Sean protested, “He already told Officer Reed.”
Archer kept his eyes on Winter. “Mrs. Devlin, let me do my job,” he said condescendingly.
“I'd like to speak to Director Shapiro,” Winter said before Sean could blow up again. “Mrs. Devlin is right. I went through it with Reed, and his partner wrote it down in copious detail, which I assume he shared with you.”
“Well, answer this one thing, then. Wasn't there some way you could have captured just one of them?”
“Absolutely not.”
“The one you fired on point-blank, from slightly above?”
“He—” Sean started.
“Mrs. Devlin. You can stay here, but only if you can refrain from butting in,” Archer interrupted coldly.
“I was there, too,” she said angrily. “Winter told him to surrender and he didn't. He tried to shoot me and Winter fired only to stop him.”
“Deputy Massey was in charge, was he not? You were just being dragged around, weren't you?”
Sean raised an eyebrow but didn't answer.
“Ms. Devlin wasn't being dragged anywhere,” Winter told Archer. “She was extremely helpful and, despite terrifying circumstances, she kept a very cool head.”
“Is that so? And that man?”
“I assumed that the UNSUB's decision to bring the muzzle of his machine gun around despite my warning meant he wasn't contemplating surrender. Regretfully, he presented the only opportunity I had to dialogue meaningfully with the UNSUBs. Perhaps if you had been here, you could have ordered them all to surrender.”
Archer stared into Winter's eyes. “Deputy, I represent the attorney general of the United States. I take exception to your disrespectful manner, which under the circumstances, I find particularly offensive.”
“I'd like to speak to Director Shapiro,” Winter said again, dismissing him.
“The chief marshal's got his hands full at the moment. You told Reed that everything that happened before the lady deputy was killed is classified. Let me clarify something, Deputy. This WITSEC detail was never a secret to the attorney general, and he has ordered me here to find out what happened, which I intend to do. You will cooperate fully with me, or there will be serious consequences.”
Winter nodded reluctantly. He knew that Archer was right.
“What I hope you can help me figure out is how the four deceased UNSUBs knew where Devlin was. Who do you think furnished them with that information?”
“How could I know that?”
“You have never been assigned to witness security before—is that right?”
“Inspector Greg Nations asked for me.”
“I know Nations requested you. Tell me how you came to strike the witness.”
“Winter . . .” Sean began. Archer's lifted brow made her pause. Then, resolutely, she continued, “Deputy Massey was protecting me from my husband. You can ask Inspector Nations about it.”
Winter saw something change in Archer's eyes—a softening perhaps. “I'd like to.”
Winter wondered why he hadn't said, “I fully intend to, or I will.”
“Devlin drugged Dixon and Martinez. Then he killed the cook's cat and left it in his wife's drawer,” Winter said. “We assumed initially that he did it to gain access to guns, but he was simply trying to torture his wife.”
“Wasn't the altercation between you and Mr. Devlin why you remained here with Mrs. Devlin?”
“Yes. After Devlin killed the cat, Mrs. Devlin was upset. He had been warned not to approach her, but he confronted her and she struck him.”
“She struck him first?”
“I sure did!” Sean cried. “He wanted me to. He knew I was about to explode over Midnight.”
“Midnight?”
“The cat was black,” Winter explained.
“Did you ever strike him before?” Archer asked Sean.
“Do I seem like someone who would physically confront another person?” She scowled. “Don't answer that.”
“May, I?” Winter interposed. He explained how the altercation had started, what he did, and why he did it. Archer didn't interrupt, but his expression was one of dissatisfaction.
“Mrs. Devlin, is there anything you'd care to add?”
“First of all,” she told Archer, “I am not easily provoked and I have never struck my husband, or anyone else, before. I didn't know my husband was a violent person. If I had I would never have married him. Deputy Massey saved me from being hurt, and last night he saved my life.”
“You didn't know your husband was violent?” Archer asked, incredulous.
