Armageddon Conspiracy

by John Thompson

  The second pile, not really a pile but a single sheet of paper, contained the names of all the people she’d spoken with over the past day and a half as she tried to drum up support for DeVito’s thesis. She’d been rebuffed by her old compatriots at the FBI, by her superiors in Homeland Security and the U.S. Attorneys Office, by the White House staff, by members of the Committee to Re-elect the President, by the New York Mayor’s Office and the New York Chief of Police, as well as by the Boston and Charleston commands of Project Seahawk. Her barrage of phone calls had finally brought a harsh response from her superiors at Homeland Security, and now she was expressly forbidden to communicate her Condition Red to anyone else.

  The third pile, and the one that troubled her most, consisted of several news items: the theft of over eight hundred million dollars a few days earlier, the murder of a wealthy Egyptian, an arson/murder in Rye, and a murder in a Manhattan parking garage. Underneath the clippings lay Maggie DeVito’s memo.

  It was damn creative detective work, Jenkins thought, but her requests for wiretaps and surveillance had been turned down. The connections were too tenuous—pure speculation someone at the U.S. Attorney’s Office called them—and Biddle was too powerful. Still, Jenkins respected the way DeVito had followed her gut. All her instincts told her that DeVito was on the right path.

  Unfortunately, it led straight into a political minefield. Anybody who went that way risked getting blown to pieces. She shook her head, continued pacing, and tried to bite another nail.

  FORTY-EIGHT

  LAMBERTVILLE, NJ, JULY 1

  MOHAMMED CIRCLED THE SMALL HOUSE for the third time and listened to the sounds of the night all around. A dog barked in a yard somewhere. Once, a car sped past, not slowing. Mohammed’s own car was parked over a mile away, and he moved silently and carefully. The faint sound of a television leaked through the walls, as if someone was still watching, but he didn’t think they were. Maybe they’d fallen asleep, but he doubted that, too. Something felt wrong.

  He’d noticed the broken pane in the back door on his first circuit, and he’d gone around twice more to make sure he wasn’t missing anything else. Now, he went up onto the back porch and tried the knob. The door was unlocked. His Marakov 9mm was already in his hand, and he stepped over the broken glass and tiptoed through the kitchen.

  The downstairs was empty, and he crept up the stairs, his pistol centered on the landing. At the next to last step, the smell hit him, and he glanced to the right and saw the two sprawled bodies. He looked quickly at the other two rooms, found only emptiness, and then backtracked and left the house through the back door. On his way to his car he used his cell phone to call Abu Sayeed.

  “The holy man and his wife are dead,” he said.

  Abu Sayeed said nothing for several seconds, finally, “What about the other one?”

  “I have him.”

  “Come back.”

  “What about the bodyguards?”

  “They’ll come with Biddle.”

  FORTY-NINE

  TEETERBORO AIRPORT, JULY 1

  ANNELIËS TOOK A SERIES OF deep breaths to calm her nerves as Biddle’s Gulfstream touched down on the far end of the runway. The jet reversed thrusters and then a few seconds later braked just short of where she waited with the car.

  The engines wound down. A door swung back, a metal ladder unfolded, and Biddle hurried off the aircraft wearing wrinkled khakis and a plaid shirt with the sleeves rolled to the elbow. He stopped just short of the Range Rover and cast a searching look for his two bodyguards. He continued to glance around while the co-pilot loaded his luggage in the Range Rover’s cargo compartment. Finally, he thanked the pilot for a safe journey then climbed in the car. He gave Anneliës a curt nod, and she started through the gate that led to the airport exit road.

  They went several hundred yards in silence before Biddle demanded, “Where are they?”

  She braked and turned to face him. It was after three a.m., so there were no other cars on the airport exit road. “I don’t know,” she said, presuming their absence meant Abu Sayeed had already dealt with them.

  Biddle looked exhausted and worried, but he seemed to shake it off. “Come here,” he said, his voice rough with pent-up desire.

  She leaned into him and felt his kiss, as awkward as always, lips tentative and stiff. She responded, opening her mouth and sliding her tongue between his teeth. Biddle’s mouth was nearly dry, stale with the taste of his long travel, and she resisted the urge to pull away.

