The Secret Corps

by Peter Telep

  “Thanks.” Johnny let his head fall back on the seat. He blinked hard, feeling the initial shock begin to wear off. In his mind’s eyes, he went through the box’s contents again. A note in Arabic. Keys and instructions to a storage facility. A block of Colombian Cocaine. How was Daniel going to “step up to the plate” with these items? The possibilities formed a hollow ache that clutched his chest. He reached into his pocket and produced Norm’s business card. He dialed the number.

  “Hey, old timer, it’s Johnny.”

  “Hey, Johnny, I’m glad you called. I wanted to apologize again—”

  “Don’t. Just listen. Is there anything else you remember?”

  “I don’t think so. I told you everything. I might be old, but I know what I saw, and I know what I believe.”

  “You didn’t ask Daniel about the Arabic writing?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “I told you he was nervous, and I didn’t want to push it.”

  “You notice anything else that was weird, out of the ordinary after that?”

  “No, everything seemed normal. Johnny, do you believe me now? Did you find something?”

  “Tell you what, you just keep your word, Marine. Don’t talk to anyone.”

  “My word is my bond.”

  “Roger that.” Johnny ended the call. He fumbled with the phone’s charger cord since the battery was down to fourteen percent. He nearly ran off the road doing so, and once he reached the next red light, he began to hyperventilate. He might even throw up. His thoughts raced from supposition to supposition:

  Daniel had met some jihadis at the university who had intrigued him with their soft voices and promises of inner peace. They wore him down and had him discussing his childhood under the old man’s iron rule. Daniel’s desire to become a true man allowed them to brainwash him into turning his back on his family. He secretly converted to Islam. From there, they radicalized him. He began smuggling cocaine for jihadis tied to a Colombian cartel. The product came up through Miami and was stored in Sneads Ferry before being distributed throughout the country. Dr. Daniel Johansen, the son of an Army Black Hat and the brother of a Marine, was helping jihadis fund terror attacks against the United States of America.

  Or maybe he was being black-mailed by the jihadis? Maybe he had converted to Islam but then had second-thoughts about becoming a jihadi? Maybe he had stumbled upon their operation and had paid the ultimate price? But an innocent man would have gone immediately to the police, right? Why hide the evidence?

  “What the hell?” Johnny muttered aloud. Could any of this be true?

  If Johnny ran these theories past his old friend Mark Gatterton, the man would describe exactly how Daniel had been radicalized and why he had betrayed his country. Gatterton, a Naval academy graduate, had been a platoon commander, assistant operations officer, and airborne/diving officer with 2nd Force Reconnaissance Company. He had gone downrange with Johnny on several occasions and had completed the U.S. Army’s Ranger Training School.

  After resigning his commission, Gatterton joined the FBI and became a member of the bureau’s Counterterrorism Division. He created the FBI’s first program to train special agents in identifying and responding to threats posed by Islamist terror groups. With over a decade of dedicated service, he left the bureau to become an independent consultant. Through his website, his many publications, and his lectures given all over the country, he trained and educated leaders at all levels on various threats to security.

  Unfortunately, Gatterton’s Marine Corps background did not allow him to mince words or abide assholes and other assorted buffoons, especially those in government whose blind eyes and politically motivated inaction had already resulted in causalities at home and abroad. He pointed fingers at those in office who he believed had direct ties to jihadis or whose organizations had been infiltrated by the Muslim Brotherhood. He named names. His blog posts and interviews on Fox News incited many to label him an Islamophobe. Johnny would run into him at military trade shows, where they would reminiscence about their days in the Corps until Gatterton went off on a rant about how certain government officials were traitors and working to undermine the country. When Johnny would mention Gatterton’s name to colleagues, they would grow wide-eyed and say, “Yeah, I saw that guy on the news. He’s really out there. He doesn’t give a shit. He calls out the entire government. And now he’s got a huge target on his back.” The mad liberals and the jihadis both wanted to silence him forever.

