Mahegan said nothing.
“That’s enough,” Savage said. “Still doesn’t prove anything. All that bullshit is on the Internet in some fashion or another. Easy enough to put two and two together, anyway.” Savage would know. He was the one directing Mahegan.
“She wouldn’t know about Cassie,” Mahegan said.
“Bullshit. You guys have it written all over you. We just don’t say anything,” Savage said.
Mahegan looked at O’Malley, who simply shrugged in agreement with Savage. Draganova lifted her arms in a what do you have to say about that? gesture.
“Assuming you’re Draganova, what do you know about Gorham?”
“Everything. He’s told me everything, which is why I had to stop him.”
“He’s looking for the hacker . . . the cook. Does he know it’s you he’s looking for?”
“He may. I don’t know. He’s missing two women, remember? The CFO? But to get at your point, he was calling me several times a day before this all began. I’m assuming he has continued calling. He may draw a conclusion from that. At the very least, he suspects me. At the worst, he has been able to confirm it is me.”
Mahegan turned to O’Malley. “Sean, what do we have on Draganova from NSA, other intel files. Russian spy? What?”
“Nothing. Been looking. Everything on her is clean.”
“Someone who can go toe-to-toe with Gorham and Shayne on the Internet is good enough to clean up their Internet presence.”
“That’s an insult to Sean, Jake,” Draganova said. “He’s good. He would be able to find something on me, if it were to exist. Remember, I’ve seen him in action.”
Whether it was the realization that she might be Draganova or his imagination, Mahegan began to detect more of the Eastern European lilt. He superimposed the picture O’Malley had shown him onto her face. It fit. The hair and makeup were different, but otherwise it was the woman in the picture.
“Okay, so what’s his play?” Mahegan asked.
“That’s what I was trying to figure out. He scared me enough to go rogue on him, though. And now this,” Draganova said, pointing at the screens that showed the three separate theaters of operation.
Turning to O’Malley, Mahegan asked, “Where are we on Cassie and the Jordanians?”
The last check had shown them waiting for another Night Stalker and Army Ranger pickup. Every mission was a combat mission, Mahegan knew, and there would be nothing easy about getting a second sortie of helicopters into the Yazd beaten zone.
“Rangers just crossed the border into Iran. They took a different route. Cassie led the Jordanians about five miles north to a different pickup zone. She dropped a pin.” O’Malley turned the monitor so that Mahegan could see it.
She had led them through the rocky landing zone they had originally used, over a ridge, and into a valley beyond a tall mountain peak. The satellite showed them huddled in a defensive perimeter, facing outward. Iranian jets and airplanes zipped through the sky in a methodical grid search pattern. Mahegan figured that Cassie and the Jordanians had maybe an hour before they were located. Two hours before infantry could reach them, less if they were moving by helicopter. In his estimation, they were well camouflaged. If Cassie had not dropped the pin locator and if O’Malley had not zoomed in on that exact spot, it was doubtful whether he could find them just scanning the terrain. But he had to assume the Iranians had thermal capability, which would make Cassie and the Jordanians stand out to an average intelligence analyst. Mahegan felt the worry begin to boil in his stomach. He suppressed it.
But still, the concern was there. Two hours. Max.
They had about two hours until landing at Idaho Falls as well. Everything was going to come to a head all at once.
“Jake?” Draganova repeated.
“Yeah. I’m listening.”
“It’s all about Gorham. He claims to want a new society. To burn down the United States and rebuild it in the Utopian vision he has. That’s all bullshit. I think on some level he believes that, but mostly he’s a narcissist who just wants to be loved.”
“You asked me about my parents. I loved them. They’re with me. I’m Croatan. I have unique beliefs about death and dying. You asked me about Cassie. I love her, too. That’s a different deal. She knows the risks. Signed up for it. Can hold her own. My parents were slaughtered by the most vile and brutal people you could ever meet.”
“I’ve analyzed serial killers,” Draganova said.
“Gunther, who killed my father and raped my mother, would chew up, spit out, and then piss on whatever serial killer you think you talked to.”
“But you killed Gunther,” Draganova said.
“And delivered him to evil. Sent him straight to Hell without batting an eye. So don’t tell me about psychobabble. Tell me about Gorham. What’s his next move? What is he seeking? Does he want to destroy the world? Or is there an ulterior motive?” While Mahegan was a brute force actor, he also believed that the mind was an equally effective weapon. Knowing your enemy’s strengths and weaknesses was fundamental.
“I would never underestimate Ian,” she said. “He is a complicated man. Nothing is ever as it seems. No one predicted he would have the commercial success he’s had. And now he’s caught the entire world flatfooted.”
“Hey, Jake. General,” O’Malley said. His fingers were clicking away on the keyboard.
“What?” Mahegan asked. The boiling in his gut, his heart, renewed with ominous fervor.
“I just did a deep dive on one of the Russian nukes in Vladivostok. They’ve got massive firewalls at the system level, but I got fairly deep into one of the fringe missiles.”
“Just lay it out, Sean,” Mahegan said.
“This missile is on countdown. Four hours until launch.”
