by James, Mark
“Can I steal the helicopter, the good one? That would get me back here in about an hour, maybe less. We’ll hide the markings.”
He was referring the president’s military helicopter, one of two that existed.
“Take it.”
†
Lani sat on the couch across from Jack. The rear windows were open and they could hear gulls crying out at sea. They’d said nothing to each other for the past few minutes. The shock was still setting in.
Jack’s mind had been running through options, tactics, probabilities.
“Alright, let’s not psych ourselves out,” he said, trying to find a bright spot. “If we pull back, the core problem remains, there are simply more people chasing after us. Our opponents have made another move and, in doing so, have necessarily exposed themselves further. We need to use this, trace it back to its source, stay on-target.”
He knew it was a reach; they’re situation was impenetrably worse. However, another touchstone of strategy was that it was always best to keep one’s troops positive – or, in this case, his only soldier. And he would surely need Lani if they were ever going to escape this narrowing trap.
“It’s not that, Jack, I can handle the pressure. But you need to tell me what’s happening. I need to know.”
Mac said that the order of nondisclosure on Aisha had come directly from the president. With that said, Jack wasn’t a member of the administration and couldn’t be ordered by anyone, to do anything.
Honor, however, made him keep that promise, along with the knowledge of what leaking Aisha’s existence could do to the administration, if not her. It was certainly not the time for another global crisis.
“It would expose you, Lani, make you a bigger target.”
“Jack, I’m already exposed, we both are. To be honest, though, I don’t think that has anything to do with it.”
“What do you mean?”
“What did you say last night, that we needed to trust each other?”
He decided to dig in.
“Lani, I gave my word to Mac and through him to the president.”
“And what about your word to me?”
He looked at her, expressionless.
She became quiet, “That’s not it, though, is it?”
“Honestly, Lani, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“It’s about you, Jack. You’re going to have to start trusting someone again.”
Maura. It was never far away.
He continued to look at her, through her.
He then remembered what Maura had once told him when they’d first met – that no matter what had happened in her life, if she was lost or upset, or didn’t know what to do, all she had to do was ask: What would someone like Jesus do in her same circumstance? Or the Buddha or Lao Tsu? If they were alive, standing next to her, what would they say? She admitted that it sounded corny, yet, strangely, each time she asked the answer simply came to her, as if it had always been right in front of her.
If he were Lani, right now, what would he need?
He looked deeply into those jade green eyes, seeing that she needed…him.
“Alright, Lani, we’re in this together. I meant what I said.”
He started with the theater bombings and the capture of Aisha in Iowa, the white orchid, how he’d been secretly brought in by Mac and the president to interrogate Aisha and the ensuing pressure from the GMA.
“And, she was just about to give up the terrorist cell location in Croatia when all of this started.”
“Do we know anything about this girl, Aisha?” Lani asked. “I mean, where’s she from?”
“A small village in Southern Lebanon. She immigrated to the U.S. to attend college on a student VISA, graduated early with a bachelor’s degree and then disappeared – until the bombings. We were trying to obtain information on the cell location and her activities in the U.S. during the gap, trying to find threads that could possibly lead back to other sleeper cells in the U.S.”
“There’s more?”
“No one knows. The NSA still hasn’t found out where Aisha’s group was hiding, although they know that the terrorists picked up rental cars in Minnesota and had a contact there.”
“Did they apprehend the contact?”
“Another Arab, deceased, suicide, face bleached too – the orchid I told you about. He was living in the middle of this Minnesota town. He attended a church as a cover, every Sunday like clockwork. He even dated one of the parishioners. No one suspected.”
“Hiding in plain sight,” she whispered.
“And maybe,” she continued, turning to Jack, “that could be the key for us? Perhaps the clue is right in front of us and we’re simply not seeing it, because we’re too rushed, or too… something.”
That could be true, Jack considered. In the past when he’d trained new prosecutors, one of the main pitfalls he warned about was becoming too wrapped up in the list of questions they’d spent the previous night concocting. In a trial, opportunities arose at random, and if your face is stuck in a notepad, holding to it like a safety blanket for your nerves, you’ll miss your chance.
“Good point,” he said. “Let’s backtrack, think it through. We know that, first, the key is Aisha and, second, that the GMA desperately wants to get at her. Why? It would certainly be a plum in the GMA’s cap – and justify their continued existence – if they could find and destroy the Croatian cell. But is that sufficient motivation to set up – and in such an elaborate fashion – the phony bank account transfers? The same accounts we might later trace back to them?”
“Which puzzles me,” he said.
“Tell me,” she said, leaning forward.
“Because, if they know that we – meaning, Mac and Josh – will eventually track down the bank account numbers and prove the transfers to be false, that means that their actions, their eventual goal, is time sensitive.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning that whatever the GMA needs from Aisha, they need to obtain within a certain time frame, after which they must be assuming that any of our efforts to find the account information won’t matter. As if, by the time we locate the evidence to prove our innocence, it won’t matter because…”
“Because…” Lani said, “they’ll already be in control. And they’ll be able to bury the evidence themselves.”
