by Tim Tigner
As he sat down to wait, Wiley felt butterflies begin to dance. His subconscious was voicing the words his conscious did not want to hear. Whatever happened next would be either very good, or very bad.
President Carver entered the study almost immediately through another door. Wiley caught a quick glimpse of the Oval before it closed. “Thank you for staying, Wiley. Please, remain in your seat.”
The windowless study had royal blue carpet and white plaster walls. The furnishings were handmade from gold upholstery and rich mahogany wood. Wiley was pleasantly surprised to detect the scent of cigar smoke, though the cleaners clearly tried to overpower it with room freshener and furniture polish. He always found deep satisfaction in the discovery of another man’s peccadilloes.
As Carver sat opposite him in a matching chair, Murphy entered with two glasses of freshly squeezed orange juice. Wiley would have preferred another cup of Joe to the president’s favorite drink—the only C Wiley ever craved was caffeine—but he accepted it with a grateful smile, saying, “Perfect,” after savoring a sip. He set down the glass, smiled at Carver, and tried to relax.
“A privilege of the office,” Carver concurred. Then he hardened his features and cut to the chase.
“We didn’t predict the fall of the Berlin Wall or the collapse of the Soviet Union. We didn’t foresee 9/11 or Hamas. Yet even with all that precedent, I’m going to look like one of history’s greatest fools if al-Qaeda pulls off something major on US soil after my own FBI Director has spent the year blasting the airwaves and editorials with predictions of an impending attack.”
“With all due respect, Mr. President, that’s not necessarily true,” Wiley interrupted. “You just need to be seen taking a firm and active stand.”
Carver paused to consider Wiley’s words, but then forged ahead on a predetermined course. “I trust you didn’t hold anything back earlier in your briefing. You really have no idea when or where the next attack will come?”
“I could give you the techno-fluff we feed the media about increased chatter and prime targets of attack,” Wiley said, “but that won’t get you further in practical terms than a little common sense.”
“Still, you’re predicting that the next attack is coming soon, say within a few months?”
“I am, Mr. President.”
“Please elaborate.”
Wiley knew that he was on dangerous ground. He had to remain vague yet valuable, coy yet credible. “I wish I could, but all I have is intuition—the confluence of thousands of subliminal clues gleaned from the endless stream of reports crossing my desk.” With someone else, Wiley would have repeated the same statement another way, adding no facts while making his answer seem more complete. But he knew that tactic would not fool Carver, so he stopped.
Carver stared at him, and then seemed to make a decision. His stern look evaporated into his trademark smile and he said, “Well, it’s good to have a prophet on my team.”
“Thank you, Mr. President,” Wiley replied, struggling to suppress the glee erupting within at Carver’s choice of adjectives.
Wiley thought that was the end of the meeting, but then Carver continued. “If there’s one thing the base likes, one thing that will drive them to the polls next November, it’s a hellfire-and-brimstone prophet—assuming, of course, that terrorism still piques their interest.”
With that repetition and embellishment, Wiley felt a hot surge of adrenaline rush from his heart to the far ends of his body. Carver had said it. He had actually said it. Only thanks to a lifetime of practice was Wiley able to keep his poker face un-cracked.
Carver seemed to be reading his expression anyway. The president flashed him an amused smile. “I understand Stuart Slider is consulting for you now.”
Wiley was shocked. Carver was throwing all subtlety aside. This was unbelievable.
“You’re not my only source of information,” the president continued. “Anyway, I was glad to hear that. Stuart is very, very good.”
“Thank you,” was all Wiley could think of to say. He was elated beyond words, at least until his eyes drifted to the doorway of the chief of staff and remembered the price he had to pay.
Chapter 27
Annapolis, Maryland
STANDING THERE IN the ASIS boardroom, Cassi could not shake the feeling that the two CEOs had something dubious to hide—especially Rollins. He looked positively evil. She could tell that both men were a lot more scared than they were letting on and her instincts were screaming that that was important. But she had yet to pinpoint why. Were they just being coy because they were mighty captains of the defense industry and she was a woman? That was possible, but Cassi did not find it likely. Given the context, she felt that the very fact that they were trying hard not to betray their fear indicated a sense of guilt. Still, she was not there to investigate collusion, be it with Drake or against him. She was there to salvage her career and save two lives.
So far Cassi did not have the impression that she was doing well on either account. She would know for certain soon enough. She concluded the formal portion of her virtually impromptu presentation with what she hoped would be a provocative line. “One thing we do know for certain is the nature of the beast. Mark Drake was killed by a professional.”
Abrams and Rollins both continued to lean back in their leather chairs as she finished. Cassi felt a chill of disappointment. Her lure had not brought them forward. “But you don’t know which professional,” Abrams said after an uncomfortable silence. It was a statement of fact by a man unimpressed. “Nor do you know whom he was working for.”
“Or why,” Rollins added. “Yet you chose to warn us. That’s quite a leap.”
“Might even border on harassment,” Abrams said.
