David Kirk chimed in with “Has it occurred to you that we want to do the right thing? That we want to help rescue people who should never have been taken hostage?”
Jonathan’s first instinct was to roll his eyes. Overt statements of altruism were so rarely real that he wanted to dismiss this as ridiculous. Then he saw the look in the kid’s eyes. Boxers might have seen it, too, because he became uncharacteristically quiet.
“One of my best friends was killed by these assholes,” David said. “Then they tried to kill me and my girlfriend.”
Jonathan caught the hiccup that came with the g word, and he wondered if it was the first time it had been uttered aloud.
“Throw in the fact that the United States—the country that even us reviled journalists are proud to call our home—is threatened, and maybe we’ve decided that there might just be a cause worth dying for.”
The words hung in the air. Truth be told, the altruism angle had never occurred to Jonathan. In his mind, that gene had never been bestowed upon a reporter.
“Thank you,” Yelena said.
All eyes focused on her.
“I don’t know how to describe what this means,” she said. “That you would risk your lives for my family . . .” The words trailed off.
Jonathan resisted the urge to tell her that public servants risked their lives for strangers every day, but it would have been rude. The glare he shot to Boxers said, Let it go.
Big Guy clearly didn’t want to, but he did.
“Here’s where we are,” Jonathan said, turning his body to face the entire room. “I can’t predict the future, but each of you needs to know that we’ll be on an airplane soon, and on the far end of the flight is a helicopter ride that is going to insert all of you—all of us—into a spot from which there is no return. According to Wolverine’s numbers, there are forty-five people at the facility we’re about to assault, and they will not be pleased with what we are planning to do. For the plan to work, every one of you needs to perform at one hundred percent. If any one of you drops the ball, we all will likely die.”
“So why are you doing this?” Yelena asked. “Of all of us, you two are the ones who could walk away without consequence.”
It was the most obvious question in the world, yet it took Jonathan completely by surprise. “It’s my job,” he said. “It’s our job.”
“Too easy,” Yelena said. “As I understand it from your own mouth, your job was to rescue me. That job was completed, and I confess that I have not been as grateful as I should have been. But now you are pressing to do more. Why would you do that?”
It felt odd having his own questions turned back on him. Jonathan looked to Boxers for the right words.
“Hey, you’re the boss,” he said. “I just go where you tell me.”
That was a lie, of course, but it was a harmless one.
“Duty, honor, country,” Jonathan said.
It landed like a punch line among the others, earning a group groan.
“Don’t do that,” Jonathan said. He put a sharpness in his tone that was designed to startle, and it worked. “You asked for an answer, and I gave it to you. Don’t you dare dismiss it. When I say ‘duty, honor, country’ that’s exactly what I mean. It’s what I have always meant. That’s what we have always meant.”
A soapbox speech was blooming in Jonathan’s gut.
“Next time your husband talks about soldiers or sailors or airmen as pawns in some geopolitical game—or the next time you”—he pointed at David—“start thinking of them as numbers on a budgetary spreadsheet, ask yourself why they do what they do. Even back in the day, there were a hell of a lot easier ways for me to earn fifty-five thousand dollars a year. And that was after seventeen years working for Uncle. We do what we do because there is, in fact, an absolute value to right and wrong.”
He felt his ears growing hot, and, completely out of character, he felt tears pressing behind his eyes. “It’s wrong to snatch innocent people out of their beds and take them hostage. I don’t care who the players are or what the motivations are. That’s wrong. And when the motivation behind it is to harm the government of the country I love, that makes it a cause worth dying for.”
“You are getting paid, I assume,” Becky said. “Pretty well, I imagine.”
“I’m already rich. My fee is a rounding error, a test of commitment for my clients.”
“And your life?” Yelena asked.
“What about it?”
“You’re willing to risk that for people you’ve never met?”
Now his blood was boiling. “Yeah, Yelena, I am. Your family is my mission, I’m willing to die for them. And kill for them.”