  If there was any man out there who could advise Johnny on what to do, it was Gatterton. He spoke often about how jihadis actively recruited young people on college campuses, using Muslim Student Associations as fronts for their activities. The UNC Wilmington campus had an active MSA, and Daniel had worked with Muslim students like that kid who had won the engineering competition.

  Johnny took a deep breath and ordered his phone to “Call Mark Gatterton.”

  A few seconds later came a familiar voice: “Hey, Johnny, you old rock star, what’re you doing now?”

  “I’m in the truck.”

  “What’s going on?”

  “Where are you?”

  “Still home in Arlington. I don’t fly out until next week.”

  “Good, I’ll need you here in a day or two. We’re burying my brother and his wife.”

  “Shit, Johnny, I’m sorry. What happened? Car accident?”

  “Nah, it was a home invasion.”

  “You kidding me? God damn it.”

  “Yeah, sorry to call with the bad news.”

  “They catch the guys?”

  “Not yet.”

  “If you want me to look into it—”

  “No, no, the boys here are all over it.”

  “Well, all right then, no problem. I’ll be there. You can count on it.”

  “Good, I’ll text you the details.”

  Gatterton’s tone softened. “How’re you doing? You hanging in there?”

  “Doing the best I can. We’ll catch up when you get down here.”

  “Roger that. And Johnny, you call me if you need anything. Anything at all.”

  “I will. Thanks, Mark.”

  Johnny hung up. It was just good to hear his friend’s voice, even though they could not speak openly over their phones. Gatterton’s regular line was no doubt being monitored by the alphabet soup of intelligence and law enforcement agencies.

  Then again, Johnny was still reluctant to tell anyone, not until he learned the truth—because what if Daniel had converted to Islam? What if he had been in bed with drug smugglers and terrorists? Generations of Johnny’s family had dedicated their lives to the United States. To learn that his own flesh and blood could have done something like this... How could Johnny ever live that down?

  * * *

  The flooring guy was a gray-haired Lynyrd Skynyrd fan with a camouflage ball cap on backwards and a pony-tail swinging like an errant snake beneath the brim. At least ten different grout colors had stained his jeans and concert shirt into an abstract mosaic, yet his light brown work boots looked freshly drawn from a Wal-Mart shelf. The right side of his face was swollen from all the chewing tobacco he had jammed between his cheek and gum, and he spit occasionally into an old soda can he had cut in half and had carried with him into the house.

  A cleaning crew had already done battle with the hardwood floor, lifting the blood pools and restoring the wood to a rich sheen. Now it was up to Mr. Bernard Truehall to chisel out all that stained grout in the kitchen. “Y’all know I can remove the blood,” he had told Johnny. “Just wish I could do somethin’ more to make ya feel better. I’m very sorry.”

  The home, Johnny assumed, would be left to Daniel’s daughters, and he wondered if they would keep it. Were it his, he would wait a year, then put it on the market and unload it fast, before anyone remembered it was the “Holly Ridge Murder House.” Of course there were always some unscrupulous real estate scumbags who could pick it up and either flip it or lease it
to unsuspecting buyers or tenants. Those investor pricks could care less what had happened to the prior owners. A more radical idea would be to hang on to the property, bulldoze the place, and start fresh. He would present all these ideas to the girls... but in due time.

  “You can stay or come back. This’ll take me a few hours,” Truehall told Johnny. “I can lock up for you, too.”

  “That’s fine, you get going,” Johnny answered. He gave the man the barest of nods, then found himself walking a little too quickly into the master bedroom, where he started on a tall chest of drawer’s on Daniel’s side of the room. Boxers, socks. Did anyone still wear Argyle socks? At the same time, Johnny’s phone beeped with multiple text messages.

  From Elina: Please call me when you can. We want to do dinner here.

  From the funeral home: Mr. Johansen, we have a few more things to discuss, if you can call us back.

  From Willie: You okay? Dinner’s at your house, and we’re all coming.

  “Hey, Johnny?” called Truehall from the kitchen. “You got company.”

