“Six: Once Morris and the priest were in custody, Stark was being escorted out of the room to receive medical treatment. That’s when Ms. Doyle grabbed the pistol from the holster of a slow-witted Secret Service agent and fired three bullets into Stark before being fatally shot herself by other agents. Her motivation remains unclear, although one Secret Service agent reports that her dying words were something like ‘Not such a monster, after all.’
“Seven: Stark was rushed to Bellevue for emergency surgery. He was close to death at several points—but as you know, he has fully recovered—physically, at least.”
“Fascinating,” Burnett said. “And this little recitation is supposed to interest me why?”
“That will become clear once I share with you some other information that has recently come to light.”
“Really? Then share away—without wasting any more of my time.”
“I’ll try my best sir,” Neale said, keeping most of what he felt out of his voice. “One item of relevance is something we already knew, but is worth remarking upon again: Quincey Morris, the self-styled occult investigator was arrested following Stark’s rescue and charged with a long list of federal crimes. Six months later, Leffingwell quietly pardons him, along with the priest, Father Finlay.”
“What did Leffingwell know that the Secret Service, or Justice, didn’t?”
“Hard to say for sure. But I decided to check Leffingwell’s appointment schedule for his first six months in office. I struck pay dirt right at the start. On his first full day in office, President Leffingwell’s first appointment was with Senator Howard Stark.”
“Well, now—that is kind of interesting.”
“It gets even more so. Stark had asked for a half hour of the President’s time. But not long after the meeting started, Leffingwell cancelled his appointments for the rest of the morning. Stark didn’t leave until just before noon.”
“And Stark got there when?”
“He was brought into the Oval Office at 8:03, sir.”
“Four hours with the President,” Burnett said. “Shit nobody gets that, even the Joint Chiefs of Staff—unless we’re on the verge of war, or something.”
“I guess Stark must have had some interesting things to say. And there’s more, sir.”
What Burnett said next was something that Neale had never heard the man utter in his presence: “You have my full attention.”
Neale unconsciously sat up a little straighter. “A source of mine at the Bureau says that Morris and Chastain have worked with Fenton and O’Donnell, unofficially, several times in the past. But there’s nothing about it anywhere in the files. The scuttlebutt is that the four of them were involved in that very odd business in Iowa a few years back, when Walter Grobius’s estate was destroyed, along with everyone inside.”
“Idaho,” Burnett said.
“Excuse me?”
“Grobius’s place was in Idaho. I’ve been there, myself.”
“Sorry, sir—I’m always confusing those.”
“What else have you got?”
“Morris and his partner Chastain, the alleged witch, were in town recently. Took a suite for four nights at the Willard.”
“A suite? Two bedrooms?”
“Yes, sir.”
“They’re not fucking?”
“I have no intel on that sir. Would you like me to find out?”
“No, it doesn’t matter. Continue.”
“The Willard, as you know, is just a few blocks from the White House—although neither of them have appeared on Leffingwell’s appointment calendar—this week, or ever.”
“Neither did some of Bill Clinton’s girlfriends.”
“Sorry, sir?”
“I was just thinking that it’s possible to pay a call on the President without it being noted on the record—if that’s the way the President wants it.”
“I suppose so. Well, there’s no record of Morris or Chastain visiting the President, but I did follow up on your idea concerning the visitor’s log at Quantico. One of the people who signed in a four days ago was named Quincey Morris. He signed out again eighty-five minutes later.”
“Does the log say whom he went to see?”
“No sir—it just covers the main entrance to the building. But Fenton and O’Donnell’s office is in the basement, with the rest of the Behavioral Science types. And the log shows they were in the building at the time Morris visited.”
“Hmm.” Burnett was quiet for a little while. “When do we have the first report that these FBI types were asking questions over here about demons—before Morris’s visit, or after?”
“Let me check.” Neale flipped notebook pages. “Here—after. The first incident was the day after Morris presumably saw them.”
