The Cabal

by David Hagberg

  “The two cameras in front went down, and the lights are going out one at a time,” Schilling said.

  “Something wrong with the power?” Foster asked.

  Cardillo’s cell phone rang.

  “I believe Mr. McGarvey shot out the cameras and is doing the same with the lights.”

  “He’s right outside the house, then.”

  “Yes, sir. But the only way in is through the front door, which I’ll cover.”

  Cardillo’s cell phone rang a second time.

  “Let Boberg know what’s going on.”

  Cardillo’s phone was answered on the third ring. “Yes.”

  “Why the hell did you leave?” Whittaker shouted, but all of a sudden he realized that he wasn’t hearing the helicopter’s cabin noises.

  “Because I didn’t want you to get away before I had a chance to talk to you and Foster,” McGarvey said.

  Whittaker was shaken, but not surprised. “The FBI is on its way out here in force,” he said. Foster and Schilling were staring at him.

  “Not yet, David,” McGarvey said after a slight delay. “We’re monitoring calls from the house, including your cell phone.”

  Whittaker held his hand over the cell phone microphone. “It’s McGarvey on my pilot’s cell phone. Can he get inside the house?”

  “Only with explosives,” Schilling said.

  “Unless you brought some Semtex you’re not getting in here.”

  “I saw the bars on the window,” McGarvey said. “Makes you wonder what Foster is trying to protect. But I don’t need to blow my way inside, because you and Foster are going to let me in.”

  “The hell you say.”

  “We deciphered a flash drive that Remington gave to us before he was gunned down by his own people. It’s a Friday Club membership list. Impressive.”

  “You’ve got nothing, you son of a bitch. You’re a traitor to your country.”

  “We have the information on your laptop. Stupid to leave it in your office for just about anyone to grab. Otto told me that he built the machine, and he knew your user ID and password. Whittakercia? Come on, David.”

  Schilling had stepped out into the stair hall, and he came back. “Boberg is on the way. Keep McGarvey talking.”

  “All you have are the names of a number of American patriots who love their country enough to form a club, just like Kiwanis or Rotary.”

  “Except Rotary wasn’t involved in Mexico last year or in Pyongyang a few months ago. Rotary hasn’t involved the Chinese in some kind of plot.”

  “You’re talking nonsense,” Whittaker practically shouted, but he was rocked to the core. He knew what McGarvey was capable of. He had tried to warn Foster and the others, but none of them would listen, and now it was too late, unless McGarvey could be killed.

  “There never was any polonium in Mexico, and none ever came across the border in Arizona. And we know that the shooters who took out the Chinese general in Pyongyang were South Koreans working for a Russian expediter in Tokyo who’d been hired by Howard McCann. And Howard was getting money from your club of patriots.”

  Schilling switched off the living room lights and those in the stair hall. He was armed with a Franchi SPAS-12 automatic shotgun capable of firing four rounds per second. It was a devastating weapon at close range. “Stay in this room,” he said, and he disappeared into the darkness in the stair hall.

  “Even if what you’re telling me was only partially true, it still proves nothing. How do we know this flash drive you mentioned was Remington’s?”

  “I think Otto could make a case for it,” McGarvey said. “The only thing we haven’t figured out yet is what you people are really up to. Whatever it is involves the Chinese, of course. But to what purpose?”

  Whittaker said nothing.

  “So here’s what we’re going to do. If Mr. Boberg manages to kill me in the next few minutes, you will have won. But if I survive, I’m coming inside and you and I and Foster will have our little chat. Fair enough?”

  Whittaker broke the connection. “He wants us to let him in so he can ask us about China.”

  Foster was unfazed. “Fine.”

  “Don’t be a fool,” Whittaker said, and he speed-dialed the CIA’s on-duty security officer, and he didn’t give a damn if McGarvey’s freak friend Otto Rencke was somehow monitoring his call.

  The number didn’t answer until the fourth ring. “Security, Donald Briggs.”