  The kiss finally ended, and Biddle straightened, breathing heavily. “You don’t know how long I’ve wanted to do that,” he said.

  His fingers caressed her cheek. He didn’t grab at her breasts or thighs, as other men would have done. She found his inhibition a relief. “I’ve suffered too, my darling,” she murmured. “Even a day is too long.”

  Biddle gave her a tender smile then sagged against his seat. “Thank God it won’t be much longer.”

  Anneliës resumed driving, turning out of the airport and heading toward Long Island.

  Biddle put his hand to his mouth and stifled a yawn. “The boat is ready?” He was referring to the Chris Craft she’d purchased on his orders at a pre-owned boat sale. It was the exact model the Coast Guard used, and now had false registration numbers and a repainted hull with wide bands of white tape along both sides that could be peeled off to reveal the diagonal red Coast Guard markings. Biddle’s plan called for the Arabs to use the disguised boat to penetrate the protective perimeter, where they would then fire their missiles at the President’s helicopter. Even if the President survived, he believed the United States’ retaliation would precipitate Armageddon. There would be no one to point the finger of guilt, because he fully expected the Arabs to die in their attack.

  “It’s in position,” she said. Two days earlier Anderson and McTighe had moved it to an industrial pier in the Red Hook section of Brooklyn. Biddle had leased the pier through a series of dummy corporations with untraceable ownership.

  “Thanks be to God,” Biddle said.

  Anneliës nodded, but her pulse quickened. She knew Abu Sayeed had no intention of using the disguised boat or sacrificing his life. His plan was to fire the rockets into the middle of Manhattan then disappear before anyone realized what happened. To Abu Sayeed, Biddle had been a tool to transport weapons and people into the United States, and soon he would become a bargaining chip to ensure their escape.

  She chewed her lip as her anxiety spiked. It was time to make the ultimate decision, and the risks were terrifying. If she warned Biddle about Abu Sayeed’s plan, how would he react? Would he choose survival or martyrdom? If he chose the latter, he’d give them both away, and Abu Sayeed would kill her at the first hint of betrayal. Yet if she didn’t warn Biddle, her life would never change.

  She reached into her pocket, and her fingers grazed the small syringe Abu Sayeed had given her in case Biddle seemed suspicious and refused to return to his estate. All she had to do was lean over and stick him in the neck, and her own safety was assured. She could deliver Biddle then go to JFK, board a flight to Europe, and disappear. However, her money would eventually run out, and once it did she’d be on her back again for any pig that wanted her body.

  She held her breath and made her choice. When she finally withdrew her hand from her pocket it was empty. She’d come too far, especially when Biddle could give her everything.

  “Darling,” she said. “I’m frightened.”

  Biddle had been resting, but now he opened his eyes and turned.

  “Those Arabs are animals,” she said.

  “They are infidels,” Biddle corrected. “They have never seen God’s light as you have.”

  “I don’t think we should go to your estate without protection.”

  Biddle seemed to think it over, then shook his head. “The Lord is all we require.”

  Anneliës looked away, trying to hide the desperation in her eyes. She thought of Biddle and Abu Sayeed, both men bril
liant and analytical yet each ruled by his own childish superstition. Perhaps she should get away from both of them, but where to go and how to do it?

  Biddle had closed his eyes again. “We’re almost finished, my love,” he murmured. He rested his hand on her thigh. “Soon we can be together.”

  Now, as she steered through the light traffic and tried again to make her choice, she thought back over fifteen years of whoring, ever since the German police had crushed the anarchist group she’d joined at the University of Heidelberg. She had fled and gone underground, where her looks had been her ticket to a living.

  That was how she’d come to work for Abu Sayeed—sometimes as his courier, sometimes as a personal amusement, sometimes as his gift to others—and how on his orders she met and seduced Biddle.

  Therefore, what choice did she really have? In ten more years, who would want her? And Biddle treated her well and paid her lavishly. For the first time she no longer had to sleep with other men for money. She had a hold on Biddle and believed he would make the arrangement permanent—if he survived the next forty-eight hours.

