by Tom Clancy
The troops smashed into the crowd from all directions, letting loose with their heaviest firepower. Live parabellum rounds poured from their guns. People trying to flee were trapped in the press of bodies and fell screaming and crying, swept with gunfire, slipping on their own blood, crawling through pools of blood.
The television crews already on the scene were speedily joined by satellite crews that could provide live coverage of the melee.
Watching the event closely on television, Nga Canbera couldn’t decide how to feel about it. He had poured a fortune in rupiahs into financing the demonstrators, caring nothing about most of their issues, but liking to play political games with the administration, largely because he resented the competitive advantage held by the President’s businessman relatives-—and in particular by one of his sons, a former college classmate who owned a bank that was propped up by government loans and investments, and consistently outperformed his own as a result.
Still, Nga found the rabble crude and undeserving of sympathy. Would the crackdown play to the ruling party’s advantage, or further inflame its domestic opposition? And what if the International Monetary Fund withheld the balance of its economic recovery package, or even aborted it entirely in a knee-jerk spasm of humanitarian-ism? What effect would such a turn have on the Canbera family’s holdings … and most perplexingly, why hadn’t he asked himself that before?
It was all very confusing and intimidating, especially when he stopped to consider that his involvement with the students would only be the beginning, the very tip of what would surface if someone started digging around in his affairs … and that his complicity, however indirect, in the killing of the American spy could be the very thing that led to where his secrets were hidden. Kinzo’s thinly veiled warning was well taken—there was so much, so much that could bring catastrophe upon him. And what would Kinzo have said if he’d known about his role in what General Kersik and the others were plotting? Nga didn’t understand how the game could have gotten so complicated and dangerous, how it could have gotten so big. He felt in over his head.
He stared at the television. At the armored cars, the troopers, the pathetically frightened demonstrators being cut down in their tracks as they tried to scramble to safety. The President and his advisors deserved credit, at least, for having the courage to strike decisively, to chance the repercussions of bold action rather than wait until the wolves were at their door… and perhaps, Nga thought, there was something invaluable to be learned from that, a clue to what his course ought to be.
Again, it all came back to the words of advice Kinzo had offered. If Max Blackburn’s employers began tracing the circumstances of his death, it would inevitably lead to Nga’s own door. How, then, to preempt such an investigation? Yes, Marcus Caine eventually would be feeding on UpLink, devouring UpLink—Nga was no less confident of that than before. But as he had tried pointing out at the Thai’s dismal hiding place, the process of consumption would take time. Too much time.
Nga continued staring at the TV, but his eyes were no longer focused on the chaotic images flashing across its screen. He was wondering if the problem was not that the game itself had gotten beyond him, but rather that his strategy needed to be broadened. That he had reached the stage where studied and incremental moves would no longer work… and where one swift move could win it all.
Nodding to himself like a man who has suddenly realized the solution to a complex puzzle, he picked up the telephone and called Marcus Caine.
“Hello?”
“Marcus, hello. I’m actually surprised I was able to catch you at home. According to what I’ve been reading, you’re the toast of the town these days.”
Caine raised an eyebrow at the sound of Nga’s voice. He’d been in front of his television for over an hour watching raw CNN satellite feeds of the Jakarta bloodbath. By the time the footage made it to the regular broadcasts, it would be edited for mass consumption, sparing viewers the more grisly scenes of atrocity—but he preferred his glimpses of the world’s ugliness straight up. Diluted reality afforded little in the way of insight.
“Libertine that I am, I occasionally give my follies a rest and try catching up with the news,” he said, wondering if the timing of Nga’s call was any coincidence. “Speaking of which, what’s this madness going on in your country?”
“Our beloved head of state is clamping down on his opposition, it seems.”
“Does that distress you?”
Caine heard Nga sigh. “I suppose it depends on how these events come to bear upon my own fortunes.”
Caine’s eyebrow arched a little higher. He’d expected an earful of Nga’s phoney rhetoric … sympathy for the common man, and all that nonsense. The apparently honest answer Nga had given him instead was almost startling.
“As long as your bank continues doing well, I imagine you’d be in a good position regardless of who comes out on top,” he said, uncertain whether that was true considering Nga’s habit of fucking around in Indonesian politics, and hardly giving a damn in any case. He was just filling the silence, really.
“Marcus, listen to me,” Nga said after a moment. “We have to talk about Roger Gordian. Something’s arisen that could have damaging implications for us unless it is addressed right away.”
Caine stroked his chin, thinking. He had no idea what to make of Nga’s cryptic statement, other than that it presumably concerned the takeover.
“I’ll be formally announcing my intention to acquire UpLink in today’s Wall Street Journal/’ he said. “The company’s lawyers are certain to stall things in court, but I think it will all be smoke. Give me a few weeks and—”
“I said Roger Gordian. Not UpLink.”
Suddenly disquieted, Caine thought some more, wishing Nga would just spit it out. “Does this have any connection to the son of a bitch who was nosing around my Singapore branch? I thought you took care of him.”
A pause.
