Threat warning

by John Gilstrap

  Rollins made a show of looking around. “It’s not as if it ruined your life. You seem to be doing okay.”

  “I was rich the day I was born,” Jonathan said. “I give most of it away and I’d still never be able to spend it all. Not in ten lifetimes. It was never about making a living. It was about honor, and you proved you had none.”

  Rollins did not rise to the bait. “We all have jobs to do. Not all of them are enjoyable. If you had done yours, you’d still be in the Unit.”

  “I saved three lives that night.”

  “But to do it, you took five lives that the NCA deemed more important than the ones you saved.”

  “Don’t flatter yourself,” Jonathan spat. “Your whim is not the National Command Authority. We were in position, we’d taken four days to get there, and they were going to execute those kids.”

  “I gave an abort order, and you ignored it.”

  “It was a bogus order. You misunderstood it.”

  “Jesus, Digger, do you want to go through the whole court-martial again? We can’t retry it, but even if we did, the fact will remain that you disobeyed an order.”

  The door from the hallway flew open with enough force to make a dent in the wall it slammed into, and Boxers stormed into the office. Born as Brian Van de Meulebroeke, Boxers stood closer to seven feet than six, and likely bent the needle on most bathroom scales. When anyone that big moves that fast, you know that damage is going to be done. His eyes showed murder.

  “Box, no!” Jonathan shouted as he shot to his feet. JoeDog slinked under the coffee table.

  Rollins scrambled to rise from the depths of the sofa, but he never had a chance. Boxers closed the distance in five quick strides. He grabbed a fistful of Rollins’s shirt in one hand, and his hair with the other, and effortlessly lifted the colonel over the back of the sofa. He heaved him onto the floor with enough force to make two table lamps jump and tumble over.

  “What did I tell you last time I saw you?” he shouted.

  Rollins landed on his back, his head bouncing off the carpeted floor. He looked stunned. Or maybe terrified.

  “Box!” Jonathan yelled. He’d never seen Big Guy this spun up. This homicidal. As he vaulted the back of the sofa to intervene, the conference room door flew open again.

  Venice yelled. It wasn’t a scream, exactly, but rather a guttural expression of surprise.

  Jonathan dove for his friend, catching him by his belt and pulling to restrain him.

  Boxers whirled on Jonathan, his fist cocked. He was that far gone. When Jonathan winced-a full-force blow from Big Guy could be fatal-Boxers’ eyes changed. Horror replaced rage.

  In the hallway, Rick Hare and Charlie Keeling-two of the full-time security guards at Security Solutions-appeared at the door, hands gripping their sidearms. What they saw was clearly not what they’d been expecting.

  “Everything okay in here, Mr. G?” Rick asked. His eyes shifted to the various parties, trying to decipher it all.

  Jonathan kept Boxers’ eye. “You okay?”

  Big Guy whirled to Rollins, pointing two fingers like a weapon.

  “Look at me, Box,” Jonathan said.

  “I told him I’d kill him next time I saw him,” Boxers said.

  The security guards stepped in to take positions around Rollins. With the bad guy identified, they knew who to target.

  “And you damn near did,” Jonathan said. He smiled and winked.

  Venice stood with her hands on her head, her mouth slack. “What is this?”

  Jonathan held up a hand for silence as Gail Bonneville arrived in the doorway. Her hand was poised near the Glock on her hip, but then she relaxed. “Oh, there’s got to be a good story here,” she said.

  With reinforcements in place, JoeDog felt secure enough to bark. Just once, as if to remind everyone that there was a four-legged killing machine in the room. The absurdity of it made Jonathan chuckle in spite of himself. He directed his attention to the security team. “Thanks, guys. We’re all okay here. Just a flash of anger.”

  Rick Hare looked unconvinced. “You sure, boss?”

  Jonathan nodded. “I’m always sure. Not always right, but always sure. How about you, Roleplay? Are you hurt?”

