by Brad Thor
Harvath smiled. “I appreciate that.” It was good to know that Tracy and his mother would continue to be looked after.
“If you change your mind about additional help,” continued Parker, “you’ve got my number. In the meantime, I’ve got a couple of housekeeping items for you. They’re not much, but they should help sharpen your focus a bit. I’ll drop them off shortly.”
“Thanks,” replied Harvath, who knew that Parker was referring to the internet-based electronic dead drop they had developed in case they needed to communicate while Harvath was away from Elk Mountain. Considering recent developments, he was glad they’d established it.
“Anything else we can do?” asked Parker.
“There is one thing,” replied Harvath.
“Name it.”
“I need you guys to help me arrange a tee time.”
Chapter 74
BETHESDA, MARYLAND
T he Congressional Country Club was one of the most exclusive country clubs in the nation. Opened in 1924, its Blue and Gold courses had been later redesigned by Rees Jones, with the Blue course repeatedly named one of the country’s hundred best.
The course was a challenging tableau of rolling green hills and tall trees. It embodied the best characteristics of the world’s finest courses and was the only thing demanding enough to take James Vaile’s mind off the crap that went along with his job as director of the Central Intelligence Agency.
He had a standing Sunday tee time, which he kept even more religiously than Sunday services at Holy Trinity in Georgetown. It was like therapy, and he truly believed it was one of the few things that kept him both sane and civilized in an undoubtedly insane and uncivilized world.
The Congressional Country Club was the playground of Washington’s elected aristocracy, and Vaile found it invigorating to be treading the same links that William Howard Taft, Woodrow Wilson, Warren G. Harding, Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover, and Dwight D. Eisenhower had.
The eighteenth hole of the Blue course was normally Vaile’s favorite. The view from the tee alone was incredible, as it looked toward the rear of one of the most majestic and imposing clubhouses in the world.
The drive itself took all the concentration Vaile could muster. From the elevated box, it was 190 yards over water. If you were lucky, your ball landed on the peninsulalike green and rolled to the edge of the cup, or better yet straight in.
Today, lady luck was not smiling on the DCI. Still upset over the ass-chewing he’d received from the president and having serious doubts about whether his people would be able to recapture Harvath, Vaile airmailed his first shot well over the green. He still couldn’t believe that Rutledge thought he might have had a hand in the deaths of the Maryland ME and his investigator girlfriend. Though the accident was certainly convenient, neither Vaile nor any of his agents had anything to do with it. The idiot had just blown through a red light.
Even so, the president wanted the reporter from the Baltimore Sun taken care of. How the hell Vaile was supposed to do that was anybody’s guess, especially as Rutledge had made it crystal clear that no harm was to come to the man.
With two of the five Gitmo terrorists dead, the biggest point of contention between the president and the DCI was what they should do next. Rutledge was all but convinced that a carefully worded Homeland Security directive needed to be sent to all law enforcement agencies about the possibility of an attack on American school buses. Vaile, though, still had his doubts and fell back on many of the same arguments that he had made before.
One thing was certain, there was no way any alert could go out with the threat of the Baltimore Sun article looming. It would throw everything that the president did from that point forward into question. His credibility would be severely undermined, and every single terrorism directive that came out of Washington would be second-guessed to death.
Vaile already had the beginnings of a plan in the works and welcomed the opportunity for a little peace and quiet out on the links. Many of his best breakthroughs came when he simply quieted his mind and concentrated on his game.
Though the DCI tried valiantly to do just that, his next drive was what was known in golf parlance as an “elephant’s ass”—high and stinky. It came up short and rolled down the shaved embankment into a watery grave.
“Except for the distance and the direction,” quipped Vaile’s golfing buddy, “that was a pretty good shot.”
Vaile wasn’t in the mood. He tee’d up one more, just to prove that he could put it on the green, which he did. It was his putting, though, that proved to be his final undoing.
It should have been a tap-in, but Vaile ended up four-jacking the hole. He was a man of considerable temper, and it took everything he had not to break his club over his knee. Vaile’s chum couldn’t decide what he found funnier, three shots off the tee to get to the green, or four putts to get the ball into the hole.
As the man wound up to bust his friend’s chops once more, Vaile looked at his watch and informed him that he needed to be on his way. The pair shook hands and Vaile’s foul mood notwithstanding, the DCI promised to pick up lunch after their game next week. The CIA director then disappeared toward the clubhouse with his protective detail in tow.
Hitting the locker room, all Vaile wanted to do was take a short steam before heading back to his office in Langley. He prayed to God no one would recognize him, or if they did that they would have the good social grace to leave him the hell alone.
Stripping out of his clothes, Vaile grabbed a towel and headed toward the steam room. His security detail was familiar with his routine and wouldn’t expect him to exit the locker room for at least a half hour.
Though he wasn’t crazy about his people seeing him naked, the real reason Vaile had them wait for him outside was that he just needed time alone. Being the director of the Central Intelligence Agency was hard enough; being constantly surrounded by bodyguards because so many nut jobs wanted him dead only made it harder. Sometimes, even if it was only for half an hour on Sundays, James Vaile wanted to forget who he was and just be anonymous for a while. And considering the day he was already having, he could use a little escape time more than ever.
