“Great, I can catch up on my tv shows.”
Jarvis wasn’t entirely certain his friend was kidding. He planned on getting at least two nights’ worth of sleep on the military plane to Germany. There was planning to do and the comfort of a smooth-flying commercial flight with food and drink was the perfect setting. They sat quietly for a few minutes, very different emotions about the job ahead but almost identical strategizing going on their minds.
“I’m going to grab a shower. We’ve got a couple of hours.”
Brin looked up. “I was gonna say something, but…”
Jarvis laughed as he headed to the back of the building. His friend still smelled of hospital and sweat. He hoped there was enough hot water for Brin after he took his own 30 minutes to wash the sand, the grime, and the scent of death off his body.
Chapter Thirty-Six
It was a seven hour ride to Frankfurt Main Airport. The converted DC-10 was almost as loud as the helicopter and much bumpier. The seats slightly more comfortable than aluminum beach chairs. Jarvis settled across from Brin who promptly fell asleep and snored lightly for six and a half hours. Jarvis had no doubt that if a gun were cocked within fifty feet, Brin would instantly awaken and have the target in his sights. But all other noises were filtered out.
Jarvis pulled out a tiny spiral notebook, smaller than a cop’s beat notes. A shard of pencil stuck out the metal rings. He flipped open to an empty page as the plane sharply ascended. The first 5000 feet kept them in range of any shoulder missiles the Taliban might have acquired, so the quicker they made it out of that altitude the happier everyone was. Descents were even more interesting since gravity was working in their favor.
He doodled for a moment, creating an intricate and meaningless design along one row of the lined paper. The shapes didn’t form anything in particular, but resembled a geometric prison. His mind wandered to Wisconsin, then New York, and finally the ground falling away below.
Movie idea: A girl raised in Afghanistan learns to hate the invaders, her father a leader of the insurgency. She meets a soldier, who she believes is responsible for the death of her father, only to learn her own countrymen did it for political reasons. She questions her allegiance as she falls in love with the soldier.
Ending?
His pre-sleep ritual sometimes took the form of movie ideas. He re-read it and tried to picture Brin with a family, but kept seeing him like Tarzan living in tree-tops instead.
Jarvis stretched his legs out, leaned back, and watched Brin breathing deeply half a dozen times before his own eyes fell heavily. He slept for two hours, double his norm, making up for the previous night of no sleep at all. He cycled through two periods of REM and the dreams were vivid and shocking, but they didn’t interfere with his rest. He awoke refreshed and peered out the window into the dark sky knowing the sun was chasing them westward. Below was the first hint of Europe and in a couple of hours they’d land in Germany. He looked over at Brin who didn’t appear to have moved in the slightest.
Jarvis pulled out the piece of paper with the names of the remaining terrorists who were still loose on American soil. He ran his finger along each name, trying to imagine their emotional state right now. Then he took his thoughts back in time, when they’d been radicalized by a horror blamed on him and his comrades, but in reality perpetrated by these children’s own people. They were still children today, though hardened and filled with hatred. And the instigators were not truly their people, but a mutation, a false family who preyed on the fears and the patriotism of the innocent. Jarvis had to stop these children. He probably had to kill them. Little comfort came from knowing Mudar was dead. There would be another to replace him.
Ninety minutes later the plane made a slow, lazy circle and landed on a special runway far from the commercial tarmacs. Brin woke instantly and ready for combat seconds before the wheels touched the pavement. A narrow, stubby bus with tinted windows and plush seats carried the two men along with five other passengers to an unobtrusive gate at the main terminal a mile away. No one spoke except for the driver, a corporal in NATO uniform, who thanked Brin and Jarvis as they gave up their weapons before stepping off the bus. The transition was serene and bizarre; one minute a rifle and handgun were as normal as a laptop bag and bottle of water. Now they would cause hysteria and get both men arrested. Jarvis momentarily felt naked. He shook it off as he and Brin clambered up the metal staircase to the terminal building filled with regular travelers. In a few hours he would be armed and on the hunt again in New York.