“Did Stark visit the President before or after Morris and Chastain checked into the Willard?”
“Just a second.” More page flipping. “After—two days afterward.”
“And where are Morris and Chastain now?”
“They checked out of the Willard this morning and caught a Jet Blue flight to JFK.” Neale checked his watch. “Wheels down about twenty minutes ago, if it was on time.”
Burnett had on his desk a large model Nokia tablet. He turned it on and began drawing circles on the screen, writing things in them, and connecting the circles with lines. Neale was not invited to participate in the process, so he sat and waited.
Burnett was done in three or four minutes. “Okay,” he said. “We have a prior connection between Morris and Leffingwell, going back to the Convention. There’s no evidence that Morris or his girlfriend saw Leffingwell recently, but he didn’t start talking about demons until they’d arrived in town. Stark has a past connection with Morris and Chastain, and we know he did see Leffingwell before the President started talking, in his cryptic way, about ‘forbidden weapons.’
He looked up at Neale. “Make sense so far?”
“Yes, sir—it’s all supported by the intel.”
“Now, these two feebies—Fenton and O’Donnell. They’ve got some kind of unknown prior connection with Morris and Chastain. Morris probably visited them at Quantico a few days ago—unless you can think of anybody else down there he might have reason to look up.”
“No, sir. There’s no one else in the Bureau with any known association to those two.”
“All right, so Morris pays a call on Fenton and O’Donnell, and shortly thereafter they start asking Agency personnel what they probably think are subtle questions about demons. Does the intel support that, too?”
“Yes, sir—all the way.”
Burnett stared at the tablet’s screen moodily. “There’s a structure building here. And if we let it continue to develop, we could wake up and find ourselves hemmed in by it. Result: Project H is never launched, the fucking Caliphate takes over the entire Middle East, thus gaining control of a big chunk of the world’s oil and the revenue it generates, and you and I get fired, at minimum, and more likely face a series of federal indictments which we might be able to plead down to a twenty-year sentence in a palatial resort like Leavenworth. Sound reasonable?”
Neale nodded glumly. “Yes, sir—in a depressing sort of way. Unless, of course, parts of the structure are removed before the encirclement is complete.”
“I like the way you think, Clyde—mostly because I’m thinking the same way.”
Burnett turned the tablet off and sat back in his chair. “We can’t touch the President, that’s out of the question. Besides, the VP is an even bigger idiot than Leffingwell. Stark? He’s a minor US Senator, but still a Senator. His death would attract a lot of attention, much of which would be outside our ability to control. But a couple of FBI field agents—well, I’d say they could be considered expendable. They’d even get their names on a plaque in the Hoover Building’s lobby. And as for Morris and Chastain, they’re civilians and hence the most expendable of all.”
“Chastain is supposed to be some sort of witch, sir.’
“Ye
ah—and my grandmother claimed she could foresee the future, but the old bitch never bought herself a big-money lottery ticket, even though she played every day.”
“Yes, sir.”
“I want an action plan to deal with these four individuals—for my eyes only, and I want it within forty-eight hours. Clear?”
“Of course, sir. What about collateral damage?”
“What about it?”
“Do you want the action plan designed to minimize or eliminate it? That will take longer to formulate, of course.”
“We’re talking about preserving the vital interests of the United States of America, Neale. Compared to that, what are a few civilians who wonder into the line of fire? It’s regrettable, to be sure. But you can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs.”
“Yes, sir. I believe I’ve heard that somewhere.”
“Then keep it in mind—and get to work.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Two days later
CLYDE NEALE SLIPPED into his usual chair in front of his boss’s desk. He had brought his ever-present legal pad with him, along with an air of excitement that only Burnett knew Neale well enough to discern.
“I take it you’re bringing good news,” Burnett said. “I hope so—good news would be welcome right about now.”
“Actually, I’ve got good news and better news.”
