Executive Actions

by Gary Grossman

  “What?” exclaimed Bernsie. “The man who tried to kill Lodge is involved in the death of a Russian, too?”

  “Maybe,” Evans said.

  “Do you know what you’re saying?” Bernsie said. His voice cracked like a teenager’s. “This could be a hit by the Russians? Retribution for turning their man. Or…”

  “Easy, Bernsie,” the president said.

  “But there are legal ramifications. National and international. I can’t begin to stress…”

  “Later, Bernsie. When it’s time to notify the AG we will. But by the look on Jack’s face, I don’t think he’s quite finished yet.”

  “No, I’m not.” He directed his comments to the president, who had been right about both the seriousness of his expression and the need to continue. “McAlister was the shooter in Hudson. But McAlister is an alias. There’s no such person. A few days after he checked into the Hudson hotel, this McAlister moved from one room to another. Into 301, exactly where he needed to be to set up his shot. Initially that didn’t raise any concern with the FBI. Now it does, thanks to some heavy lifting by the local Police Chief. McAlister had direct line of sight from there. He just blew it.”

  “If killing Jenny Lodge was blowing it,” Bernsie interrupted. He showed his anger.

  “Okay,” Evans apologized, “Poor choice of words. Anyway, agents say Room 301 gave him the percentage shot. And the room became available to him right when he needed it. Right when someone else left the hotel earlier than he indicated at check-in.”

  “I assume you’re saving the best for last, Jack.”

  “Quite right, Mr. President. The man who checked out? His name was…Dolan.” Evans paused to allow the president to process the first part of his story.

  “And…” Taylor said encouraging further clarification.

  “And according to a statement the police took from a witness in Stamford, Connecticut, the man who shot Hoag was also Dolan.”

  “Dolan,” the president repeated.

  “Dolan. With a description that matches the man who checked out of 301, allowing McAlister—who had requested it—to move in.”

  “How do you know this?” the president asked.

  “I just know it.”

  “That’s it?” Bernsie blurted.

  “And Mulligan?” the president asked.

  “I’m sure you’ll hear from Robert this evening.”

  “This is ridiculous,” the chief of staff protested. “We have spies spying on the FBI? Is that it?”

  “We learned this through a telephone call. That’s all you need to know, sir.”

  “Are we not playing together nicely in the sandlot, Jack?”

  Evans took a few steps closer to his boss. He respected him a great deal and didn’t want to see Morgan Taylor defeated, personally or professionally. “We’re not playing, Mr. President. We’re not playing at all.”

  Evans took a breath and then added, “And there’s more.”

  “We received another report from Sandman.”

  The president stood up and walked to the bay window facing the Rose Garden. “Go on,” he said to the DCI. Taylor definitely wanted to hear more about their deep cover in Abahar Kharrazi’s OIS.

  “Abahar is hell bent to find out about what his brother is up to. He knows where to look. So do we now. Neither of us have detailed intel. Not yet. But it’s big enough to make Abahar fear for his succession. It involves Bashar Al-Assad and his father before him. And if that’s the case, I’ll bet it also means the Russians have their fingerprints on this. And I’d like to lay the groundwork for a mission to find out.”

  “Oh shit,” Bernsie said under his breath.

  The president continued to gaze outward into the darkness. Two pictures instantly came to mind. The photograph of Bobby Kennedy consoling his brother Jack; exhausted looks on their faces during the fearful days of the Cuban Missile Crisis. And Lyndon Johnson at the same window mulling the catastrophic effects the Vietnam War was having on his presidency. Now he was here contemplating the unknown himself. He was grateful no photographer was around to capture the moment.

  Taylor walked back to the couch.

  “I want Roarke.”

  “With all do respect, Mr. President, that’s not possible,” Evans answered. John Bernstein cleared his throat trying to telegraph that this would not go down well, but he was too late.

  “He has no history with Sandman,” the intelligence chief continued.

  “He has a history with me.”