* * *
Gorham was back in spin cycle. He needed Draganova, but she didn’t answer his calls. She was ghosting on him. The pull. The allure. All of it was like a drug to him. He needed her voice like an alcoholic needs a drink. No twelve-step program for him. Gorham was decidedly not sober when it came to Draganova.
He tried some of his body scan meditation moves she had told him to use. The self-soothing of the body. Knuckles against the thighs. Eyes closed. Humming to himself. Hugging himself. Massaging his neck, his chest, his legs. None of it was working.
Instead he pulled up another video.
There she was. Dressed in a short black dress, showing ample thigh. Gorham licked his lips. The black hair, much longer, fell around her shoulder blades, swishing as she turned to reach for her notepad on the table. They were in an office building in Cincinnati. The Ohio River slipped by in the background. He listened to their dialogue.
“Do you know about Frederich Nietzsche’s Beast with Red Cheeks?”
“I do. Am I a beast?”
“Do you need to be valued, recognized? Is that where you derive your self-worth?”
“Maybe another box we need to open,” he said.
“You’re doing all the opening, Ian. I’m just giving you the box cutter.” Draganova led him down that primrose path of recognizing his own need for recognition.
“An apt metaphor. The box cutter.”
“Perhaps. But back on topic, is that why you have become so successful, Ian?”
“Perhaps. It’s not the money.”
“Then what is it, Ian?” Her voice was a seductive melody.
“It must be the social change?”
“Do you really care about change? Why not just give away your money to every poor person in the country? You make more money than most countries.”
“Because I have a vision.”
“So it’s about your vision?” Or is it about you?
“The vision. My vision.”
“You’re bringing genius to the world?”
“Exactly.”
Draganova paused for a long time before saying, “You are talking about broad, sweeping change that cannot be done normally. There are no legislative s
olutions.”
“No. It must be done through force,” Gorham said.
“Force? Military force?”
“Every type of force. It is a revolution. You can already see it happening. Half the country wants it, already.”
“And you can win over the other half through force?”
“My algorithms, my global social network penetration, my hackers. They all combine. I have a plan,” he said.
“We are back to this being about . . . you?”
Gorham paused again. “You may be right, but it is my idea, my vision, my plan.”
“Then just admit that you are the Beast with Red Cheeks, exactly as Nietzsche outlined. You require the fame, the attention.”
Gorham watched himself flinch at her unusual directness.
“But I want to make the social change. That counts for something,” Gorham said.
“It is a means to your own end. Recognition, adulation, adoration. You need those things, Ian. Why?”
Why? He snapped the tablet shut again and looked out the window, unable to see beyond the image in his mind. The box was open just like that. Stuff was scattered around on the floor of his brain. How did he get it back in? Could he function with such a cluttered workplace in his mind? The more clutter, the more difficult the functionality.
Spin cycle got everything flying around, made it harder to think, but so far, he’d been doing okay. Better than okay. The body scan meditation and self-soothing in the past had worked for him.
Military jets hung off the wings. He opened his tablet. The jets had picked him up over the Aleutians and escorted him over Mount McKinley, through Canada, and now The Grand Tetons loomed large out of the port window. The Manaslu Boeing 777 approached from the north. Two F-35s had swapped out multiple times as a KC-135 refuel aircraft had flown in serial with the six fighter jets, all taking turns with escort, rear security, and refuel operations. Landing, they looked like a military formation for a hero’s homecoming.
Gorham would be a hero soon. That much he knew. He was in the classic win-win position. Everything was recoverable and achievable. Building the Manaslu headquarters near Idaho National Labs was, of course, genius. Just bringing more genius to the world! That was all he was doing. Everything Manaslu could be wiped out with a single missile strike. He chuckled at the thought of military imaging experts looking at the purposefully leaked Russian 500/2000 target option maps. Idaho was wide open; only it wasn’t.
The plane touched down. Gorham’s black limo was waiting for him. He was thankful that none of the sleeper cells were in Idaho. He had seen enough combat for one lifetime. The point of the cells in the United States had been to wreak havoc, distract leaders, and create general chaos.
And they had.
A SWAT team motorcade was lined up behind his Tesla. Gorham smiled. He’d get his own O.J. Simpson slow speed chase. He thought about calling Mahegan, but decided against it. They had to treat him with kid gloves. He was the answer to their prayers, though they were praying to an empty altar. Gorham smiled as he deplaned. He lifted his hands to the sky, as if he were saying, “Shoot me!” A cool October wind from the Salmon Challis National Forest Mountains reddened his cheeks.
Stepping down from the airplane and stepping into the Tesla, Gorham said, “To the headquarters, of course.”
Stasovich occupied the front seat with Gorham in the back right, where they each belonged. The car pulled away slowly and the SWAT team convoy followed. Snipers were secured to the roofs of the boxy vehicles. Rifles poked from the windows of the police cruisers. The drive from the airport to the factory north of Idaho National Labs was under thirty minutes.
Helicopters buzzed overhead. Fighter jets left donut holes in the sky as they circled. Ten Blackhawk helicopters flew in formation low and slow, five on either side of the convoy. Delta Force snipers trained rifles in all directions.
