41
WINCHESTER, VIRGINIA
Marcus and Annie headed west.
They spent the afternoon driving around the Virginia countryside, then went for a long walk in Shenandoah National Park, talking about anything and everything other than work, their relationship, or the crisis back in D.C. Eventually they pulled into a diner on the outskirts of Winchester to get a bite to eat. When the waitress seated them and brought them menus, Annie asked her to turn up the volume on the TV mounted over the counter.
“This is CNN breaking news,” the announcer said. “Now from Washington, here’s Carolyn Tam.”
“Good evening. With the White House engulfed in multiple crises that seem to worsen by the hour, CNN has learned the identity of the official allegedly responsible for the disastrous bombing of a facility in western Libya, a facility that turned out not to be the base camp of the Kairos terrorist group but a school for severely disabled and mentally challenged children.”
An image of Marcus flashed on the screen, and Annie gasped.
“CNN has exclusively obtained the audio recording and the official, classified transcript of the national security briefing at Camp David last Saturday,” Tam continued. “They reveal unmistakably that a CIA officer named Marcus Ryker told President Clarke that Kairos founder and spiritual leader Abu Nakba was in the Libyan compound and pushed hard for Clarke to order the attack.”
Marcus couldn’t believe what he was hearing.
“Multiple sources in the intelligence community and the Pentagon tell CNN that Ryker—a highly decorated Marine combat veteran and former Secret Service agent—currently serves as a special agent with the Diplomatic Security Service, a division of the State Department. But our sources say that this is merely a cover and that Ryker actually works for the Central Intelligence Agency.”
As Tam played the first sound bite from the NSC briefing, Marcus found himself being stared at by a dozen or more people who looked at him, then back to the screen, then back at him.
“I have no doubt Abu Nakba is in that compound, sir. You have the brief. It’s all there. The evidence may be circumstantial, but it is overwhelming. And I would remind you all that the Agency never had photos or phone intercepts of Osama bin Laden in that compound in Abbottabad. But he was there. And your predecessors made the right call sending in U.S. forces to take him down.”
Then came the second sound bite.
“Mr. President, you know my family history, and you know my service record. I am well aware of the risks you would be putting our pilots in, sir, and I do not believe I’m asking you to act recklessly. I’m following the evidence. Not my whims. Not my passions. But carefully gathered evidence. Evidence that leads to that building in Libya.”
After the sound bites, the image switched to a CNN correspondent doing a stand-up report outside of Marcus’s apartment in southeast D.C.
“We need to go,” Marcus whispered. “Give me the keys.”
Annie slid her keys across the table. Then they stood up, walked out, got back into Annie’s Fiat 500L, and peeled out of the gravel parking lot.
“That’s not all you said,” Annie remarked as they pulled onto 66 heading east, back to D.C. “You told them about the ‘massive and sophisticated compound’ built ‘in the middle of nowhere.’ You talked about ‘cinder block walls twenty feet high,’ and guard towers in all four corners of the compound, and a ‘steel reinforced gate.’ You told them the NSA had picked up the signal of Abu Nakba’s own satellite phone in the compound.”
Marcus, hitting the accelerator and zigzagging through traffic at upwards of seventy-five miles an hour, glanced over at Annie.
“How do you know all that?”
“I told you I read the transcript.”
“Yeah, but you remember those specific pieces?”
“I reread it all this morning.”
“Why?”
“I wanted to know if I would’ve drawn the same conclusion you did.”
“And?”
“I think I would have.”
They drove in silence for several minutes until Annie asked where they were going. Marcus said he was driving her home; then he’d go back to his place to pack; then he was heading straight to Reagan National to catch the next flight to Colorado.
“You can’t, Marcus.”
“Why not?”
“Because you’ve just been accused on national TV of being responsible for the deaths of all those women and children. By the time we get back to D.C., it won’t just be CNN. There’s going to be a dozen news crews in front of your apartment and probably mine. And your mom’s house is going to be next.”
Marcus knew she was right. But he had no plan B.
Annie did. “What you need to do is get as far from the Beltway as possible and stay off the grid until we can figure out a plan. I’m coming with you. And I have just the place.”
“Where?”
“A beach house.”
“No, Annie, if we do this, we need to really get lost for a few days. Where no one can find us. Not Stephens. Not McDermott. Not the press. Or your boss. And you just said yourself that if the media is staking out my place, they’re going to stake out yours.”
“You’re thinking of my place in South Carolina, the one my parents left me. What I’m talking about is completely different.”
“You have another place?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“North Carolina—the Outer Banks.”
“You have a beach house on the Outer Banks?” Marcus asked, incredulous.
“Corolla—actually, a little north of Corolla—but it’s not exactly mine.”
“Then whose?”
“My aunt and uncle’s place. They usually rent it out for the summer.”
“How far is it?”
“We can be there in five hours.”
“Isn’t someone renting it now?”
“The season doesn’t open until Memorial Day. What do you say?”
Marcus needed to think about it, but he didn’t have long. They were rapidly coming up on I-95 south. If they were going to the OBX, he had to decide fast.
“It doesn’t seem a little weird to you that we’re barely dating and now you want to shack up together?” he asked.
“Look, you’ll have your bedroom, I’ll have mine, and never the twain shall meet,” she told him. “You got a problem with that, then book yourself a room at the Hilton. But you’d better pay cash or all your friends from Moscow to Pyongyang to Tehran and beyond are going to track down your credit card and pay you a visit.”
“Fair enough, Miss Stewart.” Marcus nodded, smiling—just a little—for the first time that day. “I’m in.”
He asked Annie to dismantle their phones, taking out their SIM cards so no one could reach them or track them. If they were going off the grid, they had to do it right.
Minutes later, he exited on I-95, heading south.