The Templar Reprisals (The Best Thrillers Book 3)

by James D. Best

“Is that important?” Baldwin asked.

  “It is if you want confirmation.”

  “Spill it,” Evarts ordered.

  “The PR firm is just down the street. It also does public relations for several Middle East clients. It was the PR firm’s idea, and they brought it to the CEO personally. They offshored the manufacturing to keep it secret. They wanted no pre-launch leaks. The case for the book was manufactured by Persian Gulf Fabricators in Al Jubail, Saudi Arabia. Same city as the bombs were assembled. The books were air freighted to them and they sealed them inside those cases and shipped them back. Oh, and if they try to crack it open, there’s no acid bath inside. They joked about it, but their general counsel nixed the idea before it left the board room. Liabilities could be through the roof. Remember the recipients are VIPs. But for fun, they used the ruse to discourage snoopers.”

  “Someone could still get curious,” Baldwin said.

  Methow laughed. “They’re all curious.”

  “That seems like a flaw in the plan,” Baldwin said. “If someone sets off the bomb early, alerts will go out far and wide.”

  Wilson nearly jumped out of her chair. “Damn, they didn’t kill Johnson to deflect us away from the books, they killed him to set a precedent for small bombs killing Congress members. If one or two go off, the investigators will assume more targeted bombing. The misdirection only has to hold for a partial day, then all hell will break loose.”

  Evarts was all smiles. “Doesn’t matter. We got ’em. This is enough confirmation to put the brakes on the entire attack. We can foil them.”

  “I hate to be the party pooper,” Wilson said, “but the president’s butt is still hanging out in the wind.”

  “I’m sure the general has that well under control,” Evarts said.

  Chapter 52

  Evarts felt happy. They had most likely thwarted the biggest terrorist attack in the history of the world. His pleasure faded almost immediately when he remembered how he had gotten drawn into this whole mess. The Ikhwan wanted his scalp. And his wife’s. Even if they crushed this attack, the Ikhwan would survive. The only sure way to get the Ikhwan off his back was to severely cripple their organization.

  After eliminating the current threat, O’Brian’s interest would return to purging the government of Templars and their Mason sympathizers. As a law enforcement officer, he had never liked vigilantes, but beyond that aversion, Methow had revealed too much of their belief system. Evarts was repulsed, but not so repulsed that he wouldn’t use them to conquer the Ikhwan. He would have to be clever as hell to straddle the line between these two powerful secret organizations. One society wanted him dead and the other was willing to sacrifice his life to get a clean shot at the other. What a mess.

  “Tell me about Jakarta,” Methow said. “No more stalling.”

  “You were the one who told us that the caliph currently resided in Jakarta,” Evarts answered. “We believe his name is Ali as-Saad and he is teaching at Universitas Islam Negeri Syarif. But … something doesn’t jibe. You said you couldn’t find the caliph in Jakarta. Why not? We did it on the internet.”

  “Because you’re wrong,” Methow said exasperated. “We know Ali as-Saad whereabouts, but Ali as-Saad is not the caliph. He’s a sympathizer, that’s all. He’s a campus recruiter and a fund raiser, but we don’t believe he’s even a card-carrying member of the Ikhwan. We’ve been trailing him for years, but he’s led us nowhere. A minor-league player, probably unaware the Caliph was in the same city.”

  Had they been that wrong? Had they merely found what they wanted to find? That was the bane of intelligence work. An analyst should never allow himself to fall in love with a pet theory. They had assumed that Major Callaghan had spilled the beans on Ali as-Saad, and the Templars had dispatched a team to grab him. They even worried that the Templars had a five-hour head start. Instead, the Templars already knew about Ali as-Saad and dismissed the lead. Or was this the misdirection. The Templars might want Army Intelligence thrown off the scent.

  “Why did you rule out Ali as-Saad as the Caliph?” Evarts asked pointedly.

  “I told you, we tracked him for years. His travels don’t correspond with the Caliph. For example, when the caliph was in Alexandria, he was in Istanbul. This Jakarta thing is just coincidence.”

