“Why hasn’t this information been released to the public?” asked Bloch.
“They made an emergency landing in the middle of the woods,” said Shepard. “They were incommunicado for hours. It’s been only minutes since a reconnaissance helicopter spotted them, and the pilot hasn’t found a way to land there yet. They’re holding off on releasing the information until they’re at a secure location.”
Bloch flopped into her chair with relief. The casualties of the day had not been as catastrophic as she had thought it had been. With the President located and Conley on the way to pick up McKay, this series of events might be drawing to a close.
Her phone rang: unknown number.
“This is Bloch,” she said, adopting her usual businesslike tone. “Who is this?”
“This is Cougar,” came the voice on the other line. She sat up, alarmed.
“Where are you? What is this number?”
“I’m at a gas station,” he said. “It’s Lambda. They’re working for Weinberg.”
“What?” she exclaimed, incredulous.
“I can’t explain it, either,” he said. “But they took my cell phone at gunpoint, along with the coordinates of McKay’s hiding place. They tried to kill me, and they mean to kill her, too. You need to warn them.”
“Hold on,” she said, while motioning for Shepard to lend her his phone. She dialed the phone in Lily’s possession. It rang once, twice, three times.
“Hello.” It was a man’s voice.
“Who is this?” she demanded.
“Bloch,” said the voice, in a reassuring tone. “It’s me. It’s Morgan.”
“Morgan, thank goodness. Are you still at the hotel?”
“Yeah, we’re here.”
“Get out,” she said in her commanding voice. “Get out right now. Lambda—they’re working for Weinberg and they know where you are. Get out and get as far away from there as possible.”
“I could do that,” he said. “But I think it’s better to end this right here, right now.”
“Morgan, the safety of Senator McKay—”
“Won’t be in jeopardy,” he said. “She’ll be far away when anything goes down. But I’m not running anymore. This ends tonight.”
Chapter 65
June 16
Massachusetts
Walker was in a pissy mood, and when he was in a pissy mood, he drove too fast. Although, the truth was, he always drove too fast. Not that he loved the speed, but he resented the road and others on it.
He had lost Clutch, and he was not happy about that. Cougar had gotten away, and he was even less happy about that.
He was aching for the feel of his Uzi in his hands. His mood had been improving as they approached their destination. In fact, Walker was downright giddy as he turned into the Ellery. The rest of his team followed in the other car.
The Ellery was a plain two-story motel with the corridor exposed to open air on one side. They parked in the lot, and everyone emerged from the cars with semiautomatic machine guns drawn and ready.
“We don’t want any survivors,” said Walker. “We’ll kill the entire damn motel if necessary. But out primary target is room twenty-one.”
He took the lead, going up the stairs and all the way down the hallway, with four of his team following him. He stopped at the door and tried to peek in through the large window, but the blinds were drawn. The lights were off inside. He signed for Bluejay, who kicked like a mule, to get it open. The former linebacker positioned himself in front of the door and stomped it in.
Walker let the others go in first, and then entered the room. In the light from outside he saw two beds and a cot, all of them occupied. He gave the signal to fire at will, and Lambda team let fly a hail of bullets into each of the figures in the beds.
Something was not right. There was no blood, no parts, just foam and feathers. Walker turned on the lights. Goddamn decoys! Pillows and blankets! They’d been fooled by elementary-school level deception.
“What the hell is that smell?” asked Bluejay.
Morgan stepped out of room 26 of the Ellery Motel. On his daughter’s cell phone, he dialed 911. Phone in hand, standing halfway down the upstairs hallway, he drew a Zippo lighter from his pants pocket.
“Nine-one-one, please state your emergency,” came the voice on the other line.
“I’d like to report a fire at the Ellery Motel,” he said. “Send help right away.” With this, he hung up, flicked the lighter, and dropped it.
Morgan had always appreciated the way that flames traveled on alcohol, in a way that was beautiful, smooth, almost elegant. He watched as the iridescent blue spread down the hall. It was a beauty to behold.
