Force Protection

by Gordon Kent

  “You promise?” Her head was spinning. She thought she just might throw up.

  “Promise.” His lower jaw moved a little sideways, his mouth slightly open. He looked her up and down. “You’re a class act, Commander. I’m sorry I mouthed off at you.” He lowered his voice. “Go home.”

  Everything seemed to recede from her. She stood alone in the middle of a vast space where tiny figures moved like ants along the horizon. The distance to the car that would take her home seemed like miles. She took a step. Another. Another. She made it to a fringe of weeds and threw up.

  Langley, Virginia.

  An analyst in the African Section conflated an agent report and a satellite sighting into a short, nonurgent notice of activity at the main airport in Sierra Leone, West Africa. An aircraft believed to be a Tu-103 had landed and was believed to have offloaded personnel. On another pass of the satellite, the aircraft was gone, then later was on the ground again.

  Because of established UK interest in Sierra Leone—Britain was the old colonial power—the analyst flagged the notice and suggested it be passed to MI6. At that point, she suspected only that some sort of support for local rebels might be involved.

  Mombasa.

  The word had spread through the det that somebody had tried to kill the skipper. When Alan walked into the hangar, work stopped and everybody looked at him. Any resentment that might have resulted from his absence from Craw’s memorial service was erased. Alan, aware of the atmosphere, waved and grinned.

  Somebody on the far side clapped his hands together. Then somebody nearer him did. People were coming out of the spaces on the second level. There was a whoop and more applause. Alan waved again.

  Geelin had been waiting for him at the guard point. He had filled him in on the mortar attack as they had walked toward the hangar: nobody hurt, no damage, three new holes in the dirt beyond the perimeter; no, he hadn’t responded, goddamit, because those were your orders, sir (goddamit, unsaid); would he please, for Christ’s sake, let them do a sweep of the raghead slum where the mortar rounds had come from!

  Then Cohen grabbed his arm as soon as the men stopped clapping. One of the CIA guys was there, too, then Campbell and Chief Bakin. There was nervousness and a need to be reassured that he was truly okay, uninjured, really okay. By the time that was over, he was up the stairs, and they gave him a quick briefing right there on the balcony: the Marines from the gator freighter had arrived; there’d been another small riot near the port, now over; Fidelio and Mink and three sailors had been lifted to the Harker to study the bomb damage and were due back at 1800.

  Patemkin, the CIA man, was smiling a little grimly. “Kenyan cops are going to let us talk to the guy from the dhow.”

  “Ambassador talked ugly to them?”

  “I talked ugly to them. I told them if I had to go to the chief of station, ugly wouldn’t even touch it.” He jerked his head. “Sandy and I are seeing him tomorrow.”

  “Good. Well done.” Alan started into the det office and turned back. “Is he Islamic?”

  “Kenyans say he’s Somali.”

  Alan thought about Harry and about the IPK. He nodded and turned away.

  Later, he went down into the hangar and was surprised to see that David Opono was still there, he and Sandy Cole silhouetted against the open doors. The sun was almost down, the light the color of hot coals. She was leaning toward him; he was talking, her head turned up to his face. Once, he lifted a hand, finger extended, a gesture perhaps of scolding, perhaps only teaching. Then she leaned back and turned slowly and walked away deeper into the hangar. Her shoulders were bowed. It struck Alan like a tap on the chest: he’d dumped her, probably had dumped her before she had ever come to Mombasa. Then another tap: had she come to Mombasa to be near him, to bring him near? Was that why she’d been so willing to bring Opono into the operation?

  What had she asked him? To start over? Whatever it was, it was something he couldn’t give. To leave his wife? To spend a night with her? To take her back to Nairobi? Alan watched Opono watch her walk away, sensing in Opono’s slender solidity a man who didn’t care enough. That, of course, was what he couldn’t give. He couldn’t care enough, not for her, perhaps not for his wife. Alan sensed what he would have called the man’s coldness, which was really a passion, an obsession, an ultimate caring, but not for her—egoism focused on a nobler goal, the attitude we used to see in “the artist,” see still in the occasional hero, the occasional idealist. It is the object of the only caring it can manage.

