by Vince Flynn
Brooks guardedly folded her arms across her chest and looked at him with her greener than brown hazel eyes.
“Stop asking questions. This isn’t a fucking debate club. It’s a benevolent dictatorship, and I’m not feeling very benevolent right now, so unless you want to find your ass transferred out of the Clandestine Service and into some secretarial pool at one of the offsite locations, you’re going to do everything I tell you to do for the next two hours. Can you do that?”
She took a moment to decide and then reluctantly said, “Yes.”
21
Rapp yanked open the light aluminum door and looked down at Gazich. It was obvious by the prisoner’s pasty skin that the morphine had worn off. His forehead and upper lip were covered with beads of sweat, and his entire body quivered beneath the drab gray blanket. Rapp knew from firsthand experience that simply going from darkness to light in such an agonizing state could be painful. He watched the Bosnian shut his eyes and winced with understanding. Rapp did not like Gazich, but he took no joy in his discomfort.
Rapp had just spent the last five minutes on the phone with Marcus Dumond learning more about Gazich. There were passports, financial information, a key to a safety deposit box, cash, weapons, computers, backup disks, and hard files all found by Hacket and Wicker at Gazich’s office and home. All of it was scanned or photographed and sent to Dumond back in DC. At first glance the information gave them a pretty good idea of what Alexander Deckas had been up to for the past seven years. Dumond had already taken to referring to the prisoner as two separate people. Gavrilo Gazich was the man wanted by The Hague for war crimes in Bosnia, and Alexander Deckas was a seemingly legitimate businessman who had run a company called Aid Logistics Inc based out of Limassol, Cyprus.
Hacket and Wicker had taken the hard drives from both the office and home computers of Gazich and uploaded them via satellite to Dumond. So far the encryption programs had frustrated the MIT genius, but he expected to have them decrypted by later in the day. Rapp told him to make sure no one at Langley knew what he was up to, including DCI Kennedy. Dumond was used to working on a need-to-know basis, but DCI Kennedy was pretty much always in the need-to-know loop. Rapp told Dumond he was short on time and would explain everything when he saw him later today. The more pressing issue at the moment was to get Gazich to talk before he had to turn him over to the FBI.
Moving one step to his left, Rapp managed to block out the light that was hitting Gazich in his face. The CIA operative held out a syringe and said, “Here’s how we play this game. I’m going to ask you a series of questions. If you answer them truthfully, you get your shot of morphine. If you lie to me, just once, no shot.”
Gazich nodded eagerly.
“I want to be really clear about this…I know more about you than you can possibly imagine. I’ve talked to the big Russian,” Rapp lied. “The one whose face you were in process of carving up. He had some very interesting things to say about you.”
“Russians are professional liars,” Gazich growled.
Rapp help up a cautionary finger. “We’ve gone through your office and your house and have run your photo through our facial recognition system. We have you on tape buying coffee at the Starbucks on Wisconsin Avenue the morning that the bomb went off. If you lie, even once, I shut the door and we start over again in thirty minutes.”
“I’ll tell you whatever you want. Hurry up and give me the shot.”
“Oh no.” Rapp laughed. “We talk first, and then you get the shot.”
“Then hurry up with your questions.”
Rapp had a theory, and he was going to test it after he started with a few easy questions. “Who hired you?”
“I don’t know,” Gazich moaned in frustration.
“Fine.” Rapp took a step back and started closing the door.
“I swear!” Gazich yelled in a panic. “Everything was handled over the Internet.”
Rapp stood there with the door half closed. This was the answer he expected. If Gazich had given him a name he would have been suspicious. Big money contracts like these were rarely handled face to face.
“You didn’t know them, but they knew you?” Rapp asked.
“By reputation only.”
“Then how did they track you down?”
“I don’t know,” he snarled. “I was in the process of finding that out when you burst into my office and shot me.”
“How did you get into the U.S.?” Rapp watched Gazich hesitate before answering. So far the man had denied any involvement in the attack on the motorcade. “Be careful. Take your time to think this one through. You wouldn’t want to lie to me.”
Gazich squirmed under the strain of the straps and said, “I flew into New York the day before.”
“Which airport?”
“JFK.”
“The explosives?”
“They were waiting for me.”
“Where?”
“Pennsylvania.”
“The state?”
“Yes, the state. Now give me my shot.”
“Not quite yet. You’re doing a good job, though. So you pick up the van, drive it down to Washington…when, on Friday?”
“No,” Gazich snapped. “I told you I arrived in New York on Friday.”
It was possible to fly into JFK, stop in Pennsylvania, and get to Washington in one day, but Rapp wasn’t going to argue with him. Not yet. The fact that his fuse was so short was a good sign. He wanted the morphine big-time.
“So you stayed in Pennsylvania on Friday night?”
“Yes…Yes! The van was waiting for me and I drove it down to Washington early on Saturday morning. I found my spot, I parked it, I waited, and then when the time was right I blew it up. End of story. There you go. Now give me my shot.”
