While everything he’d read painted a picture of a dedicated agent on the rise, he couldn’t afford to blindly trust her. Not yet anyway. The field was a poor proving ground, though, so he was going to have to keep an eye on her. Underestimating her could be the last mistake he ever made.
Mason’s phone vibrated to alert him to an incoming text as the cruiser pulled around behind division headquarters. He glanced at the message. Chris had worked his magic and gotten him on the task force, which was set to convene at 8:00 A.M. Layne’s phone chimed about ten seconds later, rousing her from her slumber, to inform her of the same.
The deputy let them out at the rear security gate. They thanked him for the ride and headed toward the nearly empty parking structure. Before they split up at their respective vehicles, Mason made Layne promise to go home and squeeze in an hour or so of sleep, knowing full well she had no more intention of doing so than he did.
He needed time to think.
Something about the nature of the trap at the farmhouse was eating at him. Like Layne had said, while primitive, the design of the bomb had been perfect. The moment anyone opened that door, that person would be killed instantly. There was no doubt about it. The explosion itself would have more than done the job, but the container full of nails added an unnecessary element of brutality. There’d been more than enough fertilizer and fuel oil down in the cellar to increase the size of the bomb exponentially, enough to convert the entire acreage into a smoldering crater. Instead, the unknown subject—UNSUB—had built a device that was relatively intimate in proportion, yet one that would cause the most egregious physical damage to the intruders.
The IED—like the chemical dispersal unit that had killed the men behind the wall, the death trap in the knocking pen, and the methane bomb that ripped through the SWAT team during the manhunt for the Hoyl—had been designed for the victims to trigger it themselves. Surely there was some sort of underlying psychological motivation there, perhaps a means by which the killer could distance himself from the act of killing, and yet there was an undeniable element of cruelty at odds with that assessment. He’d wanted the men behind the wall to know they were going to die in the worst-possible manner, unless they opted for a slow asphyxiation. For Alejandra to experience the agony of her neck snapping a heartbeat before the captive bolt punched through her forehead. For the SWAT team to smell the gas, feel air rushing past them, fueling the fireball that would consume them. For the officers at the farmhouse to hear the sound of the tape peeling and the click of the paint can’s handle striking the battery terminal, to see the spark, then the flash of light that propelled the nails through them. He wanted his victims to understand with their final thoughts that there was no escaping what was about to happen.
Finding the Novichok was their priority, though.
They’d have all the time in the world to examine the UNSUB’s twisted signature and speculate about his motivations once the greater threat was eliminated. Right now, they had to believe that he knew they were coming for him and was undoubtedly already accelerating his timetable. They needed to find him in a hurry and it was going to take all of the task force’s resources to do it.
But first he needed to shower, change into a pair of pants that didn’t have holes in the ass, and pack a travel bag in case things started to move in a hurry.
Mason wasn’t used to driving to his new house and certainly didn’t think of it as home. It was simply the place where he slept and showered. And while he didn’t know if his wife had ever even seen the building in which he now resided, he felt her absence within its walls. Every now and then he swung by his old house and parked across the street, but it didn’t feel like home, either. Not anymore. Now it belonged to a couple who wore business suits and carried briefcases. All he really knew about them was that they were young and they smiled a lot, which made him feel good. He’d smiled a lot in that house, too.
That life was over now. His wife’s murder was a fresh wound that tore open every single day. Everyone who’d contributed to the events leading to her death was dead. Everyone except for the entity that had set those events into motion, an entity he would track to the ends of the Earth if he had to. Hunting it down was the only thing that mattered. Everyone needed a reason to live. In that sense, he was lucky.
He had thirteen.
His new place was in an industrial corridor close enough to downtown that he could hear the omnipresent racket of construction, but far enough off the beaten path that few cars even inadvertently turned down his street. Fifty years ago, it must have been a hotbed of activity. Maybe even fifteen. At one time or another, the building had been a tire shop, a construction company, a used-car lot, and a showcase for aspiring graffiti artists. He’d bought it on a whim and had regretted it immediately, and yet somehow he warmed to it a little more every day.
The renovations were moving at a snail’s pace, though. He would have thought that a crew being paid by the job and not by the hour would approach its work with a sense of urgency, but it was undoubtedly better to have the job done right than fast. For what he was paying them, he really hoped they were doing it right.
He’d replaced the windows with glass of the bulletproof variety and added a set of doors with the kind of lock that couldn’t be picked with a battering ram. He’d chosen to leave the appearance largely untouched, although he’d applied what he liked to think of as a renewal of anonymity by mounting broken shutters and coiling razor wire through the top of the chain-link fence. His only real extravagance was a set of remote-control openers for the front gate and the garage doors.
The inside was another story. Having the whole thing gutted and stripped down to the bare framework had taken only a few days, but he was beginning to think the actual construction might take another twenty years. It was his own fault, he knew. He’d commissioned several challenging alterations of the structure itself, namely a panic room off the main living area, a storage room reminiscent of a bank vault, staircases behind walls, and an underground tunnel that let out by the river behind the property.
