“What am I doing here?” Jason demanded. “Who the hell are you? Where the hell am I?”
Jason sat in the den of an affluent, private residence outside Washington, DC. The dark wood furniture of the massive office was upholstered with brightly patterned fabrics and accented with highly-polished brass lamps. In the center of the desk rested a brass banker’s lamp. A green shade shone a perfect cone of light on the leather blotter.
A varied assortment of expensive Hummel figurines, antique handguns, and pens in cushioned cases lined wall bookshelves, dotting spaces between leatherbound tomes. Framed photographs and citations covered the walls above an ornate chair rail. Four decanters holding bronze liquids sat perched on a small corner table surrounded by crystal rocks glasses.
Sitting in a chair directly opposite a large, expensive desk, Jason scanned the room. Five stern-faced men in dark suits, four of them about his age ringed the walls. The fifth, his face lined with fine wrinkles that framed a pair of intense blue eyes, was an older gentleman around sixty. The perfectly trimmed, close-cropped, silver hair hinted at a military pedigree.
Jason’s eye caught the small bar, and suddenly he wanted a drink.
The older man noticed Jason’s glance. “My apologies, Mr. Rodgers. Can I offer you a something?”
Jason nodded.
He wore a dark navy suit and a crisply starched shirt. The red tie glowed against the white fabric of starched shirt. He poured three fingers of an amber liquid into two glasses, stepped over to Jason, and held one out. Jason accepted it.
As the man circled the desk to the thick, cushioned executive chair behind it, Jason placed the glass to his lips and gulped down the scotch, wincing as it burned its way into his stomach.
“Do you know who I am?”
Jason shook his head. “No.”
The fact that he was now sitting in front of someone from the federal government meant his ploy had worked. This fact concerned him and at the same time offered him a glimmer of hope. He was one step closer to finding Michael and Chrissie. He had abandoned Peter, leaving him to deal with the delivery of whatever lethal cargo the truck held. He tried not to think about what Hussein would do if she discovered that Jason was not in the truck.
“I am Giles Doyle, director of the Secret Service of the United States.”
“What am I doing here? I have no business with you. I need to be speaking with someone from the FBI.”
“For now you get me. I apologize for interrupting your quest.”
“My quest? You know about that?
“Of course we know. The government has many agencies at its disposal. You didn’t expect that Delilah Hussein would organize an assassination attempt on two presidents and that we would let it go at that, did you? I also know that your son and girlfriend have been taken and that Delilah Hussein has them.”
“How long have you known she was alive?”
“We found out two weeks ago.”
Jason shuddered. This whole thing, for him, Peter, Michael, and Chrissie, had started forty-eight hours ago. ‘Are you shitting me? Why was I not told?”
“That was not my call.”
Jason shook his head. He narrowed his eyes. His next words were laced with contempt. “I could have taken steps to safeguard my family!”
Director Doyle absorbed Jason’s reaction without a flinch or narrowing of the eyes. In a soothing, calm tone, he said, “Jason …”
“That’s Mr. Rodgers to you!” Jason glared. He coughed and continued. “So why hasn’t she been taken down? It would have saved me a lot of trouble.”
Doyle nodded, then frowned. “I understand … Mr. Rodgers … that decision was made at the highest level. You have to understand there was concern that any communication with you could have been intercepted, or any actions taken by you after that communication could have tipped Hussein and her group that we are on to her, creating the chance the she could elude us. We need the element of surprise.”
Jason lifted an eyebrow as if saying: I don’t give a shit.
“We had no idea she was going to kidnap your son and Miss Pettigrew.” Doyle leaned forward. “Well maybe we can help each other out. We were hoping you might fill in some of the gaps.”
“You need my help finding her?”
“It would be a service to your country.”
“You guys knew she was alive. You knew what happened in Newport News. You knew she could retaliate against me and my family. No one bothered to inform me. And now you want me to help you?”
