“You’ll stay at my home,” Cullsworth said. “My personal security detail will see to your safety as if it were my own.”
Sam opened her mouth to protest, but Cullsworth cut her off. “I’ll hear no arguments. Our department has thus far failed to protect you, and the safety of my agents is my personal responsibility.”
Cullsworth’s telephone rang, and he picked up the receiver. He listened for a moment, frowned, then cupped his hand over the phone. He looked at Sam. “Someone’s downstairs at the desk asking about you. Ever heard of anyone named Peter Kittredge?”
“Jesus, what happened to you?” Peter Kittredge’s speech was slightly slurred, Sam noticed, and his eyes were glassy and bloodshot.
“I could ask the same,” she said, laughing. “You look like a frat party casualty.”
Kittredge blushed a little. “Rough day.” He looked around Cullsworth’s office. “Nice digs.”
Cullsworth chuckled. “At least by government standards.” The mirth left his face. “Let’s get down to business. Tell me how you fit into all of this,” he said, looking at Kittredge.
“I’m not sure I do,” he said.
“I beg to differ,” Sam said. “You’re involved with both sides. At least, that was the case a day ago when we talked to you last.”
“Ah yes,” Kittredge said, affecting a reminiscent pose. “You left me hogtied and stranded in a field, if memory serves.”
“You weren’t stranded,” Brock pointed out. “We left you a car.”
“A stolen car. Thanks for that.”
“Details,” Brock said.
“Tell us why you’re here,” Sam said.
“Simple, really. I have no place else to turn, and I thought you had an honest face. At least,” he added, “that’s the impression I got when you kidnapped me.”
Sam smiled. “I’m flattered. But I thought you had too many relationships with intelligence agencies in your life already, and you didn’t want any more.”
“That was before the CIA murdered everyone I knew in the VSS,” Kittredge said.
Sam shook her head and frowned. “They do that sometimes,” she said. “‘Low-intensity conflict,’ they call it.”
“Not something I can be a part of,” Kittredge said, his voice thick.
“Not to be melodramatic about it,” Sam said, “but I don’t think you have much choice in the matter. It didn’t sound like you had much negotiating room, master spy that you are.”
Kittredge nodded. “But I can’t be party to murder. So you understand my predicament.”
Cullsworth leaned back in his leather chair, a pensive look on his face. “And you think we can help you somehow?”
“I don’t know,” Kittredge said. “Maybe. And I had hoped to help you. If you think there might be a connection between that” – he pointed at Brock’s cast and Sam’s collection of stitches – “and the ‘low-intensity conflict’ going on right now.”
He pulled a crumpled slip of paper from his pocket. “It’s not much, but I hope it leads to something. I hope you stop those bastards.”
Sam unfolded the paper and read the telephone number it contained. The area code was local.
“Which bastards?” she asked, handing the paper to Dan, asking implicitly for him to start the telephone trace.
A wan smile crossed Kittredge’s face. “All of them.”
“I’m not in the business of throwing stones from inside a glass house,” Cullsworth said, “and my agency isn’t exactly a paragon of human rights and Constitutional rectitude. That’s part of the reason I was brought in, as a matter of fact. But if there’s criminal or unconstitutional activity occurring on American soil, and that activity falls rightfully under federal jurisdiction, it is my duty to act.”
Sam smiled a little at the canned speech, even though she believed Cullsworth actually meant what he said.
“I’m glad to hear you say that,” Kittredge said. “Because I led the CIA to the VSS agents.” His voice turned maudlin. “I got them killed.”
Cullsworth nodded thoughtfully. “And you think there will be reprisals,” he said.
“I hope not. But maybe.”
“We’ll protect you,” Cullsworth said. He nodded toward Sam. “Please make the necessary arrangements. After you allow my security detail to take you to my home, that is,” Cullsworth added. “I insist that you get some rest and nourishment before doing anything else.”
“No argument here,” Sam said.
44
Dr. Javier Mendoza padded down the now-familiar VIP hallway in the Caracas hospital. He didn’t relish delivering his news.
He’d never seen any disease develop and spread quite so quickly and virulently. He felt powerless to help his patient, the most powerful man in Venezuela, who would undoubtedly succumb to the devastating disease in a matter of hours.
Mendoza entered President Hugo Chavez’s hospital room. El Presidente was unconscious, machines monitoring his vitals.
Chavez’s chief of staff met Dr. Mendoza at the door. “I take it the situation is unchanged?”
“Sadly, no,” Mendoza answered. “It is much worse than I feared it might be. I’ve never encountered a disease as aggressive as this one. Even the most powerful drug therapies have failed to slow its advance.”
The chief of staff nodded heavily. “How much time do we have?” he asked.
“Please forgive me if this sounds indelicate,” Mendoza said, “but are plans in place, in case His Excellency does not survive the night?”
The chief of staff sighed. “This was my fear,” he said. “Yes, there are plans in place.”
“My recommendation is that we shift our focus to making El Presidente as comfortable as he can be during this time.”
“You’re saying there’s no hope?”
“In my opinion,” Mendoza said gravely, “there is no hope.”
