The thin polyester material gave no opposition to the flame. In just an instant it was glowing brightly as the crowd cheered with everything it had.
Chapter Six
The heel of Charles Vance’s shoe was no longer resting on the corner of the conference room table. Nor was his bottom planted square in the padded seat at the head of the room.
Instead, he was on his feet, standing in front of the enormous screen on the opposite wall. To either side of him, Reiff, Andrews, and Rowe all stood as well.
Standing with his arms folded over his torso, Vance didn’t bother looking to any of them. He imagined they all wore the same expression he did – a mixture of shock and concern.
He didn’t need to glance over to confirm it.
It wasn’t like it would change anything.
This was bad, in a way he could not have imagined. Certainly not in any way he had encountered yet in his time as the Special Director.
Maybe if he dug back into the archives he would be able to uncover something similar that had happened somewhere in the region.
He’d just never heard of it.
The Agency’s presence in Venezuela was growing, but it still didn’t compare to some of the other countries on the continent. There were no cartels operating in broad daylight, controlling the government and everything else that went on. Nobody was trying to export copious amounts of cocaine or heroin out, most of it bound for Los Angeles or Miami.
Interest was largely predicated on the fact that it was a country that it was in the midst of a political and economic freefall. Interfering with such a thing didn’t do much to serve America’s interests.
Making sure it didn’t turn into the sort of place that could easily become Colombia or worse did.
Monitoring the campaign was something Vance had decided on not long before. At the time, the decision was an easy one to make, even easier to justify.
Whoever was the next president – new or incumbent – would have a large role in how the country was shaped moving forward. Vance wouldn’t be doing his job if he didn’t know everything he could about the two candidates, including the promises they made along the way.
As any American could easily attest, things said on the campaign trail rarely came to pass in real life, but they did often serve as a starting point.
All of that circled in the back of Vance’s head as he stood and stared at the screen. Keeping tabs on the election was necessary, but it wasn’t supposed to be difficult.
It damned sure wasn’t supposed to be shocking.
“Is that...?” Andrews began, his voice trailing away.
“A burning American flag?” Vance finished. “Yes. Yes, it is.”
“And that crowd...?” Reiff asked.
“Eating it up?” Rowe said. “Absolutely.”
On the screen before them, the flag was down to just a few loose strands of fabric. Most of the flames had receded to nothing more than glowing cinders. A few melted parts had already fallen to the ground at the base of the flagpole.
Over the years, he’d seen many pictures of the stars and stripes burning, most of them from the Vietnam War era, when such social protest was commonplace. Not once had ever seen one in person.
Never had he ever witnessed one being torched on foreign soil.
Especially by someone seeking the highest office in the land, looking to ascend there by playing on hatred of the western world.
“Has there been any indication of this sort of behavior before now?” Vance asked.
In his periphery, Rowe took a half-step forward. “Never. Like I said, he’s a businessman. If anything, he’s profited greatly from the global markets.”
Under other circumstances, Vance might have smirked at the irony of a man trying to villainize the very thing that had allowed him to be where he was.
“What is the anti-American sentiment like in the region?” he asked.
“No more than anywhere else in the world,” Rowe said. “There’s some occasional grumblings about greed and such. Nothing that would seem to indicate this sort of rhetoric.”
Both of the answers Vance had already known before asking the questions. He just had to make sure he did, and that his three ranking staff heard him do so.
The person he had to call next would ask him the exact same things.
On the screen, the man they were watching turned away from the flag. He raised a fist in the air and began to bellow, the crowd eating up every word he said.
Vance didn’t hear a bit of it. Nothing that was said from this point forward greatly mattered anyway.
A line had officially been crossed.
There was no undoing that.
Part II
Chapter Seven
The flies were split into three distinct categories, one each for the trio of hard plastic cases piled on the desk before me.
On the right were the dry flies. Parachute Adams. Stimulators. A few elk hair caddis and foam beetles. Four full rows, all were filled to capacity without being overcrowded and risking damage in transit.
Opposite them on the right were the nymphs. Hare’s ear, pheasant tail, and princes, each with their own row.
Set into the space between them were the streamers – my personal favorites. A little larger, they were designed for times when you really wanted to get a trout’s attention. Muddler minnows, Mickey Finn, and several woolly buggers, all tied up and ready to go.
In total, it was a collection that a normal person could pick up at most any Sportsman’s Warehouse in the greater Yellowstone area for a few hundred dollars. If someone was especially enterprising, they might even be able to find it for half that online somewhere.
For me, it represented more than a week’s worth of effort, all of it sitting stooped over my tying station, squinting through a magnifying glass.
Originally tied in anticipation of the spring season, I didn’t feel the least bit sorry for deciding to bring them along now. Was reasonably certain my client would feel the same.
