Day Zero

by Marc Cameron

  Things looked as though they might be getting better. Cogent thoughts began to work their way back into Ross’s head. She took an active interest in life again, and dreaded the thought of being replaced. She knew Winfield Palmer had President Clark’s ear and had spoken to him several times about it. He seemed happy enough with her performance to let things remain status quo long enough that if she did leave, it would be on a positive note.

  Then Hartman Drake had taken over. Ross didn’t quite know what to think about him. It would take some time, she thought, time to learn exactly what he was all about. In the interim, she’d keep running, climbing out of her personal funk, and leading the agency as best she could until he fired her.

  Just off her right shoulder, she saw Adam Knight lift a small microphone to his lips, calling ahead to the residence no doubt, to let them know that “Fable’s arrival was imminent.” She’d not chosen the code name herself, but Ross liked it. She was a woman in a business traditionally dominated by men with code names like Renegade, Lancer, and Rawhide. Fable let her pretend an air of femininity in the testosterone-infused world.

  Panting now, sweat soaking the front of her green Dartmouth T-shirt, Ross glanced over at Wiki, who loped along easily beside her. Ross’s feet, carried by somewhat stubby legs, hit the ground twice for each one of the young agent’s lengthy strides. Long, graceful arms seemed always ready to reach out and catch her or stop some oncoming threat. It was impossible not to notice the black fanny pack cinched tightly round the young woman’s waist and the beige radio wire that led to her flesh-colored earpiece.

  “Race you the last block,” Ross said as they rounded the corner on the homestretch to her house.

  “Feeling energetic are we today, ma’am?” Wiki said, saying “energetic” in the particularly pinched nasal New Zealander accent Ross found endearing.

  She had bowed her head to pick up the pace when the agent on the bicycle slid to an abrupt halt and began to shout,

  “Gun front! Gun front!”

  Adam Knight bolted into the lead, yelling, “Ambush! Ambush! Ambush!” into his lapel mike.

  Ross caught a fleeting glimpse of men standing in front of her house half a block away. She couldn’t see any guns, but trusted her detail. An instant later, Wiki enveloped her. The protective agent used her own arm as a fulcrum, jamming it into Ross’s solar plexus while at the same time grabbing her by the back of her collar and bending her forward at the waist. They ran together toward the Suburban.

  Ross’s driver screeched in next to the curb. The forward agent had already thrown his bike to the street and stood with pistol drawn beside the open door, scanning for threats beyond the obvious. Wiki shoved Ross in the backseat—nearly ripping her T-shirt off in the process—and then piled in beside her. Adam Knight jumped in the front passenger seat and slammed the heavy armored door. He beat on the dash with the flat of his hand.

  “Go, go, go!”

  Once Ross was in the relative safety of the armored Suburban, the driver threw the vehicle in reverse, accelerating backwards away from the threat. Per protocol, he abandoned the agents on the ground to fight their own way out.

  Still on her belly, Ross was thrown forward, smacking the front seats. She slid into the armrest with Wiki piling up behind her as the driver suddenly let off the gas and cranked the wheel, spinning the SUV in a quick 180 to head toward the safe site, the Rockville Police Station less than three miles away.

  Ross tried to raise her head to get a peek at what was going on, but Wiki leaned on top of her, pressing her down.

  “The truck’s armored,” the agent said, her Kiwi accent stronger from the stress of battle, “but I don’t know what sort of weapons they have, ma’am. Let’s keep our coconuts down, shall we for now?”

  Knight snatched up the microphone clipped to the console. “Rockville PD, Rockville PD, Fable Limo,” he said, his voice much calmer than the sweat on his upper lip made him look. He shot a backward glance at Ross while he waited for a response. “You okay, ma’am?”

  “I’m fine,” Ross said. “What—”

  The dispatcher cut her off.

  “Fable Limo, Fable Limo, go ahead for Rockville PD.”

  “Possible compromise at Fable residence,” Knight said. “We’re four minutes out, en route to your location.”