Rapp squatted down and pulled back the blanket to reveal Gazich’s hand. A port was taped to the back of his right hand. Stroble had put it in earlier so he could give Gazich a bag of plasma and his first two shots of morphine. Rapp popped the cap off the premeasured dose and was about to insert the needle when he thought of one more question.
“Where were you standing when you detonated the bomb?”
Gazich’s eyes were focused on the needle with such intensity that he didn’t understand the question. “What?”
“When the bomb went off…where were you standing?”
“The fucking tree!” Gazich yelled. “I was standing behind a tree a half block away! Now give me the shot.”
Rapp nodded. Agent Rivera had been right. He slid the needle into the white port and pressed the plunger. The dose was just enough to keep him comfortable for thirty to forty-five minutes, and then the pain would come back with a vengeance. Rapp watched as Gazich began to relax almost immediately. His body went from rigid to relaxed, and his breathing settled into a normal pattern as the alkaloid drug eased his pain.
“So they tried to back out of paying you the rest of the money after the job.” Rapp said this casually. Like one professional talking to another.
“The second part?” Gazich scoffed. “They wanted their deposit back.”
“Not very professional,” Rapp said with a disappointed look on his face. “So you waited a few seconds too long and you only got one limo instead of both.”
The drug was working fast. Gazich looked up at Rapp with dilated eyes and slurred his first few words. “I did exactly as I was told. I fulfilled my part of the deal. They were the ones who screwed up.”
“How so?”
“They told me to hit the second limo.”
Rapp’s brow furrowed with surprise. Tactically this made no sense. The van had enough power to take out both limos. Picking just one from the outset cut your odds of success in half. “Why not take out both?”
“I don’t know. I’m not paid to question my employers.”
“So when did they tell you to hit the second limo?” Rapp was thinking maybe he’d received the order when he’d picked up the van.
“Twenty to thirty
seconds, before it all went down.”
“Before the blast?” asked a surprised Rapp.
“Yes.”
They must have had a spotter that morning watching the candidates get in their vehicles. Rapp wondered if Agent Rivera shuffled the limousines as they left the compound. It was a fairly common Secret Service tactic. That would explain why they blew up the wrong limo.
“The phone you received the call on…where did you get it?”
“It was waiting for me in the van.”
“Was it also used to remote detonate the bomb?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t suppose you hung on to it?”
“No.”
“Okay.” Rapp was trying to wrap his mind around the entire operation. It wasn’t how he would have done it, but then again the enemy had proven in the past that they weren’t always logistical geniuses. He stood and looked down at Gazich. “One more question. I read your file. You obviously hate Muslims. Why work for them?”
Gazich smiled for the first time. “My enemy’s enemy is my ally.”
“That and the fact that they probably paid you a shitload of money.”
“The money was fine, but I wanted to strike a blow for my country.”
Rapp would have gladly debated him on the issue, but it would have been a waste of crucial time. Guys like Gazich didn’t simply change their mind after a brief conversation. Rapp began closing the cargo door and said, “We’ll be landing in an hour.”
22
BALTIMORE-WASHINGTON INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT
The big plane touched down softly at 10:47 a.m. Eastern Standard Time. Rapp and Coleman joined the pilots in the cockpit as they taxied to the cargo portion of the airport. They half expected to be greeted by a welcoming committee of police cars, FBI sedans, and a gaggle of news vans. Fortunately, it appeared their cover story had held. It looked cold outside, which was a good thing. Customs officers were humans too. The cold weather would keep them huddled inside rather than out on the tarmac nosing around. Rapp took one final look out the window and then turned to Coleman who was now wearing the same uniform as the pilot and copilot: black pants, white shirt with black and silver epaulets, and a black tie. He was listed as Tom Jones, the plane’s navigator on the official manifest. He had a full set of worn credentials to match. Coleman would clear customs with the two pilots and be off the airport property in thirty minutes or less.
Rapp stuck out his hand. “I’ll see you in a few hours.”
“Good luck with the handoff,” Coleman replied.
“You sure you don’t want to come along?”
“Yeah…right after I get my barium enema.”
Rapp laughed at him and left the cockpit. He passed Stroble who was now wearing a soiled BWI ground crew uniform. “Don’t drop the container.”
“I won’t, boss.”
“And stop calling me boss.”
“Sure thing, boss.”
Brooks was waiting by the cargo door with her two bags.
“Are you all set?” Rapp asked.
“Yes.”
“Good. Let’s go.”
The two of them proceeded into the storage area with Stroble following them. The big Russian had already been transferred into the container and placed bound and gagged on the floor next to Gazich. Like Gazich, he was also drugged. There was just enough room for Rapp and Brooks to sit at each end of the container. Once Rapp and Brooks were situated, Stroble closed and locked the doors.
The plane was guided to its spot on the tarmac, and the engines were shut down. Ten minutes later two trucks pulled up, one with a set of stairs, the other with an extending cargo box. The two pilots and Coleman came down the stairs, their black trench coats flapping in the wind. They held their hats with one hand and dragged their carry-on bags behind them as they made their way to the cargo terminal. The forward port cargo door opened from the inside, and the aluminum cargo container was pushed into the back of the truck’s extended cargo area and secured. Stroble shut both the truck’s and plane’s cargo doors and walked back through the plane and down the stairs. When he hit the tarmac, two more trucks manned with BWI ground personnel pulled up and went to work emptying the cargo in the lower holds.
