She couldn’t mover her fingers.
She squeezed her eyes closed and waited for the final shot, the one that would end everything.
From far below she could hear chaotic screaming and sirens, and the sound of panicked people running for cover. They had heard the gunshots. By now Reagan would be halfway to his armored limo. She would die knowing she had prevented the president’s assassination, but it would be small consolation.
Shane Rowley was dead or would be soon.
Shane, whose only sin was to pull her from the wreckage of a burning airplane.
Shane, who had done more for her than she could ever repay.
Shane, the man she had fallen in love with.
A second that felt like a lifetime passed and when nothing happened, Tracie forced her eyes open. She lifted her head toward the KGB assassin and blinked, stunned. Shane had risen to his feet and was barreling across the rooftop at the Russian.
The man turned away from Tracie in surprise and squeezed off a hurried shot. The slug struck Shane somewhere on the right side of his body but he kept coming, slowing only slightly. He had started out maybe fifteen feet away from the assassin and had now closed half the distance. He stumbled, placed a hand on the roof and pushed himself upright and kept coming.
The Russian fired again and this time the bullet hit Shane square in the chest, the second time he’d been shot there. He stopped and staggered and then, unbelievably, kept coming.
He hit the Russian before the man could shoot again, striking him like a freight train and driving him backward. The assassin windmilled his arms in a desperate attempt to maintain his balance and the gun flew out of his hand, arcing high into the air and then dropping to the roof with a metallic clank.
Shane kept driving with his legs, shoulder planted squarely in the Russian’s chest, moving him backward but without the strength left to take him down. They were running out of room quickly and Tracie could see what was about to happen.
She shouted, “Nooo!” as the pair of grappling men struck the roof’s two-foot-high retaining wall.
They were moving fast but to Tracie’s horrified eyes the events played out in slow motion, like some awful sports clip being shown on the evening news. The Russian’s legs struck the retaining wall just above the knees and he reached for the wall with both hands in an attempt to avoid tumbling over backward.
Shane pumped his legs one last time, churning relentlessly, and the Russian dropped over the edge.
And so did Shane.
He swiveled his head and locked eyes with Tracie and then disappeared.
A second later, the screaming intensified on Columbia Road far below.
52
June 5, 1987
1:00 p.m.
CIA Headquarters, Langley, Virginia
The office of CIA Director Aaron Stallings was spacious and infused with an old money, country-club stuffiness.
Leather-bound volumes filled the oak bookshelves lining the walls from floor to ceiling. A small television set mounted in one corner of the office had been tuned to CNN, volume muted, and was broadcasting three-day-old footage of the events at the Minuteman Mutual Insurance building in a continuous silent loop. A massive walnut desk dominated the room. And the carpeting was plush and thick, serving to deaden sound so completely that voices seemed to struggle into the air and then vanish.
The overall theme of the office seemed to be one of stern intimidation, Stallings making the pecking order clear to visitor: he was important and they were not.
The effect was wasted on Tracie. Her future with the agency would be determined by this meeting, but she wasn’t at all certain she wanted to continue, anyway.
She had been overcome with depression since watching Shane tumble over the roof of the Minuteman building three days ago, an ennui that seemed to have clamped onto her heart. She wondered if it would ever ease.
Shane had sacrificed his own life to save hers, somehow struggling to his feet after being shot in the chest, then still managing to pack enough of a punch to overcome a trained and armed professional assassin despite being weaponless and suffering multiple bullet wounds.
He was being hailed as a hero, lauded on television and in the worldwide press as an ordinary man who had stumbled onto a plot to assassinate the president of the United States and then foiled that plot at the expense of his own life.
All of which was true, of course, as far as it went.
But the authorities were releasing few details of how this “ordinary citizen” had single-handedly taken down the lone gunman, or even how he had managed to uncover the plot while working as an air traffic controller and living his life far off the beaten path in Bangor, Maine.
His escape from the massacre at the Bangor Airport was receiving airtime as well, its link to the assassination attempt still unclear.
For now, the compelling human interest angle was dominating the news cycle, and Tracie knew that by the time it occurred to the networks and reporters to dig below the surface, a bland cover story would have been concocted, one that would satisfy the public while simultaneously avoiding any possibility that embarrassing details might be leaked involving potentially treasonous activity by a long-time, high-ranking CIA employee.
No doubt a team of agency psychologists and spin-doctors was hard at work right now, doing exactly that. Just another day at the company.
Of the assassin Shane had thwarted little was known, officially or otherwise. His broken body had been found on the sidewalk outside the Minuteman building bearing no identification, and Tracie knew the few details that would eventually emerge regarding the man would bear little more than a passing resemblance to the truth. They certainly would not include the fact that the gunman was working for the KGB with the tacit approval of at least one CIA official—information that would be buried so deep it would never see the light of day.
She pictured Winston Andrews smiling in approval.
Tracie sat up as straight as she could, no easy feat with both shoulders wrapped heavily in gauze and surgical bandages. Her arms were immobilized in slings, crossed over her chest, giving her the appearance of an angry housewife confronting an errant husband. The wounds throbbed incessantly, and doctors had told her to expect more of the same for the foreseeable future, although a full recovery was expected.
