RED Hotel

by Fuller, Ed; Grossman, Gary;

  The morning air was already oppressively thick with Washington summer humidity. Reilly was glad that the town car was close, and the air conditioning was pumping out cool air by the time the vehicle exited the lot onto Aviation Circle.

  Before merging onto George Washington Memorial Parkway, the driver asked if Reilly wanted to leave his bags at a hotel.

  “No, thank you.” He didn’t bother explaining that he’d be flying out later that day from Dulles.

  Reilly fell into a deep sleep for the rest of the twenty-five-minute trip in morning traffic. It helped make up for all the travel he had been doing lately and the resulting lack of sleep.

  He awoke as the car turned onto the Virginia State Road 123, drove about a half a mile, and then made a left at a restricted street. Two short left turns later and they came to a gate that required the driver’s ID card and personal code and Reilly’s identification. Ahead was a second gate with a traffic light. If it turned red, cars had to stop and await further clearance. If, for any reason, they kept going without permission, a steel barrier would automatically deploy from the roadbed.

  The driver got a green light and proceeded the rest of the way to the George Bush Center for Intelligence in McLean, Virginia. The CIA headquarters.

  Reilly left his suitcase in the town car. As the driver opened the door and led him to the entrance, Reilly took in his surroundings. There were two main office buildings: OHB, the Original Headquarters Building constructed in the early 1960s, and NHB, the New Headquarters Building completed in the late 1980s. Also on the campus was an auditorium known as “The Bubble,” and another structure, a small modern house, which was a day care center where children were known by numbers.

  Reilly walked past officers in black uniforms inside the austere white Alabama marble lobby of the new building. There were armed with M4 carbines, which were shorter versions of the M16A2 assault rifle. He was familiar with the weapon, though he hadn’t kept up with its use on the firing range.

  Reilly took in the symbolic artwork, the inspirational messages, and most of all the staid statue of “Wild Bill” Donovan, head of the OSS, the predecessor to the Central Intelligence Agency.

  The driver, without a doubt a gun-carrying agent himself, escorted Reilly to the main security post. Once again, he produced his license and office ID. But now Reilly also had to state his business.

  “I have an appointment with Robert Heath,” he told an officer at the desk. No use of the word meeting. No purpose stated. All polite, but to the point.

  “Social security number, Mr. Reilly?”

  Reilly recited the nine-digit number.

  The guard typed his name and the number into the computer. A moment later, the guard said, “Please take a step back to the line on the floor and look at the lens.”

  A camera was positioned on the lobby shelf. Reilly posed for a headshot that was quickly printed onto an ID card with a big “V” and the declaration “Visitor Escort Required.”

  He inserted it in a plastic sleeve and presented it to Reilly adding, “Please wear this at all times.”

  “Thank you.”

  “You’re good to go, Mr. Reilly. Welcome to the CIA. Agent Heath is expecting you.”

  An officer stepped forward to accompany Reilly to the elevator and on the ride up. Robert Heath was waiting for him on the second floor with a hearty handshake.

  “Bob, great to see you!” Reilly said, grasping his outstretched hand.

  “Likewise,” the CIA operative said with a smile. “How have you been?”

  “Busy. Really busy,” Reilly replied.

  “I’d guess so.” Heath knew full well what Reilly had been dealing with. “Sorry about Tokyo.”

  “Thanks.”

  As Heath led Reilly to his office, Reilly noticed that his old friend had gone completely bald and gained some weight. Not completely surprising considering he walked with a pronounced limp now and likely was no longer able to run marathons, let alone do field assignments.

  Heath was two years younger than Reilly. They’d met on a mission out of Kabul; Reilly, the army officer, Heath the CIA’s regional eyes and ears. Heath owed Reilly his life.

