“I’ve got a lot to follow up on,” Carter said. “Review 911 calls. CIA’s records. I need a staff. Start with two. I’ll take the offices at the end of the hall.”
Red held up a hand. “Hold on. Your investigation is under the radar.”
Carter pointed to the hangar’s towering ceiling. “The Det is on Langley. And Quantico is just around the corner. Get me a special agent from Air Force Office of Special Investigations with a good investigative background. Experienced, but not old school. Someone hardheaded, with an attitude problem. The second can be junior grade. A yes-man.”
“How’re you gonna keep a lid on this?”
“You’re a fusion cell. There aren’t two people in the entire building that walk alike. No one will notice.” Carter stooped again, straightening the BDUs on the floor. “Lori? She OK?”
Red blinked at him as if coming back from a trance. The man really did need some decent sleep. “I’m a bad husband. My wife gets shot in the calf and I spent the night drafting a mission plan.”
Carter stretched a nitrile-gloved hand into the BDU chest pockets. Nothing. Then he checked a cargo pocket and felt the crackle of stiff paper. He pulled out a small scrap of white, a corner torn from a larger piece. On it was printed in black letters: Pick up the leaf on your way home. Mount one over the headboard. Burn the rest.
He held it in front of Red’s face. “Know what this means?”
A glimmer of recognition flashed across his face. “No. But I’ve got the same note. It was in my own locker in the armory. Found it not long ago.”
“And?”
“Didn’t know what it meant, so I threw it away. Thought maybe I’d remember later. Funny, though. My note was in Lori’s handwriting. This one isn’t.”
Carter folded the paper and slipped it into a plastic bag. Lori was wrapped up in Marksman’s death deeper than either of them knew, but Red always dismissed the idea. To him, she was faithful, infallible. But she’d only answered just enough of Carter’s questions to get by. Typical with agents who had worked in the field. But something had never settled in Carter’s gut about her. So that’s the way he’d left her, an open file in his mind, set aside till he could find the folder she fit into.
Carter set the boots back in the locker. His back to Red, he closed his eyes. “What did Lori say about the note?”
“What? Oh, I never asked.”
Carter whirled about and shoved Red in the chest. “What the hell is your problem? You find a cryptic note in your locker, in her handwriting, then the same note in a dead man’s BDUs—a man who died saving her just as much as you—and you’re not even a little suspicious? Whose side are you on?” He shoved Red again, but this time it felt like pushing against a concrete block wall.
“She’s my wife, Carter.”
“Yeah. Well, if she was mine, I’d be pruning her fingers with garden shears till she came clean.”
“You gotta trust your team.”
“Open your eyes, is all I’m saying. Be objective.”
Red took a step back, his gaze on the floor, words flat. “I trust her. Why can’t you understand that?”
“I swear, you’d make the world’s worst detective! How can an operator be such an idiot?” Carter balled up fists, though he had no intention of swinging at the man. “Are you covering for her?”
“What?” Red sneered. “No.”
Carter gripped his shirt front. “So help me, if you’ve got me running this investigation as some diversion, you will regret it.”
He locked hard into Red’s eyes. Still, nothing in the man’s manner raised a flag. But no one could be this blind, could they? The fact that Red didn’t appear evasive was infuriating. It didn’t match the circumstances.
Sergeant Jimmy Crawler stepped from the weight room into the hangar. Shit. This single-digit-IQ, poor excuse for an operator was the last man Carter wanted to tolerate now. In his single prior experience with the Det, the cheap-beer-guzzling lowbrow had been a constant irritant. His belly appeared less expansive now, but it still managed to stretch a large T-shirt that read keep calm and carry guns. His barrel chest seemed to jut a bit farther. Red must’ve been pressing him to slim down. Carter ignored him, but the stocky New Yorker stepped closer.
“Hey, Major?”
“Piss off, Crawler!” Carter shouted.
“I ain’t talkin’ to you, G-man.”
Red gripped Carter’s wrists. “We’re fine. Just a chat between friends.”
