by Marc Cameron
Justin looked over his shoulder, wiping rain off the front of his clear bubble face shield. He patted his rear with a gloved hand. “What do you think, Megan? Does this suit make my butt look big?”
He was a cute kid, with mischievous, brown eyes, muddy-river hair, and the muscular shoulders of a baseball player. He was also young enough to cause a scandal of Fox News proportions if she yielded to his relentless advances.
“Justin,” Mahoney sighed into the tiny microphone inside her rubberized helmet, fighting the urge to flirt back with such a good-looking hunk of man. “Knock it off. The stuff on that airplane is nothing to screw around with. Besides, I’m old enough to be your—”
“Sorry,” he cut her off. “I’ll stop.”
“Thank you.” Mahoney walked past him. The battery pack that powered the breathing unit at her waist whirred as she made her way toward the approaching aircraft. Ensconced in the cumbersome suit, she couldn’t hear Justin sniffing along behind her, but she was sure he was there. Maybe she was giving off the wrong vibes. Maybe she was leading him on subconsciously. She certainly didn’t intend to appear needy—no matter how available she was. In point of fact, her social calendar was incredibly lacking. She told herself it was because she was too busy with work, but wondered in her heart of hearts if she just wasn’t overly picky.
When Megan was a little girl her father, the Fulton County sheriff, had described her hair as claybank, comparing it to the coat of his favorite dun mare—not blond, not red, and not brown but somewhere in between all three, depending on how the light hit it. As she’d grown up he compared her in other ways to his beloved horse. When she’d placed third in the state high school swim meet, he’d put a hand on her shoulder and said: “You know, you and your mama are more like quarter horses than thoroughbreds—built for comfort over speed.” She’d looked around the pool and, for the first time, noticed that all the other young female swimmers standing around with their families towered over her by at least four inches.
“Third in state is nothing to be ashamed of,” her mother had said, draping a towel over Megan’s shoulders.
“I ain’t sayin’ she should be ashamed,” her father tried to defend his reasoning. “I’m just pointing out she’s been blessed with a little more hip and a little less length than these bags of bones that are taking first and second.”
The quarter-horse comparisons not withstanding, Megan knew she was attractive enough. The men who did ask her out all looked like Ken dolls. Roger, the cardiologist she’d been having dinner with in Buckhead when she’d been summoned away to the limousine conference, was exactly the sort of man she seemed to attract, and exactly the sort she couldn’t stand—rich, well-groomed, highly educated, and incredibly boring. She wondered if working surrounded by life-threatening germs day in and day out had somehow dulled her senses, made her crave more excitement from a man than any human being was capable of giving. Justin was certainly willing to show her some excitement, albeit of the fumbling kind. She could see it in his hungry, young eyes every time he looked at her. Somehow, she’d have to figure out a way to hit him in the head with a figurative two-by-four to let him know she wasn’t, and never would be, something on his menu.
The jet made a slow turn off the taxiway and lumbered toward them amid pulsing lights, turning Mahoney’s thoughts back to the deadly task at hand.
Luckily, FedEx traveled with a flight crew of only two and no attendants, making it far less likely that anyone would have come into contact with the package containing the virus.
“I know what you were going to say, Megan,” Justin said from behind her, his voice dripping with impish enthusiasm. She’d started their relationship off badly by insisting he call her Megan instead of Dr. Mahoney. She made a mental note to remain more aloof with her next intern.
“You were going to say that you’re old enough to be my sister.”
Mahoney spun on her heels. Every breath threw a tiny puff of fog on her clear plastic face shield. It was uncomfortable enough to begin with stuck in the clammy suit. She wasn’t about to put up with this for one minute longer.
“Justin, I’m serious.” She jabbed him in the chest with her glove-encased finger. “If you want to work with me, you gotta rein in that horn-dog libido. If I was a twenty-year-old cheerleader at Georgia Tech, maybe you and I could have a hot roll in the hay. We could catch us a nice case of campus clap—then set up a romantic date to get treated together at the health unit. But I’m old—”
“Thirty-something isn’t old.” Justin amped up his perfect grin. “Cosmo says you’re in your sexual prime.”
