by J. T. Patten
Silver Star. You didn’t have a proxy for this so you staged some unwitting locals. Clever. You showed the threat graphically but didn’t kill innocent civilians. The van stopped long enough to be engaged by forces and captured on camera. That kept the focus on the terrorists and the threat, but didn’t cloud the message with victims. News tonight will give a chance for commentary and tomorrow you will show how the interviews were spot on. Classic psy ops. Whoever is behind this will now get a congressional subcommittee to push for more domestic terror funding appropriations in the coming days. No doubt, the votes will be unanimous.
“Havens you have it on yet?”
“Yeah, Daniels. I’m watching it now. Unbelievable. It’s just like you said. It’s going down now. No one will get hurt until tomorrow. Tomorrow could be a shit storm. What info did you dig up?”
“I take it you have the inside lane on this one too, huh?”
“Unfortunately, I do.”
“Well, what I learned is also unbelievable. Across the country, there have been dozens of situations like yours over the past few years. I don’t want to jinx you, but most of these guys end up dead about a year after their families are killed in a robbery, mass murder, or accident.”
“Not too surprising.”
“Good news is I have four potential suspects left. No one is from Chicago, except for you. There is a guy in New York, a guy in DC., and one that is missing.”
“Missing how?”
“Well, these other guys have proverbial radar pings in their areas. Traffic violations, credit card usage, bank accounts. Seems like they tried to go under the radar, but just had to hold on to a little something, which is what is popping up on our databases. I think we can put someone on these guys right away once we determine jurisdiction.”
“Daniels, fuck jurisdiction. Get someone to put kiddie porn on their computers, call and threaten the president from their cell phone, pull a damn fire alarm in their apartment or whatever. Smoke them out and whack ‘em!”
“Sean, c’mon. Really. I’ll see what I can do. What about the missing man?”
“He probably has better tradecraft than the others. What’s his name?”
“Roger Joyce. Family killed in a car accident while he was deployed. Just over a year ago. Meets the profile.”
“Rusty. Shit. Fucking traitor.” No worse than me I guess.
“Who’s Rusty? Oh, like a nickname? You know this guy, Roger Joyce?”
“I thought I was getting to know him better. Figures. And you have no info on him?”
“Nope. Was in Bragg and DC area, but the guy has bugged out for the last nine months.”
“Do a LexisNexis search on the Diligence database. You guys have access to that?”
“Sure. I’m at my desk now. I can pull it up. What am I looking for?”
“See if there are any known relationships. Should come up family. Look for anyone in Chicago area.”
“Hang on. Let me get his name in here and last cities… Bingo! Damn. He has family in Cicero. Nope. Parents dead. Property was sold in 2009. Asian family owns it now according to the record.”
“Call the Palmer House Hotel. See if he stayed there. If they don’t have his name, print out a copy of his driver’s license. Show the picture to the front desk, doorman, bar tender, anyone. He’s a big ass red head. He was our counterintelligence guy and probably covered his tracks. Anything else?”
“Nope. I’ll get on this. Why the Palmer House?”
“Seems like that’s where my friends stay. Daniels, this is the real deal. I need you to do me a favor.”
“What’s that?”
“If you find that Roger Joyce is at the hotel, send Neil over there. And if you wouldn’t mind, can you come back here to the hospital to watch my daughter?”
“Havens. What are you going to do? I need to help on this. Why Detective Neil?”
“Daniels, I trust you. Not many others I can say that about right now. Neil is better prepared to deal with Rusty. No offense, but it is what it is. I’ll be the backup plan but have to get in position.”
“Where are you going?”
“First, home to get something. Second, I’d prefer to keep you out of this part. Thanks in advance, Daniels. Maggie is all I have left. You have everything of mine in your care. Will you do it?”
“Well, if it’s all…”
Havens disconnected the call. He knew Daniels would challenge him for leaving Maggie. And Daniels would be right. What father would leave his child again after all that has transpired?
Christina, you know I have to go. I have to finish this. One last mission.
Even as Havens expressed the words in his mind, he knew he had said them time and again to his late wife. Promises said, but never kept. He bent over and kissed Maggie on the forehead.
“Daddy?”
Chapter 68
Havens left the hospital with tears streaming down his cheeks. Maggie had finally woken up and now he had to go. She woke scared and confused and he hadn’t helped things with his explanation for leaving. She did, however, understand when he said he had one man left that would pay for what happened to Maggie and Christina. He knew in actuality that it could be a lifetime of effort to eliminate everyone directly or indirectly responsible.
First things first. One man at a time.
Daniels had arrived at the hospital and relayed the news that a cop who was near the Palmer house was able to receive a text photo of Rusty and obtained a visual confirmation moments later. However, according to the Palmer House Hotel front desk receptionist, the identified man had checked out a few hours ago. Havens shifted to plan B. Father of the Year was certainly out of the question. His disregard for family commitment surfaced again when he found Cougar laying in the backseat of the car, forgotten.
