The Cabal

by David Hagberg

  “Yes, it does,” Rencke said. “From both sides of the fence. Your shooting days are supposed to be over. You’re too personally involved this time. It’s expected that you’ll back off and let the Bureau handle it.”

  “I’ve always been personally involved,” McGarvey said, bitterly. “All my life.” And he knew that he should be asking himself if it was worth it, but at this moment the question was moot.

  Rencke was silent for a long time, and when he came back he sounded sad, resigned, as if he knew that no matter what McGarvey did, no matter what action his old friend took, he would be there for him, as he had been for years now. Mac was family, and except for his wife, Louise, his only family.

  “A Gulfstream and crew will be ready at Andrews within the hour. Your passport will be aboard. What else do you need?”

  “Give me one hour on the ground in Frankfurt, then call Dave Whittaker and tell him I might need some backup.” Whittaker, who was a stand-up guy, was the deputy director of operations when Mac was the DCI. Now, under Adkins, he’d become the deputy director of the agency. His was a steady if stern hand, and although he’d never completely approved of McGarvey’s tradecraft, he’d always supported his boss one hundred ten percent.

  “Shit, Mac,” Rencke said after a long moment. “You’re not thinking straight. Honest injun.”

  “You’re probably right,” McGarvey agreed. “But I didn’t create the situation.” The hard edge was back in his voice, and in his heart.

  He shook his head, and the only thing he could think of were the bastards, the dirty rotten bastards. And he could see the son of a bitch putting the insurance round into the back of Todd’s head.

  “I didn’t start it,” he said bleakly.

  “I’ll be here for you.”

  “Thank you,” McGarvey said and he broke the connection. And for a long time he stood in the semidark corridor, the only light coming from the exit sign at the door to the stairs, and thought frankly about his life, about his contributions to the safety of the United States. Thinking about his career that way seemed almost filled with hubris, and yet he was proud of what he had done—or most of what he had done. And now he was back at it, only this time his motives were a whole hell of a lot more personal.

  Katy was still sleeping when he went back into the room, took a small leather satchel, about the size of a dopp kit, out of their luggage, and went across the hall to one of the empty rooms where he switched on a nightstand light after he’d closed the door.

  She had watched him open the floor safe in their bedroom back in Florida as she was packing and pull out a 9mm Wilson semiautomatic pistol with custom grips and sight, three spare magazines of ammunition, and a suppressor.

  He holstered the pistol at the small of his back and, turning out the light, went back across the hall and returned the kit to their luggage.

  For a long time he stood near the bed, watching his wife’s sleeping face. She didn’t look exactly at peace, but she was finally getting some rest. He hoped she wasn’t dreaming.

  Leaning down he kissed her lightly on the cheek, took his small overnight bag from the closet, and went downstairs.

  Liz was waiting in the darkened dayroom, sitting in the corner smoking a cigarette, something she hadn’t done for a long time.

  McGarvey held up across the room from her. “What are you doing, sweetheart?” he asked.

  “Waiting for you,” she said.

  “What about Pete and Dan Green?”

  “I sent them back to Langley. They were done here and they knew it. So I didn’t get any argument.” Liz stubbed out her cigarette. “Anyway, you don’t have to keep watching over your shoulder for them. They won’t be there. They understand the score, and in fact Pete said to wish you good luck.”

  McGarvey put down his bag by the door and went across to her. “I’m so sorry. I wish—”

  Liz looked up at him with so much anguish and such total devastation written all over her face that she took his breath away. “When we raised our right hands and took the oath, we understood the risks,” she said. “You know this probably better than anyone else.” She didn’t avert her eyes. “How did you handle it?”

  “Sometimes not very well,” McGarvey replied, thinking back to the day Katy had given him her ultimatum—me or the CIA—and he had run away.

  She looked away for just a moment, finally, maybe seeing some of the anguish and devastation on his face. “Do you know what’s keeping me on track? The only thing?”

  “Audie?”

