Force of Fire (The Kane Legacy)

by Rosa Turner Boschen

She found the fact they were feeding her at all a good sign. It meant that there was hope. Hope was what POWs clung to when there was nothing else left. She knew this because of the stories her father had read to her. When other children were being treated to Hansel and Gretel or The House at Pooh Corner, Ana’s six-year-old mind was filled with Reader’s Digest condensations of spy stories from World War II. Her father had served in the war and one way or another had never quite gotten the Army out of his system. She found herself fascinated by the tales of brave men and how they’d survived their predicaments. Men who had triumphed over years, not months, of not just confinement but unspeakable torture and lived to tell the tale. 'I just kept telling myself,' Ana remembered one brave soldier saying, 'they may break my body, but they will never break my spirit.' He ultimately had left the service ni a wheelchair, with several irreparably broken bones, a few severed fingers and an honorable discharge. During his entire ordeal he had never once divulged a precious U.S. Intelligence secret.

  Ana heard the sharp crispness of boots approaching down the hall and feared more than anything it would be Carnova. The tall one with no expression in his eyes save the vile vacancy of hate. Ana had once read that serial killers had no empathy for their victims because they themselves were incapable of feeling.

  The footsteps stopped just outside. She’d barely heard the light tinkle of keys when the round curve of her spine rapidly gave way to the disappearing weight of the door.

  Mark sat across from Tom Mooney in the Ambassador's stark white office. In the courtyard beyond the double doors, coconut palms danced in the sweltering breeze. It was four o'clock.

  'So, Mr. Neal,' Mooney was finishing, 'that's about all I can tell you.'

  Mark noticed the sweat dribbling down the Ambassador’s thick, red neck and pooling around his open collar.

  'If you don't mind, sir,' he said, pulling the white cotton handkerchief from his breast pocket to wipe his brow, 'I'd appreciate going over the chain of events one more time.'

  Mooney looked up at him through tired green eyes. His slick silver hair stuck firmly to the sides of his head. He had already been through this story several times.

  'Like I said, there was something awfully fishy about this from the beginning. The cable Joe received at his office was never sent to us here.'

  'And that's not standard practice?' Mark asked, removing his suit jacket and draping it over one knee.

  'If there is such a thing as standard practice with these damned insurgents. No, Mr. Neal, this was not standard practice. Generally all missives are directed to me here.'

  Mark scratched his chin and rose to stretch his legs. He had taken in Mooney's previous testimony. Now he was making sure he had it straight.

  'When you bumped into Joe's secretary at the restaurant, she mentioned this communiqué in passing.'

  'Thought it was screwy. I mean, how the devil could I have missed something so important?'

  'So after dinner, you went back to the office to re-check the message traffic.'

  'There was no message. Least, nothing regarding a planned attack on the northern highway. Didn’t like the feel of it.'

  'You thought the missive was a set-up.'

  'Damn straight, I did. Somebody was trying to throw Joe off track, either by getting him to talk Miss Kane out of her trip, which was unlikely given her head-strong reputation or – '

  '– or, by forcing him to suggest an alternate route,' Mark said, reinforcing what Mooney had told him earlier.

  'Trouble is, only other way to Tarrona is a dangerous drive along the western mountains.'

  'Dangerous, because that region is insurgent territory.'

  'Precisely. Hell, Joe should have known that. You don't know my nephew, Mr. Neal. Kid fancies himself some sort of vigilante in these parts. Thinks he can take all those guerilla fighters on single -handedly.'

  Mark thought back to his earlier appraisal of McFadden's character and had to agree with the Ambassador's assessment.

  He studied Mooney's expression a moment longer before pressing on. 'So, once you suspected something was amiss, you tried to reach Joe at home.'

  'That's right. But try as I might, I couldn't reach the kid. Not at home, not at the Mission. Later I come to find out he’d spent the night boozing it up with Miss Kane back at her hotel.'

  Mark began to pace back and forth across the checkerboard of the linoleum floor. 'You suspect there was something romantic going on between them?'

  'An affair? I don't know. There was talk. Nobody knew for sure. Everyone says Miss Kane is quite a looker, and – if you haven't heard –' he added with an unnecessary hint of pride, 'my nephew's a bit of a ladies' man.'

