Spy Thriller: The Fourteenth Protocol: A Story of Espionage and Counter-terrorism (The Special Agent Jana Baker Book Series 1)

by Nathan Goodman

  “Meaning?”

  “Meaning they’re in full body armor. Remember something, these guys don’t do pinpricks. If they detect danger, they’re going in, and going in hard. Flash bangs, stun grenades, pack-charges to breach doors, the whole thing.”

  “Jesus. They anticipate that much trouble?” said Jana.

  “No, they don’t. It will be fine. We do have a blind spot though.”

  “Oh great, what’s the problem?”

  “We can’t send you in there wearing a wire,” said Kyle. “They might sweep you for a transmitter. If you get seen, it’s got to come off like you and Cade are on a date. We can’t let them know the bureau is on to them. It’s a Friday night. Nightlife in Buckhead is in full swing. It should look fine. But . . .”

  Jana interrupted. “But what?”

  “But,” Kyle’s pure Savannah accent stretched the word into two syllables, “we can’t laser mic seventeen. We have agents stationed on all sides with laser mics so we can hear what’s going on everywhere else inside the building. But seventeen is an issue. It’s the only place we’ll be deaf to what’s going on inside.”

  “Dammit! That’s the only floor we really need ears in place. What if they grab us? Why can’t we laser mic seventeen?”

  “Virginia farm boys don’t play games,” said Kyle. “They’ve skinned the building’s outer windows on seventeen. The skin is a copper shielding designed to block surveillance and trap any sounds, especially from laser mics. We can’t even see in there, much less hear. Just stay focused. Don’t lose sight of the prize. You know as well as I do, at around 8:45 a.m. Eastern tomorrow, another attack is going down. We have to get our hands on that data. Without it, we’re blind. Everything is riding on this. Everything.”

  Jana responded, “Oh, is that all? Well, at least there’s no pressure.”

  “You can do this.” Kyle looked out at the skyline, deep in thought. “Latent called earlier,” he said. He turned to look Jana in the eye. “After you’ve gotten the data and you’re on the outside, you two will be picked up by a van, a minivan.”

  “What are you talking about? Who’ll be inside the minivan? Bob Marley?”

  “Not exactly,” said Kyle. “This guy is a little more hardcore than Bob Marley. This is the guy Latent mentioned to us earlier, Uncle Bill.”

  “Ah, so let me get this straight,” replied Jana, “Director Latent wants me to do like this high-level espionage stuff. Go into a secure building that’s run by the most sophisticated spy agency in the world, steal some of their secret data, then come outside and hand the data to some guy in a minivan named Uncle Bill?”

  Kyle laughed. “Yup, pretty much. But seriously, Latent said this guy was his roommate at Georgetown. He’s NSA, and he’s the best there is. If anyone can decrypt that data, it’s him. And something else, no one else knows Uncle Bill is here in Atlanta right now. Not even the NSA. Latent is growing paranoid. He doesn’t know who to trust anymore.”

  Jana thought about that a long moment. “Let me ask you this. I thought the NSA couldn’t operate within the borders of the United States. Doesn’t this sort of violate that wee little principle?”

  “Latent says he’s going to do whatever it takes to stop these attacks. He says the gloves come off,” said Kyle.

  “What do you think he means by that?” said Jana.

  “It means he doesn’t care what we have to do, even if we have to break the law. He will stop this terror cell, no matter what. His job be damned.”

  Jana looked rattled. “He said that? Exactly? Breaking the law?”

  “He can’t say what he knows he can’t say. No, he didn’t say that directly. But that’s exactly what he means. ‘The gloves come off’ means break, steal, kill. Anything and everything. He knows there will be a heavy price to pay in the end, but he’s willing to pay it. I’m willing to pay it too. I can’t look into the eyes of another mother whose child’s blood is smeared across the soles of my shoes and explain to her why I failed. I can’t—I can’t.”

  Cade walked out the sliding glass door and onto the back patio to find Kyle and Jana looking at one another in an abrupt silence. Kyle cleared his throat.

  Cade said, “Did I interrupt something? Cool Mac, how much time do we have?”