In less than thirty minutes, Havens had dropped off Cougar, retrieved a pre-packed satchel with his tried and true Osprey Armament Glock 34 Tier One Recon pistol, and was now en route to where he suspected Rusty would be headed.
Havens figured Rusty would return to his parents’ home and kill the current owners in order to gain access. The home was located along Midway Airport’s runway flight path. Close enough for Rusty to launch the UAV towards commercial airplanes. Whether Rusty would actually use the unmanned aerial vehicle to attack the plane or simply scare the pilot didn’t matter. He assumed that Rusty would launch during the morning so news coverage would coincide with any simultaneous train attacks. At least that was how Havens would have done it.
Sean approached the house and recognized Detective Neil’s car parked on the quiet side street in front of the bungalow home. As he slowed to park a few houses down, he noticed a body slumped on the front porch of the home.
Neil.
Havens threw the car into park in the middle of the street and raced up the lawn to Detective Neil. Hearing the car screech and door slam, Neil turned towards the fast approaching Havens.
“Hey, the cavalry’s here,” he said weakly. “Guess my hunch was right. Wish you would’ve beat me here.”
“How bad is it?”
“I’m bleeding pretty good. I just radioed in that I am down. I crunched up here so I could compress the bleeding. Door was open. I must have gotten here just after Joyce did. I saw a body on the ground in the house right before he popped me. Hit me hard enough to push me out the door. Nine mil. I surprised him though. He didn’t hesitate, but the brief look I got on his face wasn’t rage. He and I met before at Bragg. I think he recognized my face but couldn’t place me. One thing for sure though…”
“What’s that?”
“He sure didn’t come out here and say sorry. He just shut the door. He needs to be taken out.”
“Think he went out the back?”
“Not sure. I don’t think he expects someone else to be coming for a bit. He may be figuring what to do next. You need to go in somehow and I need to throw up. Fuck this hurts.”
“Yeah, this isn’t how I thought it would go d
own. He’s gotten caught up in all this shady mess too, but looks like he’s playing for keeps.”
“You going to try and talk to him?”
Havens pulled a stun grenade from his satchel. “No. I’ve had enough lies and dead guys don’t lie. Can you throw this through the picture window?”
“Yeah. I can manage that. Drapes will probably catch fire.”
“That’s fine. I’m going around back and will throw one through the side window here on the right then hit the back door. Go ahead as soon as I round the corner.”
“Roger that. Fire in the hole, buddy.”
“See you in a few.”
“I’ll be here,” Neil said, wincing in pain as he positioned himself for the toss.
The first concussive explosion sounded and the second was immediately pitched by Havens and detonated on the side of the house. Havens figured Rusty would stay on the main floor in the event that he had to flee. As Havens rounded the brick wall to the back of the house, Rusty emerged from the house and stumbled down the back stairs, disoriented from the blasts. Rusty still held the 9mm he used against Detective Neil. Rusty tried to orient himself to his surroundings but failed to command his senses.
Havens took a big swallow. He knew how this was going to go down. He believed that Rusty had been used but couldn’t think of a fast way to improve the hand they had been dealt.
“It’s Sean Havens, Rusty. You’re safe! Just lower your sidearm! You’re safe! I’m not going to shoot. This is all going down bad.”
Rusty quickly leveled the firearm towards the sound.
Sean squeezed the trigger twice.
Chapter 69
Sean opened the front door of the Havens home to find Detectives Neil and Daniels. Daniels handed the small Sports Authority bag that he was holding to Sean and stepped inside.
“What’s this, early Christmas?” Sean asked.
“It’s not for you, Havens. We know how you accountants don’t like to play sports. Too afraid of jamming your calculator fingers. It’s for the dog.”
Havens pulled the size 3 soccer ball from the bag and smiled.
“Gee thanks, but you guys haven’t seen Cougar in awhile. She’ll choke on this thing now.”
At the sound of new voices, Cougar bounded up from the basement gnashing her teeth and barking relentlessly.
“COUGAR! DOWN!” Sean barked back.
With a whimper Cougar got down on all fours, anxiously smacking her tail against the hardwood floor like an old woman beating a dirty rug.
“Holy shit, Havens. She did grow. And she’s obedient. I’m impressed.” Daniels knelt down for a closer look.
“Careful, I don’t have her electric collar or thunder blanket on now, so she could go for your head.”
Slowly Daniels rose. “Fuckin’ beast.”
The men all laughed.
“She ate a frozen pork roast I was going to cook the other night right off the counter. Gone. Strings and all,” he added. “So you guys still rounding up the usual suspects in this circus show? I have been watching the news and sounds like you are making some progress.”
Neil put his hands in his pocket. He continued to watch the dog as he responded. Havens could see that Neil was recovering well from the gunshot but had some residual stiffness and discomfort.
“Well that’s the thing. I don’t know what we are doing. We keep following these trails, and we find papers, computers, names, but it doesn’t feel right. It’s like things are being left in the open. It makes it so we can find it but not have it so easy that it looks set up. It’s like a parent putting Easter eggs out for kids. Not too high, not too low, just within eyesight but not so you can see it directly.”