Gorham felt like the most protected man in America. And well he should. He had convinced the American military that he was the key to stopping a nuclear attack on a defenseless United States. In less than two hours, the Russians were launching 2,000 missiles into the United States. Mutual assured destruction was neutered and the United States would be no more. Two thousand nukes from Russia without any possibility of recourse. He had brought genius to the world. Dismantling mutually assured destruction was brilliant. Gorham could blackmail the two most powerful countries in the world, the United States and Russia, if he wanted. So far, his odds were looking good. Russia was poised to execute his plan. The United States was dealing with him. Had allowed him back into the country. Was escorting him to his facility with the full protection of the military and all law enforcement personnel available. The world was at war and he was commanding the attention of the entire United States.
So are you the beast with red cheeks, Ian? Is this all about you?
Of course, it was all about him. Anyone would be insane to think otherwise.
They passed the Idaho National Labs facility and continued north until they reached the main Manaslu headquarters. The Idaho Falls Chamber of Commerce loved Manaslu because while he employed very few locals, he brought great international and national attention to the region. He had also set up a test facility for different merchandise delivery techniques. Drones, parachutes, hyper-loop, and a variety of other experimental formats. Some were in prototype and others were in full production mode. The ManaPack was a drone that could fly along a street and deliver packages wrapped in high-tech bubble wrap. The drone would drop the package with a small parachute deploying to slow its ascent. Like in the old days when a kid on a bicycle would toss newspapers into the bushes, except the ManaPack was highly accurate.
The Tesla turned into the gated facility. Gorham looked over his shoulder and saw a giant anaconda of vehicles snaking along behind him. The parking lot would not be large enough to hold them. To his front, snipers were on the roof of his compound. One had wedged his long rifle in the V of the M on the Manaslu logo with its white capped mountain peaks.
In the distance, media helicopters hovered, filming, recording history in the making. They weren’t sure what they were filming, but it had to be something newsworthy with the armada of military equipment escorting this lone car.
So, it’s all about you, Ian?
Gorham pressed some buttons on the digital touchpad screen in front of him. CNN popped to life and was showing the slow speed “chase” of his vehicle.
One of the anchors was saying, “We believe this is Ian Gorham. We saw the Manaslu plane land at the Idaho Falls airport. We saw him step off and raise his arms. We presume he was glad to be back. Our sources are telling us that he had been trying to negotiate a cease fire with the Russian, Iranian, and North Korean leaders, but that an American military raid of the meeting location actually disrupted the discussions, resulted in multiple foreign leaders being killed, and ultimately put the United States at risk. Now, our sources are telling us that Ian Gorham is the man who can save America. That Russia has either begun, or will soon begin, a nuclear countdown of the five hundred target option, which includes us right here in New York City.”
Of course, that’s what their sources were telling them. The stories were being pushed out on ManaSuite, just like Hootsuite, in preprogrammed fashion. As part of the planning over the past two years, Shayne had created a Web page that would appear on the third day of the operation—this morning—until a confirmed news source viewed it and reposted it in some fashion on ManaBook, Facebook, Twitter, or in the mainstream media. Shayne had programmed the post to then disappear, making the entire situation all that much more mysterious.
But the bottom line message of the news story, which fed into the revolution in the country was that Ian Gorham was the savior, not the bad guy; the American military was the bad guy, not the savior.
Perfect for his narrative.
Once the vehicle stopped in front of the floor to ceiling glass entrance, Gorham and Stasovich exited the vehicle. They had every type of
weapon trained on them. Every type of sensor was recording their every move. The most protected man in America. He wondered what analysts reviewing the satellites and intelligence feeds were thinking of Stasovich. He was a beast, battered and worn. Scars raked across his face. His left eye was shut. Towering over Gorham, Stasovich projected the image of a savior, as well. He had saved the chosen one. The man who could save the United States from annihilation. They made the perfect picture for the 24/7 news cycle. The genius and his protector. Mystery cloaked their appearance and their purpose.
Gorham approached the front doors of his facility, ready for the end game.
* * *
Mahegan and team had taken a more direct route to Idaho Falls. That, coupled with his instructions to have the fighter jets warn the Manaslu pilots that they had to follow certain air speeds to allow for proper security, gave Mahegan about an hour head start on Gorham.
The team had rested, researched, and planned during the remainder of the flight. During the research, O’Malley had been relentless.
They landed, ushered the C-17 into a giant Air National Guard hangar at the far end of the airport. As they deplaned, Ranger had insisted on sticking by Mahegan’s side. She limped and hobbled a bit, but he was impressed by her fortitude and welcomed her working through her wounds. She was a tough spirit. Standing in the hangar, Ranger sniffed the back of Mahegan’s hand, which was the size of an infielder’s glove. Cuts and scrapes were healing but still fresh. She licked his knuckles and nuzzled closer. He absently rubbed her ears and neck, glad to have the companionship as he thought through Gorham’s next move.
“Plan?” O’Malley asked.
“Boss man is going to stay in the command suite here, monitoring the op to get Cassie. That’s priority. You and Draganova here can push intel my way until I get Gorham to walk the plank. He’s mine.” Walking the plank was Mahegan’s terminology for entering the biometric chamber.
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