“I’ve seen too many deadly bugs to screw around with you, or anybody else who hasn’t been living inside a plastic bubble all his life.” That was a lie, but it sounded good. Mahoney hooked a gloved thumb over her shoulder toward the FedEx jet as it powered down behind her, lights pulsing in the dark rain. “It’s time to get serious. You hear what I’m saying? There is no vaccine for what’s in there, no cure.”
The intern slumped. “I understand. Won’t happen again.”
“Good,” Mahoney said, knowing that it would most certainly happen again ... and again. They had a similar talk about every other day. Talking about a roll in the hay with the beefy youngster had caused her hood to fog up even more.
When this is over, she thought, I’ve gotta find a full-grown man who can really fog my face mask.
Seven yellow airport fire trucks moved in to form a loose perimeter outside the ring of deputy marshals who now surrounded the aircraft. Tentatively, the copilot opened the door and stepped out onto the rolling metal stairway. He waved sheepishly, looking relieved to be on the ground. The lead marshal pointed back in the plane, shaking his head.
“Please stay aboard, sir,” he shouted. “No one out until we give the order.”
“I’ll be the only one to go aboard,” Mahoney said over the radio so the marshals could hear her. “My team and security contingent will take the package. The rest of you can secure the aircraft and crew for decontamination.” She turned to her pouting assistant. “Justin, grab the bubble stretcher and wheel it up to the base of the steps.”
The bubble stretcher was a Plexiglas box, long enough to hold a human body, fitted with an electric air pump and HEPA filter. Any virus or bacteria was kept inside by the constant negative air pressure provided by the pump.
“On it, Doctor,” Justin said, professional, for the moment.
Mahoney stopped and took a deep breath at the base of the Jetway. Through unthinkable errors of miscom-munication between governments, FedEx had just accomplished the very act terrorists had failed to complete on Northwest 2. They had landed a weaponized version of the deadliest virus known to man on American soil.
She glanced at her watch to confirm what she already knew.
It was September 11.
CHAPTER 17
11 September
Mount Vernon, Virginia
In the back of a dark blue armored limousine, where the Director of National Intelligence conducted the lion’s share of his work, Win Palmer briefed his new agents on the events surrounding Northwest Flight 2 and what he believed to be the inevitability of a bioterrorism attack with weaponized Ebola.
Quinn let out a deep sigh. The conversation with Kim had gone as expected. There was no ranting, no screaming, just a long, resigned sigh and a sullen “I knew better than to hope.” Quinn was sure that wasn’t the end of it. Rather than dwell on his own sorry problems, Quinn turned his thoughts to the tragedy of the Northwest flight. He’d heard of Steve Holiday, one of the most beloved squadron leaders ever to command the Blue Angels. He thought back to what Sadiq had told him outside the mosque that night in Fallujah.
“My informant says this guy Farooq is determined to do something worse than the mall bombings—to bring America to her knees.”
“And then shoot us in the head.” Palmer gave a somber nod. “Unfortunately, everything we have on Sheikh Husseini al Farooq—or his organiz
ation—wouldn’t fill a double-spaced page. We could kill him—if we could find him—but for all we know he has a second-in-command that’s even worse. Are you still in contact with your informant?”
Quinn nodded. “He’s got my secure cell phone number and I gave him a stack of phone cards before I left Iraq. He’s too greedy not to call me when he gets anything.
Thibodaux scratched his buzz cut, staring at his reflection in the tinted window. “I got a question or two if I might be so bold.”
“By all means,” Palmer said, smiling like a friendly uncle. He nursed a bottle of water across a low teak table from Quinn and the Cajun. Both still wore their uniforms, though they’d taken off the tunics and, thankfully, the ties—to Quinn, wearing a tie was like being choked by a very weak man. It was late, after eleven, and the heavy armored limousine thumped slowly down deserted residential streets. Compared to his BMW, the limo was a cage. Palmer had assured him the motorcycle would be transported to meet him, but the thought of someone else riding, or even trailering, his baby ate a hole in Quinn’s gut.