Leaning away from the desk, I heard the springs on my desk chair groan beneath me. Giving them no mind, I laced my fingers atop the shaggy hair on my head, admiring my handiwork.
A moment that lasted just a few seconds before being interrupted by the sound of the bell on the front door announcing that I had a visitor.
Flicking my gaze from the spread before me to the door, I listened as heavy footsteps crossed the wooden planks of the front half of the building. Knowing merely by the sound and pace who it would be, I remained motionless as Kaylan Quick appeared in the doorway across from me.
Six years prior, I had moved to West Yellowstone and founded Hawk’s Eye Views, a private outdoor guide company. Drawing on the training I had received first from my father, later from the navy, and finally, by the DEA, I had made a second career out of taking people from all over into the nation’s largest playground.
In that time, I had hired only a single employee – Kaylan. For the first two years I was in business, most things were done by word of mouth. By extension, that meant finances were tight, at times barely covering what I alone needed to survive.
Over time, word got out and my clientele expanded, allowing me to purchase the building we were now sitting in.
A year later, the need for someone to answer phones and keep my calendar straight had precipitated the need to hire on.
At the time, she was nominally more than that, a local girl in search of work, thankful just to have something to do. In the few years since, both the business and her role had each grown tenfold.
Now if pressed on trying to give her a title, I would probably default to the clichéd Jack-of-all-Trades, a moniker that would include marketing whiz, computer expert, customer service guru, and a host of other things.
Not the least of which, friend.
“Why, hello there.”
Kaylan’s first response was a huff. The second was dropping the heavy shoulder bag she carried to the floor, the item landing with a thu
d.
Half a decade younger than me in age, she was freshly thirty, a fact she was still doing a good job of concealing. Carrying a few extra pounds kept her skin clear and full. A pile of curls extended from the back of her head like a blonde pompom.
Dressed for April in the park, she wore jeans and a hooded Montana State sweatshirt. In sneakers, she was just a shade above five feet in height.
“Hello yourself,” she replied. She leaned her body against the door frame and folded her arms across her torso. “Nice to see you’re here in one piece.”
I knew exactly what the veiled reference was alluding to, a situation that I had been pulled into up north in Glasgow a few months earlier. The reports in the aftermath had been appropriately vague to keep any names or incriminating details out, but in a place like Montana, it didn’t take long for whispering to occur.
And given that my own cabin had been destroyed in a similar dustup not long before that, it was only natural for my name to get mentioned.
Not that I – or the others involved – would ever confess to such a thing.
“Of course,” I replied. “Winters up here aren’t as hard as you guys try to make them out to be.”
Opening her mouth to respond, Kaylan thought better of it. She settled with a simple nod of her head, a knowing smile on her lips.
Again, a friend.
“Thanks for coming in a week early,” I said, shoving the conversation back to the present. “I really appreciate the help.”
The look lingered another moment, letting me know she saw what I’d done there, before she waved a hand across her body. “You kidding me? By this time of year, I’m starting to crawl the walls at home. If I have to watch one more episode of The Price is Right...”
She didn’t finish the thought, though she didn’t have to. The previous fall, her mother had moved in with her and promptly commandeered the best seat in the house and the remote control.
At last word, there seemed to be no sign of her relinquishing either in the near future.
“Still,” I replied, “spring cleaning and setup isn’t exactly the most fun part of our job. I’m sorry I won’t be able to lend a hand.”
“No worries. Like I said, be nice to get out of the house for a while.”
It seemed there was a great deal more she wanted to add but pulled up short.
Family has a way of doing that.
“Take all the hours you need,” I replied. “This is all being billed as overtime, so feel free to milk the clock.”
Chapter Eight
The sun was sitting at a forty-five-degree angle, exactly between the horizon and high noon. Shining in from the east, it blazed through the windows on the veranda, illuminating the office of Venezuelan president Miguel Salazar.
When he had first taken office, the veranda had been one of his favorite places in the world. Every morning he had taken his Cafecito there. For one solid hour, he would sit and sip it, perusing newspaper offerings from around the globe.
Now, on the heels of all that had transpired in recent years, it was determined by his security staff that presenting himself in the open like that would be a foolish and unnecessary risk.
Which meant he was now resigned to sitting in his desk chair and looking out through the thick plexiglass that had been installed over the windows to protect him.
Like a puppy in a pet shop staring out the window in longing, hoping to one day escape.
Down to the last dregs in his porcelain cup, Salazar pushed it and the saucer it rested on a few inches away. Turning sideways, he lifted his right ankle to his left thigh, his linen pant leg hiking up, revealing bare skin beneath.
If he had a major function that he needed to attend, the full regalia of suit and dress shoes came out. Over time, such events had become less frequent, a combination of both his post and the general apathy of the country as a whole.
In their stead, it was easier to cluster such things together on the same day, meaning that most of the time he was free to dress as he now was.