“Mr. Rodgers,” Doyle said, placing his drink on the end table, “her continued existence was and is a matter of national security. We know The Simoon has plans to attack the United States. We believe that attack is underway right now. But we do not know what it is, or where it is going to happen. She is using you to carry out part of her plan. What is in the truck?”
Jason gnashed his teeth. They knew! They knew two weeks ago!
Jason lowered his eyes to his lap and studied his hands. His fingers blanched as they dug into the fabric of his trousers. Betrayed!
Michael and Chrissie’s kidnappings could have been prevented!
Jason uttered the only two words that came to mind. “Fuck you!”
The words appeared to hit Doyle like a speeding truck. He appeared to be swallowing his initial, angered gut reaction.
“You asked a Newport News cop to contact us on your behalf. You reached out to us, remember?
Jason pushed out a long breath. “Yes.”
“So you must think we can help, right?”
“I don’t have any other options.”
He sighed. “I understand your anger. But you’re wrong. We didn’t know what was happening. We still don’t. Hussein’s plan, whatever it is, needs to be stopped.
Jason couldn’t get past what seemed obvious. “Perhaps, if you had warned me, and by proxy her, she would have ceased operations and halted the attack.”
“Doubtful,” Doyle retorted. “I repeat: if we had warned you, it could have alerted her that we knew. We couldn’t risk that. According to our expert on Hussein, she’s filled with a need for revenge.”
“So I’m a pawn. A chess piece to be sacrificed.”
“Jason,” Doyle persisted, “you contacted us through Detective Palmer. You wanted the government involved because you want your boy and your girlfriend back. You came to us. You’re here now. Make the most of it!”
Jason, at a loss for words, shook his head slowly
“Do you want your family back?” Doyle continued, raising his voice.
The betrayal Jason felt, the knowledge that they had known, had temporarily derailed him. Then the realization hit him. He was going to have to work with these men whether he liked their decisions or not. There were no other options.
“We suspected you would be distrustful. So we brought in someone we know you can trust … and someone that trusts you.”
Confusion mixed with a swirling maelstrom of frustration. A rattling sound interrupted Jason’s fugue. Coming from behind him, it reached a crescendo a few feet away. Jason turned for a glimpse. His eyes registered a shriveled form in the wheelchair.
Several long moments elapsed. A flicker of recognition passed through Jason’s mind. Doyle said the words before Jason’s mind formed the name.
“Mr. Rodgers, I believe you know Special Agent Clay Broadhurst.”
“The brothers stopped at the rendezvous point,” Oliver explained. “For about twenty minutes. They proceeded and are now heading north on Route 13 again.”
“That is good news, Oliver, mon cheri,” Hussein replied. “Has Pierre’s body been disposed of?”
“Oui, Madame. It has been dropped in the ocean four miles offshore.”
Hussein placed a gentle hand on Oliver’s shoulder as he sat at the computer terminal showing the blinking icon on the screen. She squeezed until Oliver winced. Hussein placed her lips beside his ear.
“You have let me down, Oliver. Your men royally screwed up. You better hope we find the boy,” she threatened. Hussein’s breath caressed the side of his face and neck, making him tense his muscles. “How long until they reach Dawson?”
“With no stops, should be three to four hours.”
Hussein smiled. “No more screw ups.” Oliver nodded as Hussein reached down and placed a pair of boning scissors on the table beside the keyboard. Instantly, Oliver’s two missing pinky fingers began to ache.
Moments earlier, Jason Rodgers and Clay Broadhurst had studied each other for several moments. Each nodded to the other, acknowledging a mutual respect borne out of a common fate forged in the Windsor Towers in Newport News.
“Did you know?”
“No. I don’t like any of what’s happening either, Jason,” Broadhurst replied. “I have made my objections known to Director Doyle, quite vehemently.”
Broadhurst shot a brief, harsh glance at his boss. Jason turned to see disgust register on Doyle’s countenance.
These two don’t like each other! Jason thought. For some strange reason, this fact comforted him.
Broadhurst continued. “To be fair to the director, the decision to not warn you came from above him … at the highest level!”
