“What about confidential material?” Admiral Ingram asked. “Things above the clearance level of your pilots.”
“We don’t have secrets on our team,” Alex said. “I have the highest clearance, of course. What I share what is pertinent to the team and our missions. I won’t hold back something vital over bullshit clearance.”
“What does the Intelligence Center say about that?” Admiral Ingram asked.
“What can they say?” Alex asked. “I’m well within my right and authority. Plus, the team has sworn an oath of secrecy. No one would break it.”
“They know the consequences if they do,” Raz said.
“The consequences?” Admiral Ingram asked.
Alex gave him an annoyed look.
“What can we do for you, Admiral?” Alex asked. “I’m pretty sure you didn’t come here to ask us about our standard procedures.”
The Admiral looked down at his hands. Alex and Raz let the silence linger. She was about to tell Zack to take them back to Bolling when the Admiral looked up at her. She was surprised to see tears in his eyes.
“Did you kill my brother?” Admiral Ingram asked.
CHAPTER FOUR
“Nathan?” Alex asked. “No, sir, I did not. By the look on your face, I’m confident that you have read our reports.”
Admiral Ingram’s eyes fixed on Alex. For the first time, it occurred to her that he was more than her new asshole superior officer. He was a grieving relative. She forced herself to put away her aching ego and outrage.
“Nathan was a wonderful man and a great friend,” Alex said. “He never had a negative word to say about anyone, even those who deserved it.”
“Such as?” Admiral Ingram asked.
“The mother of his son, comes to mind,” Alex said.
“How did he die?” Admiral Ingram asked.
“It was a professional hit,” Alex said.
“Paid for by?” Admiral Ingram asked.
“A broker,” Alex said. “We have a general idea of who might have paid him, but we have yet to find concrete proof. His daughter tried to kill me a year later.”
Alex looked at Raz, and he took over the conversation.
“The broker’s daughter was another story,” Raz said. “She told Alex that she had worked for her father, but that’s only partially true. She worked for her father as an accountant. For unknown reasons, she seemed to have no idea what he did for a living.”
“Her idea was that her father was in service to wealthy clients,” Alex said. “She was unaware that she was accounting for murder.”
“Exactly,” Raz said. “She learned her father’s line of work through her personal and intimate connection to Cee Cee Joiner…”
“The one who went by the moniker ‘The ‘Boy Scout,’” Admiral Ingram said.
“That’s correct,” Raz said. “Under his tutelage, she made an effort to replace her father.”
“It takes a lifetime to create the kind of network her father had at his fingertips,” Alex said. “Her father’s clients saw her as a spoiled child. She started taking contracts as a way of proving herself.”
“Was she successful?” Admiral Ingram asked.
“We were unable to confirm that she ever killed anyone,” Raz said.
“She’s dead,” Admiral Ingram said. “The Boy Scout is dead. Everyone involved in this is dead, except you.”
The Admiral spit out the last words as if they were a curse.
“Not for a lack of trying,” Raz said.
“How did my brother die?” Admiral Ingram asked.
Raz took a breath to say something, but Alex covered his hand with hers. Raz looked at her for a moment before nodding.
“I can only tell you what I remember,” Alex said.
“We’ve been able to confirm this with the videotapes collected from the vault,” Raz said.
“The videotapes that were subsequently, and, may I add, conveniently destroyed?” Admiral Ingram said with a sneer.
Alex and Raz became very still.
“Wait, you mean they weren’t destroyed?” Admiral Ingram asked.
“I’m sorry, sir,” Alex said. “I’m not sure why you think the videotape of the Fey Special Forces Team was destroyed.”
“We have copies of the files,” Raz said.
“They were on the CIA server the last time I looked,” Alex said with a shrug. “I mean it’s been a while since I checked, but both video tapes — from the hall and from inside the vault — were there.”
Admiral Ingram shook his head.
