by Vince Flynn
“I’d say so . . . And Stan?”
Kennedy decided to leave out all the melodrama of their late-night argument and keep it to the facts. “He’s safe, but not by much. He was with Paulette. A few minutes after he left she had her door kicked in.”
Stansfield nodded. “Have these vehicles been swept?”
Kennedy shrugged. “The Embassy claims they’re checked on a routine basis.”
Stansfield frowned and pulled out a pad of paper and a pen. They’d have to do this the old-fashioned way. He placed a lighter in the center cup holder in case he needed to act quickly and destroy the notes. “Where is Rob?”
Kennedy knew he was asking about Rob Ridley, one of their top field operatives. “He’s in the city.”
“I need to speak with him this morning. How does the Embassy look?” Stansfield asked, and then started writing.
“The Directorate has the front and rear entrances covered.”
“We’ll have to figure something out. I want Rob to personally sweep everything, and I have a little job for him.” Stansfield slid the pad over and showed her what he’d written. “Mitch?”
Kennedy shook her head. “Nothing so far.”
Stansfield scribbled, “Message Service?”
“I’ve been checking.” Again she shook her head.
“Victor?” Stansfield wrote.
Kennedy shrugged. She didn’t believe a word that came out of his mouth, but he was going to hear it from Hurley, so she reasoned she might as well give him the latest. She was about to speak, and then she reached for the pen and paper. She began printing in neat block letters. “Claims Mitch sent a decoy into the safe house and then ambushed them. Killed McGuirk, Borneman, and two DGSE agents.”
Stansfield was reading as she wrote. “Oh, my God.”
Kennedy kept scratching. “V in the process of destroying surveillance van, and the other incriminating evidence. Claims he had to flee for his life and Borneman’s body was left at the scene.”
The deputy director of Operations kept his composure despite the fact the situation had just become drastically worse. He grabbed the pad from Kennedy. Held the pen for a moment and then wrote, “Do you believe him?”
Kennedy shook her head vigorously.
“Are they looking for him?” Stansfield asked.
“Not that we know of.”
The deputy director scratched out another question. “Have they ID’d Borneman?”
“We have no idea. The police are handling the investigation and the Directorate isn’t exactly known for their cooperation.”
“Unless it’s to their advantage.” Stansfield put the pen to paper again, “What was DGSE doing there?”
“Not sure, but if I had to guess I’d say they followed V and his people there.”
“Why do you say that? They could have known about it beforehand.”
“Stan and Paulette had dinner last night.” Kennedy grabbed the pen. “Paul Fournier showed up unannounced and joined them for a bottle of wine.”
“You think they had Stan under surveillance?”
“Yes. I was followed all the way from the airport to the Embassy when I arrived last night.”
“And this morning?”
“There was a car. It’s probably behind us right now.”
Stansfield nodded.
“Does Deputy Director Cooke have any idea what’s going on?”
“No.”
“Did you let him know you were leaving?”
“No, I ordered another jet. His will be waiting for him when he gets to the airport in another six hours.”
“And when he asks where you are?”
“I have Waldvogel flying over with him. He’s going to tell him I was forced to make other travel arrangements.”
“And if he digs?”
“The Brits wanted to meet with me about something.”
“And if he checks with the Brits?”
“He’ll find out that I had breakfast at the British Embassy this morning.” Kennedy’s eyes narrowed, revealing tiny wrinkles.
“He could probably verify that if he wanted to.”
“And he can go right ahead.”
“We’re having breakfast at the British Embassy?”
“That’s right.”
“May I ask why?”
“You’ll find out when we get there.”
They rode in silence for a while and then Stansfield wrote, “You need to convince Mitch to talk to me.”
“I can’t even get him to talk to me.”
Stansfield tapped the pen on what he’d already written.
“I know. I’ve been trying to figure something out, but he doesn’t exactly trust us at the moment.”
“He’s going to have to start, Irene, or I’m going to be left with no other choice.”
