The Perfect Candidate: A Lance Priest / Preacher Thriller (No. 1)

by Christopher Metcalf

  “We make sure the other people on the bus are secure and we hold that position or even fall back from the scene of the crowd.” He looked from Sarah to Carl. They both nodded in support of his response.

  “You leave hostages in danger when they are right there in front of you in a structure you could easily enter and take control?” Seibel looked only at Lance.

  “Easily?” Lance furrowed his brows. “What’s easy about hundreds of people going crazy? Six Marines against that would mean lots and lots of people hurt or killed for hostages we don’t know are in there. That’s easy. Stick with what you know and stay in control.”

  Seibel let the sneer fade into something of a frown and then moved his gaze from Lance to Sarah and Carl. “Do you two agree?”

  Carl and Sarah nodded again.

  Seibel continued, “A bird in the hand, huh?”

  “Better than two in the bush with a bloodthirsty crowd between you and the bush,” Lance added. He was confident, maybe too confident. Maybe.

  “Potete credere questo capretto?” Seibel turned and posed the question to Braden.

  “Nada surpreende-me,” Braden replied. Grisham nodded.

  He turned back to Lance, “I think I would have to agree with you. Keeping those we have safe is first priority before launching any kind of rescue mission, regardless of the numbers or support. Tactical gamesmanship aside, going into that crowd is an absolute no-win. Casualties would be expected and repercussions would extend well beyond a local flare-up. Probably turn into an international incident.” Seibel moved back to the door.

  “Congratulations again, you have averted an international pain in the ass for our government and probably saved lives. Now wouldn’t it be fun to get to do this in real life?” The smile came back and Seibel turned and exited the room.

  Grisham laughed a personal little laugh and moved to the door. “Congratulations for passing a little test within a test. Sometimes they are more important than the results that show up on paper.” He gave Lance a fake punch to the gut walking past him. Lance smiled like he was supposed to.

  The lunch around the pushed-together conference tables in the large conference room involved lots and lots of small talk between oral exam candidates and prompters. The civilians in the room shared their stories from the morning session and the small group exercises. Lance made small talk with those around him. Sarah sat next to him again. She kept her eyes on him. He could see her glances and outright staring from his peripheral vision.

  From above, he paused the scene and looked around. He had not noticed at the time that neither Seibel nor the guy he knew as Marsco joined them for lunch. Grisham was there along with the other prompters.

  Video cameras were also watching from above. This lunch gathering, like the morning session and Lance’s small group exercise, was being captured for analysis. Two video cameras, one in the fake clock on the wall, the other protruding ever so slightly out of a smoke alarm on a pillar a few yards from the table, watched the room. Both cameras were trained on one individual as they had been during the written exams, while he spoke with customers on the car lot, while he ate dinner on his one date over the last three months and during several of his classes. At the other end of the video cable sat Wyrick peering into his monitor. Braden had just joined him and sat eating his boxed lunch sandwich. The psychologist found it difficult to eat with the fake mustache, but didn’t dare take it off and have to fight to put it on again. That tried his patience more than anything.

  “Anything new here?” Braden whispered to Wyrick.

  “Nope. More of the same perfect pitch performance. He’s talking football with Number 7; accepting adoration from Number 2 and doing a flawless job of ignoring Number 3’s stare.”

  “Anything at all I need to take to Papa, last minute wise?” Braden asked.

  “You see what I see, right?”

  “Yep. I like perfect pitch as a metaphor. It fits.” Braden scratched his head. The wig made him itch.

  Wyrick continued, “I struggled over what it was I’ve been witnessing with this kid. And perfect pitch with its ability to replicate a note seemed most appropriate.”

  “Like I said, I like it,” Braden finished his sandwich and stood. He smoothed his mustache and wig and left the room.

  As lunch wrapped in the conference room, Grisham stood to give the candidates their orders for the afternoon’s final sessions. “I hope you all enjoyed your government-issue lunch. Better than bologna but no filet mignon right?”

