by James Phelan
“What’s Heller got to do with this?” McCorkell asked.
“I’m not sure,” Walker said. “But he has everything to do with Yemen.”
Somerville said, “This is about revenge?”
“No,” Walker said. “It’s about another target. An imminent attack.”
They both looked at him, expectant.
Walker said, “In New York.”
•
Somerville said, “And were you planning to stop this attack alone?”
“Who says I’m working alone?” Walker said.
“Marty Bloom,” McCorkell said. “Great guy, one of the best. But this is the A League. And times change.”
“Yeah, so I hear,” Walker said, drinking from a bottle of water. He checked his watch.
“How do you plan to stop what’s coming?”
“Call in a warning,” Walker said. “Prevent it, or at least get the intended victims out of harm’s way. Maybe all of the above.”
“Is that still your plan?” Somerville asked.
“Do you have a better one?”
“Ah, yeah,” Somerville said. “How about telling the world’s intel agencies about this impending apocalypse?”
“You don’t think I tried that?” Walker said. “The first few months, I sent anonymous messages to everyone I’ve ever been in contact with and trusted. CIA, FBI, Homeland Security, NSA, MI5 and 6, DGSE . . .”
“And?”
“And nothing.”
“They could be working it,” McCorkell said. “I mean, you wouldn’t know, right? You’re out of the loop.”
“They could be. But I can’t take that chance. I can’t assume it’s going to be beaten. They’ve got contact from me, giving them a date and time. A date and time. And that deadline is getting close with nothing being done for all I know.”
“You could have come forward,” Somerville said. “Put your name to the warnings, to lend them credibility. Or go public, or at least go to the Agency or Bureau. Once they see that you’re a legit operator—”
“Yeah, because it’s worked out really well for me since the world’s intel agencies have known that I’m alive,” Walker said, then sighed. “Look, I’ve done what I can, working this on my own. I’ve backtracked through my last mission, in Yemen. I made other couriers in the network. I’ve been able to operate with extreme . . . let’s say, prejudice to uncover this target. I’m getting close and I’m not giving up yet. There’s still time.”
McCorkell said, “What’s the target?”
Walker said, “All I have is a city. New York.”
“We’re hours from deadline!” Somerville said. “And all you have is the city?”
“There’s still time,” Walker repeated. “Have a little faith.”
“I have faith,” McCorkell said. “And you should too.”
Walker looked at him.
McCorkell said, “I got your message.”
Twenty-three hours to deadline.
53
Andrew Hutchinson had Eve’s work and home addresses written down on a small notepad. All the young agents used smartphones or tablets these days. Hutchinson wasn’t old—just on forty—but he didn’t have time for those things. The batteries could die, and they could be hacked, read from afar. Plus you could drop them or get food on them and that would mean an expensive repair or replacement. Impractical for the working man. A small paper notebook? Five for a dollar. Paper and pen were dependable. The time-proven perfect technology.
Hutchinson liked to cover bases and worry only about the things over which he had no control.
Take his current house call.
Across the road he watched Walker’s former wife, Eve, leave work. She was five-seven or close to it, dark brunette, with the toned and tanned figure of someone who did a lot of running. She was a nurse, on night shift. Leaving a little late. Overtime. Understaffed. America today . . . She got in her car, a five-year-old Camry, and took off, soon heading through streets of treelined, picket-fenced homes that made up the American dream.
She drove like a maniac, and he broke at least three laws just staying in her wake. At first Hutchinson thought she was late for something, then decided it was simply her regular driving style.
He slowed a few houses down the street as Eve pulled up into her driveway and waved to the kids playing catch in their front yard next door. Hutchinson pulled up closer. Her wood-paneled home was painted white with light-blue shutters, the upstairs loft space with a slanted roof like an oversized bungalow design. The garden was well kept, the lawn mowed in the past couple of days. A long-haired Golden Retriever bounded out the front door when she opened it—a quick sniff and then it dashed off the porch, sniffed her car, did a quick loop around the front lawn, selected a spot in the garden and then lifted a leg and peed on a shrub.
Eve called him in, having to repeat herself a couple of times until he bounded up the stairs and into the house.
She closed the door, not looking out. Not wary. Not worried that someone might be watching.
A dead end, this one. Still, he had to do it. The Taurus was due back before his afternoon flight to DC. It would be back in plenty of time. He would file his report to McCorkell from the airport bar.
Hutchinson stepped from the car and headed for Eve’s house.
•
“When you sent out those warnings, you included Bloom,” McCorkell said, “and he passed the intel on to me. He didn’t mention it had come from you, just a source that he trusted like no other. Yesterday, he contacted me again, confirming the source was you, because he was concerned for you.”
“I guess I should be thankful he has a big mouth,” Walker said. “How do you know him?”
“He does consulting for me at the UN and for the International Court of Justice, tracking down those still wanted in the area from the siege and Balkans war. He’s a good guy. Without him, this conversation might not be happening—not this way.”
“Bloom’s word was enough to convince McCorkell that you were not a threat,” Somerville added. “And he convinced me.”
