by Dale Wiley
She looked down and read the latest FBI briefing. It mentioned the amount in Grant’s account. Then something hit her—something she wanted them to follow up on.
Miller was more business savvy than most agents. He made some diversification of his assets, she learned earlier that day. He was not going to retire, but his finances were healthy, set up for long-term growth. She knew this because the agents were required to submit their accounts to full-time monitoring. Miller knew this and had supplied the information to the Bureau.
So why would Miller give that account to the Feds? It would be easy enough to set up a dummy account under a corporate name. Without a serious goof, there would be almost nothing that the FBI could do to find this if they went looking, and it certainly wouldn’t happen the same day as the transfer.
Miller was a smart guy. It seemed totally out of character for him to ask that any bribe or reward money be put in this account. It was like cheating on your wife on your couch while she was at home. You were assuring your own defeat.
Mandy seemed hesitant when she told her what to do with the men. She was understated, but she believed Miller was being set up. The president still had his doubts. Maybe she was being overly harsh. Maybe there was a middle ground.
Just then, as she finished the report, the phone rang. It was Vegas.
Mandy was calling but not from her own line.
“Yes, Mandy.”
Mandy sounded shaken. She hoped she was pulling this charade off for a very powerful audience. “I’ve got some bad news. Amin and Miller overpowered me. They tied me up. The other officers are looking for them, but I think they’re gone.”
So much for that theory, Vanessa thought as she tried to imagine how to tell the president.
Fifty-Eight
Britt made it downstairs and was learning how to walk with his new infirmity. He had packed several damp washcloths around the injury and looked an absolute mess. He was feeling lightheaded, and he instructed his driver to find the nearest Whole Foods and run in to get him some food. He needed energy. He didn’t want to check the dressing too often, but, man, it hurt. There were just certain places that were going to be stunningly painful for a long time. He knew he needed to get it checked for infection as soon as he could. Human bites were among the gnarliest things to fix. He told his driver to find someone who could give him something for all of this. Vegas was filled with backroom quacks. He needed to find one quick.
As his man moved back into Vegas traffic, Britt tried to get his mind off of the last hour—the blood, the dead girls, and the limp dick. He felt ashamed, and he knew he needed to feel something else. He decided to try to get his mind back on the impending deadline.
He liked the direction the stock was trending. By his calculation, it was worth a couple million dollars more for the stock to hit thirty-five, but that wasn’t his main concern. The trading activity itself made him fifty million dollars while he was sitting in his chair. His five-million-dollar investment in the plot and the ten million he spent that week to make sure Grant’s name was ruined forever seemed well worth it. He would take that return any day of the week.
But he was still not out of the country, and that was an issue. He didn’t have a “forever” arsenal of computer tricks. He was one man with a lot of money, but he wasn’t Fort Knox. He wrote a few more programs that would dazzle and injure, but Sabotage was created to get him on his way out of the country within 24 hours. That time was rapidly approaching. He felt a little like a gambler with a dwindling stack of chips. Before, he was going on mojo, but, now, he had to plan how to maneuver with the mayhem he left. It was not a fun place to be.
There were no concubines or indentured servants, and he still had favors to repay. He needed to plan for the longest window of time as possible. He made each one of these thoughts between winces and thinking about opening the dressings just to see how much damage was done. Any movement felt like death. He needed a place to regroup.
When Caitlin left, he had a strong assumption she knew there were plans afoot. He made a mistake in ordering Tony to bring her back instead of simply putting a bullet in her scalp. He knew that now. The phone tracking device that worked so well and let him pinpoint her in less than an hour was still circling Las Vegas. It was clear she had ditched it and put it in a cab. He had to figure that she pieced some of his plan together and knew he was more than just a jealous boyfriend. Would she go to the authorities? He wasn’t sure.
Caitlin was a serious party girl. She didn’t turn tricks, but she could rage with the best rock star. Chances were she was carrying at least coke, if not molly, and maybe even some pressed pills. As he said these things to himself, he again could not believe he had allowed himself to be so compromised. Even a smart, alluring party girl was still a party girl.
He had to assume she would go to the cops, especially if she thought Grant was dead. The media had played up the fact that St. Louis was hit and even added this was the location where the famed FBI playboy was thought to be working. He knew she still was unresolved about Grant; she couldn’t look him in the eye when she talked about him.
He developed a rhythm to aid with the pain. Deep, protracted breaths worked best, and the road seemed smoother than it had. He knew it probably wasn’t getting better, but he was learning to deal with it. He could live with that until he could just hit the skyways.
If Caitlin went to the police, he thought, they could start piecing things together earlier than needed. He wasn’t worried about Tony, who foolishly headed in the wrong direction in the desert, still an hour or two from LA. He had already sorted that out. But Caitlin could bring the heat too close.
Red was on her way. She would be worth ten Tonys, but he still had one other card to play.
They stopped and pulled into a low-rent strip mall. Britt looked up, and his driver signaled that someone was going to meet them with a medical bag and some friends. That made Britt the happiest he had been in some time.