  “No worries, Romeo,” teased Kyle. “No, seriously, we’re going to be fine. We’ve got about thirty minutes before we leave. Then, it’s go-time. Oh, and both of you listen up. HRT is giving you twenty-five minutes to get in and out of there.”

  “What?” said Cade. “Why the timeline?”

  Kyle replied, “Remember, once you’re inside we won’t have any communication with you. You can’t carry anything electronic since it appears they track and monitor all of that. If you had any type of device on you, it might trigger an alarm somewhere. That means we can’t put a wire on you. It’s just too risky. The same is true for your cell phones. Go ahead and hand them to me and I’ll put them in my pack until you’re out of there. We won’t have comm with you. Other than listening in to what we can hear on the other floors, there’s no way we’ll know what’s going on once you enter the building. You’ve got to get in, grab that data, and get out without Virginia farm boys being any the wiser.”

  “Oh, you’re full of good news,” said Cade. “Shit. Twenty-five minutes should be plenty, but damn. Look, I’ve been thinking. The thing is, we can’t just sneak in there and download data off of Rupert Johnston’s laptop. It will be too obvious. The breach will be detected in the morning. They’d see what data was breached, and they’d put two and two together. They’d know the FBI or someone was onto them.”

  A vein in Kyle’s forehead throbbed. “But if they find out we’re onto them, the terror cell might not get further instructions from all those e‑mails going out. The break in communication could signal them to carry out their final, pre-planned objective, whatever that is.” He looked at Jana with immediate concern. “So what the hell do we do? Goddammit, why didn’t I think of that? We’ve got to get this data without being caught.”

  Cade put his hand on Kyle’s shoulder and joked, “You didn’t think of it because you never studied. And because you were so busy with women chasing you, you never had time to . . . well, never had time to think.”

  “All right, genius, what do we do?”

  For the first time in the investigation, Cade looked confident, almost as if he was now in his element.

  “We’re going to plant a virus on Johnston’s computer,” said Cade.

  Kyle and Jana’s eyes squinted, but Cade continued.

  “We’ll download the data first, plant a computer virus on his laptop, then get the hell out of there—simple. Why are you looking at me like that? Don’t you get it?”

  “No,” said Kyle.

  Cade laughed then glanced at Jana. “He never studied. Look, by planting the virus, it will screw the entire computer up. They won’t even be able to tell anything was downloaded. Just in case, we’ll download his entire hard drive. That way, even if they are suspicious, they won’t be able to know someone accessed his system with a specific agenda to download specific data. The assholes won’t know what we were after since we’ll download everything.”

  Jana put her hand on Cade’s chest, which sent goose bumps down his spine. “That’s brilliant, Cade, brilliant.”

  Cade turned three shades of red and averted his eyes, obviously proud of himself.

  “I’ll get it ready.” He started to walk away, but turned back. “Hey, shouldn’t Jana and I be seen in Buckhead first? You know, seen on a security camera or something, like we’re on a date? They might think to check that kind of thing out . . . assuming we get caught, that is. I mean, if we get caught, couldn’t the CIA access whatever security cameras they wanted? Wouldn’t they want to check out our story?”

  Cool Mac and Jana looked at each other. Each knew Cade had unearthed another critical point that they had missed.

  “Son of a bitch,” said Jana.

  35

&
nbsp; The MARTA rail system ran underneath Peachtree Street. In a difficult feat of engineering, this portion of rail line was tunneled after construction of the Atlanta Financial Center complex. Twenty-five years earlier, Atlanta’s then mayor argued that the city should fund the extension of the MARTA rail into Buckhead prior to the construction of the huge glass, marble, and steel buildings. But unchecked corruption that plagued Atlanta’s city government at the time prevented the approval.

  Straight across Peachtree Street’s six lanes from the Financial Center was Thoughtstorm’s corporate headquarters. The towering building’s shadow darkened a wide swath of Buckhead, Atlanta’s premier business district. The Buckhead area was also well-known for courting the nightlife crowd. Upscale bars and dance clubs abounded in the ’80s and ’90s, but many of the clubs had been swallowed by real estate deals promising to usher in an era of businesses and expensive restaurants. Still, a few clubs survived.

