acela train to new york, april 2018
After spending thirty minutes observing the station to make sure he didn’t have any unexpected surprises waiting for him and that he could board the train without security checking his bag, Nolan sat in the rearmost train car and in the rearmost forward-facing seat. It was something he had done for years and now was second nature. Like a mafioso, when he went out to eat, he always chose the table at the rear of the restaurant, in a corner, near the kitchen. He wanted to know the comings and goings of the other patrons and have a quick exit from the building; no point making it easy for anyone who might want to mess up his day. Being on a train was a little different, but not by much. The easy exit wasn’t really an option but at least no one could approach him from the rear. And he would spot a frontal assault coming from half a car-length away.
He had bought the obligatory Starbucks coffee, a venti macchiato loaded with sugar for energy, as well as a bacon, gouda, and egg breakfast sandwich. He wolfed down the sandwich and drank a third of the coffee before starting the day’s urgent tasks. First he had to send out a warning flare to his other Parishioners. Given that his boat had been compromised and his attackers—presumably remnants of the IRA—knew his real name, he had to be sure his Parishioners were safe. Terry dug out one of the cell phones from his duffel and a number of SIM cards that were in small labeled Ziploc bags, one for each agent. Inserting one of the SIMs he sent the first text message.
Now I have to wait fifteen minutes. If everything was okay, the reply would be, “Sorry buddy I can’t make it. I have to help the father-in-law with some stuff at his house.” If the shit had hit the fan, the reply would be, “Great, looking forward to it,” or no reply at all. In this case, after fifteen minutes, nothing, so against protocol he gave his Parishioner another ten—still nothing. “Oh shit,” he mumbled before quickly removing the SIM card and tossing it back in its Ziploc.
After three more tries with different messages to other Parishioners and still no reply, he knew they had all been burned. Goddamn it! What the hell is going on? Putting his frustration aside, he tried the others with similar results. How the fuck could they all have been burned? It’s not like we ever really met in person.
And they hadn’t, except once when he had first come over to the States. These people had been on the payroll for a very long time and been run by various Vicars, who, for security reasons, he didn’t know and didn’t want to. Terry was old school when it came to making contact. Any monies paid were sent to various overseas bank accounts. Those payments were then transferred by the Parishioners in small amounts to US banks, but not the banks that held their regular accounts. All communication was done by dead drop or brush past, which he was excellent at. All brush-past contact was carried out in locations that were packed with people, such as baseball or football games, or the subway. These passes and dead drops were arranged with various signals such as chalk marks on a lamppost or mailbox or a flyer on a notice board. Terry even placed messages in the articles he wrote if it was urgent. On rare occasions, he used the classified sections of local papers that were impossible for anyone to read without the one-time keys his Parishioners had been supplied.
He knew some Vicars used email and other online messaging applications, but he didn’t trust them. He had an inkling of what the Government Communications Headquarters in the UK was capable of, and he felt certain that the NSA was ahead of them in the game of snooping into other people’s mail.
He sat for a second and considered his next move. Obviously, he had to call headquarters and report his predicament, but he was beginning to get that what-the-fuck-happened feeling that he’d had after nearly getting blown to shit in Belfast back in the day. Please, God, don’t let this be a bloody mole. But even if there was a mole, how the hell had they found out about Shae?
Unlike his other Parishioners, Shae was completely off the books. Only two people knew about her, himself and K. R had steadily climbed the ranks and was now director general of MI5, a position that traditionally was known throughout the organization as K. And I sure as hell know K isn’t a mole.
Terry and Shae had met in 2014 completely by chance in an out-of-the-way Thai restaurant called Archa off the Highgate Road near Hampstead Heath. He had been told about the place by a reporter friend and decided to give it a try. After being shown to a table, at the rear of the restaurant per usual, he had looked up from the menu and was surprised to see a fellow member of MI5 sitting with a gorgeous blond. There was something about her that brought back memories of a better time, but also a time in his life of terrible sadness. He had thought about walking over to their table and saying hello, but they seemed very engrossed with each other’s company, so he had decided to give it a pass. Through snippets of their conversation he had gathered that the girl was American—somewhere in the Midwest was his guess—and she was wearing a ring. It didn’t seem to be a wedding ring or an engagement ring. I wonder if she’s been checked out by our masters. He was halfway through a huge bowl of the most delicious tom kha soup he had tasted in years when his fellow agent noticed him.
