King and Maxwell

by David Baldacci

  “No. They had Carlton’s place staked out. You showed up. One reason that prompted this meeting.”

  Sean studied Cole. The man seemed to have aged ten years since they had last seen him at Camp David.

  He’s thinking this is his Watergate, thought Sean.

  “I’m surprised that the Feds hadn’t already visited him.”

  “Free speech. Fourth Estate,” responded Cole. “Tricky thing. I’m not looking to censure the media. I get accused of enough crap without fueling that fire. But you’re not the government. You maybe can do things we can’t do.”

  “And then share them with you?” asked Michelle.

  Sean glanced nervously at her.

  Cole said, “I thought we agreed that that’s exactly what you would do? Work this thing together. Starting with finding Sam Wingo by using your connection with the son.”

  Sean glanced again at Michelle but said nothing.

  Cole added, “And if you’re covering for your buddies at Hoover, I already know the FBI lost the boy.”

  “We apparently don’t have buddies at Hoover, sir,” said Michelle.

  Cole shrugged. “This ends right, it’s no harm no foul, as far as I’m concerned.”

  “That’s very generous of you, sir,” said Sean, although the look on his face did not match his words.

  Cole did not seem to notice, or if he did, he did not seem to care.

  Sean said, “So Iran? That’s what we were doing?”

  “Not as simple as that, no.”

  “Money for weapons to fuel insurgents in Iran. With North Korea next on the drawing board?”

  “Who told you that?”

  “Private investigators, sir. We have to maintain confidences.”

  “Just as we are with you,” added Michelle.

  “So if it’s not that simple, can you enlighten us?” asked Sean.

  “Why?”

  “We have to know the big picture if we’re going to make a dent in this, Mr. President.”

  Cole stared at him for a few seconds before leaning back against the couch. “As was mentioned in that stupid blog, the euros were going to purchase poppies for heroin production. Not really, of course, the poppies would never be used for drug making. At least not by us.”

  “But you needed a way to launder the euros,” speculated Sean. “Before they got to their final destination.”

  Cole nodded. “The purchased poppies would end up in a third party’s hands.”

  “Let me guess,” said Sean. “An international arms dealer?”

  “And then the weapons obtained in return for the poppies would make their way to Iran.”

  “And what would the arms dealer do with the poppies?”

  “I said the poppies would not be used by us for making heroin. I can’t speak for anyone else.”

  “Permission to speak candidly, Mr. President?” said Sean.

  “Considering you’re no longer in the Secret Service, you can speak candidly whenever you want.”

  “Whoever came up with this plan needs to be fired, sir.”

  “It’s idiotic,” added Michelle. “With so many ways it could go wrong. And did.”

  Cole’s face flushed but then his anger quickly subsided. “I accepted the person’s resignation two days ago. Not that that matters. The buck stops with me. I authorized it. I own it.”

  The room was quiet for a few seconds.

  Cole said, “The blogger?”

  “Out of the game,” said Sean. “He knew nothing about his source.”

  “You believe him?”

  “I can read fear in a man’s eyes,” said Sean. “He was clueless. Just looking for the next big scoop.”

  “Do you have leads to the source?”

  “Working on that right now.”

  “If it came by email my people could work back to the source, but—”

  “That tricky balance thing,” said Michelle. “Free speech, the Fourth Estate.”

  “Right. A scandal is one thing. Perhaps survivable. Covering up the scandal is unforgivable.”

  “Then let us do our thing, Mr. President,” said Sean.

  “Can you find Sam Wingo?”

  “I believe so.”

  “Do you think he’s involved in this?”

  “We think he was set up.”

  “By whom?”

  “Not clear yet. But we have some leads and we’re running them down.”

  The president rose. “Then I should let you get on with it. I have an appointment outside the office.”

  Sean and Michelle stood.

  “Thank you, sir,” said Sean.

  “Anything I can do, let me know. I can’t drop everything I’m doing, but this is a priority for me.”

  “Understood.”

  Sean and Michelle followed at a distance as Cole and his protection detail, surrounding him in a hard diamond pattern, walked down the passageway.

  They went outside where the motorcade was waiting.

  The presidential limo, known as the Beast, sat there with its engine running. D.C. cops had already cleared all roads the motorcade would travel on. The Beast did not stop for red lights or anything else.

  Before the door was closed Cole looked up at them. “I’m counting on you both.”

  Then the motorcade was off.

  Michelle looked wistful as the long line of vehicles sped away.

