Wickheiser’s wife had told authorities she’d gone to bed around ten p.m. and that at that time her husband had been acting normally, watching television and eating a light snack. She’d taken sleeping medication and could not recall whether or not he’d ever come to bed.
Two inexplicable deaths of United States diplomats in separate European nations on successive Wednesday nights one week apart.
As a United States ambassador, Clayton Leavell was privy to information that had thus far been successfully withheld from the media and the public: the two diplomats had been murdered, and their killings were as far from unrelated as it was possible to get.
Evidence recovered at the scene of both deaths suggested strongly that the killings had been committed by the same person, or at least that the same organization had been responsible for both. What was being withheld from the public for the time being was that a note had been recovered at each scene.
Despite Clayton’s status as ambassador to France and a very interested party, he’d not been advised of the notes’ exact contents. What he had been told was that both were brief and cryptic. So cryptic, in fact, investigators had thus far been unable to fully decipher their contents.
While Clayton found that information fascinating from a theoretical point of view, the more important and terrifying fact was that until the crimes were solved, he had to be considered a target, as did every ambassador stationed in Europe. Secretary of State J. Robert Humphries had called him personally five days ago, and in a long conversation told him, in effect, to hunker down.
No trips outside the embassy except on official business, and even then, only accompanied by armed security personnel.
No public appearances of any kind except as necessary to perform official duties.
Basically, he was to make himself a prisoner inside the embassy.
Humphries’ words hadn’t frightened Clayton as much as had his tone. He was somber, and his concern was sincere and obvious.
Clayton had sent Rebecca and the children home by nightfall that day. All the media was told was that his wife and children were taking an extended vacation back in the states, reconnecting with Rebecca’s parents. She had wanted to stay with Clayton, of course, but hadn’t put up much of an argument out of a desire to protect their son and daughter.
And Clayton had been left alone.
That was almost a week ago, and the sad fact of embassy life was that once you removed the ceremonial duties from an ambassador’s schedule—speeches to civic groups, question-and-answer sessions at schools, glad-handing host country politicians—most of the time there wasn’t much actual work of substance to keep a man or woman occupied.
Clayton had been reduced to walking the embassy grounds at all hours of the night and day, giving himself more exercise in the past five days than he’d gotten in probably twenty years. In what he considered a fair display of gallows humor, he’d named these sessions his “Death Marches.” When not occupied by one of his death marches, he forced himself to his desk for extended periods of time spent shuffling official paperwork.
All of which explained his presence here, alone in his office, as the grandfather clock in the corner announced midnight’s arrival with all the rich, deep-throated grandfather-clock pomp and circumstance appropriate to the launch of a new day.
It was now Wednesday morning.
The murders of the two U.S. ambassadors had occurred on this day, one week and two weeks prior.
Clayton swallowed heavily, staring at the clock, the minute hand moving ever so slowly past the twelve. He knew he was safe—if isolated and alone—inside the embassy. The security staff was competent and professional.
Still, the compound felt cold and empty without Rebecca and the children.
And undoubtedly Nevin and Wickheiser had felt safe also, right up until the moment they weren’t.
Clayton had requested additional security during his briefing by Secretary of State Humphries, but that request had been summarily denied. “We can’t appear skittish to the public, Clayton, like we’re allowing the actions of one or two lunatics to dictate our response.”
“Sir, the public would never know. The public is unaware these killings are related.”
“True,” Humphries had said. “But at some point the news about those notes will leak out, and once it does, our every move in response to this crisis will be scrutinized by a critical press. We need to maintain a holding pattern, just for now, until our investigators can develop a lead on the perpetrators. Once that happens, we’ll have a better handle on how to proceed.”
Clayton understood Humphries’ point. He even agreed with it on that damned theoretical level. But from a personal standpoint, as a guy with a target presumably painted on his back, a few extra men with guns patrolling the walls and gates of the embassy compound might have made him feel, if not comfortable, at least a little less uneasy.
He sighed and turned away from the clock.
And found himself staring straight down the barrel of a gun.
2
Clayton Leavell was no gun expert. He hated the damned things and in fact had never touched a real handgun, certainly not one that was loaded and ready to fire.
But he sure as hell knew what they looked like. What he’d never realized until this very moment was how goddamned big a pistol looked when it was being leveled between one’s eyes.
Which accurately described his current situation.
He froze and tried not to make his terror obvious. The intruder’s wry smile told him he’d failed.
“How did you get in here?” Clayton said. “This is the official residence of the United States Ambassador to France, and you are not welcome in my home.”
The man’s smile widened. “I understand. I think I will stay anyway. And to answer your question, there is always a way in, if you know where to look and are willing to impart the proper…motivation…to those who insist on attempting to stop you.”
Despite his fear, Clayton cocked his head at the sound of the man’s accent. After spending the better part of seven years as a semi-permanent resident of Paris, he’d become quite accustomed to the heavy French accent of those Parisians who spoke English, and this was not it.
