no Vermeer. There was no sophisticated alarm. There was definitely more to this than met the eye, and she wanted to know what it was. “Now for the most important question, Sal, the one your future rides upon. Who gave you the contract?”
“I knew you was going to ask that. I don’t know.”
“You know more than you think,” Cassi said. “What did he call himself?”
“X.”
“X?”
“Yep.”
“What else can you tell me about X? Was he working from the inside?”
“I’d say so. He had everything: blueprints, details of the security system, and, of course, he knew 'bout the painting.”
Cassi saw a picture rapidly taking shape. “Did he mention the kids?”
“Yeah. He said their screams would cover up the noise. Also suggested that if the shit hit the fan they’d make good insurance.”
“He said that?” Cassi asked, filling in the final strokes.
“Yeah. See. Takin’ hostages wasn’t even my idea. I’m no threat to nobody.”
“And how did he get you the blueprints?”
“Mail.”
“And how were you going to get him the painting and collect your cash?”
“He was going to call me once the job was done to work that out.”
The results of her interrogation were not perfect, Cassi thought, but the police were still going to be pleased. More importantly, Sal was now convinced that she was receptive to his escape plan. It was time for her to rescue the kids.
From his explanation of the job, she knew that Sal was quick on his feet. From his vocabulary and syntax, she knew that he was intelligent but not formally educated. From his escape plan, she gathered that he was meticulous. She had to assume that Sal had studied hostage-negotiation techniques. That made her job more complicated, if not more difficult.
Given his current state of mind, Cassi knew that Sal might react violently if he caught her manipulating him with standard procedure. That meant she would not be able to play this one by the book. Still, she could not abandon negotiation’s central tenets. She would still keep him off balance, but in an unorthodox way.
“You know what I’m supposed to do now, right Sal? You’ve seen the cop shows. I’m supposed to tell you that you that you can’t take the kids. Make you release one now. Tire you out. But I can tell that you’re too smart for that. So here’s what I’m going to do … Oh, hold on a second, I almost forgot. You said you have a bomb, right? What kind is it?”
“What’s it matter?”
I want to make sure that it won’t go off when we shoot you, she thought. “I need to make sure there are no electronics around that might accidentally trigger it.”
“It’s plastique—not military grade, the homemade stuff. X sent it to me in case the drill wasn’t enough for the wall or I couldn’t crack the restorer’s safe.”
“How much?”
“Enough to do th
e kids is all you need to know.”
“Don’t talk like that, Sal. Don’t blow it now. I can tell that you’re a reasonable man at heart, not some violent psychopath. I am prepared to get you what you want. I’m going to call for your helicopter now. All you have to do for me is put the kids in the bathroom to keep them quiet and out of the way while we wait.”
“These kids are staying right next to me. If you’re worried about them, you’ll get the helicopter here that much faster. Meanwhile they’re going to make sure that you don’t get any bright ideas. I do like the idea of keeping them quiet though. Hold on a minute.”
Cassi felt spiders in her stomach as she heard the screech-rip sound of duct tape. Once. Twice. Then the soprano sobbing peaked and stopped. Her nerves began to kick in, yanking her out of The Zone. Suddenly she was acutely aware that two beautiful kids, her unborn child, and her career were riding on the next sixty seconds of her performance.
“Okay, Sal. I’ve put in the request for the helicopter. It won’t be long. Now, convince me that you’re not going to harm those kids.”
“What can I say? I was just trying to steal a painting. That’s just larceny, not a violent crime. It ain’t a big deal to have me out on the streets. I’m a teddy bear. And like any bear, I’m no threat if nobody spooks or threatens me.”
Cassi noted that a desperate twang had crept into Sal’s voice. She kept quiet, pressuring him to continue.
He did. “I don’t want to harm these kids. But if you threaten me, then that’s what I’m going to do. I’m sure you agree it would be much better to let me fly out of here than to let it come down to that.”
“Absolutely, I see your point. Oh, hold on ... It’s here, Sal. Your helicopter is here.”
“In the yard?”
“No, there wasn’t room with the telephone wires and the jungle gyms. It’s up on the roof. You’re going to have to use the fire escape.” This was all bullshit, of course. As soon as Sal put his head above the roof he would get a bullet between the eyes. Cassi could not let herself think about that, however. She could not let treachery tweak her voice.
“Okay, here’s the deal,” Sal commanded. “Everybody clears out. Everybody but you. Nobody is in the yard. Nobody but the pilot is on the roof. When you’ve made it that way, you let me know.”
Cassi felt the warm glow of approaching victory when her ears seemed to erupt inside her head. Before the sound could register she found herself flying backwards through the air, borne toward the bricks with great force by a giant bubble of heat.
Chapter 19
Lake Maroo, Virginia
ODI BOLTED UP in bed, awakened by chirping birds. He had slept well, even with his ears perked like a German Shepard’s.
Two weeks had passed since his auspicious awakening in the Iranian hospital ward, and in that time his outlook on life had swung one-hundred-and-eighty degrees. Betrayal changes a man. Betrayal makes him worry about things he never worried about before. It makes him worry about things like self-preservation. Ponder motives. And plan his revenge.
Realizing that going public with their knowledge would put them squarely in the assassins’ sights, he and Ayden had inevitably settled on the only course of action that was both honorable and expedient. They had chosen to hunt the killers down. Actually “they” was a generous term. Odi was the soldier. He was going after them alone.
He had entered the US using Ayden’s passport in order to preserve his greatest tactical advantage: the fact that everyone still believed him dead. He had used discretion and disguise to keep it that way, and he would continue to do so for as long as it took to neutralize all the people who conspired to murder his team. Once his mission was complete, he would just wake up in Iran. A coma was an airtight alibi. And he had a credible doctor to corroborate.
