by Joseph Flynn
Ludwig chose to go hard core. “In principle, yes. Texas is a border state. He should be allowed to defend himself against any threat coming out of Mexico.”
“I see. The Mexican threat. There are real dangers, of course, from the smugglers of drugs and immigrants — people who show no respect for the United States border.”
“Exactly.”
“So let’s say our superbly armed billionaire rancher does real damage to these foreign criminals, but for some reason the Mexican government takes offense and decides to show him what real military power is all about. Should he have to fight a foreign country on his own?”
“Of course not. That’s absurd. You’re talking about an act of war against the United States. No individual, no matter how rich he is, can go up against an entire country. The U.S. Army and Air Force would have to respond.”
Kipp nodded. “You’re right, they would. But now let’s examine another scenario involving that same billionaire rancher. Let’s say he’s a swindler. Most, if not all, of his fortune is ill-gotten. A warrant for his arrest has been issued. Only when the police arrive to take him into custody, they find themselves hopelessly out-gunned. It would be suicidal to try to bring the man in. Would the authorities be justified if they called on the U.S. Army and Air Force to balance the scales?”
Kipp thought he could hear Ludwig’s molars grinding.
He pushed the man a step farther. “The president said the Second Amendment doesn’t give anyone the right to declare war on the government. You say the right to bear arms is complete and total. So in a conflict pitting those two propositions against each other, which is right?”
Ludwig said, amidst a spray of saliva visible to the camera, “This is bullshit, all this make-believe crap. This isn’t what we’re supposed to talk about. This isn’t what we agreed —”
Ludwig cut himself off, too late.
He wasn’t the first victim of a Monty Kipp live-television ambush to put his foot in his mouth. God, the little Brit thought, it always felt so good. Tabloid journalism was the next best thing to sex.
Rising to number one after your willie lost its starch.
In a calm voice, Kipp asked, “What would you like to talk about, Mr. Ludwig?”
“I’d like to talk about my being persecuted by the police. I’ve been charged with obstruction of justice simply for asking the hero who killed Abel Mays to step forward and identify himself. A Metro PD police captain had me arrested for obstruction of justice and told me if I were found guilty I could be locked up for as long as thirty years.”
Kipp adopted a grave expression, all the while laughing to himself.
“I assume you’ve taken on able legal representation.”
“Yes, I have, and now I’m taking my case to the court of public opinion. I ask all my freedom-loving friends to let your elected representatives know I should neither be prosecuted nor persecuted. Call them, email them, and if you live anywhere close to Washington, go to their offices on Capitol Hill.”
Having long experience with self-righteous wankers hiding their dirty little secrets, Kipp asked, “Surely, the police must have some reason for charging you with such a serious crime, no? If all you wanted to do was to help them find a criminal —”
“A hero,” Ludwig said. “The man who shot Abel Mays is a hero.”
“As you like. You’re still saying all you tried to do was help identify a person the police certainly want to find. There’s a gap between your doing that and their charging you with a crime. Would you care to fill in that gap, sir?”
Ludwig looked at Kipp like he wanted to strangle him. “I can’t talk about that; my lawyer told me not to.”
“Ah, well, always best to follow expert legal advice.”
“What I can and will say,” Ludwig told Kipp, leaning forward, “is that James J. McGill is investigating the death of Jordan Gilford, the last man Abel Mays killed, and you can bet he’s looking to pin that murder on someone else.”
Oh, dear, Kipp thought. McGill was entering his life once more. He’d have to be careful.
“Why would Mr. McGill do that?” he asked.
Ludwig rolled his eyes. “McGill is married to the president. He’s her tool. He also makes a living as a private investigator. If he admits the obvious, that Mays killed Gilford, his case is closed and he loses money. But if he joins in a conspiracy saying somebody else killed Gilford then …”
The CEO of FirePower America seemed to lose track of his own reasoning.
Kipp instinctively helped him. “If someone else killed Mr. Gilford, then maybe that person also killed Abel Mays.”
Ludwig smiled. The little foreign jerk was finally playing ball with him.
“Yeah, exactly. That’s the line of BS they’re trying to sell, McGill and the president.”
“I see,” Kipp said. “Well, given what you’ve told us, we can assume that Mr. McGill is pursuing the investigation as he sees it. What are you doing to prove your contention?”
Ludwig looked directly at the camera. “I’ve already offered $100,000 plus a promise of paying the legal fees of the good guy with a gun who killed Abel Mays to come forward. So far, I’ve had no credible response. So what I’m going to do now is offer $1 million to anyone who can legitimately tell me the identity of the shooter who killed Abel Mays.”
The camera lingered on Ludwig for a beat and then went to Kipp.
He said, “A million dollars. I’m sure Mr. Ludwig’s phone is ringing already.”
Chapter 20
Calle Ocho — Miami, Florida
Jerry Nerón, having learned that Auric Ludwig had offered him a hundred grand to step forward and claim credit for the death of Abel Mays, had put Ludwig’s name on a Google alert. He’d checked it first thing that day and found the lobbyist would be interviewed on Monty Kipp’s morning show on SNAM.
