by James Ward
Chris Taylor’s life had been a series of successes, but this would be the greatest. Mister Al Kafajy would probably make him a full partner when this was over. That would mean a twenty percent stake in a $1.5 billion gross volume trading company with offices in nineteen countries. Not bad for a thirty-five year old half Brit half Arab guy with meager education and no nobility in his blood on either side. For this he was willing to endure life in backwater mid-Asian towns with no amenities and lots of gastric distress.
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Blake’s truck lumbered up a dirt driveway, splashed through deep puddles of muddy water and rolled through open doors into a large red barn. Roche followed right behind him in the Buick. The storm had weakened considerably over land, but was now dropping about an inch of rain per hour on Orangeburg, in the middle of South Carolina. The door slid closed, pushed by two men in fatigues. Blake got out of the truck into the dim light of a few bare bulbs near abandoned horse stalls. Randy Pullin a lanky American sporting fatigues with Colonel’s bars and an Australian bush hat stepped out of the shadows. ‘Colonel’ Randy was about six-foot three, leather faced, with dark, deep set eyes that would have made the Ayatollah Khomeini look like a school boy. “Hello Blake, Hey Roche, how did it go?”
Roche wanted to relate the “hitch” at Sullivan’s Island, but a flash of warning in Blake’s eyes stopped him. “Fine, it went fine,” asserted Roche. “No problems.” Blake nodded, eyes averted from “Colonel” Randy’s piercing gaze.
“Have you heard from Brandt?” Roche posed the question quickly to break up any potential for deeper queries about the morning’s events.
“Yeah, Brandt and his men will be here in a few minutes. They got up river and packed into a truck we left for them.” Randy’s eyes narrowed. “What about Battles?”
Roche understood the look. “I took care of that personally.” Colonel Randy studied Roche. He figured Roche had killed him in spite of orders to the contrary. In truth, Roche had planned all along to kill Battles. Roche had made sure that Battles’ knock on the head had put him to sleep permanently.
“So, everybody’s clear of the area?” Roche seemed a bit nervous as he asked.
“Everyone that you know, or need to know,” Colonel Randy replied. Randy always had double back-up plans. Roche figured that Colonel Randy probably had the two lumpers from the warehouse followed and neutralized. With their pockets full of money, they would get drunk or high then they would get dead. At least that’s the way Roche would have done it.
Blake declared, “Let’s get to work.”
They unloaded the crates from Blake’s truck. After personally checking the marking on the crate, Colonel Randy handed Roche and Blake each a passbook to separate bank accounts in their names at a Cayman Islands bank. Roche called the bank via cell phone to verify first his deposit, then Blake’s by identifying himself with a password created when he had opened the accounts months ago. The bank verified the money was on deposit.
“Nice working with you again Randy, I’ll see ya later,” drawled Blake as he started his truck. Blake wouldn’t feel good about this until he was safely a hundred miles away from this barn.
After Blake left, Roche made small talk with the men. He was waiting for Brandt to show up. Two of Brandt’s men were Roche’s personal friends. He had connected them with Colonel Randy’s group over a year ago. Roche wanted to see the men paid off and safely out of sight.
This was the fourth time they had all worked together. He trusted Blake but couldn’t muster the same feeling toward Colonel Randy or Brandt. These militia types were un-predictable to begin with, but Randy was crazy to boot. Roche and Colonel Randy had served together in Viet-Nam, sweating in the jungle, ducking Viet Cong bullets, toiling for freedom. They had been Special Operations officers, running a counter-intelligence unit that trained and managed South Vietnamese spies to infiltrate the V.C.
Their Vietnamese spies eventually betrayed them and they were taken prisoner, along with two others of their ops unit. One of those other officers was Bob Steck, now a senior operative for the CIA, the other was Brandt’s father, Glenn. The men were treated worse than dogs in their V.C. prison camp, but the unspeakable cruelty of the guards only hardened their resolve to survive. During their seventh attempt at escape, Glenn Brandt was wounded. The V.C stripped him, hung him feet first from a tree limb then made the others watch as they disemboweled him alive. In his dreams Colonel Randy Pullin still saw this terrible scene and still heard the elder Brandt’s screams of anguish. Randy came away from his Viet-Nam experience disillusioned by what he perceived as betrayal by his superiors and betrayal by the American people. On his return home Randy had refused several offers of good jobs. Brandt’s wife died young, of drug addiction brought on by loneliness and despair. Randy adopted Brandt’s son as his own. Disillusioned with the government that had abandoned him and his men, Pullin formed a militia group that lived and trained in a compound in the Rocky Mountains. The group soon attracted hundreds of similar minded men and their families. Word in the spy community was that for enough money, Colonel Randy would perform any task that called for military training, whether legal or not.