Of course, some rather more explosive materials were beautiful, too.
The door to room 21 erupted in a spout of flame, and this would not be the mild burning of alcohol. He felt the heat singeing his hair. He would rather not have to think about what it might be like for someone who was in that room.
It couldn’t have been pleasant.
Chapter 66
June 17
Baltimore
As soon as Smith’s gunshot wound had stabilized, his connections had gotten him out of the hospital and into another: Johns Hopkins. He limped down the antiseptic corridor, as walking any faster would have hurt like hell, until he came to the checkpoint where Secretary of State Lee Irwin Wolfe’s security detail was standing guard.
“He’s expecting me,” said Smith, flashing one of his many fake identities.
One of them checked a list while the other spoke into his communicator. “Follow me,” the one with the communicator said after a few seconds. He led Smith farther down the hallway to a wide door that opened into a spacious private room. There lay the Secretary of State, haggard and unshaven but clean and in apparent health. He looked up at Smith, showing a weary and suffering expression with a hint of relief.
“Smith,” he said.
Smith looked to his right, where a bodyguard sat vigil on a chair. Wolfe took the cue.
“Give us a minute, Ryan, would you?” The man left the room. “Smith,” Wolfe repeated. “What happened? You’re hurt.”
“I was double-crossed,” said Smith. He watched Wolfe’s expression, but saw no sign of a reaction. “By Ken Figueroa, of all people.”
“Are you kidding?” said Wolfe, looking surprised. “Ken shot you?”
“Right.” Smith pulled the chair in which the bodyguard had been sitting to a spot on Wolfe’s bedside. “And then I shot him. And now I’m here, and he’s in a body bag.”
“Why the hell would Ken shoot you?”
“That’s a good question,” said Smith. “I’ve been asking myself that for the past twenty-four hours. Why the hell would Ken Figueroa shoot me? Why would his tactical team turn on my people and try to kill Senator Lana McKay? Why would they kill Haider Raza, unarmed, when he is the only person who could tell us about your whereabouts?”
Smith saw the alarm dawn on Wolfe’s demeanor.
“Do you have something tell me, Lee?”
“Listen, Smith, I—I don’t know what you’re getting at here.”
“All, coincidentally, as Gunther Weinberg attacks, simultaneously, the President, the Vice President, the Speaker of the House, and President of the Senate. Who, if all dead, would clear up the line of succession to the presidency directly to, well, you. Just, coincidentally, as you return from being held captive and tortured by America’s public enemy number one to receive a hero’s welcome. Am I leaving anything out, Lee?”
Wolfe chuckled. “You’re losing it, Smith. You’re so far into your own conspiracies that you’re seeing them everywhere.”
“Is that a fact?” Smith said.
“Yes, it is,” Wolfe said, anger creeping into his tone. “I’m back to my home country after going through hell in Pakistan, and you—”
“Save it,” said Smith. “I know you planned the attack on the line of succession. I know you planned your own abduction
to make yourself into some kind of hero. But it’s over, Wolfe.”
“You pathetic little man,” said Wolfe. “ Do you know who you’re talking to? I will bury you. I will—”
“No,” broke in Smith. “You won’t. The Aegis board have been notified. They are unanimous on this issue. You’re done. You have two choices. You bow out and keep out, letting America keep thinking that you’re a hero—”
“What, no justice to be served? Aren’t you going to ask me to fall on my sword or something? Commit seppuku?”
“I do not care about justice,” said Smith. “I care about outcome. You are done, whether or not you live. No good can come of bringing this all to light. You have a choice. Leave public life forever. Retire, citing your recent captivity. Go to a ranch in Texas and spend the rest of your days hunting or horseback riding or whatever it is you do. Or die in the next few days.”