Considering the kind of power against which he’d aligned himself, he needed his house to be able to withstand a full-on assault. And it wasn’t like money was an issue. He figured Angie would have approved of him using her inheritance to track down and destroy the cabal that had used and then discarded her entire family. It was probably the only thing he’d ever done of which her old man would have approved.
His own father, however, was a different story.
The gate was open and the crews were gathered around their trucks, which looked like they’d been worked on more recently than his house. They were parked on what he only loosely considered his yard and the men were either sitting or lounging with thermoses and smokes. Chatting and laughing. Music blaring. Surely at some point they’d want to head inside and do some actual work, if only to break up the monotony of doing nothing.
Mason wasn’t in the mood this morning. He was tired and preoccupied and would have enjoyed a confrontation, which was a good-enough reason to avoid one. The foreman nodded to him as he drove through the gate and pulled into the middle of the three garages. He hadn’t even opened the driver’s side door when the reflection of a black Town Car flashed across his rearview mirror.
He closed his eyes and fought the urge to repeatedly pound his forehead against the steering wheel.
As if this day couldn’t possibly get any worse.
18
J. R. Mason was a second-term United States senator. He was tenacious and driven, not to mention largely absent from Mason’s life after his mother died and he was shipped off to a prestigious prep school, from which he’d been occasionally checked out for major holidays and photo ops. Or at least that was how it had felt at the time. Lately, though, it seemed as though their relationship was in a state of transition. Especially since Angie’s death. His father had been there to help him through the worst time of his life and make the arrangements he’d been unable to handle on hi
s own. Maybe his reasons for doing so were self-serving, but that was just his way.
His reward for helping Mason wash his hands of the AgrAmerica disaster was being stuck with the bulk of the shares at a time when unloading them was impossible. To his credit, he never once complained. He simply thrust out his chin, took his lumps from the media, and challenged himself to right the ship. Of course, that meant hiring a fleet of MBAs and PR guys and lawyers who could actually do the job, not necessarily rolling up his sleeves and doing it himself, as the papers made it sound.
Although he loved his father, Mason wasn’t happy to see him. Drama followed him wherever he went like special interest groups at budget appropriations time. All he wanted to do was grab a quick shower, pack a bag, and get to the task force meeting, which, unfortunately, was probably the whole reason the senator was here.
“I like what you’ve done with the place,” he said. “When are you going to tear the rest of it down?”
“Funny.” That joke was really getting old. “Shouldn’t you be in Washington, voting yourself a pay raise?”
“We did that weeks ago, before the session adjourned. Have you already forgotten how these things work?”
“I know. Christmas with the Constituency. I’m just grateful you didn’t buy us matching sweaters this year.”
“I only did that once, and yet you find a way to bring it up every chance you get. You were a child, for crying out loud.”
“I was sixteen, Dad. That’s the kind of thing that scars a kid for life.”
“It doesn’t hurt to show a little Christmas spirit, you know.” As if on cue, his driver entered with a small decorated tree. He looked around, shuddered, and set it down in the middle of the main room. “Ah, yes. Thank you, Rodney.”
The driver tipped his cap and took his leave.
Mason couldn’t help but smile as he stared at the tree. It was maybe three feet tall, plastic, and more blue than green. It looked like the kind of display a downtown bookstore might put in its window, but it was a grand gesture of the type he rarely attributed to his father.
“What?” he said. “Worried it’ll scare off the rats?”
“Christmas was three days ago, Dad.”
“I’ve stopped by multiple times during the past few days, as you’d know if you ever checked your voice mail.” The senator winked. “Unless you’re deliberately trying to avoid the man responsible for giving you the gift of life—”
“It’s perfect. Thank you.”
His father clapped him on the back and strolled deeper into the skeletal structure.
“I try not to tell people how to do their jobs—Lord knows how little I enjoy being told how to do mine every waking second of the day—but I believe more would get accomplished if your foreman were somehow able to coax his workers inside the house.”
“Look, Dad. I appreciate your stopping by, but—”
“Oh, I know. You have a busy day ahead and I did show up unannounced. I just wanted to check how things were going with the investigation up north. I realize you’re not obligated to share the details of an active investigation, but I’ve heard there’s been a lot of activity out there recently. You know, at the end of a tunnel that leads directly into a building on my property. I think that entitles me to some answers, and I’ve encountered precious little cooperation through formal channels.”
“It was a gas leak. Plain and simple. Someone ruptured a line.”
“Strange they would need to activate a hazmat team for something so ‘plain and simple.’”
“I’m sure you know more about that kind of thing than I do.”
“You were there. At least that’s what I heard from sources—none of whom was my own son, I might add—who thought I deserved to know, since it affected me on both the personal and professional fronts.”