This was not even close to it.
The man’s English was passable, in a “foreigner-who-learned-the-language-but-doesn’t-speak-it-regularly” kind of way, but the accent was as far from French as it was possible to get.
It sounded Russian.
Clayton raised his eyes and met the man’s gaze head-on. It was difficult to do, but he decided anything would be better than staring down the barrel of that awful gun.
Then their eyes locked and he reconsidered his hypothesis. Because despite the smile on the intruder’s face, the man’s eyes were cold and stony and glittering with hostility.
It was becoming harder to keep his voice steady, but somehow Clayton managed it. For now. “What sort of ‘motivation’ did you impart on my security? How many men did you shoot?”
A wounded look crossed the intruder’s face and then disappeared. “I did not shoot any of your men. How could I be expected to surprise you if bullets were flying outside your window?”
“Then I’ll ask the same question a different way. How did you neutralize my security?”
“At the point of a knife.” The glitter deepened in the man’s eyes. At first Clayton assumed it was the expression of a madman, but now he wasn’t so sure. He didn’t think the intruder was insane, not exactly. Not clinically, at least. He was…highly committed.
To what, Clayton had no idea.
“How many men did you kill with your knife to gain access to my home?” He wasn’t sure he wanted to know the answer to that question, but the intruder hadn’t pulled the trigger yet, and Clayton figured if he could continue the dialogue, maybe he could figure a way out of this mess.
It was the longest of long shots, but it was better than dying where he sat.
“As many as I enco
untered,” the man answered flatly. His amused smile was gone and Clayton longed desperately for its return.
The two men gazed at each other for what felt like an extended period of time, and then Clayton said, “What do you want? Why are you here?”
“What I want is to make a point. As for why I am here, well, isn’t it obvious?” The intruder glanced down at his gun and then across the desk at Clayton, and at that moment Clayton realized he really needed to pee.
“Wh-what kind of point are you trying to make, and to whom?”
“That is of no concern to you.”
“Of course it’s my concern! You’re holding a gun to my head and threatening my life, so—”
“Taking,” the man interrupted.
“Excuse me?”
“You said I am threatening your life. I merely attempted to correct the inaccuracy of your statement. I will be taking your life.”
“But…why? What have I ever done to you?”
“I already told you why. I am making a point. Sending a message. And to answer your second question, I am quite certain you have never done anything to me. In fact, you seem like a fine, upstanding, reasonable man. Please do not feel this is in any way personal.”
“It is to me.”
The smile returned. “Da. I suppose it would be.”
“Don’t do this. It’s not too late to leave, and if you do no one ever has to know you were here. I give you my word I won’t—”
“Please stop. Begging for your life is humiliating. It is beneath you, Mr. Ambassador, and more to the point, it is irrelevant. I told you this is not personal. I am simply doing what must be done to get the attention of people who have thus far ignored me, and so I have no choice but to finish what I set out to do. Anything you say, any begging you do, will be meaningless in that context.”
Clayton realized his eyesight had become blurry because his eyes had filled with tears. This scene felt unreal, like something out of a nightmare, and yet it was as real as the big black gun being pointed in his direction. He thought about Rebecca, and about Lorena and Matt, and about how he would never see any of them again. He thanked God he had sent them away, but wished with all his heart he could hold each of them one more time.
“If it is any consolation, Mr. Ambassador, there will be no pain. It will be over quickly and you will never feel a thing.”
Clayton swallowed heavily. His fingers felt numb and he wondered if he might be suffering the onset of a stroke. “It really isn’t,” he whispered.
“Perhaps not, but remember, things could always be worse. They could, in fact, be much worse. Be thankful you must not ingest the poison I forced your comrade, Ambassador Wickheiser to ingest.”
“Poison?”
“Da. It was not over quickly for Comrade Wickhesier.”
“Oh, God, why…”
“There is nothing to be gained by continuing to discuss topics we have already covered. What do you say we get started?”
Clayton’s throat was suddenly as dry as the Sahara. He tried to answer but discovered the term “tongue-tied” had a literal application. He simply could not speak. He began shaking his head, breathing heavily as his blurry eyes began leaking down his cheeks.
“Do not move,” the intruder said, apparently not realizing Clayton not only couldn’t move, he could barely breathe. The intruder stepped back to the office doorway and bent down while continuing to train his gun steadily on Clayton. He’d placed a small gym bag on the floor and after rummaging around inside the bag for a moment, retrieved a roll of shiny silver duct tape.
The intruder displayed the roll to Clayton and said, “Duct tape would not be my first choice of binding for this operation, but as I mentioned, the point of this exercise is to capture the attention of the proper people, so I must do what will best accomplish that goal.”
He stood and approached Clayton and Clayton instinctively shrank back in his desk chair, scrabbling his feet against the polished hardwood floor and rolling the wheeled chair backward.