“I believed he was a marketing consultant,” she replied. “He told me that his boss in Washington had dealings with Russian mobsters and that he was cooperating with the government in the prosecution of the Russian Mafia—certain politicians and lawyers. I learned differently only when Mr. Whitehead confirmed that my husband had been killing people.”
Archer sat in silence, contemplating what she'd said.
“If that's all?” Winter asked. “Ms. Devlin needs some rest.”
“The bedrooms are all being processed,” Archer said curtly. “Mrs. Devlin can use this couch.” Archer stood. “We'll need your prints for comparison purposes, Mrs. Devlin.”
Sean said, “Aren't you wasting time dusting for prints? The killers wore gloves and you have their bodies. So what's the point?”
“That's our business,” Archer shot back.
Winter was accustomed to long periods awake punctuated by catnaps, but Sean was obviously getting punchy. After giving her prints and washing her hands, she rejoined Winter in the living room.
“I thought Dylan was being protected from the bad guys,” she said under her breath. “Not because he had been killing people for the bad guys. I can't blame Archer for not believing that. It must be hard to imagine anyone being so ignorant about somebody they were married to.”
“If all you heard was his lies, they probably made sense—especially if you wanted to believe them.”
“If it had been you bringing the coat out, instead of Angela, all three of us would be dead now and nobody would know who did it.”
“Maybe not, but they'd have known his boss ordered it.”
“I know it made you furious that he killed a dozen people and because he testifies, he gets off without a scratch. Now more innocent people are dead because of Dylan.”
“Hopefully when he testifies it'll end up saving more lives because it will stop the man who paid him to do it. All I can hope is that there's a net gain on some tally sheet somewhere. If I spent my time worrying about what the courts do or don't do, or how disgusting and unfair the deals the prosecutors cut are, I'd be in a mental hospital on a Thorazine drip. Like the serenity prayer says: Don't waste your life worrying about crap you can't fix.”
She began to cry softly and, uncertain how he should respond, Winter put a tentative hand on her shoulder. It had been three years since any woman had been this close to him. He felt for her, an innocent who through no fault of her own had been in the company of ravenous wolves, having to fight for her life.
She regained control, wiping her eyes with her hands.
“Thanks,” she said. Her voice was stronger. “For everything, Winter. I mean, even if you did let that man shoot me.”
“If it would make you feel better, you can let somebody shoot me sometime,” he teased.
She scooted away from Winter, but to his surprise, she lay down, placing her head on his leg like it was a pillow.
Eleanor used to sleep with her head on his leg just as Sean was doing. Sometimes Rush still did. He was glad that she felt secure enough with him to fall asleep. But once the initial impact of the life-and-death struggle they had experienced together wore away, she would probably associate him with an unpleasant experience and do her dead-level best to forget him.
Winter looked down and studied her delicate features. He found himself drinking in the scent of her, daring to imagine what being in bed wi
th her would be like. He realized that this woman sleeping against his leg was a mystery to him. With a sense of unease, he remembered how easily she'd lied to Reed about the cat.
He closed his eyes. Her lie didn't matter. Tomorrow she would be gone and he would go to Washington for debriefing and then home. Later he and Greg would meet somewhere, open some bottles, and dissect the entire operation. Maybe by then—with Greg—he would be able to laugh at the funny parts and not cry at the sad.
39
Friday morning
The sound of Archer's voice roused Winter abruptly from his nap.
“Deputy Massey, I need to talk to both of you.”
Light from outside filled the room. Sean Devlin was curled up, her head still on his leg, sound asleep.
Opening her eyes, she sat up and stretched, running her fingers through her hair, sweeping it back.
“I'm just going to say this outright,” Archer said. “The plane carrying Inspector Nations and his team vanished below radar four minutes after takeoff. The assumption was that the jet had gone down in the Atlantic. After the search started, we got word of what happened here.”