Wolfe stared out into the middle distance, abstracted. There was no guilt in his demeanor, Smith noticed. Only a hint of shame, and he had been given a way out to avoid it. That was what motivated people like Wolfe, all they would respond to—shame, and the drive to avoid it.
“I have just one question,” Smith said. “How does Gunther Weinberg fit into all of this? What was in it for him? Influence?”
Wolfe shook his head. “No. I mean, yes, that, too, but something else. He was . . . bored, I think.” He stared into the distance, as if he were somewhere far away. “I know how it sounds, but it’s true. He already had all the money he could possibly use. There was nothing he couldn’t buy. But it wasn’t enough for him. He needed more. He needed—something like this. A grand plan, something truly extraordinary. The way he talked about it, like it was going to be his masterpiece.” Wolfe turned his head to look at Smith. “This isn’t over yet.”
“If you’re going to threaten me, Lee—”
“No, not at all,” said Wolfe. “I mean Weinberg. He’s not done. He won’t let this failure stop him.”
“I’m sure we can manage—”
“You don’t understand,” said Wolfe. “He’s here, he’s still in the country, and he has a tactical nuclear weapon in his possession. He’s going to make his mark, and he’ll raze an American city if he has to.”
Chapter 67
June 17
Boston
“All right, this is the situation,” Bloch told Shepard and Spartan in their suite at the Mandarin Oriental, with Morgan, Conley, and Lily on speakerphone. “We have to find a tactical nuclear weapon that’s located somewhere on American soil. We have zero leads as of right now, and this is a race against the clock. Run a search for Weinberg’s names on every database.”
“We’ve tried that,” said Shepard. “No go. No hits for his own name and ID or his sister’s, no known aliases.... It looks like money can buy you real anonymity.”
“Shipping manifests?” suggested Lily. “Anything that can help us determine how he got the bomb here?”
“Not in the time that we have,” said Shepard.
“Can we do a satellite sweep for the bomb’s radiation signature?” asked Conley.
“It’s possible in theory,” said Shepard. “But not in our time frame.”
“Why not?” asked Morgan.
“Making a general sweep of the whole country, for starters, would take days that we don’t have,” said Shepard. “Also, there’s nothing unique about the signature on a nuclear bomb. We’d be poring over satellite readouts for weeks trying to weed out all the CT scan and X-ray machines.”
“What if we narrowed down the search parameters?” suggested Bloch. “Give you a target area to run the search?”
“That might work,” said Shepard. “What are we looking for?”
“What would he need to launch a missile?” asked Bloch.
“Highway access to get the equipment in, enough space to set up the rig,” said Conley.
“And privacy,” added Morgan. “You don’t want the neighbors catching sight of your nuclear missile.”
“Let’s not forget that Weinberg travels in style,” said Lily. “He wouldn’t settle for any old place.”
“So let’s see . . .” said Shepard. “Properties larger than fifty acres . . . rented or bought in the past year. . . . Let’s set a price threshold. . . . There!” His screen displayed a list of real estate properties. “All right,” he said. “Now, I’m going to input their coordinates into our instructions for the satellite sweep, and see if something comes up.”
Everyone watched Shepard’s computer screen as it blinked through a blur of images and numbers. After about thirty seconds, Shepard said, “You know, this is probably going to take awhile. Why don’t you all go get a cup of coffee or something?”
Bloch sat back down on the room’s sofa, and noticed how tired she was. There was a deep ache in her muscles, and her eyelids grew heavy. The pain in her torso was dulled, but still hurt constantly, always at the edge of her consciousness. She was tired, so tired. If only she could rest her eyes—
“We’ve got a hit!” came Shepard’s voice.
Bloch’s eyes shot open. “How long was I out?” she asked.
“About an hour and a half,” said Spartan.
“Why didn’t you wake me up?” she said.
“Boss, you’re burning the candle at both ends,” said Shepard. “We thought you could use the rest.”
“All right, no matter,” said Bloch. “What do we have?”