  “I understand you ruled him out,” Evarts said, “but I’m not buying the bullshit. You have new information that caused you to take another look. What did you find?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “You do. O’Brian told us you have a network of spies inside the Pentagon. Masons and maybe even a few Templars. You learned through them that we mentioned Ali as-Saad to O’Brian.” Evarts gave Methow a hard look. “Now, you’re pretending to not know about our findings means that you have something and want us diverted from the hunt. Spill it.”

  Methow’s expression remained placid, but his eyes gave him away. Something was amiss.

  “I still don’t know what you’re talking about,” Methow said. “I told you, Ali as-Saad is not the Caliph.”

  Evarts pressed. “What makes you believe he’s not the caliph. And no more bullshit … or this cooperation ends right now.”

  “Okay. Relax. Like I said, we tracked Ali as-Saad. What I haven’t told you is that we also discovered their communication channel. It was code made to look like commonplace comments on a banal Facebook posting. We never broke the code, but we matched comment timing with Ikhwan activities, including their terrorist attacks.” Methow appeared pleased with himself. “We found a direct correlation. Then we went back through our Ali as-Saad surveillance archives to discovered that he had made no electronic communication at the time these messages were posted. I won’t bore you with the details, but we know these comments were the go orders. Since Ali as-Saad wasn’t issuing commands and he wasn’t participating in clandestine meetings, we ruled him out.”

  “Could one of his assistants have posted the comments?” Wilson asked.

  “We had them surveilled as well. At least enough that we felt confident they weren’t acting as electronic errand boys. Listen, at one time we suspected that Ali as-Saad was the caliph, but the Ikhwan used our inside man to send us disinformation. We swallowed it hook, line, and sinker, but we were wrong. Ali as-Saad was a decoy.”

  “Like you’d like me to swallow this cock and bull story.” Evarts used his hard cop look and leaned into Methow. “What did you find when you took another look at Ali as-Saad?”

  Methow sighed. Looked at each of his three guests and decided. “Okay, we found a different correlation. Ali as-Saad was in communication with someone a few days prior to each Caliph order. At first, we thought we had been mistaken and he was the caliph using a cut-out. But … with some corroborating information, we now believe Ali as-Saad is the leader of the backup triumvirate.”

  “That’s big!” Wilson exclaimed. “What could you learn if you grabbed the backup team?”

  “A lot. The caliph-in-waiting knows about operations, protocols, the identity of key players, and everything about finances. More about finances than the caliph. For all intents and purposes, he’s the chief financial officer of the Ikhwan. On the downside, he wouldn’t know the actual location of the caliph.” Methow hesitated for only a moment. “But … yeah, the amount of information Ali as-Saad holds would make it very worthwhile. We’ll grab him, if possible.”

  Evarts nodded, then leaped to his feet. “Time to go.”

  “Wait a minute,” Wilson interjected. “We need to know the status of the Ali as-Saad grab. What’s happening in Jakarta?”

  “Diane, he won’t make inquiries while we’re here. We need to get out of here.”

  Methow nodded.

  Wilson appeared to want to argue further, but Evarts put his hand on her shoulder and nudged her out of the room.

  Just before he exited, Evarts stuck his head back through the door and said, “We expect you to share all the intel from this grab. Remember, we know who you
are, and where you live. You’d regret double crossing us.”

  He turned but just before he left, he stuck his head in one more time.

  “To be clear, this is me talking, not Army Intelligence. My personal stake precludes civility.”

  As he slammed shut the door, he heard shattering glass followed by the report of a rifle shot.

  Chapter 53

  Evarts put his shoulder to the door and barged back into Methow’s office. What he saw caused him to instantly fall to the floor and roll onto his back to look behind him. Thankfully, the women had not followed him back into the office. He yelled for them to stay away when he heard additional rifle reports. The drywall by the door showed three holes, each about ten inches apart.

  “Down! Down! Everyone on the floor!”

