"What about buses?"
"All of them headed South, within two hours of his sighting."
"Anyway, he wouldn’t be such an idiot as to get off the train directly at his destination; he knows very well that there are cameras in airports and stations," said Anaïs.
"What do you plan on doing?"
"I want to use our informants to get news from the states bordering Arkansas and then look for other clues going back to the period he was an intelligence agent. I see no other solution at the moment. Can you retrieve the names of his last team?"
"Secret, Anaïs, and the British agency has no intention of reopening a discussion about Savannah..."
"Sorry but haven’t they burned him? Don’t they want to terminate him?"
"They let us wash their dirty laundry in order to avoid a diplomatic incident because it involves Reed’s son. I remind you that Richard Reed worked for the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. In addition, we owe them a favor..."
"I’ll ask the Colonel then, without additional sources we’re not going anywhere, I'm afraid."
"He surely will be able to help, and we’ll move accordingly. Explain the issue to him and get his instructions," replied Green, who had no intention of taking direct responsibility for arranging a meeting for her with Jenkins, who he didn’t trust at all.
Anaïs Degann did have to kill Savannah, but she should not have the slightest clue about Richard Reed’s parallel activities; and if someone did inadvertently provide information about that issue, he didn’t want to be involved or responsible.
75
"Anaïs! I'm glad to see you back in such good shape. I heard you had a pretty tough nut to crack during the flight and as usual you were great," said Reed, who was just passing down the hallway and had stuck his head into Jago C. Green’s office.
"Colonel Reed, nice to see you. How are you? I was just coming to talk to you…when do you have ten minutes for me?"
"Come along now, I’ll offer you a good cup of coffee in my office. Should Green come with us?" said the Colonel, looking into Jago eyes.
"Of course, we have to talk about how to go on with the mission," said Skylinep92.
"Jago? Do you have time for a coffee now?"
"I'm sorry, Colonel, I’m really very sorry, but I have to follow the operations for the preparation of the transplants and carry out the cyclical quality checks. Can you do without me?" Green replied slyly. In fact, he had no intention of attending the meeting in order to avoid any kind of responsibility.
"Sure, SkylineP92 will update you later."
The Colonel and Anaïs went out together and headed for Walton I. Reed’s office.
After having drunk her coffee, Anaïs began to speak.
"As you know, Savannah headed to Little Rock and now we're going to search for possible clues along the bus routes, but I think we need to search for clues in his past and more specifically meet the agents who worked with him on missions. Who can I contact in your opinion, Colonel?"
"Anaïs, unfortunately, the British agency declined to provide us with the names of the agents who worked with him on the "Uday who runs fast" operation and Jenkins, a CIA agent, has already testified against Savannah, as you have read in the dossier that Jago gave you, revealing much of the French mission. Personally, I don’t have access to the specific file on Afghanistan, the country where he tracked down the terrorist; it's a secret dossier of the highest level due to the diplomatic implications of the four involved countries: the UK, USA, Pakistan and Afghanistan," said Reed, lying. In fact, he had read the report, and he considered the contents dangerous due to the details it contained.
"So, what do you recommend we do? If I can’t get things moving, we risk losing time and maybe increase the advantage he has over us. Maybe Jenkins can give me some ideas, they may be details of little interest to the investigation but useful for us."
"Forget Jenkins, he’s a waste of time, he has a limited brain."
"But if all the information is top secret and you can’t get it without hurting the susceptibility of the different parties involved, and even Jenkins cannot be disturbed, there is only the current option, which doesn’t include any shortcuts but only several weak leads to follow," replied a very puzzled Anaïs, who had noticed a certain nervousness on the part of the Colonel who had shown, openly, to be reticent to any attempt to sift through Savannah’s past.
"You're right," said Reed, modifying his attitude. "Maybe Samuel Q. Jenkins remembers a particular conversation or some interesting details. You can go and talk to him after you’ve taken your passengers back to Oklahoma. You might as well give it a try."
"When is the return flight?" asked Anaïs.
"Tomorrow night, you’ll take them back with a doctor and a male nurse," said Reed picking up the phone. "Hello Jago? Please check if Samuel Q. Jenkins is in on an operative mission, thank you. Call me back immediately."
Jago C. Green, after a few minutes, called Reed back on his cell phone.
"All right, yes, thank you. Make an appointment with him for Anaïs in the afternoon the day after tomorrow, and organize courtesy transportation for her to Langley, thank you."
"Anaïs, Jago will organize a meeting with Samuel Q. Jenkins for you and the return trip as well. Let's hope we’re not wasting more time." Reed said, seriously.
"Well, thank you. That evening I'll get together with Green to evaluate the status of the situation. I’ll update you when I get back, sir."
"See you soon, Skylinep92."
As soon as Anaïs had left his office, Walton I. Reed called Samuel Q. Jenkins on a secure line.
"Jenkins, it’s Reed. Jago will call you to schedule an appointment with Anaïs Degann, one of my field agents. She’ll ask you some questions about Mark Savannah. You will confirm the official version of events and won’t say anything else about him. Agreed? Great, come by my office when you want.
