Double Crossfire

by Anthony J. Tata

  “Cassie Bagwell, first female Army Ranger,” Zara said.

  Williams nodded. “I knew your father.”

  “He’s dead,” Cassie said.

  After a pause, Williams smiled thinly and looked at Zara. “I see why you like her.”

  Cassie asked, “What are we doing here?”

  “You’ve demonstrated some ample skills, young lady,” Williams said. “Zara told me that you were good. My men here have already attested to that. You took them both down. I watched the video at the house. Impressive.” He pointed at a small tablet that had Ring software programmed so that he could monitor his home with cameras.

  “They were easy,” Cassie said. “As would be the entire crew here.” She gave a half shrug.

  “Perhaps,” Williams replied. “But Zara’s the tough one.”

  Cassie wheeled and lashed out with a thin-bladed hand, going for Zara’s throat behind her, but the Spaniard was too quick. Zara blocked the slicing movement and counterpunched, catching Cassie in the solar plexus. Not to be deterred, Cassie whipped a sharp elbow into Zara’s jaw about the time two men stepped in and pushed them apart in the small confines of the sailboat.

  Heavy breaths escaped Cassie’s lungs as she recovered from having the wind knocked out of her.

  “There’s a plot to kill the president and vice president,” Williams said.

  The statement floated in the air like a football punt with maximum hang time.

  “Tomorrow,” Williams continued. “CIA Director Carmen Biagatti has called for an emergency meeting with both of them. As some of you may know, she’s a member of the Resistance. They’re going to meet in the SCIF in a Loudoun County safe house near one of the president’s golf courses. She’s going to lock the SCIF and commit suicide.”

  “How will she kill the president and veep, then?” Cassie asked.

  “They’ll die with her. Lethal hydrogen cyanide gas will pour through the circulation system killing anyone in the small room.”

  “Zyklon B?” Cassie asked. “Like the Nazis used?”

  “Like that,” Williams said.

  “Where are you getting your intel from?” Cassie said.

  “My intel is good. You don’t need to worry about that. We need you and Zara to stop the attack. It’s really a simple matter of changing out the tanks that feed the SCIF.”

  “Won’t it be guarded?” Zara asked this time.

  “It will, but your skills are good. Biagatti’s inner circle is in on it. Not to the extent that they’re going to be willing to be in the room, but if you recall, she brought in her team. She’s kept her secret hidden well, but it’s about to break. In three days, Breitbart and Project Veritas are going to run exposés on her allegiance to the soft revolution taking place in our country. People can no longer wait, apparently, for elections. The circumstances have become too dire—for them anyway.”

  The Speaker of the House was of the same political party as the president, yet Cassie knew he was no fan of the commander in chief. The Speaker, a traditional swamp rat DC politician used to brokering deals with the opposition, had little time for the histrionics or the populist wave of the president. Reports were that he was getting rich by cutting backroom deals and would prefer a new president as opposed to one who through his every action was shining a spotlight on the corruption in Washington, DC, whether he intended to or not.

  Still, assassinating the president and vice president was a coup, plain and simple. But she had heard Zara’s words.

  Artemis teams are ready.

  “We have to stop this,” Cassie said.

  “I agree,” echoed Zara.

  “That’s why I asked Zara to come tonight,” the Speaker said. “The cover was that we were going to discuss Carter’s platform, whatever the fuck that might be, but the reality is that we need to protect the nation from Carmen Biagatti. As much as I dislike the current commander in chief, treason is treason. A coup is a coup. We can’t allow it to happen. So now that we’ve decided this, here’s the deal. You’ll need to infiltrate this compound, kill these guards, and then change out the tanks.”

  “Why not just warn them off?” Cassie asked.

  “Perfectly logical question, young lady. You’re an intelligence officer, correct?”

  “I am,” she replied.

  “Okay, then. Would you prefer to give up gobs of information you’re collecting from a target by killing him or her, or would you prefer to keep that target alive and know precisely what’s happening twenty-four/seven?”