Stroble gave the guys a wave and a nod as he jumped in the front passenger seat of the truck he had just loaded. The man sitting behind the wheel was someone he had never met and didn’t care to know. Someone who worked for Rapp at the CIA handled this end of the operation. The truck headed straight for the customs checkpoint. A customs officer left the warmth of his booth just long enough to grab the paperwork from the driver and then he retreated inside. Stroble assumed this guy was also on the payroll. Thirty seconds later the guy came back out with the paperwork and gave it back to the driver. They rolled through the gate and stopped at a truck yard no more than a quarter mile away. A truck of similar size, but without the ability to lift the cargo box vertically, was waiting with its rear door open. Stroble jumped out, opened the cargo door, and climbed in. The truck from the airport backed up until the two cargo areas were aligned with just a six-inch gap in between. The cargo container had ball bearings on the bottom so it could be easily maneuvered in tight spaces. Stroble unhooked two straps that had kept the container in place and then pushed the aluminum box from one truck into the back of the new one.
Once the truck from the airport left, Stroble jumped behind the wheel of the new vehicle and began driving toward an industrial park on the Patapsco River. Only four miles away, he took the quickest route, just like Rapp had told him. Five minutes later, he pulled into an old brick warehouse and closed the door. The entire trip took just under thirty minutes.
Two white vans were waiting side by side. Other than that the place was empty. Stroble let Rapp and Brooks out of the cargo container and they transferred Gazich into one van and the Russian into the other. Rapp put his bags and Brooks’s bags in the van with the Russian and then walked Brooks over to the other van.
“Do you know where you’re going?”
She nodded. “What if they won’t let me in?” She held up a passport. “This isn’t even real.”
“I told you I’d call and make sure you’re on the list. Candice Jones…just give them the passport, and they’ll tell you where to go.”
Brooks shook her head and frowned.
“What?” Rapp asked.
“They’re going to be expecting you.”
“Yes they are. But I’m not going.”
“Why do I have to do this?”
“Because you’re the one who thinks this will be good P.R. for the Agency.”
“I do, but I don’t see why you’re dumping it all on me.”
“Cindy, listen to me. I promise you this will not hurt your career. In fact, it will probably help it. Just hand Gazich over and leave. Don’t hang around and let them start peppering you with questions. There’s going to be an agent there who I know pretty well. He’s a big guy. Late fifties. His name is Skip McMahon. Just tell him I’ll call him.”
“When?”
“Today…tomorrow…I don’t know. You’d better tell him today. But whatever you do don’t tell him how we got into the country. Are we clear on that?”
“Yes.”
“Good. Follow us to the interstate and then once we hit the exit for Andrews you’re on your own. Give them Gazich and get out of there. I’ll call you in an hour. All right?”
“Yeah…I got it.”
“Good. Let’s roll.”
Brooks climbed behind the wheel of the one van and Rapp got into the passenger seat of the other. Stroble pulled down on the gearshift and put the van in drive. They pulled out of the garage and headed toward Interstate 95.
Stroble looked over at Rapp and said, “They’re going to shit their pants when they figure out you’re not there.”
“I know they are.”
“So what’s your master plan?”
“Sandbag them.”
“Huh?”
“So
oner or later the media and the Clark Kents at the FBI and Justice are going to turn the spotlight on me and make this about my tactics.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m just making sure they do it sooner rather than later.”
“And why is that a good idea?”
“I’m going to give them enough rope to hang themselves, and then I’m going to kick the chair out from under their legs.”
“I’m still not sure I follow.”
Rapp held up his Treo phone and played back the recording he’d made of the session he’d had with Gazich. “Don’t worry,” he said to Stroble. “By tomorrow evening they’re all going to be diving for cover.”
23
DULLES INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT
Ross had flown commercial with his Secret Service detail even though a private jet had been offered to him by one of the billionaire attendees at the conference. The offer was tempting, but Ross knew the media, the vicious bloggers, and the crazy talk radio folks would light him up. Taking a private jet home from a conservation summit smacked of elitism and hypocrisy. He could wait one more week until Air Force Two was at his disposal.
Besides, the Air France flight wasn’t bad. The stewardesses up in first class were extremely attractive and spared no effort in fawning over him. His fellow passengers wanted their photo taken with him. Ross was a man of the people. His not-so-pleasant conversation with Green in the wine cellar the night before had driven him to drink more wine than he should have, and he had boarded the plane with a head-splitting hangover. Everything after midnight was a slight blur. He remembered being in the kitchen with Speyer, and the lanky blond talking, though about what, he could not remember for the life of him. Music was playing, the blond started dancing, and the next thing Ross knew, he was pinned against the refrigerator; her ass pressed firmly against his groin. He had a glass of wine in his left hand; she had his right hand wrapped around her body and placed dangerously close to her left breast.