Zero Separation

by Philip Donlay

  She overheard William reassure Abigail that everything was alright, that Mommy just had an upset tummy. He let himself into the bathroom and ran water in the sink. He handed her a warm washcloth and then sat on the edge of the tub.

  The washcloth felt good as she pressed it to her face. She sat unmoving, waiting for the slightest hint that her body wasn’t finished. For the moment at least, her stomach seemed quiet. William took the washcloth and handed her a towel.

  “Thank you,” Lauren whispered, her voice raw.

  “I know it’s a lot to absorb,” William said. “When he was Robert, he had no illusions about how money changed people’s perceptions of him. He was determined not to have that happen again. He never wanted the financial side of his existence to be a burden, or to impact you in any negative way, so he elected to keep it separate.”

  “Yeah, he was good at that,” Lauren said. “I can’t stop wondering, what if he’s not dead? He did it once—could he have done it again? Is there any chance he’s left us all behind?”

  “He’d never leave the two of you,” William said without hesitation. “Believe me, I’ve processed this from every angle and it just doesn’t work. If he were going to erase Donovan Nash, then he’d have to deal with Kyle as well as Agent Montero. I can’t see how that could happen. I’m afraid this is real.”

  “What if Montero and Kyle died in the plane crash, but Donovan didn’t. Would he take the opportunity to vanish before the truth about Robert Huntington made the headlines?”

  “No,” William shook his head emphatically. “I can’t see him doing anything like that, and I don’t believe you do either.”

  “Right now, I’m not all sure what he is, or isn’t, capable of.” Lauren looked up at William and felt as if he were complicit in all of Donovan’s lies. Everything came rushing to the surface. “William, I’m his wife, and he hid everything from me. His past that we could never talk about, the nightmares he wouldn’t share. I watched a movie he couldn’t tell me about that centered on a woman he never stopped loving. I saw it, William, the look in his eyes he had for her. I went back and watched it again. I can promise you he gave Meredith a look he’s never given me.”

  “I don’t believe that for a second. It had to be the effects of seeing him before the surgeries.”

  “It was in his eyes, and they’re the same. I feel like a fool for never allowing myself to believe that Meredith was a threat. I’ve been so pragmatic all this time. From the moment I learned the truth about Donovan’s past, it seemed pointless to compete with a woman who had been dead for nearly two decades—but now I know without a doubt that I’ve been wrong. I’ve never felt so humiliated. Meredith was the love of his life and Donovan has never gotten over her. Why did he marry me when it’s so obvious I was never more than the runner-up?”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  Donovan and Montero took turns trying to sleep. They’d given up trying to get free. Even if they did work themselves loose, the only place they could escape to was into the jungle, where, as Strauss had promised, they’d probably die before they reached help. Donovan guessed it was now late afternoon or early evening. Strauss had removed both of their wristwatches—a basic tenet—keep the prisoners off balance and confused. On and off, Donovan heard noises, the sounds of wood being cut with a handsaw, as well as nails being driven. There was also the banging of hammers on metal—activities not typically associated with airplanes. At one point, both Strauss and the other man came into the tent and one by one carried out all three of the tanks. It was later that Donovan heard the unmistakable sound of the truck pumping fuel into the da Vinci. By how long it took, either the pump was slow, or they were going to fly a very long time.

  The heat of the day was draining, the humidity oppressive. He was hungry and thirsty. He thought of Meredith, how she’d been held for weeks. Had she been immobilized like this, her hands and feet tied? He’d have gladly traded places and died for her. When had she known with certainty that she was going to die? Had she blamed him? She should have. He’d always believed that the blame was all his.

  He thought of that final phone call in Costa Rica, the last time he’d heard her voice. As always, remembering was like a twisting knife in his chest. He’d been asleep when her kidnappers had called. He assured them he had the money, but he demanded to hear her voice, to know for sure she was still alive. When they put her on, all she said was not to pay them. Don’t give them the money because she was already a dead woman. The last thing he heard was Meredith calling out that she loved him. The call terminated—but she’d been right, they’d never intended to keep her alive. Meredith knew it, and Donovan’s guilt would never abate.