  “It is impressive,” said Sean.

  “Yeah,” said Michelle.

  “But it gets old fast.”

  She snorted. “Right.”

  “This way,” said a Secret Service agent.

  They were driven back to their vehicle outside the hospital.

  As they climbed into the Land Cruiser, Sean, noting his partner’s subdued look, said, “That was your past, Michelle. You can’t live in the past.”

  “Sure you can, Sean. If you’re not too thrilled with your future.”

  CHAPTER

  61

  “HIS FATHER-IN-LAW?” SAID SEAN.

  He and Michelle were sitting across from Edgar Roy at his farmhouse west of D.C. The place looked asymmetrical in that the interior and furnishings were rustic, but there was gleaming computer equipment everywhere.

  Edgar had texted them on their way back from the hospital that he had news to share. They had immediately headed to his farmhouse.

  Edgar sat at his desk, which was actually a large rectangular section of sanded and painted three-inch-thick plywood painted black that rested on four sawhorses. Sitting on it were three giant computer screens set next to one another.

  Edgar nodded but looked oddly chagrined. “Yes, Dan Marshall is Alan Grant’s father-in-law.”

  “His father-in-law?” exclaimed Sean again.

  “Yes. Alan Grant married Leslie Marshall nine years ago. They have three children. Dan Marshall is a widower. His wife, Maggie, died of cancer two years ago.” He paused. “I’m sorry that I didn’t find this connection earlier. I can’t believe I missed it.”

  “It’s okay,” said Michelle in a soothing tone. “It just shows you’re human like the rest of us.”

  “Yeah,” agreed Sean. “Only you have four times the brain power of the rest of us.”

  This seemed to perk up Edgar’s spirits and he continued in a firmer voice. “Alan Grant served in the Army and was honorably discharged. He heads up Vista Trading Group. I could find no connection between Vista and Heron Air Service.”

  Sean said, “And Grant’s parents? You said you’d found something there?”

  “A suicide pact. They killed themselves back in 1988 when Grant was thirteen.”

  Michelle said, “Suicide pact? What was the reason?”

  “Franklin Grant served as an assistant to the NSC back in the 1980s. He became embroiled in the Iran-Contra affair and I guess he couldn’t live with it and neither could his wife. All very, very sad.”

  Michelle looked at Sean. “Okay, is that significant?”

  “Maybe.”

  Sea
n looked at Edgar. “What else can you tell us about Franklin Grant’s duties at the National Security Council?”

  “Most of it, Sean, is still classified. But from what I could gather Franklin Grant might have been in the loop on the scheme but wasn’t in favor of it. I dug a bit deeper than just the papers and other media reports at the time. It seems that Grant tried to speak out against his superiors but they used him as a scapegoat.” Edgar looked down for a moment and said, “I know what that feels like.”

  “We know you do, Edgar,” said Michelle. “So a scapegoat and leaving behind a young and suddenly orphaned Alan Grant.”

  Sean looked thoughtful. “I remember reading about Iran-Contra in the papers, of course, although I came to Washington after it was over. I don’t remember the name Franklin Grant.”

  Edgar glanced at his screen. “There wasn’t much to find. There were juicier parts out there. Reagan and all his high-ranking administration officials. Oliver North. North’s secretary. Manuel Noriega. Franklin Grant seems to have simply gotten lost in the history shuffle.”

  “But he was the only one who paid the ultimate price, right?” Michelle asked.

  Sean added, “From what I remember, even though a ton of documents ended up somehow being lost or withheld during the course of the investigation, quite a few administration officials were indicted and/or convicted, including the then-secretary of defense. But a bunch of the convictions were either overturned on appeal or vacated. And those that weren’t were pardoned by the next administration. I think North got jail time but he was pardoned too, or something like that.”

  Edgar said, “He actually received a suspended sentence and probation and did some community service. But his conviction was later vacated and all charges were later dropped.”

  “So Franklin Grant was really the only one who bit the bullet,” said Sean.

  “Maybe despite trying to be a whistleblower he had a guilty conscience,” reasoned Michelle.

  “Or more integrity than some of the others involved,” replied Sean. “But the bottom line is, this gives Alan Grant a great motive to have planned what is happening now.”

  “I’ll confess I was too young to really follow Iran-Contra. What exactly happened?” asked Michelle.

  Sean looked at Edgar. “I wasn’t too young. But you’ve just done the research. You can probably explain it better than I can, Edgar. The details are a little fuzzy for me.”