“You knew that when you got here,” Winter said. Anger flooded his mind.
“The Coast Guard and Navy started a search, and I came to see what had happened here. We assumed both events were connected. When we found the plane, we were certain of it. It was discovered at an abandoned military base in Virginia, a hundred miles inland from where it dropped off the radar screen.”
“Emergency landing?” Winter wondered aloud. Despite Archer's unemotional delivery of the information, Winter knew this was going to be very bad news.
“The plane was hijacked, flown to the old base, then blown up.”
“Hijacked?” Winter repeated incredulously. “How do you know that?”
“The two Justice Department pilots who flew Avery Whitehead to Cherry Point to meet your detail were found there murdered and stripped of their uniforms. Someone took their places. There is sufficient physical evidence at the Virginia base to conclude there were multiple fatalities. Based on the way these people operated here and at Cherry Point, I think we can assume that the seven people on that jet were murdered and the hijackers escaped.”
The idea that Greg was dead would not fit into Winter's brain. Archer was saying something about transportation, but Winter was incapable of listening. He turned his attention to Sean, who sat expressionless. He expected her to ask questions, to at least be curious about her husband, but she merely sat there, numbly silent, as though she was listening to a mechanic explain what was wrong with her car.
“Killing Mr. Devlin,” Archer continued, “was the whole purpose of both operations. Looks like there were two independent teams to ensure success even if there were last-minute changes.”
“Maybe they aren't all dead.” Winter felt as though he had been drugged.
“I am going to the scene, Deputy Massey,” Archer told him. “Your director is there. I am taking you with me.”
“What about me?” Sean asked.
“You will be going on to D.C., Mrs. Devlin.”
“I'd prefer to stay with Deputy Massey.”
“We'll make whatever arrangements we feel are appropriate. You'll be informed as those decisions are formalized.”
“You just said that you're in charge,” Sean said coldly. “As next of kin, I should be able to visit the place where my husband died. If you can't okay that, please ask for permission. I'd like a chance to speak to the head of the marshals. Perhaps I have no choice but to be passed around between marshals and the FBI, but I will not be led about by a ring in my nose without protest.”
“We wouldn't dream of having you think of us as bullies, Mrs. Devlin,” Archer responded, perhaps not wanting to look like a tyrant in front of such a beautiful woman. “I'd be happy to allow you to accompany the deputy here to Virginia and hand you over to the marshals. You have thirty minutes, if you'd like to freshen up. We've moved your things to the cook's quarters.”
As he packed, Winter could hear Sean running water in Jet's bathroom. As he exited his bedroom he saw that Jet's door was standing open. Sean didn't see him when she placed Martinez's suitcase outside and closed the door. Bureau technicians had used yellow evidence tape to seal the battered Samsonite case, making it look like a gift.
40
Due to their tight cylindrical cabins, Lear jets were often referred to as executive mailing tubes. Winter and Sean belted themselves into the bench seat in the rear. Archer and Finch were in the foremost seats, across the narrow aisle from each other. Sean's briefcase fit edgewise in the space between her and Winter on the sofalike, forward-facing bench. Winter had stowed their bags in the cargo section behind them.
Winter didn't want to think about Greg. He wanted his mind to stop replaying the images of the night before—Martinez, the flight across the island, the UNSUBs—but he had no choice. He listed in his head what he knew about the UNSUBs. They were as cold-blooded as men get. They'd been trained by the military, probably Special Forces. People didn't learn high-altitude, low-opening jumps from watching television. They had access to the latest weaponry. Two operations, like the simultaneous assaults at Cherry Point and Rook Island, didn't just happen. The killers didn't fly by the seats of their pants, improvising, and they didn't luck into anything. They had known Devlin was being kept on Rook Island. The killers had to have had an inside source for the intelligence their mission required. Winter thought Archer's assessment, that the assassins who landed on Rook were there as insurance in case Dylan's travel plans were changed at the last minute, was probably correct.