  “This is David Whittaker. I want someone to go up to my office right now, and check my computers.”

  “Somone’s already on the way up, sir.”

  “Why? What’s happening?”

  “I’m not sure, Mr. Director. But one of the watch officers called and said there might be a security issue.”

  “What sort of an issue?”

  “Unknown.”

  “I’ll hold,” Whittaker said, but then he knew what the issue was, and he knew that it had been his own sloppiness that made it possible. “Have there been any visitors to the building tonight. Within the past half hour or so?”

  “Other than Mr. Adkins, I don’t know. But his passes were all still valid. I’ll have to check the log at the Reception Center.”

  “Is Adkins still in the building?”

  “I don’t know, sir.”

  “Well, find out, you idiot! And if he’s still there, arrest him!”

  “I’m on it, sir.”

  Whittaker broke the connection. “Dick Adkins was in my office and it’s unlikely, but possible, he managed to get into my private laptop.”

  Foster nodded. “Anything that would hurt us?”

  “Names, dates.”

  “No manifesto, I would hope, David.”

  “No.”

  “Well then, I think it’s time we telephone our friends at the FBI and the Marshal’s office,” Foster said. “Let them know that Mr. McGarvey is here to assassinate me, and that you came to warn me, and protect me. With your life, if need be.”

  SEVENTY-ONE

  McGarvey was crouched in the shadows on the west side of the house from where he had a good sight line all the way along the front wall, and down the hill toward the woods.

  “Did you get any of that?” he said into his comms unit.

  “Yeah, I managed to tap into the cell phone you took from the chopper pilot,” Otto replied. “It’s one of ours, standard issue for housekeeping and security. But Whittaker also called Campus security and he knows about Dick.”

  “Has he made it out of there?”

  “He hasn’t called me back so I don’t know. But I’ve got everything from David’s laptop.”

  “Anything interesting?”

  “Pretty much the same info from Remington’s flash drive. A few more names, some dates, and banking stuff. We can use it.”

  “Mac,” Louise broke in. “I can’t see your heat signature. Where are you?”

  “On the east side of the house, right up against the wall.”

  “Is Pete with you?” Louise asked. She sounded strained.

  “No, she’s on the other side of the house,” McGarvey said. “Where’s Boberg?”

  “I had to switch back to the ship for a minute or two, and when I got back just now he was gone. The only place he could be is somewhere inside the heat signature of the building. But I’m painting the remnant heat of his footprints leading up to the house. To the west side of the house.”

  Pete didn’t have a comms unit so there was no way for Louise to contact her.

  McGarvey turned and sprinted toward the rear of the house. “I’m on my way,” he whispered.

  “I have to get back to the ship,” Louise said.

  “Do it, and then get out of the program. Security’s been alerted and the Campus will probably go into lockdown. Every system out there is going to come under scrutiny any minute now.”

  “I can slow it down,” Otto said.

  McGarvey held up at the back wall and took a quick peek. The rear of the house was lit up, but no
one was in sight, so he eased around the corner and, keeping below the level of the windows, hurried toward the west side of the building.

  “Too dangerous,” he whispered. “It could interfere with ongoing operations.”

  “Let’s hope Dick managed to get out of there,” Otto said, but McGarvey had reached the west side of the house and he didn’t reply.

  Pete had shot out the cameras and lights on this side of the house, so it took a full minute for McGarvey’s eyes to adjust to the darkness before he saw her shoved up against the wall near the front veranda. Boberg was in front of her, his pistol less than two feet from her face.

  McGarvey switched his pistol to his left hand, and pulled a spare magazine out of his pocket with his right. Hiding the pistol behind the back of his leg, he stepped around the corner. “I think it’s me you want,” he said.

  Boberg turned and looked at McGarvey, his pistol never wavering from Pete’s head. “You’re damn right I do. Throw your gun down.”

  McGarvey tossed the magazine to the ground. It was dark and the distance was great enough that the Admin contractor could not have gotten a very good look.