  She looked up at her father and a brief smile passed her mouth. “Her too. But it’s you, Daddy. And Mother.” She shook her head. “Christ, there never was such a couple, or ever will be.”

  McGarvey had no idea what to say. But he leaned over and brushed a kiss on her cheek.

  “The gray Chevy van, government plates, out front. No one will notice. Keys are in it.”

  McGarvey nodded. “Keep your head down, sweetheart, this is bound to get ugly.”

  Her eyes tightened. “Oh, I hope so.”

  And McGarvey left.

  THIRTEEN

  The airport shuttle dropped Remington off under the sweeping portico of the five-star Frankfurt Steigenberger Hotel around two in the afternoon. Although he had slept reasonably well in first class on the Lufthansa flight over, he’d been restive, worried about what was coming next.

  With Kirk McGarvey now in the mix, the assassinations of Van Buren and Givens would have to be explained to the satisfaction of the FBI, and of course the CIA, which was one of the objects of the exercise in addition to silencing the nosy reporter. And he needed to impress on Roland what was at stake for both of them, for Admin’s continued existence, even for their personal freedom. He had no desire to end up in a federal prison somewhere because Roland refused to keep his eye on the ball.

  He carried only a small overnight bag with a clean shirt and underwear and his toiletries—because he was only staying the night, taking the morning flight back—plus his laptop with all the material from Givens’s computer and a BlackBerry, encrypted. He figured there would be little danger crossing borders with the material; he was just an ordinary businessman who’d popped across the pond for a meeting. No one bothered with commerce.

  He spotted Sandberger seated across the lobby, reading a newspaper, but went directly over to the front desk where he checked in and sent his overnight bag up to his suite with a bellman, whom he tipped well, but not so well that the man would remember him.

  The hotel wasn’t terribly busy at this hour, though more guests were checking in than out, and heading across the expansive lobby he spotted Roland’s bodyguards, sitting fifteen feet away from their boss; Alphonse with his back to the elevators, and Hanson with his back to the lobby doors. Their attention constantly shifted, though not so noticeably unless you were looking for it. Nor did they stand out physically. Both men were of average build, with pleasant faces, neatly trimmed hair, expensive if casual European-cut clothing—open-necked shirts, khakis, and double-vented sport coats—but they were well-trained killers. They were among Admin’s best and highest paid operators, and therefore the most loyal.

  Sandberger, too, was a deceptive man, with narrow shoulders, slight build, sparkling blue eyes, ash blond hair, and a pleasant small-town smile and demeanor. But he was a steely-eyed businessman with an astute understanding not only of the American political scene but of international affairs. And like his bodyguards he was a killer.

  Remington had been with him two years ago in Kabul to interview three local recruits, all of whom had served as President Hamid Karzai’s personal bodyguards, but were looking for fatter paychecks—or so they’d claimed.

  They were supposed to meet in a tea shop in the area known as the Wazir Akbar Kahn a few blocks from the National Bank of Pakistan, across the street from an alley with rug, silver, and copper merchants, but Sandberger was spooked and he told the three that the shop was not acceptable, that they would have to meet tomorrow in
another place, to be specified.

  Almost immediately Remington sensed something was wrong, not only from Sandberger’s body language but from the sudden rise in tension in the three men, and he stepped back, his hand automatically going under his jacket for his Beretta 92F.

  “If this all works out for us, you’ll have a nice future right here in Kabul, if that’s what you want,” Sandberger said, pleasantly, his voice betraying nothing of what Remington damned well knew was about to go down.

  They hadn’t taken their seats yet and were standing around the small wrought-iron table under the striped awning, traffic busy on the anonymous street. The three were flustered, and one of them—Remington couldn’t remember his name except that he was a tough-looking bastard who wasn’t to be trusted for all the tea in China—glanced to the left toward the merchant’s alley, and it was at that moment Sandberger moved, lightning fast, decisive, and final.