Cassi bit her tongue, reminding herself to stay on target even as she felt her FBI career slipping from her grasp. Their skepticism might not be personal. Perhaps these guys had endured a recent proctologic exam courtesy of another federal agency, perhaps the IRS. In any case, she had to deduct that her feed-them-the-facts approach had failed to light their fires. The fact that she’d had only hours to prepare it would not buy her any slack in Quantico. Whatever goodwill she had previously enjoyed, the daycare disaster had destroyed.
She weighed her options and decided to regroup to launch a second offensive from more familiar ground. She closed her eyes for a second, just long enough to slip into The Zone. She pictured Rollins and Abrams on her chessboard, looking like Laurel and Hardy. She leaned forward toward the obese Abrams as the fire reignited in her eyes. “You’re right,” she said. “There are dozens of reasons why someone might want to kill your colleague that have nothing to do with either of you. Why, there could be a hundred. So for the sake of argument, let us suppose that there is only a one-in-a-hundred chance that Drake’s killer is planning to shove a grenade up your ass. Are you willing to accept those odds, gentlemen? Are you willing to risk everything on a single roll of the dice? Or would you rather work with me to keep your proctologist happy?”
Rollins’ gaunt cheeks assumed a lemon-like pucker. He turned to Abrams, who shrugged his fleshy shoulders. “What do you know about the assassin, Agent Carr?”
That was more like it, she thought. She decided to skip the usual statistical qualifiers and give it to them with both barrels. She needed to make the assassin’s threat seem credible. To do that she needed to make the assassin feel real to them. Besides, if she got something wrong, nobody would know it until she caught him, and then no one would care. This time she leaned toward Rollins. “We’re looking for a white male in his thirties. He is a large man, about six foot one inches tall, with an athletic build. He keeps his hair short and does not wear glasses. He is skilled as an actor, and capable of convincingly altering both his appearance and his voice. He works alone on the basis of meticulous advance planning. He is highly disciplined, highly educated, and exceptionally creative. He is a techie, comfortable with everything from digital cameras to laptop computers. And he is a che
mist, capable of brewing sophisticated original ordnance. He is knowledgeable of investigative procedures and forensics. He is passionate about his work and yet coldly detached. In short, gentleman, he is as serious as the death he deals. Of all the profiles I've worked over the years, this is the man I would fear the most if he was after me.”
During her speech, Cassi was delighted to see both faces begin to crack. Now she leaned back in the plush chair and hoped for an inviting fissure.
Abrams offered one. “What are you asking of us?”
“I want free reign to work with the heads of your corporate security to augment your personal protection. I want them and everyone working for them to know that my orders are to be accepted without pushback.”
“We’re a defense contractor,” Rollins said. “Our security is already top notch. You must be aware of that.” Then he walked right into her trap. It couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy, she thought. “I’m sure that even with your gold shield you didn’t get your gun past my men.”
Cassi smiled and opened her purse. “You’re right. They asked me to leave my firearm at the door.” She withdrew three lipstick tubes from a side zipper pocket. Then she added, “Hexamine, nitric acid, and ammonium nitrate,” as she set each down like a missile on Rollins’ precious table. “I may as well be packing a rectal grenade.”
Rollins grew a shade paler, but he was not finished yet. “Do I understand that it’s our personal safety rather than our companies’ security that you are worried about?”
“That’s correct.”
“Well, then you needn’t worry about me. I’m scheduled for two-weeks of annual leave starting Monday. There’s no reason I can’t start a few days early. I will be staying at my Florida beach house, which may as well be Fort Knox. It’s built to withstand category-five-hurricane winds, and the security system is state of the art.”
“That sounds like a promising start,” Cassi said. “The important thing in the short term is to get you out of your usual routine. Do you have room at your beach house for a contingent of guards?”
“As many as you’d like.”
“Tell me about the place.”
“I’ve got two acres of oceanfront property on a semi-private beach.”
“Semi-private?”
“Velveteen Beach is a three-mile-long, one-bridge island separated from the Florida mainland by the intracoastal waterway. The houses on Velveteen are few and far between, numbering only eighteen in total.”
Cassi nodded. “Very well. I’d guess six guards should be able to secure a location like that around the clock. With your permission, I’ll ask your Director of Security to make those arrangements.”
Rollins nodded.
Cassi turned to the larger CEO. “What about you, Mister Abrams? Do you have any vacation coming?”
“No, and I’m afraid that taking leave is out of the question at the moment. But I can confine myself to my home and the office, with a short helicopter ride in between.”
“I’ll need to inspect both sites. Will you be flying home tonight?”
“Yes.”
“May I join you?”
Abrams stroked his chin between a pork-chop thumb and two sausage fingers.
“I’ll only need a couple of hours if your majordomo will cooperate,” Cassi added.
“All right.”
“So we’re agreed then,” Rollins said. “I’ll leave immediately on vacation in the company of the dirty half-dozen. And Miss Carr will accompany Abrams home tonight to help wall him in.”
As Cassi concurred, Abrams asked, “Agent Carr. I’m assuming that you will be able to wrap this up in a week or so. Is that correct?”
Cassi attempted to give a nod that conveyed more confidence than she felt.