  Mark thought of Ana's penetrating black stare and imagined the spell she could cast. He paused momentarily, then summed up the action. 'So there was speculation of an affair between Joe and Ana, but no proof. The records from the Embassy jeep pool show Joe signed out a vehicle and a driver at six forty-five on the morning of his and Ana's disappearance.

  'That afternoon around five, the hospital administrator from Tarrona, frustrated Ana had failed to show for their appointment, telephoned Ana's project office downtown. The office's senior consultant tried the hotel, the contracts office, then finally got in touch with you here.'

  'That's right, but by the time I got the call it was almost seven. Sun was going down. Local authorities wouldn’t do a damn thing without official signs of distress.'

  'But you did call Washington.' Mark returned to the sticky warmth of his chair.

  'Called our backstop office at State. But, dammit all, no one was willing to take this thing seriously. Joe has a name in Washington. His disappearance with the young Miss Kane raised more eyebrows than questions. 'Give it forty-eight hours, ' they said, 'and buzz us back if the kids don't resurface.'

  Mooney's perspiration seemed to pick up new vigor. The pleats of his sheer, pink shirt were soaked. He wiped his sweaty palms on his pants legs then shuffled some papers on his desk.

  'Here's a copy of the communiqué Joe received. Don't know what good it will do you, but thought you might want to have it.'

  Mark folded the rumpled sheet of paper and tucked it in his breast pocket.

  Mooney placed both hands on his desk. 'Cromwell says you're the best. Do you think you can find them?'

  'If you’ll excuse my language, sir,' Mark said, slowly rising to his feet. 'I’m going to damn well try.'

  Mooney gave him a steady look. 'I imagine you will.'

  'Ambassador, I thank you for your time. If you think of anything else, anything at all, I'd appreciate a call at my hotel.'

  Mark was halfway out the door when Mooney stopped him with a question.

  'How's old George holding up?'

  Mark turned slowly on his heels. The phrasing of this inquiry seemed odd, unprofessional.

  'Mr. Cromwell's fine,' he said, deliberating.

  Mooney rose and shifted slightly on his feet. 'Good. When you talk to him, you tell him we've got everything under control down here.'

  Mark suddenly remembered it was Mooney who had contacted Cromwell about the abductions. 'Yes, sir. Will do. You two go back a long way?'

  Mooney hesitated a few seconds. 'Served together in the Caribbean.'

  'That's right,' Mark pretended. 'The War.'

  The Ambassador took Mark’s hand. 'Thank you coming, Mr. Neal. Give me a call as soon as you know anything.'

  Mark accepted Moony’s gesture. 'Will do, sir. I’ll tell Mr. Cromwell you send your regards.'

  Mark folded his damp trousers neatly in thirds, then tossed the remainder of his sweat-drenched clothes in a heap on the bed. He stepped into his swim trunks, summing up his meeting with Mooney. Ana’s abduction had gone according to plan. But whose plan? That was the question he pondered as he walked down the hall to the outdoor veranda.

  Mark dove into the water, the crystal cavern of the pool sucking the heat from his skin. He considered Ana's mouth, a toasty cinnamon, and felt a
rush of excitement fill his loins as he surged forcefully through the water. Ana Kane was a looker, so Mooney said. Yes and no, thought Mark, carrying himself onward with slow, steady arms. Ana wasn't pretty in a conventional way, but she had something. Something powerful. It was there in her eyes.

  Mark started to slacken his pace, but turned at the wall instead, pushing himself off from the side of the pool with new vigor. He liked the water, for though it was bigger than he, it always yielded to his control. He could command his body, predict the roll of the timid waves. The ocean was more of a challenge to swim in, but still he could navigate its tumultuous hurdles with uncanny ease. The sea creatures never bothered him. It was the two-legged land ones he seemed to have trouble with. The demented ones with the psychopathic mind set. Those perverted bastards with nothing better to do than detonate barracks loaded with two hundred and forty-three sleeping men.