Crawler stepped even closer. His breath was garlic, tomatoes, and stale tobacco. “Youse sure, now? G-man’s wrinklin’ your shirt, Major.”
The grip on Carter’s forearms tightened, and pain shot like an ice pick through his funny bone. He let go. His eyes were hot. He turned to Crawler. “I said piss off!”
The man cocked a fist, but Red stepped between them. “Sergeant. Not your fight.”
Crawler chewed his unlit stub of a cigar so hard it jerked. At last he stepped away. “Yes, sir.” He strolled back toward the weight room, banging a shoulder into Carter, making him stumble. The sergeant lumbered off, the thick flesh of his legs pushing against the other in turn.
Carter massaged his forearms. “I don’t even work for the feds anymore and the ignorant bastard still calls me G-man.”
Red stooped and swept the BDUs from the floor, hanging them back in the locker. He shut it with a slam. But when he glanced back, he was smiling. He turned toward the front of the building, where the offices were. “If you’re done shaking me down, I’ve got something that might help your investigation.”
* * * *
Red walked through the maze of sterile cubes. Conference tables were surrounded by analysts and operators alike, many still with bed heads firmly in place. Damn good team. The buzz of the area felt comfortable, fitting. Above it all hovered the welcome burnt-molasses scent of Mr. Frank’s coffee. He’d be brewing pot after pot of that oily black concoction for the team in chain-smoker succession.
Why was Carter so suspicious, especially of Lori? He seemed convinced she hadn’t come completely clean. She was just a CIA analyst working fintel. But he had to concede one point. This time, the wet team had gone for her, not Red. And a big part of this op was fintel driven.
He needed to call, let her know what he’d learned in last night’s planning session. How Mossad thought Marksman was a leak. Ask her about the note Carter had just found. But he couldn’t talk about that stuff by phone, probably not even a secured line.
“Just a sec,” he said, holding a finger up to Carter, trailing behind. Red stopped in an empty cube, lifted a receiver, and pressed Lori’s mobile number. He could at least ask how her leg felt. The call went straight to voice mail, though. It never did that. Why’d she turn her phone off now? They continued toward his office. Grace’s voice shook him from his thoughts as they passed her desk.
“Detective. Nice to see you again,” she purred. Red glanced back. She was standing, shaking hands with Carter. She must’ve slipped home last night for a shower because she wore a black blouse now, unbuttoned further than most women in the office wore. Thick salt-and-pepper hair fell to her back, not even a lock in disarray. Rolled sleeves exposed muscular forearms, ligaments stretched tight to the wrists. He loved how the combination of her mature beauty, tight body, and audacious smile left most men ill at ease. Except Carter.
The detective smiled warmly. “Hello, Grace.”
She stared after the man as he passed. Red closed the double mahogany doors behind them. “That woman’s going to seduce you one day.”
“Worse things could happen,” Carter shrugged. “Best to keep up the foreplay. When I need a favor here in the Det, she’s always helpful.”
Red stared at the man. So Carter was flirting with Grace just so he could get stuff done?
“Don’t worry,” Carter said. “I’m not sleeping with her. Becau
se if I ever did, I wouldn’t have to sweat a divorce. Wife says she’d just slit my throat.” His nose twitched, as if from an unpleasant odor. “And she would. She’s got the most beautiful blue doe eyes, but I swear I’ve seen daggers drawn in their reflection.... This office, OK to talk in here?”
Red glanced about. He’d never thought about his room being under surveillance. Maybe he should have someone sweep it.
“How’s it going, clearing my file on Marble Hill Madmen?”
What a cluster. The question seemed to drain what little energy Red had held in reserve. “It’s in process.” He’d pulled every string he had hanging to get at the data. Went directly to one of the Det’s own moles in the CIA, a techie hacker somewhere below the chief information officer. The man had complained about how it was impossible to delete the thing. “It’s not like the old days where you break in and steal paper. Electronic files are versioned, backed up, archived, and in some cases chiseled—undeletable. There could be hundreds of copies of it in multiple locations.”