She took him to mean that he would issue a kill order. She’d seen it done before. A dossier would be put together, a price would be determined, and then the usual suspects would be contacted. Certain assets within Langley would also be used, but this type of stuff was usually handled with outside contractors. Rapp was good. He could probably last for a year or two, longer if he was willing to undergo plastic surgery, and there was a better than fifty-fifty chance that he would eliminate the first man or two who were sent to deal with him. She was suddenly reminded of what Dr. Lewis had said to her only a few days earlier. If there comes a time where you need to neutralize him, you’d better not screw up. Because if he survives, he’ll kill every last one of us.
The thought sent shivers up Kennedy’s spine. What if she’d already lost control of Rapp? What if Victor was telling the truth? She refused to believe it. She knew better than anyone. He wasn’t just another one of Hurley’s heartless killers. She needed time and she needed to convince Stansfield. Lewis could help with the latter. Looking at her mentor, Kennedy said, “I need you to talk to our good doctor this morning. He has some observations you need to hear.”
“In regard to what?”
“Who.” Kennedy grabbed the pad and pen and wrote down Victor’s name.
“Fine,” Stansfield said. He knew what was going on here. His two chief lieutenants were both going to champion their men. He should have never let it get this far. There was too much bad blood between Rapp and Bramble. He should have cut one of them loose a long time ago, and despite the current evidence against Rapp, it was Bramble whom he would have dumped. He was Stan’s man, though, and what Stan wanted he almost always got. Unfortunately, what Stan wanted right now was a dead Mitch Rapp.
Stansfield stretched his legs and leaned against the door’s armrest. He couldn’t allow his personal bias to interfere. Rapp was far more likable. Bramble was an obtuse brute, but he had his purposes. If Rapp didn’t come in and tell him exactly what he’d been up to, Stansfield would be left with only one choice. He would have to order the execution of perhaps his best operative.
CHAPTER 37
THE crane moved the heavy magnet into position and then the cable was played out and the rusty steel disk dropped until it was a few feet from the van. The magnet was turned on and the rear tires of the van levitated off the ground until the roof was pinned against the steel disk. The power was increased and slowly the front end, weighted down by the engine, began to inch upward. When the roof was firmly immobilized to the underside of the magnet, the big diesel engine on the crane revved and belched black smoke and then the thick steel cable moaned until it had the van twenty feet off the ground and swinging toward the industrial-sized compactor.
Bramble watched as the van was not so gently placed inside the three-sided metal box. The magnet disengaged, leaving the van in place, and moved clear. Steel jaws swung into place above the van and the crushing began, top to bottom first for a few feet and then the sides. It went back and forth like that for several minutes. When the van was finally smashed into a four-by-four-foot cube, Bramble noticed a red liquid leaking from the base. It was expected. There were two bodies inside, after all. Th
ere should have been three, but Borneman had been lost along the way.
The man next to Bramble held out his hand and said something in his gruff native Serbian tongue. Bramble didn’t understand a word of any of the Slavic languages, but he didn’t need to. They had an agreement and the man wanted to be paid. Bramble had already counted the money, twenty-five hundred dollars in advance and twenty-five hundred when they were done, and the guy was going to throw in a piece-of-shit two-door Renault that he would drive back to Paris.
Bramble had wiped the prints from his gun and left it in the van to be crushed with all the other evidence, the bodies, the surveillance equipment, and most important, the recording of him shooting the man he thought was Rapp. It had all appeared to be going perfectly. Rapp was dead, and he’d dealt with Borneman and McGuirk. All of that he could have explained to Hurley. They were pulling out when Rapp ambushed them. He killed Borneman and McGuirk and then Bramble jumped in and put a bullet in the back of Rapp’s head, end of story. But then those two Frenchies showed up. Bramble still had no idea who they were. More than likely cops, or maybe French Intelligence, either way it wasn’t good. Bramble was still proud of the shot. He bet there weren’t more than a dozen men on the planet that could have hit that first guy square in the face, as he had. They’d been stupid in how they came after him, no cover, and they were standing too close together. In Bramble’s mind they had gotten what they deserved.