He looked at her. “And, in the process, bury us.”
“We’re on a countdown, aren’t we?”
She already knew the answer.
†
“Release!” he ordered, prompting a man in an impeccable suit a hundred feet away to open a door as two forms launched into the sky.
Lucien stood in the middle of a green valley – his valley, to be precise, with national forests all around. Behind, his estate house – reconstructed precisely from an English castle – loomed over the valley and the morning mists like an ancient, indifferent sentinel.
In a flurry, the two pheasants launched into the air, seeking their freedom.
Lucien felt the vintage Parker 12 gauge double-barreled shotgun in his hands – it’s cold sensuousness, its raw power. He raised it, sighting one of the racing birds. A ripping blast echoed across the valley and one of the forms fell like a damaged kite into the long grass.
He turned towards the other, holding his breath, caressing the trigger. The bird, still climbing, had almost made the treetops when the next sound came. Alive but winged, it fell through the branches, striking several until it found the ground in a thud.
Lucien raised his hand as two English setters bounded towards the woods.
“How did you like that, dear?”
The pale woman lying on the blanket behind him said nothing. She was a model he’d met the night before at a downtown party. She was young, distracted by anything and, above all, desperately trying to look like Twiggy.
“I don’t care about birds,” she said, vacuously playing with her hair. “When are we going shopping? You promised.”
> He ignored her. In his eyes, she existed on an evolutionary rung directly above the birds. Still, there was her smell: sweet, musk.
Lucien’s servant since childhood, Mr. Henry Strawn, walked across the lawn.
Strawn’s perfectly shined shoes and cuffs were wet from the grass. In the early mornings, his age and arthritis made him stoop to shine them. “Sir,” he announced, “Mr. Jessup has arrived. Should I bring him down, or leave him in the visitor’s study?”
“Out here,” Lucien answered as he flicked a cartridge shell at the model, who swatted it away like a bug.
This made him smile.
Jessup walked up and stooped over, wiping the dew off his shoes.
“Yes, Mr. Jessup,” Lucien said. “I assume there’s an emergency, or you wouldn’t be interrupting my sport, correct?”
The model rolled over and fell asleep and Jessup looked down, as if he’d just noticed her.
“Ah, sir…”
Lucien turned, the gun now casually pointed at Jessup’s midsection.
Jessup noted the barrel as Lucien motioned down at the girl, “As you can see, our Ms. Twiggy doesn’t have all day. Nor do I.”
He flicked another shell and it hit her on the rump, bouncing off and causing her to moan.
“Sir, I tried to call. My apologies for disturbing you at your, ah…home,” he said, turning to the massive manor house and having trouble calling it a house.
“But you asked to be notified as soon as the warrants were issued. Again, I tried calling, but couldn’t reach you. The warrants, they were handed down this morning. The FBI, CIA, Interpol, they’ll all be searching now. We’re also monitoring those agencies’ communications. Together, of course, with information we receive from the Surveillance-Net.”
“And O’Neill?”
Somehow, Lucien sensed that the key to completing his plan lay with this stupid former cop.
“No information yet. They’re definitely running, though. We trailed Osborne out of the White House this morning with the new surveillance mini-drone, but it turned out to be his double. So, no doubt, he’s up to something. With all of the people coming in and out of the White House on this Iranian nuclear crisis it has been difficult to track targets.”
Lucien knew there was no use in disciplining Jessup further, at least today. It would be like beating the dead birds.
The dogs loped up and dutifully sat at his feet, the colorful birds hanging in their mouths like wilted flowers.
Lucien turned back to his valley and motioned at another servant a hundred feet away. Crowded inside the twelve remaining cages, thirty-three pheasants milled and cooed.
Strawn was aware of his employer’s gestures and took a step toward Jessup, his hands folded in front of him. “Mr. Jessup, this way.”
Without a word, Jessup turned and began walking back towards the house. Behind him, he heard an echo across the valley.
“Release!”
19
Jack sat in front of the fireplace, searching the flames for that elusive something.
On some mornings, the answer would simply be there, as if he’d been thinking of it while asleep. At others, it would form like an opening leaf, an apparition. It arose from silence, like a whisper. He’d once read that Einstein had toiled for months searching for his mathematical key. Yet it was only when he became exhausted, lying in a bathtub and thinking of nothing that the “something” – the Theory of Special Relativity – came to him. Jack was quite certain that he was no Einstein, but he assumed that the process operated essentially the same for everyone.
Something caught his attention. He turned, listening. The cottage was eerily quiet. Outside, the gulls had stopped crying.
To his right, Lani was on the couch reading a magazine. He turned towards the windows. There was a small sound, disconnected from the sea and wind, distant and growing.
Suddenly, like a gale, a roar invaded the room, a windstorm of sand hurling through the open windows, pinging against the porcelain lamps and stinging their faces.
“It’s a ‘copter! Take a window!” Jack yelled, the sound so loud she could only see his lips move.
Her training engaged and she dove to the ground, shimmying towards the back wall.