  Colonel Rollins eyed Boxers with ill-disguised hatred as he rose to his feet and brushed himself off. The front panel of his shirt was torn at the buttons. “I’m fine,” he said.

  The guards clearly sensed the tension, but they also understood their order to leave. “We’ll be at our posts,” Rick said. “Just give a shout if you need something.”

  Jonathan smiled. “If anyone out there asks what happened, tell them that a bookcase fell over.”

  Charlie Keeling touched two fingers to his brow as acknowledgment. Gail pulled away from the door to allow room for them to depart, and then asked Jonathan if she was to stay or leave.

  “I want you here for this,” he said. “Let’s gather in the War Room, where we will all keep our hands to ourselves.”

  Boxers nearly vibrated with anger, but when the tension left his shoulders, Jonathan knew that he was back with the program.

  As they filed into the War Room, Venice pulled Jonathan to the side. “I’ve never seen Boxers like that.”

  “Did you find the video?”

  She clearly wanted more, but knew better than to push. “Cued up and ready to go,” she said.

  Tension remained heavy in the air as they filed into the War Room. Jonathan wasn’t sure where the nickname for the space originated, but given the activities that were often planned in this space, it was apropos. Detailed in teak and mahogany and featuring calfskin-soft chairs, the War Room offered all of the latest in communication and presentation technology. On the far end, Venice had already retracted the panels in the wall that housed the 106-inch projection screen, where the frozen image of the terrified Nasbes stared at them, frozen in time. He’d already seen it, of course, but it was time to pay attention.

  He asked, “Colonel Rollins, would you like to catch us up on what you know before we start watching?” By using his official title, Jonathan hoped to defuse the tension.

  Rollins leaned forward and cleared his throat. “The people you’re going to see are Christyne Nasbe and her son Ryan, sixteen. We don’t know how they ended up in the custody of terrorists, but we suspect that they were somehow taken after the Wilson Bridge incident last night. They live on Bragg when Boomer is home, but they’re apparently up here visiting her sister in Mount Vernon.”

  “Does Boomer know the family has been taken?”

  “He was the one to tell us. He found out purely by chance. He thought he recognized them despite the masks, and when he tried to establish contact with them, he couldn’t. They weren’t at the address where they were supposed to be staying, and both of their cell phones were turned off. We did a little checking and discovered that the SIM cards had either been disabled or removed.”

  Jonathan asked, “Is he just going by the voice?”

  “That was the first thing that caught his attention. But then he looked closer. It turns out that the son, Ryan, has a birthmark on his belly. It shows on the video.”

  Gail asked, “Why are you coming to Security Solutions? A case like this has FBI written all over it.”

  Rollins hesitated. “I’d rather we discuss this in private, Digger.”

  Jonathan shook his head. “My team gets to know what I know.”

  The colonel took a moment to think it through. “Here’s the thing,” he said at last. “The FBI is a civilian agency. I’m sure they’re fine at what they do, but they’re pretty damned distracted right now, and we want the Nasbes’ safety to be the first and only priority, not just one of many.”

  Gail started to object, but Rollins held up a hand to signal that he wasn’t done yet.

  “There’s also the Unit connection. The FBI can’t know that, and I think it’s clear that the kidnappers don’t know it, or they would have mentioned something about it in the video.”
r />   Gail didn’t get it. “And why can’t the FBI know?”

  “Because the FBI is packed with unnamed sources,” Rollins answered. “Deep Throat, anyone? What isn’t leaked to the press is revealed though congressional hearings. I owe Boomer more than that.”

  Jonathan nodded to Venice, who pushed the buttons to make the lights dim and the picture come to life.

  The setting was all too familiar, although Jonathan wasn’t sure that he’d ever seen it staged with multiple hostages. The boy, on the left of the screen, was shirtless and wore what appeared to be blue jeans. The mother wore a nondescript black-on-black outfit that looked oddly stretched out and disheveled.

  “Do you see the birthmark?” Rollins asked.

  Venice froze the frame.