“So he said,” Jason replied. “The president, the man I helped to save, decided he would not return the favor.”
“It’s more complicated than that,” Doyle interrupted.
Jason studied Broadhurst’s weak, emaciated appearance. He’d lost an egregious amount of weight. His clothes hug from his frame. The eyes were dull. The man was a breath away from death.
“Let me help you, Jason. I owe you. Let me return the favor.”
“Maybe.”
“You don’t have a lot of options,” Broadhurst whispered. He lifted a white handkerchief to his lips and coughed several times into it.
Ten seconds later, Jason nodded.
“Good. Where is your brother now?”
“I don’t know.”
“Where were you going?”
“Don’t know that either.”
“Then what the hell was the plan?”
“We were supposed to get more information at a location somewhere north of Exmore on the Eastern Shore. We would get further instructions then. Peter has probably already been there.”
“Where on the Eastern Shore?”
“Turkey Run Road in Mappsville. Get me a computer and I’ll show you on Google Earth.”
Broadhurst removed his cell phone from his jacket and dialed. “Get a response team mobilized. Eastern Shore of Virginia.” He ended the call and turned to Jason. “Show me where exactly.”
“The Greek Monitor has initiated contact,” the deputy director of operations of the CIA said.
“How?” John Beck, the director of operations of the Central Intelligence Agency asked.
Beck was acquainted with the secret CIA black site inside the Red Onion State Penitentiary in the mountains of western Virginia, staffed with corrections officers serving in a dual capacity as CIA operatives. These select agents drew two salaries, one from the Virginia Department of Corrections and a second, covert remuneration from the Central Intelligence Agency. Their directive was to maintain order in accordance with state protocols for the five ultra-secret political prisoners and collect information for the Agency, passing along any data gleaned from the inmates for evaluation by analysts at Langley.
In the wake of the security breach and assassination attempts, Beck had tasked the deputy director with placing an alternate agent onsite at the prison. This agent was an ultra-paranoid safety measure made necessary by the leaks and moles discovered in Washington. Someone whose presence was known only to the deputy director and Beck. Beck didn’t know the agent’s name. The deputy director did. The Greek Monitor’s sole mission was to watch the watchers. The dual agents at the Red Onion had no idea they were being scrutinized. Beck did know the agent was a woman who delivered meals to the ultra-secret detention unit.
“She sent an email with the code “GPI,” the deputy director explained.
“GPI?” Beck asked.
“It means ‘Greek Protocol Initiated.’ It references the fact that Cyclops, al-Faisal’s self-anointed nickname, is a mythical Greek figure.”
“Okay, give me the details.”
“She used a polygraphic substitution cipher in a long email to a phony boyfriend we set up months ago …”
“I don’t need those details, just what’s going on at the Red Onion.”
“Okay, first, there’s this.” The lieutenant dropped a flash drive and a file on the director’s desk.
“What’s this?”
“Clayton Usher has been missing for the last forty-eight hours …”
“Tell me something I don’t fuckin’ know,” Beck spat.
Beck had been briefed in the days and weeks following the assassination attempts in Newport News about the presence of a deep-cover mole inside the Agency. A classified team of select Agency personnel was assembled to find the double agent. They narrowed their search to three possible suspects. The trail ultimately led to one man who stretched head and shoulders above the other two possible spies. His name was Clayton Usher, director of communications at Langley. Codename: Hammon.
Shortly after the assassination attempts in Newport News, Hammon’s activity ceased. He had gone underground. But the team had traced his activities, whereabouts, communications, and personal finances, and by cross-referencing it with known activities of the perpetrators of the assassination attempts and information gleaned through the intensive interrogation of Cooper and Sam Fairing aka Sharif al-Faisal, they were able to train their sites on Hammon/Usher.
Beck always chuckled at the term intensive interrogation. He preferred to call it what it was: torture. And it was very effective at extracting information.
