End Zone
Page 33
Other times she would sit for hours just watching the fire burn in the grate, imagining what life was like for those early pioneering families who’d made the trip out west. She imagined the hardships of building a home, of raising a family, the quiet desperation of the women as they’d waved their menfolk off to hunt and trade, the crushing loneliness that lasted for days, weeks, months on end, the dangerous challenges of weather and illness and a multitude of other threats that Coffman could barely comprehend. They’d fought to survive, to carve out a life. And often they died. How easily society had forgotten where they’d come from.
The crunch of snow brought her back to the present. Two men in white arctic gear and carrying automatic rifles stamped past her cabin.
‘Good morning,’ she waved from the porch.
They glanced in her direction before continuing their patrol. They were not allowed to speak to her, she knew that, but it was always worth a try. She hadn’t had a proper conversation since her interrogation. During that time she hadn’t stopped talking, eager to carve out some sort of deal, but once it had been struck, no one spoke to her anymore, not unless they were giving her orders. Her captors lived in the modern, heated modular buildings that surrounded her dilapidated cabin. She’d thought about setting fire to her accommodations in the hope that they might trade her up, but the ruse would be discovered, of that, she had no doubt. The cabin was damp and draughty, but it was better than any prison.
That’s where Erik was. A deep, dark hole, Foley had told her, from which he would never return. The news had broken her heart. She’d demanded fairer treatment for the man, only to be told to keep her mouth shut or find herself in a deeper, darker hole than her erstwhile Chief of Staff. She’d considered calling their bluff, but as she’d shivered beneath her blankets in the darkness before the dawn, her instinct for self-preservation prevailed. She would say nothing more and live instead with her memories. And when she thought of Erik in his own private hell, she would banish those thoughts immediately.
‘Coffman.’
Her head snapped around and she saw Foley approaching. He wore ski trousers and a dark parka with a US flag patch on his shoulder. His hair was a little longer and the beard suited him, she decided. She might’ve lost a lot of things but not her eye for a good looking man. The only man who would speak to her too. Her smile was wide and genuine.
‘Hi, Foley.’
‘Let’s walk.’
She had to stretch her legs to catch him up, and they walked side-by-side as they headed towards the tree line, their breath fogging on the crisp air. Foley’s arrival meant something was afoot. A new trip she imagined. Foley always travelled with her, always made sure she played her part. He was also a reminder of what awaited her in North Dakota; an abandoned nuclear missile silo, two hundred feet deep and as cold, dark and damp as any grave. Foley was life and death rolled into one. Coffman was still terrified of him.
She never initiated conversation or made small talk. That was still verboten in Foley’s rulebook, so she trudged across the field in silence, focussing instead on lifting one knee after the other. They were approaching the tree line when he eventually spoke.
‘You’re going on another trip.’
Her heart leapt. ’Where?’
‘DC. Arlington, in fact. One of the Joint Chiefs died. The funeral’s on Wednesday. You’re going to show your face.’
‘What day is it today?’
‘Monday. We’re leaving after lunch. There’s some weather coming in. We need to get ahead of it.’
Coffman could’ve wrapped her arms around him. Instead, she said nothing and kept walking.
’You’ll be going to Texas in a few weeks,’ he continued. ‘They’re holding an open-air memorial service outside Lubbock. The president will be in attendance, as will the world’s media. You’ll be there too, for a few days.’
‘Okay.’ She tried to keep her voice neutral. What she really wanted to do was scream with joy.
The world darkened as they entered the forest, the snowy path meandering through ancient pines. As they moved deeper inside, the frozen air became heavy and oppressive, the silence like a thick blanket. Foley’s voice broke it.
‘You’ll be expected to say something at the service, just a few words. There’ll be a Chinese delegation there too, and they’ll be watching carefully. They may even want to meet you. That’s something we’ll try to avoid but neither will we run the risk of offending them. This is a big deal, Coffman, so you’d better start preparing yourself.’