Slipping out of bed fully dressed, he pulled on his hiking boots and looked out the bedroom window. Dawn’s first light was just breaking over the lake. The water took on a golden shimmer and seemed to summon all living creatures to come forth for a dip. Lake Maroo was a pristine paradise. He could see why Commander Potchak spent virtually every weekend here in his cabin. It was just what one needed to balance out a Quantico workweek. At least it would have been for Odi. Obviously Maroo’s charms were insufficient to stifle Potchak’s ravenous greed.
Odi emerged from the cabin’s only bedroom to inspect the status of his project. Potchak was still there, of course. He was standing exactly as Odi had left him eight hours earlier—suspended on his tiptoes by the noose around his neck.
Odi walked to the center of the room to appraise the condemned man. The fact that this was the traditional time for military hangings had not been lost on his prisoner. Potchak’s face was beaded with sweat despite the morning chill and he had dark bags beneath his bloodshot eyes. Physically, Odi thought, he looked just about right.
Odi stretched his arms over his head and let out a contented yawn as he studied Potchak’s eyes. It was a tactical ploy, designed to stress the contrast of their relative positions while simultaneously giving Odi time to evaluate his opponent. Odi liked what he saw. He could begin—but he wouldn’t. Not just yet.
Odi had not said a word to his former boss since capturing him at dusk. He would say nothing now. Better to let him stew a few minutes more. He took a moment to reflect on the events that had transpired, letting tension mount.
Capturing Potchak had been surprisingly easy. When the commander returned to the rustic cabin from a day of bow hunting, Odi was waiting, hidden behind the dense foliage of a Fraser Fir. The moment his boss turned his back to un-strap the buck from the hood of his Jeep, Odi Tasered him in the back. As Adam would have said, it was a piece of pumpkin pie.
~ ~ ~
When Potchak awoke to a choking sensation his first crazy thought was that the deer had somehow turned the tables on him, for he was the one who had been strung up. He had no idea how he had gotten there, but there he was, hanging by his neck at the end of a rope in the main room of his cabin. He reached for the noose around his throat as his feet sought the floor but found his arms bound tightly behind his back. His toes made blessed contact and he pressed down vigorously and managed to ease some tension out of the rope. Potchak gasped a few breaths and sought to maintain his balance. A few seconds in that position were all it took to realize that remaining elevated and balanced enough to breathe was going to inflict a constant mental and physical strain.
He immediately recognized this as a stress position. The kind often used in interrogations. But his mind did not dwell on that. For as surprising as his new predicament was, the next sight that met his eyes as he glanced around was even more so. He found himself looking at a ghost.
Odysseus Carr was dead. Yet there Odi was, sitting beside him in an armchair, casually reading a book. Was this hell? Was this to be his special torment? Was he doomed to spend eternity struggling to breath while his victims looked on in peace?
Potchak groaned through the duct-tape that gagged his mouth.
Odi continued to read in silence without looking up.
~ ~ ~
After finishing Follett’s latest thriller and breaking for a dinner he did not share—fresh venison steak—Odi retired to Potchak’s bedroom without a word. He was anxious to get started but knew that the interrogation was more likely to succeed if he gave his captive’s fears a chance to percolate. He wanted Potchak to contemplate the reversal of their positions as his terror fermented and his physical strength dwindled away.
Appraising the situation anew that morning, Odi found himself intrigued by the thoughts that must be going through Potchak’s mind. He reasoned that his boss must have spent much of his tiptoe time trying to guess the angle that would give him the best chance of saving his own neck—praying all the while that Odi would give him a chance to speak before he hoisted him up that last lethal inch. Odi was curious to learn what strategy Potchak chose, what ploy he would invoke. Potchak’s choice would tell Odi a lot about how he was perceived.
Would Potchak attempt to sway him through pity, through fear, or through greed? Would he offer Odi money? Apologies? Information? Sex? Would he try a power play and issue threats? Would he claim to be a victim himself? Or would he just beg?
Appraising his captive, Odi decided that it was time to find out. He grasped the rope that ran upwards from Potchak’s neck over the central rafter and down to a cleat that Odi had screwed to the far wall. He twanged it as though the rope were the string of a giant guitar. Potchak’s heels lifted further off the floor. Twelve hours of stretching had made no difference to the rope. It was still taut as a Sumo’s loincloth.
Odi walked over to the cleat and partially unwrapped the end—just enough for it to slip. He added enough slack to let Potchak slump from his tiptoes onto the balls of his feet and then re-secured the rope. Satisfied that Potchak remained utterly helpless but would now have the mental bandwidth to focus on something other than balance, he spoke for the first time since the capture. “Lest you get any bright ideas, the noose is tied so that it cannot be loosened or removed.”
Potchak grunted. Odi took this as a submissive sign. He untied Potchak’s left hand and used the extra rope to secure his right hand to the back of his leather belt. Then he ripped the duct tape from Potchak’s mouth in one swift move. It left a nasty red rash, but Potchak still looked relieved. Odi smiled with satisfaction. Then he walked behind Potchak and into the kitchen without another word, no doubt leaving his prisoner even further confused.
He watched Potchak through the doorway as he brewed a pot of strong coffee. Potchak did not try to turn around or speak. The former did not surprise Odi. His prisoner had no doubt suffered from a misstep or two during the night and learned to leave well-enough alone, even now that he was down on the balls of his feet. As for the latter, the silence, that, Odi was sure, was about to change.