“And don’t hold it against Bloom,” McCorkell said to Walker. “He was looking out for you.”
“I’m not angry at the guy,” Walker said, then chuckled. “Should have known the old dog wouldn’t walk away from work, not completely. So, how much did he tell you about this threat?”
“Only that you—we—are on the clock. He gave me a date and time,” McCorkell said. “I’ve spent the past couple of days playing catch-up regarding you. I know that you got burned in Yemen.”
“And does that mean anything to you?”
McCorkell nodded. “What do you know about a guy named Dan Bellamy?”
“Private spies,” replied Walker. “His INTFOR supplies the intel community with private contractors. He wants it to become what companies like Blackwater were to the military when we went into Iraq and ’Stan.”
“Yep. That’s what he’s working toward,” McCorkell said.
Walker said, “Smart opinion says that the intel community is a good decade away from outsourcing half its workload to private contractors.”
“That’s the smart opinion,” replied McCorkell.
“You think that Bellamy is the one driving this deadline?” Walker said.
“Who do you think it is?”
“I’m not ready to say.”
“Why?” Somerville said.
“Because I need to be sure. It’s where things have been pointing since Yemen. But I’m not ready to call it. Not quite. Not for sure.”
“You don’t have much time.”
“I’ll get it done.”
Somerville looked to McCorkell and then asked Walker, “What did those guys back in Hong Kong want?”
“My head on a plate,” Walker said.
“Who were they?”
“Working for the same people as the guys at the safe house.”
“The guy on the bike that hit our car back in Rome?”
&nbs
p; “Him, I don’t know,” Walker said. “That was a kill mission. Maybe because I was with you. Maybe those guys back there in Hong Kong’s Mid Levels didn’t want to talk either but wanted to get us in the car to finish us. It makes more sense doing it that way.”
“So, they’re all working for the same guy?”
“A guy who has wanted me dead since the safe-house cock-up.”
“Bellamy,” said Somerville.
McCorkell nodded.
Walker shrugged. “You say so.”
Somerville asked, “Who was the girl in the safe house with you?”
“Nobody,” Walker replied.
“No, not nobody,” McCorkell said, leaning back and looking at the other two. “Clara works for me.”
54
Walker thought back to when he first saw Clara, standing in the doorway to Felix Lassiter’s apartment. Then he thought about how calm she had been when aiming that pistol at him.
“She’d been following you for three days,” McCorkell said. “Picked you up when you got back from Greece, when you crossed Lassiter’s path.”
“Who is she?” Walker asked.
“Clara works for AISI,” McCorkell said.
“Italy’s domestic intelligence agency,” Somerville said.
“What was her mission?”
“With you?” McCorkell said. “First she was to observe and report. Then, when she saw you go to Felix’s apartment, I told her to make contact. It took me until yesterday to put your name to Bloom’s warning, then I had a sit down with the guy.”
“Clara’s good,” Walker said, leaning back and feeling the stitched-up cut in his side. “Not the best seamstress in the world . . .”
“Let’s get back to Yemen,” McCorkell said. “The HVT that crashed the party. Did you ever find out who he was?”
“He was supposedly a bomb-maker,” Walker said.
“Supposedly?”
“I’ll get to that. A goddamned good bomb-maker. Asad Kamiri.”
“That’s a lot of heat to bring for a guy who makes things that go boom,” McCorkell said.
“I thought so too, until I uncovered more,” Walker said. “This guy was legitimately on our most-wanted list. Bomb-maker to the stars. The guy rewrote the IED playbook. Not only could he fashion a bomb to look like pretty much anything, he refined the explosive mix. He’s got shit that has about ten times the explosive charge of C4.”
“You’re talking about ONC,” Somerville said.
“Yep,” Walker replied. “He could turn something the size of a pack of cigarettes into a car bomb.”
“Okay, now I know who you’re talking about,” McCorkell said. “It was never reported as Yemen, but I remember the hit being announced through the community—it was a happy day around the office.”
“Yeah well . . .” Walker stared into his drink. “I’m sure the Agency sold the Yemen angle quietly because they didn’t want every other bomb-maker in the world sending their CV to Al Qaeda’s top brass. Not that that’d slow things down much.”
“Okay, so it’s making more sense now,” said McCorkell.
“Sense?” replied Walker.
“Why they’d strike the house even though you and another operative ran into it.”
“Does it?”
“We believe that Asad has had a hand in major strikes against the US, from the ninety-three World Trade Center bombing to the USS Cole attack to sending home God knows how many of our uniformed in body-bags from Iraq and Afghanistan.”
“As well as connections to London and Bali,” Walker said. “The guy works to the highest bidder: Al Qaeda, their affiliates, whoever.”
“And they got him,” said Somerville.
Walker shrugged. “Supposedly.”
“What? What do you know?”
“I saw him,” Walker said. “The body. In the house, at Yemen.”
“After the strike?”
“After the first strike. He was cooked, but I saw him.”
“And?”
“It wasn’t our bomb-maker.”
Somerville looked at him sharply. “The body in Yemen—it was someone else?”
Walker nodded.
“How do you know?” McCorkell asked. “His face was never on file.”