‘I won’t let you down,’ she assured him. Foley said nothing, and she decided to push her luck. ‘I know I can’t have a TV or a newspaper or anything, but I was wondering how things were? Politically, I mean.’
‘Not going the way you planned,’ Foley told her.
‘And the Chinese?’
‘You mean, are they still pissed about killing millions of their own people to stop a virus that you unleashed? Yeah, pretty much.’
‘That wasn’t really — ’
‘Things aren’t so rosy for the people of Lubbock either. That’s a couple of hundred thousand American lives you’ve destroyed right there. They’re eating each other now, the infected that are left. Cannibalism, tribal warfare, hunting in packs - it’s horrific, and you’re responsible for all of it. And don’t get me started on the Baghdad embassy. I knew a lot of people in Iraq, many of them friends. You’re lucky you’re still breathing, Coffman, remember that.’
The words tumbled out before she could stop them. ‘How could I forget? You remind me every time I — ’
Foley grabbed the hood of her jacket and yanked her backwards. He spun her around and slammed her against a tree, knocking the breath from her lungs. Heavy clumps of snow tumbled from the branches above. Foley shook her violently.
‘Don’t you ever talk back to me again. Ever. Do you understand?’
‘I’m sorry,’ Coffman panted. ‘It’s frustration, that’s all. I never get to speak to anyone.’
‘Boo-fucking-hoo,’ Foley sneered. He jabbed a finger in her face. ‘Remember this; the only reason you’re alive is to keep this country together and the Chinese off the scent. They’ll never stop looking for the people responsible for Shanghai, and if they somehow discover that the President of the United States was involved, two things would happen; first, they would nuke us, and secondly, the resulting conflict would tear this planet apart, so they keep you alive and visible, and for that you’d better be goddamn grateful. Your opinions are worth shit to me so keep them to yourself, understood?’
‘Understood,’ Coffman echoed breathlessly.
Foley took a step back. His eyes narrowed as he studied her face. ‘Don’t get complacent, Coffman. Situations can change, remember that.’
Coffman dropped her eyes. Foley was right, the fake illness and fragile public appearances could only last so long. Either way, her usefulness was finite. Sooner rather than later her cancer would end her. Then a thought struck her — they’d do it after Lubbock.
The timing would work, she reasoned. She would attend the ceremony, exchange a few slurred pleasantries with the Chinese delegation, and Beijing would be placated. The event would mark a turning point, and the world would finally move on. In its wake, Amy Coffman’s health would deteriorate. She would disappear from public life, and then, sometime later, the news would be broadcast around the world…
Former President Amelia Coffman passed away this morning…
She was running out of time. She wasn’t ready to die.
‘May I ask a question?’
‘What is it?’
‘Bob Blake cut a deal, right? The man who was really behind this whole thing. He managed to walk. Why?’
Foley shook his head. ‘Blake’s dead. You’re right, he cut a deal, at least that’s what we let him believe. He gave us everything in return for a period of house arrest and assessment. He had some great footage of you, by the way. At Rock Creek? That meeting with Aswad?’
> Coffman smiled. ‘I knew he had something. Men like Bob Blake cover all the angles. What happened to him?’
‘He was forced to step down from Kroll, and we kept him under surveillance twenty-four-seven. We had to be sure there was no one else out there, no one else who knew. Your girl Baranski corroborated a lot of it too.’
‘I told you everything,’ Coffman insisted.
‘Your word doesn’t count for shit anymore. Blake was similarly self-absorbed, which is why he didn’t see it coming. Once we’d squeezed him dry we gave him a heart attack. He was dead before he hit the floor of his own bathroom.’
Coffman smiled without humour. ’Poor Bob. What about Karen?’
‘She’s still assisting us. She thinks she’s going to cut a deal too. She’s dead wrong about that.’
Coffman brushed the snow from the front of her jacket. ‘Is that how it’ll go for me, Foley? A heart attack? I grant you, it’s quick and clean, and you won’t have to go to the trouble of — ’
The blow knocked her on her backside. Her head swam and a cloud of tiny feathers drifted on the air. Foley was dancing around her like a boxer, a blurry figure that yelled at her unintelligibly. The air sang and Foley danced away.