He leaned in closer as he delivered the rest. “Just as your Secret Service detail was willing to do for you.”
He felt Boxers’ hand on his arm, a signal that he was a few degrees too hot.
“Tell me what you’re implying,” Yelena said.
“I’m implying that a lot of good, dedicated people died in service to your security,” Jonathan said. “Their wives and children will never see them again. I refuse to let that sacrifice be in vain.”
A long silence followed—every bit of sixty seconds and more—as no one made eye contact with anyone, except for Jonathan, whose eyes demanded a response from the First Lady.
“I don’t know what you want me to say,” she said. “That I am sorry?”
“No,” Jonathan said. “No one gives a shit whether you’re sorry. The dead will remain dead, even if you drop to your knees and offer up a novena. What I want from you is acknowledgment that a lot of people have paid the ultimate price to protect you, and that now a bunch more are willing to pay that price for your family.”
Tears welled in Yelena’s eyes. “Why are you doing this? Did you think I didn’t feel guilty enough?”
“I don’t care,” Jonathan said. “That’s the key. Listen to it again: This isn’t about your feelings. It isn’t about publicity, and it isn’t about anything that resembles politicking or selling papers. We’re going into battle tomorrow. People are likely to die, but if we get home alive, then the killing will have been worth it. That’s what mission focus is all about.”
Ordinarily, Boxers would have driven the plane, but Austin Mannix announced that he needed his plane back later in the day. Thus, they had to accept a ride from two pilots who seemed very contented to know nothing about their passengers. It was a short flight, too. Just a little over an hour.
Venice had arranged for a Cadillac Escalade to meet the Lear on the tarmac at BTV—Burlington International Airport—where Jonathan and his team could transfer the tools of their trade directly from the plane without triggering about a thousand security traps that frowned upon the kinds of hardware they were transporting. To the casual observer, the Escalade was being filled with heavy duffel bags.
And Yelena Poltanov had transformed herself into a cross between June Cleaver and Granny Clampett. Her hair had gone from its natural brown to strawberry blond, and she’d cashed her après ski outfit in for an unremarkable brown dress that drooped to below her knees, where brown stockings took over and led to brown hiking boots.
Yelena caught Jonathan’s amused look. “It’s a lesson I learned from the Marshals Service,” she said. “If people are noticing the outfit, they’re not noticing the face.”
But even her face had transformed to be unrecognizable. She’d broadened the bridge of her nose and donned a pair of clear-lens glasses. A prosthetic appliance on her upper teeth added puffiness to her cheeks which, combined with pale pink lipstick, erased the glamor that had made her such a hot property for ladies’ magazines.
“I’m impressed,” Jonathan said. “When this is all over, I’d like a lesson in disguises.”
“Particularly that lipstick, Boss,” Boxers said as he passed with the last of the duffels and laid them on the flat bed of the Escalade. “I’m tired of that red shit you usually wear.”
Jonathan flipped him off.
>
“I can see you wearing that,” Yelena quipped.
He flipped her off too. But added, “Ma’am.”
Following the directions downloaded by Venice to Jonathan’s GPS, Boxers piloted the enormous SUV through ever-narrowing roads in the general direction of Lake Champlain. The farther they got from the major thoroughfares, the more snow-covered the roads became. As they closed to within the last two miles, Big Guy had to throw the switch for four-wheel low. Though clearly built more for sports than utility, the Cadillac performed better as a truck than Jonathan had expected.
At just after 9:00 A.M., Jonathan held up his hand and said, “Okay, slow it down.”
“I’m doing seven miles an hour. Slower would mean reverse.”
Jonathan kept his eyes on his GPS. “According to this, we’re coming up on the road that leads to the road to Striker’s property. It’ll be up here on the left.”
Every occupant leaned forward and to the left to help with the scanning. Encrusted in white, the woods looked stunning in a way that you can only see in New England. It must have snowed the night before because the coating on the branches was still powdery enough to whisper away from the breeze created by the monstrous vehicle.
