Dark Heart

by James Phelan

  “You were Overton’s senior agent in the Service?”

  Acton nodded. “I’m Assistant Special Agent in Charge of Counterfeit Investigations.”

  “So, what do you think happened with Steve?”

  “Dead. Convoy attack, kidnapping gone wrong, drone strike, IED, stray bullet from any one of dozens of different forces fighting there—take your pick; we’ll never know. State assigned him along with a dozen others to make contact with the opposition groups that Washington thought they could bear to do business with post the current regime. He was there to dole out money to the so-called ‘good guys.’ One day he didn’t report back. That’s the game over there.”

  Walker was silent. Taking it all in.

  “I told Overton that,” Acton continued. “And I was there when she told Rachel that her husband must be presumed dead. But I figure she wouldn’t buy it from us, so she left, to go and see for herself. I got the feeling that until she had a body to ID, she’d never believe it.”

  “I’ve met people like that,” Walker said. “I get it.”

  “So, what do we do with this?” Acton looked to Walker. “If I even mention to someone up the chain that we need to look into Deputy Secretary Daniel Harvey, it’s gotta be ironclad.” He gave a nod toward the two agents in his living room. “Given this guy’s injuries, he’ll lawyer up and plead the fifth and whatever he’s told us will be tossed out as information given under duress. It’ll go nowhere.”

  Walker said, “How much time can you buy me?”

  “Time?”

  “How long can you keep these two guys locked up, and shut off from communication?”

  Acton searched Walker’s face for a clue as to what he was thinking but he found none beyond the obvious. “You’re going to go after Harvey yourself, despite everything I’ve just said?”

  “The thought crossed my mind that he and I should have a conversation.”

  “You’re mad, Walker. Harvey’s as good as untouchable. Leave it to someone else, high up, in the system.”

  “Who would that be?” Walker asked. “The Secretary of Homeland Security? She’ll look at me and you like we’re something stuck on her shoe. Tell her that her star recruit is corrupt and—and what?—that he’s part of a conspiracy that stretches back to Syria, but we don’t know what it’s about, or what the end game or ramifications might be, let alone his motive?”

  Acton said nothing.

  Walker continued, “But if Harvey is indeed the guy who ordered me dead at the farmhouse, and if he’s behind this—and he may have other answers that I’m after—then I want a chance to hear it from him.”

  “You can’t just barge into his office and demand answers,” Acton said. “He’ll have you arrested and on the first ghost flight out to some country where you can easily be disappeared without any form of oversight or recourse—he’s got that kind of power when it comes to national security.”

  “I’ll find a way to get to him one-on-one,” Walker said. He looked at Acton hard, wanting the guy to come around. “But I need a window. I need time, just a little, to maneuver.” He gestured to the two Homeland agents. “How long can you keep a lid on this?”

  Acton looked pained as he glanced at the two guys in his house, one conscious, one not, then down at his feet, then up at Walker, like he’d calculated it all and weighed it up. “Best case: forty-eight hours.”

  “I’ll take it.”

  “I said forty-eight hours was best case. Who knows when these idiots have a check-in? It could be in a couple of hours, right? I can only stall so long, if it really does go all the way up to Harvey.”

  “Fine with me, just string things out as long as you can.”

  “I need to figure out where to transfer them to. They need medical attention.”

  “You’ll find a place,” Walker said. “Maybe take them back to where they whacked Bahar?”

  “It’s not that simple. This might get out of my control,” Acton said, again looking over at the two Homeland men. “Someone might fret over these two a-holes—if not their agency, then Daniel Harvey himself. If they come looking here for them . . .”

  “Put your family in a safe house, and keep a low profile,” Walker replied. “Leave the rest to me. I want Harvey worried about these two, I want him wary, because that’s when he’ll make a mistake.”

  Then, before Acton could agree or disagree, they both heard a knock on the front door.

