by Will Jordan
‘Why?’ Drake asked, captivated by what he was hearing.
‘Why does the man do anything? Money, of course.’ She practically spat the word. ‘He had never fully trusted Task Force Black, or me. To him, we were a liability. And anyway, the war in Afghanistan was coming to an end. We were outliving our usefulness, so he took the opportunity and sold us out to the Soviets. They were so desperate to catch us that they would have paid any price.’ Drake heard a snort of derision from her. ‘Carpenter never expected that I would come home. When I did, he was forced to improvise. He fabricated evidence against Luka and had Cain feed it to me, knowing I trusted him.’
She raised her head up then, as if facing up to the truth at last. ‘Luka knew I had been sent to kill him. He knew Carpenter had set him up, but still he allowed me to go through with it because he knew Carpenter would have me killed if I turned against him.’ He heard her sigh – in resignation, in acceptance, he couldn’t tell. ‘He gave his life … for me. The good soldier.’
Drake took a step towards her, reached out to touch her arm. ‘Anya, I—’
Suddenly she twisted out of his grip and rounded on him, visibly shaking with anger. ‘Stop it, Drake! I am not some frightened little girl to be comforted. I don’t need your pity or your sympathy. I don’t need you to hold me and tell me everything will be all right. I don’t need anyone for anything. Do you understand that?’
Was she trying to convince him, or herself? She had survived as long as she had by relying on no one but herself, by refusing to allow the vulnerability that came from trusting another. But there was more to living than mere survival.
Still, Drake knew better than to try to force the issue. Anya wouldn’t say or do anything she didn’t want to, and trying to change that would be an exercise in futility.
He lowered his outstretched hand, saying nothing.
Anya exhaled, slowly calming herself.
‘Carpenter retired from the military while I was in prison,’ she said, carrying on the conversation as if nothing had happened. ‘He left the service with enough money to found Horizon. He and Cain were never friends, but his connections with the Agency allowed him to turn Horizon into a major defence contractor in just a few years.’
That explained the rapid growth and success of his company, Drake thought. A PMC owned and operated by a man with access to an almost unlimited pool of retired operatives, and the political connections to ensure they won any contract they bid for. Whatever his record as a soldier, Carpenter was clearly a shrewd businessman.
‘Carpenter spends his life hiding behind walls and bulletproof glass. I could not get to him myself,’ she went on. ‘So I contacted Mitchell and he agreed to look into Carpenter and his company. The last time we spoke, he told me he had found something far bigger than either of us had imagined. He knew Carpenter would use his connections to stall an official investigation, so he would have to gather evidence himself. That was a week ago. A few days later … he was abducted and killed.’
‘What kind of evidence did Mitchell have?’ Drake asked, eager to know what the man had been working on.
‘He did not say. He was worried about security, seeing dangers in every shadow. Even our email communications had to be done via code words.’
‘So he didn’t share any of it with you?’
Anya said nothing to this. She merely stood there for a few moments in thoughtful silence. Clearly she had reached the same conclusion long before he had, and was facing up to the fact that Carpenter might well have slipped beyond her grasp.
‘I had hoped you could recover him alive, so he could share what he had found.’ She chewed her lip, for the first time looking genuinely contrite. ‘Now we may never know.’
‘That’s not exactly true,’ he said. ‘There might be another way out of this.’
She frowned. ‘What do you mean?’
Anya listened while he outlined his plan to use Cunningham to bypass Horizon’s computer security, and how Frost would soon be able to trawl through the company’s secrets.
‘It’s not easy, but I’ve got one of the best people I know working on it,’ he concluded. ‘She won’t let me down.’
For the first time, Anya looked genuinely impressed. He had accomplished something she could not. And maybe, just maybe, he had found a way to get what she needed.
She was silent for a few moments, clearly weighing up something in her mind. Then, reaching some unspoken decision, she nodded to herself.
‘All right. If you find what you are looking for, call me.’
Then, having concluded her business, she brushed past him and started walking back up the slope.
‘Hey, where are you going?’
He didn’t know what was going on in her mind, but he recognised the fast, purposeful walk, the slightly raised chin, the squared shoulders, the back held ramrod straight. She had set herself on something, had abandoned any lingering doubts and decided her course of action.
‘We have nothing more to say to each other, Drake,’ she called back over her shoulder. ‘If you find something on Carpenter, then we will talk. Until then, goodbye.’
Without looking back or saying another word, she carried on her way, disappearing over the brow of the hill. And just like that, she was gone.
Chapter 36
Frost was halfway through her second cup of coffee when her phone buzzed with an incoming text message. As she’d expected from a man like Cunningham, it was simple, concise, and told her exactly what she needed to know.
It is done.
‘About goddamn time.’
Setting her cup aside, she clapped her hands together and turned her attention to the laptop, booting up the program she had created to exploit the now compromised firewall.
‘Okay, you son of a bitch. Let’s dance …’
‘This had better be good,’ Crawford said under his breath as he reached for his desk phone. Line 1 was illuminated to let him know there was a call waiting.