“Is that it?” Becky asked from the second rank of rear seats. “See those red reflectors on the trees?”
Jonathan saw them just as she said the words—two round, red reflectors of the type you might see on a bicycle, mounted at about ten feet to two massive hardwoods that rose like columns from the ground to the sky. If he used his imagination, Jonathan could see a snow-covered path—it would be a vast overstatement to call it a roadway—that led deeper into the woods.
“I think that’s it,” Jonathan said. “The GPS shows that we’re right on it.”
“Well, let’s be sure,” Boxers said. “Because once we start up there, we won’t be turning around for a while.”
Yelena leaned forward until her head was even with theirs. “Are you sure you can fit it there at all?”
Boxers turned the wheel and gunned the engine to get traction. “The important parts will.” He fishtailed just a little as he threaded the needle through the trees, shearing the right-hand sideview mirror from its mount. He laughed. “I’ve always said that nothing performs like a rental car.”
Jonathan made a mental note to have Venice scare up the name of a local body shop.
Over the course of the next half mile or so, the pathway opened up a little, but not much. If another vehicle were coming the opposite direction, there would have been an interesting standoff.
“Here we go,” Jonathan said at last. He pointed toward another gap in the trees. “That’s the entrance to Striker’s property.” From the looks of the ground, no one had driven this way in several snowstorms. The coating of white was pristine, undisturbed.
Boxers made the hard left, this time clearing the tree sentries with room to spare.
“This Striker guy,” David said. “He doesn’t like people very much, does he?”
Jonathan chuckled at the understatement. “No, he doesn’t. Never did, actually.” While Oppenheimer had delivered Jonathan in and out of more than a few hotspots, the SOAR guys didn’t interact all that much with the Unit guys outside training and missions—Fort Campbell was a long way from Fort Bragg—so all Jonathan knew of the guy was that he seemed intense, intelligent, and, frankly, scary. He took wild chances and had the medals to prove it, but Striker’s heroism came with a suicidal edge that made Jonathan nervous.
Jonathan had seen Striker only once since the man had retired on disability, and on that occasion—a training seminar on infiltration strategies—Striker seemed . . . spent. To Jonathan, it seemed that when that bullet took away his ability to fly for Uncle Sam, it took away the pilot’s sense of self. He didn’t like people enough to return to headquarters as an instructor, and, from what Jonathan picked up through scuttlebutt, he’d just sort of disappeared to the old family homestead in Vermont and surrounded himself with the mechanical creatures he loved.
The Cadillac struggled some with the depth of the snow on the ground, but Boxers plowed on, never letting up on the throttle, and somehow finding traction despite bottoming out more than once.
The Oppenheimer spread was an impressive one, easily thirty acres, an equal mix of woods and fields. Being this remote, and knowing Striker’s personality, Jonathan imagined that Oppenheimer was a survivalist at heart, living off the vegetables he could grow in the short summers and the meat he could shoot from his kitchen window.
“This is beautiful,” Yelena said.
“A real slice of New England,” Becky agreed. “The way Norman Rockwell pictured it.”
Even the clapboard farmhouse looked like something from a postcard, with its gables and a wraparound porch that appeared to surround the entire structure. The house sat atop the long, gradual slope that rose from the opening in the fence, and as they came closer, what had initially looked like three large barns became more obvious as hangars for Striker’s pet helicopters. Protected from the direct wind and snow by heavy timber walls, the double doors on one of the structures was gapped just enough to make out the unmistakable nose of a Vietnam-era UH-1 Huey. It was officially called an Iroquois, but Jonathan couldn’t remember a single time that he had heard anyone refer to it that way.
“Park next to the Suburban,” Jonathan said, pointing to the forest green SUV that sat either in the yard or in the driveway. It was impossible to tell which.
As they pulled to a stop, Boxers asked, “How do you want to play it? He’s always been a little twitchy.”
“We’re just old friends who are paying a visit,” Jonathan said. “I briefed him on the phone, and Mother Hen was supposed to call him and remind him we were on the way.”
