by JT Sawyer
Carter glanced over at the ruins of the library at the rear. “Hopefully not here.”
15
After a grueling afternoon discussing funeral arrangements with his sister-in-law on the phone and then speaking with the funeral director, who was courteous enough to come to his house, Cal stepped out onto his back porch, slumping into a lounge chair. He welcomed the sun on his face, feeling like his soul had become permanently glacial.
After what seemed like hours, the rumbling of his stomach caught up with him, and he realized he hadn’t eaten much of anything since the previous day. He still wanted to check on Reggie at the hospital, as much to make sure his friend was recovering from his concussion as to find some answers to his questions about those final moments leading up to the explosion. The man had been the head of security and Burke’s personal bodyguard.
Would he have any ideas on who could have been behind the attack? Anything suspicious about the caterers or wait staff or anyone else that day?
He glanced at his watch then got up, recalling that there was very little to eat in the fridge.
I’ll have to get something on the way to the hospital.
Cal grabbed his wallet, keys and phone before heading into the garage, stunned at its emptiness as he remembered that both his and Cassie’s vehicles were wrecked heaps sitting idle in Burke’s driveway.
He walked to the corner near a heavy bag suspended from the ceiling, retrieving the helmet off his Harley Davidson then removing a brown leather jacket from a peg on the wall. Sealed in the concrete at the base of the wall was a small cylindrical tube with Cal’s evasion kit, something that each agent had in place at their residence in case they had to quickly disappear. It contained several passports and assorted foreign currencies, a spare HK pistol and two magazines, along with a burner phone and a small trauma kit.
It was considered life insurance for an agent on the run, but like his colleagues in covert ops, he hoped it would forever remain sealed.
The drive to St. James Hospital took just under forty minutes, even with a quick stop at a taco shop to scarf down some much-needed calories.
Heading inside the hospital, Cal tucked his helmet under his arm then stepped into the elevator beside an older woman and a nurse, pressing the button for the third floor, where Reggie’s room was located. He looked at the floor chart on the wall, his heart sinking when he saw the listing for the pediatric department on the next floor up.
He thought of the visit they’d had with Cassie’s doctor at another hospital and all of the discussions with the clinician about what to expect during the remaining trimesters. For a second, he thought he could feel his wife’s fingers interlacing with his just like after their last visit, as they joyfully rode the elevator down to the lobby after discovering that they were to become parents to a baby girl.
Afterwards, they’d strolled through the gift shop on the first floor as Cassie playfully discussed the traits of the stuffed animals that they were going to fill the nursery at home with. She looked so happy, her eyes lit with the same smile that had drawn him to her on their first date.
He heard a faint female voice piercing through his weary brain. “Sir, this is your floor, I believe,” said the nurse to his right.
He forced himself to breathe, realizing that the doors had already opened. Cal nodded at her then trudged forward onto the floor, pausing to collect his thoughts. He ran his hands through his brown hair, reminding himself why he was here, then walked to the front desk.
“Reggie Sinclair, please. I’m a friend. Can you tell me which room he’s in?” he said to the red-headed woman behind the counter.
She thrust her arm to the left. “Room 224, but you won’t be able to get in—the FBI’s there. Mr. Sinclair died about a half-hour ago. I’m so sorry.”
Cal headed down the hallway, breaking into a trot. He rounded the corner, slowing down as he saw two men in suits standing on either side of Reggie’s room.
The tall figure on the right stepped forward, putting his hand on Cal’s chest. “Sorry, sir, there’s no admittance right now unless you’re family.”
He peered around the man’s shoulder, seeing the two FBI agents who had visited him at his house. “Reggie’s a friend of mine. What happened?”
“I can’t say anything at this time, sir.”
“It’s OK,” said Carter as she moved towards the door. “Let him in.”
Cal stepped inside the room, walking past Carter to the foot of the bed. Reggie’s eyes were glassy, staring at the ceiling, his mouth frozen open.
“I just talked to the nurse here on the phone yesterday—said Reggie was starting to show signs of responsiveness and that he was going to pull through.” He looked at Tremblay then over at Carter. “What changed?”
Carter folded her arms. “Not sure. The doc said that his vitals tanked a little while ago and then he flatlined. Possibly an aneurysm from his head injury.” She stepped to the window, peering at the parking lot. “The staff here also said that there was a guy in the room earlier. Left out the rear stairwell, which is a little odd, since that only leads to the dumpsters around back. The hospital security guard said the guy took off on a motorcycle.”
“Where were you prior to this?” said Tremblay, glancing at the helmet in Cal’s hand.
“Not here.” He glared at the agent. Cal’s head was swirling. He knew Reggie’s death wasn’t a coincidence.
But why would someone eliminate him? Reggie wasn’t privy to Perseus’ inner workings. Did he witness something at the house, or was he in on the whole thing?
“Did you know that Mr. Sinclair recently received a payment of $10,000 into his bank account?” said Carter.
Cal’s eyes darted along the ground. “What? No…from who?”