In the end, he’d promised the job could be done, though now Red owed him several favors. But that’s the only way shit gets done, Jim would have said.
Red lifted a beige metal lockbox from a desk drawer. He smiled as he slid an orange sticky note with a phone number scribbled on it from beneath a stack of old IDs. He passed it to Carter. “Marksman gave me this after his last op, before he left. It was how I was supposed to get in touch with him, if I ever needed to.”
Carter slid it into the same plastic bag as the scrap of paper. “You ever call it?”
“Hold on.” Red punched some buttons on his phone. A young, groggy, male voice picked up. “Jamison.”
“You track that number yet?”
“Oh, yes, sir! It was—”
“In my office.” He hung up and glanced at Carter’s pressed blue suit and black wingtips. He was going to love Jamison.
A minute later Grace opened the door, smiled at Carter, and let Jamison step in. Lime-green Chuck Taylors stuck out below wrinkled yellow jeans. The skinny kid had graduated from James Madison University with a degree in modern Middle Eastern studies, minoring in computer science. His paycheck said FBI, though he wasn’t a special agent. His psychological screening had indicated too high on self-preservation. So they’d put him to work hacking and listening in on the Arab royal family till he’d been assigned to the Det.
“It was a burner phone,” he said, his voice nasally. “An old one, too. No GPS.”
Carter slouched in his chair. “So, you ping it?”
What the hell’s a ping? Red thought. Like, from a ship’s sonar?
The kid’s eyes brightened. “Oh, yeah. Got it pretty good. I’d say we’re a hundred percent. The signal was within range of four cell towers, three pretty strong. The azimuths intersect at an apartment complex near Mount Vernon. But there’re fifty apartments. Get close, we can call the phone again. I’ve got a tool I made that’ll point us right where it is.”
Red thanked the kid, who blushed and let himself out, hanging jeans scrubbing the floor as he walked.
Red pointed toward the far wall, outside of which lay Grace’s station. “She’ll get started on your request for staff. Take whatever unoccupied offices you want. If anyone asks, you’re on a short-term assignment, reporting to me. I’ll pass the word, so you should get cooperation.” Suspicions would be manageable for a month or so. Hopefully this private investigation wouldn’t take that long.
“That can wait.” Carter pointed to the lockbox. “Get your FBI creds. You’re coming with me to this apartment.”
“I’ve got an op to plan.” Right. A plan that now seemed a thick mist he was swimming through, dragged by tides, driven by winds, always groping for a beach he could crawl onto. Everyone wanted to make things so damn complicated, but at its core this op would be just like so many others. Get to point A, destroy something, get out, don’t let anyone see you. This time collateral damage wasn’t a concern. In fact, standing orders were to kill anyone present. A mission pitched clean as they come.
The detective walked toward the door, curling his fingers in a follow me gesture. “You’ve got a capable exec. He’ll fill in. You knew Marksman as good as any. I need you along while I look at his place. Just like the locker, never know what you might see.”
“I’ll come with you, but later.” What he’d give to be a plain operator again. Now that he was squadron commander, everyone vied for his time. And the Det sucked him dry...a fusion cell, a mist of an organization. Officially, he wasn’t even in charge. Javlek said his position was de facto only. But in practice, he needed to be the chemical bond that held the amalgam together.
“It can’t wait, Red. We don’t even have the man’s body, so we aren’t the only ones interested in him. Someone else may have zeroed in on this apartment, too. If Mossad thinks he was dirty, they’re not going to leave it alone. I need your eyes, and your gun.”
Chapter 19 – Lock Pick
Red steered a blue Ford Taurus northeast on Richmond Highway. The scent of Givenchy cologne reminded him the car had been Jim’s not long ago. Red hadn’t yet returned it to the motor pool, and his predecessor’s silver eagle on a small blue plate still hung from the front bumper. Carter rode shotgun, staring out the passenger window. Wearing a shiny double-breasted black coat, the detective looked more like he was taking a date to a high-end nightclub than working an investigation. Red scratched his neck where the collar of his green woolen L.L.Bean sweater had irritated his skin.