  Rollins pointed from his seat. “Look there on his stomach. Just to the left of his navel. Our left, his right.”

  Jonathan leaned forward, as if by shortening the distance by five inches he could see the image more clearly.

  “I see it,” Gail said. “Looks like a little check mark.”

  “That’s it exactly,” Rollins said.

  Jonathan took it on faith. One of these days, he was going to have to get glasses.

  The picture had been framed tightly so that none of the captors’ faces showed. In fact all they could see of the captors were legs wearing black pants-Jonathan counted four pairs-and the muzzles of the AKs that were resting against each of the victims’ skulls.

  Christyne Nasbe spoke for both of them. As she did, Arabic subtitles crawled along the bottom of the frame. “People of America,” she began. From the first words, she sounded as if she was reading, but how could that be, with a hood over her face? “We and our satanic government have brought suffering to the peaceful people of Islam for many years. We have murdered tens of thousands of innocent children while they slept in their beds, and we have martyred countless holy warriors as they fight every day only to create a world that will live in peace, free of the sloth and the wickedness brought by our Western ways. We need to realize that we can never win.

  “This week, the Army of Allah began a new holy war that will bring you to your knees. They are many thousands strong, and they have already begun their battle, first in Kansas City, and on Monday night in Washington, D.C. This morning, they took the battle to our children, killing our youth as we have killed so many of theirs. The killing will continue until the United States government apologizes to Islamic people everywhere and withdraws all U.S. forces from the Middle East and Afghanistan. If an announcement to that effect is not made by next Wednesday, one week and one day from today, my son and I will be martyred for everyone to see.”

  The instant before the image clicked off, the boy’s voice said, “Martyred means murdered in English.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  They watched the video three more times before Jonathan asked Venice to freeze it on the image of the huddled captives.

  Jonathan turned to the colonel. “I understand that you want me and my team to rescue the Nasbes, but I’m still confused,” he said. “This video is going to go viral. Even with their faces blacked out, somebody’s going to recognize them. Neighbors are going to call. Distant relatives are going to call. What do my team and I bring to the table that you’re not going to get from the authorities?”

  Rollins shifted in his chair, recrossing his legs, one over the other. “Two things we need to talk about,” he said. “First, we’ve already reached out to the community at Bragg. We’ve asked them not to forward any theories on the family’s identity, and we’re confident that they’ll understand. Ditto the immediate family. We’ve let them know that the best way to bring their loved ones home safely is for them to rally around each other and say nothing.”

  “Surely someone’s going to say something,” Gail said.

  Jonathan shook his head. “You haven’t witnessed the community built up around the Unit,” he said. “They understand the importance of secrecy. Even the kids. Back in the old days, we used to exclude the family from almost everything for fear of word leaking out to the bad guys. But the toll was too great on families.” He gestured with his hands as if to say, ta-da.

  Boxers agreed. “We opened up a lot of the details to the families, and the result was all good-specifically because everyone understood the stakes.”

  Rollins went on, “I sense that you’re looking at the equation from the wrong side. It’s not about what you bring. It’s about what I bring.” He cast another uncomfortable glance at the others in the room.

  Jonathan waited him out.

  Rollins sighed. “Look, you’re not a naive guy. The new administration has rewritten all the rules. As a guy who’s been in the service for more than a few years, I’m more feared by them than trusted. These days, you either toe the line, or you tour a jail cell. The old national security shortcuts just don’t exist anymore. But you know how the community works. We look after our own, yet Posse Comitatus forbids the military from engaging in domestic law-enforcement activities. Other laws and executive orders prohibit domestic activity from other intelligence organizations. No eavesdropping without warrants, no questioning without probable cause, no midnight rescues without due process.”

  “You mean we have to obey the law,” Gail said.

  Rollins shot a look to Jonathan. “All on the same team?”

  Jonathan shrugged. “What can I say? You can remove the girl from the cops, but you can’t remove the cop from the girl.”

  Rollins drilled Gail with his eyes. “With all due respect, some laws are ridiculous. Like the ones that respect terrorists’ rights over those of the people they terrorize.”