“Doesn’t mean he’s not still twitchy,” Boxers said.
He made a valid point. “Y’all stay in the truck till we get everything settled,” Jonathan said to the others.
Jonathan didn’t own any winter camouflage gear, so he and Boxers had opted for their standard black 5.11 Tactical kit, minus the ballistic vests and heavy rucks, which they left in the vehicle. Jonathan made sure that his Colt was visible and accessible. He didn’t expect to use it, but twitchy people tended to get twitchier if they thought you were trying to conceal a weapon from them. If the weapon was in plain sight, they didn’t feel duped.
Up close, where the paint was peeling, and the sag in the porch steps was obvious, the house lost a lot of its charm.
Jonathan climbed the four steps to the porch and stomped his feet, ostensibly to remove the snow from his boots, but also to make as much approaching noise as he could.
He’d just raised his hand to knock when the door pulled open.
Striker beamed a delighted smile. “Jonny-boy,” he said, pushing open the fraying screen door. He’d lost a lot of weight and grown a lot of beard since Jonathan had last seen him, and his bald pate—now ringed with gray rather than black—gleamed white as bone. His pallor, combined with his Santa beard, painted a picture of ill health. The cane didn’t help to improve the image.
Jonathan extended his hand. “Hello, Striker,” he said.
“I don’t answer to that name anymore, Jonny. Call me Carl.”
“Only if you call me Digger. I’ve never responded to Jonny.”
“It’s a deal.” As they shook, Carl’s hand felt cold.
“You remember Boxers,” Jonathan said, gesturing to Big Guy.
Another big smile. “The man who always caused me to rework my fuel charts.”
Boxers didn’t much like being teased about his size, but he managed a smile anyway as he shook Carl’s hand.
“Come on in, boys,” Carl said. “Let’s get caught up.”
“I have some other people to introduce you to,” Jonathan said. He waved for the others in the car to join him. “One of them is going to startle you a little.”
Becky led the way up the stairs, followed by David, and then Yelena. Jonatha
n introduced them one at a time, and then, when it came to Yelena, he paused for a moment for the recognition to materialize. The First Lady still wore her frumpy clothes, but she had removed all the feature-altering prosthetics.
Carl scowled. “Why are we all looking at each other like this?”
“I just wanted to give you a moment to recognize her.”
Carl added pursed lips to his scowl. “Do we know each other? Please don’t tell me I fathered one of your children.”
Jonathan suppressed a laugh, but of course Boxers didn’t, and Yelena just looked appalled.
“This is Anna Darmond,” Jonathan said, and Yelena presented a demure hand.
“Hi, Anna.” Carl shook her hand—her fingers, really, the way you’re supposed to shake a lady’s hand if you’re of a certain age. “Why do I sense that I should have just heard a deep organ chord when I did that?”
Boxers crossed his arms and smiled even more broadly. “Yeah, Boss, why is that?”
Jonathan felt himself blushing.
Becky took a shot at it. “Anna Darmond,” she said. “The Anna Darmond.”
“Are there a lot of them to choose from?” Carl wasn’t getting it.
“She’s the First Lady of the United States,” Becky said. She seemed to take pride in uttering the syllables.
“Huh,” Carl said. “Well, welcome to Vermont. I gotta tell you, though, you needn’t campaign here. Tony’s got my vote for sure.”
“I bet he doesn’t tomorrow,” Boxers said.
Jonathan shot him a glare.
“Come on in, have a seat and get warm.”
The inside of Carl’s house hadn’t seen a dust cloth in a very long time. The low-angled morning light made the sun itself look dirty as it shined through the cloud of motes. The fifteen-by-fifteen-foot room was packed with mismatched furniture, making it look smaller than it actually was. Lots of old-style guns-and-cannons early American upholstery on sagging, overstuffed cushions. Jonathan noticed as many kerosene hurricane lamps as modern ones, calling into question the reliability of the electrical service. The heat from the woodstove made Jonathan wish he’d worn shorts and a T-shirt.
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