“By the way,” Reeds voice became suddenly cold, “stop using the coke, otherwise you might just get your fingers burnt. You have it under control? Sure, just remember I am the one who lets you keep up your standard of living and allows you to work.
“And don’t forget that in four days we have to start the joint monitoring with Grigoriy. You’ll have to make some day trips to Oklahoma now and then. Call me back after you speak with Anaïs, I want to know word for word what she asks you. It’s important. Perfect, I'm counting on you."
Walton I. Reed knew Skylinep92 very well. The questions that she asked Jenkins would reveal if she had any suspicions that might lead her to discovering the darker side of his son Richard Reed.
76
"QRV? Digitrevenant69."
Pavel received a message at 9:00 in the morning.
"QRV, go ahead, I gave you up for lost," Mark replied. “Let's speak on the secure line. I'm alone and far from eavesdroppers."
A few seconds later, Pavel’s cell phone rang.
"Runaway75, British agent, 37-years old, a negotiator, an expert in hostage rescues, missions in Nigeria, Libya, Sudan, Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Officially, he’s the Commercial Director at BCG Corporation."
"An interesting guy, I’d say," replied Mark.
"Yeah, imagine what it's like to be involved with oil in those countries..."
"Do we have, let’s say, any common "friends"? Parallel missions?"
"Nothing, you don’t have any contacts in common. He’s an officially registered agent, and that's not your case. You belong to different divisions that don’t cooperate with each other ever. So don't worry, the fact that he’s there is a mere coincidence. He’s not on your trail."
"But they have brought him here. Why? Besides, why he’s not in one of the agency’s recovery centers? I’m very puzzled Pavel, he has suffered a tremendous shock that has given him Cotard’s syndrome, panic attacks and hypnagogic hallucinations; he survived waterboarding and he kept silent under torture. And yet they leave him here ..."
"Maybe he got burned for s
ome reason…him too…"
"If you get burned, you have to escape; and if you don't run, they make you disappear. No, he hasn’t been burned; they know that his brain was "washed" and completely "clean". Actually, not completely. In fact, it depends on the skill of the therapist, who in my opinion hasn’t washed the "cache". I'm sure I can go farther with him and get more information; but I want to cure him, and I don't want to do any further harm to him. Besides I might need him, you never know."
"How long has he been in Dallas?" asked Digitrevenant69.
"For nearly three weeks."
"He arrived a week before you."
"In fact, that’s precisely the point, I don’t think it's by chance. First of all, he has attempted to stab people twice, so there are certainly pending criminal proceedings, and the agency cannot make him go away right now. Secondly, when he arrived here, I had just terminated my father’s murderer..."
"Andrew Davis?"
"That's what I think. He's here because he has to be treated in a civil structure and Marshall is a famous neurologist, but Davis, knowing of my situation led me to this place certainly for a reason. Pavel, ask yourself, how often two agents ever meet each other by chance in the same place? We'll find out. Who knows, maybe it is pure bloody coincidence."
"And Marshall?" Pavel urged.
"Marshall trusts Davis, and I don’t think that he’s aware of Cox’s real job. In my case I had to tell him about my previous job. He was looking for a psychiatrist and I was on the run, there was no time. In fact, he must have gone to bat for me, I’d bet on that, but even in this case we'll find out along the way. Right now I don’t have a clue.
“Any news about Anaïs Degann?” continued Mark. “She also works for Biosketch Technologies Inc.. I bumped into her a couple of days ago at the Dallas Air-Park. I took David Marshall flying and she made an incredible landing during a heavy hailstorm at the same airport. She had a male nurse and three patients in the aircraft. I'm sure she was going to New Mexico. I had to remain hidden for twenty minutes until she took off."
"Damn it, that's really strange, there are so many coincidences! Surely, as you said, she has been to see Aisha. I haven’t found anything about Anaïs, Miss Degann doesn’t actually exist, but..." Pavel paused to sneeze.
"But what?"
"The Colonel often visited Switzerland until two years ago…Geneva. Two years ago, Anaïs’ mother died, and since then he hasn’t visited Switzerland. The lady used to receive two calls a day from the USA, from an untraceable number, and Anaïs had already left home long before.
“I carried out a search of the images of Colonel Reed published in the media in the last fifteen years. He has been always a public figure and, well, a powerful man. Surprisingly, he appears on several occasions with the family, but often in the same picture the figure of a woman appears in background, Charlotte Leroy, mother of Anaïs Degann."
"She was probably his mistress, and the girl? Do you think she might be his daughter?" asked Mark, now he wasn’t surprised by anything.
"I doubt it,” replied Pavel, “even if it cannot be completely ruled out, Anaïs is never in any of the pictures, her parents divorced when she was three years old and just before that the child had received a blood transfusion following a car accident. She was in the car with her mother when another car ran the stop sign and crashed into their car.
“Her father was the donor,” continued Pavel. “They have the same blood type. So I checked Colonel Reed’s blood group, and it’s different. Anaïs can’t be his daughter.”