  “Oh, I see,” Gail said. “All we need is to let the military decide who’s good enough for their own constitutional rights.”

  Jonathan sensed where this was going, and he hurried to intervene. Gail had never been comfortable with moral gray area in which Jonathan plied his trade, but it made no sense to engage Rollins like this. “No civics lessons, okay?” he said. “I asked him to state his case. We need to let him do that.” To Rollins: “Go on.”

  The colonel shrugged. “The rest should be pretty obvious. The unit has friends in the right places, and they’re willing to help us-off the record, of course, and behind the scenes. We need someone to feed the intelligence to, who can then go and bring the family to safety.”

  Venice cut to the chase. “You want Security Solutions to provide cover for you to break the law.”

  Rollins smiled for the first time since arriving. “Well, no,” he said. “To hell with providing cover. I want you to actually break the law.”

  Something about the sheer honesty made Jonathan laugh. “What kind of support are you offering?”

  “Whatever you need. Any and all intel assets we might have. No hardware, though, and no manpower. There’s no way to do that without triggering a congressional hearing.”

  “How do you provide the soft services without triggering an investigation?” Venice asked.

  “Through careful management of resources,” Rollins said.

  “Who all knows you’re here?” Boxers asked.

  “I’m not at liberty to answer that.”

  “How high up the Unit chain?”

  “I’m not at liberty to answer that, either.”

  Boxers growled.

  “Here’s the thing, Colonel,” Jonathan said. “We’ve still got tread marks on our backs from the last time you threw us under the bus. How do we know you won’t do it again?”

  Rollins leaned forward in his chair, and his expression became very thoughtful. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m not making myself clear. I’ll be more direct. If this thing blows up-if word leaks out-you are exactly the ones who will take the hit. With all respect, isn’t that why people pay you for your services?”

  Jonathan noticed Gail’s ears turning red so he spoke quickly. “They pay us because we’re a hostage recovery team with a perfect record.”

  “Except
outside of the community, nobody knows you have a perfect record. When Daddy Lottabucks’s kid gets snatched from spring break, all he knows is that you’ll get the job done without the police ever knowing a thing. I bet he’s expecting you to take the fall quietly if things go wrong.”

  “Daddy Lottabucks is paying for the privilege,” Boxers said.

  “We’ve got money,” Rollins said. “A bunch of the guys pooled our resources, and we were able to pull together sixty thousand. I know that’s not what-”

  Jonathan held up his hand for silence. “Boomer’s a friend,” he said. “I don’t want your money.” His teammates froze at his words. It was a gang poker face.

  Rollins smiled, genuinely relieved. “Digger, I appreciate this. I’ll inform-”

  Jonathan cut him off again. “This meeting never happened, Colonel. We’ll do what we do, but we will not keep you in the loop, and we will not accept any help that we don’t ask for. If, on the other hand, we ask for help, I expect to get it immediately, and without question.”

  “But the team was expecting-”

  “Nothing,” Jonathan interrupted. “Your team should expect nothing because this meeting never happened. I will not answer to you, I will not cover for you, I will not run interference for you.”

  The colonel leaned back in his chair. He seemed to know there was more coming.

  “More than anything,” Jonathan went on, “know this. If you cross me, I will hurt you. Badly.” He shifted his eyes to Venice. “Please escort the colonel to the door.”

  Michael Copley stood on the mezzanine overlooking the shop floor, marveling at the quality of the work his people produced. Thanks to their dedication to him and his mission, they had together raised Appalachian Acoustics to be the source for some of the most sought-after orchestral and choral tools in the world. Lightweight, less expensive than the competition, and easy to assemble by even a single person, his patented acoustic reflectors had become the gold standard.

  These one hundred eighty employees were the ones who made it happen every day. Their continuing dedication to him, the company, and their mission stirred emotions that might have been called love if the context were different. They meant that much to him. And he was confident that he meant that much to them.