While he waited, Britt gingerly grabbed a laptop out of his bag. It was one he hadn’t used for a month, because it had one specific purpose. Six months ago, he had paid a college student a small fortune to reroute a completely different mobile internet signal, one far less secure and easier to manipulate than the one he had carefully devised for Sabotage. It was routed so that it mirrored in every way a connection from Little Rock, Arkansas. He had tested it several times on Facebook, with local maps and other applications, and every time it had shown him as being in a neighborhood in the south half of Little Rock. He had installed it for exactly this purpose. The kid thought it was about some sort of illicit porn connection, but, really, it was so much cooler than that.
Britt logged on to his e-mail account as FriendlyHenry. FriendlyHenry had a Facebook account, a Twitter handle, and had ordered several pizzas, all from different hotel rooms in Jonesboro and Fort Smith, Arkansas. He had ordered gifts from Amazon and Target and had written letters to Mike Huckabee. In other words, when they started asking questions about this tipster, he would appear genuine. They would eventually find this was the computer that had set up the shipping business American Securities.
He opened the e-mail form and addressed it to Gayle Nipstad, an FBI agent high enough up the chain to be able to quickly make waves. He knew she would be working, because he had hacked into their scheduling computer that very morning. He also addressed it to twelve other agents and the general FBI e-mail address so that it would seem more believable. He typed in all cap—FriendlyHenry always typed in all caps.
I’M IN ARKANSAS. I’VE BEEN PAID WELL. I CAN’T STAND THE THOUGHT OF WHY I WAS PAID SO WELL. CHECK OUT AMERICAN SECURITIES AND THE OMEGA JET TO FIGURE OUT THAT I KNOW MY SHIT. I HELPED HIM SET IT UP. PRETTY SURE THE GUY’S NAME IS BRETT OR BRITT. I CALLED HIM BRAT, ALTHOUGH HE ALWAYS HAD ME CALL HIM YANKEE. HE HAS AN APARTMENT ON THE 29TH FLOOR OF TRUMP TOWERS, LAS VEGAS. HE HAS A VIEW OF THE MOUNTAINS. I CAN’T REMEMBER ANYTHING ELSE ABOUT THE PLACE.
He proofread, added a spelli
ng mistake or two, and pressed send. The apartment was actually on the 34th floor, but they would figure that out. This would divert them for hours if not longer. If it really worked right, it would kill them.
Just then, the door opened and a short man in a polo that showed way too much of his gut brought in his medical bag and nodded at Britt. He didn’t know what tone to strike, so his “Let me see,” came out forced and almost comical.
Britt rolled his eyes, dropped his drawers, and prayed for anyone to stop the pain he felt.
Fifty-Nine
Tony was almost back to LA. He got to enjoy the desert cooling off, the disintegrating sky giving way to night. He had nothing but his thoughts, and, at a time like this, he wished he didn’t. He tried to listen to music, but nothing felt right. He didn’t like or trust Britt. Britt was a pretty boy with a mean streak. Tony really didn’t think Britt couldn’t handle fighting in the trenches. He sized him up as having some sort of academy training, but Tony had actually been in the streets, first in New York City and then in Vegas. He was there when the collars were made. He had heard the cartilage break, not looked away soon enough as someone was putting a round into some unfortunate soul. He could outsmart the boy. He needed to grab a few things, and then he could be on his way. Tomorrow morning, he would start a new life. He would circle back to Vegas in a different vehicle, see if Red wanted to come with him, and be gone. He had a little money saved. That sounded good.
He stopped off at a convenience store, grabbed a cup of coffee, and got back in the SUV. He looked down and saw his cell phone was ringing.
“Hey boss,” he intoned, trying to sound reasonably cheery. “Whaddya need?” He had checked once to see if Britt tracked his cell phone; he hadn’t. He realized he hadn’t checked this in some time and hoped to hell nothing had changed.
“Where are you?” This sounded cold as almost anything that left Yankee’s mouth.
“I’m almost to Tahoe.”
“Making good time, huh?” Yankee almost seemed to brighten.
This surprised Tony. He didn’t know if he was being tracked or not. He guessed he wasn’t.
“Yeah, I’ll be there in ninety minutes or less.” He would actually be back to L.A. in less than an hour as long as there wasn’t traffic.
“Call me when you get there. I’ve still got lots for you to do.” The coldness returned.
“No problem. I’ll call and get my orders.” Tony wished he hadn’t said it. It sounded stiff and stupid and something he wouldn’t say.
Again, the cold. “Do that. I’ll wait to hear from you.”
Tony ended the call. He was going to be glad to be loose of that motherfucker.
Sixty
Naseem and Grant sprinted off the airplane and down the tarmac. Grant saw Gate 17 to the left and made a hard right, which put them closer to the exit. He saw a motorized help cart and used his FBI badge to commandeer it. They sped off and were out of sight before anyone came out of the other gate. He knew it wouldn’t be a long head start, but it was probably enough.
Naseem sized up the situation. He had silently seethed since Grant took the shot at him back in St. Louis. He knew he deserved it, but that didn’t make it any easier. Now, he might just have one shot to do this right, and he wasn’t sure Grant would be willing to do what needed to be done.
