by Sean McFate
Jackson approached the dais slowly, and Kelsey’s eyes silently pleaded with him to stop.
You lie for a living, he thought, meeting her gaze. I cannot. I’m the national security advisor. She stepped aside as he took the podium.
“Are enemy nukes in the U.S. right now?” asked a journalist in the back.
Damn you, thought Jackson about the tall man as he stared down at the microphone. Then he spoke.
“There are some people who think they can get away with anything. They threaten our country and our homes. They think they are smarter than us, and they will never be caught. But I say to them—” Jackson leaned forward “—we will hunt you, find you, and finish you.”
Chapter 30
The tall man shook his head in disdain as he watched the press conference unfold. He sat behind a large mahogany desk in a dark room that looked like a palatial Victorian study. It had dark oak paneling, Empire-style couches, and a palatial Persian carpet. An antique cane leaned against the desk. The monkey’s face was a mixture of tortured grimace and laughing insanity. On TV, Jackson took to the podium and the cameras zoomed in; the tall man frowned.
“Fool,” the tall man said when Jackson had finished. An aide turned off the TV, while another rushed into the room looking distressed. “What?” barked the man in a raspy voice.
“Sir, he’s back.”
“Who?”
“Him,” said the aide, handing a computer tablet across the desk. The tall man examined it, and his scowl turned into a grin. The aide stood by nervously, having never seen the tall man smile.
Brad Winters had not smiled in a year. Months in a Saudi torture prison had twisted him, like the carved monkey on his cane. It took all of his negotiating skills to buy back his life, and now the only evidence of his incarceration was a limp, a crushed larynx, and a massive vendetta. Tom Locke had put him in that torture cell, and he swore his vengeance daily the way other people said prayers. Now justice was at hand.
“Tom Locke,” hissed Winters. “Alive.”
“Yes sir.”
Winters enlarged the picture. It showed Locke and two Apollo agents getting into a black Chevy Suburban near Eastern Market. He recognized one of the men as Lava, a reliable team leader who had chosen the wrong side in Winters’s hostile takeover bid for Apollo Outcomes. The board had fired Winters as CEO because of unauthorized private military activity in Ukraine. Now he was back to reclaim what was rightfully his: the company he founded twenty years ago and the influence it wielded in Washington. It was to be his year of justice.
“When was this picture taken?” asked Winters, leaning back in his chesterfield leather desk chair.
“A little over forty-eight hours ago.”
“Two days?! And I’m just seeing it now? Why did you take so long?”
The aide shuffled his feet, absorbing the tall man’s ire. “Because we just figured out it was Locke.”
“Explain.”
“Locke wasn’t the mark. We’ve been tracking one of the Apollo hunter-killer teams for the past four days. Our signals intelligence unit was able to place a transponder on their vehicle, and we’ve been two steps ahead of them ever since. Three nights ago, they were running agents in Langley and Meade, although the other night they went dark—”
“Get to the point,” interrupted Winters.
The aide tensely cleared his throat. “Around nine a.m., they made a beeline for a coffee shop on Capitol Hill. It’s an indicator because it’s completely outside their normal operational profile, triggering us to slew and cue surveillance. We assigned a drone to get eyes on, and it captured this picture. At first, we had no idea who they were meeting. The facial recognition algorithms came up blank, as if someone had erased the individual’s profile from the databases. It turns out someone did.”
“Fascinating,” said Winters, knowingly. “Who?”
“We did. A few years back, we won the IDIQ contract to manage the IC’s persons of interest databases,” said the aide. IC referred to the intelligence community: CIA, FBI, and fourteen other agencies.
“Ah, yes. I remember now. A handy little contract,” Winters said of the billion-dollar deal. “We erased the identities of all our operatives without anyone knowing.”
The aide gave a pro forma chortle, and then continued. “We got lucky, sir. One of our older techs recognized Locke. They used to work together.”
Winters sighed and his frown returned as he placed the tablet on the desk. The aide stiffened reflexively, but Winters sat motionless.