  The last time he’d spoken to Lauren, he’d promised her everything would be fine. Now, in her mind, he was dead. He hated himself for what he’d done—the things about his past that he’d hidden from her. He’d justified it under an altruistic banner. He’d wanted to protect her, but all he’d really done was alienate her.

  “Are you awake?” Montero whispered.

  “Yeah.”

  “I can’t stop thinking about why Strauss asked about the Pan Avia black boxes.”

  Donovan closed off his thoughts of Meredith and Lauren. “What did you say?”

  “The black boxes from the Pan Avia flight. Why did Strauss ask about them?”

  “Maybe his plans don’t call for an armada of naval vessels anchored in the Caribbean Ocean.”

  “Armada or not, he’s not getting anywhere near the U.S. in a stolen Gulfstream. I can’t figure this thing out. We know Strauss is from Israel and he hired two thugs from Trinidad, Diego and Ramone, who may or may not be Muslim. Then when he wanted to kill Michael Ross in Virginia, he made it look like the work of a jihadist suicide bomber. How does any of this make sense?”

  “I don’t think you can look at this with traditional borders in mind. Strauss is nothing more than a mercenary, an arms dealer who happens to be ex-Israeli Defense Forces. I think he’s simply hired himself out to the highest bidder, and he’ll use any means possible to remain undetected.”

  “You’re saying he sold anthrax to Islamic terrorists and is helping smuggle it into the United States?” Montero asked. “I’m having a hard time buying that an Israeli would do that.”

  “He’s a psychopath, what’s hard to believe?”

  “I think he’s working toward some greater end than getting rich.”

  “Like what?”

  “It’s like any crime, you have to look for the motive. If it’s not money, then it’s either love, or he’s covering up a bigger crime.”

  “That doesn’t make him any less of a psychopath.”

  “Who gains if there’s an anthrax attack on one of our major cities?” Montero asked. “Say Washington D.C. or New York. Or even Miami or Atlanta? What happens on a global political scale?”

  “I don’t know if anyone gains, but the knee-jerk reaction would be to blame any number of Middle Eastern terrorist groups.”

  “We have the jihadist who bombed the hospital. That’s where the evidence leads. Strauss is making that part easy. He’s dangled the Islamic extremist carrot for all to see.”

  “Strauss loves deception.” Donovan said, a picture starting to form in his mind. “What if he’s manipulating this entire operation to appear as if, say, Iran, or some other Middle Eastern group is behind the attack?”

  “You think he’s planning this anthrax attack himself, hoping to point the blame at the Middle East? Do you think Strauss and Keller are in this together? Do you think Israel would really manipulate events to try and trigger a war between the United States and say, Iran?”

  “I doubt Keller or Mossad or Israel is behind this. Strauss played you and Alec to kill the team that Keller had sent to eliminate him. The way I see it is Strauss is working alone and Keller is looking for him. Keller wants Strauss dead.”

  “We all want Strauss dead,” Montero replied.

  “It sounds like they’re building somethi
ng out there. I also heard them fuel the plane which makes me think that they plan on departing soon.”

  Montero started to say something but stopped.

  “What is it?” Donovan asked.

  “It’s just—I’m taken aback that you’re not the monster I always thought you were.”

  “Really? Well, you’re still the one I thought you were.”

  “I probably deserve that. I’ve been wrong about you. I’ve always read about you in terms of being the playboy billionaire who killed Meredith Barnes. I worshiped her and you were easy to hate. If it means anything, I’m sorry.”

  “I do have a question for you. In your personnel file there’s mention of assault and blackmail charges. The person who made the accusations then disappeared. You already know about revenge, don’t you? Strauss isn’t the first person to cross you that you’ve fixed a vendetta on, is he?”