Daniels nodded. “Yeah, but I guess scoring so many little wins in such a short amount of time is giving us more exposure as a city, especially with such big loss of life on the board now, is getting us a lot more funding. So, in one sense, it was horrible, but on the other hand Chicago Police has never had so many resources available. They even approved implementation of the social networking link analysis tools that Lars had been pushing for to follow the money and attack the network for organized crime. Even has geospatial layover I hear so we can do pattern predictive analysis based on crime indicators. Slick shit.”
Neil nodded again in agreement and looked up at Havens. “Have you talked to Lars lately?”
Havens squinted at his new companions. “Is that an official inquiry or a friend inquiry?”
“Hey, you called us friends. Awww,” Daniels said, tilting his head in mock adoration.
“Friend inquiry,” Neil answered. “From our vantage, verdict is still out on that guy. Seems like he knew a bit too much. I know he was single and didn’t spend much, but I just hope he wasn’t on the take from these…whoever they are. CPD never did an IA investigation on him and his contributions got him a meritorious service award before he retired. FBI never checked on it either. Figures. I inquired about where all the intel we sent them on the trains went and they told us to back off. Did your friend Red ever say anything? I mean, we, well, you nailed it.”
“Yeah,” Daniels chimed in. “The Lars thing and Bureau thing don’t add up. I really thought we were going to stop this.”
Havens nodded and pursed his lips.
“It wasn’t meant to be,” Sean replied hesitantly. “Someone either called off or cut off everything we tried to disseminate. Red’s been busy with all the fanfare and accolades. I sent Lars a note. Christmas card really. Just saying we are all good, but I haven’t heard back from him. He left for Arizona in a hurry. I think he may be avoiding me for some reason. Not sure why. Something was off that’s for sure. He could be in some sort of trouble. I do worry about him. He’s too smart to have been played, and I can’t imagine he was dirty. Seems to be pointing that way though. It wasn’t the first time I was fooled this year though.”
“Is he in Arizona for good?”
“He keeps going back and forth, but I know he is out of his apartment. I stopped by and the mailbox has changed owners. Lars never had a name on his unit. I know he likes spring training, but I also know he loves a good hunt. I wouldn’t be surprised if he got involved with some law enforcement down there as a consultant, maybe looking into cartel stuff south of the border.”
“I suppose. Well, I won’t say to tell him hi from us. Can’t say we were close, but, man, he was a god when it came to a crime scene.”
“Let’s just pray he doesn’t become one,” Sean added.
“Hey, here’s a puzzler for you. Who do you think would win? Mexican cartels or the Albanians?”
Neil gave his partner a punch in the arm. “OK, Havens, we better get going. Have a good holiday.”
“You too, guys. Maggie and I are going on a little road trip to see a specialist out west, but we’ll be back for the Super Bowl if you aren’t doing anything.”
“May take you up on that if you have Cujo here locked away.”
“Deal.”
Chapter 70
Conrad knocked on the solid oak door. Despite the sterile feel of the corridor doors within the Pentagon, the quality of wood for the executive offices was quite nice.
“Come in, Conrad.”
“Sir.”
“Have you found him yet? Or the war chest of his that we funded?”
“No, sir.”
“Have you searched his home, his records, everything?”
“We are still looking for Draeger’s home, sir. The addresses we had ended up being abandoned homes in unincorporated areas. No utilities on, nothing. Mail was all sent to a forwarder and we lost the trail at a PO Box. Checked the security cameras and it had been him, but he paid in cash all the time. Trail is dead there. No credit card trails, money transfers, nothing. Draeger’s gone, sir.”
“How much did we lose from the approved funds we gave him?”
“Just over six hundred thousand. There could be more, but his guy Jason, the other commo whiz, is gone too. They moved the accounts
so we can’t access the funds. It appears they tapped into Silver Star too. Someone took a few hundred thousand. Draeger had another fund that is gone too. He kept the books on that.”
The general sat in silence. He rubbed his chin, then his ear, scratched his neck. He began to nod.
“Conrad, that snake accomplished as much as we could have hoped for. I can’t say I think he was the best man for it, and it was messy, but he succeeded in raising awareness and vigilance again in this country to an appropriate level. And we now have some resources back to keep our enemies at bay. To lose six hundred thousand dollars or six million dollars at this point is a shot of piss in the pot. It’s a fart in the wind compared to what we gained. No, I think this ended up alright. Plus, I’ve been ordered by someone else to use him, so we’re clear.”
“So should we call off the hunt?”
“God, no. Do I have to do all the work here? Eliminate those motherfuckers from the earth, wherever they are.”
“Sir, that won’t be easy.”
“My God, man, how did you make it this far? You make sure that man and his lackey cannot leave the country, cannot return to this country, cannot set foot in another country, cannot move by air, rail, sea, or dig under the fucking ground with the help of a million Chinamen. You trump up something bad and get it on all the wires. And if someone finds him…pffft pffft.” The general made a pistol motion with his fingers.