“Manor house in South Carolina,” said Shepard, showing her a satellite photo of a green property. “One hundred and fifty acres, colonial style. Rented out six months ago to an anonymous holding company, and look at what we have on the front lawn!” He pointed to a rectangular red smear overlaid on the satellite picture of the house and property. “Radiation signature. That’s our bomb.”
“All right,” said Bloch. “It’s time to move out. Cobra, Cougar, Lily, get moving. I’m sending Diesel your way as well. We’ll work on getting you access to the mansion from here.”
Chapter 68
June 17
South Carolina
It was nighttime when Morgan pulled the Corolla carrying Conley and Lily into a narrow roadside stop where Diesel was waiting for them. They were a mere four hundred yards from the edge of Weinberg’s property.
“I’ve brought us some firepower,” said Diesel. He popped his trunk and displayed a wide array of weapons, as well as bulletproof vests and night-vision goggles for everyone. “Gear up,” he told them. “We’re moving out right away.”
Morgan surveyed the weapons—automatics and semiautomatics, handguns, tactical knives, and—
“I call dibs on that one,” said Morgan.
“I thought you might,” said Diesel. “That we use in case we need to destroy the missile.”
“Won’t it cause the warhead to go nuclear?” asked Morgan.
“If you hit the rear of the rocket, it’ll be disabled without setting off the bomb,” said Diesel. “Just be careful to aim for the butt.”
They left the cars where they had parked and walked into the woods with Conley navigating, the terrain rendered green by the night vision. They reached the perimeter wall to Weinberg’s property within ten minutes. It was the most remote corner they could find, where it bordered public land. Morgan slung a FIM-92 Stinger portable surface-to-air missile launcher, a particularly heavy weapon, across his back. It weighed him down as he climbed the tactical ladder to the top.
Once in, they spread out on the forested area, taking cover as they moved across the terrain. They soon neared the expansive lawn in front of the house. It was an enormous colonial mansion, red brick with majestic white columns and entablature. But impressive as it was, it garnered less attention than the missile, more than half as tall as the house, illuminated by the floodlights that lit up the entire area.
From behind the tree line, Morgan counted twelve men in black—the same hired guns, he surmised, that had carried out the attack on Liberty Island. Four were patrolling the
edge of the lawn and two held sniper positions on the balcony, while the rest were scattered around the missile. They carried an assortment of submachine guns—Morgan saw three Uzis and two MP5s and a Colt nine millimeter among them. He clutched his own suppressed Remington sniper rifle and stood with his back to a mossy beech trunk.
“We’re outnumbered three to one, at least,” said Morgan over the radio communicator. “Our one advantage is the element of surprise. Let’s use it wisely.”
“Roger,” said Diesel. “I’ll take the sniper on the left, and you the one on the right, you figure?”
“Confirmed,” said Morgan. “Conley, Lily, give us covering fire. Remember not to stay in one place—you stay put, you let them know where we are and how many we are. Let’s keep them guessing.”
Morgan rested the Remington on a low bough of the beech and found his first target lying behind the white banister of the corner of the balcony. Taking stock of the wind, he adjusted the shot.
“Do you have your shot, Diesel?”
“Standing by,” he said.
“On my mark. Three. Two. One.”
The gunshots rang out nearly simultaneously. Morgan’s target jerked at the impact of the bullet.
Immediately, the remaining ten commandos sprinted out toward the woods, fanning out over the lawn. He heard the suppressed fire from Lily’s and Conley’s MP5s. Morgan took aim with his rifle again, waited for another burst of bullets—from his right, Lily—and took the shot, hitting one of the running men in the neck. With this second shot, his location would certainly be made, so Morgan ran parallel to the tree line, taking cover now behind a bush.
“Morgan!” Gunther Weinberg bellowed from the house’s veranda. “I know you’re out there!”
Forgetting about the approaching hostiles, Morgan took aim at Weinberg, but he was too hasty. The bullet sailed over Weinberg’s head to hit the ceiling.
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