At first there was shock as the couple quickly spoke quietly with each other; then, surprisingly, they both rose and approached his table.
“Hello, Terry.” He was still using the name K had given him, but he’d become Terry Williams, his permanent identity now. “Not on the job, are you?”
Terry laughed. “Sorry to disappoint but no, not tonight. Just out grabbing some delicious Thai food.”
“Good, that’s good. I’d like you to meet a good friend of mine. Shae, this is Terry Williams, he’s a reporter mate from way back. Terry, this is Shae.”
Terry stood and shook her hand. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Shae.” He raised her hands and took a good look at her ring. “I guess you may be a little closer than good friends.” The young lady blushed and Terry laughed again. “Don’t worry, guys, your secret’s safe with me.” He was looking in the eyes of his fellow operative when he spoke.
“Thanks, Terry, I appreciate that,” replied his compadre. “Shae, can you give me a second? I have to have a little chat with Terry for a minute.”
The girl flashed them both a smile and returned to their table. Terry sat and took another mouthful of soup before speaking.
“Are you out of your fucking mind?” he hissed. “A goddamn Yank, you’re fucking engaged to a Yank. Our masters will lose their goddamn minds.”
“I know, I know,” replied his friend. “I didn’t mean it to happen, it just did.”
“I presume you haven’t reported this relationship.”
“Not yet, no.”
“Jesus, they are going to eat you alive. As for her, you better hope there’s nothing, I mean nothing, that will come back on you.”
“There isn’t.”
“I bloody hope so.” He suddenly felt sorry for them both as he remembered his affair with Ciaran more than twenty-four years ago now. What the hell, what the heart wants the heart hopefully gets. “Listen, they aren’t going to find out from me, okay? Just get it sorted before you get crucified.”
“Thanks, Terry, but there’s another reason I want to talk to you.”
“What might that be?”
“I’m leaving tomorrow to spend some time with our friends in the north.”
Terry wiped his hand across his face. “Please tell me she doesn’t know what you do for a living.”
“Do you think I’m mad? Not a chance. She thinks I work as an assistant to a member of Parliament who happens to travel a great deal.”
“That’s something, at least. So what do you want me to do?”
“As I was saying, I’m traveling with a team back to Londonderry in the morning. We’ve been working with the Police Service of Northern Ireland tracking an arms and drug shipment coming over by boat from New York and destined for our NIRA friends. It’s due to arrive in four days and our intention is to track it to its final destination, then have our police friends roll in and bust the lot of them. MI5’s job is to interrogate the people on the receiving end before their lawyers get involved and try and locate the source in the States. I should be back in a couple of weeks.”
“You really shouldn’t be talking to me about this, you know.”
“I have to talk to someone and my direct superior is out of the question.”
“Okay, I’ll let it slide this time. Anyway. It sounds easy enough. So what’s the problem?”
“If something should go wrong, I want you to let Shae know. She’s . . .”
“Let her know. Let her know what, for Christ’s sake?”
“I don’t know, make something up. Tell her there was a traffic accident or something. Just don’t leave her in the dark. She deserves better than that.”
He could have said no, said they were nuts, but he couldn’t do that. At least Ciaran had the closure of a funeral, but Shae never would if the operation went to shit. “Okay, I’ll take care of it. How do I get hold of her?”
“She’s a student at the London School of Economics. One year left of her masters. Last name: Cochran. That should be enough for you to find her.”
“Fine. You can both buy me dinner when you get back, okay?”
“Absolutely, and thanks.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now get back to your date.”
And of course, as things tend to do when fate is challenged, the operation had gone to shit. When the team had moved in, they’d been ambushed and cut to pieces.