“Well, first off,” Thibodaux said, “do I still report to my same command structure? I ain’t no mercenary, but the wife will want to know about little things like where my pay will come from. I got a few mouths to feed.”
“Fair enough question,” Palmer said. “The paperwork has already been processed to put you on loan to OSI—”
“Hang on a damn minute there, sir,” Thibodaux said. “I’m a Marine. No offense, Quinn, but I didn’t sign on to be a wing waxer.”
“You’re still a Marine, Jacques,” Palmer chuckled. “You’re just on loan to the Air Force. We have an arrangement with OSI that makes it easier this way. You are now both what we in the business call OGAs—Other Governmental Agents. I’ve found it’s much easier to hide my OGAs in plain sight rather than trying to set up some clandestine agency. It’s not at all uncommon for agents of the federal government to go on various assignments they don’t talk about. As you would assume, most of those assignments are yawners—dignitary protection, diplomatic missions, things like that. Even James Bond could get lost in a bureaucracy as big and complex as ours. Take it from me; it’s much easier this way than putting you on the CIA or NSA payroll. You both have clearances and I can read you in above TS. Your pay and benefits mechanisms are already in place. You’ll start to receive oh-six pay as of last week.”
“A colonel’s salary?” Thibodaux whistled. “The child bride’s gonna wonder what kind of deal I’ve made with the devil for that one. I’m still not sure what our duties will be on this ‘Hammer Team’ of yours.”
“Your duties”—the DNI grinned—“are whatever I find necessary. Apart from the fact that you saved my grandson, I chose you two because of your particular skill sets and above all, your personalities. Your records demonstrate you don’t kill just because you have the opportunity ... but when it’s the correct thing to do, you don’t hesitate. Thankfully, the President has removed the chains of red tape from me. We can act when we need to act—without waiting for fifteen others to sign off on our actions.”
“Are there more of us?” Thibodaux asked. Quinn had the same questions but was happy enough to let the big Marine do the talking.
The limo turned into a tree-lined circular drive off a shadowed side street a stone’s throw from George Washington Parkway.
“There are a few, but I doubt you’ll ever meet. Terrorists learn from us ... and we learn from them. Small, independent cells can act on their own and, better still, they can act with speed. It gives the President deniability.”
“Deniability ...” Quinn mused, mouthing the distasteful word.
“Correct,” Palmer said. “You report only to me and I report to the President. No matter the politics, the person sitting in the Oval Office feels the harsh weight of reality settle on them pretty fast. Torture, enhanced interrogation—call it what you want, but every great once in a while such a thing becomes a necessity. Some play the game in the open, some more discreetly. The events in Colorado have purchased a new sense of realism from the citizens of the United States. For a time at least, they see the need to fight back.”
Thibodaux crunched his brow like his head hurt. “But if the President knows, he doesn’t have deniability.”
Palmer smiled. It was the sort of smile the general had warned them about when he mentioned men in suits. “He knows what I say he does.”
“So you’d lie?” Thibodaux released a deep breath.
“In a heartbeat,” Palmer said simply, “for a greater cause.”
“What about Congressional oversight? Isn’t it illegal to do this sort of thing without legislative approval?” Quinn studied the man’s cool eyes under the dim yellow dome light.
“We have our supporters,” he said, shrugging. “Call it a Select Committee of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence—I call them the Gang of Five. The SSCI has fifteen members, the majority party having one more seat at the table. Our Gang of Five keeps that same ratio—but again, they only know what I tell them—and generally they don’t do too much asking. I think they prefer to bust my chops after the fact than to know the whole truth up front. No matter what anyone weeps about in front of the television cameras, we have the backing we need—sometimes even from the same people who bash us on CNN. The Gang of Five likes to have their deniability, too.”
“So you’d lie to the Senate, but you won’t ever lie to us?” Thibodaux said.