“Then I’ll give you my full cooperation—until a week from this Friday,” Abrams said. “If I haven’t heard the all-clear by then, I’m going to make a call to your boss.”
As he spoke those closing words an odd look passed between Abrams and Rollins. Cassi did not know what it meant, but she left the meeting with an unsettling impression. It was almost like she was being used …
Chapter 28
Velveteen Beach, Florida
ODI PAUSED WITH his finger on the trigger. Something did not feel right. He squirmed to adjust the pile of sand beneath his chest and then added a few scoops. He wanted to take more weight off his elbows, leaving his arms completely relaxed. Satisfied with his position, he closed his eyes and focused on the ocean’s swishy roar as he slowly inhaled and exhaled a deep breath of salty air. It was time.
He refocused his gaze on the laptop lying before him on the dune and squeezed the joystick’s trigger. Four yards to his left the rotor of a remote-controlled helicopter spun to life, kicking up a cloud of fine white sand. Odi squeezed harder and the craft began to rise. He took it straight up, easing off on the trigger only when the altimeter display on his computer screen indicated a height of forty feet. Forty was what he needed to clear the neighboring rooftops with a margin of safety.
Focusing on the screen’s main display, he watched his own prone form come into focus as the helicopter leveled off. There between the rolling dunes of Velveteen Beech he looked like a single hotdog in a sea of buns. He smiled, pleased that the hobby-shop salesman had not talked him out of an extra four-hundred bucks in vain. Even at night the picture quality transmitted from above was remarkably clear. He could trace the individual camouflage splotches on his desert BDUs.
He used the joystick’s thumb lever to orient the helicopter due south and then pushed the handgrip forward. The bird responded like a dream. It was both nimble and quick.
Odi had positioned himself three houses down from Rollins’ place where he still had line-of-sight to the CEO’s third floor across half a mile of sea-oat-covered dune. He had reconned the beach from Charlotte’s cottage using Google’s keyhole satellite shots. With those photos, it took him just ten minutes to find what looked from above like the perfect spot, and the reality on the ground had not disappointed him.
He had exercised extreme caution getting to Velveteen, especially for the last few miles. Odi reasoned that if he were in charge of Rollins’s security, he would have a man watching the bridge through a long-distance lens. So he parked his rental car at a motel on the mainland and crossed the river on the bridge’s scaffolding just as the sun was going down. It was the time of day when everyone’s eyes played tricks and the ground was still hot enough from the Florida sun to make infrared binoculars worthless.
Once on the island, he low-crawled sniper style most of the way from the bridge to his chosen location, taking his time, moving bush to bush when no one was around. The size of the pack he had carried would have earned him a kick in the balls from every drill sergeant he ever knew, but for this operation he needed every bit of the bulky cargo stored therein so he had risked it. If detected, he had planned to pretend to be the nephew of a local resident, a soldier on leave preparing for upcoming Special Forces training. But he made it to the beach without incident or challenge. Once settled into his pre-selected spot on the dunes, he had spent six virtually motionless hours studying his target through a telescope lens while struggling to ignore the constant nipping of sand fleas.
The presence of attentive guards working three-man shifts bothered Odi. It was not that they posed any particular threat or challenge. He had built his plan around them. Rather, he was irked because their presence reconfirmed that neither Rollins nor Abrams intended to come forward and confess. That was a disappointment if not a surprise. Ayden had predicted as much, but it still blew Odi’s mind. How could the condemned men ignore him once they had seen the explosive video of their lackey and the encore with their colleague? Odi retained hope that Abrams would come forward tomorrow after Rollins’s death, but he would not hold his breath.
Odi tracked the helicopter’s position by comparing what he saw on the laptop screen to the printout he had made from the Google satellite shot. As the
neighbor’s swimming pool disappeared from the screen, he felt the thrill of the end game kicking in. A moment later the helicopter was over the target.
Rollins’ beach house was a beautiful three-story white structure, with multiple balconies and lots of floor-to-ceiling tinted glass. Looking at it from his flea-ridden dugout in the sand, Odi could not help remembering that he had passed up the opportunity to spend his life in one of those. He had passed on the beach to work for Potchak. The thought set his blood aboil. Only with effort was he able to push his feelings of betrayal aside and refocus his attention completely on the mission at hand.
He could see the whole oceanfront side of the mansion from his position in the dunes. When the guards were out of sight, it looked more like the setting of a romance novel than a thriller. “Except for the damn fleas,” he added aloud, swatting for the thousandth time. Once the sun had set and the lights had gone on, it had not taken him much time with the telescope to figure out which balcony belonged to the master bedroom. Now that the lights were out, he steered the helicopter to where they had been.
He tried to position the helicopter directly over the master balcony, but gusting winds were creating a dangerous stability challenge. For this to work he had to align it midway between roof and rail and perpendicular to the master bedroom’s sliding glass door. He cursed himself for forgetting to factor wind into the equation when designing the payload. If, after all he had gone through to get here he had to abort his beautiful plan on account of something as mundane as wind, he would go berserk. That would be like scrapping the moon shot for a flat tire.