  Jana plopped in the passenger seat of the car.

  “Okay, Cade, we’re on our big date now. Where to, you big lug?”

  She had grown fond of teasing him. And, if the truth be known, she was enjoying being with him—there was something about his innocence. She began to realize it was a waste of time to search for a great-looking guy when instead she should look for someone who made her happy.

  “Well,” he said, “there’s always Lulu’s Bait Shack.” And off they went on their first “date” to a place known more for its red-punch alcoholic drinks served in a fish bowl than anything else. Turning onto Pharr Road, Lulu’s was just a couple of blocks down on the left. The location was perfect. They would go in and mill around, being sure to be caught on a few surveillance cameras. Then it was just a few blocks’ walk to Thoughtstorm and up onto its ominous seventeenth floor.

  The streets were crowded as they walked towards Lulu’s. Just outside the door, they both turned and looked high over their shoulders at the hulking building silhouetted against the dark night sky. Dimly lit clouds rolled behind the building and continued on their northeast path, unconcerned about the trouble brewing below. Yet inside that building was a world of conflicting forces. Most of the functions of the e‑mail service provider company were geared towards selling e‑mail software and services to many of America’s largest corporations. The seventeenth floor, however, housed the CIA, the very heart of what terrorists around the world called The Beast. As far as the FBI could tell, the seventeenth floor was pure Central Intelligence Agency. It also appeared that the terror cell was still unaware the CIA was secretly behind their funding—funding that Stephen Latent thought of as an abomination against the American people.

  Cade shuddered to think of the task in front of them. Standing in front of one of the old hangouts of his drinking days, he never imagined life could get so complicated, so serious. By instinct, Jana took his hand as they stood at the entrance waiting to be carded by the bouncer. Cade was drunk with the smell of her hair. It was like an intoxicating infusion of fresh jasmine vine splashed with salty beach air. He was quite taken with her, and she knew it. He just didn’t want to make a fool of himself. They descended the handful of stairs that went down to the club and went inside.

  36

  Thirty minutes later, the couple left the club and walked down Peachtree. If ever Cade felt like he was being watched, now was that time. Six sets of FBI snipers were deployed on rooftops, each sniper with a complimenting spotter, an agent trained to assist with visualization of targets and communications with other agents. Binoculars focused down from different angles. Lots of encrypted radio chatter was ongoing as groups of agents communicated back and forth. But to Cade and Jana, there was only the whooshing sound of a passing bus, a car horn in the distance, and the dull hum of music permeating from nightclubs in the neighboring blocks.

  There were four additional HRT teams deployed at three hundred and sixty-five degrees around the building. Each team pointed a laser mic at various floors, listening for anything unusual. The agents of the Hostage Rescue Team were keyed up. In their vernacular, cocked, locked, and ready to rock. These guys lived for this stuff. To an HRT member, this is what it was all about; this is where they earn their pay. For some HRT agents, this was their first live deployment, although every one of them came out of a military background and had extensive experience in live firefights in the Gulf War.

  Jana continued to hold Cade’s hand and led him down the wide stairwell off Peachtree Street to the MARTA tunnel below. The tunnel crossed underneath the road to the train platform on the other side. It was somewhat deserted at this time of night, with the exception of a few people waiting on trains, and one Kyle MacKerron, seated on a marble bench at the far end adjacent to the north-bound train line. Kyle wore an Atlanta Braves ball cap and carried a messenger bag over his shoulder. Inside that bag, there was certainly no laptop computer or notepad. Instead, Kyle’s MP5 subcompact machine gun lay quiet, hoping beyond hope not to be needed. One of his best friends was walking into harm’s way, along with a fellow agent. The tough part was Kyle couldn’t do anything about it. It wasn’t like they could avoid this situation. No, the danger was there, and it was something that had to be done. Cade and Jana would have to face it alone.

  Kyle watched them from the corner of his eye as he listened to his earpiece, awaiting the go-code from HRT that the two were cleared to enter the building. Once they entered, the twenty-five-minute countdown would begin, and there would be no turning back. HRT watched for the building’s guards to change shifts.