  “The second one,” Cassie replied. “But the president can just fire her if we let him know.”

  “And he would believe us, why?”

  She didn’t have a good response to that question. She didn’t know anyone in the administration, despite her father having served as chairman of the Joint Chiefs prior to his death.

  “I’m an intelligence officer in the United States Army,” Cassie said.

  “No. You’re a damaged, traumatized woman who is a national security risk. You just escaped from a trauma clinic, for Christ’s sake. Secret Service won’t let you anywhere near the president.”

  “Biagatti knew my father,” Cassie said. “I can get close to her. Warn her that we are on to her.”

  Williams seemed to mull this over, rubbing his meaty fingers over his chin.

  “I know for a fact that Secret Service has been warned about you. Returning combat vet. PTSD. Danger to the nation. All that shit. You’d think it would be different, but the previous Homeland Security secretary still has some acolytes in the department. All part of this Resistance thing,” Williams said, shaking his head sadly.

  Cassie cast her eyes downward, thinking. The rage building, but somehow subdued. Her behavior had been erratic. No Secret Service officer in his or her right mind would let her near the president.

  “A letter?” she asked.

  “Anthrax,” Williams countered.

  “Okay, so we just what? Kill Secret Service and replace the tanks? That seems worse than me trying to talk to the president.”

  “I’m told the tanks are in there. If we replace them tonight, they’ve just got a few rent-a-cops out there. You could probably get away without having to kill anyone,” Williams said.

  The boat creaked and rocked. The claustrophobic galley was beginning to make her head spin. She just wanted out, and fast. She looked at Zara, who was eyeing Williams questioningly. Glad she wasn’t the only one who thought this mission was bonkers.

  “SCIFs are eight inches of concrete all around, minimum. The air ducts are sealed and monitored with alarms,” Cassie said.

  “Again, tonight you two do a recon and execute if you have enough time. If not, the Secret Service will be closing in, about nine a.m. It’s almost midnight. An hour to get there. An hour to recon. An hour to execute. An hour to escape. That leaves five hours for the fog of combat, so to speak,” Williams said.

  “Where are the tanks?” Cassie asked. Her mind was racing. Execute mode. Normally, she would have been more circumspect, but her energy was high. She wanted to act, do something. Her sworn duty was to protect the nation against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Here was an enemy of the nation, a member of the Resistance, with a potentially easy way to catalyze the coup that so many desired.

  “Right here,” Williams said. He pointed at one of the beefy security guards who was holding two small green tanks, about half the size of a scuba tank, that read OXYGEN on the side. Fresh paint seemed to shine from the canisters, both the body and the letters.

  Still unsure, Cassie said, “Let’s do this.”

  “Do we have transportation?” Zara asked.

  “Black Suburban. You’re on Daingerfield Island, just south of Reagan National. GPS shows about an hour to the compound.”

  And with that, they loaded the Suburban with the oxygen tanks, pistols, long rifles, and a few knives. Zara drove while Cassie navigated. They wound their way through Alexandria and Arlington, finally hitting Interstate 6
6, where they made some decent time in the middle of the night. The conversation was muted. Cassie noticed that Zara seemed amped as well, focused on the mission. Save the president and vice president.

  “I’ve got it figured out,” Zara said. “I’m quicker than you. You’re quick, but I’m quicker. So I’ll watch and deter any threats. You handle the tanks. Get them switched out. We take the old ones and deliver them as proof to the FBI.”

  “Why don’t we just call the FBI right now?” Cassie asked. Hamlet’s phrase “The lady doth protest too much” briefly appeared in her mind. Still, she had to balance her natural inquisitiveness with a willingness to go along. Being her authentic self was the key to success. Zara had to know that Cassie didn’t trust her, in which case the questions seemed perfectly logical. It seemed smart to feed into the patient-doctor relationship that Zara feigned.

  “Focus. We went through all of that. Nobody will believe any of this shit. Plus, could be a member of the Resistance that answers the phone. Ever think of that? People want the president dead.”

  “How solid is Williams’s intel?” Cassie asked.