  “Quite honestly, Mr. President, I’m not comfortable. He’s not one of mine.” Evans realized he might have misspoken. He put it a different way. “I would feel much better if we used one of the Agency’s assets.”

  Anyone who worked closely with Morgan Taylor understood that he was a good listener. He rarely interrupted. It was his military training and his Jesuit upbringing. He was polite. But he was also President of the United States. A man who made his own decisions.

  “Thank you, Jack. Of course, you’re right.”

  Evans smiled.

  “But, I want someone in there who can explain everything to me in terms that I will understand. I want to know exactly what my options are. Roarke will do fine. Just have the mechanism to spring them if there’s trouble.”

  Evans sighed. He wouldn’t win this round. “Then I’ll need him by the weekend, Mr. President.”

  “Agreed.

  John Bernstein was not happy. “If you’ll allow me a moment. We should have something concrete before we send a man like Roarke in. He might know every last sand dune in Iraq, but this is new territory for him. He could compromise the whole…”

  “He won’t.”

  “But if he does, Mr. President?” the CIA Director asked solemnly over his shoulder. “If he gets caught?”

  “Then you get them out,” the president stated emphatically.

  “Morgan, please,” said Bernsie. “This is no walk in the park.”

  “He’ll be ready. Trust me,” the president responded calmly. Then he turned back to Jack Evans. “Jack, put Roarke with anyone you want. Anyone.”

  “I have a man in mind.”

  “Good, now tell me, when Bob comes in, how surprised should I be by what he tells me?”

  An hour later, Robert Mulligan got his appointment and went through what he knew. The major difference was in the details he’d gathered from Bessolo’s conversations with the Hudson Police Chief. The president didn’t disclose what he learned from Evans or that the CIA had their hooks into Hoag. This was a classic example of “need to know.”

  When Mulligan finished, Taylor graciously thanked him and asked for a favor.

  “Yes sir, what can I do?”

  “Bob, I need you to open some doors for me at the bureau.”

  “Anything, sir. I believe you own those doors. What is it?”

  “Scott Roarke. He needs some bureau help.”

  “Sure. What’s it for? Part of his little Boston escapade?” he added. “The one the police would give any thing to figure out?”

  “He’s got something else on his mind. He doesn’t ask for much. Make it so, Bob.”

  “Done. Have him at my office at 8 A.M.”

  They wrapped up their meeting with a nightcap of scotch.

  When Mulligan left, the president telephoned Roarke with news about his morning meeting. Then he said goodnight. The president held off telling him about a little trip he’d be making soon. Better he get a few good nights’ sleep.

  CHAPTER

  28

  Washington, D.C.

  Tuesday 5 August

  “I need to work with that photo expert of yours up at the Academy,” Roarke said.

  “Which one?” FBI director Robert Mulligan replied between bites of his onion bagel.

  “You know, the Identikit guy. The nerd,” explained Roarke.

  “Touch Parsons.”

  “Touch?”

  “Touch, like ‘touch up,’ but it’s really Duane Parsons,” Mull
igan explained.

  “Okay. Can I see him today.”

  Mulligan made the call. Within minutes Roarke was on the way to the FBI Academy at Quantico, Virginia.

  The ride was slow going. The weather bureau forecast a 60 percent chance of rain. But along I-95 100 percent of it was coming down in sheets, slowing his way. Roarke had an idea and no time to waste. He’d once seen what the Identikit could construct in the hands of an expert. And by all accounts, Touch was the best.

  Mulligan cleared Roarke ahead of time at the gate, but rules still required officers to thoroughly search the underbelly of the Roarke’s Jag with mirrors, pop the trunk and check under the hood. An officer in charge scanned his photo ID with a government bar code reader, counted the ten seconds it took for computer confirmation, and then asked Roarke to place his hand on a palm print scanner.

  In the past decade all of the security regulations were buttoned up, and as a result, the FBI Academy was becoming as secure a facility as the CIA and NSA. It was all necessary.

