Hard Target (A Jon Reznick Thriller)

by J. B. Turner

  “That’s why they really want me dead. Maybe they eventually would have killed me like they did the others, but that’s why I took the documents that I did. To prevent them from sweeping all this wrongdoing under the rug again until another auditor uncovers it and they kill him or her too. I was almost certain—and knowing what those men said to you, now I am certain—that they knew I was looking into these deaths. And my testimony in the closed session tomorrow gives me the perfect platform from which to expose them.”

  Reznick looked again at the faces on the laptop.

  “I feel like I know each one of them. I need to tell their stories,” Dyer said.

  “I admire that. I hear exactly what you’re saying. But here’s the thing. Especially after everything you’ve just told me, I do think both you and Trevelle would be infinitely safer in the FBI’s hands.”

  “I’m going to take my chances, Jon.”

  “Is that your final word on it?”

  Dyer nodded. “My mind is made up.”

  “Well, if you’re sure, then I will do my best to help make sure you testify tomorrow.”

  “I don’t want you to get into trouble with the Feds over this.”

  Reznick smiled. “I think it’s probably too late for that. They’re already on my case.”

  Trevelle walked into the living room. He saw the faces on the laptop, and Reznick explained the situation. “Shit, you for real?”

  Dyer nodded.

  “What is it, Trevelle?” Reznick asked.

  “Sorry to interrupt, but I forgot to tell you, I spoke to Meyerstein earlier.”

  “You did?” Reznick said.

  “I told her I would hand myself in to them, but only after Rosalind has testified. I want the Feds to catch these crazies. And I don’t want to bail on anyone, not now.”

  Reznick held up his hand so he wouldn’t be interrupted. “I need to make a call.” He got up from his seat.

  Dyer said, “Don’t sell me out, Jon.”

  “Don’t worry.”

  Reznick headed through to the kitchen, where Fifi had on her headphones as she tidied up. He shut the door. He sat down at the kitchen table and called Meyerstein, relaying what had happened at the apartment about an hour earlier.

  There was only silence.

  “Did you hear what I said? Two bodies. One dead, one tied up. Guatemalans. Ex-military intelligence.”

  “Is this some sort of joke, Jon?”

  Reznick pressed the phone tight to his ear. “Listen to me, I haven’t got time to get into a philosophical argument. I’m giving you a heads-up.”

  “Jon, this is outrageous.”

  “Did you get the new Miami footage?”

  “I thought . . .”

  “I said, did you get the new Miami footage?”

  Meyerstein sighed. “Yes, I did. It’s being analyzed.”

  “Those guys filmed themselves killing that poor kid.”

  “But to kill one of them?”

  “I didn’t start this. These guys are the hunters. Rosalind Dyer and Trevelle are the hunted. And now me too. Listen, do you want to know where these guys are?”

  Meyerstein snapped. “Of course I do.”

  “Get this. There was a sniper rifle and ammo in an upstairs bedroom, line of sight to the Hart Senate Office Building. I took it from there. It’s now in my possession. I’m going to send over some footage.”

  “What?”

  Reznick gave her the address. “You’ll find them there. You need to get over there now. I didn’t want to call the cops.”

  “I understand.”

  “These guys were going to be part of a team or were linked to a team that’s in DC, here and now, tasked with neutralizing Rosalind Dyer. This is a serious operation they have going down. I got lucky. But that luck can change. These are dangerous people, Martha.”

  He heard Meyerstein shouting the address to her colleagues.

  “I’ve got a team on the way right now. We’ll secure the area.” A long silence. “Jon, I’m sorry this is happening.”

  “So am I.”

  “But it’s important you know. Rosalind needs to get to a secure location. And quick.”

  “She will. But only after she’s testified. That’s the deal.”

  “Jon, I’m begging you, bring Rosalind in! Otherwise, this is not going to end well.”

  “No can do. There’s a plan to kill Rosalind Dyer. The two guys I just handed you won’t know what other teams are in town. They’re lower down the food chain. Now that the apartment is compromised, they’re going to try to get her some other way. Figure it out, Martha. We’re running out of time.”