  Johnny sighed and left the bedroom, winding his way to the front door. Chief Schneider was standing there as Truehall slipped by him, bringing in some of his tools. “Bernie’s an ace, Johnny. No worries there.”

  “Thanks for the recommendation.”

  “Paul tells me you were up at the university.”

  Johnny steeled himself. “Yeah, I’m trying to get a handle on all this. It’s going to take me a year to pack up his office. Might get my nieces to help.”

  “I know Paul warned you about interfering, and I’ll just emphasize that. I know you Marines can’t leave well enough alone, but this time, I’m telling you, Johnny, you need to remember that these things are very delicate and lawyers can twist shit like you wouldn’t believe. I need you on our side.”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Well, don’t bullshit me, son. You need to stand down.”

  Sure. Easy day, no drama, Johnny thought. I have a brick of Cocaine, the keys to a storage facility, and a note written in Arabic.

  He answered aloud, “I’m standing down, Chief. All day long.”

  “Good. This punk can’t hide from us. We’ll get him.”

  “I’m counting on you.”

  “I know it, Johnny. Now can I say, you’re looking rough. You got no color. Get your ass home and eat, all right? Come on...” Schneider threw an arm over Johnny’s shoulder and led him outside.

  Johnny could have resisted, but it would be nice to decompress over dinner. He needed time to further appreciate the enormity of his discovery, and he needed to plot his next move a lot more carefully than his last one. Allowing the police to learn of his visit to the university was a rookie mistake. He should have remembered they were talking to Daniel’s assistant.

  “You can trust Bernie with everything,” the chief said. “When he’s done, he’ll secure the place for you. He’s good people.”

  “Roger that.”

  They reached Johnny’s truck, and before he climbed inside, the chief lifted his chin. “Paul said there was something your brother wanted to tell you.”

  “Yeah, but it was probably nothing.”

  “Maybe he wanted to say how lucky he was.”

  “Lucky?”

  “That’s right—to have a brother like you.”

  Johnny snorted. “I doubt it, Dennis, but I appreciate it.”

  “You bet. Go eat. Get some sleep.”

  Johnny climbed into the cab and shut the door. He could almost feel the heat billowing off the package near his feet. What did the note say? What was inside that storage facility? What had Daniel been doing with a block of Colombian cocaine?

  For just a moment, Johnny considered what would happen if he discarded the box...

  ...if he wrote off his brother’s death as a terrible tragedy...

  ...if he let those secrets rest with the dead.

  He could probably do that.

  If he were not a Marine.

  Chapter Ten

  “You’re asking if I think Johnny has PTSD? Dude, who doesn’t have it? We used to joke that Marines don’t have skeletons in their closets ‘cause the bodies are always fresh. But all we really have in there is everything... everything we can’t forget.”

  —Corey McKay (FBI interview, 23 December)

  Edward Senecal and his wife Mimi held vigil in Emile’s room at St. Michael’s Hospital. Down below, the rush hour traffic pulsed through Toronto. Their son’s attending physicians were en route to update them regarding Emile’s status. Like most doctors, they were running late, and Senecal felt like a dog on a leash, tugging his way between the window and the door, his stomach churning.

  Since being ruthlessly battered by those Muslim boys, Emile had yet to open his blackened eyes, and the brain swelling had continued. Senecal and his wife had not left the hospital. The nurses were pleasant and professional, offering to buy food and provide anything else they might need. While Senecal and his wife smiled politely, their eyes remained grim. Mimi stood over their son and was visibly trembling. Seeing her like that drove Senecal to the bed, where he clutched her hand, trying to offer her something firm and stable, trying to be the man she needed right now. Behind them, the doctors entered with a somber greeting.

  “We need some good news,” Senecal muttered. “Anything you have.” This was unfamiliar territory for him. In every aspect of his life, he was in control. At work, he was always spearheading the conversation, even with potential clients. He was never at someone else’s mercy.

