by J. C. Fields
Joseph frowned. “In what way?”
“While nothing is conclusive, when they searched his apartment, they found references to a group mentioned in several of the documents found in Dorian Monk’s cabin. Plus, Laramie, Wyoming was where we first found Monk. I don’t believe in coincidences gentlemen, only connections. We’ll start there.”
Chapter 30
Lander, Wyoming
The cell phone recording acquired by CNN showed a man in a blue polo shirt withdrawing his gun and moving toward his left. The video, now on YouTube with over a hundred thousand views, played on a sixty-five-inch large flat-screen TV in Kevin Marks’ office. He hit the reverse button on the remote and returned to the point where the video started. He pressed the play button and watched it again. Pausing the forward motion, he stared at the frozen image of the man and cursed under his breath.
“Dammit, it is him.”
He clenched his fists as he watched the video again. “Something has to be done about this bothersome FBI agent.”
He stopped the video and switched the input on the TV to his local cable company and Fox News. He punched in a number and made a call. It was answered on the fourth ring.
“Blake.”
“We need to talk.”
“So, talk.”
“Not on the phone.”
There was a sigh and a long pause. “Where?”
“Wanda’s Diner, thirty minutes.”
“You’re buying lunch.”
After ending the call, Marks muttered, “Probably not.”
***
Wanda’s Diner resembled an old fashion greasy spoon common in the 1950s, mainly because it had been built in the fifties and received little remodeling since its original opening. Booths lined the wall near the front entrance with four top tables in the middle of the room. A counter with stools for single diners faced the kitchen.
Kevin Marks sat in the farthest booth from the front door as Fremont County Sheriff Roger Blake entered. Blake waved at the café owner and sauntered toward the booth. He stopped every once in a while, taking his time to speak to many of the café’s patrons. Eventually, he sat across from Marks. “So, talk.”
“I need to know the name of the FBI agent who stopped the kid at Mount Rushmore.”
“Why?”
“I have my reasons.”
“How do you know he was an FBI agent?”
“Because it’s the same guy who chased Monk out of Laramie.”
Blake stared at Marks and remained quiet while a waitress placed a white ceramic mug in front of him.
After she poured coffee from a glass decanter, she said, “Anything else for ya, hon?”
He looked up. “Not right now, Linda. Give me a few minutes.”
She took the decanter and walked to another customer.
“That agent was with Homeland Security.”
Marks shook his head. “Have you looked at the video yet?”
“Several times. I didn’t recognize him.”
“It’s him. CNN identified the man as a federal law enforcement agent. To me, that means FBI. I need to know his name and where he lives.”
“I’ll get you his name, but where he lives is up to you. I’ll only do so much.”
“And I’ll remember that next election day.”
Blake sipped his coffee. “Be careful, Kevin. The next sheriff might not be as forgiving as I am to your extra-curricular activities.”
Marks stood and said, “Get me his name.” He stared at the sheriff for several seconds and then walked toward the café’s front door.
The sheriff continued to sip coffee while he contemplated not running for the position again. His loathing of Marks grew every day.
After finishing his coffee, he threw three dollars on the table and headed back to his office to start making phone calls.
***
Late afternoon found Marks working in his office at the store. His cell phone sounded with an incoming call. After glancing at the caller ID, he answered, “What’d you find?”
“The agent’s name is Sean Kruger. There’s a problem, though.”
“What?”
“He’s retired.”
Marks fell silent at this news. “Retired? Since when?”
“My source wouldn’t say. But he is no longer an active agent.”
“Did you find out where he lives?”
“I told you that was up to you. I did what you asked me to do. I found his name.”
“How’s the name spelled?”
Blake told him.
Marks ended the call without further comment and went to the computer on his desk. An hour later, he’d found fifteen Sean Krugers across the country, none of which were the right age or identified as working for the FBI. He tried LinkedIn, Facebook and several other websites dedicated to locating individuals. None gave him the address or even the city where the agent lived. He found zero references to siblings, a spouse or children. His frustration grew by the second.
His next search used Google and the results were the same. Nothing.
He would need to figure it out another way.
***
JR Diminski observed the pop-up alert at the bottom right corner of the middle monitor on his workstation. He clicked on the icon and read the message. With a frown, he reached for his cell phone.
“Kruger.”
“Who do you know in Wyoming?”
“Beg your pardon?”
“Someone in Lander, Wyoming is burning up the internet searching for you.”
“Huh.”
“Know anybody there?”
Kruger grew quiet for a few moments. “Lander is the county seat for Fremont County. The county where Monk’s cabin is located.”
“Uh-oh.”
“Yeah, uh-oh.”
“Did you piss someone off while you were there?”
“Probably. Thinking back on it, the sheriff was way too interested in the boxes Jimmie found.”