  Reznick ended the call. He sat and pondered his options as he sent Meyerstein the footage from his cell phone. The clip, taken in the apartment near the Hart Senate Office Building, showed the two hit men, one dead and one unconscious. He was annoyed with himself for not telling her about the sniper rifle and ammo as soon as he left the apartment.

  He contemplated the situation as Fifi and Trevelle joined him at the table. They placed their laptops on the big wooden table in front of them.

  “What’s going on?” Reznick said.

  Trevelle tapped away at the keys as he logged on. “I told Fifi about those seven guys.”

  Fifi said, “She needs to testify. If she doesn’t testify, no one will know. It will all get buried in the machine.”

  “Got a little update for you, Jon,” Trevelle continued.

  “What kind of update?”

  “From the moment the guy with the electronically distorted voice contacted you while you were in the apartment to the moment you ended the call, we were listening in.”

  “You were?”

  “We’ve been working on identifying his voice.”

  “You can do that?”

  “Reverse engineering. Fifi has some software she developed.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “You didn’t ask. We’ve managed to strip away the electronic distortion. Anyway, what we found is pretty interesting.”

  “You got something?”

  Fifi nodded. “Oh yeah!”

  “So you can identify him?” Reznick said. “Seriously?”

  Trevelle said, “Once we stripped away the distortion, which incidentally is ten-year-old technology, we ran his real voice through several databases. And we believe, definitely believe, we know who it is.”

  “You guys are seriously the most way-out-of-left-field people I know.”

  Trevelle rolled his eyes. “Jon, you kill people. Now that’s left field.”

  “Point taken.”

  “The voice, let’s focus on that for a moment. You want to prove it beyond a reasonable doubt, you’ll need audio forensics experts to look over this clip. But I think we have a pretty good idea who it is.”

  “Who?”

  Trevelle smiled across the table at Reznick. He turned his laptop to show a grainy image of a white guy in shades. “Photo was taken four years ago on Sanibel Island, Florida. This is the guy.”

  “Who is it?”

  “Max Charles, former senior CIA way back in the 1970s. Involved with the Contras, Central American death squads, and the militaries in those countries. Regime change specialist. False flag operations. Assassinations. Works on various CIA front operations, including aid agencies in the Third World.”

  Reznick stared at the image. “Max Charles. The name seems familiar.”

  Fifi said, “Let me refresh your memory. He currently runs a shadowy consulting firm in Manhattan. Geostrategy Solutions. Specialists in private security. Geopolitical advisers. Offices right in the middle of Manhattan on Lexington. Know what else?”

  Reznick shrugged.

  “Max Charles advises the State Department and the Pentagon and has close contacts with MI6 and Mossad. What do you think? This our guy?”

  “Now all we need is a link to Guatemala. And don’t mention any of this to Rosalind,” Reznick said.

  The pair of hacke
rs nodded.

  “She might freak out. It’s important we keep her in the right frame of mind. Besides, there’s a lot of moving parts on this. We’ve got Max Charles, his Guatemalan goons in town, and we’ve got Rosalind, who is poised to testify, here in DC, tomorrow morning.”

  Fifi said, “I understand what you’re saying. But doesn’t she have a right to know about this Max Charles?”

  Reznick leaned back in his seat, arms folded. “Fine. You want to tell her? See what she does.”

  “You think she’ll freak out?”

  “Fifi, she’s supersmart. She already knows she’s at risk. And she’s rejected any offers to hand herself in and let the FBI take her to safety.”

  Fifi said, “I guess. What do you want us to do with this information? We can’t just sit on it.”

  “Get the audio of my conversation with Max Charles, stripped of the electronic distortion, and send it to Meyerstein. But also send the original conversation which disguises the voice.”

  “Right now?”

  “Right now. Tell her what you know, that you think this is Max Charles. And let the Feds deal with it.”