  56

  Hayes and Muertos stepped into the hall, looked at Walker and Acton, then took in the scene in the front sitting room. Hayes and Acton embraced. Muertos looked from the two Homeland guys to Walker, then Acton, with whom she shared an awkward hug. Then she stood close to Walker, looking up at him, her expression tinged with guilt or apprehension, or something else entirely.

  “How’s the arm?” Walker asked.

  “Fractured clean through both bones.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “They set it without hassle, said it will heal fine. I think I’m still high on the pain meds.”

  Walker put a hand on her shoulder. “You know I had to, right?”

  “You had to,” Muertos said, nodding. “We’d have been killed otherwise, I know that. Though you could have tried breaking your own wrist.”

  “Pretty sure my bones are indestructible,” Walker replied. He was glad to see that she was in good spirits, all things considered.

  She pointed at the Homeland guys. “How’d this go down?”

  “They got to Bahar at the hospital, and then were coming here to get to Acton.”

  “Their final target to clean up.”

  “Yep.”

  “Have you figured out who they’re working for?”

  “A Deputy Secretary at Homeland,” Walker said. “Daniel Harvey.”

  “Never heard of him,” Muertos said.

  “I have,” Hayes said. “You’re sure about that?”

  “He’s our next lead,” Walker said, then updated Muertos and Hayes, right up to his plan to find Daniel Harvey.

  “I’m going with you,” Muertos said.

  Walker nodded.

  “How are you planning on doing this?” Acton asked. “Make an appointment at St. Elizabeths and roll on in to question their second in charge?”

  “I’m gonna reach out to him,” Walker said. “Get him some place neutral. Get him to talk, pressure him to make mistakes.”

  “Walker, I don’t think you understand who it is we’re talking about,” Hayes said. “The superstar Deputy Secretary of Homeland? He’s not going to meet with you. And if this is some grand conspiracy he’s involved in, he’ll send a tactical team to put a bullet or ten between your eyes. Or a drone and a missile. Or all of the above, just to be sure.”

  “I don’t think so,” Walker said.

  “Why?” Acton asked.

  “Because of you two,” Muertos said, and Walker nodded. “You’re alive, and soon you’ll be somewhere secure and off the grid, and that’s going to piss him off, right? Plus, you’ve got these two. So, you’re insurance, and as long as it stays that way Walker and I will be fine.”

  “Well,” Hayes said, “I’m just saying, I think you’ll get as far as the front door before all kinds of legal threats come flying at you.”

  “She’s right,” Acton said. “Even with this agent’s testimony, if it holds, which I doubt because of the injuries he’s sustained, it’ll get nowhere. Harvey’s untouchable.”

  Walker smiled. “Something I’ve learned, firsthand, many times over: no one is truly untouchable. I understand what you’re saying. A guy like Harvey is above the law, because he is the law. Which is fine by me, because I don’t plan on using the law against him. That’ll be something that you have to do, in the aftermath.”

  Acton said, “How are you going to do that?”

  Walker looked to Muertos. “I’m going burn his house down.” He let the silence hang in the room for a moment before he continued, saying aloud what they were all thinking. “Y
ou guys all need to decide what happens next, and be at peace with it. If the buck stops with Harvey, then I say he deserves what’s coming to him, because he’s killed two of your friends, as well as being up to something seriously no good. So, if you have objections to this being done my way, the hard way, then speak up now.” He looked at Acton and Hayes, then to Muertos. “Rachel and I want some answers. You two deserve some vengeance. And none of that will happen if we play this the nice way, because Harvey sure as shit won’t be playing nice.”

  “Do it,” Hayes said. “Whatever it takes. For Sally and Jim.”

  Walker looked to Acton, who seemed ambivalent. They all looked to Muertos. She was silent, and still.

  Then, she asked, “How do we get to him?”

  57

  Walker and Muertos stood inside the open front door to Acton’s house, the two Secret Service agents alongside them. He looked again at the burner phones of the two Homeland agents, which he was taking with him.

  “You guys had prepaid burners too,” Walker said to Acton and Hayes.