“Not even if a donor liver can be found?”
“Even if El Presidente were to survive the surgery, which is not guaranteed given his weakened condition, the virus exists in high concentrations in his bloodstream. It would simply attack the new liver. We would buy him only a few days, in the best transplant scenario I can envision.”
“What about a blood transfusion in conjunction with a liver transplant?” Chavez’s chief of staff asked.
“Akin to pouring clean water in a soiled vessel,” Mendoza said. “There are billions of copies of the virus hiding throughout his organs and tissues. I am afraid there is very little that can be done. Even the most extreme measures are unlikely to prolong his consciousness by a meaningful amount of time.”
“Thank you, Doctor Mendoza,” the official said. “We will naturally seek other opinions, but I thank you for your diligence and dedication.”
“Of course,” Mendoza said. He turned to leave, but changed his mind. “There’s one more thing,” he said, “which may be important to you.”
The chief of staff raised his eyebrows, signaling Mendoza to continue. “I am not a forensic biologist,” the doctor said, “but I am very familiar with all known diseases of the liver. In my opinion, either we’re experiencing a new and utterly unknown natural mutation of the Hepatitis virus, one that makes it suddenly among the most deadly diseases on the planet, or…”
“Or what?”
Mendoza wavered. He was about to make a very serious statement, one with potentially far-reaching ramifications. Just follow the facts, he coached himself.
He took a deep breath and continued. “Either we’re witnessing the first known case of a terribly unlucky disease mutation,” he said, “or El Presidente is the victim of an engineered virus.”
“You mean an attack.”
“I believe so, yes,” Mendoza said. “An act of biological warfare.”
45
El Jerga fumed in solitary silence.
She was dead! And then, she wasn’t.
It was unbelievable, inconceivable even, that anyone should survive that kind of voltage, es
pecially after enduring hours of pain and suffering.
The man was a different issue entirely, El Jerga knew. He should have disposed of the man early on in the proceedings. Now, he was left with yet another loose end.
But killing the man would have had an undesirable effect on the woman. She would undoubtedly have given up much sooner. She’d never have endured half of the suffering he’d planned for her, if she’d witnessed her lover’s grisly demise beforehand. It was human nature, plain and simple. It would have taken the fight completely out of her.
The message from the puta gringo in the aftermath of El Jerga’s second botched attempt on the pair’s lives had been unambiguous: I would kill you myself if Caracas allowed it. The gringo’s orders had been equally clear. El Jerga was to wait in silence until the appointed hour, and check in for further guidance using normal protocols.
El Jerga had attempted to contact El Grande directly, but had received no reply. It wasn’t like El Grande to ignore him, and El Jerga interpreted the silence as a change in the value of his own stock with the VSS.
Ephemeral things, success and reputation.
Until three days ago, El Jerga had been deadlier than the plague. But the same victim had survived two of his attacks. Twice! And just like that, his fortune had taken a dramatic turn.
It was an outrage and an embarrassment, and El Jerga felt something he hadn’t felt in years. He was ashamed. And he could hear in his head what they must be saying about him, that he had finally allowed his passions, his enthusiasm and eccentricity, to interfere with his professionalism.
His face flushed as he pondered the thought. He realized, to his further disgrace, that those voices were absolutely correct. El Jerga’s joy was in the doing, not in the outcome, and that weakness had driven him, recklessly and foolishly, to prolong the job beyond what was reasonable. It was needless and selfish, and his indulgence had caused serious problems for his employers.
Yet, if the gringo’s message was an accurate indication, Caracas still had need of him. For that, he was grateful. And he took comfort in the knowledge that if they did not have further use for him, he would likely already be dead. El Jerga had no illusions that he was the only competent killer in Venezuela’s stable. And he knew that there was such a specialty as a hunter of assassins. There was the distinct possibility that the gringo’s message was only intended to relax him, El Jerga knew, to induce him to let his guard down in advance of his death. He resolved to remain more watchful than ever.
And much more sober. No longer would he allow himself the giddy revelry that had driven him to failure. If the job called for a statement, he would surely make one. But the job would come first. His addiction would come second.
He felt his wounded shoulder, tangible evidence of his failure. The slug had passed clean through, but it had taken a chunk of skin and muscle with it. It needed medical attention if he was to remain useful.
He looked at his watch. It was time. He felt anxious, wondering what message he would receive.
As per his instructions, El Jerga dialed a particular number, using a particular mobile phone, one that had been supplied to him for this purpose alone. He allowed the phone call to ring several times, then ended the call attempt before a connection was even made.
Several seconds later, a notification popped up. Though his phone never rang, he had a voice message waiting for him. He pushed the button to listen.
The message contained no words. It was comprised of a series of eleven tones.
El Jerga sighed. He hated these kinds of messages. He tore the top sheet off of the pad of paper on the hotel nightstand, grabbed a pen, and sat on the bathroom floor to write. Using a table would have left a traceable impression on the wood surface that might later be used to reconstruct his activities, but using the hard bathroom tiles as a writing surface would leave no discernible evidence.