The business class seats on Lufthansa fully reclined and Brin was asleep again before the chimes went off at 10,000 feet indicating it was safe to turn on approved electronic devices. Jarvis pulled out the iPad that was miraculously still in the duffle bag the corporal had handed him a couple hours earlier. He hadn’t bothered asking who had gone to the hotel room and collected his things. Jarvis pulled up a map of New York City and plotted the location on the sheet indicating the address of the poisoner. The plane had wi-fi so he could overlay museums, stadiums, outdoor markets, shopping centers, and any other heavily traversed spot or gathering place where people were likely to consume food or drink. He also added supermarkets. Assuming the poison hadn’t been aerosolized – a technically complicated process and one that diluted the potency of the agent that needed to be ingested – the killer would need to get it into some food supply. The rinky-dink Starbucks attempt would only have killed half a dozen people. That made sense if the goal were to create uncertainty and fear among the populace. But New York had heavy, dense population centers so a bigger splash would be easier. And maybe with most of the cells now out of commission or hiding, a big hit was in the plan. Jarvis rolled the dice and assumed the murders would be big and showy.
He wrote ideas and the broad strokes of a plan in the Notes app and linked them to different locations on the map. When they landed, the first thing they’d have to do was get armed. He pulled up Outlook and shot a couple of emails to former colleagues in the area. Shutting off the iPad, he settled back and flipped on the large screen embedded in the seat in front of him. There were twenty-four movies, sixty-three televisions shows, a hundred and sixteen music tracks, and a dozen games available on-demand. He narrowed it down to one film he thought he could put up with and accepted the offer of wine and dinner from the flight attendant who seemed to want to stay and chat. He started the movie and figured by the time the protagonist got the girl, saved the day, and rode off into the sunset he’d have some answers to his emails.
Seven hours passed quickly. Jarvis watched the business travelers sleep through most of it. He had no recollection of his sleep patterns as an infant or toddler, but he vividly remembered long nights in elementary school when his father would catch him reading with a flashlight under the covers or watching a portable television at 2 a.m. in the closet. College was when he decided it was a blessing instead of a burden. Getting into an Ivy League school surprised his parents because they never paid attention to his grades and assumed a smartass kid who spent all his spare time playing basketball and chasing girls was making up for being dumb. He never tried to distinguish whether he excelled because of talent in the classroom or an extra six hours of study time every night. In college he just knew he could take more classes, ones he liked and not just the ones for his major. Biology for the latter, and anything related to history, criminal justice, and war that he could get his hands on. He could have graduated in two years if he’d focused on bio but staying the full four cost his father another sixty grand and he figured it was a fair trade for almost two decades of having to live with the prick. The chain of thought was not transparent to him as he looked at the slumbering passengers and he was unaware of rubbing the spot on his collarbone where his father had slammed the frying pan one Saturday morning breaking it – the bone, not the pan – clean in half. The acceptance letter along with first year tuition information had just arrived. Jarvis’ mother reminded his dad about a promise he’d made a dozen ye
ars earlier – he’d pay for any school the kid got into. So sure his son was a moron, he laughed and even signed with his scribble on a sheet of yellow legal paper she provided. She hadn’t pulled it out since then, half in hope and half because over the years she’d moved inexorably toward her husband’s way of thinking, that her son was never going to amount to much. The father’s incessant cynicism, code for what others might call emotional abuse, wore at her and Jarvis. It was easier to give in and not fight. But when the letter came, a shadow of her former self emerged and she insisted.
When the frying pan hit and Jarvis bent over in pain as he heard the bone snap, he kept his legs beneath him. It took thirty seconds for the blinding agony to stop and when it did, he rose up. Still a couple inches shorter than his father, a growth spurt still a year or so ahead, and forty pounds lighter, he single-mindedly aimed himself at his father who had already turned back to the dish of eggs he’d made. Jarvis’ mother saw the look and stepped between them before the father could know what was in Jarvis’ eyes and heart. She took Jarvis to the hospital instead of calling the police and used this new leverage to whisper to her husband, “every penny the boy needs.”
