‘That much I don’t know,’ Hannah admitted, ‘and I’m pretty sure the Director’s not telling me everything, but then again I wouldn’t expect him to.’
‘It doesn’t feel right,’ Vaughn said. ‘What about this Mitchell guy, the one whose blood you pulled from the homicide in Virginia?’
‘Drew a blank,’ Hannah said as they walked into the office. ‘Sure, there’s something there but LeMay’s priority is Warner.’
Vaughn frowned but said nothing as they made their way through the office. They were barely half way to their desks when a voice hissed from an adjoining office.
‘Ford!’
Hannah turned to see Valery Jenkins glaring at her from one side of the office. She turned and strolled casually across, fully aware of the half dozen or so agents who had looked up from their computer screens with interest to watch the exchange.
‘Where the hell have you been?’ Jenkins demanded, her tightly–bunned gray hair quivering with restrained fury as she stormed into her office.
Hannah followed her at a leisurely pace and leaned on the door jam.
‘Had an appointment that I couldn’t miss, case you forgot.’
Jenkins stood behind her desk. ‘Tell me, now.’
‘Can’t do that.’
‘What?!’
‘National security, ma’am,’ Hannah replied as she examined her fingertips. ‘If there’s anything else?’
Jenkins glared at Hannah over her thin–rimmed spectacles and for a brief moment Hannah thought that Jenkins might spontaneously combust.
‘You’re pushing me to the limit, Ford,’ she growled. ‘As your superior I am required to know what you’re doing and where at all times. Your whereabouts are also a matter of national security.’
‘Director FBI begs to differ,’ Hannah smiled back calmly, her voice just loud enough for everybody else in the office to hear. ‘Do take any issues you have to him as from this moment. I have work to do.’
Hannah spun on one heel and marched away from Jenkins without a glance back. She stifled a broad smile as she heard a faint curse and the slamming of a door somewhere behind her as she sat down at her desk.
‘You’re playing with fire,’ Vaughn said as he observed the rest of the agents in the office quietly return to their work.
‘Playing with fire is what gave mankind an edge over the animals,’ Hannah pointed out as she switched on her computer.
‘So, where do we start?’
The screen on Hannah’s monitor glowed lethargically into life, and not for the first time she wondered about the agency’s policy regarding technology. Her friends always figured that law enforcement agencies and especially intelligence outfits possessed the very latest in computer technology, but in truth they preferred technology that was a year or two old. The simple reason for that was reliability – new tech’ was always plagued by bugs that took time to iron out as flaws were exposed by users. Only when computer programs were stable did the FBI and other agencies begin to adopt them.
‘LeMay’s essentially given me, and by extension you, carte blanche to dig into Warner and Lopez and find out what the hell they’re doing. Our first job is to find out where they are.’
Hannah accessed a secure search engine and located the Warner & Lopez website.
‘It’s changed to Lopez & Warner,’ Vaughn observed. ‘Looks like I’m not the only guy being bossed about by a woman.’
Hannah picked up her phone and dialed a number.
‘You’re just going to call them?’ Vaughn asked in amazement. ‘Won’t that alert them to the fact that we’re watching them?’
‘Yes, that’s exactly what it will do,’ Hannah said. ‘I want Warner to know that I’m breathing down his neck. I want to become an irritation to him, get on his back and stay there until he gives some ground and starts talking.’
Vaughn cast a glance at Jenkin’s office and smiled faintly.
‘I have the sense you might succeed in annoying him.’
Hannah slapped the back of her hand across Vaughn’s shoulder as she listened to the number she had dialed briefly ring and then switch across to another line as it was diverted.
‘They’re not in the office,’ she said. ‘I’m guessing it’s switched to a cell.’
The cell rang briefly and then went to answerphone.
‘It’s Lopez,’ Hannah said to Vaughn.
Hannah hung up the phone without leaving a message and then accessed another program on her computer. Connecting to the FBI’s immense database, the program gave Hannah the ability to immediately trace the location of the receiving cell.