Beck and his task force had been watching, listening to, and monitoring Usher for eighteen months, waiting for Usher to make a false move or contact that would confirm their suspicions. He had received an email several days ago, then disappeared. The codebreakers were still trying to determine if the email was a coded message. At present, he had eluded their surveillance and was “off the grid,” causing Beck two sleepless nights.
The deputy director ignored Beck’s sarcasm. “This flash drive and file belonged to him. These were dropped off at my desk last evening.”
“What the hell does this have to do with the Red Onion?”
“This confirms he’s the guy we’ve been looking for.”
Beck flipped through the file. “Summarize.”
“He left this note.” The DD handed Beck a single, handwritten missive. Beck scanned it. “It says that he was meeting with Delilah Hussein yesterday. The note is dated three days ago. He left instructions to have the drive and the file delivered to us by courier if he did not return by 3 pm yesterday. It arrived at 4:30 pm. I spent last night and this morning studying and verifying it. It contain details of the assassination attempts, spreadsheets, financials in offshore accounts, the whole nine yards.”
“And he hasn’t returned?”
The DD shook his head.
“Is he dead?”
“Don’t know. I have agents combing his home, office, and personal accounts. We’ll have a preliminary report in a few hours.”
“What was Usher meeting with Hussein about? Getting out of the country?”
“We don’t know … neither did he. She requested the meeting.”
“Where did they meet?”
“Usher carried with him a GPS transmitter, giving us a trail of his movements?
“Where did he go?”
“He went to Bonaire.”
“Where the hell is Bonaire?”
“It’s an island in the southern part of the Caribbean Sea, just north of Venezuela in South America.”
“Okay, then what?”
“The electronic trace disappeared there.”
“What do you mean ‘disappeared’?”
“Just that. The electronic transmission being sent to his laptop simply stopped.”
“Let’s get some satellite pictures of the island.”
“I’ve already arranged it. The NRO’s KH-12 Kennan satellite, part of the Keyhole program, has a bird on close orbit over the south Atlantic right now. Sign this.” The deputy director slid a memo to Beck.
“What’s this?”
“Your permission to retask the satellite. I will send it through the proper channels and have the NRO reposition it over Bonaire.”
Beck scribbled his name on the document.
“Good work.”
The DD smiled. He was used to Beck’s belittling comments. He had learned long ago to ignore them. He had just been given the most lavish compliment he’d ever heard Beck utter.
“There’s one more thing, John.”
Beck peered at him like an impatient father waiting for more bad news from a troublesome child.
The DD continued. “A few hours after the scheduled meeting Usher had with Hussein, we intercepted a communication from our agent in Syria, the double agent in ISIS. He was contacted by someone representing Hussein asking to place a CO at a prison in the U.S.”
“No shit! The Red Onion?”
“Didn’t say.”
“Did you contact the Virginia Department of Corrections?”
“Yesterday. Discreetly. At about four in the afternoon a man named Dalton Griffin met with the deputy warden, Jeremiah Travis. His first shift began this morning.”
Beck nodded, acknowledging the obvious. The DD nodded along with his boss.
“How and why did they replace him?”
“According to the Greek Monitor’s email, Josh Baker, Cyclops’ CO, died along with his family. An apparent murder-suicide. He was replaced by a CO named Dalton Griffin. Dalton is not employed by the Agency.”
“How did that happen?”
“We’re still looking into that.”
“We have more moles?”
“Could be.”
Beck pushed out a long sigh and rubbed his temples. “The director and the president are going to have my balls for breakfast. Go on.”
“Within twenty-four hours of taking over Baker’s duties for Sharif al-Faisal, aka Cyclops, inmate Steven Cooper was dead. They found an implant inside his ear. We believe it contained a touch poison that was passed to him by the Cyclops. We’re reviewing the video from the prison now.”
The director had been forwarded ultra-secret daily reports from the Greek Monitor unit inside the Red Onion. She transmitted secure emails two to three times a week from a secure server at her home near the prison to an equally secure server offshore. Through several relays, the email arrived in the deputy director’s inbox, was decoded by the DD himself, and hand delivered to Beck for review. Until this moment, her communications had been devoid of any controversial information.