  “Are you sleeping?” she asked.

  “Just resting my eyes.”

  She gripped the wheel tightly. “I think the Arabs intend to kill you.”

  Biddle’s eyes opened and he turned his head. “Why?”

  She shook her head. “I hear them whisper things.”

  Biddle said nothing, but she thought she detected a hint of uncertainty.

  “I know they’re treacherous,” he said after a moment. “That’s why I wanted Beddington and McTighe here tonight.”

  “Maybe we should go someplace safe until you can talk to them.”

  “They don’t answer their phones.” His voice betrayed his rising doubt. “I don’t know what’s going on.”

  “We shouldn’t go back there alone.”

  Biddle shook his head then put one hand over his face. “Sometimes I fear that God will abandon me,” he whispered. “That my sins have made me unfit.”

  Anneliës took one hand off the wheel and caressed Biddle’s neck. “What you’re doing is sacred.”

  “But what if I’m wrong?”

  She felt him tremble, and his growing doubt alarmed her. “Prophecy is not wrong,” she insisted. “You’re not wrong. But if you can’t reach the bodyguards, you need to stay away from the Arabs.”

  Biddle sank back. When Anneliës looked at him again, his expression was distant. “Sometimes,” he began in a soft voice, “I know God will send me to Hell for my lust. Other times I believe you are the reward for my faith.”

  Anneliës forced a certainty into her voice she did not feel. “I am your reward darling,” she said.

  Biddle looked at her and gave a sheepish shrug. “I’m sorry to be weak,” he said.

  Anneliës shook her head. “You’re just confused, but it’s very understandable. That’s why I’m taking you to a hotel. You’ll feel better when you’ve had some sleep.”

  FIFTY

  MORRISTOWN, NJ, JULY 1

  MAGGIE WOKE TO THE SATURDAY morning traffic report on the clock radio, but then remembered Brent, the weight of his encircling arm and the warmth of his naked body spooned against her. She experienced a few blissful seconds until reality hit.

  She tried to shrug out of his grasp, but his arm tightened. “Let me up,” she muttered. Brent relented, and she kicked off the covers and staggered into the bathroom, feeling the leaden staleness in her body. For a time she leaned against the sink without moving, and finally, fighting the heavy pull of exhaustion, she began to brush her teeth.

  After too many days with hardly any sleep, her brain seemed to run in slow motion while the rest of the world hurtled by in real time. In the harsh light of morning, her theory about a connection between the terrorists and the theft and murders—and the memo she’d written to Jenkins—all seemed hopelessly ineffectual, an attempt to connect the unconnectable. Only, last night when the pieces had seemed to fit together so perfectly, she’d opened her big mouth and told Brent. It had felt right at the time, but now she realized the inevitable consequence—that when the authorities refused to take her ideas seriously, Brent would go after Biddle on his own.

  When she stepped out of the bathroom, Brent was already out of bed. “Try and go back to sleep,” she said.

  He shook his head. “No way.”

  She put her hand on his cheek, feeling his impatience like an electric motor beneath his skin. “You have to stay put,” she said. “Give me time to pull a few more things together.”

  Brent stiffened. “Wait for the bureaucrats to allow you to take Biddle down?” He shook his head. “They’ll never do it.”

  She sighed because she couldn’t argue with his logic nor deny that time was running out. She thought about tomorrow’s POTUS visit. “Just stay put,” she said again.

  She stood on her tiptoes, gave him a quick kiss, and felt a surge. Was it love? she wondered miserably. Probably. “Be tough,” she said, speaking to herself as much as to him.

  • • •

  Ninety minutes later and most of the way through her third cup of coffee, she was searching through the previous night’s police reports for any mention of the Turners or Tom Beddington and Darius McTighe when an overwhelming wave of guilt slammed her anew. Four more people dead! And she had shot Beddington herself. It had been clear self-defense, but she had pulled the trigger on a cop. A very, very dirty cop, but still . . .