“Help me understand something,” said Winters. The aide swallowed hard. “I was led to believe that Locke was dead. Yet here is a picture of him alive, yesterday, in this city. Help me understand.”
“We thought so too,” said the aide with fear in his voice. Winters did not suffer bad news lightly. “He was reported killed in Syria by Jase Campbell’s team.”
The aide waited for a response, but none came.
“Campbell is the—” the aide began, but Winters held up a hand.
“Locke has more lives than an Afghan warlord,” said Winters, eyeing Locke’s photo on the tablet. “I’ll deal with Campbell later. What concerns me is why Locke has returned. Why would he risk everything by coming out of hiding? And coming back here, my home turf? Help me understand. Why would a rogue like Locke do it?”
The aide remained silent, hoping it was a rhetorical question. It wasn’t. Finally, he offered weakly: “We don’t know, sir.”
Winters glared. “How long has Locke been here?”
“We don’t know.”
“Where is Locke now?”
“We don’t know.”
“Dammit, what do you know?!” shouted Winters, who winced with pain and massaged his throat as he coughed. When he finished, his eyes turned to the aide, who was pale. “Why did you lose him?”
“We just fingered him five minutes ago. Had we known at the time, we would have abducted him. Now he’s gone dark. But we’re working up his digital signature. If Locke is working the Capitol region, we will find him.”
Winters leaned back again, thinking. He was framed by floor-to-ceiling red velvet drapes and valanced windows that overlooked a private garden. A wrought iron balcony and elaborate cut stonework around the windows could have passed for a Haussmann apartment in Paris. After a few minutes, he sat forward.
“Could he have been involved in last night?” asked Winters.
The aide shifted uncomfortably. The destruction of Elektra was an unmitigated catastrophe for their contract, and Winters spent the morning on the phone sweet-talking the client and screaming at staff. Heads were rolling. “Possibly. We are still conducting the postop.”
Winters stared at the picture of Locke. The aide’s forehead glistened with sweat despite the room’s cool temperature.
“Well, no matter. He’s not our problem anymore,” said Winters. He almost sounded happy.
“Yes sir,” said the aide in astonished relief, not comprehending yet thankful.
“Get me a secure line to the national security advisor,” Winters said. A moment later he was connected to the White House.
“Jackson speaking.”
“Good morning, George. It’s me. Nice performance today.”
“Good morning, Brad. Thank you, I had someone specific in mind.”
“Let’s hope they were watching.”
“Oh, don’t worry. I have it on good authority he was,” said Jackson with satisfaction. “Now, you are calling because you have a little something for me?”
“Indeed I do, as promised. I’m a man of my word,” cooed Winters as if the world were unicorns and rainbows. He thought he deserved an Oscar.
“Thank you,” said Jackson, and then paused. “I have to confess, Brad, this morning I expected you would sandbag me.”
“George, we are both patriots,” said Winters coaxingly. “We may have different methods, but we both want the same thing. We must trust each other, if we are to succeed.”
&n
bsp; “Agreed.”
Winters picked up the tablet and stared at the picture on the screen.
“The man you’re after is named Thomas Locke. He used to be one of mine, but he’s gone rogue and taken a few colleagues with him. He’s the one behind the WMD. I’ve committed every asset at my disposal to stopping them—”
“Wait, Winters!” interrupted Jackson, raising his voice in alarm. “Did you just say parts of Apollo Outcomes have gone rogue, and they have nuclear weapons inside the U.S.? Are you telling me you lost positive control of Apollo Outcomes?” Jackson’s voice trailed off as he contemplated the horror. It was like a T-rex running loose on Noah’s ark.
Winters had hoped the conversation would not veer in this direction, but perhaps it was for the best. “No George, I’m in control of Apollo. Locke is leading a splinter cell and we needed to know how large, which is why I couldn’t speak about it last night. I had to be sure, and now I am. Locke is the man with the nukes. He is maniacal and has images of self-grandeur.”
“Too much time in the field doing your dirty work, and now he’s lost his ethical compass,” said Jackson in a condescending tone.