“You know I hate those fucking word games,” Burnett said sharply. “Get to the point.”
“Yes, sir,” Neale said, his excitement only slightly dampened by the rebuke. He felt like a chess player who has just watched his opponent commit exactly the mistake that will make Neale’s checkmate in three moves inevitable.
“You ordered me to develop action plans for the elimination of four individuals who usually operate in pairs: Morris and Chastain is one, and the feebies, Fenton and O’Donnell, make up the other. I had developed tentative plans for the removal of each pair. The basic structure of each seemed sound, but I wanted to work out a few more details before I presented it to you for approval. Then this morning, I got a phone call.” He paused expectantly.
“I warned you about being a fucking drama queen, Neale.”
“Yes, sir. Sorry. The call was from one of our people at NSA who’s monitoring Chastain’s phone. This morning, she gets a call from one Special Agent Colleen O’Donnell, who seems to be friendly with Chastain, based on the conversation.”
“Are they having dyke sex together? Is that what you mean?”
“No, sir—the conversation didn’t seem sexually intimate, just friendly. Of course, that doesn’t preclude a sexual relationship between them. If you want, I can put somebody—”
“Never mind. Just get on with the fucking phone call.”
“Right. I’ve verified the contents, by the way, by having him play it for me. O’Donnell says that she and Fenton are going to be in New York next week for some law enforcement conference. She asks if the four of them—O’Donnell, Fenton, Chastain and Morris—can get together at some point to discuss what O’Donnell refers to as ‘developments.’”
“Developments in what?”
“She didn’t say, sir. I suspect she was being deliberately cryptic, out of habit. And it was an open line, after all.”
“All right. What else?”
“They agreed that next Tuesday around 4:00 p. m. would be a good time. Chastain says Morris is still in New York, staying at a hotel. Our surveillance confirms that, by the way sir. Morris is at the Waldorf Astoria, paying $329 a night for a single.”
“So they’re not fucking.”
“Morris and Chastain? Apparently not, sir.”
“Is Morris’s hotel room wired?”
“Yes, sir. He hasn’t said or done anything of interest to us since he checked in.”
“No hookers stopping by?
“Afraid not, sir. He hasn’t received any visitors at all.”
“What about Chastain’s apartment?”
“It’s actually a condo, sir.” Neale stared at his legal pad for a couple of seconds. “I regret to report that we don’t yet have it wired.”
“Why the hell not?”
“We sent people over there, even before Chastain got back from Washington. They couldn’t get inside.”
“I thought our people were supposed to be experts at this kind of thing. You saying they couldn’t pick the damn lock?”
“The senior man on the team tells me that the locks are standard for the building, nothing special. The knob turned, but they couldn’t get the door open, not even with both of them leaning their weight against it.”
“How do they explain their failure?”
“They don’t sir—it was the only door into the condo, so it’s not like she could have put a bar across it from inside.” Neale cleared his throat. “But she is a witch, sir.”
“Don’t start with that witch nonsense again. Hire another team—someone competent this time. Subcontract it, if you have to.”
“These guys were supposed to be the best—but, yes sir.”
“So the reason you were so excited coming in here is because next Tuesday all four of our pigeons are going to be in the same coop.”
“Exactly, sir. We can, literally, kill four birds with one stone, if we use the right stone.”
Barrett nodded thoughtfully. After a few seconds he said, “A radio-controlled bomb hidden in the condo would probably be best. We wait until they’re all gathered together, then bang.”
“I agree—that sounds like the best approach.”
“Have Special Devices prepare the bomb. Give it to the new team you’re sending over to her condo, with proper instructions.”
“Yes sir. But what if these guys can’t get in either, sir?”
Burnett scowled. “You really think that’s a viable possibility?”
“Hard to say, sir. But I know the team I already sent were first-rate.”
“All right, put together a back-up plan. Maybe an RPG from across the street—whatever seems best given the location. Just in case Chastain’s ‘magic’ keeps our new and improved burglar squad from delivering the goods.”