“We’re working on that,” said Tremblay. “It was wired from an account in Switzerland.”
“Does that sound like something Burke would have done?” said Carter. “I’ve heard he was pretty fond of giving generous bonuses to his staff, but 10K seems a little excessive, wouldn’t you say?”
Tremblay glanced down at Cal’s wrist. “I couldn’t help but notice you wearing a Rolex the other day when we were at your place… Burke must have been paying you pretty well.”
“Is that your attempt at a question?” said Cal, staring the man down.
“Just trying to get a pulse on all of this, Mr. Shepard,” said Carter. “We were at the Burke estate recently going over forensics—saw that most of the other employees who perished there were driving high-end sports cars in the six-figure realm. Now, we find that Sinclair has a hefty amount of newly acquired funds in his bank account.”
“Burke’s senior staff were some of the most brilliant minds in the tech industry, so I’m not surprised that they were driving the cars they were. As for the Rolex, that was a parting gift from Burke for my service to his company.”
“You know that’s a $20K watch?” said Tremblay. He shrugged. “I’m kind of an aficionado on Rolexes and looked up the one you had. That’s a helluva gift. Must have been a welcome sight for a security consultant like yourself.”
Cal straightened up. He wanted to drive an uppercut into the chin of the pasty agent but knew the man was just playing the bad cop role while Carter stood back and watched Cal’s reaction, just as they had done at his house.
He had been through rigorous conduct-after-capture training and endured all manner of mental and physical punishment during his indoctrination phase with the agency, and he didn’t have the time or inclination to stand here and put up with Tremblay’s juvenile attempts at manipulative questioning.
Clearly they are struggling to find answers on who orchestrated the attack at Burke’s.
“I came here to visit a friend, not to go through a cross-examination, especially one as poorly hatched as this.” He clutched his helmet. “Maybe you guys should spend more time on the street, gathering actual information instead of treating this like a game of Clue, haphazardly trying to connect
imaginary dots.”
He headed to the door, pausing to glance at Carter. “And since you seem like the brains of the operation, maybe you can educate your boy. Persuasive questioning requires that you establish a command presence beforehand to elicit a response, rather than seeming like a tethered circus monkey performing for his boss.”
Cal moved past the two guards, who stepped aside, then headed down the hallway to the elevator, wondering who the mystery man was that visited Reggie.
How was Reggie involved in all of this? Did he give someone access to the security codes at Burke’s place…and the company? It had to be him. But who was he working for?
Cal knew where to begin his search. But there were things to be done before he could try to launch his own investigation into that horrific day.
He stepped back into the elevator, feeling like the floor was going to open and plunge him into a dark abyss as he thought of tomorrow’s funeral service for Cassie.
16
After Tim Rourke left his office at the NSA, he stopped by Mickey’s Bar & Grille to throw down a few beers and a double cheeseburger, sitting alone at a booth in the corner while he pondered his future and how twelve years of sobriety had suddenly been swept away in the past few days.
We must all pay the devil his dues.
With the horizon of fifty years approaching, he had hoped to have climbed further up in the government. He felt like he had stepped into the assistant director position in the NSA electronic surveillance division at the dawn of computers, when in fact it had only been six years.
I’m just a glorified gopher for the director, attending meetings he should be at but without the power to make any actual critical decisions on budgeting or dissemination of intel.
After his third beer, he paid the bill and headed home, grateful it was only two miles.
Entering his house, he smelled the lingering odor of another of his wife’s semi-burnt dinners before heading up the dark stairwell to their bedroom.
“You’re home late again—another inter-agency meeting?” Alicia Rourke said, not looking up from the TV on the dresser as she lay on the bed in a long teal-colored nightgown.
“Something like that,” he said. He dropped his laptop bag and cellphone on the armoire in the corner then kicked off his shoes. Rourke sat down on the bed, fumbling with his tie and button-down shirt as he stared at images of paramilitary forces in Afghanistan, followed by commentary from the Director of National Intelligence, Jason Begley.
Another fucking stooge who never served. I saw action in the army years ago when our base got shelled.
As if sensing his frustration, his wife slid forward on the bed. “You should have been made Director of Intelligence, not Begley. Maybe things will turn in your favor with the new fiscal year approaching.”
He knew it was unlikely that he’d be advancing anytime soon, and with the CIA gaining a tool like Perseus, his analyst duties would be further reduced. He’d be faced with becoming a training instructor working with new recruits or making a lateral move back to the Special Collections Service and overseeing satellite retasking again.
“Fucking guys like Patterson who are cozy with the players on the Hill just keep muscling their way into my territory. Pretty soon, the NSA will be absorbed by the agency if guys like him have their way.”
Rourke felt his wife’s hand on his back, giving him a perfunctory pat on the shoulder before she turned on her side and went to sleep. He knew her primary concern was whether she would have to return to the trenches of being a medical transcriptionist and cut back on her private yoga classes and weekend getaways to Atlantic City with her girlfriends.
Soon, we’ll never have to worry about money again.