  While on a patrol to root out a Taliban leader, their convoy lead driver had spotted a young boy writhing in pain by the side of the road. The Humvee pulled over. The rest of the caravan slowed. Two infantrymen, their Colt M16s in hand, exited the vehicle to secure the area. They scanned the terrain, concerned about nearby rocks, but saw no threats. They signaled the driver and captain, who got out to assist. It was to be their last act of kindness. The boy held a detonator wired to a backpack bomb. Then he pressed the button. The blast took out the vehicle and instantly killed the four men at ground zero along with two more in the first Humvee.

  The three Commando Select armored vehicles, distinguishable by their V-shaped hulls and ceramic painting, were forced to stop suddenly behind the Humvee. With nowhere to maneuver they began to back up. But not fast enough. They were ambushed by the enemy, hiding behind a stretch of boulders.

  The Americans returned fire from their Browning .50 caliber M2 machine guns and Mk 19 automatic grenade launchers. But almost instantly bombs buried in the road went off, propelling two of the vehicles, each with a squad of four soldiers and two special observers, ten feet into the air. Heath and Reilly were the two observers.

  Survivors struggled to get out from the heavily reinforced but now upended Commando Selects. Four were cut down the moment they stepped out to take up defensive positions. Three others died inside. Heath took a bullet in the leg as he cleared the door. Reilly caught him as he fell backwards. As the remaining standing Select vehicles continued to answer the enemy’s barrage, Reilly went for the door on the opposite side, dragged Heath out, and found cover in a gully.

  With no view of the battle, Reilly pulled Heath twenty-five yards farther away where they found refuge between two boulders. Reilly kept pressure on Heath’s leg and waited.

  Eventually the shooting stopped. Seconds later they heard joyful screams and the sound of automatic guns shot into the air. The Taliban had won.

  That day Dan Reilly had saved Robert Heath’s life and kept him alive until four hours later when a pair of army Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters flew over the kill zone and spotted them.

  That was Heath’s last assignment in Afghanistan. Reilly stayed on another four months investigating a lead indicating that command had ignored verifiable intelligence of an imminent attack—intelligence that could have prevented the massacre. He brought it to senior officers who denied the claim. Reilly followed the trail of evidence higher, all the way to a field general. When he tried to make a case for the cover-up in the field, he was reassigned to Washington.

  Back in the states, Reilly continued to pursue the case that had cost the lives of nineteen men. A year into it, he learned that the one-star general in question had quietly retired and evidence of the attack had been expunged.

  Reilly resigned. Thanks to a friend, he took a job with the State Department. That friend was Bob Heath. It was the beginning of Reilly’s career in international affairs—a career where Heath and Reilly never lost touch.

  “Okay to pop a thumb drive into your computer?” Reilly asked once they were seated in Heath’s office.

  “Not really.” Heath said. “More broadly, not at all.”

  The CIA might not be as susceptible to computer viruses as most government agencies, but it was still at risk.

  “Yours?”

  “No. From Naichō.”

  “Love them like a brother.” Heath laughed. “By the way, I don’t trust my brother.”

  “Any alternative?” Reilly asked.

  “We have an off-the-grid PC down the hall. Requires separate login that changes every day. I’ll get it.”

  While Heath went to get the computer, Reilly looked out the windows onto the campus. People were coming and going. Agents known and unknown carrying America’s secrets and the world’s problems on the
ir shoulders. Spies with secret identities and those who decoded transmissions. Operatives who survived war zones—some who one day might not return.

  Dan Reilly didn’t doubt they accepted the risks. If they died in the line of service, their names would be etched without fanfare into the OHB lobby wall. The list was growing, although their deaths usually weren’t reported. In contrast, those who had died in Reilly’s international hotel made news, if only for a short time.

  Chris Collins was right about one thing, he thought. We do have liability. But Reilly defined liability as an obligation, a responsibility to the people who put trust in the company.

  In the spy trade, the CIA was also referred as “the Company.” Now Reilly saw the parallels and the overlaps of the two. Both served people. Both needed timely, accurate, and actionable information.

  The room felt cold. Reilly shivered, but it wasn’t the air conditioning.