He had been pulled out of the ops room only moments before with news of a priority call from Langley waiting in his office. As if he didn’t have enough to do already, now he had to get his ass chewed by some desk jockey back in DC.
He already had a sneaking suspicion it was George Breckenridge, Drake’s troublesome superior, demanding to know why his team wasn’t on a flight home.
‘Section Leader Crawford,’ he said, managing to sound more calm and efficient than he felt at that moment.
‘Crawford, this is Deputy Director Marcus Cain,’ a smooth, deep voice announced. ‘Do I have your complete attention?’
Crawford’s eyes opened wider. Shit, this wasn’t good.
‘Yes, Director.’
‘Good. Then I suggest you listen carefully, because we have a major situation here that needs to be un-fucked right now. Make no mistake when I say I’ll be holding you personally responsible if it isn’t. Do you understand?’
Crawford resisted the urge to swallow. ‘I do.’
‘Good. This is what I need from you …’
The mood in the conference room was fraught with tension as McKnight and Keegan waited for word from their companions in Kabul. Drake had contacted them after the meeting with Cunningham to confirm the man had agreed to help, but beyond that they had had no further contact.
Anything could be happening, and they had no idea. Their role at that moment was to remain on station at Bagram, keeping up the illusion that they were still following leads. In reality, they had none left to pursue.
Then, without warning, the door flew open and Crawford strode in, accompanied by two security operatives.
Both were in their thirties, standing over 6 feet tall and packing well over 200 pounds of solid muscle apiece, with crew-cut hair and cold, unflinching eyes. They looked as though they had been around the block enough times to know their business, and know it well.
They were dressed in suits and shirts with open collars, though McKnight’s trained eye spotted the slight bul
ge beneath each of their jackets. They were armed.
‘Is something wrong, Crawford?’ she asked.
‘You’re being shut down. I’ll have to ask you to hand over your computers and cellphones,’ Crawford replied with a hard undertone that made it clear this wasn’t a suggestion.
McKnight’s eyes narrowed. ‘On what grounds?’
‘I can’t say.’
‘Bullshit you can’t,’ Keegan hit back. ‘You ain’t getting anything from us until we get some answers.’
With a single curt nod from Crawford, one of the operatives moved forward to confiscate Keegan’s cellphone. Keegan was a good fifteen years older than him and at least 40 pounds lighter – no match for a young man in his prime.
Then, suddenly, Keegan grabbed his outstretched arm and twisted it with enough force to spin the man around, moving with frightening speed and the confident ease of a born fighter. A kick to the back of his leg brought him to his knees, and within moments Keegan had him at his mercy.
‘Bad move, son,’ he said, his voice low and menacing. ‘Don’t do it again.’
However, the second operative wasted no time drawing his weapon and levelling it at Keegan’s head. ‘Let him go,’ he hissed. ‘Let him go now!’
Keegan stared at Crawford. ‘Christ, can’t you see what’s happening here? You’re being played, you asshole. Someone doesn’t want us to find the truth.’
‘I have my orders,’ Crawford replied, his expression grim. ‘Let him go. Don’t make this any worse than it has to be.’
‘We’ve got nowhere to go, John,’ McKnight said, hating every word. ‘We can’t win this one.’
More than the show of force, her calm, reasoned words were enough to cut through Keegan’s instinctive reaction. Even he couldn’t take on two armed agents twice his size with his bare hands.
Reluctantly he released his hold, kicking the agent away in disgust before raising his hands in surrender. Rolling his shoulder, the agent glared at him with unconcealed hatred.
‘Knock yourself out, asshole,’ Keegan spat.
‘They’re covering this whole thing up, Crawford,’ McKnight said, raising her arms while one of the agents searched her. The other was busy disconnecting and packing away the laptops the team had set up. ‘And you’re allowing it to happen.’
Crawford said nothing to this, avoiding McKnight’s angry gaze.
‘Do you hear me? If you go through with this, you’re no better than Carpenter or the guys who killed Mitchell. Think about that next time you look in the mirror.’
Crawford tried not to hear her scathing words, instead concentrating on following his orders to the letter. Orders that had come straight from the second-highest ranking man in the Agency.
Orders that left a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach.
With a single beep, the message Frost had been waiting for appeared on the screen.
HorizonNet access granted
‘Yes!’ the young woman exclaimed, clapping her hands once again.
Negotiating her way through Horizon’s firewall had taken longer than she’d expected, even with the back door provided by her Trojan Horse program. They seemed to be using an access protocol she wasn’t familiar with, and she’d been forced to improvise.
Still, it was done now. She was inside their network and free to roam at will.
She smiled as her fingers danced across the keyboard, bringing up their main file directory so she could begin searching for what she needed. As soon as she found anything vaguely relevant, she would copy it onto the high-capacity drive connected to her laptop.
She was just reaching for her cup of coffee when she froze, alerted by a noise outside her hotel room door. A faint hum and a click.
The sound of an electronic lock being disabled.
‘Oh, shit.’
An instant later, the door flew inwards with a resounding crash and two men rushed in, huge and imposing, their eyes locked on her.