He motioned in hand signals as they both withdrew their weapons.
She looked at him. They had talked about it: What if a GMA commando unit found them first? Would they fight? She held her shoulder against the wall, preparing to take a firing stance upon his signal as the growing vibration of the helicopter began to shake the small cottage.
Thirty feet away, Mac crouched at the helicopter exit way, readying to jump as soon as they touched down on the beach. Leaving the White House, they’d gone out to sea and stayed low to avoid detection.
They were now approaching the shore. It was early and the beach was empty. Then he saw the old man poking at the sand, digging for clams. The man looked up at the roar, shielding his eyes from the sun behind the helicopter, a quickly expanding shadow.
The old man was a retired fisherman and he didn’t like being driven from his beach, from his sea. He began to run, mouthing some epithets back up at Mac. This was exactly what he’d been talking about in his letters to the editor; these nouveau riche interlopers who somehow thought they could go around doing anything!
Jack and Lani inched closer to the windows, guns high. Jack gave her the signal and they spun into the openings, weapons extended.
The craft set down and Mac jumped onto the beach, arms waving, two Navy SEALS running close up behind. As ordered, the remaining SEALs held ready at the compartment opening, training their rifles on the beach entryways left and right. Mac turned and gave a signal as the rotor blades slowed, the engine winding down like a reluctant dragon, pulling back into itself. The silence was stark, only a breeze remaining.
They met at the sand’s edge, halfway to the cottage, “For Christ sake, Mac, we thought you were GMA.”
Lani joined them, holstering her weapon and noting the SEALs in the helicopter eyeing her closely.
“Sorry, Jack. It was the only way. I have to get back fast. Did you see the Iranian thing?”
“To hell with the Middle East, Mac. Did you see the warrants?”
“Yeah, I saw them. The D.C. cops are going through Lani’s hotel room as we speak. They won’t find anything; we’ve already forensically wiped it. It’s the GMA, Jack. They’re pulling in favors left and right, caught us flat-footed on the warrants. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say they’re up to something big, because there’s no reason to go after you two so hard. My gut says they’re trying to get to the president through you. That’s why I’m out here like this, with the presidential helicopter. We need to get you out of here, fast. We have a private jet waiting up the coast. The ‘copter will take you to the meet point.”
Lani flinched at the mention of her hotel room, it feeling like another violation.
Mac looked over and saw her green eyes turn cold. “Sorry again, Lani. I’m still not sure why you’re wrapped up in any of this.”
She said nothing; they’d moved past the place of apologies.
Jack grabbed Mac by the arm, “Where are we going, Mac?”
“Scotland,” Osborne smiled, trying to appear positive.
“What?” they said at once.
“You’re telling me the NSA has a safe house in Scotland?” Jack said. “Not likely.”
“Well, not quite. More like a favor owed me.”
Lani stepped forward, her hand still resting on the Glock.
Jack smiled at his old friend, “You better tell her, Mac, because I think our good detective here is about to rap you upside the head. At which point, old buddy, I might just join in.”
Mac Osborne, always the guy in the room with a wry smile in a crisis, gave them his best. “Actually, it’s more like a castle.”
“So, who owes the favor?” Jack asked.
Mac smiled, “William Arthur Phillip Louis Mountbatten-Windsor.”
/>
“Who?” Lani asked.
“You’re kidding me, right?” Jack said, shaking his head.
Mac beamed, “No joke, it’s ‘ol Will. As his buddies call him, Billy the Fish!”
“What?” Lani said.
Mac laughed, “That’s right, the King of England!”
†
“Mon amour, you have to pay more attention!” Elise laughed as Garneau missed their second turn that morning. They’d never won one of these road rallies, and, to be honest, she really didn’t care, but a respectable showing was always nice. She looked at him closer. She simply didn’t know what had been wrong with him these past few days. He seemed so distracted.
Blood eyes…
Like no other case before, the images had stayed with him, the four eyes from the St. Regis Hotel staring straight ahead.
Staring into nothing? Staring into something?
They paused at a stop sign on an old country road outside of Amiens. Peering both ways, they searched for a signpost, any sort of clue. It looked the same either way, the road empty.
“Sorry, dear, it seems we’re lost.”
She smiled, “I don’t care, Henri, really. It’s just another trip. Let’s call it a day, head back to the B&B. I’m done, how about you?”
Even the thought of retreating irked him. “Quit? We’ve never done that before.”
She laughed, “We’ve never been this lost before! Admit it, we’re both exhausted. We should have done that quiet weekend, like we talked about. Anyway, who says we can’t quit anything, anytime? What’s that saying of yours…omission is action? Closing a door is opening another and all of that? What do you think – a hot bath and some tea, maybe an early dinner at that bistro we passed?”
She leaned over and rested her head on his shoulder. He’d never been able to resist her. When they first fell in love, they talked about getting old together – the comfort of it, walking together in the woods. Or just sitting here, like this, lost on a road, it didn’t really matter.
“Of course,” he said and steered back from where they’d come.