“Sorry my first thoughts weren’t about how it would affect you, Dad. I’ll try to be more considerate next time.”
“Don’t twist my words. That’s not at all what I’m saying. My concern is that you’re taking unnecessary risks now that Angela is no longer with us. I’ve already buried a wife and a daughter, James. I have no intention of burying my only son.”
“I’m not opposed to cremation.”
“I see I’ve caught you in a rare mood this morning. Perhaps we should find a more fitting occasion to catch up on current events. And invest in some new pants. Those have holes all up and down the back.”
“I sat on a cactus.”
“So I heard. You should really make an effort to be more careful. Like I said, don’t think for a second that Angela will be happy to see you again so soon.” He turned on his politician’s smile and effectively switched personas. “Fifty dollars will buy you a coffeemaker and a space heater. The carrot always trumps the stick, son. This place will be finished in half the time.”
He flipped up the collar of his overcoat and started for the door.
“Where are you staying?” Mason asked.
“The B Suite.” The top floor of one of the buildings on the AgrAmerica lot had been designed to accommodate visiting investors and VIPs. Mason’s father-in-law hadn’t been known for doing anything half-assed. It was lavishly appointed and had stunning views of what had once been Paul Thornton’s kingdom. “Swing by tonight if you’re up that way. I’ll treat you to a steak as thick as a dictionary. There are advantages to owning your own cattle, you know.”
“As long as you’re not the one cooking it.”
“Perish the thought.”
The senator offered a one-armed hug and headed for the door.
“Thanks for the tree, Dad. It really spruces the place up.”
“Try not to sit on it.”
His father stopped in the entryway and turned around. He looked at Mason, then past him, and nodded to himself as though confirming some deep inner thought.
“I’m going to be spending New Year’s in the District this year,” he said. “I’m heading back tomorrow afternoon. I’d like to formally invite you to come with me. There are some people I’d like you to meet.”
“People?”
“Person, James.” It struck Mason that his father was referring to a woman. “Don’t make this any more uncomfortable than it already is.”
The senator hailed his driver and ducked outside. A cloud of breath trailed him into the cold. Mason was just about to close the door, when his father abruptly turned around.
“I heard the, quote, unquote, ‘gas’ was actually a chemical warfare agent.”
The words caught Mason by surprise. He was too slow with his reply. He opened his mouth, but by then it was too late. Anything he said would have been a lie and they both knew it.
“That’s what I thought.” The senator inclined his face to the sky and closed his right eye against the sun. He didn’t look at Mason when he spoke. “Ask yourself a question, son. If you wanted to make something like that, who would you hire to do it?”
Mason stared blankly at him for a long moment. Sometimes he forgot that politicians had to have more than a megawatt smile and a firm handshake. Most were incredibly bright, whether or not the media decided to portray them as such.
His brain was already kicking into overdrive.
“Looks like it might snow after all,” his father said, and then he was gone.
19
The Dodge-Hill Strike Force, named in honor of Drake Dodge and Anthony Hill, the Wray police officers killed in the explosion, was established as an offshoot of the Joint Terrorism Task Force, which was comprised of the combined assets of the ATF, DEA, FBI, ICE, and every other domestic agency responsible for counteracting foreign and domestic terrorism. Taking the investigation to the JTTF was a stroke of brilliance on Chris’s part, not only because it prevented Homeland from supplanting them but also because it actually gave the FBI an element of control, since it was responsible for all funding, from the salaries of the agents on loan from the various agencies to vehicles and materiel support. It also meant that Chris co
uld appoint a leader over whom he felt he could exert some amount of influence.
Assistant Special Agent in Charge Diana Algren’s role was to liaise with department heads and field units, dole out assignments, collate evidence, and disseminate information for public consumption. While the media had yet to catch wind of either the release of the Novichok or the remains in the cornfield, it was only a matter of time before someone tipped them off to the sheer quantity of bodies piling up in the morgue.
From Mason’s perspective, Algren’s involvement didn’t necessarily bode well for a speedy resolution. The cameras loved her, although not nearly as much as she loved them. She was as articulate as she was attractive, and fast-tracked for an SAC posting. Her chestnut hair was longer in front than in back and framed her face in such a way as to draw attention to her green eyes and perpetually pouting lips. The former were natural, the latter augmented, presumably by the same plastic surgeon who erased her crow’s-feet and tightened the skin on her neck every so often. She wore a cream-colored blouse, a tapered suit jacket that emphasized more than the bulge of her sidearm, and a knee-length skirt that fit her like the upper half of a mermaid’s tail.
She stood at the head of the polished rosewood table with a stack of black binders, which she slid to each of them in turn. The table was easily large enough to accommodate twenty people, so they spread out, but remained clustered by agency. The blinds were drawn and the recessed lighting had been dialed up, spotlighting photographs of Denver through the years, from black and white to color and all of the faded shades in between.
The Annihilation Protocol Page 11