  “Overton got them from Walmart,” Acton said. “Four handsets, paid in cash. For this op only.”

  “But no matter the phone’s pedigree, it shows a lot, right?” Walker said. “The government can subpoena the information and gain access to all the metadata, like which number called which, when and for how long, where the caller was at any given time.”

  “Yep,” Hayes said. “But there’s no need to get a warrant; all the information is available to government agencies under the Patriot Act. It’s all online, in the Intellipedia portal. You just have to fill out a form and state why you need the data—like, it’s a suspect involved in an imminent attack, or a person of interest—and it’s all available inside five minutes. But if you want access to Intellipedia you need someone on the inside to access the secure LAN at St. Elizabeths, or one of their fusion centers.”

  “I know a guy with access,” Walker said.

  Hayes nodded, then looked to Acton.

  “I’ll take my family to a hotel we use for witness protection,” he said. He looked to Hayes. “Can you accompany them, while I make some inquiries about Overton and Bennet, and deal with these two Homeland idiots?”

  Hayes bit her lip. “Of course.”

  “I’ll have another agent come help deal with them,” Acton said, then passed Walker a handwritten note. “Here’s my cell number.”

  Walker took it and pointed at the Homeland guys. “Where are you going to move them?”

  “I’ll figure it out when they’re in a car. I’ve got a few options,” Acton replied. “You better trash their cell phones. When Harvey can’t reach them, you can bet your life that he’ll have some tech heads at Homeland run a location trace on them.”

  Walker nodded and passed Acton the Homeland agents’ wallets, minus the cash, Kingsley’s ID and a credit card, all of which he put in his jacket pockets along with the Homeland burner phones.

  “I’ll contact you tonight,” Walker said. “See where things are at by then.”

  Acton nodded. “Good luck.”

  Walker headed out the door, and Muertos followed right after. He went to the little Ford sedan, and tossed her the keys to the Homeland agents’ SUV.

  “You drive with one arm?”

  “Please.”

  “Okay, follow me. Take this phone, call me if we get separated.”

  “Borrowed another car, have we?” Muertos said.

  Walker smiled, climbed into the Ford and started the engine. He waited until he saw Muertos cross the road and get into the SUV before he headed up the street. He kept Muertos visible in his rearview mirror and enjoyed the silence as he drove to the feeder road toward DC. Shortly after, they both pulled into a car park beside a gas station and in the front of a group of shops. He used some of the Homeland agents’ cash to buy a prepaid cell phone from an off-brand RadioShack-type of store, along with a small set of binoculars. When he returned to the cars Muertos was waiting with two cardboard cups of coffee.

  As he removed the packaging from the phone and put it together with the sim card, Walker said over the roof of the Ford, “Why didn’t you tell me about your husband being killed in Syria?”

  Muertos looked away, first toward the gas station or something beyond, then down at her coffee, then up to Walker. “It didn’t seem necessary to tell you,” Muertos said, now looking around the car park, her breath, warmed from the hot black coffee, fogging in front of her. “That’s my driving force, sure. I want to know what happened to him. It was a set-up, did Acton tell you that?”

  “No. Set-up how?”

  “I’m trying to find out, and just like you and your father, I want answers from all involved, which now means Harvey.”

  “Do you think Harvey could be the US contact for Almasi?”

  “When I heard of his involvement the thought crossed my mind. You?”

  “It’s looking that way.” Walker sipped his coffee and looked around the parking lot. “But we need motive. It’s important, to understand, to be sure.”

  “Well, nothing’s changed between you and me, has it?” Muertos asked. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you my motive before, from the get-go. Now you know. We both want answers. For both of us, it’s personal.”

  “You should have told me.” Walker headed away and tossed the empty phone pack in the nearest trash can, then joined Muertos at her side of the Homeland car and took his cardboard cup of coffee from the roof of the Ford. He powered up the cell phone; the screen lit up and told him it had fifty percent charge. He went to the browser and typed in the webpage he used to contact Paul.