  The leonine Dr. Kamran was the taller of the two physicians, with a well-manicured beard and semi-rimless glasses. His associate, the cherubic Dr. Levin, was clean-shaven and wore his graying blond hair slicked back with gel. Kamran cleared his throat and consulted a tablet computer. “Mr. and Mrs. Senecal, we know this is an incredibly difficult time for you, and it’s hard to think clearly. But we need to pause now to review your son’s injuries and his response to treatment. Then we’ll discuss our observations. We’ve made those together and independently.”

  “We just need to know... Will he make it?” Mimi blurted out. “Can you save him? Please, god, tell us you can. That’s all we want.”

  Senecal squeezed her hand. “Mimi, please, let’s listen.”

  “Emile came in with very serious injuries,” Kamran said. “Critical injuries. We made sure you understood that during our first consultation.”

  Senecal nodded anxiously. “You made that very clear.”

  Kamran pursed his lips, glanced at his partner, then continued, “The trauma Emile received to his extremities, to his nose, and to his lungs were manageable, but the blunt force injuries to his brain were significant, and those injuries are irreversible.”

  “What does that mean?” Mimi asked.

  “I’ll explain,” answered Kamran. “First, we have very specific guidelines to determine brain death in children, and we followed those to the letter.”

  Senecal flicked his gaze to Emile, his only son lying in a cocoon of tubes and wires. “My boy is brain dead?”

  It was Dr. Stone’s turn to speak: “Dr. Kamran’s neurologic examination indicated that Emile met the legal criteria for brain death. After a shortened interval, I was able to conduct my own exam and apnea test, and I’m afraid I reached the same conclusion. We even brought in a third physician, which we don’t have to do, and he concurs. While Emile feels warm to the touch and seems to be breathing, his brain isn’t helping with those functions. He’s in a persistent vegetative state. Without mechanical assistance, he would pass away in a day, a few days, maybe a week or two. We don’t know. Of course mere words can’t express how terribly sorry we are.”

  Mimi tore her hand out of Senecal’s grip and drifted to the window. She began sobbing loudly, leaving Senecal to face the two doctors, who despite being veterans of similar conversations were both glassy-eyed and obviously moved.

  “We know this will take some time,” Dr. Kamran said. “And we
assure you that everyone at St. Michael’s understands that. But it’s important that you know all the facts.”

  “What else is there?”

  “Well, because your son will be legally classified as brain dead, we recommend that his ventilator be removed, and that we allow him to pass on naturally. I wish there was something else we could do, but there isn’t.”

  Senecal swung around and shut his eyes. The darkness gave way to their street, to Emile screaming for help as he was clubbed to the ground. Senecal reached out, but a numbing force held him back. He wrenched open his eyes and balled his hands into fist. “Are you sure about this? I don’t know anything about the kinds of tests you conduct.”

  Dr. Kamran softened his tone. “Mr. Senecal, the examinations were performed with great care. As Dr. Stone mentioned, we even brought in a third colleague, just to be absolutely certain.”

  “So my boy is not coming back.”

  “I’m afraid he’s not.”

  “Mr. Senecal, I understand what you’re feeling right now,” said Dr. Stone.

  Senecal’s voice cracked. “My boy’s gone, and you’re telling me you understand?”

  “I lost my own boy to cancer last year,” Stone explained. “He was just a year older than Emile.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  This repulsive feeling, this helplessness, was completely alien. Here he was, a captain of industry, yet he was no longer at the helm of his own life. His boy had been taken, and there was nothing he could do. Emile was going to learn how to be a man. He was going to take over the businesses. And that was just the beginning...

  Senecal glanced past the doctors to the armed security guards outside the door. He lifted his palms, as if to surrender. “All right, look, I’m okay.”

  “You will be,” said Dr. Stone. “You’ll get even more angry. You’ll have thoughts that scare you. We’ve provided some recommendations for grief counseling. You should go. I did. It works.”

  Senecal could not mask his skepticism. “Look, I don’t need to talk to anyone right now except my wife. And you’re not doing anything with my boy until we say so.”