  Thirty

  Meyerstein was watching the real-time footage on the big screens in the FBI’s fifth-floor Strategic Information and Operations Center. A SWAT team was moving from room to room at the DC apartment where Reznick claimed he had left the Guatemalans. It was stripped bare. Each and every cupboard and closet. Nothing. No one was there. No injured. No dead. And no blood. Not a trace.

  Meyerstein felt empty inside. She also felt like a fool. She had instigated the raid on the information Reznick had provided. And there was nothing there.

  She slammed her hand hard down on the conference room table, sending papers flying. “Goddamn it, what the hell? Gimme answers, people. What the hell happened?”

  A senior analyst, Barry McNulty, said, “They sent in cleaners. Very professional. All my team agree.”

  Meyerstein turned and looked across at McNulty, who was sitting at the conference table, laptop in front of him. “So quickly?”

  “Appears so.”

  “Why the hell did it take us so long to get there? The SWAT team entered fifty-five minutes after Reznick called. Did they really take that long?”

  “Breakdown in the chain of command. We’re still trying to figure it out. From what I can tell, the SWAT team was diverted when the hostage rescue team called for immediate backup. A Somali guy on a terrorism watch list started shooting off his gun eight blocks away. So the call was made to go there.”

  “That was all handled though, right?”

  “In hindsight, absolutely.”

  “I’ll deal with that later. For now, tell me about the audio that was sent to us by Trevelle Williams. Max Charles, right?”

  McNulty tapped a few keys on his laptop. “Audio forensics have confirmed that he’s the one talking. Absolutely no voice morphing. It’s him.”

  Meyerstein’s mind flashed up images from her past. The name Max Charles made her blood run cold. “That’s the same guy I told you about. He was involved in that Russian crew that abducted me, if you remember. He was pulling the strings for that Russian mobster who lived in New York. He had links to the Ukraine and to Russian oligarchs. After that, he dropped off the grid. No one seemed to know where. Just disappeared. Son of a bitch! Do you remember?”

  “How can I forget, ma’am.”

  “What do our records show?”

  “Unconfirmed sightings in Belize, Sudan, and Guatemala, interestingly. Usually flying in and out on a private jet registered to a shell company in the Bahamas owned by an American company that doesn’t file returns.”

  “Great. Well, he’s back. I need to know, is he using an alias? Has he been in America without us knowing it? For how long? It boggles the mind.”

  “I’ll check it out.”

  “And this is definitely the voice of Max Charles?”

  “He’s known as Max Charles, ma’am, but he was born Thomas McAleese in the Paulus Hook area of Jersey City seventy-eight years ago.”

  “That’s his real name?”

  “McAleese, that’s right.”

  “What else do you have on his background?”

  “He won a scholarship to Yale. Very bright. And along the way he changed his name to Max Charles. Probably because he wanted to fit in more with the Ivy League crowd at Yale at the time.”

  Meyerstein sat down in her seat.

  “The CIA got tipped off by a professor about his test scores and psychological profile. He was recruited by the Agency. As a young man, he was mentored by Dulles, no less. Allen Dulles.”

  “I know the type.”

  “Both Dulles and McAleese, or Max Charles as he was then already known, shared the same Cold War ideology. Virulently anti-socialist, communist, leftist, and saw Ban the Bomb, Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, and anti-war movements as Moscow-led fronts.”

  Meyerstein scribbled down the details on a writing pad in front of her. “So where is he now? New York?”

  A fresh-faced twentysomething IT guy with glasses put up his hand. “Ma’am, you might not like this.”

  “What do you mean I might not like this? Like what?”

  “Max Charles is here.”

  “In DC?”

  “No, ma’am. Max Charles is in this building as we speak. He’s up on the seventh floor with Director O’Donoghue.”

  Meyerstein’s head was swimming as she took the elevator to the seventh floor. She brushed past the desk of the Director’s long-serving assistant, who looked up from her desk. “Hi, Martha, you got an appointment?”

  “Not today.” She walked past the desk.

  “He’s in a meeting!”

  “Too bad.” Meyerstein knocked twice on the door and strode into the office.