“What do you mean, too interested?”
“He got in my face and demanded the boxes be transferred to his office for investigation.”
JR chuckled. “I’m sure that went well for him.”
“Not really.”
“Do you think it might be him?”
“Don’t know. Maybe.” He paused. “Keep an eye on it, JR.”
“Always.” He paused. “Hey, Sean.”
“Yeah.”
“Are we official yet?”
“Should be sometime tomorrow. Joseph sent a text message to let me know the president would be signing the Executive Order around noon.”
“Then what?”
“We get busy.”
JR smiled.
Chapter 31
Fremont County, Wyoming
Tom Shark stood with his hands on his hips staring at the small cabin. With this his first major investigation as a Special Agent in Charge, he felt a little overwhelmed and intimidated. Five agents, all in blue windbreakers with FBI in bold letters on the back, busied themselves in and around the structure.
One mental exercise that had served him well over the past decade came to mind. The question: What would Sean Kruger do?
Earlier in his career, he never hesitated to call his mentor and ask for advice. Now with Kruger retired, Shark felt a bit lost.
As he gazed around the area, the answer came almost as if Kruger had whispered it in his ear. “Look outside the box.”
Dressed in jeans, hiking boots and his own navy windbreaker, Shark set out to search a larger area around the cabin. Their original search area comprised an area with the cabin in the center and a radius of only fifty feet.
An hour later he noticed a patch of ground one hundred yards north of the small building which seemed to have been recently disturbed. Few leaves littered the area and the grass looked new. He retrieved a long probe from the back of the forensic team’s SUV and pushed the tip gently into the soil of the disturbed area. After several attempts he struck something h
ard only four inches beneath the soil’s surface. Continuing to utilize the probe he determined the object was relatively flat, hard and square.
An hour later, after taking numerous pictures of the site and carefully removing the soil, two of the forensic techs lifted the box out of the ground.
Shark said, “Looks like a fireproof file box.”
Lisa Sural, a twenty-something blue-eyed forensic tech from Denver, replied, “My guess is the key we found hanging on a nail in the kitchen area will fit it.”
After placing the box on the only table in the cabin, they took more photographs and cleared the excess dirt away. Sural said, “We need to get this to a lab and see if we can raise any latent fingerprints.”
With a nod, Shark said, “See if the key works, then we can photograph the content and ship it back to Denver.”
The key did work and contents of the box—a stack of paper roughly three quarters of an inch thick—were removed. Over two hundred pages were then photographed one by one and kept in the original order. During this process, Shark skimmed several of the pages and grew more excited with each one. Turning back to Sural, he asked her to join him outside.
When they were out of earshot of the other techs, he asked, “Can you get those pictures of the documents to the cloud so we can have someone at Quantico start examining them?”
She nodded. “I can with my satellite phone, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“It is.”
“Sure. As soon as we finish, I’ll transfer the file.”
“Good. I’ll make the call and let them know they’re coming.”
Thirty minutes later she told him the pictures were in the bureau’s cloud-based file system and gave him the name of the file.
“Thanks, Lisa.”
When she returned to the cabin, Shark dialed a number on his satellite phone and waited.
***
Three men dressed in forest-camo fatigues watched the FBI activity surrounding the cabin. One was short and stocky with broad shoulders and narrow hips. As he watched the activity through binoculars, he said in a low voice, “Once they have everything loaded in the SUVs and prepare to leave, we’ll take them out.”
The other two men nodded in agreement.
***
Shark’s call went straight to the cell phone of the head of the forensic lab at Quantico, who answered on the fourth ring.
“Forensics. This is Charlie Craft.”
“Charlie, Tom Shark. How are you?”
With a smile, Craft said, “Great, Tom. It’s been a while.”
“Yes, it has. I’ve been assigned to Denver as the new SAC.”
“Congratulations. I guess you heard Sean Kruger retired.”
“Yeah, I know. Have you spoken to him?”
“Not yet. I’m kind of afraid to call him.”
“Don’t be, he’d love to hear from you. I spoke to him just the other day.”
“Good, I will. Why the call?”
“We found a buried fireproof and waterproof file box on Dorian Monk’s property. I didn’t read all of the documents, but on the few pages I looked at, Alan Seltzer’s name appears several times.”
“How fast can you get them here?”
“That’s why I’m calling. We’ve uploaded photos of the documents to our cloud storage and wanted to give you the file name.”
“Great. I’m ready when you are.”
Shark gave him the information and then said, “We’re getting everything we found of value loaded right now for the trip back to Denver. We’re planning on testing the file box to see if we can raise…”
Automatic weapons fire could be heard in the background of the phone call. When Shark did not finish his statement, Charlie checked to make sure the call was still active. It was. Unintelligible shouts could be heard along with the sound of small weapons fire. More shouts and the sound of automatic weapons returned. Finally, there was only silence. The call ended suddenly, and Craft reached for his desk phone.