"I agree,” said Mark, “but he raised her for his use; and since she’s not on the list of CIA agents or on that of operatives, I wonder what her knowledge of the activities of Richard Reed is. Although I suspect the Colonel, taking into account his relationship with the mother, has avoided introducing them to each other and just put them in touch for his projects. Maybe that's why he didn’t want to classify her in the internal files of the CIA, and why she doesn’t exist for U.S. intelligence, even though she’s on the Clandestine Service payroll as a specialized skills agent."
"What will you do with Cox?"
"I want to get him out of trouble, but I’ll not tell him or David what we have discovered. If Davis is involved in the matter and wanted to inform Marshall about Cox’s true identity, he would have done so already."
"I agree with you, and now I must say goodbye. I took a day off to go walking in the mountains with Anna. I'll call you in a few days, my friend."
"You’re always ready for her. Sometimes I envy you, such deep feelings are unknown to me. Talk soon."
A few minutes later the phone in Mark's house rang. He was taking his time that morning; in fact, he only had to check on his patients later that morning.
"Mark, it’s David, I'm sorry to bother you, but I need your opinion and it’s quite urgent."
"I’ll be there in fifteen minutes, just the time it takes to get there from here," Mark said, pulling on his jacket.
77
When Mark knocked on the door to Marshall’s office, a voice greeted him with a relieved tone.
"You were quick, thank goodness! I’ll come straight to the point: do you remember the "Transtem 1.1” project?"
"Yes, of course,” answered Mark. “I remember the project, transplantation based on a new generation of tissue engineering, Biosketch Technologies Inc.. Why? What has happened?"
"We don’t know what's going on,” David replied with a concerned frown, “but the patients we have under follow-up seem to have changed behavior."
"What do you mean? All the patients?"
"It seems so… What about Brad Foster?"
"I didn’t notice anything abnormal. We should take all the medical records and analyze them in detail. Maybe it's just a temporary side effect."
"I would like you to supervise this situation. For the moment we haven’t informed Biosketch Technologies Inc. because I want to be sure that it’s not a false alarm, and up to now Foster hasn’t shown any behavioral change."
"Okay, you can count on me. Meanwhile, I'll go visit Foster, and then we can meet to evaluate the status of the situation. See you later."
Mark took his leave from Marshall in a thoughtful mode and went directly to Brad’s room.
Brad Foster stood at the window, looking at the garden below.
"Hello Brad, how are you?"
"Doc. Stearman…? I was expecting you later!" exclaimed Brad.
"I had to come now because of a surprise engagement later. How do you feel?"
"Definitely better. I sleep, I'm hungry, I feel comfortable and I no longer feel the need to vent by masturbating. Now I'm sure I can make it."
"I’m happy for you, but it is possible that you might still be affected by sexual impulses at times. It would be normal, so if it should happen sporadically, don't be afraid. The phenomenon will eventually disappear: the cure is very effective and we have begun to reduce your antidepressants. Keep me up to date. How do you see your naked body now? What do you think of it?"
"I’m not ashamed now. Yesterday I was looking at my penis in the mirror and didn’t find it embarrassing any more. You were right, it’s not small! It was just a fixation. Now I would like to try it with a girl in the flesh," Brad replied with a self-confident and calm tone.
"It gives me a great pleasure to hear that, Brad, but for the moment still no network, no web, no tablet. I'm sorry but I don’t want to jeopardize all the work we’ve done together so far," Mark replied firmly.
"Okay, even if I miss them, but only the contact with friends and the gaming. The rowing machine and exercise bike that you made available to me have helped me a lot! A great diversion and it’s keeping me in shape. I also read a lot. Please, can I have visitors? Jennifer phoned me in the ward, and she’d like to come and see me."
"Who is Jennifer?" asked Mark.
"One of my school mates… red hair, very pretty and she’s fun."
"It isn't that you want to make it with her, is it?"
Brad gave Mark a grin.
"Brad, you have to be cautious, you risk failure and that would be detrimental to your recovery and you might even scare her. No way, it's too soon. You may invite her in a week if you want, so you can be sure that the situation is under control."
"Ok, Doc. I'll tell her, but in a week I'll try..."
"Brad, I hope so. Remember you’re in a hospital and not in a hotel room, so no sex. Now I’ll check your blood pressure and then we’ll do some additional tests."
After about an hour and a half Mark was back in Marshall’s office.
"David, Brad’s condition is getting better every day. He’s very relaxed, so we’ve reduced the dosage of his antidepressant therapy. I found nothing unusual; indeed, if he goes on like this, it may turn out that we’ll be able to discharge him earlier than expected! And therefore not all the patients have quirks, David. Today’s analysis shows that all is normal," said Mark. "I’d ask you the favor of keeping this between us: please check to see if my team has made any mistakes without being obvious and let me know. You have access to all the medical records, you should have no problems with this."
"Of course, this thing intrigues me, too. I'll call you as soon as I have finished analyzing the situation."
78
Anaïs had arrived in Langley at noon in torrential rain and, given that she had to see to some bureaucratic formalities, and she didn’t want to get wet for the second time, she called Samuel Q. Jenkins and asked him to arrange for the meeting in the CIA cafeteria instead of the bar suggested by Green.
Black Hawk Day Rewind: An action packed spy thriller (Mark Savannah Espionage Series Book 1) Page 18