  “Ten-four, Fable Limo,” the dispatcher came back. “You are clear on this end.”

  As detail supervisor, Knight would have made it a point to liaise with nearby police departments and hospitals in the event their assistance was ever needed. The detail often ran drills, but they were dry runs that Ross only read about. She’d never taken the time to participate in one.

  “What did you see, Adam?” she asked, still pressed down against the seat.

  Knight held up his hand and continued his radio conversation. “Fable CP, Fable CP, Limo,” he said, trying to raise the command post at the residence. He cursed when there was no answer.

  Brian Shumway, the agent who’d been on the bicycle, came across on the radio. His voice was breathless, but in control. “No idea what’s going on, boss,” he said. “I’m not getting the CP either—by radio or cell.”

  “Tell me what you do see,” Knight said, still tapping the dashboard with his open palm, willing the Suburban to go faster.

  “I count three white males,” Shumway said. “All with MP5s standing in the front yard. Barb and I have good positions about half a block out, but these guys aren’t doing a damn thing. They know we’re here, but they don’t seem to care.”

  “Okay, sit tight,” Knight said. “PD will have SWAT heading your way.”

  The CIA had footed the bill for a series of heavy concrete bollards to reinforce the fenced parking area behind the Rockville Police Department. They’d also paid for the steel-wedge barrier that had to be lowered to enter or exit the lot in a vehicle. Knight used a remote that looked like a garage door opener to lower the barrier when they were fifty yards away.

  “PD, PD, Fable Limo,” Knight said as they spend into the parking lot, the barrier coming up behind them. “Arrival. Arrival.”

  “Ten-four, Fable,” the dispatcher said. “Chief’s at the back door to bring you in.”

  Ross adjusted her sweaty T-shirt and tugged at the legs of the shorts. They were fine for running, but seemed much too immodest to be wearing during an attack. She often ran in public, but wasn’t accustomed to being thought of as the director of the CIA dressed only in gym gear. Stress made her chuckle at the thought.

  Knight got out of the car first, checking the surroundings to make certain they were clear before opening Ross’s door.

  Disheveled or not, Ross was a professional. She put on a pleasant face for the chief as they hurried toward the open back door to the PD where the lanky man waited to greet her. He was not smiling, a fact that made both Adam Knight and Wiki stop in their tracks.

  A second man Ross did not recognize, with dirty blond hair and a high forehead, stepped out from behind the chief. Rumpled as if from an all-night drinking binge, he held up both hands to say he came in peace. A cadre of three other agents, all stodgy and overfed-looking things, piled up behind the man in the wrinkled suit.

  “Glen Walter,” he said. “ID Task Force.”

  Ross cringed at the mention of the IDTF. She shrugged the protesting Wiki off her arm and stepped around Adam Knight. If someone had taken over the police department to ambush her, there was little any of them could do about it at this point. The fact that this was an IDTF man made her think things were even worse than that.

  “Virginia Ross,” she said. “What can I do for you, Mr. Walters?”

  The man’s face pulled into a half smile as he extended his hand. “It’s Walter,” he said. “There’s no ‘s.’ Madam Director, I’m going to have to ask you to come with me.”

  Knight drew his weapon and pointed it at Walter. “You step back until I figure out exactly who you are.”

  Walter raised his hands again, giving a nod to Kni
ght’s pistol as if this sort of thing happened to him all the time. “It’s a touchy thing to serve an arrest warrant on someone when they have the luxury of a protective detail.”

  “You don’t arrest a sitting director of the CIA,” Knight snapped. “Not without the President getting involved.”

  “Believe me,” Walter said, still smiling a sort of smirky half grin that made Ross’s stomach sink with dread. “I wouldn’t get within ten miles of something like this without making sure all the piddly work was done up front. I’ve already taken the liberty of providing a copy of the warrant to the PD.”

  Ross looked at the chief, who gave her a solemn nod. “It’s legitimate, ma’am,” he said.

  “I assume those are your men back at my house,” Ross said.