“Doing our dirty work,” corrected Winters. “I don’t know what he wants, despite several overtures to talk reason to him. But Locke is not a reasonable man.”
“How could you let this happen?” scolded Jackson. “This was never part of our deal. You were supposed to be better than this.”
The words stung but Winters pushed ahead, feeling his trap closing around his prey. “What matters now is Locke has a nuclear weapon in the continental United States and the man is unhinged. He is a Tier One threat, George. Do you understand me? Tier One.”
Jackson paused. “Where the hell did Locke obtain weapons of mass destruction?”
“Pakistan. Two years ago, Locke posed as Saudi secret service and bought a bomb, leaving Saudi a big bill and bigger embarrassment. They kept it a secret for obvious reasons, and now the Kingdom is after him too. We all thought he was dead, and the nukes lost somewhere in Yemen. Saudi launched a war in Yemen partly to recover the nukes before the Iranians could find them. But no one found them. It turns out Locke was hiding with the nukes, waiting for his opportunity to strike. The VP’s death was Santa Claus for him.”
“If what you’re saying is true, Brad, then why didn’t the CIA or NSA know about it?”
Winters chuckled. “There’s much the CIA and NSA don’t know, George.” Especially since they outsource much of their critical work to me, he thought with a smug grin. Cooking intelligence to land more contracts was something of a specialty for him.
Winters could feel the tension over the phone. Come on, Jackson, you old sentimental fool. Bite! Winters had known him for thirty years, since Jackson was just a budding lobbyist for Boeing selling jet fighters to Congress. But the man was a true patriot, and that was what Winters was counting on. Perhaps he needed a sweetener to push him in the correct direction.
Winters cleared his throat. “George, I need your help. I can’t stop Locke on my own,” he said in a vulnerable tone. Now for the coup de grace. “And the country needs you too, George.” Winters paused for effect. “The hour is desperate.”
More silence. Come on, Jackson! thought Winters.
Jackson sighed. “Fine, I will clean up your mess. We cannot let this stand, and we are partners in this project until the end. Alea iacta est,” he said, quoting Caesar. He had a bevy of historical lines memorized for such occasions.
“‘The die is cast,’” replied Winters without hesitation. “You are quite right, old friend. We crossed the Rubicon together months ago, and we are committed now. Let’s work together and do what’s best for America.”
“Agreed. Where are the nukes now? Where’s Locke?”
“No one knows. Find Locke and find the nukes,” said Winters, eyeing Locke’s photo on the computer tablet as he talked. I got you, he thought with satisfaction. Checkmate Locke.
“All I need is a description. We’ll take it from there.”
“Good. I’m sending over a man right now with Locke’s file,” said Winters, nodding to the aide, who left the room. “And George, one more thing. This Locke guy; don’t underestimate him. You won’t find him in any database because he’s invisible. Worse, he’s cunning. We originally recruited him for infiltration and assassination, but he proved—” Winters paused, searching for the right word “—artful. If you spot him, don’t get creative, just take the shot.”
“Understood, Brad, and don’t worry. I have a Special Mission Unit at Bragg who will have Locke bagged and tagged by sundown, if the intel you give me is any good.”
“Oh, it is,” said Winters, beaming. “Happy hunting.”
Chapter 31
It was the next day and I still had not heard from Lava or Tye. Even the tiny mouse had gone on sabbatical, free to roam the greater trash heaps of the I-695 underpass. Lucky rodent, I thought, nearly nodding off. Jet lag and solitaire do not mix.
Where are Tye and Lava? I thought about using the burner phone to call them, but opted against it. Boredom was not an emergency. Also, maybe they were setting me up. They could have been stalling, and it might be hours before they arrived. Even a day or two. Time was precious, and I was wasting it. Every hour in my safehouse was an hour lost finding evidence implicating Apollo in the terrorist attack. This is bullshit, I thought, grabbing my Mark 23s and holstering them.
“Who knows what side Lava is really on?” I said aloud, wanting to trust him but knowing Apollo was in the middle of a civil war. It was difficult to know where people’s true loyalties lay in such circumstances.