Roche’s reward for his Viet Nam experience had been a career with the CIA. Twenty years of success had been cut cruelly short by one big mistake. The cold war was just about at an end when Roche’s impeccable record had been tarnished forever by a big political mistake. By a series of unlikely circumstances, Roche wound up taking on the top man in the Israeli Mossad in a dispute over Palestinian top-secret information. A communiqué that Roche intercepted had directly proven the guilt of the Mossad officer in the assassination of a top Palestinian diplomat in Los Angeles. Roche vigorously pursued the Israeli. He had the goods on his man but, as his boss and old friend Bob Steck had pointed out, the truth is sometimes not compatible with career growth. Finally, he became an embarrassment to the Agency and to members of the Senate Intelligence Committee that staunchly supported Israel. Unjustly sacked, he had turned to a double life as owner of a small store in Norfolk, VA and as a mercenary for hire by anyone with the desire for a trained operative and the money to pay a market price for his services.
The headlights of a vehicle flashed through the barn window illuminating the half-darkness of the storm. Randy nodded to a man at the door. The man checked the source. “It’s Brandt.”
“Let ‘em in.” Two of the men rolled the door aside, and a rack-bodied crew cab Ford rolled to a stop inside the barn. Brandt and the men got out to stretch, dry off and change into street clothes.
“I guess Roche wanted to see that you guys were paid and out of here in one piece,” quipped Colonel Randy. “Here’s your pay, in cash as agreed.”
The men took the money, exchanged high fives with Roche and packed into a rental car to drive away. Brandt stayed, going to work with Colonel Randy’s men. They deflated the Zodiac and packed the truck for the long trip to Wyoming, careful to stash the crates safely under other gear. Colonel Randy’s GMC Yukon and the truck rolled away Northwest towards Spartanburg.
Roche pointed the Buick back towards Charleston. He would pick up I-95 to Richmond, then I-64 to Norfolk, but not before checking on that “hitch” in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina.
CHAPTER 3
Bob Steck’s red phone rang at six-fifty am, as he was on his way to Langley. There was almost never a red phone secure call during Bob’s morning commute from his Virginia horse farm to his office at the CIA.
Slipping his BMW 750iL out of cruise control and drifting to the inside lane of George Washington Parkway, he answered the ring with a curt “Steck.”
“Bob, there’s been a strange event in Charleston, during the hurricane yesterday.” The voice was his boss, Ryall Morgan. “Do you remember Alex Grayson, the FBI agent?”
How could Steck forget that weasel Alex Grayson? Grayson had tried to horn in on that messy Israeli thing, the one that resulted in Bob having to fire his number one operative and long-time friend, Paul Roch
e. “Yeah, I remember him.”
“Grayson was found dead on the waterfront near Charleston, just before the storm hit.”
Steck was tempted to make a crack, like “I’ll write a memo to myself to grieve.”
Morgan didn’t wait for Steck to speak, but went on. “This needs to be addressed quickly and discreetly, Bob.” Morgan was leading up to something.
Adjusting to Morgan’s tone, Steck asked, “Addressed by whom? Certainly it should not be me Ryall in light of the circumstances.”
“Bob, he was working under cover and hadn’t filed any reports in days, but his boss thinks he might have been tailing Paul Roche.”
Steck tensed. He knew that Roche had been so disillusioned after his firing that he had sought out some pretty unsavory company. The idea of making Roche ‘disappear’ had even been considered by top brass at the agency, an idea that Steck had blocked by a few well-placed political moves. Steck had investigated Roche personally. He had traced him to a gift shop in Norfolk, Virginia, had personally watched him for a few days then had him tailed for over a month. Nothing had been uncovered to dispute that Roche was a simple shopkeeper. Case closed, Right?