“Marcus, are we secure?”
“I can only vouch for my end of the line.”
“Then we should be able to speak freely,” Nga said. “The one you speak of is dead. And that’s where the complications begin.”
Caine suddenly realized his heart was beating fast. “I— I don’t understand. I mean, what went wrong? And what does it have to do with me?”
“How it happened is a long story, but be assured it wasn’t intentional,” Nga said. “Really, though, abducting him was a mistake, and I objected to it from the beginning. Had he been released, he would have been able to share information about his captors with the authorities and his employer. His death, meanwhile, is surely going to bring about an investigation. In the end, what is the difference? People are going to want answers, and all roads lead in our direction.”
“Wait a second,” Caine said. “You’re speaking as though I had a hand in this. And I didn’t. I didn’t even want to know about it. Your friends came up with the brainstorm of taking him, when there had to be an easier way to find out what he was looking for. A sane way.”
“Calm down. We can’t reverse what’s past. The important thing now is that we have the courage to deal with the rest of it.”
“Don’t give me that bullshit. You fucking deal with the rest, whatever it may be. I’ve repaid your loans ten times over. I’ve done everything you asked, like a fucking indentured servant. But this … I want no part of it.”
Another pause, this one of longer duration than the first.
“Marcus, I needn’t remind you that you’ve already participated in activities that would be considered treasonous offenses by your government. If your actions come to light you’ll be imprisoned for life, if not executed. Why do you think Blackburn had to be stopped? There was no choice—”
“Don’t say his name. And don’t you dare call me a traitor,” Caine protested. His voice had become shrill. “My God, I’m not used to this. Those sons of bitches you consort with, those thugs, it’s their problem. What do you expect me to do about it, an
yway?”
“Nothing directly. But there are men in the States who’ve performed certain kinds of tasks for us before. Who can get into and out of places without anyone witnessing anything. You know who they are, Marcus.”
Caine was incredulous.
“No,” he said. “I won’t hear any more—”
“Yes, you will,” Nga said. “I will tell you what has to be done about Gordian because there is no other choice. And for that same reason you will listen.”
“No, no, no—”
“I will tell you, Marcus,” Nga repeated.
And before Caine could interrupt again, he did.
FIFTEEN
SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA
SEPTEMBER 24, 2000
SITTING IN HIS PICKUP OUTSIDE THE BAYVIEW MOTOR INN, Jack McRea resisted the impulse to check his watch for the third time in ten minutes. He was torn between contradictory desires, part of him eager to see the woman he was supposed to be meeting arrive in her car, part of him hoping she wouldn’t show. He had been unfaithful to his wife only once in over a decade of marriage, and that had been when his drinking had gotten out of control and Alice had moved out for a while. Furthermore, he had never before breached his trust as a county sheriff’s deputy or screwed up any of the jobs on which he’d moonlighted to pay the bills. Not even when his alcoholic hinging was at its worst had he done that.
Yet here he was in a motel parking lot when he should have been on duty at the private airfield where he worked as a night watchman. Here he was waiting for a woman he had met in a bar where he still occasionally had a couple of beers between the end of his shift at the sheriff’s office and the beginning of his shift at the airport. He knew nothing about her except that her name was Cindi with two i’s, and that she was blond and had pretty eyes and looked fantastic in short skirts and high-heeled shoes. Also, she wore this glossy stuff on her lips that made them look very moist, and had an incredible, sexy smile, the kind of sexy that made your stomach tight.
When they had met at the bar last night, she’d told him she was waiting for a friend who’d stood her up, and he had bought her a drink because she’d seemed kind of down, and somehow or other they’d gotten kind of flirty, and she’d edged a little close on her stool, and when he’d given her a look to show he’d noticed, she just smiled, and sat there a while with her skirt way up high and her thigh touching his leg.
Well, one thing had led to another, and they’d gotten very touchy, and because it was obvious where they were heading, and just so she knew where they stood, he’d decided to come clean and tell her he was married. She’d giggled a little at his confession, and when he’d asked what was so funny, had put her finger on his wedding band and said she’d sort of figured it was either that or he was trying to look hard to get, and he’d realized how lame he must have sounded and started laughing, too. And then she’d told him she had a regular boyfriend, which made them even, or almost even, and for some reason that had gotten both of them laughing harder, and they were still laughing as they leaned in close to each other and deep-kissed, then began necking at the bar, saying how much they wanted to be alone, forget the wife, forget the boyfriend, alone, damn near getting it on right there at the bar.
Jack had known of the Bay view from passing it on the way to work every night—work being the airfield, which was owned by a group of local businessmen who had partnered up to keep their corporate jets there, and was just a hop-skip-and-jump from the bar—and also because a couple of his married buddies had been there with women they were seeing on the sly, and told him the owners went out of their way to keep things nice and discreet.
He’d mentioned it to Cindi while they were practically climbing aboard each other’s laps, and said he had a couple of hours before work, and would she like to go there with him and finish what they’d started? And that was when she had explained about the guy she was kind of dating, saying he was a long-haul trucker who would see her whenever he was in town, and was stopping by that night midway through a long run, and that even though she didn’t expect him until much later, she figured he’d want a little something from her like he always did, which made her feel funny about, you know, being with Jack that same night.