Stallings gazed at her, saying nothing. He had been silent since summoning her into his office and gruffly instructing her to take a seat in a chair placed directly in front of his desk. Tracie knew he was using silence as a weapon, an obvious attempt to draw her out, to encourage her to try and fill the emptiness with words.
She wasn’t having any of it. She was very familiar with the tactic—had used it herself many times in interrogations. She knew she could outwait him and assumed he would reach the same conclusion eventually.
Besides, she was used to silence, comfortable with solitude.
She sat quietly.
Finally Stallings gave up and cleared his throat officiously. “So,” he said. “Regarding the Gorbachev communiqué…” and waited.
She said nothing. No question had been asked so there was no reason to speak.
She’d been rescued from the Minuteman Building by a Secret Service agent, who rushed to the roof just seconds after the bodies of Shane and the assassin crashed to the sidewalk below it.
Upon her arrival at the hospital, a young CIA operative she didn’t recognize took possession of the wrinkled envelope containing Gorbachev’s letter shortly before Tracie was rolled into surgery to repair the damage done by the two 9mm slugs. The document had disappeared into the chasm that was CIA officialdom, and she knew she would never see it again.
She didn’t care.
Stallings continued, a hint of annoyance creeping into his voice. “Some in positions of authority in the administration—myself included, if you must know—believe you should be placed under arrest and charged with treason for opening that envelope. Its contents were classified Top Secr
et, for the president’s eyes only. Opening that letter is antithetical to every single operating principle here at Central Intelligence.”
Tracie had told herself she was not going to give Stallings the satisfaction of a response, no matter how vicious or unreasonable the attack, but she couldn’t help herself.
She shot back, “Really? And what about the real treason: the activity of Winston Andrews? What about that?”
“That is all hearsay, unprovable charges made by an unreliable witness against a dead man who served his country honorably for more than four decades and is not here to defend himself.”
Tracie barked a bitter laugh and Stallings said, “But in any event, let’s not get off track here. The subject is your malfeasance.”
“Malfeasance? Is that what you’re calling it? The president is alive right now because I opened that envelope.”
“Yes, well, you could argue that, I sup—”
“It’s not an ‘argument.’ It’s a fact.”
“Nevertheless,” Stallings said. He was a large, jowly man, with fleshy pouches below his jaw that jiggled when he talked. “There’s another factor to consider, one of the utmost importance: we cannot set the precedent of permitting operatives to handle classified intelligence in any manner they see fit during a mission. Were it up to me, and many others, you would become an object example to every agent, now and into the future, of that principle.”
“This scenario was not typical, and you know it,” she said angrily. “It was one in a million, not likely to be repeated in our lifetimes, if ever.”
“However,” he continued, talking over her as if she hadn’t even spoken. “President Reagan refused to allow the issue to drop. He threatened to replace the entire management team at CIA if we took any punitive action against you.
“The upshot,” he said, bitterness creeping into his voice, “is that your job is safe. For now. You’re expected back into the operations branch as soon as you are physically able to return.” He scowled, looking as though he’d just gotten a whiff of rancid meat.
“What about Andrews?” Tracie asked, refusing to allow Stallings the satisfaction of seeing relief on her face. She wasn’t sure she felt any.
Stallings spread his hands in exasperation. “What about him?”
“Come on,” Tracie snapped. “You know damned well he couldn’t have been the only one inside the agency who was working with the Soviets. What is being done to flush out the rest of them, to ensure nothing like this fiasco ever happens again?”
“There’s no evidence to indicate anyone besides Winston was involved, at CIA or elsewhere.” Stallings smiled, his eyes cold and predatory. “In fact, as I already mentioned, there’s not even any evidence to suggest Winston was involved. There is certainly no reason to pursue the matter further.”
And just like that, Tracie realized the potential involvement of other high-level members of the United States government in the attempted assassination of a sitting president would be swept under the rug, just like the full story of the incident, just like the true identity of the Soviet assassin.
She flashed back to Winston Andrews’ words as he sat in his home office just before committing suicide. There aren’t many KGB collaborators in positions of power above mine, but there are a few. A wave of nausea washed over her that had nothing to do with her injuries.
“How are we using this fiasco?” Her voice had dropped nearly to a whisper.
“I don’t know what you mean,” Stallings said innocently.
“Come on, goddammit. I was almost killed, got accused of treason, saw my mentor take his own life, watched the man I lov…I mean, watched a close friend die to save me. I served up two Soviet agents on a silver platter in New Haven, operatives I’m sure you’re grilling somewhere in this very complex as we speak.”
Narrow-eyed stare from Stallings.
Tracie continued. “Stop beating around the bush. You know exactly what I mean, and I want an answer. You owe me that much. The United States is in possession of irrefutable proof that the KGB was behind an assassination attempt on President Reagan. How are we using that information to our benefit it we’re not releasing it publically? There has to be a plan.”