The Hollywood image of agents attempting to locate the bad guy by keeping them talking for long enough to get a trace had long ago become a thing of the past. A landline call could be originated immediately by the carrier, which in this case was Hannah’s own desk phone at the field office. Likewise, using a digital trace to the receiving cell that had picked up the call could reveal the location of the user, if one had the FBI on their side and the complicity of the relevant phone company.
Hannah watched and waited as she saw a visual indication of the call trace being mapped out on a simple image of the United States before her. Moments later the image zoomed in on Washington DC, in particular an area just off the east shore of the Potomac River alongside Highway 295.
‘Joint Base Anacostia–Bolling,’ Vaughn read from the screen.
‘Headquarters of the Defense Intelligence Agency,’ Hannah murmured in reply as she leaned back in her seat.
‘Looks like your boy Warner was telling the truth,’ Vaughn said. ‘They do work for the DIA. Which makes me wonder again why LeMay wants them in prison so badly?’
‘Me too,’ she replied as she stood up abruptly and grabbed her jacket. ‘I guess there’s only one way to find out.’
‘What’s that?’
‘Get your coat,’ Hannah said as she breezed past him. ‘We’re going to DC. I’m going to follow Warner and find out what he’s really up to.’
***
XII
Anacostia,
Washington DC
‘I see them.’
Hannah Ford leaned on the window of the pool car and watched as Ethan Warner and Nicola Lopez travelled in a dark blue Lincoln with government plates through the traffic headed south on the Anacostia freeway toward DC’s Capital Beltway. Vaughn followed a discreet distance behind the Lincoln, driving casual so as not to alert their targets to the tail.
The city was busy, but Warner’s driver seemed to know the backstreets and the best ways to avoid the local choke points as he drove across the Potomac toward Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport. Their vehicle pulled up a short while later at a drop–off point before the airport’s enormous concave entrance and both Warner and Lopez got out as Vaughn cruised by toward a massive lot and pulled into the first vacant space he could find.
‘Where do you think they’re going?’ Hannah asked as they climbed out.
The sound of airlines soaring into the hard blue sky completed with the buzz of traffic as Vaughn shrugged.
‘Who the hell knows with these two? Either way, we’d better corner them before they leave town.’
Hannah slammed her door shut and smiled behind her sunglasses. ‘Leave that to me.’
Vaughn moved alongside her as she strode into the terminal entrance, Warner fairly easy to find and follow through the crowds, taller than most guys and with a slight swagger that was perhaps a remnant of his military days. Hannah stayed back a respectable distance and watched as both Warner and Lopez headed directly for the departures lounge, both with carry–on luggage of small back packs, no suitcases or other paraphernalia.
‘Travelling light,’ Vaughn observed.
‘I get the feeling these two don’t do luggage,’ Hannah replied as she circled around the lounge as Warner and Lopez settled in to a couch after they had checked in.
‘They won’t talk.’
‘They don’t have to,�
� Hannah replied as she took a direct line, approaching Warner from behind where he could not see her. Vaughn drifted off to her right to watch from a nearby coffee shop as Hannah moved up behind Warner.
‘Hello Hannah,’ Ethan said without looking behind him.
Hannah felt her cheeks flush in irritation as she stared at the back of Warner’s head.
‘A bit of an amateur, isn’t she?’ Lopez murmured from alongside Warner as she leafed through a magazine.
Hannah looked up and saw in the glass windows of a convenience store opposite a shadowy reflection of the lounge behind her, her own form superimposed over it. Hannah mastered her dignity and leaned her arms on the back of the couch as she looked down at them.
‘Going somewhere nice?’
‘Far away from you,’ Lopez smiled sweetly as she glanced up from her magazine. ‘And your puppy dog over there,’ she added with a tilt of her head.
Hannah managed not to glance at Vaughn, who was sitting at a coffee table and watching them. Instead she moved around the couch and took a seat opposite Warner.
‘I’m not sure I can let you leave the country,’ she said. ‘You’re both still suspects in an unsolved homicide.’
Ethan watched her for a long time, his gray eyes unnervingly still until he spoke.