“This body had no face,” Walker said. “He was a mess.”
“But?”
“Asad had lost a hand, early in his career. Occupational hazard for guys in his field. His was major, because he’d always played with the big toys. Lost everything below the left elbow, and he was known to have a prosthetic.”
The look on McCorkell’s face showed that he now knew.
“This guy, in Yemen,” Walker said, “had two hands.”
55
Hutchinson knocked on the wood panel next to the screen door. The dog barked as the sound of footfalls came to the door. Eve opened it. Up close Hutchinson saw the small freckles dotting her face; she was no more than five-four, with dark-brown hair tied back in a loose ponytail.
“FBI, ma’am.” Hutchinson showed his ID. “Special Agent Andrew Hutchinson. I need a couple of minutes of your time, please.”
“What’s this about?”
A car sped past.
Hutchinson looked around, then turned back to her. “It’s sensitive.”
The dog barked again.
Eve shushed him, then opened the screen door. “This is about Jed, isn’t it?” she said, standing on the threshold.
“Yes.”
“Y’all alone?” she asked, looking about outside, seeing his unmarked car parked out in the quiet street that she knew well.
“Yes. This won’t take a minute.”
Eve nodded, stepped aside and Hutchinson entered the house.
•
“Tell me about the connection with Bellamy,” Walker said.
“He ordered the strike on the house in Yemen.”
“How?” Walker asked. “Is his little private company operating their own fleet of drones now?”
“No, not yet,” McCorkell said. “But be careful what you wish for. And they’re not so little anymore.”
“How did he order it?” Walker said. “Everything I’ve learned says that the order came from the SAD Director, Jack Heller.”
“That’s who you’re pegging this on?”
“We’d had run-ins before,” Walker said. “He had personally pulled me off this op when I was still at the Agency. And his guy that was with me in Yemen—he drew down on me, mentioned Heller by name as he checked out.”
“Well then, it’s Heller, via Bellamy,” McCorkell replied. “I heard it from a source that I do not doubt.”
“Who?”
“A senator on the intel committee.”
“And why would Bellamy do that?” Somerville said. “Order the strike, I mean?”
“The official reason is because of Asad,” Walker said. “The bomb-maker. It was a cover. The world stops looking for him because he’s dead. Meanwhile, he’s now working for Bellamy. And I’m out of the picture.”
“That’s about the sum of it,” McCorkell said.
“Until ten minutes ago I thought Asad was now working for Heller . . .” Walker said. “Now I know he’s working for INTFOR.”
“Why would a private intelligence company and the CIA want a bomb-maker listed as dead? Because he’s working for them as a spy?” Somerville asked. “As an agent? I mean, he can’t infiltrate AQ anymore if they think he’s dead—he’s of no use. Or have they got the real Asad in a room somewhere, like Gitmo, bleeding him of intel?”
“None of the above,” Walker said. “They’ve got him working for them doing what he does best: making bombs.”
56
Hutchinson said hi to the dog in the hallway. The house was timber floored, wide old boards that looked like they’d been reclaimed from some place far older. The paint scheme was muted but for a wall in each room that was painted a vivid color; violet in the hallway, emerald in the lounge room, burnt orange in the kitchen. A
distraction maybe, some kind of therapy, something to shock the senses into remembering to keep it together. He wondered how Eve had taken the news of Walker’s death when their friend Durant had broken it to her.
“Take a seat,” Eve said, motioning to a row of stools at a marble-topped kitchen bench. “Coffee?”
“Thanks.” Hutchinson could see that the backyard was unkempt: shriveled plants, the ankle-high grass burned in patches from the heat of the sun and not enough water, a dead tree fallen over. It was in stark contrast to the front. Hutchinson looked out the back and saw Eve’s private turmoil let to go to pasture, as if she did everything she could but as much as it was and as hard as it had to be, she couldn’t do it all.
He knew then that this was a dead end.
•
“So, they have Asad making bombs,” McCorkell said. “And we have a deadline and a city: New York.”
“And think about the bomb,” Walker said. “It’ll be small, and powerful. That’s Asad’s specialty.”
“So,” McCorkell said, “it could be anywhere.”
Somerville said, “Could be more than one. Could be multiple targets.”
“It doesn’t need to be,” Walker said. “It’s a public space. It’s for show, more than anything. This attack is designed for a specific purpose: to show the world that the imminent, persistent threat of terrorism is still out there.”
“Damn,” Somerville said. “That’d help Bellamy out some, right?”
“Him, the Agency, anyone in the intel community,” Walker said. “And I think I’ve figured out the place.”
“You know the target?”
“The target, no, just the location—and with Bellamy involved, it makes a whole lot more sense now . . .”
“Sense? Where?”
“Think about the time,” Walker said, snapping out of his thoughts. “What happens at nine-thirty in the morning in New York?”
“People are at work,” Somerville said. “Kids are at school.”
“It’s a specific time, though,” McCorkell said. “What’s it mean?”
“I followed the money,” Walker said. “That’s where I found the answer. I kept searching and looking, and with the New York location, and the time, it became clear.”