  14

  ALONG THE OB RIVER VALLEY

  RUSSIAN FEDERATION

  1996

  Construction on Nikolai Gorshkov’s dacha was complete. It resembled an old villa he rented outside of Potsdam, but built better, like the new Russia, and it came with security, both inside and out—also like the new Russia.

  The dacha was located in a picture-perfect river valley ninety minutes north of Novosibirsk. Gorshkov and a group of seven friends, principally businessmen from the city, became a virtual fraternity, carpooling weekends to his dacha.

  They spent much of the time contemplating the seismic changes in post-Soviet Russia and what they would mean for them. Over their vodka-fueled discussions they replayed Gorbachev’s political blunders, the rise of Western greed and crime in the Russian Federation, and what they’d do if they were running the country.

  It was generally the idle talk of eight drunken men, except for Gorshkov. He only considered that if temporary. He framed everything with historical perspective, arguing how vulnerable their new Russia was without its expanded borders.

  Gorshkov routinely ended these gatherings, mostly filled with rhetorical boasts, with a toast to better times. This weekend, he forgot the toast. He was anxious to excuse his guests and get onto real business. Andre Miklos was waiting in another room.

  “I’m sorry it took so long,” said Gorshkov after his guests had left. Normally he was not one to apologize, but he had a special relationship with Miklos. “Any difficulty getting past the security gate?”

  “None,” Miklos replied.

  That was both good and bad, Gorshkov thought.

  Miklos snickered. “I know that look. Don’t worry. I’m better than your guards. They never knew I was there. They won’t know when I leave either.”

  “Well, apparently I need to make improvements with my staff,” Gorshkov laughed. “But we have work to do.”

  They talked again about the failures in Potsdam, how far out and removed they felt, how Moscow had turned a blind eye toward them when rioters threatened. And as always they resolved to never let that happen again.

  “I have something important to tell you, Andre.”

  “Yes?”

  “I’m leaving Novosibirsk. I’ve been called to Moscow. It’ll be a new beginning. On the inside.”

  “FSB?” Miklos asked.

  “Better,” he responded. “A new job. In the Kremlin. Amassing intelligence on the bastards who are still ruining Russia. You will have a new job, too.” He smiled with great satisfaction. “With real growth potential.”

  15

  LANGLEY, VA

  CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY

  PRESENT DAY

  Heath finished watching the video on Reilly’s USB drive. He leaned back and drew a large breath that filled his checks.

  “Dan, you understand no one has formally asked us to get involved.”

  “I’m asking.”

  “And if I say yes?” Heath replied.

  “Then we help each other. Advance word, warnings. Information we can use. Like I testified.”

  “Intelligence.”

  “Well yes,” Reilly said. “Intelligence. Nothing really sensitive—”

  “Advance word and warnings are sensitive. And they come with a price,” Heath stated without a hint of humor.

  Now Reilly hesitated.

  “Information costs, even among friends,” the CIA operative continued. “But we could make this work. You’re in a perfect job. You travel, you meet business people of all stripes, including government officials, and you’re willing to mix it up with the cartel.”

  “You know about that?”

  “Yes. Nice job, by the way.”

  Reilly merely smirked.

  “In truth, brother, you’ve got a great cover.”

  “Wait,” Reilly exclaimed. “This is further than where I was going. I liked it when our relationship meant we had occasional meals, talked about old times, and you simply gave me a heads-up when it counted …” He trailed off.

  “So we add another dimension. We share,” Heath stated. “You and me. Like you say, when it counts.”

  “You want me to be a source?”

  “There are other terms.”

  Reilly knew them, but he didn’t say them aloud. Not yet.

  “Informally,” Heath said, using the word of the day.

  Dan Reilly pushed his chair away from the computer and leaned into Heath.

  “You want me to work for the CIA. To gather intelligence for you. You realize the risk to my job?”