  O’Donoghue was sitting on the sofa and looked surprised to see her. Standing beside the windows, hands behind his back, was a tall, elderly man wearing a gray suit.

  The man turned around and gave a thin smile. “Max Charles. Nice to meet you.”

  Meyerstein shut the door behind her and stared at Charles for longer than she intended. “I’d like to speak to the Director alone.”

  “Martha, pull up a chair,” O’Donoghue said.

  “Sir, if it’s alright with you, this needs to be private.”

  O’Donoghue pointed to the chair. “Please, Martha. What’s the problem?”

  Meyerstein reluctantly pulled up the chair and sat down, adjacent to O’Donoghue. She looked at Charles, who was still standing beside the window, hands behind his back in an imperious manner. “Your name has come up in an investigation I’m currently running,” she said. “Max Charles, you said?”

  O’Donoghue stared at her.

  Meyerstein fixed her gaze on the man standing beside the window. “Your name is Max Charles?”

  The man stared at her long and hard.

  Meyerstein looked at O’Donoghue, who was now frowning. “Sir, I’m sorry to drop this on you. I wanted to talk about this in private. But it appears Mr. Charles has beaten me to it.”

  “What are you talking about?” Charles said.

  “I’ll tell you what I’m talking about. We’ve analyzed a voice recording that appears to be a match for your voice. You spoke with Jon Reznick, who occasionally consults with us, this morning. You’re behind the attempt on Rosalind Dyer’s life. What have you got to say for yourself? And what the hell are you doing here? This is outrageous.”

  Charles looked at O’Donoghue and smiled. “What is this, Bill?”

  O’Donoghue said nothing.

  Charles looked again at Meyerstein. “Maybe I should explain. I speak to a lot of people. What is this in connection with, this conversation I supposedly had?”

  “Your name came up previously in connection with my kidnapping, several years back, as well, you may remember.”

  “My name? I’m sorry, I think you’ve made a terrible mistake.”

  Meyerstein shook her head.
“Russian mob? That jog your memory?”

  Charles gave her a patronizing smile. “I think you’re very much mistaken. Although, you might be getting mixed up with my other work, as I do have a lot of back-channel connections with Russians living in America. For the purposes of opening dialogue between us and Moscow. My services are used by the Pentagon.”

  “I assume you wouldn’t mind answering some questions regarding that investigation?”

  “Not at all. Glad to help. I’m due to visit my attorney later today, so I’ll mention that we spoke.”

  “The FBI will be in touch. But we are also investigating serious allegations concerning the testimony tomorrow morning of Rosalind Dyer. Are you involved with people who are attempting to dissuade her from speaking before the Senate Armed Services Committee?”

  Charles spread his palms and smiled. “Assistant Director, I think we’re at cross-purposes. I believe I know something about what you’re getting at.”

  “You want to tell me?”

  Charles sat down on a sofa opposite O’Donoghue. “Bill, I’m sorry this probably sounds a bit crazy. But I’ll try and explain what’s happened.”

  O’Donoghue sat stony faced.

  Charles looked across at Meyerstein. “Rosalind Dyer . . . That’s why I’m here. I’m representing the interests of the United States. I work for the American government.”

  “In what capacity?”

  “As you can imagine, a lot of my work is classified. My company consults for organizations as diverse as the Pentagon, NSA, CIA, and several oil majors. But you probably know that already.”

  “Indeed I do.”

  “Geopolitical risks and such. And I liaise with intelligence agencies across the world, including our own.”

  Meyerstein shifted in her seat. “You aren’t working for the CIA?”

  “No, I’m not. You might be interested to know that I still have the highest security clearance, though. And it’s required because I consult with various governments and businesses around the world.”

  “Who are you representing in regard to Rosalind Dyer?” Meyerstein asked. “I need a name.”

  “I’m working for the President’s national security adviser, Brad Firskin.”

  Meyerstein’s blood ran cold. She felt as if she’d been hit by a ten-ton truck. “And they’re pulling the strings on this little operation you’re running?”