The show would also be live-streamed on SNAM.com. Jerry could have watched it on his tablet, his laptop or his smart TV. But doing that would have left a record in a device’s memory. What he did was watch the interview on a small, old, brainless TV that still had a sharp picture and would never tell any cop anything useful.
Jerry watched Kipp make a monkey of Ludwig. He enjoyed that, but then Kipp let Ludwig spout his line of bullshit at the end. Then that sonofabitch Ludwig put what amounted to a million-dollar bounty on Jerry’s head. Cabrón!
Thinking about the situation for a minute, Jerry realized he was in deep trouble. The client who’d hired Jerry to kill Jordan Gilford didn’t know his hitman’s name. The client didn’t know where Jerry lived. A series of technological and other cutouts prevented that — up to a point.
Jerry had studied Jordan Gilford, as he did every target. He’d learned Gilford’s life story, knew the man had recently gone to work at the Pentagon. The Department of Defense was more than just the place where generals and admirals had their brass polished. The Pentagon was the home of the biggest, best-funded spook shop in the country, the Defense Intelligence Agency.
It wasn’t hard to imagine someone somewhere in the military didn’t want Jordan Gilford poking his nose into whatever it was they did with their money. Some budgets were supposed to be totally off-book. The better to fund covert operations. But secrecy was also the perfect cover for any number of scams.
Jerry knew from his discussions with the Cuban exile viejos that a lot of their money came from the CIA, a name the old ones said also stood for cash in advance. Not that there was ever as much money as the exiles wanted. The government people said that was because the funds for the exiles were off-book. They could only squeeze so much secret money from Congress.
That was back in the old days, though, before the jihadis hit the country.
After 9/11 defense spending jumped over the moon.
Better than half-a-trillion dollars a year was what Jerry had read.
So, with all that money pouring in, what if someone at the Pentagon decided to stick a hand in the till? Corrupt politicians in Iraq an
d Afghanistan had certainly been doing it. It would have been only natural for some people on the American side to think: Hey, what about us?
But all it would take to screw up somebody’s gravy train would be one honest man.
Enter Jordan Gilford. He certainly couldn’t be allowed to work his whistleblower magic.
So Jerry had been brought in, a private contractor, to get rid of Gilford. Hiring someone from the private sector to do the hit would give the insiders at DOD distance and deniability. There might be some blowback about Gilford getting killed, but any investigation would go nowhere. After a year or two, the case would be effectively as dead as Gilford.
Only now that moron Ludwig was publicly trying to hunt Jerry down. That had to be making Jerry’s client nervous. And if the client had the resources of the Defense Intelligence Agency behind him he’d have ways of overcoming Jerry’s safety precautions.
Hell, Jerry thought, his client might be searching for him already.
If the client got rid of him, a loose end would turn into a dead end.
Jerry realized he was going to have to take a vacation, maybe a long one.
First, though, he had to put an end to that prick Ludwig. The bastard’s reward offer would die with him. Jerry had no choice, really. The way things stood, with a million-dollar incentive and the way technology could track people these days, maybe even some teenager with a computer might find him. Shit, just thinking like that scared him.
But with Ludwig gone the pressure should lessen.
That good guy with a gun Ludwig liked to talk about was coming for him. Put an end to Ludwig’s worries about going to prison and everything else. Jerry couldn’t get sloppy, though. He had to be more careful than ever.
He wouldn’t fly commercial this time. More than one friend from the exile community had his own wings. Most of them didn’t use their private jets anymore. Kept them only in case a miracle happened and they got to fly back to a free Havana in triumph. That being a pipe-dream, he wouldn’t have a hard time finding a plane to borrow.
Jerry looked over at the first suit he’d finished for his client in Washington. It was a thing of beauty, as all his tailoring was. He’d deliver it personally. Say he wanted to have the pleasure of seeing it worn for the first time. Make sure the rest of the client’s order was equally superb.
That would be his cover story. He’d shutter his shop and put a sign on the door.
Taking a well deserved rest.
With a bit of luck and Ludwig dead, his client would stop worrying. He’d be back in his shop before the end of the year. Having given up his sideline of killing people.
If his luck turned bad, though, he’d have to become an exile just like his grandfather. Truly, his situation would be worse. He would have to both run and hide. Maybe for the rest of his life. Goddamn Ludwig.
Jerry picked up his phone and called his client in Washington.
He said, “Putnam Shady, please.”
The Oval Office — The White House
Hume Drummond sat alone on the sofa opposite the president and her chief of staff. He’d hoped and argued to speak privately with the president. As a concession, the president had asked Welborn and Special Agent Benjamin to wait outside. Welborn was his usual gracious self; Benjamin was savvy enough to nod politely. Galia Mindel sat next to the president and would be present for the duration.
“Mr. Drummond,” the president said, “you have our full attention. Don’t hold back anything.”
The inspector general of the Department of Defense bit his lower lip, as if to get off to a proper start for what would be an exercise in pain. “Madam President, I think we’re looking at a rogue operation in the DOD and possibly the worst government scandal since the Iran-Contra debacle in the 1980s.”