Yanking open the door to the steam room, the DCI was greeted with a heavy cloud of thick mist scented with eucalyptus. He grabbed a seat on the lowest tier of the white-tiled benches and listened for the beautiful music of the door clicking shut.
When it did, his body began to relax. For the next few minutes he was completely cut off from the outside world, enveloped in blissful silence.
Vaile leaned back and closed his eyes. He was finally alone.
His mind began to drift, but as soon as it did, his thoughts were interrupted.
“That was one of the ugliest games I’ve ever seen played in my life,” said a voice from one of the benches above him.
Vaile was a well-known figure at the club, and he wasn’t surprised that his play had been noticed. Still, he had to fight back the urge to tell the hazy figure sitting above him what he could do with his opinions. Vaile simply wanted to tune everything out.
“This hasn’t been one of my best days,” he replied, his voice trailing off—a clear signal that he didn’t feel like talking.
“You can say that again,” replied the man as he leaned forward and cocked his pistol.
Chapter 75
D espite the intense heat of the steam room, Vaile’s body turned to ice. “Who are you?” he demanded. “What do you want?”
“You’ll forgive me, director,” said the voice, “if I save us both time and ask the questions.”
“My security people are—”
“Not even in the locker room and won’t expect to see you for a little while still.”
Vaile recognized the man’s voice but couldn’t place it, at least not right away. “I know you.”
Harvath came down off the upper bench and took a seat next to the DCI.
When the curtain of fog parted, Vaile couldn’t believe his e
yes. “Harvath. Are you crazy? Aren’t things bad enough for you? Now you pull a gun on the director of the CIA?”
“First,” responded Harvath, “I don’t see how things could get much worse for me. And second, I didn’t pull a gun on you, I cocked one that wasn’t even pointed in your direction.”
“I’ll make sure to note that subtlety when I report this meeting to the president.”
“I know we’re in a steam room, but let’s not jerk each other off, okay?”
“Listen,” replied Vaile, “we both know what this is about. The president was forced to make a deal with the devil and—”
“And the people I care about are the ones who are paying for it.”
“We had no idea things were going to turn out this way.”
Harvath was ready to punch the DCI’s lights out. “But now that they have, I don’t see anybody doing a hell of a lot to stop it.”
“You don’t know the first thing about what we’re doing,” snapped Vaile.
“What do you mean we?”
“The president asked me to put a covert team on the case.”
“He assigned a CIA team inside the United States?” asked Harvath. “In addition to the FBI?”
Vaile held up his palms. “The president wanted hefty counterterrorism experience on this and that’s what I gave him.”
“But they haven’t made much progress, have they?”
Vaile didn’t bother responding. It was painfully obvious that his people hadn’t made much progress.
“Were Morrell and his Omega Team in charge of that too?”
The DCI shook his head. “No. We fielded a separate team. I picked them myself. They’re all solid operators with Spec Ops experience, there’s just not enough for them to go on.”
Harvath shook his head. “And you saved Rick Morrell for the real dirty work so that you could use our friendship against me, didn’t you?”
“It was the fastest way to get the information we needed.”
“I should have known better.”
The DCI took a deep breath and then let it out. “Scot, negotiating with these terrorists was a bad choice, but it was the only choice the president had. We weren’t going to let these animals kill American kids. And we’re still not. That’s why you’ve got to turn yourself in.”
It wasn’t an easy call. Harvath didn’t want to provoke terrorist attacks on American children, but the fact that Vaile’s people hadn’t made any progress in catching the person responsible for hunting his loved ones only served to reinforce his decision. “I’m not stopping until I nail this fucker.”
“Even if it means you’re putting countless American lives on the line?”
Harvath was tempted to tell the DCI what he’d learned from Tammam Al-Tal in Jordan—that his operative, Najib, had been sprung from Gitmo in exchange for Al-Tal relinquishing his contract on Harvath, but at this point he was in no mood to share intelligence with anyone, especially the director of the CIA. Instead he said, “Whoever this guy is, he came looking for me. I didn’t start this.”
“Either way,” replied Vaile, “the president gave his word that we wouldn’t go after these men once they were released from Guantanamo.”
“One of them has attacked Americans on American soil. That right there should invalidate any deal the president made. As far as I’m concerned, these five shouldn’t be handed a get out of jail free card for the rest of their lives.”
“I agree with you,” said the DCI. “They shouldn’t, but there’s only one left now.”
Harvath didn’t understand. “One?”
“You killed Palmera and Najib, and we’ve recently located two others.”
“Which two?” asked Harvath. “Where are they?”
“Morocco and Australia,” said Vaile. “They’re under surveillance and are very close to being picked up by those countries for engaging in terrorist activity since their release from Gitmo. Which leaves—”
“The fifth detainee released that night. The Frenchman.”