“Do you want me to have Griffin relieved and interrogated?”
“Is there any indication that an attempt to free al-Faisal is in the works?”
“Not at this time.”
Beck shook his head. “I don’t like it. Tell the Greek Monitor to keep her ear to the tracks. Get me George McNamara. I want an extraction team on standby, ready to go. If we get word of any more unusual activity at the Onion, any sign they are trying to get al-Faisal out, we move! Is that clear?”
“Absolutely. Move to do what? Stop the escape?”
“Delilah Hussein wants her son back. We know that. We haven’t pinned down her location yet. The electronic trail is varied and inconsistent. Broadhurst is sure she will make an attempt. We are going to use this to our advantage.”
“I’ll have the Greek Monitor report every eight hours.”
“Excellent,” Beck said. “Hopefully, retasking the satellite will give us a better idea where she might be.”
“I’ll contact the FBI director myself, so you can make your request.”
The director nodded. “Make it happen.”
They crouched, scanning the terrain. Michael and Chrissie had stayed out of sight in the shadow of trees on the property.
Michael pointed to the area where Pierre had taken him to relieve himself and where he had hit him in the face with the small boulder.
“This way. Quick,” Christine said.
They peered around the corner. Seconds later, a phalanx of men appeared. The leader pointed in the direction of the wine cellar. The squad of men fanned out, dispersing. Two ran toward their former cell.
“We need to get away from here,” Christine whispered. “Follow me.”
She checked the expanse of ground behind the wine cellar and led Michael toward the rear corner of the compound and a tall, green, chain-link fence. She pointed toward a narrow cave of darkness created by a copse of trees. They ran, crossing the exposed distance.
When they reached the shadows, they stopped and dropped to the sandy earth inside the chain-link barrier.
They lay beside each other on their stomachs, chests heaving.
“Who are these people?” Michael asked in a whisper.
Christine recalled the image of Oliver standing over Pierre, his form backlit by the morning sun.
Despite the various traumas she had survived in the last two days and the warm breeze, the sight of Oliver sent an Arctic shiver through her. Her mind quickly registered Michael’s hands desperately clutching her arm.
She repressed the image. “You don’t want to know,” she replied.
A second wheelchaired man rolled himself into the spacious room behind Broadhurst. Unlike Broadhurst, his legs were not covered by a blanket. In fact, Jason immediately noticed that this man had no legs.
“And,” Doyle continued, “this is Special Agent Tom Johnson. Agent Johnson served with your brother in the marine corps.”
“Hello,” Jason replied, remembering hearing the name. “This reunion is a very nice and all. But I need to find my son and Christine.”
“We are … I am working on that,” Broadhurst croaked. His voice sounded like a dying electric toy. The high pitch trailed off as air seeped from his lungs. “Jason, we can help each other.”
The director interrupted. “Mr. Rodgers, what Clay is trying to say is that if you help us, we may be able to help you.”
Jason had recognized his plight moments before. But something deep inside him caused him to continue to object. As if that might cause them to be more careful when it came to getting Michael and Chrissie back. “So the lives of two people I love very much depend on my helping the Secret Service? These are American citizens that have been kidnapped by a terror organization. And you’re using them as pawns.”
“The sooner you get used to that fact, the sooner we can move toward getting them back,” the director shot back.
Jason frowned and shook his head slowly
“We need to know what Hussein has asked of you. What is she forcing you to do?”
“I told you I don’t know”
“Tell us everything that has happened. It may hold a clue as to what she is attempting. I promise we will do everything we can to get your son and your girlfriend back.”
Jason’s shoulders sagged. He had depleted his stores of resistance. Delilah Hussein had manipulated him. Michael and Chrissie were not coming back unless he worked with these asses.
“Okay … okay,” he relented. “But I swear if you don’t live up to your promise, I will scream everything I know from the mountaintop. I’ll tell everything that happened with the attempted assassinations and what is going on now. Are we clear?”
Director Doyle nodded. “You have my word.”