Linen pants, cotton dress shirt, leather slip-on shoes without socks.
The only acceptable business attire for a place where the temperature and humidity were both perpetually above seventy.
Especially in April, the hottest month of the year.
In his hands, Salazar held a copy of The Guardian. Just hours removed from the presses in London, he idly flipped through the pages, reading more of the usual offerings from the first world.
The stock market was continuing to stall in the wake of their exit from the European Union. A gunman had shot three people in a tube station.
On the far end of the room, a door opened and a woman with silver hair and a green skirt suit passed through. With her came a burst of background noise, all of it fading as she quickly closed the door behind her.
Walking on square-heeled shoes, she strode directly to the opposite side of his desk and stopped, a sheaf of papers clutched to her chest.
“Buenos Dias.”
Salazar flicked his gaze from the newspaper to see his Chief of Staff standing before him. His own cousin, he had known her since birth, the two having grown up together and spent much of their adult lives working together.
Most people that were close to them assumed they were siblings, their constant company and close semblance making it a likely conclusion.
Both were on the smaller side in stature, standing with exaggerated precision, chests out. Each had thick hair that was once dark and glossy but was now trending toward silver. Both shared smooth olive skin.
The only major difference between them – save fashion sense – was the thin beard Salazar wore along his jaw and framing his mouth.
“Good morning, Isabel. How are you this morning?”
She ignored the question, nodding to the paper in his lap. “How is the news from around the world today?”
As always, she spoke in short sentences, the words clipped. More than once Salazar had thought it was like she was always racing to finish speaking as fast as she could.
Folding up the paper, Salazar sighed and tossed it on the table. “Same old stuff. Economies are hurting, madmen with guns, but people like to say we’re the ones that are collapsing.”
If she had any opinion on the matter, Isabel kept it to herself, offering only a terse nod. “Have you seen our newspaper yet this morning?”
Picking up on something in her voice, Salazar asked, “No, should I?”
“You should,” she replied. Pulling a copy from the stack in her arms, she dropped it down onto the desk before him.
His gaze fixed on her for a moment, Salazar shifted his focus down to the newsprint. The way it was folded, he could only make out half the headline stretched across the top, though the picture below it was clear enough. Several inches tall, it was done in color, the subject framed to stare directly up at him.
His opponent, Edgar Belmonte, standing beside a burning American flag.
Again, he flicked his gaze up to her. “What the...?”
Expecting no response, he reached out and slowly unfurled the paper. Once it was expanded to full size before him, he scanned the article quickly, his attention eventually landing in the same place it had started.
On Belmonte standing beside the flag, a hoard of cheering people visible in the background.
“Any idea where this came from?” he asked.
“Sir?”
Gesturing toward the page, Salazar said, “You know, this. The burning flag, the anti-American sentiment, all of it.”
As he asked the question, he leaned back in his chair, lacing his fingers over his stomach.
Taking the cue, Isabel slid to the side, lowering herself onto the seat across from him.
“Truth? No clue,” she said. “We’ve been monitoring his campaign up until this point, and thus far it’s been pretty vanilla. Traditional values, education, the same old stuff.”
“Right,” Salazar inserted. Still months away from the election, he had
kept a very distant eye on what his opponent was doing.
Up to this point, he’d been quite unimpressed. Definitely nowhere near the point of feeling threatened.
This was a different tact entirely.
“Desperation play?” he asked.
“This early?” Isabel asked. “Hard to say, but I doubt it.”
Salazar nodded. That would be his best guess as well. Crazy things like this were usually the sort of thing that occurred on the final weekend before polls opened.
To do something so outrageous so early seemed to indicate that Belmonte was going to use it as a platform moving forward.
For a moment, neither side spoke, both processing the information.
“This could be bad,” Salazar eventually said.
“Extremely.”
Given the weight in her tone and the instant response, he focused on her, unable to miss the signal she was handing him. “What do we know thus far?”
Isabel drew her mouth into a tight line. “Two things. First, we did a quick overnight poll. Just based on this, Belmonte jumped eight points.”
Salazar felt his eyes bulge slightly. Eight points more than cut his lead in half. Eight points could make for a much more difficult election than he had anticipated.
That sort of a response to a burning American flag could also signify a starkly different public sentiment than he had realized.
“And the second?”
“We have a call with the White House set for this afternoon.”
Chapter Nine
“So why am I here early this year?” Kaylan asked. She had pushed herself away from the doorframe and was now seated in one of the two visitor chairs on the opposite side of the desk from me.
Which effectively meant my office – despite comprising the entire back half of the building – could comfortably accommodate one more individual.
Provided they weren’t too large.
Not that such shortcomings had ever had any noticeable effect on my business model.
“And does it have anything to do with the Montana jewelry cases you’ve got spread out here?”
Hellfire: A Suspense Thriller (A Hawk Tate Novel Book 4) Page 3