  “They are,” Walter said.

  “Well, call them off right now,” she said. “Before we have a blue-on-blue shooting.”

  “Good idea,” Walter said. Ross thought he might be from Florida or maybe Louisiana. Walter nodded to a shorter man with thinning blond hair. “Go ahead and call Benavidez.” He let his eyes play up and down Ross’s body, shaking his head. “Forgive me for saying so, but you’ve lost a heck of a lot of weight from your photographs.”

  Knight, who was on the phone with CIA general counsel, stopped talking and turned to Walter. “I don’t care if you’re the President’s favorite nephew. Talk to the director like that again and I’ll kick your ass across this parking lot.” He wasn’t pointing his pistol, but he’d not gone so far as to return it to the holster in his fanny pack.

  “It’s fine, Adam,” Ross said, knowing he was a half a breath away from shooting the ID agent. “Stand down.”

  “A courtesy call wouldn’t have worked?” the protective agent snapped. “You’re a presidential appointee, ma’am.”

  Walter gave an insolent shrug. “The United States government isn’t really comfortable giving courtesy calls to suspected spies.”

  Knight held the phone away from his face a bit so the general counsel rep could hear the conversation.

  “You’re arresting her for spying?”

  “Violation of the Espionage Act,” Walter said, almost as an afterthought. “I’m not at liberty to get into specifics. I will say it’s a pretty serious charge, considering you’re the director of what is arguably the world’s most powerful intelligence agency. I don’t understand how a woman of your standing could—”

  “Shut your mouth,” Knight said, stepping in between them again, daring the ID agent to make a move.

  Ross put an arm around his shoulder. “Calm down, Adam,” she said. “There’s no doubt that this is a bizarre situation, but if he’s got a warrant, we don’t have a choice.” She turned to Walter. “I’ll go with you,” she said, “but I’ll have to call the President first.”

  “Oh, Virginia,” the gloating agent said. He shook his head like she was a small child that just didn’t understand the reality of the situation. “Do you really think I’d be here if he didn’t already know?”

  Chapter 26

  Maryland

  Garcia felt the phone buzz in the pocket of her running shorts and replaced the tiny bud back in her ear. She’d only planned to do five miles, but being followed gave her the extra adrenaline to run the entire ten-K loop through the park. Besides, her ex had often reminded her that running would keep what he called her “ghetto booty” from getting any larger than it already was. She preferred to think of herself as having breeder’s hips, but deadbeat son of a bitch or not, her ex happened to be right—at least on that aspect of her booty.

  “Hello,” she said, slowing her pace some so she could hear over her own breathing.

  “Garcia?” Winfield Palmer said.

  “Yes, sir.” Ronnie slowed to a walk, confident there was an unmarked car a block or so away that she was driving crazy with her changes in pace. She owed Palmer her job—and more. As national security advisor to President Clark, he’d seen her for what she was, and plucked her from the obscurity of being a CIA uniformed officer and thrown her in to work with people like Quinn and Thibodaux. It was dangerous work, but, as Jacques often pointed out: What was the fun of livin’ if someone wasn’t tryin’ to kill you?

  “Can you talk?” Palmer asked. Not one to check in and chat with subordinates, he didn’t really care if she was busy. He wanted to know if the line was secure.

  “We’re okay,” Ronnie said. “I do have a tail, but the phone is good and I’m out on a run.”

  “Outstanding,” he said, deadpan as if his news was anything but good. “An ID team just arrested Virginia Ross.”

  Ronnie stopped altogether, leaning forward with her hands on both knees as if she was catching her breath. “The director?”

  “Afraid so,” Palmer said.

  “When?”

  “Five minutes ago.”

  Garcia put a hand on her head, walking in a slow circle while she gathered her thoughts. She wondered how he’d found out about it so fast, but then remembered she was talking to Win Palmer, the man who had contacts inside virtually every agency in the government.

  “What did they charge her with?”