  8

  Cairo.

  WALKING AWAY FROM THE CAIRO LOCKUP, DUKAS STOPPED grinning—he had stopped laughing only a minute before—and said, “I thought for a second there they were gonna keep you. One of those guys really had a yen for you.”

  “That’s the sergeant who shot the assassin. He doesn’t have a ‘yen’ for me; he knows that I’m his only backup in his self-defense case.”

  “Yeah, well, he doesn’t have to worry; they’ve already pinned the dead guy as a member of al-Jihad, so they’ll probably give him a medal for the kill.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “The world’s gone on while you were in the jug, Dick. I got it from D.C. when I got off the plane. Homeboys think it was a hit to shut the woman up—they were done with her, etcetera, etcetera—so the Egyptians are looking now for the guy who was her lover, who wasn’t the assassin, they think—they’ve already done some hair analysis and shit like that. I’m surprised they’re that good, myself. Or maybe they’re making it up. Anyway, we were right, the American woman gave away the AID office to her boyfriend and it got blown. Bad—nine dead, they figure three hundred injured.” He blew out his breath, reaching for the handle of his rental car. “You ever wonder why they hate us, Dick?”

  Triffler’s face was in shadow, but his eyes glittered in the light from the street. “I’m black, Mike.”

  “What’s that mean? Oh—you don’t have to wonder, huh? You hate us, Dick?”

  “No. But I’ve hated some white people. But no—I don’t hate America, you know that.”

  Dukas was still standing with one hand on the car. “Sometimes I do,” he said. He was tired out. His shoulders sagged, and he sighed. Jet lag squared. “A city like this—the goddamn dogs are all bones; the kids are hungry and make a pain of themselves begging; half the guys have no jobs. And we have everything. Money—muscle—the crap we dump on the world—rock music and goddamn soft drinks that rot your teeth and drugs and—”

  Triffler put a gentle hand on his shoulder. “Mike—you’re babbling.”

  Dukas straightened. “Yeah.” He opened the car door. “Forget I said it. What’d you find in the killer’s apartment?” He got in the other side and slid behind the wheel and said again, “Well? What’d you find?”

  Triffler was feeling for a seat belt and realizing that there was none. For one moment, he looked as if he might refuse to ride in the car. Then he put a thin hand on the dashboard and braced himself and, staring ahead for the crash that he knew was coming, said, “A computer. With Windows in Arabic. You ever try to use a computer with Windows in Arabic?”

  “What’d you get?”

  “I have no idea.” He flinched at something that flashed by. “I downloaded everything to disk. E-mails. A lot of MP3 files. Couple of folders, but no idea what was in them. You should try downloading the contents of a hard drive when the instructions are in Arabic.”

  “Where’re the disks?”

  “I sent them DHL to the office. We’ll have Leslie e-mail them back to the hotel. I was afraid the Cairo cops would seize them when they caught up with me.”

  Dukas laughed. “Dick, you should have been a crook.”

  “I used to be a telemarketer.”

  Dukas laughed again, then sobered. He was trying to find the team’s hotel. Triffler set him right after two wrong turns. When they were on a long, broad boulevard that was crowded with cars, Dukas said, “Only three of us could get on the direct flight. The
rest are coming in three hours.” He glanced at Triffler, whose face showed the strain of his day. “I’m afraid you gotta stay up for a late-night meeting.”

  Triffler looked down at his bloody trousers, his ruined silk jacket. “I suppose I’ll be allowed time to shower and change.”

  “I suppose you will.” Dukas flinched and swore and stood on the brakes as a truck darted in front of him. “As long as you get on the STU to Leslie and get those files back so you can report on them at the meeting.”

  Triffler was silent. When he spoke, it was clear that he had been figuring. “It’s almost lunchtime in D.C. I’ll just have time to shower and change before Leslie gets back.” The car swerved and lurched and Dukas swore again. “If you don’t get us killed before we get to the hotel,” Triffler said.