“Never.”
“Is that a lie?” The Cajun grinned.
Palmer leaned back to study the limo’s carpeted ceiling a moment, and then put both hands flat on his knees. “I’ll make you this promise, gentlemen. I may not always tell you everything, but I’ll never send you to get killed without giving you the whole of it. That kind of mission should be voluntary and fully disclosed.”
“Sounds like it’d be pretty easy to drop us in the grease,” Thibodaux said, stone faced.
Win Palmer sighed, closing his eyes. When he opened them he looked directly at each man in turn. “Neither one of you would have stayed alive as long as you have if not for the ability to read people. You saved my grandson’s life and that’s something I don’t take lightly—but more than that, you have talents that can save countless other lives. I love my country, gentlemen, and from your records I can tell you do as well. I don’t believe I’ll ever have to ‘drop you in the grease’—I think you’d jump in on your own.”
Quinn kept quiet.
“Get some rest.” Palmer nodded toward a sprawling brick home behind an alternating row of sycamores and oaks that had already been big trees when George Washington was still receiving guests at Mount Vernon. “Miyagi will settle you in and see to your equipment issues in the morning.”
“Are you shittin’ me?” Thibodaux grinned. “Mr. Miyagi works for you?”
“Mrs. Miyagi,” Palmer corrected. “And no ‘wax on, wax off ’ jokes. This woman might not look like it, but she could seriously kick your ass.”
Quinn’s cell phone began to buzz in his pocket.
“Go ahead and take that,” Palmer said, pushing open the door. “But don’t loiter out here too long. Mrs. Miyagi is expecting you—and she’s not someone you’d want to have mad at you.”
Red oak and yellow sycamore leaves, the beginnings of an early fall, swirled under the tires in the feeble glow of the taillights as the limo crunched down the deserted street to leave the two men alone.
Quinn pressed the button on his cell. “Hello.”
Thibodaux leaned against the ghostly white bark of a sycamore tree and stared into the night.
“Daddy?”
Quinn put aside thoughts of grimy politics and let himself go soft inside. His five-year-old daughter was the one person in the world who never disappointed him.
“Well, hello, Mattie. What are you doing up so late?” She gave her trademark giggle. “Daddy, it’s always late where you are. It’s only eight in Alaska.”
Quinn looke
d at the Aquaracer on his wrist. Midnight. She was so far away.
“Daddy?”
“Yes?”
“Are you killing surgeons?”
“Where did you get that idea?”
“On CNN they said that Americans are killing surgeons in Iraq. You’re an American.”
“I think you should stop watching CNN.”
Thibodaux chucked softly in the darkness. “Tell her to watch Fox,” he whispered. “I don’t let my boys watch nuthin’ but Fox.”
Quinn waved him off.
“I saw a girl moose today in our yard,” Mattie said.
“Wow.” Quinn didn’t care what they talked about. Just hearing the kid’s voice soothed his soul. “Mom told me she had to drive you to school.”
“I heard Mom tell Grandma she’s worried about you.”
“Is that right?” Quinn couldn’t help but smile that Kim would talk about him at all. Still, he didn’t like the idea of her worrying Mattie. “Can I talk to Mommy a minute?”
“She said to tell you she’s sleeping.”
Quinn nodded, loving his daughter’s naïve honesty.
“I have to go, Daddy. Don’t let the surgeons get you. You’re my bestie.”
“You’re my bestie too, sweetheart. Love you ...” Quinn returned the phone to his pocket, fighting back a tear.
Thibodaux hung his big head. “I thought I’d be home spoonin’ the delta whiskey tonight. Hell, I don’t even have a toothbrush. I hope Mrs. Miyagi has an extra.”
Quinn stared down the empty road, toward the orange glow of D.C. He thought of what Win Palmer had said. Deniability—it gave any professional soldier pause. It was another word for throwing someone under the proverbial bus.
Dry leaves skittered across the pavement on the cool breeze, sending a chill crawling up Quinn’s neck.