“We keep the original copies of the files on a server in Paris,” Alex said. “Why did you think the tapes had been destroyed?”
“I was told they’d been destroyed,” Admiral Ingram said.
“By whom?” Raz asked.
“No one on the Fey team, I presume,” Alex said.
“May I see the video?” Admiral Ingram asked in an annoyed voice.
Alex’s brow furrowed with concern. Raz glanced at her before starting to spin a story.
“Sir, we can set up…” Raz said.
Alex touched his arm.
“If you want to see them, you are well within your right to watch them,” Alex said. “But trust me, they are not an experience to be taken lightly. The video is violent and disturbing.”
“I watch military-incident live feed and video documentation of battles every day,” Admiral Ingram said.
“Those videos don’t include your brother,” Raz said in a soft voice.
“Never-the-less,” Admiral Ingram said. “If you have the tapes, I’d like to see them.”
Alex and Raz looked at each other.
“Now,” Admiral Ingram said.
“You’d have to say ‘please,’” Zack said.
Alex grinned at the Admiral. He raised his eyebrows before uttering the words they had hoped he wouldn’t say.
“That is an order,” Admiral Ingram said.
Alex closed her eyes in sorrow. When she opened them, she saw Raz looking at her. She nodded. He typed on the computer in the table.
“Sir, I…” Raz started.
“Just play the God-damned video,” Admiral Ingram said. “I’m not a child.”
Raz’s eyes flicked to Alex. She lifted her shoulders in a slight shrug.
“There is no sound,” Raz said. “You can guess what’s going on. The cameras are on a motion detector. There’s a little less than four minutes before the action. Would you like to see it? Or cut straight to the shooting?”
The Admiral looked up at Raz. He glanced at Alex.
“We were getting ready for a night in Paris,” Alex said. “It was my birthday weekend. We had an assignment in Afghanistan, so we stopped over for drinks, dancing, and dinner. We were due to fly out at three the next morning.”
The Admiral nodded and looked at Raz.
“Don’t look at her again,” Admiral Ingram said. “Play the tape. That is an order, Agent Rasmussen.”
Raz gave him a long, assessing look before hitting the start button for the video inside the vault. Alex sighed. Under the table, Raz reached for her hand. She held onto his hand with both of hers.
The screen was dark for a moment before the fluorescent overhead lights began to flicker. The camera had a clear view of most of the interior of the limestone vault. The corner under the camera wasn’t covered. The thick limestone door opened, and a younger Alex bowed. The team streamed past her and into their storage vault. From this direction, they watched Sergeant First Class Jesse Abreu proficiently check that his MP5 was loaded and that the safety was off. He grabbed an M870 shotgun from a rack on the wall and went through the same quick ritual. He took a spot at the door.
The Fey Special Forces Team was in all of their glory. Alex, Raz, and Admiral Ingram watched as they laughed and teased each other, all the while changing into street clothing for a night out. Four minutes. Four glorious minutes. Alex sighed.
“The light in the hallway is off,” Admiral Ingram said.
“It’s on a motion sensor,” Alex said. She looked at Admiral Ingram. “The lights shut off when there’s no movement in the hall.”
A flash of fire from an AK47 lit up the dark hallway, and Jesse fell. Alex forced herself to watch the Admiral. He flinched when the shooter appeared. His jaw slackened open and he frowned. When the shooter got to his brother, Admiral Ingram’s breath caught. His mouth opened and closed before his face became a stoic mask. His hand instinctively covered his mouth.
The Admiral sat huddled with his hand over his mouth for the rest of the video. When it was done, he flipped off his headphones and went to the toilet in the corner of the plane.
The Admiral vomited.
“What’s he doing?” Zack asked.
“Throwing up,” Alex said.
The toilet faucet ran for a moment, and the toilet flushed.
“Good thing he’s too tough for that kind of thing,” Zack said.
The toilet door opened, and the Admiral strode back to his seat. He put on his headphones.