  Everyone laughed. “As you know, your last session will be an individual oral assessment. Some of you will go immediately to this session, while others wait. The order of these sessions has already been determined prior to today, so please don’t read anything into the fact that you have to sit around for an hour or so before your turn.”

  Grisham finished by giving each of them their destinations. Lance was assigned room three right now, no sitting around. He liked that.

  “You should all say your goodbyes to each other now. Once your session is complete, you will be free to leave. These sessions will all last differing times so you won’t come out together.”

  Lance turned to Sarah. She was already facing him.

  “It was very nice to meet you,” she stuck out a hand first.

  He accepted it. “You too. I enjoyed going to Africa with you.”

  “It was a blast and you were great.” Her smile wider.

  “Thanks, you too. Very impressive,” he did a spot-on imitation of Seibel. Sarah smiled and held his hand a little longer than customary.

  “Maybe we’ll see each other some time,” she added.

  “If you’re ever in Tulsa, please look me up.” He pulled a business card from his breast pocket. “I work at a car dealership to pay the tuition bills.”

  “New or used?” She looked at the card.

  “Mostly used. I get to deal with real people that way.”

  “A used car salesman. Now that is something I would have never guessed. Then again, maybe it makes sense. You were awesome on your feet. I’ll bet you do great selling cars.”

  “The secret is to never lie,” he winked.

  “Okay, Lance Priest, car salesman,” she read off the card. “Good luck on the individuals.”

  “Thanks Sarah Ridenhour, graduate student,” he held up a pretend card. “Good luck on your individual session. You’ll do great.”

  “How did you know I am a graduate student?” Her procerus muscle tugged her eyebrows together.

  “Easy. The clothes, the hair, no business card; you’re all grad student.”

  She let a look of surprise flash across her face as if she wasn’t supposed to. “You nailed it.”

  “See ya,” he smiled and stepped away. He walked out of the room after saying so long to a couple of others, including Grisham.

  Lance paused the playback. Instead of looking around the room at others, he looked at himself. He moved in close to look at his face. He didn’t like what he saw. This Lance was good looking and all, couldn’t help it, he joked. But this Lance from a couple of days ago was oblivious, inept. He was so intent on impressing others, on stealing the show and playing his little mind games, that he missed detail after detail. It was hubris. Good old-fashioned arrogance.

  Lance opened his eyes to release the image of himself about to walk down the hall and be introduced to a new life at the end of a gun. He sat up in bed drained from his review of the last two months of his life. And he still didn’t know the trigger, the thing that started it all. He’d missed it.

  It was just after noon. His room service lunch would be delivered in a few minutes. Two hours later, he would make a call. He had survived the 72-hour test. Now he needed to find out what this was all about. Who were these people? What government agency did they work for?

  Most importantly, he wanted, needed really, to know more about Seibel. He wasn’t close to being done with him.

  Chapter 13

  “Congratulations Mr.
Priest.”

  The call was routed through four switches in three area codes. Not just difficult to trace, it was designed to be untraceable. On the third ring, Geoffrey Seibel, walking across the floor of his library study, had picked up. The call came in three minutes late.

  He got no reply from the other end of the line.

  “I imagine you have been moving constantly the past three days Lance. I pictured you in bus terminals, train stations, hitching rides beside the highway. Always on the move, constantly looking over your shoulder. I’ll bet that was exciting for you.” Seibel remained silent for a few moments and continued. “The reports received from the field have been most impressive. Only two potential sightings; in Mobile, Alabama and Lakeland, Florida. But neither were confirmed.”

  Still nothing from the other end. “I didn’t think you’d head for Orlando, but I am never really surprised by how people under pressure react. Fort Worth was too easy and too close, but you certainly recall the lay of the land from your three-plus years there as a pre-teen. You’re much too smart to go to Tulsa.”