  He had seen Methow and there was nothing he could do for him, so he swiftly crawled back out of the office frightened of what he might find. As he came around the doorjamb, he caught Baldwin’s eyes. They were full of fear, which meant she was alive. He saw Wilson race out of the assistant’s office and sprint through a cubicle maze that housed associates and paralegals. He knew she was racing to street level in the hopes of intercepting the sniper. Methow’s assistant had suffered the same fate as her boss. From the floor, Evarts could only see that she was slumped over her desk, but the blood splatter on the opposite wall indicated that she had been hit by one of the assassin’s bullets that had penetrated the drywall between rooms.

  Evarts crawled to Baldwin and threw a protective arm over her shoulder. She shook her head and yelled at him to help Wilson. He crawled around the desk and then ran out in a crouch. As he navigated the cubicle farm, he spotted a conference room glass partition shattered. A bullet would have needed to pass through two walls to reach the conference room. The shooter was using a high-powered automatic rifle.

  “Everybody stay down! Call 911 and get police and an ambulance here! Tell them active shooter.”

  By the time he finished the sentence he was in the posh reception area. People were screaming questions at him, but he ignored them as he punched the elevator button. While he waited, he grabbed a relatively calm man. He put one hand on each shoulder and looked him straight in the eye.

  “I’m a cop. There’s been a shooting. Jeffrey Methow and his assistant have been hit. Keep everyone on the floor until the police arrive. No one is to leave, and no one is to go into Methow outer office until cops arrive. Got it?”

  He nodded apprehensively. “Do they need medical help?”

  “No.” The elevator arrived. Evarts ran into it. Before the door closed, he said in a low voice he hoped only the man heard, “They’re both beyond medical help. Keep the crime scene sterile.”

  As the elevator descended, Evarts was pleased he had picked the right man. His only question had been proper. Most people would have asked rapid-fired questions or gone comatose. Evarts always carried his police identification, so he pulled it out to flash at arriving cops or building security. He also always carried a gun, but he didn’t draw his weapon because it would distract attention away from the ID he held in his left hand.

  The elevator door slid open to disorder on the ground floor. Building security was running every which way and people were standing around looking befuddled. Evarts exited the elevator with his badge held high.

  An authoritative man marched up to him and asked, “Do you know of a shooting in the building?”

  “Twelfth floor. Secure the floor. Police are on the way. Shots came from outside. Did a woman run through the lobby?”

  “Yeah, I guess she’s the one who yelled something as she ran out.”

  “Which way?”

  He pointed to the front door and hooked his finger left to indicate the direction she took outside.

  “Can I have some men?” Evarts asked.

  “One is all I can spare.”

  He yelled some orders and a relatively fit man in his fifties sprinted over. Evarts made a follow-me wave with his hand as he ran out the door and then veered left. Wilson had once said she had been trained to run bad guys to ground. She wasn’t kidding. As soon as shots were fired, she was gone. Evarts stopped on the sidewalk and looked at the building across the street. He guessed she went for the entrance.

  “Remove that blazer and take the right side of the building. I’ll cover the other side. Stop and keep an eye on the first exit you encounter. Do not confront the assailant. He’s armed and dangerous. Stand away from the entrance and try to get a description. See where he goes. That’s all. Got it?”

  “Yeah,” he said nervously as he removed his bright blue, tell-tale blazer and laid it across a planter wall.

  Evarts ran across the street, past the main building entrance, and around to the other side. He didn’t look back to see if the security guard did as he was told. He either did or didn’t. As he rounded the corner, Evarts saw no exit on this side of the building, so he picked up his pace and ran nearly full speed toward the back. He weaved through the crowded sidewalk, with his badge still held high. As he approached the street that ran along the rear of the building, he slowed to make the turn. Bam! He was flat on his back.

  He assumed he had crashed into a pedestrian until he saw the man. His clothes were dark, casual attire, and he wore black tonal sneakers. When the stranger spotted his badge, his eyes told the story. This was the sniper. As the assailant reached into the small of his back, Evarts used his feet to push away from him as he reached for his own gun. Adrenalin slowed time. Drawing his weapon while on his back was not a practiced move and he saw that he was going to be too slow. As he glacially lifted his own gun, he saw the sniper’s automatic moving to center on his chest.