Chapter 76
T he DCI nodded. “His name is Philippe Roussard. A sniper by training, he was also known as Juba. Before we caught him, he’d made quite a name for himself in Iraq; over one hundred confirmed kills of American service personnel.”
“That’s who’s killing my friends and family?” responded Harvath, searching his memory banks for the names and coming up empty.
Vaile nodded again.
Harvath’s anger was rising once more. “I can’t fucking believe this. You know who the hell this guy is and still you’re not doing anything to nail his ass to the wall.”
Vaile didn’t want to get into a pissing match with Harvath, so he changed the subject. “Did you know that I had a nephew who was killed in Iraq?”
“No, I didn’t,” replied Harvath, trying to get his temper under control. “I’m sorry.”
“For obvious reasons, our family and the Marines kept the relationship secret. As it turns out, Roussard was the one who killed him. He had no idea, of course. My nephew was just another infidel crusader to that scumbag; another American notch on his rifle butt.
“Even in death we kept my nephew’s relationship to me hidden. The last thing we wanted to do was hand the insurgency such a high-profile victory, especially since Juba, or Roussard, had reached almost mythical status for being untouchable and able to kill anyone he wanted.”
“Of course not,” said Harvath, sorry for the man’s loss, “but at the risk of sounding insensitive, where do I and the people I care about fit into all of this?”
“The name Roussard doesn’t ring any bells with you, does it?” asked Vaile.
Harvath shook his head.
“I guess it makes no difference. As long as the president intends to honor his side of the bargain, I have no choice but to bring you in.”
“But what if I can get to the people responsible for all of this before you do?”
“Personally,” said Vaile as he stood, “I don’t think any of this is about kids, school buses, or conditions at Gitmo. I think somehow it is all about you, and I’d like nothing more than for you to hunt down and kill every last one of the people responsible.”
There was a long pause in which Harvath sensed there was something else the DCI wanted to say.
A moment later, the man spoke. “But my personal opinions don’t really matter much in this case. Professionally, I’m bound to carry out the orders given to me by the president of the United States. I’d recommend you start doing the same, but something tells me we’re well beyond the point of that doing any good.”
“We are,” replied Harvath.
Vaile walked the couple of steps to the steam room door and then, with his hand upon it, turned to look back at Harvath. “In that case, there’s something you need to see.”
Chapter 77
SOMEWHERE OVER THE CARIBBEAN SEA
T he flight to Rio should have been restful, but Harvath didn’t get a wink of sleep. Vaile had promised to email him Roussard’s dossier, but Harvath doubted there’d be much in it of any use.
He still had one slimy little rock to overturn.
Harvath kept thinking about his past in general and one person in particular. Meg Cassidy was the last person he’d been involved with before meeting Tracy.
Brazil was one of those magical places Meg had always wanted to take him to, but Harvath had never been able to find, or never wanted to find, the time to go. As his commercial flight roared south, he thought what an idiot he’d been to lose Meg and how lucky he’d been to find Tracy. If Tracy died, he knew his status as damaged goods would be permanently cast in stone. One was rarely given second chances in life. He’d managed to get his second chance at happiness put on a life support system. It was an ironic metaphor, as his love life had always been in critical condition.
Harvath tried to shake the morbid thoughts, but couldn’t. Across the aisle from him was a young, newlywed couple. By the looks of their hand-holding, kissing, and repeated
requests for more champagne, they were off to Brazil or points further afield for their honeymoon.
He hadn’t been keeping track of the date at all. Glancing down at his Kobold chronograph, he realized Meg Cassidy’s wedding was just days away. He made a mental note to contact Gary to ask him to arrange a special security detail for her, effective immediately. While he and Meg were no longer romantically involved, Harvath still cared deeply for her and wouldn’t want to see anything happen to her, especially because of him.
Lawlor had gotten to know Meg very well and liked her immensely. The president had also grown quite fond of her and visited her summer cottage each year when he vacationed in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin.
Meg had done her country an invaluable service in helping Harvath to track down the heirs to Abu Nidal’s terrorist organization several years ago. Lawlor would have no problem getting President Rutledge to agree to assigning her a special detail for the next few days.
That was the window of time Harvath was most worried about. Despite the attack on New York, the last Harvath had heard the president was still planning on attending Meg’s wedding. Security would be beyond tight at that point. It was the run-up he was concerned about.
Like Tracy, Meg was an amazing woman. Though it had probably created more than a little friction between her and her fiancé, Meg had sent Harvath an invitation.
When it had arrived, the beautifully engraved note card had hit him like a hammer in the center of his chest. He’d never realized it, but it became apparent at that moment that he still carried a torch for Meg and harbored a hidden desire that things might one day work out between them. Seeing the invitation with her name and that of her fiancé, made him realize that some sort of spontaneous reconciliation cast down from the gods was no longer a possibility.
Not knowing how to reply to the invitation, Harvath simply set it aside and politely changed the subject the one time the president brought it up.
Now, speeding ever closer to Brazil—a country Meg had been so passionate about having him visit—Harvath couldn’t help but think of her and also of himself. God, was he really that screwed up? It seemed like everything he touched turned to dust.