They never spoke of it and Jarvis did not see his father for six years.
The plane circled New York as it descended to five thousand feet and Jarvis looked out the window. They flew along the Hudson and it seemed the plane was tracing the outline of the gaping, empty hole that was still ground zero. Construction crews, scaffolds, trucks – they were all dwarfed by the enormity of what was no longer there. The flight attendant tried gently to wake Brin to tell him to return his bed to the upright position. She got as far as reaching a hand out to his shoulder before he was fully alert and instantly assessing the situation. He did so quickly enough to avoid grabbing her hand in mid air. Instead he turned to Jarvis.
“Get a good night’s sleep?” He yawned and cracked open a bottle of water. “Let’s go hunting.”
Thirty minutes later they were in a taxi heading to Brooklyn. A pawnshop run by a Ranger Jarvis knew had a back room and wide selection of weaponry.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Both men felt better walking down 7th Avenue with weapons tucked in their waistbands. Brin wanted a couple more items but couldn’t think of a good way to avoid getting attention carrying a high-powered sniper rifle in Manhattan. He’d settled for a beautiful knife with a brutal seven-inch serrated blade. It added weight to his ankle and felt good. They passed three Starbucks in two blocks and picked the next one that was mostly empty. Jarvis’ tall drip fought back some of the jet lag and he was surprised at Brin’s caramel macchiato and blueberry scone. They picked a couple seats in the back with a small table and no onlookers. Jarvis spread the sheet with the poisoners’ names and the map he’d drawn.
Brin got crumbs on the map as he gestured with the scone. A piece of blueberry landed on Yankee Stadium. “You think they’ll go for a high value target?”
Jarvis brushed off the blueberry. He peered at the map and the list. “Only one name on our sheet with a red mark. One guy with poison, the other five don’t have it yet.” He shook his head. “Unless we missed something and Said and his pal weren’t the only suppliers. Yeah, I think he’ll hit something big if he isn’t scared off.”
Brin washed some scone down with sugary coffee. “Let’s go get this guy.”
“Yup. And I’ll check in with Timmons and see if they’ve made progress on the rest of the list.” He pulled out his phone. “I’ve got to make a call first.”
He scrolled through the text messages he’d received in the past few days. One was from Penny at the Parker Meridien. It made him smile but it was a little too dirty to share. He found the one he wanted and hit “Dial number.”
Harding answered on the fourth ring. The journalist sounded like he’d been sleeping or drinking. It was both and Jarvis could hear the creak of the bed as Harding sat up and rubbed his hand over his face. “Yeah, yeah…Jarvis, finally, huh? What the hell’d you do? Shit’s been flying for the last 24 hours.”
The voice could be heard across the table and Brin smiled at the flying shit they’d caused.
“I’m going to send you a file. It’s a narrative, a story about a Taliban plot to murder their own people and blame the US, radicalize some kids, send ‘em to the States as moles for half a decade, then activate them so they start poisoning innocent people around the country. Sound interesting?”
There was dead silence on the phone for ten seconds and then sounds of scrambling as Harding pulled himself together, grabbed his computer, pulled on a pair of boxers, and reached for an almost empty bottle of scotch, all at the same time.
“Goddammit, you better have some names to give me!” It sounded more to Jarvis like he was saying “I’m gonna get a Pulitzer for this!” He hung up and raised his eyebrows to Brin.
“I think I made his day.”
Harding didn’t care the line had gone dead. He sat at the desk facing the window onto the street in front of the Intercontinental Hotel and connected to the satellite broadband signal. He launched a secure VPN and logged into his paper’s account. A dozen emails of increasing agitation from this editor, but nothing from Jarvis yet. He strummed his fingers on the desk and watched his belly shake in rhythm. He hadn’t visited the gym on the second floor in the three months he’d been there. Or any gym for about twenty years. He took the bottle of Scotch by the neck and washed away any lingering regrets over the state of his flabby gut. A knock on the door didn’t dissuade him.