‘You just can’t bear to be parted from me,’ he murmured. ‘I knew it.’
Hannah blurted out a laugh. ‘You’re a real fantasist, Warner.’
‘She does keep hanging around though, doesn’t she?’ Lopez pointed out, new interest in her eyes.
‘It’s my job,’ Hannah shot back at Lopez.
‘To hound innocent civilians?’
‘Let’s not waste time playing games,’ Hannah said. ‘You’re both on the DIA’s official list now but that doesn’t solve my crime scene.’
‘I told you where to look,’ Ethan said. ‘I take it that you found something of interest and that you’re here to ask questions about that something, because you and I know that Lopez and myself are innocent of any murder.’
Ethan Warner had a confidence about him that Hannah found oddly reassuring, despite the fact that he could just as easily be described as a confidence artist and con–man, the sort of person who could win the trust of just about anybody and then vanish overnight with their life savings.
‘Innocent until proven guilty,’ she reminded him.
‘Mitchell,’ Warner said abruptly. Hannah averted her eyes and saw Warner smile. ‘So, you did find out something. Do tell.’
‘I’m not here to talk about Mitchell,’ Hannah snapped back. ‘I want to know where you’re going.’
Lopez smiled ingratiatingly at her. ‘Bless. You just watched us check in and there are only two flights leaving in the next hour off that desk. One of them’s going to Hawaii and we’re not wearing beach shirts. Take as long as you like, hon’.’
Hannah’s hand drifted of its own accord toward her side arm, and with a force of will she suppressed the urge to replace Lopez’s smile with the magazine she was holding.
‘You two should have a show of your own. You’re like Bonny and Clyde, and we all know how they ended up.’
‘Folk heroes and loveable rogues,’ Warner grinned.
‘Dead,’ Hannah countered, her voice cracking like thin ice as her mirth vanished. ‘You’re both playing a dangerous game and this time I have the Bureau behind me.’
‘LeMay?’ Warner uttered. ‘Got yourself a promotion did you?’
‘I’m leading the investigation.’
‘Into what?’ Lopez asked.
‘The both of you,’ Hannah replied cheerfully. ‘It seems that you’ve been involved in a number of major incidents over the years and the Bureau believes that you represent a serious threat to national security.’
‘The only threat we represent to national security is exposing how useless it’s becoming,’ Lopez retorted. ‘But we’re off on our holidays now, so you can consider this green and pleasant land safe from our devious machinations.’
‘What are you really here for?’ Ethan asked Hannah. ‘You know about Mitchell. What did you find out?’
Hannah shrugged dismissively. ‘He served with the Marine Corps and the Navy SEALS in Vietnam, worked for the government after that. He died years ago.’
‘He’s about as dead as I am right now,’ Ethan replied. ‘Either that or he assumed the identity of someone already dead.’
‘Funny how the guy is to be held responsible for your wrong doing and yet nobody, anywhere can find him and the only cover you both have for the things that you’ve done is from the Defense Intelligence Agency.’
‘It’s not by choice,’ Lopez uttered, ‘believe me.’
‘Then why work for them?’
‘Naive patriotism,’ Warner replied. ‘I keep hoping that the agencies that supposedly work for our country will actually keep doing that. What about Majestic Twelve? Did you uncover anything about them?’
‘Y’know, I actually looked into that too,’ Hannah said, ‘and all that I found was a bunch of papers suggesting that some secret cabal was formed in 1947 by President Truman right after an alien spacecraft crash landed in Roswell, Nevada. It was real interesting, and as soon as I took the tin foil hat off my head I promised myself I’d never watch another episode of the X–Files again.’ She smiled. ‘The papers are considered by experts to be forgeries.’
‘They would be,’ Warner replied. ‘Real conspiracies seem to have taken to hiding behind false ones. You ever heard the saying: the best lies are mostly the truth?’
‘I’m not surprised that you’d know that,’ Hannah said. ‘Your record is full of half–truths, government redactions and other inconsistencies that just don’t add up for me. You’re a big bag of mysteries Warner, and one way or the other I’m going to get to the bottom of all of them.’