Bramble handed the man the rest of the cash, and the dirty mutt gave him the keys to the Renault. In his broken French, Bramble did his best to convey the fact that he’d be back in two days, and if what was left of the van wasn’t melted down he’d be sticking some people in the compactor. He’d never come back, of course, but Bramble only knew of one way to conduct business—threaten.
Limping, Bramble walked across the yard toward his subcompact piece of shit. He folded himself into the driver’s seat, inserted the key, and gunned the little four-cylinder engine. The car was a stick shift and under normal circumstances Bramble wouldn’t have given it a second thought, but he had a bullet hole in his right calf and a bullet lodged in the brawny triceps muscle of his right arm. Driving one-handed was not possible, so he engaged the clutch, bit down hard, and jammed the stubborn stick shift into first gear. The bald front tires spun on the gravel and then bit, and the car lurched forward, Bramble acutely feeling every bump and pitch.
He had a few bruised ribs as well, courtesy of that pussy Rapp lodging four slugs in the back of his bulletproof vest. If the dumbass had used a .45 caliber like Bramble he may have succeeded in killing him, but his little 9mm slugs couldn’t do the job. Bramble shifted the dusty car into second gear and popped the clutch a bit too early. The jolt made him wonder if one or more of his ribs weren’t broken. It was all good, he decided. The more beat up he was the more believable his story.
After fleeing for his life, Bramble had stopped five blocks later and closed the van’s side door. He flipped over the man he’d thought was Rapp and shook his head at his own stupidity. A canvas bag was peeking out of his waistband. Bramble grabbed it and looked inside. The cash and diamonds might come in handy. Rapp’s fake passports were worthless. Bramble wasn’t thrilled about losing Borneman, but it was all going to be laid at Rapp’s feet, so he guessed it didn’t matter. His immediate problem at that point was to get clear of the area. His wounds were not life-threatening, but Rapp was. Bramble needed to get his story straight and do it fast and then get hold of Hurley. As he put distance between himself and his handiwork, he began to refine his lie. By the time he was out of the city proper he felt that he had things about as good as he was going to get them. He dialed Hurley’s cell phone five times but got no answer. The last time he left a cryptic message with enough innuendo that Hurley would get the gist of what had gone down.
He didn’t know the exact location of the scrap yard, but Hurley had mentioned it in the premission briefing. He apparently knew the ugly mutt of a Serb from something he’d done in Yugoslavia back when Yugoslavia was a country. Hurley had helped the man emigrate to France, where he became very involved in organized crime. Hurley said for the right amount of money the Serb could be trusted. It was past ten in the evening when Hurley finally called back. Over an unsecure line it was impossible to give all the details of what had happened, but Hurley still got the gist. Bramble explained that the van was a piece of crap and that he needed to scrap it. Hurley took the hint and told him where to go and after that he told him to check the message service for instructions.
Bramble went straight to the scrap yard. It was just over an hour from Paris. The rear of the van was riddled with bullet holes and he had no idea if the police had a description of it, so he made the cautious decision to get off the road as soon as possible. There were only two problems: The scrap yard was closed and there were two bodies in the back. The second part didn’t bother Bramble so much. He’d been around bodies and they weren’t bad, at least until they started to smell. The problem was being caught with them if the police showed up.
Bramble had backed the van in near the gate so the bullet holes would be concealed and then covered the bodies with a tarp in case a cop decided to take a look. He wiped down his .45 caliber Colt and placed it in McGuirk’s lifeless hand so it would have his prints on it. Bramble stuffed the weapon under the dead man’s body and then took McGuirk’s sissy 9mm Beretta 92F. He hated the Italian piece of garbage but it was better than nothing. The same gun Rapp used.
Next he dug out the magnet from the LED box under the surveillance console and ran it in circles around the surveillance videotapes. It was standard practice in situations like this: Destroy all evidence that could tie you to the crime. It just so happened that it also suited his needs. It wouldn’t do to have footage of him sneaking up on the man he thought was Rapp and shooting him in the back of the head.
