by Trevor Scott
Kim saved Jake by coming out with news from Seoul. “Pam had just gotten back to the office when I sent her the photos of the two dead men. She wants to know if you would consider drawing out those who are after you.”
“That’s my plan,” Jake assured the young officer. “Normally, I’d like to do that here in a remote location, where I can see them coming. But that puts this whole junket in jeopardy.”
“What about me?” Lori asked. “I have to be at the DMZ in two days for the six-party talks.”
Jake stood up and thought for a moment. “Well, it’s not a good idea for you to stay here. The head of your security detail didn’t even recognize you. That’s just incompetent. Plus, their security let those two men past their perimeter downstairs. Of course there will probably be congressional hearings to get to the bottom of their failure.”
“Hey,” Lori said. “We have a vital job to do. We’re the watchdogs of our government.” She sounded serious.
Jake said, “Settle down. I didn’t mean you. You were the only one who asked me reasonable questions.”
Kim raised his hands, as if a school kid trying to get his teacher’s attention. “What’s the plan? I’ve been ordered to stay with Jake wherever he goes.”
“Do you have a safe house, or two, in the Seoul area?” Jake asked.
“Of course.”
Jake looked at Lori and then to Kim. “Put the congresswoman up in one for a couple days. Then I’ll open myself up for those trying to find me.”
“Can you at least keep one alive next time?” Kim asked with a smirk.
“Roger that. But I get to gather the intel.”
“I’m here to learn from the master,” Kim said. “As I said, we respect our elders in Korea.”
“Smart ass,” Jake muttered. He was beginning to like this young officer.
“All right.” Kim was about to text his office.
“Hold off on that,” Jake said.
“Why?”
“How tired are you?” Jake asked.
Kim laughed. “Are you kidding? I haven’t had this much excitement since joining the Agency. I’m wired.”
“Well, you haven’t been hanging around me that long,” Jake assured him. “Keep your head on a swivel. You ready to drive that rental car to Seoul?”
“Yes, sir.”
Lori got up. “Let’s check out.”
Jake smiled. “No. How attached are you to your clothes?”
She shrugged and said, “There’s nothing I can’t replace.”
“Good.” Jake went to her suitcase and started throwing Lori’s clothes around the room. Taking the cue, Kim and Lori helped out by making the room look like it had been trashed by someone looking for something.
Satisfied, Jake considered the security folks out in the corridor. Somehow he and Kim would have to get Lori past them. As it turned out, most of the attention was on the two dead men in Jake’s room. The three of them simply walked down the hall to the stairs in the opposite direction. Moments later they were outside and piled into the rental KIA, Kim behind the wheel, Jake in the front passenger seat, and Lori lying on the back seat as they drove away from the hotel.
●
The dark Hyundai sedan cruised down the secluded highway along the southwest outskirts of Gyeongju. The driver was a stocky Korean, with limited English skills, his black hair with white highlights spiked up into a faux hawk. His boyish face was speckled with wisps of hair in an attempt at a beard, but he would never grow enough to cover his chubby face.
Alex Yaroslav, in the front passenger seat, combed his fingers through his long hair as he listened to the man on the other end of the phone. The Lobbyist was pissed that they had not captured Jake Adams. Alex turned to look at his friend Danko in the back seat. They both shook their heads. Then he glanced back at the car following them. He knew it was only his Asian comrades—the two unlikely intel officers from North Korea, the intense man in his forties and the hot woman in her mid-thirties. Those two had provided the men to go after Adams, but had obviously failed miserably. Alex listened carefully once the Lobbyist mentioned what Milena had discovered for them. He told his boss not to worry and disconnected.
Danko scratched his bald head and then leaned forward and said, “What’s the plan?”
Looking at the driver for a moment, Alex switched from English to Russian. “He said we should not entirely depend on our friends here.”
“No kidding,” Danko said. “And?”
“And our girlfriend back there was able to hack into the state department database through a back door, which led her to the embassy in Seoul. She cracked the cell phone codes and can track any employee in Korea. The only one currently in the eastern part of South Korea is on an expressway just west of Daegu City.”
“That has to be Jake Adams,” Danko surmised.
“Well, it’s probably that Korean CIA officer,” Alex agreed. “But Adams is with him.” Then he switched to English and told the driver to get them to the train station immediately.
If Adams was driving the whole way, it would take them at least three or four hours. They could catch the next bullet train and be to Seoul in two and half hours. As long as that CIA officer stayed with Adams, they would be able to easily track the man down. And this time he would take a personal interest in capturing the man. Alex and Danko had followed that former CIA officer across Montana, been duped into going to Portland, Oregon, and then almost caught up with him in Washington, DC. Now they had flown halfway around the world to get the bastard. Why hadn’t that bitch just given him the encryption code? Also, there wasn’t a moment in the day when he didn’t think about his old friend Bogden, who Adams killed in Montana. That man would pay for killing his friend. They should have just drowned the man in that metal barrel in DC.