  “Spying,” Palmer said. “Listen, I’m doing some research of my own, but I’m under a pretty fine microscope here. Is there any way you can use some of your contacts to dig into this? Find out where they’re holding her.”

  “Why Ross?” Ronnie mused out loud. She didn’t voice it, but she wondered why Palmer was suddenly so interested in the director of the CIA.

  “I had to talk the President out of replacing her a couple of times after her daughter died. But she’s a good woman. I’m thinking the new administration asked around and heard she was the same old stuffed-shirt bureaucrat. That’s why they kept her on. Look at what the taxpayers are getting for their buck. He’s kept Andrew Filson in place as Secretary of Defense because he’s a warmonger, but replaced the Sec State with Tom Watchel, one of the most self-serving dilettantes I’ve ever met in Washington. Last time he was on Meet the Press he kept calling North Korea North Dakota. Every other cabinet member and high-level position is being replaced with empire-building yes-men who care more about their careers than running the government.”

  “From my lowly viewpoint,” Ronnie said, “that’s not much of a change in the status quo.”

  “Touché,” Palmer scoffed. “I’m still trying to figure out their endgame. There are too many checks and balances in place to allow them to do anything drastic right away. Congress, the courts . . . and even the military would nip any overt action in the bud. But, they’re moving slowly to keep public opinion on their side. They’ve had nearly six months to lay the groundwork for whatever it is they plan to do.”

  “What about the commission?” Garcia asked, referring to the bipartisan Rand Commission, chaired by Chief Justice William Rand of the Supreme Court.

  “Don’t even get me started on that,” Palmer said. “Not on the phone at least. Can you get rid of your tail long enough to do some checking on Ross?”

  “Of course,” Garcia said, jogging again. “Any word on Miyagi?”

  “Just find Ross for me,” he said, avoiding the question. Anyone who knew Palmer well knew he had a soft spot for the Japanese woman.

  “Will do, sir.”

  “Ronnie,” Palmer said before she could end the call. He always called her Garcia and the personal touch caught her off guard. There was a catch in his voice she’d not heard before. “You watch yourself.”

  “I’ll do some checking and get back with you,” Garcia said. She’d be careful, but if the IDTF had killed a woman as tough as Emiko Miyagi and carted the director of the CIA off to jail, there wasn’t a whole lot for her to depend on but dumb luck.

  Chapter 27

  Ronnie bumped her front door shut with a hip and twisted the dead-bolt lock. She reset her alarm on the panel just inside, next to a framed photograph of her Russian father and smiling Cuban mother. She kicked off her shoes and peeled away her sweaty sh
irt and sports bra, grateful for air-conditioning and the chance to have a shower. Her confrontation with Agent Walter had made her feel dirty and being followed all day by people who surely worked for him made it even worse.

  She set the fanny pack with her gun and phone on top of her bedroom dresser and stepped out of her running shorts. Naked, she caught a glimpse of herself in the closet mirror and laughed out loud at the bruises that mapped her body. Her defensive tactics instructor at Langley was no Emiko Miyagi, but he was a skilled practitioner of Krav Maga and jujitsu. The daily sessions allowed her to work off some aggression, but turned her forearms, ribs, and thighs into mottled purple punching bags—with bruises dark enough to show through even on her dark complexion. She’d inherited her father’s long sprinter’s thighs along with his broad shoulders and keen eye for his surroundings. From her mother she’d gotten a bawdy sense of humor, the full-figured curves that required a sports bra a small man could use as a two-room tent, and her tendency toward the ghetto booty. Garcia had always thought she had the sort of body that teetered between female boxer and hooker, depending on what she wore. Jericho seemed to appreciate it—and she was comfortable with that.

  Garcia leaned in closer to the mirror on her dresser and pulled her hair back. The tiny lines around her eyes showed in horrifying detail that she was on a collision course with her thirtieth birthday. Her chosen career had a way of smiling on attractive and intelligent women in the early days—and then sneaking up when they weren’t looking to turn them into old and spent intelligent women well before their time. She let her hair fall and sighed. There was nothing she could do about it now.