‘Well, this has been fun,’ Lopez said as she got up. ‘But we have a plane to catch and you have a whole lot of time to be wasting instead of doing a proper job.’
‘Why are you going to New Jersey?’ Hannah asked.
‘None of your business,’ Lopez replied.
Ethan stood and lifted his backpack onto his shoulder. As he turned to leave, Hannah grabbed his arm.
‘I just wanted to check in with you both, let you know that from now on I’m only ever going to be one step behind you.’
Ethan said nothing, but Lopez leaned around him and waved at Hannah.
‘And that’s probably as close as you’ll ever get. Have a nice day!’
Hannah fumed and let go of Warner’s arm, the former Marine’s broad jaw touched with an infuriating half–smile as he turned away and followed Lopez through the departure lounge toward the gates.
Vaughn walked up alongside Hannah and watched their quarry leave.
‘How’d it go?’ he asked.
Hannah watched Warner disappear and then turned for the terminal exits. ‘They’re terrified of me and we’ve got them on the run.’
‘Really?’
‘C’mon,’ Hannah said quickly. ‘Let’s head to the DIA and see if we can figure out what they’re up to.’
***
XIII
Hajjam Island,
Iraq
There were few things more beautiful than the desert at night.
The air was untainted by the human stain, the starts glittering with vibrant colors in the velvety black vault of the heavens above to cast a faint glow in the moonless sky that guided him on his journey.
There was no way that he could have crossed into Kuwait via the Safwan border crossing, which was too heavily guarded, as was Umm Qasr port far to the south east as he hiked across the silent hills, careful to stay below the ridgeline.
The journey down the Khawr–as–Zubayr Waterway from Basra had been a short but difficult one, made harder by the police checks routinely made on private vessels traversing south toward Umm Qasr and the Persian Gulf. There was much fear of Iranian sponsored terrorists seeking passage either in
to or out of Iraq, supporting the uprisings of Islamic State and its myriad splinter groups. It was hard for Abrahem to leave Iraq, but now he was alone and revelling in the solitude and safety the darkness provided, both from his enemies and from the burning hatred that seared his heart, consuming but not replenishing, focusing but blinding all at once.
He would miss his homeland, or at least what was left of it.
Hajjam Island was three kilometres long and provided access to the Persian Gulf for those with a will and a means to evade the Kuwaiti authorities. Patrol ships roamed the coast and inlets seeking out refugees, fugitives and smugglers alike, and were possessed of cameras that could see in the dark. Abrahem Nassir knew better than to travel across the open water at night, but for the time being he was safe.
At the southern tip of the island awaited a small craft that would take him around the floodplain cradling both Warbah Island and Bubiyan Island, the vessel staying within Iraqi waters although perilously close to the Iranian border. From there he would board a private vessel bound for Green Island, an exclusive resort in Kuwait City. Papers had been arranged under false names that would facilitate his exit via the international airport for the west.
All was in hand, so that the end could begin. The speed with which the American troops had closed in on captured journalist Kiera Lomas had surprised everyone, but Abrahem’s people had succeeded in their mission and now her early rescue mattered little. In fact, it may have helped things along.
Abrahem felt a light touch to his step, a jubilance born of the vengeance that flamed in his heart and grew stronger with every passing day. His time had been long coming, and it sometimes felt that he had endured an age of repressed fury and injustice, of being ignored, forgotten, abandoned, the memory of so many lost names burned into his mind, tormenting him like ghosts in his sleep…
Abrahem forced the thoughts from his mind, for they cost him focus and drive. To be a slave to one’s anger was to be imprisoned by one’s life, a Bedouin elder had once told him. Learn to let go of your hatred for it will only serve you well when you really need it, during the night of the long knives, the moment of retribution. Abrahem let the cool night air soothe him as he descended toward the island’s southern tip and saw a tiny light blink on and off in the infinite blackness ahead.
The Identity Mine (Warner & Lopez Book 3) Page 7