  Before Remington or the three Afghans could move, Sandberger had whipped out his razor sharp KA-BAR, slit the nearest man’s throat ear-to-ear with an almost casual backhand swipe, pivoted lightly on his heel to plunge the broad combat blade into the second man’s right eye socket, burying the weapon to the hilt, and even before the first man had crumpled to the dusty floor stuck the knife into the heart of the third man.

  Remington, who was fully combat trained, had never seen anything like it in his life, not even in the Sandhurst training films, or from visualizing the field ops his sergeant had told him about. And he’d always considered his reflexes reasonably good, but at that moment he knew that neither his reflexes nor his killer instinct were up to Sandberger’s.

  “Let’s get out of here,” Sandberger had said, calmly as if he were suggesting they go catch a bus.

  He wiped the blood from his knife on a paper napkin, sheathed it, and, smiling pleasantly at the horrified tea shop patrons, sauntered up the street to where they had parked their Range Rover.

  Remington at his side—then as now.

  Sandberger looked up from the Hochster Kreisbatt newspaper, a big, friendly grin on his pleasant face, his eyes lit up as if he were seeing an old friend for the first time in years, and it was always the same with him. “Gordon, good of you to fly over on such short notice.”

  “We needed to talk,” Remington said, taking the chair across the broad coffee table from his boss. Very often, when they met away from the office like this, Sandberger chose hotel lobbies for their anonymity, or if he were stateside they would meet at Admin’s training camp in the low mountains of northern New Mexico.

  “Would you like some tea or coffee?” Sandberger, always the gentleman, asked.

  “No.” Remington booted up his laptop and when he’d opened the FC files, turned the computer around and pushed it across the table. “Take a look at this first. This is how far Givens managed to get.”

  Sandberger gazed at Remington, almost paternally. “I know now why I chose you as my partner. You’re the detail man, something I’ve never been, as you well know. I like field action, and you like keeping all the balls up in the air. Never a misstep, right?”

  “You need to keep your eye on this ball, Roland, before it jumps up and bites us on the arse.”

  Sandberger chuckled. “Mixed metaphor, old man,” he said, but then he drew the laptop closer and started going through the files.

  Remington glanced over at Alphonse who was staring directly at him. The bodyguard was Sandberger’s, not Admin’s, personal pit bull, as was Hanson, and he had no doubt that if he made any sort of an untoward move they would be all over him in an instant. Alphonse smiled pleasantly, and Remington got the impression that he was looking into the eyes of a cobra, swaying, distracting its enemy before pouncing.

  Good men Roland had recruited and continued to recruit. Classy, like their boss.

  Sandberger had gone through several of Givens’s FC files and he looked up. “Is the rest of this stuff more of the same?”

  “For the most part, yes.”

  “You haven’t shared this with Robert or any of the others, have you?” Sandberger asked, referring to Robert Foster and members of the Friday Club.

  “I wanted to talk to you first, give you the heads up. But they will have to be warned. No telling what’ll happen next with McGarvey on the loose.”

  “All in good time, but it’s exactly how we planned it, Gordon. McGarvey is considered to be a loose cannon by the CIA, the Bureau, and any number of congressmen—actually, the sort of man I’d like to hire.”

  “He’ll make a move, and it’s bound to be dramatic.”

  “The more dramatic the better.” Sandberger glanced at the computer screen. “He doesn’t have this material, thanks to your quick action.” He smiled. “Actually, you were brilliant, you know. But there’s more.”

  “You still want to go through with it?” Remington asked. “We’ll have to kill him and there will be repercussions.”

  “Indeed.”

  Remington had no real idea why he’d come over here, except that he thought he had more respect for McGarvey than Roland did. They’d read the same files on the man’s impressive career, and had come to the same conclusion that he would have to be neutralized in such a way that he would be no further threat to the Friday Club. That had been Foster’s demand. McGarvey had already caused them enough grief—even though he probably wasn’t aware of it—and Foster wanted the man to be muzzled. Permanently.