  “I said throw your gun away.”

  “I just did, you stupid bastard,” McGarvey said. “Do you want me to pick it up and bring it to you?”

  Boberg glanced at Pete and then back. “Come closer, I don’t want to miss.”

  “Sure,” McGarvey said, starting toward the two of them. Pete was looking at him, trying to signal something. “But you should know something before you decide to shoot either of us.”

  “I’ve already decided.”

  “We have your name. We know everything about you and Administrative Solutions. About your work in Iraq, but mostly about the company’s assignments for the Friday Club. Payoffs. Bribery. Assassinations. The jobs are pretty impressive, and so are the names. Sandberger is at the top of the list, next is Remington, and third is Calvin Boberg. What are you, the company’s operations manager? Or should I have said were?”

  “Bullshit,” Boberg said, but it was obvious even in the dark from fifteen feet away that he was agitated. He kept glancing at Pete.

  “We have a KH-fifteen satellite watching us in real time. We saw where you parked your car just to the west of the driveway. Infrared sensors picked up your footprints through the woods where you stopped just before the clearing. We watched you coming up behind us as we sent the chopper away. The satellite caught everything. Kill us now and you’re screwed.”

  Boberg was smart enough to know or at least guess that the NRO had put up a new version of the Key Hole system.

  “Lower your weapon, turn around, and get out of here,” McGarvey said, and he stopped about ten feet away.

  “How do I know you won’t shoot me in the back?”

  “No need. It was Tim Kangas and Ronni Mustapha who killed my son-in-law and my wife and daughter. Not you.”

  “They’re dead.”

  “A lot of people are dead, Cal. And now I’m going to take Foster and his Friday Club down. If you want to take the fall with them, stick around. I don’t give a damn one way or the other.”

  “You’re lying,” Boberg said, his gun hand shaking. He looked at Pete.

  McGarvey winked at her and raised his pistol as Boberg was starting to turn back. She jerked her head a few inches to the left, and McGarvey fired one shot, catching the Admin contractor in the temple. Boberg’s pistol discharged as he was shoved sideways, the shot smacking harmlessly into the clapboard siding.

  “You’re right, I lied,” McGarvey said.

  Pete kicked the pistol away from Boberg’s reach, but the man was dead.

  “Your timing was perfect,” she said, her chest heaving. “I never heard him.”

  “We’re good here,” McGarvey said softly. “Boberg is down and Pete’s good to go.”

  “You’ve about run out of time, Mac,” Otto said. “Foster called his friends at the Bureau and the Marshal’s Service. Both of their names are on Remington’s list. They’ll have SWAT teams heading your way by chopper within a few minutes.”

  “I’m sending Pete back to you, and then I’m going inside to finish this once and for all.”

  “I’m staying with you,” Pete objected.

  “I’m going to get arrested tonight by Foster’s people, so I’m going to need you with Otto for backup. This is going to get ugly real fast.”

  “Shit.”

  “No matter what happens, no matter what you have to do, get back to Otto’s.”

  “Tell her to call me on her cell phone,” Otto said into his ear. “Louise is still on the KH-fifteen, and we can relay a safe route for her if need be.”

  McGarvey told her that, and she shook her head again, but she got her pistol from Boberg’s jacket pocket, and walked over to McGarvey and kissed him on the cheek.

  “That’s twice tonight you’ve saved my butt.”

  McGarvey smiled. “And a nice butt it is.”

  “Sexist,” Louise said in his ear.

  “Go now,” McGarvey said, and Pete turned and sprinted back to the woods.

  SEVENTY-TWO

  Adkins reached the main gate down the long driveway from the OHB, his hands shaking on the steering wheel. Administration was his thing, not running around stealing secrets, telling lies. And yet he felt just a little sense of exhilaration for pulling it off, and dread about what was happening between China and Taiwan.