  “One hundred percent,” Zara said. “Hasn’t failed me yet.”

  “Okay, then let’s do this right,” Cassie said. “No mistakes.”

  Emma’s refrain from the hospital bed next to her rolled now through her mind.

  The last ride is never the last ride, and the end is never the end.

  CHAPTER 9

  UPON MAHEGAN’S RETURN TO CIA HEADQUARTERS, DIRECTOR BIAGATTI was nowhere to be found. She had said there was a coup on hand. Where was she now?

  While waiting, Mahegan plugged in the medical cooler, ate in the cafeteria, sorted through the treasure trove of intel he had collected from the Uwharrie, and then laid on the floor of his temporary office.

  As soon as he was comfortable, Biagatti called, asking him to come to her office. He stood, ran a hand through his hair, hit the restroom on the way, knocked on the door, and entered her office.

  It was expansive and filled with the usual I-love-me wall of pictures, showing Biagatti with recognizable political figures. Biagatti was sitting at a conference table at the far end of her office.

  “Jake, sit.”

  Mahegan sat across from Biagatti and stared at her. Her face was furrowed with concern.

  “You said we had a coup. I’ve been back an hour and you’re nowhere to be found,” Mahegan said.

  Biagatti waved off his comment and said, “The president and vice president are coming to the compound to receive a briefing. Yes, we’ve got intel. The Resistance is everywhere and it appears they’ve gone operational.”

  “I’ve got intel, too. I need to see Cassie,” Mahegan said.

  “Jake, your place of duty is here, with me,” Biagatti said. Her words were razor sharp, leaving no room for interpretation. “You understand duty, right?”

  “To a fault,” he muttered.

  He had always avoided protection details because they were too restricting. He didn’t like being tethered to another person, at least professionally. Cassie was a different story. Avoiding being tethered to a woman his entire life, he had finally found the balance he was seeking. Cassie grounded him in a way no one else could. Having lost his parents and best friend in the most unimaginable ways, Mahegan needed Cassie. Perhaps she needed him in the same way, having lost her parents to slaughter as well. He was unaccustomed to the notion of needing anything or anyone other than himself. Now, a life shared with Cassie seemed better than a life without her, unshared, alone, and barren.

  “Bob Savage said you were reliable and wouldn’t go off the reservation,” she said.

  Mahegan didn’t take the bait on whether she intended the reservation word choice in relation to his Native American heritage.

  In theory, Savage had moved him to the Biagatti bodyguard detail in part so that he could be near Cassie as she was recuperating from her wounds. He had religiously visited Cassie every day in Walter Reed, spending several nights with her. While he was on an overnight protection detail with Biagatti, Cassie had been transferred to the Valley Trauma Center. Despite his attempts to see Cassie at the remote facility, he had been denied by Dr. Franklin Broome, the enigmatic leader of the VTC. Cassie had been experiencing severe nightmares, waking up in a full sweat, shivering. Once, she had leapt from the bed, intravenous needle stuck in the back of her hand, as she bent into a shooter’s stance, spinning 360 degrees, her hand kicking backward as if the imaginary pistol were firing.

  “Jake?”

  Biagatti’s voice pulled him from the searing memory and anguish.

  “I’m here,” he said.

  “But you’re not, are you?” she emphasized.

  “I am, Director. What do you need me to do?”

  “We need to head to the Harmony Church safe house ASAP,” she said.

  “Where’s your intel coming from?”

  “Syd Wise at FBI,” Biagatti said.

  As if on cue, the secure video-messaging system began its melodic ring. Biagatti pressed the green button and a man’s face appeared on the screen.

  “Syd, do we have an update?” Biagatti said.

  Mahegan found it interesting that the director of the CIA was communicating directly with a subordinate figure in the FBI. Why was she not speaking with the director of the FBI? Maybe he was off camera in the room, but the office behind Syd Wise looked small and unable to house more than one person.