  Beirut had been a close call. Too close. He could just as well have been in those barracks. It was not the threat of death that frightened him, but the idea of dying without knowing. He’d been tipped off, led to believe there were some answers.

  Somebody somewhere who knew something. The missing link to Heathrow that had clanked through his clumsy fingers.

  Mark reached the far side of the pool, spun gamely then headed back again. His breathing was in steady rhythm – stroke, stroke, turn. Stroke, stroke, turn.

  After the blast, nothing made sense any more. The ones that were taken were the ones that mattered, soldiers with families who gave a damn. He’d had the dubious honor of informing the spouses. Spouses lucky enough to get stationed nearby. 'I’m sorry to tell you there’s been an explosion...'

  And he, having no one, had lived.

  Mark kicked off from the pool wall another time, finally losing count of his laps. He’d resigned his commission the following Tuesday. He was tired. Tired of the rigmarole, tired of living beneath the capricious sway of his commander’s whim. It hit him that he was powerless. Rightly or wrongly, it had been his designation, his duty, to respond to other people’s policy. Sometimes imperfect policy. Imperfect policy set by imperfect men. Not that Mark was such a pinnacle of perfection himself. But at least he’d been in the trenches. He understood firsthand the sacrifices required when someone at the Pentagon ruthlessly waved a pen. And it wasn’t only the Pentagon, it was those other places as well: the State Department, the NSC, the entire JCS and the ubiquitous hands that fed them – DIA, DEA, CIA, to name a few. All those little initials in charge of so many little things impacted enormously on foreign policy. And the cream of the crop among them were the analysts, intelligence gatherers who could read and disseminate the threat of war and a cornucopia of other menaces besides. The experts in their field were men and women top commanders turned to when timing was tight and stakes were high.

  Mark finished his final lap and paused at the edge of the pool catching his wind. He remembered the driving sensation, the tingling urge that had told him when and where he had to go. It was time to be on the other side of things for a change. He was too young, too green for senior military service just about everywhere, but not too old to get started on a civilian career in Washington.

  Mark could hear the persistent ringing of a phone down the hall as he approached his room, an acrid mixture of chlorine and sweat. He hurried to unlock the door and lunged for the receiver.

  'Taylor.'

  'Sir, it's Pete.'

  'Hello, Jarvis. How are things in our great nation's capital?' he asked, stalling for time as he jostled through his briefcase for his scrambler. He dropped it expertly into the mouthpiece of the phone.

  'Man, took me over an hour to get through to you. There must be only two phone lines in the whole country.'

  Mark could hear static on the line and knew Jarvis was fine-tuning his decoder.

  'Yes, and we're occupying one of them. What’ve you got?'

  'For starters, I've got a line on the boyfriend. Denton, Scott Denton.'

  'They've been an item for – what? – nine years?'

  'Right. But, things have taken an interesting turn on that front.'

  'Oh?' Mark laid a dry towel under him and settled down on the bed.

  'Yeah. Seems the boyfriend took off for the Peace Corps in Guatemala without advising the Kane chick of his plans.'

  Mark frowned. 'This Denton character just up and walked out on her without so much as a note?'

  'Not exactly. There was a letter of some kind. Denton claims he sent it to her hotel in La Concha before leaving Washington.'

  Mark shook his head, making a mental note to check with the hotel regarding Ana's belongings. 'How’d he take the news?'

  'Did seem pretty broken up. Offered to cooperate, help in any way he can.'

  'We might just have to take him up on it.'

  'Want us to fly him to Costa Negra? He's right at your back door.'

  Mark ran his thumb along the piping on the bedspread, considering his options. 'No, we’re better off bringing him to Washington. I have a hunch Cromwell will want to see him. Hold off on those arrangements for now. Let me see what else I can turn up here.'

  'Any leads?'

  'Just one.' Mark removed the communiqué from the crumpled shirt on the bed. 'You know, there's something that sticks in my craw about this missive.'

  'Missive? You mean the message Cromwell referred to?'

  'Yes. I got a copy of the cable from the Ambassador this afternoon. Something about the wording is familiar – don't know how, but familiar. Can’t shake the feeling I’ve come across it before.'

  'The translation?'

  'The style. Tenses are inverted, not like from Spanish, more like –'

  'Basque?'