With that done, Bramble dug out the first-aid kit and tended to his wounds. The calf was easy to deal with, the triceps, less so. And as far as the ribs went, the only thing he could do was try to relax and not move. Bramble reclined the driver’s seat, ignored the pain, and thought about Rapp: how he would react, what kind of story he would try to tell, and who he would try to tell it to. Every way he looked at it, he figured Rapp was screwed. He was the one who had failed to check in after he’d fucked up the original job. He was the one who had sent a decoy into the apartment so he could ambush them. Hurley was going to be all over this. Kennedy could piss and moan all she wanted, but her little golden boy was going to be hunted down.
Bramble fell asleep with those happy thoughts, only to be awakened by a dirty man missing at least half of his teeth knocking on his window. Bramble sat up too quickly and immediately regretted it. His ribs screamed with pain and the rising sun was shining directly in his eyes. He rolled down the window halfway and tried to make sense of what the man was saying. His French was somehow worse than Bramble’s, which was no easy thing. Eventually, he got the gist that this was Hurley’s formidable Mafioso friend.
Bramble pulled the van into the yard and the gate was closed behind him. He looked around the yard and realized immediately that he was at the right place. Once they fired up the equipment the van would be cubed and stacked amongst all the other trashed vehicles. The negotiation, however, proved to be more difficult. The Serbian wanted to look in the van, and Bramble most definitely didn’t want him looking in the van. There was sensitive surveillance equipment in there, two bodies, and some guns and a rifle that Bramble wanted destroyed.
In the end Bramble knew he’d been played, but he didn’t really care. The money wasn’t his, and it wasn’t even his responsibility. He paid for the demolition and all of the evidence inside with Rapp’s money. He took a certain amount of pleasure in the irony of the whole thing, but he didn’t have time to enjoy it. He needed to get his head screwed on and he needed some medical attention. Getting his story straight was the first priority. The CIA could be very thorough, and even though he had destroyed prett
y much all the evidence, they would put his story through the wringer and that would involve both human and mechanical lie detectors trying to trip him up. By the time he got to that juncture, and it would begin almost immediately, he would have to believe his own BS.
A few miles down the road, Bramble found a pay phone, parked, and climbed out of the car as if he were an eighty-year-old man. He grunted and moaned and then stiffly walked over and plugged some money into the slot. When he got a dial tone he punched in a long string of numbers and his personal code. Hurley’s voice played back a specific coded message. Bramble listened intently and breathed a sigh of relief when he realized they wanted to bring him in. And “in” specifically meant the U.S. Embassy in Paris where a real doctor would treat him. Bramble dialed the second message service and again punched in a long string of numbers and a different code. There was no code or hidden meaning in this message, just a straightforward order. Bramble looked at his watch. Depending on what happened at the Embassy, he might be able to make it work, but that would be up to Hurley.
Bramble shuffled back to the car. He would have to get patched up and convince Hurley to put him back on the street so he could hunt down Rapp and finish the job. Rapp had surprised him last night, but that was stupid luck. Bramble wouldn’t let it happen again. The next time he saw Rapp, he’d finish the job, and if he got lucky, maybe he could take Kennedy out at the same time.
CHAPTER 38
NEVILLE was dressed for the cameras: black pumps, dark gray tights, black skirt, and a cerulean silk blouse. She’d called it a day after her confrontation with Fournier. The encounter had left her in such a foul mood that she had told Martin Simon she didn’t want to be disturbed for the rest of the day. She’d gone home to an empty apartment and remembered that her husband had taken the kids to see his parents. The bare apartment only served to worsen her mood until she realized that with a two-and-half-year-old son and a nine-month-old daughter, she needed to take advantage of a little solitude. She drew a bath, lit some candles, turned on some jazz music, got in the tub, and began to plot the destruction of Paul Fournier.