“Why would he be tailing Roche, Ryall? Still bent on harassment?”
“It’s possible, but now Grayson’s dead, Bob. Stop by my office when you get in. First thing, please.”
Steck could tell by Morgan’s tone that there was more to tell. “Yeah, sure, I’ll see you in about thirty minutes.” As Steck clicked off, he cursed. What had Paul Roche gotten into? Just the thought was condemning. After all, Steck himself had pronounced Paul ‘clean,’ in writing. This was not starting out to be a good day.
Steck called his secretary on his civilian cell-phone. “I may be late for the meeting with the Iran committee in the brown room. Please let them know. If you need me, I’ll be in Ryall Morgan’s office.” Steck chaired the Iran Committee. His extensive experience in Iran, both before and after the revolution of the late ‘70’s had helped to solidify his career. Add to that his intimate knowledge of Israel and the Palestinians, and it was plain to see that his success at the Agency had been assured. He would have a top job as long as he wanted to work and didn’t screw up.
Steck’s mind was full of questions and a sort of foreboding. He parked the BMW in his reserved space at the Agency. He made his customary stop at the coffee kiosk in the lobby, nodding to the attendant who had his crème donut and dark roast coffee ready. Nibbling on the sweet as he strode towards Morgan’s office, he dribbled powdered sugar on the lapel of his grey Brooks Brothers suit. As Steck entered Morgan’s three-room office suite, he made a feeble attempt to brush the powder from his jacket. All he did was spread it around, making the situation worse. Morgan’s secretary, Marie, chuckled, holding up a hand to stop him. She snatched a packet from her desk drawer, opened it and swished the stuff away with a moist towelette. She giggled then patted him on the shoulder.
“There,” she said, “you’re all set for business, Bob. Go right in, He’s waiting for you.”
Ryall Morgan was a career bureaucrat. He had started as a glorified clerk in the Russia section in 1963, mentored by a Senator who was Ryall’s father’s golf buddy. At first, his only value to the Agency was his mastery of the Russian language in all its regional variations. But Ryall quickly showed himself to be a good student of the politics of bureaucracy. Tutored by his father, who was a multi-millionaire deeply involved in international trade, Ryall quickly rose through the ranks at Langley until he was a section chief. Then a career defining moment came when he helped break the Aldrich Ames case. Now an assistant director, Ryall’s career was at the apogee. He was known as a personable yet dedicated man whose great strength was in his ability to perceive his own weaknesses, admit them and appeal to those with offsetting strengths to team with him in achieving any goal before them. A conservative man in his personal life, happily married with 3 children, Ryall Morgan was considered to be incorruptible. Steck liked his boss.
Morgan looked up as Steck entered. He motioned to the side chair by his desk. Peering over half-lens glasses, he shoved a thin sheave of papers towards the edge of his desk, to the spot where Steck’s elbow would have landed.
“Morning,” he slurred, “read this.”
Steck half spoke, half nodded a “Good morning Ryall,” gathered up the loose papers and sat back to read.
The top page announced, “Security level secret plus F6, eyes only.” As Bob read the introduction, the words in red “Navy is missing (intentionally blank) materiel” leapt off the page. He tensed, sat up straight and read intently.
Ten minutes later, he finished reading the document. Agitated, Steck waived the paper at Morgan in a gesture of frustration. “What materiel?’ he asked. Steck knew that when the words “intentionally blank” appeared in this kind of document it meant something big, something very secret. Something that by security classification standards could only be taken from a short-list of abominable things: State secrets, battle plans, advanced weapons blueprints or maybe WMD.
Morgan shrugged. “I don’t know, yet. This just got to me.”
“Well, who wrote it? How do we find out more? My Gawd, Ryall, If Roche has turned on us he can do a lot of damage.”
“Joe Bergen wrote it. I’ve never seen anything he published proven wrong. You and I will be on center stage at NSA in Beltsville today at 2:00pm. Cancel your agenda for the day, Bob and prepare all the background you can get on Roche. Be back here at noon with a brief to present to NSA. We can ride over in my car.”