  So far there was nothing in the reports, but she rubbed her eyes and forced herself to read to the end. Finally, she shoved back from her computer and ground her knuckles into her eyes. She had no time for pointless recrimination. She needed a plan, only what? She couldn’t seem to think. Ideas refused to string together, but she was desperate for a strategy—one that had a hope of working with just herself and Brent.

  “Wow,” a voice said from the entrance to her cubicle. “Looks like somebody had a rough night.”

  She glanced up, sweeping a handful of barely combed hair from her face, and saw Steve Kosinsky leaning against the partition with a large cup of coffee in each hand. She forced a smile. “That bad?”

  Kosinsky shrugged. “You’re still gorgeous. You’re just tired gorgeous.” He stepped into the cubicle and put one of the cups on the edge of her desk. “I can only hope that it means you finally came to your senses about the phantom boyfriend.”

  “You mean dumped him?”

  Kosinsky smiled and cocked his head. “Anyway, everything okay?”

  She waved a hand, taking in her cubicle. “My favorite way to spend Saturday.”

  Kosinsky stood on his tiptoes and glanced around at the empty cubicles and offices. “They need a few brave souls to hold down the fort. POTUS’s speech is much more important that finding out whether a bunch of towel heads have a nuke.”

  “That’s politically correct.”

  “I care.”

  “Are you going back to the docks?” she asked.

  “Nope.” Kosinsky scowled. “Everybody in my unit’s out checking parked cars and trash bins today, so it’s my turn to man the phones while we let commerce grind to a halt.”

  “Have you seen Jenkins?” Maggie asked.

  Kosinsky shook his head. “Somebody said she was here most of the night. She’s probably gone home to catch some sleep.”

  Maggie narrowed her eyes and studied him, wrestling with the beginnings of a desperate idea. With nothing left to lose, she plunged. “Do you have time to help me with something? I have a wild hunch I’m trying to check out.”

  Kosinsky shrugged. “Yeah,” he said. “What is it?”

  “You’ve got to keep it to yourself.”

  He hesitated for a beat. “Why?”

  “Because it’s pretty far-fetched. I sent Jenkins a memo on it, but she hasn’t said anything, so . . .”

  “You don’t want to embarrass yourself?” He smiled. “Not a word will escape my lips.”

  “Thanks,” Maggie said. “If you co
uld run some background checks, arrest reports, give me everything we’ve got on a few people.” She wrote the names on a yellow pad: Prescott Biddle, Fred Wofford, Reverend Howard Turner, Owen Smythe, and Betty Dowager. She briefly considered adding the two deputies, but held off.

  Kosinsky picked up the paper and read the names. “You’re too busy?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she lied. She felt bad about bringing him into this, but she couldn’t afford to bring suspicion on herself, not right now.

  He read the names and smiled. “If I get you the stuff on these people, will you have dinner with me?”

  Maggie slapped her hand on her desktop. “Do you ever quit?”

  Kosinsky gave her an innocent look. “Moi?”

  • • •

  Two hours later, she was on the phone trying to explain to an irate police chief in Port Chester, New York why nobody at Project Seahawk had followed up on a report of suspicious boating activity he had made several days earlier.

  “You’re telling me it’s this POTUS visit?” the chief demanded.

  “Yessir.”

  “Tell the sonofabitch to stay in Washington and let people do their jobs.”

  “I’ll pass that on, sir,” Maggie said. She hung up as Steve Kosinsky stepped into her cubicle waving a sheaf of papers.

  “Yes?”

  “Here’s what you asked for.”

  He looked over his shoulder then sat in the chair beside her desk. “Want to tell me what’s going on?” he said in a low voice.

  Maggie held out her hand. “May I see what you got?”

  Kosinsky handed her the papers. Prescott Biddle’s report was on top. She skimmed it, seeing that he’d spent two years at a Tennessee bible college before transferring to Harvard. From there he’d done two years of divinity study at an evangelical seminary and then attended M.I.T.’s Sloan School. Afterward, he’d worked at several different money management firms until starting Genesis Advisors. He made large donations to ultra-conservative causes and served on several corporate boards and on the national board of a church called the New Jerusalem Fellowship.