“I’ll cover both possibilities, sir.”
“If you do have to use Plan B, work out some kind of cover story we can leak to the press afterward. Chastain was selling drugs, or maybe building bombs for Al-Qaeda—whatever will sell the best in the New York market.”
“I’ll get some good people on it, sir. We keep a number of New York media types on retainer.”
“Next Tuesday,” Burnett muttered. Then to Neale he said, “I was hoping to get all the wet work done sooner than that. But this is a good opportunity, and we’d be fools to waste it. See that we don’t.”
“Yes, sir.”
Chapter Thirty-Six
Five days later
Tuesday
4:05 p. m.
LIBBY CHASTAIN OPENED the door to her condo to find Ashley and Peters waiting. “Hi, come on in,” she said. “The others are already here.
Introductions were unnecessary—they had all worked together before, in one instance stopping a demon-possessed politician from becoming President of the United States. Her other guests already had beverages, so Libby told her newest arrivals to follow her to the kitchen, where she asked what they’d like to drink.
“Since Quincey’s here,” Peters said, “you’ve probably gotsome good bourbon on hand. I’ll take a little of that, thanks.”
Then Libby turned to Ashley. Just looking at her made Libby feel a little week in the knees, but then Ashley had that effect on a lot of people, male and female—and liked it just fine. She said, “I’d just like some water, Libby. A small glass, please.”
Libby gave her an odd look but said, “Sure—coming right up.”
A minute later, Peters had his Jack Daniel’s while Ashley held a glass with about four ounces of water in it. She looked at the glass intently for a few seconds, and the clear liquid slowly changed into something that was dark amber.
<
br /> Ashley held out the drink to Libby. “Here, have a sip.”
Libby drank a little bit and her eyebrows raised as she swallowed. “I don’t drink the stuff much, but I know good Scotch when I taste it.”
“Twelve-year-old Glenlivet,” Ashley said with a smile. “The Galilean isn’t the only one who can pull off that trick.”
“Strong work,” Libby said. “Shall we join the others?”
Libby’s living room furniture included a Danish Modern sofa with a matching loveseat and chair. The loveseat was occupied by Special Agents Fenton and O’Donnell, and Morris had claimed the armchair, which meant that Libby would be sharing the sofa with the latest arrivals. Any hope she might have had of sitting next to Peters was dashed as Ashley took a seat in the middle. As Libby, having no choice, sat down next to Ashley, the blonde demon whispered in her ear, “I was thinking of giving you a good, hard orgasm while we’re in the middle of this little party. Would you like that?”
Libby turned to her, her smile bright but the gray eyes hard. “No I wouldn’t, actually. Maybe later.”
Libby turned back to her guests, hoping that Ashley would have the decency to leave her alone while others were present—even as she knew that decency wasn’t one of the things that Ashley did best.
Libby said to the group, “Thank you all for, er, coming.” Damn Ashley. “What we’re going to cover at the start is mostly for the benefit of Ashley here and Peters, who need to be brought up to speed before we can all put our heads together. And—who knows?—maybe going over it again will help the rest of us clarify our thinking.”
She paused, as if waiting for objections. When no one said anything, she went on, “As you know, Quincey and I were in Washington recently trying to find out more about this alleged CIA plot to summon demons and use them as weapons in the Middle East. I managed to have a private conversation with President Leffingwell, who claimed to know nothing about this business, and I believed him. I think the President took me seriously, and he said he was going to look into the matter without delay. I haven’t heard back from him. I realize that the leader of the free world has got better things to do than get in touch with me, but it’s still worrisome. We’re concerned that either he decided not to treat this as an urgent matter, or that he tried and ran up against a bureaucratic stone well. Quincey and I were ready to pack up and go home when Dale and Colleen paid us a visit. Maybe you guys can take it from there?”
Strange Magic Page 16