Winter stared out the window at the ground passing below, unseeing. His inner theater replayed the last few seconds he and Greg had been together like it was on a video loop.
41
Ward Field, Virginia
As the Lear embarked on its descent, Winter peered out and saw the derelict red-and-white-checkerboard-painted water tank that signified a military airfield. He stared down expecting to see the skeletal remains of a jet, but what he saw was the twisted steel of what had been a massive hangar and an enormous amount of activity on the ground below.
The grassy tarmac on the side of the runway was choked with small jets, a cargo plane, and two helicopters. Police cruisers, trucks, emergency vehicles, and cars were scattered around the blackened hangar ruins. Long black water hoses snaked from a trio of fire trucks.
Their pilot parked near a Gulfstream and cut the engines, and the copilot opened the clamshell door so Archer and Finch could exit. Winter spotted a group of men striding toward the Lear wearing jackets that identified them as either US marshals or FBI agents. One of them was United States Chief Marshal Richard Shapiro.
Archer spoke to Shapiro for a few seconds, then led Finch and the other FBI agents toward two canopy tents. Folding tables, with laptop computers and radios, had been arranged in a horseshoe to define the command post. In the adjacent tent, evidence bags covered several tables. Technicians were photographing the contents of each bag before handing it over to other techs for labeling and cataloging. A mobile chiller unit to handle human remains was located behind the evidence tent.
Winter stepped down and stood in the grass outside the door. Shapiro looked fatigued and concerned. He shook Winter's hand briskly. “Outstanding job on the island, Winter. This is all so . . .”
Shapiro's silence was as heavy with grief as a wail. He cleared his throat and looked past Winter. “Please, Mrs. Devlin. If you'll stay inside the plane for a few minutes. We have a lot to discuss and we will talk soon, you and I. First I need to have a few words in private with Deputy Marshal Massey.”
“Sure,” Sean said noncommitally. She disappeared back into the cabin.
Two deputies took up positions on either side of the door as though she might try to escape.
“Terrible about Deputy Martinez,” Shapiro said. “And this.”
“What happened?”
Sha
piro took a deep breath. “The jet was inside the hangar when it blew up. There's very little left in the way of evidence.”
“Do you know how they were killed?”
“They found a skull fragment with an entry wound, probably .45 caliber. The hijackers murdered the pilots at Cherry Point using manual strangulation. Wearing the pilots' uniforms, they overcame our team after they were inside the plane. Ground personnel saw the men get into the craft but they didn't notice anything unusual. The jet taxied and took off normally. As it climbed out, it rose to ten thousand feet, then plunged below radar and obviously turned west.”
Winter was staring at the evidence tent while Shapiro spoke. He saw Archer and Finch inside the tent where technicians were pointing out evidence bags. Archer had clearly taken charge.
“I can only imagine how difficult this has to be for you.” Shapiro paused. “I know how close you were to Inspector Nations.”
Winter nodded, too full of emotion to speak.
“The FBI suspects someone in WITSEC provided inside intelligence. This is an FBI investigation, and we're here at their pleasure and are being excluded from participation. Tell me what happened last night,” Shapiro said. “The broad strokes.”
Winter told Shapiro the story, ending with the UNSUB who knew his name. Shapiro listened without interrupting, then shifted so his back was to the FBI's tents.
“I've ordered the WITSEC director to open an internal investigation to examine everything, including the various methods of communication we utilized and whether any of the transmissions could have been intercepted. I don't believe there is a leak from within WITSEC. We assumed that there are so many flags, triggers, and hidden traps that it's impossible. For decades we've tried to imagine every way a thing like this could be accomplished and we constantly design, refine, and implement counter measures. Only a handful of men had access to enough of the information to furnish the necessary intelligence, and, believe me, we monitor all of them closely. The fact that one of the assailants knew your name means, either he somehow recognized you, or somebody within the service sold us out.”
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