  “Just wanted to follow up on our earlier conversation. I see you’ve got Mahegan there with you. We’ve got chatter of an imminent coup effort. I’ve briefed the Secret Service and they are placing extra personnel at the meet location. Some will be obvious, others might not be.”

  “I’ll need to know who is friendly,” Mahegan said.

  “You’ll know,” Wise replied.

  “Syd, what exactly is the threat?”

  “There’s talk of assassinating the president,” Wise said.

  “There’s always talk of doing that, ever since he became a candidate,” Biagatti said.

  “With the media fanning the flames of these new political figures who are so openly hostile to the administration, they’ve started a fire that they can’t put out.”

  “I need something more specific,” Mahegan said.

  “Sorry, soldier. I’m giving you what I’ve got now. I’ll have more in a bit.”

  “No, you’re not. You’re giving us wave-top-level esoteric bullshit. My questions are: Who said what? What specifically is being planned? How is this threat different than the millions of previous ones?” Mahegan pressed Wise.

  “Sources and methods, bro,” Wise said. “I’m telling you to be on your A game tonight.” He turned to his computer and typed a few commands. “I just sent you what I have at the moment.”

  Biagatti’s MacBook was open on the conference table and chimed with an arriving e-mail. She opened it and clicked on the PowerPoint slide. It showed more wave-top-level bullshit. Fat arrows and circles and threat warnings.

  “What does this mean?” Biagatti asked.

  “It’s a threat assessment. You see we’ve moved it to red for imminent. Take all precautions.”

  “What am I briefing the president on? The intel I’ve got is thin,” Biagatti said.

  “You’ll get that packet shortly. It will have all the details that Mr. Mahegan is looking for,” Wise said.

  “Can’t you give us what you’ve got now?” Mahegan asked.

  “The analysts are still creating the products of record,” Wise said. “Patience, grasshopper.” Wise smirked.

  Mahegan cocked his head. Something was off about Wise. Over the video-conferencing display, body language was sometimes harder to interpret. Wise looked into the camera, which was easier than looking into someone’s eyes. Even then, he averted his gaze from the camera at times, but there could be other distractions in his office. Something wasn’t ringing true for Mahegan, and it was more than the Delta Force versus Navy SEAL rivalry. Wise
had spent a couple of years as a SEAL, whereas Mahegan had nearly a decade behind the fence at Fort Bragg.

  “Okay, we will wait on the detailed information, Syd. Make it quick. We’ve got to get out to the compound.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Wise said. He was smiling a closed-lip grin when he signed off. Biagatti pressed the red button and disconnected the call.

  “What was that all about?” Mahegan asked.

  “It was an intel dump,” she scoffed.

  “Lightest dump I’ve ever seen. More of a show,” Mahegan said.

  “What are you saying?”

  “That was a pointless call. Are we any smarter now than ten minutes ago?”

  Biagatti paused. “Well, the details are coming.”

  Mahegan didn’t argue. He wondered if he should update the director on what he had learned from his short trip to North Carolina.

  He had spent the last hour scouring cell phones, digging through wallets, and running serial numbers on pistols. He had discovered the three men he “encountered” were local hires from a security firm in Fayetteville. The only interesting connection was that there were some calls to a landline in New Bern, a town in the eastern part of North Carolina that sat astride the Neuse River. That landline showed it belonged to an eighty-two-year-old woman that lived on a family plantation along the Neuse River. That lead seemed to be promising, but he’d decided to follow up later. Believing his information to be incomplete, he chose not to share it with Biagatti. He’d prefer to be able to paint the whole picture, especially in light of the bogus conversation they just had with Wise.

  “We should go,” Biagatti said.

  “Roger.” Mahegan returned to his closet of an office, swept everything he had retrieved from North Carolina into a small duffel bag, unplugged the medical cooler, and holstered his weapon. He returned to Biagatti’s office and she had changed clothes.

  “I’m ready,” he said. “We going to a funeral?”

  Biagatti was dressed in black jeans and a black sweater over a black T-shirt. She wore hiking boots and had a black Windbreaker.

  “I think it’s best we be tactical tonight,” she said.