  'Exactly. What makes you say so?'

  'Well, sir, I pulled the back files you requested. Crosschecked international ties to insurgents in the Costa Negra region.'

  'And?'

  'Your old buddy El Dedo has been putting his nasty fingers into some new pies.'

  Mark paused, bringing his hand to his chin. He’d been tracking El Dedo and his terrorist activity for almost a decade. Luis Vaquero, aka 'El Dedo,' had earned his nickname for the left index finger he lacked. He was a kingpin in Costa Negra insurgent activity and was not, Mark knew, opposed to violence when it suited his means.

  'What's El Dedo up to now?'

  'Seems Luisito has taken up some new bedfellows. Our latest data show a decisive link between El Dedo's recent activities and those of a Basque separatist faction in Spain.'

  'Not the LPP?' Mark asked with disdain.

  This terrorist group had tried for a number of years to overthrow the Spanish monarchy, leaving quite a body toll in the wake of its unsuccessful efforts.

  'When you lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas,' said, quoting the old Spanish proverb.

  'The only problem with these dogs is their bark is equal to their bite.'

  'You think they'll hurt Kane and McFadden?'

  'Not if I can help it,' Mark said, checking the clock on the nightstand. 'How much cable traffic you got for me?'

  'Somewhere between fifty and sixty pages of electronic files.'

  'You ran updates on the LPP man?'

  'Carnova? Yes, sir, as well as the Central America tie-ins. All set?'

  Mark slipped his laptop out from under the mattress and attached the thin green wire extending from the jack at the lower corner of the computer screen to the device on the phone. 'That's a roger. Fire away.'

  Mark had a feeling this ill-formed alliance between the LPP and Luis Vaquero's local group meant something. And it wasn't something good.

  Scott set down the receiver and walked to a street-side cafe. He took his black coffee and sat beneath the outstretched leaf of a palm. She had to have read it. God damn him. It had been such an easy plan. By the time she’d left, it had already been posted eight days.

  Things had not always been worn like they’d become at the end. In the beginning it had been electric, ful
l of spice and delicious fire. He’d never known anyone quite like Ana, anyone quite so pretty, quite so smart. He was drawn to her against his will and the harder he’d resisted the more firmly entrenched he’d become.

  Scott sat remembering the young dark-haired woman who’d clomped into the seminar fifteen minutes late in Western-style boots.

  He’d at first mistaken her for a Spanish girl. It wasn’t until she’d settled herself in among the fresh American arrivals that he’d realized she was one of the newcomers to the exchange program. He’d spent the next fifty minutes ignoring the lecture and trying to concoct something witty to say. He needn’t have worked so hard, for when the class ended, she’d approached him.

  'You from the States?'

  'Didn’t realize I still look so American.'

  'Still?'

  'This is my second year,' he’d said, feeling the rash of heat at his neck. He’d never seen such dark eyes. Nearly black and sparkling with that tantalizing mixture of woman and child.

  She’d looked at him, clearly sensing his interest but not the least bit intimidated. Then she’d announced she would accept his offer of coffee before the query had formed on his lips.

  At the university bar, he’d discovered she was a second semester junior. Spanish/poli-sci double major, with ambitions of living in Washington.

  At that point, Scott wasn’t sure where he’d wind up. Spain was good enough for him. So good, he’d told her, that he’d decided to finish up his senior year credits there rather than going back home.

  She’d given him a warming smile that made him want to reach across the table and touch her, but he’d resisted.

  'Quite a temptation,' she’d said, her eyes an improbable invitation.

  Scott tipped up his tumbler and drained the last bit of coffee from his glass. And now she was gone, desaparacida. Almost as if he had willed it. But he hadn’t willed it. Never in their most abysmal moments would he have wished for that. Scott felt a shiver of half-truths shimmy down his spine as he dug into the pocket of his faded jeans for some change. It was a coin toss really. Whether or not he’d done the right thing. No, honorable was the word. The Dentons were all so intent on doing the honorable thing. He knew what his father would say. But, according to his Dad, he didn’t own one goddamned shred of decency anyhow. So what the hell was the difference?