Drummond referred to the political upheaval that beset Ronald Reagan. Members of his administration secretly sold arms to Iran, violating an embargo on such sales and then used the proceeds to fund the Nicaraguan Contras, contravening a bill passed by Congress and signed into law by Reagan himself.
Investigators concluded that Reagan didn’t have knowledge of the illegal activities, but fourteen government officials, including Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger, were indicted. Eleven of the men were convicted. Only one served time, sixteen months. Presidential pardons, aka the fix, spared others from far longer terms of incarceration.
All that had happened during a time of far greater political comity than existed during Patricia Grant’s presidency, the second term of which was regarded as illegitimate by a quarter of the electorate. A new scandal on the scale of Iran-Contra could result in open political warfare.
Galia grew visibly tense.
The president remained impassive and asked, “What’s the nature of this scandal, and how did it happen?”
“I’m neither trying to shift nor assign blame, Madam President, but as far as I’ve been able to discern the problem began in the final year of your predecessor’s second term. That was when a group called the Tabulation Team came into being. Just who its architect is, I’ve yet to discover.
“The stated purpose of the Tabulation Team is, upon request, to do preliminary audits for each of the five armed services to make sure that funds provided by Congress are being spent appropriately. If any irregularities are found, they are supposed to be reported to my office for further review.”
Galia asked, “Have you spoken with your predecessor about this Tabulation Team?”
“Not yet, Madam Chief of Staff.”
“Why not?”
“I think this matter should be closely held until we can document its scope.”
The president said, “Documentation can be elusive in a digital age, can’t it?”
“It can be difficult, Madam President, but every keystroke leaves a trail.”
“Continue, Mr. Drummond.”
“As you and your chief of staff know, Madam President, the Pentagon has a well-earned reputation for both misspending and overspending enormous sums of money. Part of the blame for the DOD being known as a spendthrift, though, really rests with Congress. As one example, last year Congress appropriated $950 million more than the Navy requested for an attack submarine program.”
“And I signed the defense appropriation bill,” the president said.
“It was must-pass,” Galia reminded her.
“That only compounds the problem,” the president replied.
“On a far larger scale,” Drummond said, “during the Iraq war, your predecessor sent between six and eighteen billion dollars in cash to be used in that country’s reconstruction effort, but the money disappeared. In blunt terms, that staggering amount of currency was stolen, the most lucrative robbery I’ve ever heard of.
“The point is, even with oversight, there’s so much money flowing through the DOD, it’s easy for large sums to go astray or in this case be misdirected.”
“Are you saying there is now a gang of thieves working inside the Pentagon?” Galia asked. “This Tabulation Team you’ve mentioned?”
“That is my strong suspicion, yes,” Drummond said.
“DOD functionaries can’t be pulling this off on their own,” the president said.
“No, ma’am, but I think they are both the masterminds and the middle-men, the clearing house, if you will. In my opinion, there have to be crooked defense contractors on one side of the Tabulation Team and corrupt members of Congress on the other.”
Galia said, “So you brought in Jordan Gilford to uncover the details and organize the evidence in such a way as to be useful to federal prosecutors?”
“That or have Jordan Gilford’s reputation scare someone into coming forward and provide us with the evidence we need.”
“Instead, someone had him killed,” Galia said.
Drummond’s face sagged and he said, “Yes.”
“You’ve considered that Mr. Gilford’s death might also be a message to you?” Galia asked.
“I have, but I’m a wi
dower. I have no children. I’ll do my job as long as Madam President sees fit.”
Thinking aloud, the president said, “These people must have a second line of defense. Something that they are counting on to protect them in case of discovery. What’s their hole card?”
“Jordan asked himself that very question, Madam President. Then he played a hunch. He said there had to be a foreign bank involved, a place where all the stolen cash could be deposited and later transferred elsewhere. He felt the bank had to be in a country where a bribe to the host government would guarantee that the transactions were never reported to U.S. authorities. He found a bank in Uganda that fit the bill perfectly. He flew into and out of Kampala within a forty-eight hour period.
“While Jordan was there, he found a bank official who promised to tell him the whole story for $10 million. Jordan said he could get the man more money than that legitimately under the whistle-blower law, and he could relocate the man to the U.S.
“The guy liked the idea of hitting a bigger jackpot than he’d hoped for, but he didn’t want to come to the U.S. because he said the money in question was used to pay assassins to kill jihadis — people Washington wanted dead without anyone being able to prove who did it. The bank official said he needed time to think of another country where he’d like to live.”
Galia said, “So this inside man either let something slip or his cooperation was just a ruse. Either way, well, I’ve already mentioned what happened to Mr. Gilford.”
Drummond nodded, his face now a mask of regret.
The president kept her focus on the main problem. “The Ugandan bank official, whatever else his role, detailed the Tabulation Team’s hole card. They diverted Pentagon funds to bankroll a covert operation to kill sworn enemies of our country. People who would commit acts of horrific terror against us unless we stopped them. If we were to claim the Tabulation Team’s true goal is to enrich its members, we would be denounced as unpatriotic.”