“I’d like to see it again,” the Admiral said.
“Sir, you don’t . . .” Alex said with a slow shake of her head.
“I promised,” the Admiral said in a fierce whisper.
“Yes, but that doesn’t mean . . .” Alex said.
“Yes, in fact it does,” the Admiral said. “Do I need to order you to do it? Or will you simply play the Goddamned video?”
The video played past the awesome four minutes and into the violent rest. When it was finished, the Admiral looked up at Alex.
“How do you stop it?” the Admiral asked.
“Touch the screen, sir,” Raz said.
The Admiral started the video again. He pointed to the moment after Alex was shot.
“Why were you shot in the hip and not center of mass?” the Admiral asked.
“I was intended to survive the assault,” Alex said.
The Admiral grunted and continued the video. He stopped the video when Alex killed the shooter. He pointed to her sliding off the crate she’d fallen onto. He played the minute of her crawling from person to person in slow motion.
“They were all dead?” the Admiral asked.
“Yes, sir,” Alex said. “The only other person who managed to survive the first barrage was Dwight.”
“He was shot in the forehead,” Raz said.
He backed up to the moment when the shooter hit Dwight in the forehead.
“Your brother was killed with the first bullet,” Alex said. “He didn’t suffer.”
The Admiral kept his focus on the video. He stopped the video again when Alex left Nathan.
“What are you saying?” the Admiral asked. His voice was soft and reedy.
“Please don’t die,” Alex said at the same time Raz said, “Are you dead? Don’t die.”
Alex looked at Raz and he gave her a soft smile. They watched Alex drag herself from one team member to another. The air felt heavy on the C-130, and no one dared make a sound.
“What did you hear?” Admiral Ingram said.
“Jesse’s breathing,” Alex said. “I heard him gasping for breath.”
The Admiral’s eyebrows dropped so low on his head that his eyes were completely shaded. They watched as Alex screamed out loud before kissing Jesse’s forehead. Her head dropped forward. The video camera shut off.
Alex looked down at the table when the video was dark. The video returned to show a man talking to Alex.
“He’s taking the secondary tags,” Admiral Ingram said under his breath.
“Proof of death for payment,” Alex said.
“Pretty standard for this kind of contract,” Raz said.
“What is he saying to you?” Admiral Ingram asked.
“I have no idea,” Alex said.
“The Fey has undergone every form of memory retrieval available,” Raz said. “She had no memory of her conversation with this man.”
“The doctors believe it wasn’t encoded in my brain,” Alex said. “Too much trauma.”
“Who is he?” Admiral Ingram asked.
“He’s the broker we spoke of previously,” Alex said. “He specialized in complicated contracts — murder, rape, extortion, suicide bombings, terrorist events, things like that. He was connected to the first attack on the World Trade Center.”
“This man’s daughter tried to kill you,” the Admiral said.
“That’s correct,” Raz said.
“You seem to know him,” Admiral Ingram said. He pointed to her face.
“He also brokers kidnappings,” Alex said. “We found him to be a businessman. If we gave him enough money, he’d let us know where he was arranging a kidnapping.”
“Brokers?” Admiral Ingram asked.
“Brokered,” Alex said.
“He’s dead,” Raz said.
“According to his only daughter, he is no longer living,” Alex said.
“We have not found any evidence to the contrary,” Raz said.
Admiral Ingram watched as the broker wrapped a T-shirt around the shooter’s head.
Alex looked at the man. Even though Admiral Ingram’s face was completely still, his body gave off every sign of that he was emotionally flooded. If she’d known the man, she would have grabbed his hand to help him hold on. As it was, she couldn’t shake the nagging suspicion that his behavior was some kind of an act. She glanced at Raz, and he gave her a slight nod in agreement.
“We have not heard even a whisper about this man in all these years,” Raz said.
“The intelligence center…”
Admiral Ingram gasped. The video had continued to play long after the assault was over, and the broker was inside the vault. Admiral Ingram pointed to the screen.