  “Yes, and the benefit to it as well. You said so yourself at the hearing. You’ve asked for access to real intel. Well, I’m going to do better than that. It’ll help as you put together your own advisory committee to reassess your company’s vulnerabilities.”

  “Jesus, is there anything you don’t know?”

  “Yes. A lot. That’s why we need you.”

  Reilly sat quietly.

  “Look Dan, it’s not as if you haven’t been preparing for this. The army assignment, the State Department posts.”

  “And if it’s so apparent to you, won’t the guys on the other team make the same assumption?”

  “They might. But so far you’ve had access to everyone you’ve ever needed to meet.”

  Reilly leaned back. He was thinking. Heath gave him the time.

  “If I do this, and I’m saying if …”

  “Yes.”

  “I just report.”

  “Yes.”

  “No sneaking around bushes.”

  “Just information.”

  “No leaks.”

  “None. You’ll be considered a friend of the agency, which you already are. Call it a salaried friend.”

  “Right,” Reilly declared. “Informally.”

  They shook hands on it, with Reilly more tentative than excited.

  Turning back to business at hand, Reilly and Heath discussed how they would identify the man in the video.

  Heath explained that they’d run the face through the CIA’s comprehensive facial recognition programs first. He also asked for the names of all the Tokyo hotel guests and their passports going back one month.

  “The Japanese already have that. Not a problem.”

  “And background checks on your employees.”

  “Harder, but not impossible,” Reilly answered.

  “House cameras.”

  “No hard drives survived. No cloud backup. That’s part of my problem. Internal security.” Reilly reflected on the destruction. “The bombs were smartly placed.”

  “An inside job?” Heath asked.

  “Possibly. Or someone with a high degree of sophistication and training, and an exit strategy.”

  “But for what purpose?”

  “Don’t know,” Reilly replied.

  “Let’s move this along to some people who might have some insight.”

  Heath bought a half hour and called in Company experts to meet with Reilly.

  Their new relationship was moving fast.

  “Dan, this is Roosevelt Duboi
s and Veronica Severi. Both on the counterterrorism desk with close counterparts at DHS. Rosie and Veronica, this is Dan Reilly a personal friend. He should be considered a friend of the Company.”

  Friend had its own meaning, Reilly thought as he shook hands with both agents.

  “Dan is VP of International at Kensington Royal Hotels. You know about the attack on their Tokyo property. Suffice it to say, he’s not a newcomer to intelligence, so don’t treat him like one.”

  “Okay,” Dubois said.

  “Right,” added Severi. “Nice to meet you.

  Severi was in her early fifties. She wore her brown hair in a bob with bangs skimming the top of her glasses. She was thin, attractive, and dressed smartly in a blue pantsuit with flat shoes. Reilly noted that she had a wedding ring, but Dubois did not.

  Reilly surmised that Roosevelt Dubois had more than desk duty. He was big and tough. Reilly pegged him at 6’3”, mid to late forties.

  “So, here’s what we have,” Heath said. He introduced the footage, and to save time, told them what to watch for. After three passes at varying speeds, Heath froze the headshot, grabbed the image with his snipping tool, and enlarged the frame.

  “Ever see this guy?”

  “New to me,” Dubois said.

  “Same,” Severi added.

  “Any first blush reactions?” Reilly questioned.

  “Self-assured,” Severi began. “His pace. Not the gait of someone fleeing. His expression, too. Not someone who intended to commit suicide—then or ever.”

  Reilly was impressed. “Nationality?”

  “More Rosie’s area. I come at it from the psych side.”

  “Psych?” Reilly asked.

  “I do more than just confirm identity,” Severi explained. “I look for motivation, which computer models can’t predict.”

  “How?”

  “Well, Mr. Reilly, there’s so much in a face and body language. There are signals and markers that suggest what may be going on inside like issues with women, antiestablishment tendencies, radical views. Tattoos can reveal a subtle story,” Severi continued. “I also look for nervous tics that would make an individual stand out in public, inflated egos, visions of grandeur … Tips are everywhere to read.”