  Edgar looked at him sadly. “Your massive brain cell loss.”

  Michelle coughed to cover her laugh.

  Sean looked indignant. “Okay, listen up, I have a normal brain cell loss for someone… for someone of my age.”

  “There are medications that can help,” offered Edgar sincerely. “And I know some specialists in the field.”

  Michelle had to stifle another laugh.

  “Iran-Contra, okay? Can we get to it?” said Sean expectantly. “Because we’re wasting time focusing on my brain shrinkage.”

  Edgar sat back. “It sounds complicated, but it’s actually very simple. It started out as a way to free American hostages held by a radical group with ties to Iran. The original scheme was for Israel to ship weapons to Iran and then the U.S. would resupply Israel and receive payment from them. Then it devolved into a straight arms-for-hostages scheme in which weapons would be sold to Iran, something that was banned under U.S. law, and the hostages would be released in return for those sales. Then the plan was later modified so that an intermediary in Iran was used to sell the weapons and a portion of the resulting proceeds was used to funnel money to the Contras in Nicaragua. This was done so that Manuel Noriega and his Panamanian Defense Forces could help overthrow the Sandinista leadership, which was no friend of ours. But additional support to the Contras by American intelligence agencies had been prohibited by an act of Congress. Thus, the reason for the clandestine plan to get around that prohibition while at the same time trying to gain release of the hostages from the Iranian forces through the parallel arms sales.”

  “And you call that simple?” exclaimed Michelle.

  “Well, yes,” said Edgar matter-of-factly.

  “As simple as politicians seem to be able to make anything,” noted Sean. “And Noriega later turned out not to be such a good friend.”

  Edgar nodded. “Not unusual. After all, we liked Saddam Hussein until we didn’t like Saddam Hussein.”

  “Remind me never to run for public office,” said Michelle.

  “Or become a dictator,” amended Sean.

  Sean leaned back in his chair and looked at Michelle. “Iran-Contra back in the 1980s. And now George Carlton’s blogger source has alleged that the U.S. has attempted to funnel money through sales of Afghan poppies to anti-Iranian forces to buy weapons in an effort to overthrow the government there. It’s not an exact parallel.”

  “But maybe the best he could do under the circumstances,” said Michelle. “He didn’t initiate the scheme, Sean. Maybe he just found out about it and that was the catalyst for him to do what he’s doing.”

  “Are we talking about Alan Grant?” asked Edgar.

  Sean nodded. “He’s in cahoots with someone with connections to Heron Air Service. Sam Wingo was following that guy. He might have led him to Grant for all we know.”

  Edgar said, “But I could find no connection between Vista and Heron.”

  “There might be no discoverable connection. Or they might have covered their tracks really well. They might even have been the air service that was used to get the cash out of Afghanistan. Wingo said men flashing CIA creds took the shipment from him.”

  Michelle said, “But then the cash probably didn’t end up in Iran.”

  “No. I think it might have ended up back here.”

  Michelle said, “Look, maybe this is just a very complicated robbery. Grant is Marshall’s son-in-law. Marshall knew about the euros. Maybe he let it slip to Grant and Grant plans the heist and nabs the cash.”

  Sean shook his head. “I would’ve thought that but for the history of the parents. Pretty strong revenge motive there. I don’t think it’s as simple as a billion euros. If it was a simple robbery, why give George Carlton all that ammo for his blog? No, he’s discrediting Cole and his administration. And Grant doesn’t need the money, does he, Edgar?”

  “His business appears to be very successful with several significant clients in the government sector. His home is worth nearly a million dollars, and the mortgage was paid off three years ago. His credit history is excellent and he has no outstanding judgments or pending lawsuits against him. I even hacked into his tax returns; his income places him in the top tier of earners.”

  “You hacked into his tax records?” said Michelle. “Isn’t that illegal?”

  “Not really. I have pretty much carte blanche to go where I need to go. National security is a very large hall pass. And I just sort of extended that privilege to the work I was doing for you,” he added, a bit lamely.

  Sean slipped the flash drive from his pocket. “And now we have this.”

  “What’s on it?” asked Edgar eagerly as he took it from Sean and popped it into his computer’s USB slot.

  “The blogger’s source’s emails. There’s the usual IP trail on there. We’re hoping you can tell us where it came from. I doubt the sender made it easy, but if at all possible we need for you to track it back.”

  Edgar pounded his keys at speed as his eyes darted over the screen. “Usual protocols didn’t work.”

  “How do you know that?” asked Michelle.