Grant saw a bureau-issued SUV ahead and found a wedge seam where he could get them between another vehicle and the SUV. He was two steps ahead of Naseem and had completely let his guard down, probably after some serious concern about flying with him in general. Grant stepped to the driver’s door, and Naseem saw his chance.
He rushed him like a hockey player putting a man into the boards and hit him just under the shoulders. He hit him forcefully.
Grant fell forward, unable to brace himself. His nose broke on impact with the thick glass.
Naseem reached in his breast pocket and grabbed his badge. He obviously looked nothing like the lilywhite image of Grant, but there was no denying the value of a real FBI shield, especially on a hysterical day like today.
Naseem was sure he knew how to find Yankee. And he wanted to be the first one to do so.
Sixty-One
Red told the cab to wait for her and paid the fare up until that point. She threw in enough of a tip to know he wasn’t going anywhere.
The apartments were nice—for young people working as dealers, pit bosses, and servers at the town’s casinos. The kids there drove nicer Hondas and Acuras and made enough to start saving for a house. There was a big pool in the middle that was well-lit by lights below the water, making everything look dreamy.
Red could smell marijuana as she walked toward the other side of the complex. She passed two girls, probably twenty or so, who were sitting on their boyfriends’ shoulders, trying to knock each other off into the pool, giggling as if they were the funniest things in the world.
She found the building and checked out the door. No one was around, and there were no cameras that she could see. She walked up to the second floor and got her lock pick out. She struggled with the lock, which was surprisingly good for this kind of building, but it still didn’t take her long; it just seemed like it.
Red turned on one light as she entered the apartment and would turn it off as she turned on the next one. She did not expect Caitlin to be here, but she didn’t know who else had a key, and she wanted to be able to hide in time if someone walked in.
Caitlin was a slob, which was not surprising. Red had met her a couple of times. She was alluring and a fun time waiting to be had by all. That was Red’s summation. She could see why Britt would like her. But Caitlin had never gotten over the situation with her ex. That was obvious the minute she took a drink. He came up again and again. Red thought that Britt, with whatever human emotions he could actually conjure, did like this girl, and she could tell he hated the emphasis on the ex, the FBI guy.
She had heard reports earlier. The FBI was hit in the attacks. She doubted that was coincidence.
She couldn’t take forever, and it seemed like there were not many leads—no pictures with friends and a few with family, but they looked out of date. There was a laptop she would take but nothing that jumped out at her in the bedroom or the living room.
She saw one thing in the kitchen that caught her eye, only because there were so few pieces of personal information. It was a name—Tonya Jamison—and a cell number. It also had the word “Harrah’s” on it. Red decided to start there.
She grabbed the laptop and the latest stack of bills. She might have written on them. Tonya was her best lead. The meter on the cab was still running, and Red thought this was the best she was going to get. It wasn’t much, but she had scored on much less.
Sixty-Two
The tip had come in via e-mail. It wasn’t much in the way of tips, something about an apartment “being involved,” but it had some level of detail, and the investigators weren’t exactly bubbling over with leads.
Lee Gates thought about not getting a warrant and just walking over and seeing what was going on. But he thought better of it. He took the ten extra minutes, faxed the paperwork, and received a warrant for his troubles. This wasn’t enough on any other day of the year to get a warrant, he was sure. But today, when everything seemed so monumental, it was apparently more than enough.
Lee grabbed his partner, who was working on the explosion out in one of the city’s industrial areas. Originally, the thought from Jessica Prater and other investigators was that the blast was unrelated to the day’s events, but now she wasn’t so sure. There was some report that at least one body was found, badly disfigured, more than would have been expected in this kind of fire. She was seeing if there was any way to tie that property to the apartment they were going to visit. She could find no connections.
They made their way onto the strip and noticed how few people were outside. It never looked like that on the strip. It seemed like the cumulative effect of the afternoon’s madness had pushed everyone indo
ors. That seemed strange considering agents had thought the interior of a casino to be its most vulnerable spot. For years, they had fretted about large-scale interior attacks, but it was no matter now. The foot traffic was negligible, and there were fewer cars, but they didn’t seem like things she could complain about right now.
“I think the American location was blown up to cover something, not as a civilian kill zone like the others. I think this was his base.”
Lee nodded. This was as plausible as anything else he had heard today: a false flag attack, domestic terrorists, Islamic terrorists—the default after a dozen years of worrying about these attacks. Las Vegas had freedom and access to anything bad you ever wanted. It would be the perfect place to organize a terrorist attack.
Lee pulled up to the Trump, gave the keys to the valet, and badged him. The valet said he would keep their ride up front. Jessica showed her ID and the warrant to the man at the front desk, who quickly got help.
“We believe that we are looking for the apartment of this man. We believe his name is Britt.” She showed him the picture they were circulating of Britt Vasher, who they would know as Britt Vance.
The manager asked for assistance from the doorman, who quickly recognized him.
“I saw him this morning. He’s on 34.”
They confirmed this information and the manager got a key and accompanied them up the elevator. They walked down the long hall, turning left and then right, and then saw the number: 3472.
Lee knocked on the door. “Police.”
No answer.
He knocked harder. This time Jessica announced them.
Still nothing.