They crossed over Pohick Road, one of Fort Belvoir’s main gates, then skipped over Mount Vernon Memorial Highway, and made a turn between two strip malls. In an out lot, Vinto’s Boxing Club shone in neon blue and red in the window of a weathered cedar-clad office building. A couple more blocks, and he spotted Mesa Square Apartments, beige three-story buildings more like town houses squeezed along a circular drive.
“He’ll be on the second story,” Carter said as they rolled in. “So he wouldn’t break a leg if he had to escape from a window, but it’d be more difficult to access than from the ground.”
Red slowed and pulled halfway onto a sidewalk. A thirty-something woman in pink sweats the same shade as Lori’s crossed in front of their bumper, scowling, walking a white dog the size of a house cat. He thumped the steering wheel with a fist. “We’ve got to figure this out. I can’t have my family scared our entire lives.”
His father, Tom, had been a piece of work—brash at times, but at least they’d lived a relatively stable upbringing, despite the frequent moves. Mom had seen to that. So Red had always tried to be a better father, involved, even to the point of feigning interest as Penny droned on about stuff like horses and dressage. But he was interested, not because of the sport, but because she loved it. Same with Nick and Jackson, though both were still too young to know anything more than Legos and trains. What kind of father would he be if his children lived in constant fear, always on the move? They’d have been better having Tom as a dad, with all his flaws.
Red pointed to a metal box the size of a cigar case Jamison had given Carter. “Got that thing on?” Its face held a dial with a black needle.
It reminded him of an old analog voltmeter Tom had taught Red to use as a kid. Most times, Red had been scared to be near the man. That contraption had been the subject of one of the few father-son moments they’d shared. “See how the needle sweeps up with the blinker on?” Tom had asked, crouching behind the family station wagon, pointing to the oscillating appendage. “That means the turn switch is working. We just got a bad bulb.” He’d held the faulty marble-sized glass orb between two fingers, then squeezed till it had popped, making Red flinch. “Even though it was new, it’s broke.” He’d laughed then, an uncommon occurrence.
Now, Carter had Jamison back at the Det on speakerphone. “We’re ready.”
“Dialing,” droned the tech’s nasal voice.
An orange light flickered on the gadget’s white face. “Transmitting. You should see it now.”
As Carter swept the box in an arc, the needle steadied toward one of the buildings across the street. Red dropped the transmission into drive, tires squealing as he pulled from the curb. The muzzle of the white cat-dog, now a hundred meters away, flashed as it fired silent barks, the noise drowned out by the racing engine.
The meter had pointed to one of the buildings in the center of the circle, but others stood behind it. They had to run the whole loop to be sure which one it was pointing toward.
Carter clutched the seat with his free hand. “Why you driving so fast?”
“How you know that phone we’re calling is plugged in?”
“I don’t. Why does it matter?”
“Burners are cheap. Just picking up a signal eats battery. We don’t know if it’s got five seconds or five days left on it.” He glanced at his reluctant partner. “So I gotta think of everything?”
Carter snorted and braced an elbow against the door. “Get bent.”
Halfway through the loop the needle steadied at a building on the outside of the circle, backing up to a ditch with cottonwood trees shading the roof. Beyond the barrier lay a parking lot for a grocery store.
“I’ll bet if we looked, we’d find a trail across that trench,” Carter said. “He probably left his car in that big lot and came in the back way to keep a low profile.”
Red jumped out and gravel crunched beneath his foot. For a second, the scent of pine filled the air, but a cold breeze replaced it with diesel as a dump truck clattered down the main road. He followed Carter and jogged toward the apartment building. This one looked like three duplexes stacked atop each other, with an open stairwell between. The detective stopped and cursed, slapping the device. After another call to Jamison, it lit back up.
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