  “So, I’m telling you now.” Muertos looked up at him. “This has been very hard for me.”

  Walker was silent, waiting for the page to load.

  “It’s just superfluous information, isn’t it?” Muertos said. “We each have driving forces. Your father. My husband.”

  “Motive is important.” Walker sipped the coffee, black and strong. The site loaded, a gamer discussion group on the dark web, something Paul used for communications, a site never found on any surface Internet searches, and something very innocuous to anyone looking on. He went to the open discussion link and typed in his usual greeting, along with a basic code that was the alpha-numeric numbers to his new phone. Paul would get an automatic ping on one of his computers in near enough to real-time, then call him on his own new burner phone.

  “If it’s that important to you,” Muertos said, “then you should have asked why I was doing this.”

  “Pretty sure I did, when it was clear you weren’t working on this with State.”

  Muertos shrugged.

  “Okay,” Walker said. He put the new phone’s ringer volume right up, pocketed it, and looked at Muertos. “Clearing-the-air time. What do you think happened to your husband?”

  “It’s complicated,” Muertos said.

  Walker paused, then said, “We’ve nothing else to do just yet, so try me.”

  Muertos nodded. “Okay. Look, one of his jobs in Syria was assessing which groups the US would arm and supply. He was paying and organizing for the Department of Defense to supply arms and munitions to friendly rebel groups who were anti-regime and non ISIS or ISIL. He gained knowledge on those getting the Syrian population out of the conflict zone—through official refugee channels, and through back-channels for those who had the money to pay their way into the West.”

  “Almasi’s group?”

  “He brought them to light.”

  “You think Almasi ordered the hit on your husband.”

  “I now think Harvey of Homeland Security ordered the hit on him, yes.”

  “Why would he do that?”

  “That’s what I want to know.”

  Walker weighed it up. It was looking that way. Some kind of corruption on the ground, leading to the contacts moving back here, and a clean-up operation. “What do you know about the attack on your husband’s convoy?”

  “They knew exactly
where they’d be, and when—and all that information was compartmentalized, and being run by the DoD, so I’ve known since the get-go that it had an inside connection.”

  “Harvey could have accessed the info.”

  “Accessed and actioned.” Muertos sat on the bonnet of the Ford. “But the thing is, the joint taskforce I got myself into ran a lot of Syrian agents, to keep eyes and ears open for anything like that happening again. And there was a trusted source who swore that they saw my husband two weeks after the attack, alive and well, in Aleppo.”

  “Could anyone verify that?”

  “No.”

  “Maybe he told you what you wanted to hear, thinking it might get him a bigger payday or some other favors.”

  “No.”

  “How can you be sure?”

  “Because no one knew of my connection to him, because we had different operational names in the field, and no one there knew me.” Muertos paused, then said, “Walker, before I was there, what drew me there—there was this Syrian agent who came in and named my husband, an American that he’d dealt with before, and said he was headed north—after his death. I read that report and I headed over there, and I didn’t give a shit if they found me out and put me in prison for it. I had to know. I went there, and I checked it out as much as I could—but that was it, the only reference, until the day I met your father.”

  “Do you think your husband is alive?”

  “I did. Now it’s a distant possibility. I got into Aleppo with an NGO convoy, and I spent six days talking to every source that he could give me, but it all came up cold. So, I tried the human-trafficking front, talking to all those who were to go on to the border or coasts via the coalition forces fighting the regime. The only ones who had seen an American man attached were linked back to the group that Almasi was running. So, I went back to Damascus, and got myself attached to a State joint taskforce battling human trafficking, and two weeks later I went to the meet with Almasi in attendance.”

  “Being thought of as dead could give your husband a lot more room to move as an undercover.”

  Muertos nodded. “And until recently, I thought he might have gone dark to find out who was behind the hit. Seriously, I’d thought he may have done just that. Four other Americans were killed in the attack on the convoy, as well as a bunch of internationals from Médecins Sans Frontières.”