  Seibel’s one-sided conversation served two purposes. He kept Lance on the line allowing the computer acting as a caller ID verifier to process the location of the call. Seibel had another telephone handset to his other ear and from it he heard a voice detailing location confirmation details. That voice said a surprising word, “Texas.” Seibel’s eyebrow arched. He’s still in Texas?

  “But as I said three days ago, you are indeed something of an enigma Lance. We can usually pin someone down to a certain set of character traits and value structure, but you have remained a mystery.”

  “Dallas County,” the voice in the other handset updated caller location. Seibel let out an audible chuckle at the mention of Dallas. Holy shit, he’s still in Dallas. Unbelievable. The conversation with himself in his head carried on.

  “I think we may need to develop a new set of analysis parameters to come up with an adequate label for you.”

  “Downtown, 645 prefix.” Seibel rolled his eyes and broadened his smile at the mention of the location. He bit his lip to hold back a chuckle. “Phone number range 645-5200 to 5500. Locale is southeast quadrant of downtown Dallas. Address range involves Commerce to Main in the 600 to 900 blocks.”

  And with that, Seibel burst out laughing, belly laughs. He couldn’t control himself. “You’ve got to be absolutely friggin kidding me,” he said out loud this time. “Don’t tell me you’re in that same building Lance.”

  “I assumed you had some way of tracking this call,” Preacher finally spoke.

  Able to get control of himself and stifle his laughter, Seibel answered. “Yes, technology is coming along nicely. And the little green men in the telephone lines tell me you are calling from Commerce Street in downtown Dallas. I can’t tell you how surprised I am.”

  “This is where you yell ‘ollie ollie in come free.’”

  “Ah yes. I remember well. Hide and seek; and you obviously did one hell of a job hiding. Did you travel all across the country and then circle back? Or maybe just tool around the Lone Star state on those endless Texas roads?”

  Lance remained silent.

  “I am looking forward to hearing about your adventures but I don’t fault you for not sharing the details at this point.” Seibel added.

  Lance continued, “I’ve been on this line for one minute and 15 seconds now Seibel. I’m guessing I need to get moving quick-like before you have someone here.”

  “Oh, not to worry, not to worry. You have completed your mission. The assignment has expired for those involved. I can assure you that no one is coming for you. Those tracking you are hundreds, in fact thousands of miles from where you are. You had them chasing ghosts. Very impressive for a newbie, not yet even a rookie. Our deal was 72 hours and you have exceeded that requirement. Congratulations.”

  “Three hours.” Lance was curt.

  “Yes, go on.” Seibel replied.

  “I’ll call you back at this number in three hours.”

  “No need for that.” Seibel’s voice was soothing and soft.

  “Three hours.”

  Lance’s line went dead in Seibel’s ear but the line stayed active for the others on the call. “Assessment?” Seibel said into the handset as he leaned back in his leather chair.

  “Surprising, but not,” Wyrick chimed in.

  “Two sightings, none confirmed…” another voice said with a chuckle. “We all know we had absolutely nothing. Zero. Zip. He was gone the moment Krachov lost site of him on Main Street in Dallas. This kid disappeared and did not surface on any databases. Nada, zip.”

  “Yes, yes I know Marvin. He is living up to full potential on all aspects of the evaluation matrix.” An edge in Seibel’s tone.

  Wyrick cut in, “I was reading over third-party abstract analysis this afternoon on candidate Priest. The latest assessment by this particular team of analysts is that of an individual with multiple personality disorder. I laughed when I initially read it, but after a couple of more read-throughs I see where they were heading with their assessment. They were 100% unable to get a fix on Preacher’s underlying psychological make-up. It says ‘unable to categorize him in one or two or even three personality segments.’ They stated, and I’m reading from their written evaluation here – ‘candidate possesses multiple or dissociative characteristics or personalities evidenced in varying levels of perception and interaction based on particular environments. Subject exhibits potential sub-clinical narcissism, Machiavellianism and psychopathy.’”