The CIA director’s eyes darkened. He was unused to being questioned, especially by a lowly field operative who’d been called on the carpet, and he clearly didn’t appreciate it now.
Tracie didn’t care. She had had enough, and was about three seconds from quitting and walking out.
“First of all,” Stallings thundered, “I owe you nothing. This agency owes you nothing. If the president hadn’t learned the details of this disaster before we could contain them, you would be en route to Fort Leavenworth right now, Tanner. You would never again see the light of day if I had anything to say about it. It just so happens the right person is in your corner, so my hands are tied. For now,” he added ominously. “But don’t you dare get in my face with ridiculous demands because you feel we are in any was indebted to you. Is that clear?”
His face had bypassed bright crimson and continued straight on to purple, and Tracie wondered whom she would have to deal with when Stallings fell to the floor with the stroke that seemed suddenly inevitable.
“Are you going to answer the question or are we done here?” she asked evenly.
Stallings took a moment to compose himself and then surprised her. His thin lips curled into a tight smile that stopped well short of his eyes.
“You’re right,” he said. “Of course we’re using Gorbachev’s letter for leverage. We have already communicated our appreciation to Mr. Gorbachev for the extreme risk, both political and personal, he took in warning us about the KGB’s highly irregular operation. We have agreed that during Mr. Reagan’s upcoming trip to Europe, the president will call for the removal of the Berlin Wall and the reunification of Germany.”
Stallings paused and Tracie whistled softly, impressed despite herself.
The CIA director’s self-satisfied smile widened and he continued. “The Soviet Union is disintegrating. Gorbachev knows it and we know it. Even the KGB knows it. Their highest-ranking officials simply refuse to acknowledge it. Gorbachev does not possess the clout internally to risk the wrath of the KGB by stating the obvious: that the Soviet Union must be dissolved as the only way to save Russia from being destroyed from within.
“But with incontrovertible proof of a KGB-sanctioned assassination attempt of a sitting president to hold over the KGB’s head, we now have the clout. Reagan calls publically for the destruction of the wall, the KGB is neutralized, and Gorbachev tightens his grip on the reins in Russia. Everybody wins, including the Soviet satellites, which are able to slip out from under the heel of Communist oppression.”
Tracie closed her eyes and saw Shane sailing over the edge of the roof, his head twisting in what she wanted desperately to believe was one last look at her. She saw the same scene whenever she closed her eyes and knew she would for a very long time.
“Everybody wins,” she repeated, her stomach in knots.
Then “Are we finished here?”
Stallings stared at her for a long moment without speaking.
She opened her eyes and met his gaze straight on.
“Everything I’ve just told you is classified,” he said. “If one word leaks out, I will make it my mission in life to see that you rot in prison, I don’t care if that old fool Reagan is protecting you. Is that clear?”
“I’ll take that as a yes,” Tracie said. She rose and walked to the door.
“We’ll expect you back on active duty as soon as the medical people give the go-ahead,” Stallings said to her back.
“I’ll let you know what I decide,” Tracie answered without turning. She bent and opened the door awkwardly, turning the knob with her right arm inside the sling, and continued through without another word.
53
June 8, 1987
11:00 a.m.
Shady Oaks Cemetery, Bangor, Maine
The
day was bright and hot, a brisk wind helping make the temperature almost bearable.
Tracie stood on a shallow hillside dressed in a conservative business suit not unlike the one she’d worn days ago atop the Minuteman Insurance building in D.C. She tried to fan herself and failed miserably, her hands still mostly immobilized inside the slings. Smoked-black sunglasses covered her eyes.
Far across a field, a crowd of mourners had gathered to bury Shane Rowley. He had been part of a small family, just himself and his mother. He had never spoken to Tracie of his father, and the one time she’d asked about him, passing the time on a long drive, Shane had answered bitterly that the man wasn’t worth wasting his breath on.
Aside from Shane’s mother, who was easy to pick out, bent and broken by grief, there were probably a couple of dozen other people. Co-workers, friends from high school.
The world had begun to move on following the initial firestorm of media fascination with Shane, the news cycle continuing its relentless, grinding pace even after just a few days. A small phalanx of television trucks and print reporters crowded the street just outside the gates of Shady Oak Cemetery, and the local police kept the media representatives a respectful distance from the proceedings.
Shane’s mother had requested privacy and Tracie thought Shane would have appreciated that fact.
Tracie stood alone among small patches of overgrown grass in need of mowing, removed from the rest of the mourners despite having been invited to the service by Shane’s mother.
Tracie had met with the grieving woman twice. The first time had been while still in the hospital following the surgery on her shoulders. All the media had been told was that Tracie was involved with the president’s protective detail, but Shane’s mother had insisted on seeing her.
The second time was earlier this morning.
Her name was Katherine, and she had been shattered by the events on the roof of the seven-story office building in Washington. Katherine Rowley was kind during both meetings, respectful of Tracie’s silence on the subject of Tracie’s relationship with her dead son, but nevertheless Tracie could feel a desperate desire for answers radiating off her, none of which Tracie was at liberty to provide.
Tracie Tanner Thrillers Box Set Page 25