  After going through another checkpoint at the front desk, Roarke was given a plastic card to pin on his jacket. It contained a microchip programmed with specific clearances; where he could walk and where he couldn’t. For Roarke it meant the elevator to Parson’s floor, the hallway and the men’s room. Any place else and a readout at the security desk would scramble officers to Roarke’s exact location.

  Roarke was met by a young secretary, barely out of school, who failed to take any interest in Roarke.

  “This way,” was all she said as she escorted him to the elevator and down a hall to a waiting area.

  He laughed to himself. He was probably too old for her. But it did make him think about Katie and that powerful attraction they felt for one another.

  “Have a seat here. Mr. Parsons will be right with you.”

  “Thank you,” Roarke said.

  Five minutes later Duane Parsons burst through the door.

  Roarke had imagined that he’d be about 55 years old, a sloppy dresser with a goofy laugh, tape holding his glasses together; a dweeb.

  Instead, a tall, trim and fit man came out.

  “Hello there. I’m Parsons.” His handshake was as tight as the rest of his body. Roarke had to squeeze back just to get him to lighten up.

  “Roarke, Scott Roarke. Mulligan called.”

  “Yes. Yes. I was expecting you. You realize it’s not everyday Mulligan calls himself. To tell you the truth, it’s the first time. You must have friends in high places, Mr. Roarke.”

  “Just one.”

  “Well, from the little I heard your project is fairly straightforward. You could have gone to any number of people.”

  Roarke looked him straight in the eyes. “That wasn’t possible.”

  It was then that Parsons realized that this man was deadly serious. “All right, I’m honored. So whatcha got?”

  “Inside.”

  Parsons appeared surprised.

  “Inside,” Roarke insisted this time pointing to Parson’s office. He was inside the FBI’s labs, but that didn’t mean everyone could be trusted. He didn’t know Parson’s secretary or anyone else on the floor. He closed the door behind them.

  Parson’s office was typical government issue—a stark metal desk and matching filing cabinets, computers, a small round table for conferences, and a photograph of the President. The photograph made Roarke laugh. It was Morgan Taylor in a classic Brooks Brothers suit. Only he appeared to be around eight or nine years old.

  “Oh, that?” Parsons offered. “Some of my work.”

  With that, Roarke realized Touch was good, really good.

  Instead of stopping in the office, Parsons hit a button on the top of his desk. A file cabinet moved aside, exposing a high tech computer photo lab. “This way.”

  “Very Bond of you,” Roarke joked.

  “Well, not really. It just allows me a certain degree of isolation while I work. What I do takes time and concentration. Mulligan gave me everything I wanted.”

  “Including extra security,” Roarke suggested.

  “Yes, a bit extra, and lots of toys. As a result, I’ve been able to put new faces on some old crimes. I earn my keep.”

  “Now for your particular project.”

  Roarke removed an envelope from his pocket and silently passed it along to Touch.

  “May I?” he said, blowing air into the envelope to create space. He removed the newspaper photograph, a cropped copy that Roarke had made on a Kinko’s Kodak photo machine.

  “A newspaper. Loose dot matrix. Not much gray scale to work with and a bit out of focus. But I’ve started with worse. No caption?”

  “None,” Roarke lied. He intentionally cut off the caption and all other hints to its origin.

  Parsons placed the picture on a scanner and before Roarke fully realized what had happened, the photograph appeared on a 19” flat computer screen.

  “Now I can work with it.”

  With a few keystrokes Touch enhanced the sharpness, thereby improving the focus. He added more contrast, cropped out the superfluous portions and enlarged the subject.

  “Well, what do we have here. A Boy Scout. Troop 134. See,” he said as he zoomed in on the boy’s shoulder patch. I’d say your little fellow here is about 13, maybe 14. Tall for his age.” He studied the face, moved the cursor around and immediately filled in some pinpricks that the microfilm negative had transferred to the positive image. “I have to be honest with you. This is going to be hard. But luckily, the features are all developed; enough for a first pass.”

  “First pass?”