26
Jungbu Naeryk Expressway 45, South Korea
Jake glanced back to Lori, who was sound asleep in the back seat. Then he turned back and made sure Kim wasn’t falling asleep on him. “You all right?” he asked the Agency officer.
“Yeah, I’m fine. We’ve got at least two more hours at this speed. You’ve been on that phone and I’m guessing you haven’t been checking your Facebook status.”
“I’ve never even been on Facebook or any other social media site,” Jake assured him. “I do like your internet connectivity through your cell towers in this country. Haven’t found a blind spot yet.”
“You won’t along the expressways,” Kim said. “South Korea is more wired than just about any country. The gamers demand it.”
Jake explained to Kim how he had asked for help from the Agency to trace the background on two men, former intel officers. He had a feeling they were middle men in this entire affair, and had probably been part of the torture of Toni—perhaps even her killers. Kurt Jenkins had found some information for Jake.
“You think they’re here in Korea?” Kim asked.
“I would bet on it. I’m sure they were behind the two Koreans who came to my room tonight. And I’ve been wondering about those two ever since I killed their friend in Montana. Well, perhaps before then, when the two men attempted to torture me in DC. Just before my appearance on FOX.”
“Those were the guys you were warning?” Kim said with a slight chuckle. “You really gave Bill O’Reilly a shock. What has you stumped about those men?”
“We were explaining to the congresswoman that if I was running an op, I might use various operatives from totally irrelevant countries to throw off the FBI or the Agency.”
“Makes sense,” Kim said. “Hire the best you can find. I hear a lot of our own former special forces are being used by security for billionaires and companies.”
The young officer just described Jake’s employment since he left the Agency. “Well, as it turns out, they were able to trace their source of income. To a certain degree. The money was deposited in their accounts in Andorra. That country is very secretive with their banking. But they were able to catch a transfer from a
bank in Belize. That bank account is controlled by a holding company in the Cayman Islands. You sense a pattern here?”
“I believe so,” Kim said. “Obviously I knew about the Caymans and Belize, but I had no idea that Andorra was a big tax haven.”
“They’ve been stepping up once the Swiss and others in Europe started caving to the U.S. government who were concerned about terrorist funding, along with tax sheltering by their own citizens. It turns out the Andorran government has nothing to fear from our Federal government.”
“Where does the money come from after the Caymans?”
“They’re still working on that,” Jake said. “Breaking down the holding company. Looking at the principals and making connections. It might take a while, though. I was just in contact with an old friend at Interpol to see if he could help out.”
“Are there any contacts you don’t have?”
Jake’s phone buzzed and he checked the incoming text. He thanked the sender and said to Kim, “The NSA traced my friends to South Korea.”
“Seriously? Where?”
Smiling, Jake said, “They’re on the KTX from Gyeongju to Seoul. They’ll beat us there. I told you they were behind the men coming to my room tonight.”
“Will the NSA be able to keep track of them?”
“As long as their phones are on,” Jake said. “The better question might be why did they leave Gyeongju? Their men failed. They won’t stop until they get me. How do they know I left the city?” Jake thought about what Toni had told him after he turned over the professor’s work to her. The Agency had another leak.
●
On the KTX Bullet Train
Alex and Danko sat next to each other on the bullet train first class section. Sitting in the aisle seat, Alex glanced up toward the front of the car where two of their Korean comrades sat. Then he looked across the aisle at the man named Kwan, who was sleeping and looked like a college professor in his black slacks, white button up shirt, and his miss-matched blazer. The man’s salt and pepper hair was disheveled and could have used a comb days ago. Alex had no idea who Kwan really was, but the Lobbyist had told him to defer as much as possible to the man’s expertise in Korea. Apparently the guy had been working both sides of the DMZ in the intelligence game since he could shave.
Next to Kwan was the pretty young woman introduced to Alex as Ra Min Jee, but who went by the name Jee. Although she looked like a stiff breeze would knock her over, Kwan assured Alex and Danko that she was a former captain in the North Korean Army, spending most of her time there teaching Tae Kwan Do, before being hand-picked as an officer in the intelligence service. She had spent the last five years getting close to American soldiers and airmen—very close—trying to extract as much tactical information as her body could afford. It wasn’t clear how an active officer in the north’s intelligence service had gotten involved with the Lobbyist and his people. She had said nothing at all since they all got on the train outside of Gyeongju.
Finding it hard to sleep, Alex got up and stretched his legs. The monitor screen said they were currently cruising at 303 KPH. He wandered back toward the rest rooms and went in to try to relieve himself. But he was dehydrated. On missions like this he always forgot to drink. Only getting a trickle out, he washed his hands and splashed some water on his face, his eyes suddenly concentrating on the scar along his jaw line. His mind flashed momentarily to the incident that had got him his most distinguishing feature. Many thought that he had grown his hair to his shoulders to cover the scar. But he had simply gotten lazy in the past few years. Being on the road so much from his native Prague, he had not found a barber he could trust.
As Alex left the rest room, he almost ran into the North Korean officer, Jee.
With stoic insistence, Jee shifted her head and eyes for him to follow her. She was wearing tight black stretch slacks. How could he say no?