  “We can’t just shoot him down in public,” Remington had argued. “It wouldn’t be easy. He was the DCI, for goodness sake, and he’s sharp as a tack. As good or better than any two of our people.”

  “Oh, I don’t know about that. He’s in his fifties. A bit long of tooth for the lightning-quick reaction. Killing him could be done.”

  Remington looked away for a moment. He had a great deal of respect for Roland, but he often had feelings about things. Hunches. A tickling of the hairs at the back of his neck, warning him that something was coming his way. But Roland was a straight-forward, stand-up guy who relied on three things: his own intellect, his own experience, and the collective intelligence and experience of the people he surrounded himself with. Admin’s staff at the Washington office as well as out in the field numbered nearly two hundred. And every single one of them, from Remington to the data-entry clerks, had an open door to the boss, 24/7. Sandberger formed his own opinions, but he listened to everyone.

  “Now give me a précis of everything you know,” Sandberger said. “And hold nothing back.”

  FOURTEEN

  The CIA’s Gulfstream had flown east across the Atlantic at thirty-four thousand feet, the ride smooth enough for McGarvey, whose mind was seething with possibilities, to actually get a few hours’ sleep. When he’d finally opened his eyes the former Northwest Airlines attendant Debbie Miller was there pouring a cup of coffee from a carafe and adding a dollop of a good Napoleon brandy.

  He smiled wanly. “Evidently my reputation has preceded me.”

  “We were instructed to take very good care of you, Mr. Director,” she said, her smile radiant. “Would you care for something to eat? Breakfast?”

  “What time is it?”

  “Just coming up on eight-thirty in the morning in Washington, and two-thirty in the afternoon in Frankfurt.”

  McGarvey glanced out the window. He could see what looked like farmland interspersed by wooded areas. They were descending, he could feel it in his ears. “How far out are we?”

  “Less than twenty minutes.”

  He held up his coffee cup. “This’ll do for now. And thank the flight crew for a smooth ride.”

  “Our pleasure, Mr. Director,” she said and she went forward to the galley, as McGarvey looked out the window at the German countryside.

  He’d been here, many times before, but the Germany of his youth was different from the combined Germanys now, deeply into the worldwide recession, Berlin looking inward rather than global, more concerned about the economy than some hot or cold war with the R
ussians.

  That was in a much simpler, if more deadly past. Now the major threats to much of Europe from Germany east, and especially northeast, were the encroachments by Muslims who by and large refused to assimilate into whatever culture they landed in the middle of. Holland and Denmark and Germany were supposed to change their centuries-old traditions and mind-sets to accommodate the immigrants from the east; upheaval and insensitivity were the new watchwords.

  Against that background noise, McGarvey was fighting his own battles that most recently had begun in Mexico City, then Pyongyang, and now Washington.

  Two names had been on Turov’s laptop; McCann, who Todd had shot to death and who had very probably been connected to the Friday Club, possibly financially, and Sandberger, whose Admin perhaps only supplied security.

  Mac intended to push the man in public, because men of Sandberger’s persona very often reacted badly under that sort of pressure, and how they reacted could say reams about their real agendas.

  If he was correct in his thinking, Givens had been assassinated because he’d gotten too close to Foster and the Friday Club, and Todd had been murdered in part because of his contact with the newspaperman, but also because of his father-in-law. They were trying to neutralize a thorn in their side. Of course that logic only worked if there was a connection between Mexico City, Pyongyang, and now this.

  And that connection eluded him.

  His sat phone burred softly in the pocket of his jacket, hung up forward. Debbie brought it back to him on the third ring and retreated as he answered.

  “You gotta be close,” Rencke said.

  “Fifteen minutes. Did you find out where Sandberger’s staying?”

  “He’s back at the Steigenberger, just for the one day and night,” Rencke said. “His crew filed a flight plan back to Baghdad for first thing in the morning. And Remington is there, too, staying for just the night. Got in late on a Lufthansa flight that was supposed to touch down at eleven-forty, but didn’t actually get there until around one-thirty.”