  He was dead.

  Just before the fateful muzzle flash, the sniper’s chest spewed blood. Without hesitation, Evarts double tapped the killer in the chest as he took more hits from behind.

  Chapter 54

  The body crumbled to the ground; his entire torso pulverized. He rolled to his feet and in a crouch kept his gun aimed at the man who had tried to kill him. He had seen enough death to know that life had left the assailant before he had fully hit the ground. Five bullets riddled the body’s center mass, two from the front and three from the rear.

  Behind the assassin, Wilson stood in a flawless shooter’s stance.

  Evart rose to his full height. “Thanks, Diane.”

  “You’re welcome,” she said as she holstered her weapon. “Damn, is this going to be a hell of a lot of paperwork.”

  “Drop your weapon!” someone yelled from behind. “Police!”

  Evarts automatically snapped his safety and let the gun fall to the ground. Then he slowly lifted his hands in the air. No sudden moves. Wilson lifted her hands as well.

  “My ID is laying on the sidewalk,” Evarts said.

  A sergeant gestured that a patrolwoman should pick it up.

  After an examination, she said, “He’s police. Santa Barbara, California.”

  “This ain’t California, bub,” the sergeant said, not unkindly.

  Evarts jerked his head to indicate the body behind him. “That man assassinated one of your citizens in a building on the other side of this one. You’ll find a high-powered rifle on the roof of this building.”

  The sergeant talked into his shoulder. “Officers O’Reilly and Smith. We have a body on West 55th. Believed to be the 56th Street shooter. Suspect shot by an out-of-state police officer.”

  He listened for a bit, then said, “I need to frisk you. Both of you.”

  Evarts nodded acquiescence, and the patrolwoman patted him down collecting his personal possessions. She then stepped into the street to pass around the body to frisk Wilson. After she was done, she led Wilson into the street and around the corpse to preserve the sidewalk crime scene. During the entire process, her sergeant kept them under guard with a gun lowered but not holstered. After they were next to each other, the sergeant signaled that they could lower their hands.

  After further exam
ination of their credentials, the patrolwoman said, “This man is chief of police in Santa Barbara and she’s military police; sergeant first class, which makes her a senior non-commissioned officer.”

  The police sergeant smiled, “Then I apologize but you’re still detained pending an investigation.”

  “Understood,” Evarts said.

  The patrolwoman whipped out a notebook to take notes.

  The sergeant examined Wilson’s identification before saying, “Sergeant Wilson, are you here on official business.”

  “No, sir. I’m friends with Mr. Evarts wife, Patricia Baldwin. She’s a famous author. The three of us were in Jeffery Methow’s office when he was assassinated. Actually, we had just exited to the outer office when the shots were fired. I raced out of the building in pursuit of the shooter. As I entered the lobby of this building, I saw a man exit the elevator that looked suspicious. I surreptitiously followed him out to the street. Mr. Evarts came barreling around the corner and collided with the assassin. Mr. Evarts fell to the ground and the assailant pulled a gun from the small of his back. As he raised the gun to shoot Mr. Evarts, I shot him from behind as Mr. Evarts shot him from the front. Then you and your partner came on the scene.”

  The sergeant asked, “Mr. Evarts, why did the alleged assailant want to shoot you?”

  “I was racing around the building with my badge held high to alert pedestrians. I still held the badge when I hit the ground. When he saw it, he went for his gun.”

  The sergeant nodded. “Ms. Wilson, when he exited the elevator, what made the man suspicious?”

  “His eyes flitted left and right. Not a normal behavior for a civilian. He was purposefully relaxed, walking away at a leisurely pace.”

  “That was suspicious?”

  “Not in Des Moines, but in New York, yeah. You don’t stealthily surveil your surroundings and then casually stroll toward an exit. He wasn’t as good as he thought he was. He stood out because people heading for the same exit passed him on both sides. Besides, with the delay of getting over here, I had to choose a suspect fast. He was my best prospect.”