The two of them went between cars, an area that was much noisier than the passenger area.
She turned quickly and Alex thought she was going to strike him. But instead she grasped his jacket and pulled him to her, landing a passionate kiss on the lips. Even with her high heels, she had to go onto her toes and he had to lower his head significantly to make the connection.
Finally, she pulled away and backed against a metal wall, her eyes piercing through him. “How did you get the scar?”
“How did you learn to speak perfect English?” Alex asked her.
“I went to the University of Washington for my degree,” she said, with little affection in her voice. “Turns out it was nowhere near the American capital.”
“You didn’t like it there?”
“It rained a lot. But the classes were easy, since most Americans spend their free time drinking and fucking.”
“If you weren’t into those two things,” Alex said, a shrug, “it would be easy to distinguish yourself.”
“My GPA was not important. I already had a degree from my country. I was there for other reasons. Microsoft and other computer companies are in the area. You understand. You have a cigarette?”
Alex pulled out a pack of American cigarettes and flipped one up for her. Then he lit it for her and she took in a deep breath, bringing the end to a bright orange. Then he decided to have one with her, lighting up himself. He usually only smoked early in the morning or late at night. This was both.
“Kwan doesn’t let me smoke in front of him,” Jee said. “He’s a health nut. Doesn’t drink, smoke or, as far as I can tell, fraternize with women.”
“Maybe he likes men,” Alex surmised.
She shook her head and let out a stream of smoke. “I think he’s a eunuch. Our government cuts the balls off of a lot of its intelligence officers.”
“Seriously?”
“Yep. Fewer distractions. They’d take our clitoris if they thought we’d ever find pleasure in sex.”
Alex took in a long breath and let out two perfect floating circles of smoke. “Do you?”
She looked into their car and then across to the car behind theirs. Then she reached down to his crotch and felt his hardness. “This will more than suffice.” She put out her cigarette and led him back inside to the rest room.
With one smooth motion, Jee pulled her stretch pants and underwear down to her knees. Then she turned and put her hands against the wall like she was being frisked by the police. Alex stripped his pants down and entered her in one smooth motion. The entire encounter was over in minutes. Then they dressed and went back out for another cigarette. But neither said a word until the cigarettes were done.
She stared at him until he said, “What?”
“I thought you might not fit.”
He smiled. “Sorry it was over so fast.”
Jee patted him on the shoulder. “You’ll do better next time.”
“Will there be a next time?”
She finally smiled, nodded, and then left him there alone.
He considered going out after her, but decided to have one more smoke to consider what he would do to her next time. His mind sequenced through just about every position he’d ever tried as he took great pleasure in this cigarette.
27
Seoul, South Korea
The sun fought to rise over the mountains, obscured by swirling clouds, the prospect of snow inevitable, as Jake departed the Parisian-style bakery carrying a bag of croissants and a cardboard container with three large cups of coffee. They had driven through the night, with Lori sleeping the entire way and Jake making sure Kim stayed awake.
Jake got into the rental car and passed food and coffee to the others. “Other than the hot Korean girls behind the counter, I would have guessed we were in Paris,” Jake said.
Kim smiled and then burned his lips on the coffee. “I guess I should have bought.”
Jake shook his head. “On your Agency pay?”
“Good point.”
They sat and ate in silence until all the croissants were gone. Then Kim started the car and pulled out into th
e light early morning traffic.
“How far to the safe house,” Lori asked.
Kim looked at her in the rearview mirror. “Not far, ma’am. About ten minutes.”
“Good, because I really have to pee.”
“Wow,” Jake said. “I wasn’t sure congresswomen did that.”
She smacked the back of his chair.
The safe house was a stand-alone structure behind a tall stone wall with a remote-control metal gate that would have been strong enough to secure most third-world embassies. The only thing missing was armed guards. And those would have only brought attention to the place in this high-end neighborhood a few blocks from Gyeongbokgung Palace in the central Seoul region. This palace was the city’s most famous, and sat in a huge park that also contained the National Museum of Korea.
Kim drove straight into a garage and closed the door remotely with his cell phone before any of them got out.
The inside of the safe house was modestly adorned with typical South Korean contemporary furniture that could have come from Ikea, Jake guessed.
Lori wandered around and checked out the place. She was looking at the aesthetics while Jake checked out the security of the place. He had seen worse safe houses, and much better. The house blended well with the neighborhood. That was a good thing. It was never good to stand out. But the door from the garage was solid metal and the front door was solid wood reinforced with metal inside. Both would hold against small arms fire, as would the windows, which would stop bullets and shrapnel from a blast outside. But nothing would protect them against a direct assault with larger weapons. Not that Jake guessed that would come, though. No, these people wanted him alive. At least long enough to get him to break the encryption for them.
“Not a bad place,” Lori finally said.
Jake sat on a leather sofa and swiped his finger across the coffee table. “When did you use this last?”
Kim shrugged. “Before my time here. I’ve only been here once during my first week in Korea. We have two places in the Seoul area.”