She held onto the tree and stood up, swaying like a new-born foal on watery legs. Then something hit her in the back and she fell against the trunk. She wrapped her arms around it, but her legs failed her as wooden splinters exploded just above her head. She dropped to her knees. Her head swam and she held on as tightly as she could, trying to catch her breath. An insect buzzed in her ear and tree bark exploded in her face. She blinked and looked up. The treetops swayed and hissed in the wind. In the sky above them, a bird circled, screeching. Foley was screeching too. Coffman decided that listening was too much effort.
She leaned her forehead against the rough bark. It was getting hard to breathe and she could taste blood in her mouth. Something had happened to her, something serious. They would have to take her to the hospital. That was an opportunity, wasn’t it? An angle, another card to be played? Yes, she decided.
She would endure like she had her whole life. Because Amy Coffman was a survivor.
She never felt the bullet that blew her head apart.
He slung the G28 rifle over his shoulder and headed up through the trees towards the ridgeline, lumbering through the snow, ducking beneath branches, weaving left and right. The drifts were much thicker up here, and he had to work hard to put distance between him and his kill.
It had been a tough shot too, a downhill trajectory of over two hundred yards through densely packed trees and gusting winds, but not impossible. He’d taken harder shots in his time and still made the kill. The easy shot would’ve been down at the cabin, but that would’ve meant taking on the cameras and the passive sensors, so he’d stayed high up on the ridge. Besides, the trajectory was much flatter lower down and that increased the possibility of hitting one of the security team, and he wasn’t going to risk that. Enough good men had died already, most of them at Coffman’s hand. He wasn’t going to add to that body count. So he’d watched and waited. She came walking towards him on day three.
He didn’t know who the guy was, CIA or military he assumed, so one of the good guys. He tracked them from above, saw the path they were taking and got into position ahead of them. As he’d watched them through his scope, Coffman had said something and the guy had reacted, slamming her against a tree. His G28 wedged in the crook of a tree branch, he’d taken a snapshot and registered the hit. True, he’d missed a couple of times but only just. The orange beanie had been a mistake, for her at least, and the kill shot had been a clean one.
There was no return fire, and by the time help arrived, he’d be long gone.
He had a tough hike ahead of him, about eighteen miles of forest, hills and valleys to where his kayak was hidden close to the Lamar River. There was also a storm coming, and the sky to the north was already darkening, but it would also hamper any search and cover most of his tracks. Once in the kayak, he would paddle south, stopping a few miles short of Route 212 where his Toyota Land Cruiser was parked off-road and well camouflaged. Then he would drive east before turning south.
The mission was over.
And for the first time in his life, Kenny Chase had no idea what lay ahead.
He wasn’t sure if there’d be roadblocks somewhere ahead, and he pondered what he would do if it came to that. Put his hands up, probably. Get his day in court. Tell the world what had happened in Baghdad.
If he lasted that long.
Or keep his mouth shut, stay off the grid and keep moving because the world was still an uncertain place. But he had friends now, he knew that much. Ray Wilson for one, and the guy who’d called him, who’d sent him the grid reference of Coffman’s location. Maybe one day he’d get to buy that guy a beer. He hoped so because he didn’t want to hide in the shadows forever. Sooner or later he’d have to step out into the light, face his own destiny. But not yet. For now, he’d just keep moving.
As the wind gusted and the first flakes of snow began to fall, Chase crested the ridge and headed down into the valley beyond, almost invisible in his arctic-white tactical suit. He moved fast, his energy boundless, the burden that he’d carried for so long suddenly lifted. He felt free. And to stay free he had to keep moving.
Twenty-four hours and five hundred miles later he’d be able to rest. He would find a decent motel and then he’d sleep, knowing that the nightmares that had plagued him for so long were finally banished.
Instead, Kenny Chase would dream.
And in that dream, he would stand with his Delta brothers and smile once more.
End
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