Jack hadn’t known what to think of her story, except that it left him feeling like he needed a cold shower, and he’d asked her outright if she was having second thoughts about getting into something with him, and she’d said, no, no, you’ve got it all wrong, and had put her hand between his legs, and told him her boyfriend would be gone the next morning, and that it’d just be better if they could get together when she could be free to give everything she had to Jack… that was exactly how she’d worded it, keeping her hand on him the whole time, rubbing him where it counted right in front of everybody in the place. And that smile of hers, that smile, it was—how did the song go?—sweet as cherry pie and wild as Friday night, something like that.
Everything I have.
Ah, God, how could he resist?
And so they’d wound up making their plans for tonight. His original idea had been to meet her at the bar around six o’clock, and then for them to drive over to the Bayview, where they could be together for a couple of hours before he had to take over for the day guard at the airfield. But she’d said she had some important errands to run that evening, how about they made it a little later, maybe seven, seven-thirty, just to be on the safe side. And he’d told her that was no good for him because he really had to be at his night job by eight, which would leave them with, what, half an hour tops, and that he didn’t think either of them wanted the first time they were alone to be a wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am kind of situation.
It had gone back and forth a while, the two of them trying to get at a way to make it happen, neither wanting to delay it again, but Cindi insisting she couldn’t put off whatever she had to do, until at last she’d asked if he couldn’t maybe be a little late for work, or find somebody to cover for him, or even sneak away from his post for an hour or so, which she thought would make it that much more exciting for them, kind of dangerous in a fun way, didn’t I?
Crazy as it sounded when she brought it up, he’d immediately realized Cindi had hit on something. He could leave the gate unattended for a short time without anybody noticing; in fact, he’d done exactly that on occasions when he’d gone to buy a coffee or a pack of smokes for himself, and once or twice had even stopped for a brew before heading back to the airport. It wasn’t as though he worked at Frisco International. There were rarely any comings and goings during his watch. He could clock in at his usual time, slip away for a couple of hours with Cindi, and be back without anybody being the wiser. And, yeah, she was right, it did somehow make things more interesting.
They had finally arranged to meet in the parking area of the Bayview—he’d given her directions, and she’d told him that she sort of knew where it was, anyway—at eight-thirty, which had given him long enough to punch the time clock at the guard booth, make sure the day man was gone, and head on over.
And here he was the very next night, looking at his watch yet again, waiting for her to arrive, wondering if she was going to let him down after all their planning … negotiations, you could even call them. Which, he thought again, might be for the best. Alice was a good woman and had gone through a lot with him, and he knew it would kill him to lose her. But it hadn’t been happening in bed for them since Tricia was bom, and he was a healthy guy who had his needs. What he was doing tonight was only sexual, and had nothing to do with how he felt about his wife. Still and all, though, once these things got rolling you could never be a hundred percent sure you wouldn’t get caught with your pants down, and he guessed that was why there was a small part of him that would be glad if—
The sound of an approaching car suddenly interrupted the flow of Jack’s thoughts. He glanced into his side-view, saw a red Civic enter the parking lot behind a splash of headlights, watched it pull into a slot in the row of cars behind him … and then felt his pulse st
art to race as her long legs slid out the driver’s side and she came walking toward him, sweet as cherry pie, wild as Friday night, wearing clothes that might have come right out of his hottest fantasies, clothes that made it impossible for him to think about anything besides what she would look like once he peeled them off.
He hit the button on his armrest to roll down his window, and waited.
”Waiting for anyone special?” she said, smiling as she leaned into his car, her great big eyes and the scent of her perfume making his heart race.
“Not anymore,” he said, and reached for his door handle, knowing very well that he would not be heading back to the airport anytime soon, that he couldn’t have claimed to care if he never showed up at work, and that, like goddamned Samson in the old Bible story, he was wonderfully, deliciously doomed.
Its location chosen with privacy in mind, the airfield edged on a narrow inlet of the lower bay just northeast of the border between Almeda and Santa Clara Counties. Each of the four cinder-block maintenance hangars had a distinctive corporate logo painted large on its rooftop and at least one outer wall, making visual identification easy for approaching pilots. There were some small prefab outbuildings and two runways, one just over two thousand feet long, and a 3,400-foot high-speed stretch for the larger propeller and jet aircraft. Tonight only a handful of birds sat on the ramps beneath the calm and quiet sky: a single-prop Pilatus, a larger King Air C90B twin-turboprop, Cessna and Swearingen bizjets, and three or four kit-built sport planes. A fleet of passenger copters rested with their wheels on the numbers on a helipad at the north end of the airport.
A small oval of blacktop with space for perhaps two dozen motor vehicles, the airport’s parking area was vacant as the unmarked commercial van swung in from the tree-lined access road at half past eight, and then nosed against the fence running behind the hangars and apron.