The chair thudded into the wall and Clayton heard picture frames rattling above his head as the intruder shook his head sadly. “Please, Mr. Ambassador, do not continue to humiliate yourself. There is nowhere to go, and no means of escape.”
Clayton was sweating and panting and all he could think of was begging for his life, and the hell with what this lunatic had said about humiliating himself. But his throat was still dry and his tongue still would not cooperate and he just COULD NOT SPEAK.
The intruder stepped behind Clayton’s desk and pulled a strip of duct tape off the roll. The zip of the tape sounded obscene in the midnight stillness of the office. The man reached for Clayton’s arm and Clayton yanked it away in a blind panic.
The intruder shook his head. This time there was more annoyance than sadness in the action. “Let me make something clear to you, Mr. Ambassador. I am happy to kill you painlessly. In fact, it is what I prefer. But if you insist on making this more difficult than it needs to be, I shall have no problem dragging your death out and making it as agonizing as possible for you. The time is barely midnight. We could quite easily spend the next four to five hours together, doing things you would not enjoy. Is that what you want, Mr. Ambassador?”
Clayton shook his head violently. That was most definitely not what he wanted.
“Then sit quietly, and place your hands on the arms of your chair. I will not tell you again.”
Clayton forced himself to do as he was told. It was not easy. Every fiber of his being was telling him to spring to his feet and run, but of course he could not spring to his feet because he was quite literally frozen in fear, and he could not run because there was nowhere to go.
The intruder worked quickly. He secured Clayton’s arms and legs to the chair and in a matter of sixty seconds was ready to continue. He dropped the tape back into his bag and then removed something that looked to Clayton like a long, narrow black tube from a roll of paper towels.
The intruder began threading the paper towel tube onto the barrel of his gun, and that was when Clayton pissed himself. He couldn’t help it. One moment he was dry and the next he was sitting in his own waste.
The intruder didn’t seem to notice. Or if he noticed, he didn’t care.
He returned one more time to his bag and retrieved a sheet of notebook paper upon which something had already been written. Clayton couldn’t tell what the words were and really couldn’t care less. His life was in its final moments and unless the paper contained instructions on avoiding his fate, it was of no use to him.
The intruder approached, holding the paper and duct tape in one hand and his gun in the other. He bent in front of Clayton and shocked Clayton by shoving a portion of the paper into his mouth. He then slapped a strip of duct tape over the paper and around the back of Clayton’s head.
Then he stood.
“Thank you for a pleasant evening, Mr. Ambassador. Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end, as must all lives. Again, this is nothing personal.”
Clayton was shaking helplessly and hyperventilating as the intruder placed his gun barrel under Clayton’s jaw and aimed it upward toward the ceiling. The barrel felt heavy and cold.
And then the world disappeared.
At least the intruder kept his promise. There was no pain.
3
May 13, 1988
5:40 p.m.
Washington, D.C.
Tracie Tanner lifted the piece of jewelry from the bowl and dabbed at it carefully with a cloth held in her left hand. A rope chain threaded through a gold cross, the jewelry was simple but had at one time been quite beautiful. Before she’d placed it into the bowl, however, it had been covered in its owner’s dried and clotted blood.
She had soaked the cross and chain overnight in a jewelry cleaning solution, and by this morning much of the human tissue and unidentifiable gore had sloughed off. There had been a lot of it. Some of the blood had soaked off as well, but there was still plenty left, and Tra
cie had replaced the chain and cross in fresh solution for several hours before attacking it again.
Now she worked at it patiently, running the chain through the solution and then placing it on a bath towel atop her tiny kitchen table. The towel would have to be trashed when she was finished, as would the cloth and, in all probability, the bowl as well. She could wash everything, of course, but the thought of reusing any of it after being covered in bits of brain and bone was…unappealing, to say the least.
The whole job was unappealing, really. She couldn’t think of a single thing she would less like to be doing. But the things she wanted to do had always been very different from the things she needed to do, and this was something she felt strongly needed to be done.
So she took her time, moving link by link along the gold chain, dabbing with the cloth and working the blood off the finish, then moving forward and beginning the process again. It was close work, painstaking and mentally draining. In the beginning it was also emotional, as she was forced to relive the deadly events that had resulted in her taking possession of this beautiful cross and chain in the first place.
But as she worked, she was surprised to discover a sense of calm settling over her. It felt good to take her time and expend her energy in restoring the cross and chain to their original condition. The process made her feel close to the chain’s owner, and she thought he would have appreciated her efforts, had he lived to see them.
She hadn’t known him well; they weren’t close in any traditional sense. They didn’t even know each other’s real names. But they’d been bound together by a shared commitment, two American covert operatives toiling halfway around the world in hostile environments in support of democracy and freedom.
They had faced life and death situations together on more than one occasion, each relying on the other’s resourcefulness and courage to complete their missions. It was the sort of thing that had a way of fostering closeness even between relative strangers, of bringing people together in a way nothing else could.
Tracie Tanner Thrillers Box Set Page 147