  “Well, I can age his face to whatever you want. But I really don’t have enough visual data with just this photo to genealogically age him accurately.”

  “What do you mean? Isn’t this what you do?”

  “It is Mr. Roarke. But how good do you want me to be? That’s more in your hands than mine. Let me explain. Age progression has become an important part of crime solving. I imagine that’s why you’re here. Some sort of crime. Kidnapping?”

  Roarke didn’t give any ground.

  “Kidnapping is why we often age children. To see if anyone recognizes them as adults. We also use the process to age adolescent criminals on the run. We’ve been able to capture them five or ten years out. Of course, that’s mostly for capital offenses. What’s your Eagle Scout? A killer or did he squeeze a Girl Scout’s tits at camp?”

  “Neither. Call it research. I need to age the boy into his late forties,” Roarke said. “Can you or can’t you do it for me.”

  “I haven’t finished with my explanation. Given that this is somehow important to you, you’ll soon understand why I’ll need more.”

  “Go on,” Roarke said more politely. He sat down and watched Parsons at work.

  “Look,” Parsons said, clearing his screen. He went to a file and clicked on a picture of a young girl. He quickly cycled through various stages of her life through 75. “Amazing isn’t it. An individual’s basic look holds relatively true through the years. The eyes hardly change. They’re a signature to me, just as fingerprints are to other investigators. Certainly the subject will mature, but I can extrapolate some of the variables —the distance of the eyes to the nose, eyebrow growth. Shape of the nose through puberty. Things like that. It’s the other changes that make it a real challenge. How much will the lips thin over the years? Or the hair recede? What happens to the jaw line? All of it is indeterminable. Of course, I get a little help from computer models. The programs were developed and refined in Louisiana at FACES.”

  “‘Faces?’”

  “Short for Forensic Anthropology and Computer Enhanced Services Laboratory at Louisiana State University. We learned a lot from them in the early years of age progression portraiting technology. We still share a great deal of information with—”

  Roarke cut him off. “Not this time. You. Just you.”

  “This is serious business.”

  “Very.”

  “Well,
then, there is something that can make it far easier for me.”

  “And that is?”

  “Family photos, Mr. Roarke. If I have photographs of brothers or sisters during different stages of their life, and parents younger and older….”

  “Not possible.”

  “Come on. Parents?”

  “I don’t have any.”

  “Then find them,” Parsons demanded. “Get me pictures of this boy’s mother and father at ages 45 to 50. Better yet, get me a whole slew of pictures representing different years. Then the percentages dramatically increase for me to spot and track family characteristics. Oh, and health records of the parents. Get them, too. Invaluable information.”

  Parsons switched to another program comparing an aging montage of a boy with his father who, as Parsons explained, suffered from diabetes.

  “This case—missing persons—required determining what a boy might look like at age 35. His father had diabetes and gained a good deal of weight. Knowing that, and the boy’s genetic predisposition to diabetes, we added some pounds to him that we might not have otherwise considered.” The montage ended on the boy at age 35. It dissolved into an actual photograph of a man who had gained weight and looked exactly like the computer model. “We found him, Roarke. We found him because we added the weight. We can find them because of their health, their personalities and what we can predict that they’ll wear. All of it goes out to the FBI or police departments, or on TV. And it all helps.

  “It’s truly forensics, Roarke. We quantify growth data to predict the natural changes that a face will likely undergo through life. I can manipulate grids within the face to refine, or more specifically, redefine facial features. Knowledge of the distinguishing family facial characteristics is key to predicting the spatial arrangement over time.”

  Roarke was impressed by Parson’s knowledge. “How do faces change? What are the variables?”

  “Faces grow downward, also outward. The bridge of the nose rises. The face broadens and lengthens. The eyes will narrow slightly, the mouth expands. Hair color will darken, then gray. There are transformations to the cheekbones. They tend to become more prominent. And there’s facial-cranial growth. It’s all, no pun intended, relative. Which is why I need family pictures.