“There you are.” Admiral Ingram looked up at Raz. “And that’s . . .?”
The Admiral pointed to Ben as he stepped through the doorway to the vault.
“He went by the name ‘Benjamin,’” Raz said. “He was my supervisor.”
“How?” The Admiral’s voice echoed surprise mixed with the threat of mistrust.
“We received a tip that the Fey Team had been terminated in Paris,” Raz said. His confident voice shifted to a mixture of sorrow and regret. “We looked everywhere we could think of. We called everyone we knew. Finally, we started looking at places that sold absinthe. We knew that Alex liked to have absinthe on her birthday. Le Fée Verte was on fire and a number of people had been killed. We just followed the open doors.”
Shaking his head, Raz shrugged.
“The broker is in the vault!” Admiral Ingram said.
“Yes, sir,” Raz said. “We didn’t see him, or we would have killed him ourselves.”
“How could you not know he was there?”
“You have to understand, sir,” Raz said. “Alex is Benjamin’s biological daughter. He had spent the last ten years with her. I was her partner. The three of us were very close. Ben and I . . . We were not thinking clearly.”
Raz clenched his teeth to keep from saying more. For a moment, he looked at Admiral Ingram. After a moment, he took a breath and continued.
“We did not see him. I will say no more on that topic,” Raz said. “We know from the surveillance tapes in the hallway that he takes the shooter and disappears into the public tunnels below. Ben and I looked for him off and on, for years, but never found him. The next time we heard of him was when his daughter attempted to murder Captain Troy Olivas and the Lieutenant Colonel, as we’ve said.”
“Why wasn’t the Fey killed?” Admiral Ingram asked. His voice rose with outrage and resentment. “Why was Nathan killed and she was not?”
“She was to be a ‘prize’ for the man we knew as Robert Powell,” Raz said. “The Boy Scout.”
“But she’s wounded!” Admiral Ingram said.
“She could have survived the first barrage,” Raz said. “But when the Lieutenant Colonel fired on the shooter, the shooter returned fire. The second attack was more deadly.”
“Robert Powell was detained,” Alex said.
“By Trece and White Boy,” Admiral Ingram said. “That old bullshit story. Do you honestly expect me to . . .”
“We have the surveillance tape of their visit at that bar,” Raz said. “Would you like to view that as well? Certainly, you’ve read the sworn testimony of Captain Ramirez and Captain Blanco.”
Admiral Ingram fell silent. He bowed his head as if in prayer. Raz glanced at Alex. He nodded his head toward Admiral Ingram. Alex shrugged. They waited. After a few moments, the Admiral took a breath and looked at Alex.
“What can I do for you, sir?” Alex asked.
The Admiral squinted at her before looking away. After another moment or two, he looked back at her.
“Why were the Fey Special Forces Team murdered?” Admiral Ingram asked.
“As far as we can ascertain, Admiral, it centers around a book,” Raz said and cleared his throat. “One of the team members was married to a woman whose father was an Air Force test pilot. Her father got close to a group of individuals who were brought into the US though Operation Paperclip. This test pilot kept some notes in this book.”
The Admiral tipped his head sideways as if he was curious or possibly hard of hearing.
“Through what seems to be a fairly random string of events, a dangerous coalition believed that the Fey had this book,” Raz said. “This fact, combined with a fairly random set of events, spun into the need to destroy the entire team.”
“Random events?” the Admiral asked.
“The test pilot’s daughter was married to a member of the Fey Special Forces Team,” Raz said with a shrug.
Raz nodded sincerely to their sanitized version of what had happened. Admiral Ingram watched Raz for a moment.
“You know what that sounds like?” Admiral Ingram asked.
“No, sir,” Raz said.
“Complete and utter bullshit,” Admiral Ingram scoffed. “Black skeletons? Mysterious languages? I’ve heard talk of dragons and ghosts!”
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