Steck nodded, already heading for the door. Fifteen minutes later, Steck and seven staffers were busy sifting documents and computer files. By 10:30am, they had a fifty page dossier on Roche covering his entire career at the agency. By eleven, the dossier had been reduced to a ten page brief. Instructing his administrative assistant, Mary to hold all messages for the afternoon, passing on only those from a short list he had hastily dictated, Steck trotted the hundred yards to Morgan’s office. Over cold sandwiches, they reviewed and edited the material. Satisfied that they were ready for their inter-agency meeting, Morgan and Steck double-timed it to the garage, got into Morgan’s big Buick, and began the drive to Beltsville, Maryland.
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Colonel Randy strode through the parade ground at his Wyoming training camp, busy talking into his cell phone. His booming, raspy voice always sounded angry. This morning it was even louder and angrier, a sign of impatience.
“Dammit Major, you’re hours behind schedule, you sound half drunk and now you say you’re having car trouble. Why the hell do you think I sound upset?”
Brandt bristled at the reprimand and his steel blue eyes narrowed. “I’ll be there on time, Colonel. You can count on it.”
“That’s more like it, Colonel Randy said sternly. No excuses, just performance of your duty son.”
Brandt steered the black Suburban back onto Interstate 90 just west of Butte, Montana after some timely help from a trucker at a rest area, who was kind enough to lend him tools and advice to fix the engine. The girl he had picked up 300 miles ago was passed out drunk in the back seat. He muttered a curse that he would now have to drive all night to make up for time lost fooling around with her at the rest area. He repeated the curse louder because by the time he was getting to his intended business, the whiskey had already overtaken her. She lay in a heap, snoring loudly.
Brandt squinted into the rear view mirror to check on the crate behind the back seat. Re-packed in new wood, the precious cargo was now marked “fine English bone china.” Brandt swigged black coffee from a large thermo-jug. He set the cruise control to 80, intent on finishing the drive to Coeur d’Alene, Idaho by daybreak.
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Chris Taylor sipped acrid Tajik coffee at 4:30 am, speaking softly on the phone with one of his agents in Calgary, Canada where it was 4:00 pm. “Meet a dark blue Ford Explorer at the Kootenay Hotel in Creston, just over the border. Just get the crate to our Vancouver offic
e,” he said. “We’ll have a manifest drafted that includes it as part of a full container shipment to Dubai. When you’re sure it’s loaded, call me.”
Taylor hung up without any good-bye. He shuffled about his apartment, packing a change of clothes, business papers, cigarettes and a few magazines for the flight to Paris. Leaving a note in Russian for the housekeeper, he locked the apartment and lugged his bag down the dingy brown staircase. The front door creaked loudly as he opened it towards the street. No sense trying to be quiet when everyone in the building was already preparing breakfast to eat or food to carry for the long Tajik workday. The company Mercedes diesel was parked at the curb. Taylor greeted Alimand, the driver, and got into the back seat. He lit a cigarette for the ride to the airport. Recounting in his mind the present operation and thinking ahead to a successful conclusion, Chris whistled softly to himself. He reckoned the excrement would just be hitting the fan in Washington.
CHAPTER 4
The briefing at Beltsville confirmed that Ryall Morgan and Bob Steck were really in the crap. All that was known so far was that part of a very secret stash was missing. The stash, explained the assistant director of Naval Intelligence, was materiel seized as part of the freezing of Iraqi assets ordered by the first President Bush in the early 1990’s. The Navy had not yet found out what part of the stash at the Charleston warehouse was actually missing. The dead FBI agent, Grayson had been on official business that the FBI would only talk about at a meeting already scheduled for the next morning at the Intelligence Director’s office. Steck was startled when told that Ryall Morgan would be a presenter at that meeting. It meant his boss was privy to more than he had shared with Steck.
Steck’s briefing about Paul Roche got a somber response from the assemblage. When added to reports from the Mount Pleasant police that he was a definite suspect in Grayson’s murder, it became absolutely clear that Roche was mixed up in something awful, something treasonous. The FBI was already working to get the Mount Pleasant Police removed from the case. Ryall Morgan assigned Steck to the investigation. Since it was on US soil, Steck would have to be accompanied by FBI agents who would officially run the effort.