Trust no one, and develop a contingency plan, I thought, starting with my own intelligence sources. Without good information, I was grounded.
“What I need is the ability to find people quickly, and track them. But how?” I said, pacing around the trailer. A good hacker could do it by scraping the web for mobile ad data. Who needs the NSA when you have large corporations spying on your every move, click, and preference through your smartphone? If I could recruit my own cyberagent, he or she could tap the online ad exchanges and track individuals for me in real time. Bingo! But it left a harder question.
“Now, where to find a talented hacker?” I mumbled as I absentmindedly twirled a 7.62 mm cartridge between my fingers. The University of Maryland was just outside the Capital Beltway and had one of the best computer science departments in the country. Not exactly the NSA but good enough.
“Should be easy. All I need is an underpaid and overtalented grad student who can code,” I said, rummaging through one of my duffels and pulling out a cash roll. “A free meal and a thousand dollars will do the trick.”
Wait! Is it worth the risk? screamed my intuition. Getting NSA-like surveillance was the vital next step. However, I had come all this way, spent all my money, and risked my life. Driving through DC in broad daylight was a rookie blunder. Or was it a rookie blunder to sit on my ass?
“‘Who Dares Wins,’” I said, repeating the British SAS’s motto as I grabbed the car keys.
The BMW purred as I drove it out of the garage and down the street, the sunlight blinding me for a moment. I took the side streets, away from the traffic cameras, congestion, and cops. Decades ago, during DC’s crack epidemic, this area was gangster land, but now it was forgotten. One abandoned brick town house lay boarded up, with a gang of feral cats on the stoop. Progress.
My fixer had equipped the BMW with an illegal police scanner, and it chirped routine calls. Still, one had to be careful. DC is the most policed city in the country. I remember an instructor at the Ranch, Apollo’s training facility in Texas, tell us there are fifty-seven cops for every ten thousand Washingtonians—almost twice the average for big cities and about four times the national average. And that’s not even counting all the special police, like Capitol, Park, and Metro. The nation’s capital was a nightmare for guys like me.
Apollo at war with itself. Winters alive and leading t
he rebellion. What are the stakes? I mused as I drove. It seemed inconceivable. The local classical radio station, WETA, was playing Gershwin’s “Lullaby,” an orchestral lollipop that transported me into the Great Gatsby’s parlor before dawn.
I took a right, down a back street that would eventually dump onto the Beltway, and then it was a straight shot to the campus. A faint wump-wump of a chopper flew nearby. The music beckoned to me, and I felt my jet lag weighing heavy upon my brain. The chopper returned, getting in the way of the sweet tempos. DC probably had the highest ratio of helicopters to people, too.
Then it struck me. I was in a deserted part of the city, and no choppers should be circling above. They should not even be transiting through this airspace; they used the rivers as highways. I slowed and scanned the sky in a zigzag pattern but saw nothing. The police scanner was quiet, too.
I must be getting tired, I thought, turning off the “Lullaby.” The wump-wump returned, but I could see nothing. Then no chopper sound.
Am I going crazy? I rolled down the windows, cut the engine, and coasted so I could hear better. At first nothing. Then the ambient sounds of the city, a garbage truck emptying a dumpster, a fire truck racing toward an emergency, a jackhammer. A helicopter.
The chopper was due east of my position, probably two klicks out, and growing louder. I started the engine and raced forward. When things don’t make sense, move! Figure it out later.
Blue flashes flooded my peripheral vision, then I heard the banshee of sirens. In every direction. Before my mind registered the threat, adrenaline shot through my arteries and rocked my brain. Ambush! I floored the accelerator, and seven hundred horses stampeded under the hood, pressing me hard into my seat. A police car nosed out a hundred meters ahead; I swerved and clipped his bumper, nearly spinning out. I counted three cruisers and two black SUVs behind me. No doubt there were more vehicles flanking me on the parallel roads, blocking my escape. But my real worry was the spotter helicopter. No car was faster than eyeballs in the sky with a radio.