  “Eat mine.”

  “I’m almost hungry enough to, but no thanks.”

  Dukas stood on the brakes again and there was a solid smack as their car was rear-ended.

  Houston.

  Rose had slept uneasily on the couch and had waked often. She had got up four times in two hours and checked on the kids, Mikey playing a computer game or staring at the television, the baby challenging his toilet training in a playpen in the dining room. She had taken the aspirin that DaSilva had recommended, but she hadn’t really slept. Odd bits of bad dreams flickered through her consciousness. At one o’clock, she forced herself up again, her head aching, and made the kids some lunch.

  “You okay?” she said to Mikey. He shrugged. She hugged him and told him he’d behaved as well as a grown man would have. His stillness seemed to say that he was a child, not a grown man; he was scared and he was confused because he wasn’t at camp, and he wanted certainty and safety and a house with a father and mother who didn’t shoot people or get shot at. He said all that without ever speaking a word. With tears in her eyes, she promised him that things would get better. “Eat your sandwich.”

  “I’m not hungry.”

  Then the doorbell rang, and her heart raced. She looked out, standing beside the window, not right behind it. The police car was still out there blocking the driveway, one of the officers visible as an arm and a coffee cup.

  “Who is it?”

  A female voice called something with “NCIS” in it, then called her “ma’am.” And goddamn the police for keeping my gun, she thought. She put an eye to the corner of the square window that was high up in the door. A young woman and a fairly young man were standing out there, back from the door where she could see them. Both wore casual clothes—jeans on her, chinos on him, shirts—with something else worn loose over the top (vest, golf jacket) that could have hidden a hip gun. They must have seen her eye, because both held up blue wallets with NCIS badges.

  “Ma’am,” the woman said when the door was open, “I’m Warrant Officer Reko and this is Petty Officer Gorki. We’re from the NCIS resident agency in Corpus Christi.” She smiled—nice smile, no bullshit, good teeth—and did something with her shoulders that suggested a squaring away for action. “We’re here to protect you?” It sounded like a question, but it wasn’t a question.

  “You’re special agents?”

  “I’m an LDO special agent; Gorki’s in the Master-at-Arms program.” She smiled again. “We’re legit.”

  “Ah—the policemen—?” Rose’s head felt thick and stupid. She made a gesture toward the police car.

  “Oh, we checked in,” the woman said, laughing. She turned and waved. One of the cops waved back. “We really are legit.”

  “We’d like to check the house and then the perimeter,” her male partner said. It was a way of saying they’d like to be asked in.

  They had a rental car that they pulled in around the cop car and parked next to the house. There were long black nylon bags in the trunk, which they carried inside, and then Petty Officer Gorki, the man, went out and wrestled a STU out of the car and slammed the lid.

  Both were already wearing Kevlar vests and carrying handguns, she found. “We got more firepower, but there’s no sense scaring the neighbors,” Gorki said. “Where’s your phone?” She led him to it. The instrument was on its side, the dial tone buzzing, because early on there had been horrible calls from nosy reporters and all she’d wanted was peace. He hung it up and then listened to it and checked it with a device that looked like a pager, then asked about extensions and disappeared. The woman was going from room to room with a bigger black box.

  “You think I’m bugged?” Rose said.

  “Just being careful, ma’am.”

  Gorki came back in. “Phone line’s okay. Cops think the bad guys eyeballed you from a park up there—they found some stuff they’d left behind. We thought maybe they’d listened in, too, but they did this quick and dirty.” He looked at Reko. “Got anything?”

  “Zip.”

  “Good.”

  “Let’s get out there.”

  The phone, now active again, rang eleven times and stopped, then began ringing again immediately. It might be Alan, she thought. Could he know yet? Maybe. But she didn’t want to be meat for the media feast. When the phone stopped ringing, she took it off the cradle and laid it on the table.