  “Horseshit,” Seibel replied.

  “I know,” Wyrick added. “I’ve watched hours of video, listened to weeks of audio and read every detail of this kid’s life. He is remarkably consistent in his inconsistency. It is calculated, not based on the environment. He is a-”

  “Chameleon.” The voice Seibel identified as Marvin cut in.

  “Perfect.” Seibel added for both confirmation and effect. “We have history here gentlemen, you know what I mean. You both know we have been looking for someone like this for a great many years. Hell, I’ll bet if we would have given the hunters the order to engage, one or both of them would have ended up like the mother’s boyfriend back in Fort Worth.”

  “You know Braden and I disagree with you on that point,” Wyrick cut him off.

  “Disagree all you want.”

  “He was 13.” Wyrick was insistent.

  “Twelve,” Seibel corrected. “The guy picked the wrong single mom with two young boys to rough up. Bastard never knew what hit him.”

  “All circumstantial,” Wyrick replied. “Braden agrees with me on this one.”

  “Braden’s not here and you know perfectly well that everything we do is circumstantial. I saw it in his eyes when he put a gun to my head. He evaluated the circumstances, calculated the related risks and wanted to punish me for putting him in a difficult situation. He was cold and calculating and I’m pretty damn sure he enjoyed it.”

  “So what happens when he is placed in a situation significantly more difficult?” The disembodied Marvin asked.

  Seibel replied, “He put the gun to my head to achieve a goal, but he was also intrigued. He wanted that file folder but he didn’t want a murder on his hands that he couldn’t immediately work or talk his way out of.”

  “So you think he was intrigued by all this, but in some way not surprised?” Wyrick asked.

  “Gentlemen,” Seibel deliberately spoke slowly now to emphasize his point. “I think that for just as long as we have been looking for young Mr. Priest, he has been looking for us. Funny, he was under our noses all along. He may not have known exactly what he was searching for, but the desire for a challenge, a real opportunity to push himself, is what has been lurking below his many surfaces. Frank, you’ve read everything I’ve read and then some. I appreciate you playing devil’s advocate.” Seibel paused for effect.

  “You know this subject better than any of us. You’ve been with him longer than anyone else by
a long shot. You don’t believe for a moment he was going to shoot me. His reaction was quick, efficient and effective.” Seibel added. “We can discuss his reaction and my aching eardrum all we want. I have made my decision and Account One has given me operational authority on this matter. Isn’t that correct Marvin?”

  “Correct.” Marvin replied without emotion.

  Seibel continued. “We will proceed with full acquisition, training, development and deployment of this asset under the directive.”

  “You know I agree with moving to acquisition and training, but I think maybe you should give him more time to mature before comprehensive development and field deployment. We just don’t know what we’re buying here. He’s unquestionably talented, but this kid’s a loose cannon if there ever was one. I’ve got weeks of video and audio to prove it.” Wyrick gave his final view on the subject. He didn’t really have a vote, but Seibel trusted him and his senses.

  “We already have Braden’s opinion on this matter. Marvin, anything more from your end?” Seibel asked.

  Marvin’s voice was matter-of-fact, “You’ve already made your decision. Just remember that your plans for this role within the agency have been developed and implemented before with less than stellar results. Your ‘Fox in the henhouse’ project has done well, but not as well as you’d hoped. Patience is a virtue and the proof of your record cannot be denied, but we will need to see a return on this investment.”

  “Understood, as I have always understood the directive,” Seibel chaffed a little at Marvin’s comments that made it clear he was Seibel’s superior. He brought his hand up to rub his still numb ear. “One can never guarantee ROI, but mark my words on this chilly fall day gentlemen. You and every member of Account One will one day consider this acquisition the finest in the history of the intelligence community.”

  “Damn, you’re sold on this one.” Marvin’s tone was now surprise.

  “Bought and sold and will not have an iota of buyer’s remorse. Neither will you.” Seibel was matter-of-fact.