Then he set to work identifying the touch-tone phone key that corresponded to each of the eleven tones in the voice message. It was painstaking work for a man with no musical inclination or training, and it took forty minutes before he was completely confident he had all the right numbers.
He couldn’t be too careful. A mistake would be more than just costly for a man in his tenuous position. El Jerga knew that a blunder would likely be deadly. If the enemy didn’t kill him, his employer certainly would.
El Jerga folded the paper and placed it in his pocket, tucked his laptop computer under his arm, and walked to the hotel lobby, where he sat in silence while his Wi-Fi antenna synced with the hotel’s free service.
He called up a map website, typed in the first six digits of the code he had received, typed a single blank space, and then entered the remaining five digits of the code.
The code represented an address. All that was missing was the street name. But that didn’t matter, because the Internet would provide the right street.
The last five digits of the message were a US postal code. And the first part of the message contained enough digits – six of them – to ensure that there was less than one chance in ten million that more than one street address within the same zip code began with the same six digits.
Sure enough, Google returned but a single DC street address.
It was close enough to walk, and El Jerga was thankful for that. He needed to clear his head.
The doctor sewed the last stitch into El Jerga’s shoulder. The old sawbones had kind eyes and spoke softly in Venezuelan Spanish, but cursed like a sailor. It struck El Jerga as incongruous.
“These are grave times,” the doctor said. “Tragedies everywhere at home.”
El Jerga hadn’t heard.
“You’ve been busy,” the doctor said. “So they’ve asked me to fill you in.”
The doctor spoke in reverent tones of the dead in Caracas. El Grande. Rojo. The girl, Maria. Even Alejandro. All dead.
El Jerga didn’t attempt to conceal his surprise and concern. “This is catastrophic,” he croaked.
The doctor nodded. “Si. Most certainly. But it is not the first time these things have happened in our country.” He sighed before continuing. “I am afraid that there is more bad news.”
El Jerga felt a heaviness settle in his bones as the doctor relayed the news of El Presidente’s almost-certain demise. Biological weapons? This was a brazen act of warfare, forbidden by treaties the United States had sponsored and ratified! Was there no end to the gringos’ hypocrisy and treachery?
“We must retaliate,” El Jerga said, the words exiting his ruined voice box as a harsh rasp.
“Si. We must,” the doctor agreed. “And we will. I know this for a fact.”
“Where are the girl and her lover?” El Jerga asked.
A knowing smile crossed the doctor’s face. “Ahh, I heard there was unfinished business.”
El Jerga flushed, surprisingly embarrassed by his recent failure to kill the redhead and her consort.
“No doubt you are eager to finish the job you have been paid for,” the doctor said. “But she is no longer your responsibility. In fact, I am to inform you that you are forbidden from pursuing that job any further.”
El Jerga protested, but the doctor waved him off. “Not to worry,” the doctor said. “They have use for you yet.”
He reached into his pocket and produced a small envelope, which he handed to El Jerga. “Vaya con Dios, my friend,” he said.
46
Sam took a bite of chateaubriand and asparagus and chewed gingerly, taking care not to disturb the broken molar in the back of her mouth. The food was delicious despite the pain. “This is amazing, Mr. Secretary,” she said. “Thank you again for your hospitality.”
“Of course. Least I could do,” Cullsworth said. “And for the record, I had nothing to do with the meal. The staff took care of all of it.”
Sam, Brock, Dan, Kittredge, and Secretary Cullsworth occupied just a third of the immense dining room table in the Secretary’s Falls Church mansion. It was decorated tastefully but ex
quisitely. Nothing too ornate, but the Cullsworths had obviously spared no expense.
“Maybe I’d formed the wrong opinion about the upside potential of a government job,” Kittredge observed, his face flushed from several glasses of wine.
Cullsworth laughed. “No, I daresay your opinion was likely correct. But I do fit nicely into another stereotype. They say that behind every fantastic fortune lurks a fantastic crime. I am a beneficiary of my great grandfather’s, shall we say, opportunism.”
“Only in America,” Brock observed.
“Not quite true,” Cullsworth corrected. “But especially in America.”
“So if the pundits are right, I think that leaves either lust for power or a true believer’s heart as the motivation for doing what you do,” Sam said.
Secretary Cullsworth smiled. “Guilty of the latter, I’m afraid.”
“True believer?” Dan asked.
“I most certainly was.”
“Past-tense?” Sam asked.
“Alas, I’m a bit ashamed to admit that it took quite a long while for me to lose my naïveté vis-à-vis the political process and the machinery of government,” Cullsworth said between bites of roast beef.
“But you’ve been a Cabinet member twice now, haven’t you?” Brock asked.
“I have. Hence my embarrassment. It took me a frighteningly long time to discover that there is no such thing as a national democracy.”
Sam was taken aback. That was quite an outrageous thing to say – and it was tantamount to apostasy for someone who reported directly to the President of the United States. “Mind if I quote you, Mr. Secretary?” she asked with a bit of a wicked smile.
Cullsworth laughed. “Please don’t, and I must hasten to add that I am a humble servant of the next-best thing, I think, in the form of the style of government we now have.”
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