  The possibility that somehow Foster, who had never been anything more than a well-connected, high-priced lobbyist, and his group could have fomented trouble over there was unbelievable, even monstrous.

  If the missiles started to fly a lot of people would die. And for what?

  The same linebacker security guard who’d signed him in, came out of the Reception Center and ran into the road, frantically waving his hands for Adkins to stop.

  Evidentally Loring hadn’t been able to stall whoever had come up to the seventh floor to see what was going on, and word had been sent down here.

  Adkins swerved sharply to avoid hitting the man and jammed his foot to the floor, his E class Mercedes taking off like a rocket. He glanced in the rearview mirror in time to see the guard race back inside. It would only be a matter a minutes now before the highway patrol had a description of the car and its tag numbers.

  At the bottom of the hill, Adkins slowed down and drifted through the stop sign then headed to the Parkway south, merging with the fairly light evening traffic.

  He took out his cell phone and called Otto. “I’m on the Parkway, but they knew I was up on the seventh floor, because they sent someone up. And one of the Reception Center security guys tried to stop me from leaving.”

  “They’ll be calling the highway patrol about now, so you’re going to have to come here.”

  “I can’t outrun a cop. I mean my car is capable of it, but I’m not.”

  “I want you to cross the median as quickly as possible and head the other way.”

  “Back toward the Company?”

  “Nobody will expect it, and by the time they realize they’ve been outsmarted you’ll be across the river at Turkey Run Park.”

  “Hold on,” Adkins said, and he put the phone down. A maintenance road crossed the median, and making sure that traffic was clear and no flashing lights were approaching from either direction, he slammed on his brakes, crossed over to the other side of the Parkway, and accelerated.

  He picked up the phone. “Okay, I’m heading north.”

  “Did you find anything else in Whittaker’s office?”

  “I didn’t check his desk or try the safe. I didn’t think he’d keep anything incriminating on paper, but I went down to Watch and talked to Ron Loring. Something is apparently starting between Mainland China and Taiwan. The Pentagon is in on it, and so is State. Ron said they were sending a courier over to the president tonight.”

  “Did he tell you what it was?” Otto asked. He sounded excited.

  “He didn’t want to say any
thing at first. Not until I told him that Mac had connected Mexico City and Pyongyang with the Friday Club, and it involved the Chinese government.”

  “Are you telling me that China is going to attack Taiwan?”

  “Two hours ago the Chinese started warming up their short-range missiles, and shortly after that Taiwan began spinning up their missiles. Their military was placed at Defcon two.”

  “China wouldn’t gain a thing,” Otto said.

  “No, and Beijing knows it,” Adkins agreed. “Something else has to be going on over there. A trigger of some sort.”

  At least a half-dozen police cruisers, lights flashing, had pulled up at the access road into the CIA, and as Adkins passed on the opposite side of the Parkway, two of the cruisers headed south at a high rate of speed.

  “Cops are all over the place,” he told Otto. “That was really fast.”

  “You’re only a couple of miles from the bridge. Anyone taking an interest in the north-bound lanes?”

  Adkins checked his rearview mirror. “Not yet.”

  “Won’t take them long,” Otto said. “Once you get across I want you to head up to State Road One-ninety, it’s just a little past the Cabin John Parkway. Turn east toward Somerset and the highway changes to River Road.”

  “Is that where you are?”

  “No, we’re in Georgetown. But I want you to come here clean, so I’m going to keep track of what the cops are doing. If anyone gets close I’ll redirect you to another route. So keep your phone on.”

  “I don’t know about this, Otto.”

  “Piece of cake, Mr. Director, you’re doing just fine.”

  “Are you going to work the China thing?”

  “I’m already on it,” Otto said.

  “Keep me posted.”

  SEVENTY-THREE

  McGarvey held up at the side of the house until Pete disappeared into the woods. She’d been limping, and he figured that her wound had to hurt like hell. But she was dedicated; she believed in the mission in a way McGarvey wasn’t so sure still existed for a lot of people in the Agency.