His mind drifted to his recent phone conversation with Adam Hunley, who had assured him that their plans to install Ernesto Rimaldi as the Venezuelan president were on track. With the satellite footage and electronic eavesdropping that Rourke had provided, Hunley and his team were able to gain critical information on Rimaldi’s political rivals and, most importantly, on the fateful gathering at Burke’s place earlier in the week. It was Rourke who had first notified Hunley about Burke’s use of satellite imagery over Caracas on the day that Montoya was in that city eliminating an anti-Rimaldi journalist.
Rourke had met the former ambassador six years earlier during a diplomatic meeting in DC when Hunley had just joined the NSA. He knew the man was as capable as he was ruthless and had far more international connections than Rourke, but what started as a seemingly lucrative plan to install a puppet politician in Venezuela to bolster Roth’s oil holdings had turned into a nightmare of mass murder at Burke’s place, which Rourke had only discovered on the eight o’clock news that night.
Rourke had no idea that his satellite footage was being used for reconnaissance for an attack on the CEO’s estate, but the time for repentance would have to wait for the afterlife.
Now, I just need to get through these next few weeks and keep a low profile at the NSA.
Despite Hunley’s confidence in their undertaking, Rourke couldn’t stave off the gnawing anxiety that Shepard would somehow blow their whole operation wide open if he got wind of what was happening.
Of all the people to have as a random variable right now, we’ve got a Special Activities guy with nothing left to lose. He’s gonna be worse than a rabid lion if Hunley doesn’t put him down…and fast.
The touch of his wife’s hand on his arm caused him to lunge forward as a jolt of adrenaline tore through him like he had been ensnared in a trap.
“Christ, Tim, relax. You scared the hell out of me. I just wanted you to turn the TV off.”
He gulped down a breath, feeling the rush of nighttime air from the open window wafting over him. “Sorry, just frazzled today, is all. I need to get some sleep.”
Rourke removed his pants and socks then reached over to his nightstand and popped a Valium from a pill bottle. He slumped back in bed next to Alicia, who turned onto her other side, facing away from him.
“You work so hard,” she said. “You should take a day off soon and go have some fun somewhere.”
Sooner than you think, he told himself, trying to focus on a postcard image of Bermuda, where he wanted to take Alicia in an attempt to rekindle the pallid remains of his third marriage. He tried to calm his racing heart, feeling like his life was entwined in a web whose tenacious hold he couldn’t shake. He just had to remain cool for one more month until the election was over and his service to Hunley and Roth was finished.
As he lay in bed, staring at the moonlight flitting along the lacy curtains, he tried to force away the images from the news of the eleven innocent people who died in the explosion, waiting for the narcotics and alcohol in his system to cascade over his weary brain.
17
Cal’s senses barely registered the faint drizzle and overcast sky during the outdoor service for Cassie at the cemetery, but the gloom of the morning penetrated him to the core.
Despite the somber weather, there was a nice turnout of Cassie’s friends and co-workers from the law firm, along with their neighbors that Cal had gotten to know better during his time stateside.
Seated beside Cal was Cassie’s sister Sara, along with her husband Mike and their two toddlers. Mike had been gracious enough to handle the remaining funeral details, as Sara was as much of a wreck as Cal.
Patterson had driven Cal to the service and was seated in the second row beside several colleagues from the agency. Behind the rows of seated mourners, he noticed Lynn Vogel standing in black beside a massive oak tree, seeming out of her element away from her intel desk at Langley.
Cal stared at the closed brown casket surrounded by bouquets of flowers and a photograph of Cassie, the surreal image of it all deepening the abyss in his soul.
Last week at this time, we were walking along the beach, talking about the baby girl we were anxious to meet, and now…
As the priest’s sermon came to a close, Cal heard the man spea
k of the three things that last after death: faith, hope, and love. He would never stop loving his wife, and he yearned to follow her into the world beyond this one.
But hope and faith…
He couldn’t even recall what those feelings were anymore.
Why did I survive? I should be with you now, Cass. Tears streamed down his face as he felt his whole being tremble.
When the sermon finished and everyone had paid their final respects, Cal gave Sara a few minutes alone at the casket. Afterwards, she hugged him, weeping into his shoulder, their anguish keeping pace with the growing intensity of the rain.
Sara leaned back, placing her hand on his cheek.
“She loved you so much, Cal.”
He nodded. “You too, Sara. You were her best friend in the world. I’m so sorry.”
They hugged again, then he watched Sara rejoin her family as they headed to the vehicles, which were slowly thinning out. Cal stood silently in the rain, frozen in place, staring down at the resting place of his wife and unborn daughter.
No beach to walk on. At least not in this world. But I will see you both soon enough. I promise.
He held his hands up to his face, the grief washing over him as he sobbed, his tears merging with the torrent of rain cascading down onto the grave.
Cal didn’t know how long he stood there, barely noticing himself shivering from the cold and dampness. It was only a familiar but out-of-context voice behind him that snapped him from his daze.