She was on her feet in an instant, survival instinct taking over. Grabbing the pot of coffee that lay beside the laptop, she snatched it up and hurled it at the nearest man, rushing in straight after it with her fists clenched.
Never let them come to you. That was her first, last and only rule when it came to fighting. Everything else was fair game.
The coffee had been sitting for some time, and was by now no longer hot enough to scald him. Still, he was forced to throw up his arm to shield himself from the pot, closing his eyes as the hot liquid sprayed over his face and clothes.
In a heartbeat, she was on him, lashing out at any vital spots she could find. She tried to strike him in the throat, knowing that a blow to the windpipe would drop him within seconds, but he saw it coming and ducked aside. Her punch hit his meaty shoulder instead, jarring her arm.
Left with little alternative, she planted a vicious kick between his legs, and this time she found her mark. Groaning in pain, he started to buckle.
Straight away Frost turned her attention to his companion, knowing he was the real threat now. She was just looking up when she felt something impact her chest, something sharp and painful.
But this was nothing to the pain she felt an instant later when the taser discharged, thousands of volts of electricity flooding her body.
Robbed of control, she dropped to the floor, teeth clenched, her body convulsing of its own volition. The torment seemed to carry on for an eternity before at last the second man released the trigger. Either he considered her subdued, or the weapon had discharged its battery pack.
Whatever the reason, she was out of the fight, and somewhere in her pain-deadened mind she knew it.
Lying helpless on the cheap green carpet, she could do nothing but watch as the man with the taser loomed over her, a huge menacing shadow blocking out all else.
She saw a hand reaching out to her, clutching a piece of loose fabric. A hood, she realised. Her last sight was of his forearm, tanned and powerfully muscled. And marring the skin, a tattoo of a sword intersected by three lightning bolts.
Then she felt the fabric pulled down over her head, and the world went dark. Her hands were quickly bound behind her back, and then she felt material, rough and coarse like sack cloth, pulled up over her, covering her entire body as if she were being placed inside a giant bag.
She felt herself being hoisted up off the ground. She was small and light, and her captor made easy work of the task. A few seconds of jolting movement followed, then she stopped.
‘Clear,’ she heard a male voice hiss.
More movement, and suddenly she was being pushed into something – a narrow opening, rectangular in shape, barely large enough to accommodate even her small frame.
It took her a moment to realise it was the laundry chute opposite their room.
Then, just like that, the powerful hands released their hold and she was falling, tumbling sickeningly downward, the sides of the chute banging and jolting against her.
She winced, bracing herself for the bone-breaking impact as she finally hit the basement several floors below. She only hoped her death was quick.
Instead she felt her descent slow as the chute curved towards horizontal. With her hands bound, she could do nothing but flail helplessly as she tumbled out of the end, landing amongst what she assumed was a pile of soiled bedclothes.
Within seconds she felt herself seized up again, thrown over a man’s shoulder and carried off. In the distance she heard the rumble of a vehicle engine, growing closer as her captor strode towards it.
They didn’t want her dead, she realised then, an icy stab of fear twisting her stomach. Not yet at least. They had other plans for her.
Chapter 37
Drake had switched off his official cellphone prior to his meeting with Anya, removing the SIM card to prevent anyone tracing his location. He waited until he was some distance from Bibi Mahru Hill before powering it up again, and straight away found a text message from Frost.
Tried calling but phone switched off. W
here are you??? Have found what we need. Meet me at room. Hurry!
Excitement surged through him. She had done it! Both Cunningham and Frost had come through for him. He was almost tempted to call Anya there and then to tell her they had Carpenter by the balls, but decided against it.
Better to review what Frost had found before making any rash decisions.
Pocketing the phone, he quickened his pace. He could see the imposing white rectangle of the Inter-Continental on a hillside about a mile away.
‘That son of a bitch,’ McKnight hissed, pacing the conference room like a caged animal. ‘I can’t believe he’d turn on us like this.’
They had been locked in there for the past hour, and though conditions were far from uncomfortable, the feeling of helplessness was oppressive. Cooped up as she was with nowhere to go and no information on what was happening with Drake and Frost, frustration was starting to get the better of her.
Keegan, however, didn’t reply. The old sniper was sitting at the far end of the conference table, his eyes glued to the TV mounted on the wall. He had had it on CNN for the past ten minutes or so, partly out of boredom but also because it was their only contact with the outside world.
‘Would you like a burger and a beer while you catch the scores?’ McKnight asked, in no mood for dumbed-down analysis of foreign affairs and interviews with so-called experts.
To her surprise, he held up a hand to silence her. ‘Pipe down a minute, huh? Something’s going on.’
Frowning, she directed her gaze to the TV.
As expected, it was a busy news day. Mitchell’s execution video had spread to various sites across the Internet, and like blood in the water it hadn’t taken long to draw the sharks. Most of the major news networks had been running stories on it, speculating on everything from Mitchell’s purpose in Afghanistan, to the perceived damage to the Agency’s reputation and even the implications for the War on Terror.