“Housekeeping?” The chambermaids were Afghani, timid, and very efficient. He wasn’t sure if they hated Americans or loved the money. He left a ten dollar bill on his pillow every other day so he figured it was the latter.
“Yeah, sure, c’mon in.” He retried the email and nothing appeared. The door opened behind him and the maid came in carrying towels, leaving the enormous cart holding every conceivable cleaning item known to mankind and available on the black market. She averted her eyes and went straight to the bathroom. Harding gave her a mild wave.
The carpet in the hallway muffled the footsteps of the man who’d been pretending to open the door next to Harding’s room. He didn’t hesitate as he caught the door the maid had pushed to swing shut as she headed to the bathroom. It was only three long strides to cross the room and the Glock in his left hand rose smoothly as he covered the distance. The movement reflected on the laptop screen but was indecipherable to Harding, who half turned out of instinct. The result was the .38 caliber bullet entering his left ear instead of the back of his head. A second shot was unnecessary but entered his temple at an angle and destroyed the bulk of his frontal lobe tissue. His brain never registered the sound of the shot. The maid’s, however, did. She came out of the bathroom, eyes wide and a scream on her lips. She saw only a man in camouflage with a black ski mask, a large gun now pointed directly at her chest. The scream stayed on hold. The man shook his head slowly and put a finger to his lips. The girl, who had seen much worse even in just the last week on her walk home from work, understood. She knew if death had not come yet, it would not be delivered on her by this man at this moment. She turned her eyes to the ground and walked quietly to the door. She would clean another room for now and come back later.
The gunmen kept his weapon on her as she walked and waited for the door to shut tight behind her. He looked back at the dead journalist. The irony and convenience of the dead man’s last, inadvertent act was not lost on him. Harding’s head had hit the keyboard just right – he’d refreshed the screen and a new email sat atop his inbox. It was from Jarvis. The killer pushed Harding off the chair and with gloved hands opened the email, read the two page summary of the Taliban escapade, and deleted everything. He emptied the computer’s trash for good measure, then closed down the laptop and took it with him. The ski mask came off after he was in the hallway and heading for the elevator. He passed the cleaning cart halfway down the hall and noted the maid was not in view. The gun went bac
k into the holster on his hip.
In the Starbucks in New York, Jarvis opened his iPad. “Our guy lives in Princeton. Want to drive or take the train?”
Brin cocked his head. “Isn’t that where you…?”
“I’ll rent a car. Shouldn’t take more than forty-five minutes to get there.” He’d made the drive hundreds of times while in school. He gathered the papers from the table and both men drained their cups as they stood. There was a Hertz location six blocks away. Half an hour later they were headed to the Lincoln Tunnel in a Ford SUV whose model Jarvis didn’t recognize. The smell of stale smoke was covered by generous amounts of industrial lavender or periwinkle spray. Despite the bumper-to-bumper crawl through the tunnel, in twenty minutes they were cruising down the New Jersey Turnpike headed for exit 9. As the industrial landscape fell away to the lush, tree-filled sections of central New Jersey, Jarvis got a whiff of nostalgia over the periwinkle and smoke. He pushed it far down to where it belonged.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Brin had his window down and arm outside in the 80 mph wind, his hand snaking up and down as though it were swimming upstream. Jarvis watched, feeling like a father on a road trip with a playful kid. A kid who could eviscerate an enemy soldier with a three-inch knife before the man was aware he’d been attacked. He picked up his phone and scrolled through the contacts, hitting Timmon’s number with his thumb. New Jersey law demanded use of hands-free systems while driving, so as to avoid unnecessary distractions. Jarvis held the phone to his ear. The Homeland Security agent picked up before the first ring was done.
“How was your trip?” Timmons’ voice, even over the roar from the open car window, held as much humor as professionalism.
“Productive.” He had to shout a little and Brin closed the window with only mild reluctance. “I think we may have irritated the suppliers.”
Dead East Page 18