  “What file?”

  “You don’t think my people sat around and did nothing while you blackmailed me, do you? A young girl accused you of assault and then she vanished. What did you do?”

  “Screw you, that’s none of your business.”

  “How does it feel to have someone dig around in your life and take everything at face value?”

  “I don’t have to explain anything to you.”

  “I want to know about Veronica Montero’s version of revenge. You’ve always handled your own payback. The professor when you were in college, the superior officer in the FBI. They crossed a line, and you took care of the situation personally. That took some guts. But all of a sudden I’m hearing more remorse than rage. You better not be giving up.”

  “You’re telling me you’re not afraid right now?” Montero said. “Tough guy Robert Huntington or Donovan Nash or whoever you are, isn’t afraid?”

  “Of course I’m scared, who wouldn’t be. What I’m trying to tell you is that we need to work together because it’s going to take both of us to stop these guys.”

  Donovan watched as Montero clenched her jaw and glared at him. Keeping her agitated and on the verge of violence was his best weapon and it also gave him something to focus on, to cope with his own fear.

  “Her name was Tanya, she was a runaway,” Montero said. “A fourteen-year-old girl pimped out by her boyfriend, a guy I’d wanted to bust for a long time. When she showed up at a shelter I’m familiar with, they contacted me. I tried to use her to get to him, except she was being coached by her boyfriend the whole time. She made the assault allegations and then tried to blackmail me as a way to slow down my investigation against her boyfriend. One night I grabbed her off the street and took her down to the county morgue. We’d just put another underage hooker in the cooler, a friend of hers. The girl had been murdered by a violent methhead who was good with a straight razor. That night I convinced Tanya to go back to Denver. She signed a statement that exonerated me of any wrongdoing. Then I contacted her older brother and I personally put her on a flight home. Word on the street grew that I’d made the girl vanish. I leaned on the boyfriend and he finally left town. He set up shop in Jacksonville and he was finally busted. He’s at the state prison in Raiford, Florida, doing at least five years on a ten-year sentence. I didn’t take the law into my hands, I used the law and everything else I had at my disposal. I hated that guy and what he did to those girls.”

  “What about the others?”

  “You mean the professor and the instructor? Both were jerks who tried to use their positions of authority to pressure me to have sex with them. As you said, they were dealt with.”

  “You’re very unusual in that regard.” Donovan chose his words carefully. “Why do you resort to action when most other people either run away or cower in fear?”

  “It’s none of your business.”

  “What happened to you?”

  “Leave it alone.”

  “Did someone close to you betray you, hurt you?”

  “I said leave it alone.”

  “We’re probably going to die—what difference does it make?”

  “Stop it!”

  “I need to know what keeps you angry. What makes you the one to dispense justice?” Donovan waited for her reply, but she remained silent. He cautioned himself not to push her too hard. He needed her and was about to apologize when she began to talk.

  “My mother was killed by a drunk driver,” Montero said quietly, but the words were filled with anguish. “The bastard walked on a technicality and never served a day in prison. I was just a kid. I couldn’t believe he wasn’t punished—the system had failed me. He drank himself to death before I was old enough to finish what the system failed to do. I know what you’re thinking—and you’re right. I’m part of that same system. On my watch, I owe it to the families of the victims to make sure that doesn’t happen to them. Those who would harm me personally are a different story. They’re dealt with immediately. I handle it myself so I don’t have to worry about the system failing. I have a badge and a gun. Hell, the entire law enforcement community is only a radio call away. Three words: officer needs assistance, and everyone races to the scene, guns drawn. This is different. No one is looking for us. We have nothing.”

  “We have each other and we have to work together to stop Strauss. We need to be ready to do anything to stop him, which means we need to stay focused. You need to maintain your rage for what he did to you and Alec.”

  “You’re saying we stop him no matter what, even if we have to die in the process?”