  Since Kyle was from Savannah and sported a southern drawl, the HRT guys honed in on him like a bug to a windshield; to them he seemed to be tough as nails, and they liked him from their first meeting. To lighten the tension of such an intense operation, HRT loved to invent amusing radio codenames for each other. Kyle would be identified as Savannah across any radio chatter. And it seemed only fitting to use call sign Paula Deen, in reference to the famous Savannah chef, to identify Agent in Charge Murphy. Although he too was tough as nails, he had a well-known passion for cooking—something his men kidded him about. He was on the twelfth floor of the Atlanta Financial Center and would be personally overseeing all ground operations.

  Then came a crackle in the encrypted radio signal as Kyle’s earpiece barked to life. “Savannah, cheese grits are ready for the oven,” chirped the radio. “Savannah, cheese grits are ready for the oven.” It was Kyle’s signal to give the green light to Cade and Agent Baker to make their entrance.

  Jana and Cade busied themselves looking at the rail line map. Kyle removed his baseball cap and ran his fingers through his hair—the signal to enter the building. Without glancing in their direction, he tapped his watch, a reminder that the twenty-five-minute countdown had started. Should they fail to exit the building in twenty-five minutes, the Hostage Rescue Team would breach the structure with what they called extreme prejudice. They turned and walked through the double sliding doors. To Kyle, the two looked perfectly natural and relaxed, but his insides were eating him alive.

  High atop the Atlanta Financial Center, an HRT sniper and his spotter focused. One watched through polished Steiner optics, the other through the Leupold scope of the sniper rifle chambered in .270 Weatherby Magnum.

  Cade and Jana disappeared from sight and moved farther down the long, underground hallway, which led from the station platform to the Thoughtstorm building. Since both buildings literally straddled the train line, these entrances became a mainstay for employees to commute to work using the MARTA rail. The HRT team thought it advisable for Cade and Jana to use this entrance so as to avoid the main entrance off of Peachtree Street. Entering down here, they’d be able to access the elevator up to seventeen without having to walk past building security.

  The white hallway stood in stark contrast from the dingy train platform. Its fluorescent lights glowed brilliantly through the translucent laminate material clinging to the ceiling and walls. Cade had never used the tunnel at night, and he squinted against the light. He fe
lt so exposed, like he was walking into the mouth of an alligator. Tiny hairs on the back of his neck stood tall.

  Kyle keyed the tiny transmitter in his left hand and whispered into the mic. “Paula Deen, this is Savannah. The cheese grits are in the oven. Paula D, the cheese grits are in the oven.”

  Cade swiped his keycard across the security bar, and they entered the elevator. It was the same elevator he had stepped into so many times before, but this time it felt like stepping into a honed glass coffin. His stomach had that feeling of having just dropped down the screaming hill of a roller coaster; only this time, the feeling wouldn’t go away.

  There was no turning back. He turned to look at Jana then began to reach for the button labeled 17 when her hand interrupted his. She darted her eyes upwards towards the small security camera peering at them from the corner. Knowing they may be watched, she wanted to make this look real. The appearance of being young and in love would work in their favor if they were caught, and it wouldn’t hurt if they seemed a bit drunk either. She feigned losing her balance to carry off the appearance of being a bit tipsy. But if she told herself the truth, the lines between working this undercover role versus falling for Cade were blurring. She leveled sultry eyes, put her hand on his chin, and kissed him. After a moment, she pressed the button herself, but since it was a secure floor, the elevator door didn’t move. Cade swiped his keycard, tapped his security code into the digital keypad, and the elevator was cleared. They were headed into uncertainty.

  37

  Jana kissed him again as they embraced for the camera. For Cade, the problem was deeper. He was falling hard; he couldn’t help it. And riding up this elevator-to-terror at the same time he was kissing the most beautiful girl in the world represented a paradox he couldn’t quite comprehend. He was dizzy. The elevator ride seemed to go on and on in an endless rise. Cade was falling in love with this girl whether she was acting for the cameras or not. When this whole damnable terrorism case was over, he was going to crash, and crash hard.