  On local television, they were showing a tape of the incident as if it was an O.J. rerun—overhead shots of the overturned van, her SUV, the vet and the dog, a shot of her and Hansen with his finger raised and her face thrust up, and there was no doubt that hers was the face of a very angry woman, and there was no doubt when Hansen stamped away that he was a very angry man. “Commander Rose Siciliano, a new astronaut out at Johnson Space Center, was said to have killed one man and injured two others in an incident that police are classifying as an attempted homicide. Johnson spokesman Rick Hansen has scheduled a press conference for five this afternoon, when Commander Siciliano will present her side of the story. Hansen and Siciliano didn’t seem to be too friendly when our cameramen saw them duking it out in this—”

  AT TWO, AN AIR FORCE MAJOR WAS LED TO ROSE’S FRONT door by one of the cops. He had the kind of serious face that undertakers put on when they discuss money.

  “From Colonel Brasher, Commander. He’s been trying to get you by phone all day.”

  “So have the media.”

  He shook his head. He had a manila envelope under his arm. He waited, as if she might be about to invite him in, and then handed it to her. “Orders,” he said.

  “Orders to what?” He pursed his mouth up.

  The cop was strolling back down toward his car. Warrant Officer Reko walked across the yard and waved.

  Rose opened the envelope.

  She was being put on leave, effective immediately.

  Attached to the sheaf of leave orders was a handwritten note on paper that said at the top: From the desk of Colonel “Chuck” Brasher, USAF. The note said: Return to the Space Center with Major Gaston at once. You are restricted to the base until further notice.

  Rose asked the major if he had a pen. He did. She wrote at the bottom of Brasher’s note: Thanks for asking after me and the kids. We’re bearing up pretty well. We’re not up to going anywhere yet, I’m afraid. She handed him the note. “Thanks.”

  “You’re to come with me. Those are my orders.”

  “Major, you can’t get an order for somebody else to do something. You can be ordered to bring me to the Space Center, but I guess you weren’t. Were you?”

  He frowned, as if the customer had asked why the plain pine coffin costs eleven hundred dollars. “Colonel Brasher was quite specific.”

  She nodded. The shock was passing, she guessed—she felt better. Maybe it was adrenaline from despising Brasher. “You may tell him that the Navy is taking care of me just fine.”

  She smiled and shut the door.

  At two-ten, she called DaSilva and he told her that all three men who had tried to kill her had records. “As American as apple strudel. No foreign connections. It’s more like a mob hit.” His voice was warmer, no irony. A little sex thing there?

  “You got
a mob down here?”

  “We got twenty mobs. What flavor you like—Mafia? Cali cartel? Pachuco?”

  “It doesn’t make sense.”

  She was thinking of the cell phones. Her brain was clear. The baby was sleeping and Mikey had eaten a big lunch, apparently energized by the arrival of the NCIS people, and her world looked better, despite Colonel Brasher.

  “Mom?” Mikey had said after he was full.

  “Honey?”

  “The Navy takes care of their own, right?”

  “It looks that way.”

  He had grinned at her. “I guess my mom can take care of herself.”

  Off and on, she had been watching energetic people get as far as the police car and then get turned away. Some guy with a microphone had got into the backyard, and Gorki had met him in a combat stance with a Beretta pointed at his face, and he had disappeared.

  The Navy takes care of its own.

  “Either of those goons talk?” she said now to DaSilva.

  “One can’t, one says he won’t but dropped a few bits before a pro-bono shyster arrived. Contract hit, that looks good.”

  “I’ve got my phone off the hook. You can’t call me, but I may want to talk to you, so I’ll call. Okay?”

  “Anytime.” Did that sound just faintly personal?

  She cut the call off with a finger and immediately released it to get a dial tone before somebody else could get a call in, and she dialed fast. She heard the phone ring on the other end—three, four, five—and she checked her watch. Four in Washington. He had to be there. Where the hell—?

  “Ethos Security.” This was the Washington office of Harry O’Neill’s company.

  “Henry Valdez, please?”

  A muttered something about waiting, then the voice, muffled, shouting “Valdez! Phone!” And, after a long silence, Valdez’s voice on the phone. “Yo.”

  “Valdez,” she said, “Commander Siciliano.”