  “If that’s what it takes. Yes.” Donovan then asked the question that would impact Lauren and Abigail. “How long before everything about me is made public?”

  “If my contact doesn’t hear from me by tomorrow morning, he’ll read the contents of the packet. He’ll call a friend of mine who works for the Associated Press. After that, it won’t be long before someone holds a press conference to tell the world what I uncovered.”

  “If someone holds a press conference in Miami, I’m pretty sure the attention of the world will be focused elsewhere. The uproar about me won’t last long once people start dying. The media will have something far bigger to talk about—like a large-scale anthrax attack.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  As each minute crawled by, Lauren felt even more fragmented. Abigail had been bathed and was asleep, but Lauren continued to rock her daughter, unwilling to face the world that waited outside the nursery. Over the course of the evening, she’d run the full range of emotions. From betrayal to self-pity, to anger that Donovan was dead, to the impossible hope that he was somehow still alive. She knew that the story would break soon and she’d be forced to run. Part of her was hoping it would happen so she could finally begin to deal with the new reality of her life. She felt caught in a vicious cycle that played over and over in her mind, each element of her personal disaster more overwhelming than the one before. She placed her daughter into her bed and quietly walked out of Abigail’s bedroom. She was momentarily startled to find Buck standing in the hallway.

  “I was just about to knock. Can we talk?” Buck said.

  “Sure.” Lauren blinked back her momentary surprise. “What’s on your mind?”

  “I can’t find any easy way to say this, so I’ll come right to the point. Earlier, you were reluctant to open your bedroom door, but I saw the reflection in the mirror, you were filling suitcases. May I ask why you’re packing? And please don’t try and tell me you’re going to Jamaica. From what I saw you were packing like you were going to be gone a long time.”

  Buck had caught her, and there was no lie that was going to deflect his curiosity. “The walls of this house are closing in on me and it’s only going to get worse. At some point Abigail and I are going to Europe.”

  “Who’s going to protect you over there?”

  “I was hoping you’d take the job,” Lauren said just as Andy’s voice crackled over Buck’s radio.

  “Buck, we’ve got a limousine with blacked-out windows and diplomatic plates headed our way.”
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  Buck reached for his pistol. “I need you to go back into Abigail’s room and lock the door.”

  Lauren felt the tears began to well up in her eyes. “It’s someone coming to notify me they found Donovan, isn’t it? The State Department.”

  “I think we’d hear it from William. We’ll both wait here until we know for sure.” Buck said to Lauren then clicked his microphone. “Andy, I’m upstairs with Dr. McKenna and Abigail. Check it out and report back.”

  “Roger,” Andy replied. “They just pulled up in front.”

  Lauren wrapped her arms around herself and leaned against the wall for support.

  “The passenger is Aaron Keller. He’s got credentials that identify him as a diplomat assigned to the Israeli Embassy here in Washington. He says he needs to speak with Dr. McKenna.”

  “Do you know him?” Buck asked Lauren.

  “I’ve never met him, or even heard of him, until day before yesterday. Donovan asked me to check him out.”

  “Did he check out?”

  “Most of it was classified, I didn’t look very deep, just verified who he was and what position he held. According to the DIA database, he’s Mossad.”

  “Andy, we’re coming downstairs,” Buck said. “How many men does this guy have with him?”

  “He has a driver and a bodyguard. I checked; the FBI confirms he’s legitimate. He insists he needs to speak to Dr. McKenna alone.”

  “That’s not happening,” Buck said. “Frisk him for weapons and then bring him to the front door—alone.”

  Lauren dabbed at her eyes with a tissue. “I can’t imagine what Mossad wants with me.”

  “Have you ever worked with them before?” Buck led the way down the stairs.

  “There have been several joint assignments over the past few years. But names were never revealed.”

  “I don’t want you alone with this guy,” Buck said as they approached the front door. “I want to be in the room to listen to what this guy has to say.”