***
The first rounds of gunfire struck the SUV in the engine compartment sparking a fire in the gas line. Coolant leaked on the ground as the fire spread. Ducking behind the big vehicle away from the gunfire, Shark drew his weapon and fired in the direction of the sound. Lisa Sural took several bullets in the chest as she loaded evidence boxes into the back of the SUV. She collapsed next to where Shark stood.
More gunfire came from his left. These rounds struck Shark in the head and upper torso—he was dead before he hit the ground. The other four FBI agents went down one by one as they defended themselves. With only handguns against AR-15 style rifles, it was an unfair fight.
The firefight lasted less than thirty seconds and quiet returned to the wooded landscape surrounding the late-Dorian Monk’s property. The ever-present sound of wildlife in the background remained still, giving the scene a surrealistic feel. Three men dressed in forest camo outfits approached from three different directions, training their weapons on the prone and still FBI agents. As fire consumed the FBI vehicle, they checked each agent to make sure none survived.
The short stocky man with the wide shoulders checked the last agent near the cabin. The wounded man stared up at his assailant with a defiant expression and blinked once. His reward for surviving the initial attack was an AR-15 pointed at his head and one bullet fired.
When the SUV fire burned itself out and the background noise of birds and small animals scurrying about returned, the three assailants were gone along with all the evidence gathered by the now dead FBI team.
Another three hours would pass before first responders arrived at the scene.
Chapter 32
Washington, DC
Charlie Craft listened as details of the massacre in the forest of Fremont County, Wyoming became clear. The phone call came from the individual he’d contacted about the interrupted call and the gunfire he’d heard in the background. The fact he might have been on the phone with Tom as the FBI agent died intensified the numbness he felt.
He asked, “Did they recover any of the evidence Tom told me about?”
Executive Assistant Director for Science and Technology Denise Perkins hesitated before she answered. “No. From what I was told, one of the SUVs they arrived in was burned. There appeared to be boxes of paper in the back.”
“Okay, so the file they uploaded might be the only evidence we have left?”
“It would appear so. Have you looked at it?”
“Just a cursory glance. Why?”
“The director’s ordered a full court press on this. He’s assigned over a hundred agents to the investigation. My suggestion would be for you to get your team started on the file right away.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Charlie…”
“Yes.”
“I know you and Tom were close. Let’s get these bastards for his sake.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
The call ended and the emptiness inside Charlie Craft intensified. He glanced at the clock on his desk—it would be just past six p.m. in the Central Time Zone. He took his cell phone out, found the number he needed and pressed the send icon.
***
“Kruger.”
“Sean, it’s Charlie Craft.”
Kruger smiled. “Charlie, it’s been a while. How are you?”
“Sean, I don’t have good news.”
A frown replaced the smile. “Oh—what’s happened?”
“Have you heard about a team of FBI agents being ambushed in Wyoming?”
“No. Again, what happened?”
“Five agents were at Dorian Monk’s cabin when they were shot and killed by unknown assailants.”
“Dear God.”
“Thomas Shark was among those agents.”
Kruger went silent, unable to respond right away. It took several moments for him to trust his voice not to break. “When did this occur?”
“Earlier today.”
Taking a deep breath, Kruger felt a pang of gu
ilt about his status as a retired agent. “Who’s in charge of the investigation?”
“Don’t know yet. I was just told about it and thought I should let you know before you heard it on the news.”
“I appreciate that, Charlie. I really do.”
“There’s one more thing you need to know.”
“What’s that?”
“Tom called me just before the attack and told me they found a buried file box about one hundred yards from the cabin. They took photographs of the pages and uploaded them to the bureau’s cloud-based server.”
Kruger straightened.
Charlie continued, “My department has been ordered to start going through those files immediately.”
“Okay, sounds reasonable.”
“Uh…”
“What is it, Charlie?”
“Uh—I—uh…”
“Spit it out.”
“I know you’re retired and all that, but if you had access to the file, do you think you and JR could go over it? You know, second set of eyes, so to speak.”
Realizing Charlie was violating every rule in the FBI handbook and jeopardizing his career with the bureau, Kruger said, “Send it, Charlie. I won’t tell a soul.”
“I can’t send it to you, but I can tell JR how to access it.”
“Even better.”
***
Sitting next to JR at his cubicle, Kruger watched the computer wizard’s fingers dance over the keyboard as he stared at the left monitor. Turning to his friend, JR pointed toward the screen. “I’ve got the file downloaded and saved to my server. I’ve covered my tracks so no one at the bureau will know it’s been accessed.”