Arctic Fire (26 page)

M
ADDUX STOPPED
O’Hara outside the heavy iron door with a strong grip to the shoulder. They were just about to enter the soundproof interrogation room, which was at one end of the narrow, stone-walled corridor of the farmhouse basement. It lay directly beneath the study in which Maddux had welcomed O’Hara into RCS.

“Put this on, Ryan,” he ordered, handing the young man a crude hood. It was a faded white pillowcase with two small holes cut out of the poly-cotton blend near the closed end of the case. “And keep it on until I tell you to take it off.”

“Are you serious, sir?” O’Hara asked, grinning self-consciously.

“I get the Klan irony,” Maddux muttered as he slipped a hood on himself. “At least you don’t have to wear the robe,” he added in what was now a slightly muffled voice.

He was enjoying this moment, and he allowed himself a grin beneath the hood because now O’Hara couldn’t see his reaction. Something inside Maddux had always enjoyed putting people on edge.

“Put these on too.” Maddux pulled a pair of gloves from a pocket of his jacket and tossed them at the kid. “And make sure your shirtsleeves come down over the wrist end of the gloves at all times while we’re in there.”

“Why?”

“You said it yourself. You’re black and you’re the first one to make it in. Never give away anything about yourself you don’t absolutely have to.” Maddux nodded at the door. “Other than the man we’re interrogating today, there’s a guy from another RCS division in there as well. I don’t want him seeing your hands and figuring out it’s you if somehow he’s heard through the grapevine about you making it in.”

“Are you embarrassed by me?” O’Hara asked tersely. “Is that what this is about, sir?”

It was the first time Maddux had heard the kid’s voice grab even a slightly irritated edge. And this one wasn’t slight, it was pure resentment. “I don’t want you identified
at all
,” Maddux replied as deliberately as he could, controlling his rage at the kid’s audacity in using that tone with his new superior, but at the same time showing the young man how irritated he was in no uncertain terms. “It has nothing to do with your skin color. I already told you, Ryan. I don’t see color when I look at you. I see bravery.” He hesitated. “The bottom line is I don’t want any of my Falcons identified by anyone at any time. But everyone in RCS knows that we haven’t had an African American make it into the Falcon division before you. If the RCS guy behind the door saw your hands, it wouldn’t take him long to connect the dots. Understand?”

“Yes, sir,” O’Hara mumbled. “Sorry.”

“It’s for your protection,” Maddux continued. “That’s all. I’d do the same thing for any other Falcon whether he was white, black, green, or purple. It’s
always
best to fly under the radar whenever you can, even when you’re flying over friendly territory. You’ve probably heard that a thousand times during your training, but it’s true.” He pointed a stubby finger at the kid. “Follow our training techniques at all times to the letter, son. I can’t emphasize that enough. It
will
save your life one day.”

“So, we stay that secretive even from other RCS divisions?” O’Hara asked.

“Absolutely,” Maddux replied, watching the kid pull the hood down over his face. Maddux focused on the eye holes when the hood was in place, trying to see if anyone could tell the kid was black under there. But the holes were small enough to keep out any gaze, no matter how penetrating. “Pull those sleeves down,” he ordered. “No skin showing.”

“Why do I have to be worried about somebody from another Red Cell Seven division? Isn’t he one of the good guys?”

“He is,” Maddux agreed. “He’s a counterterrorism guy and a damn fine one. But, in my opinion, he’s got a big mouth.” Maddux shrugged. “I mean, he doesn’t say much because he is counterterror, but those guys shouldn’t say
anything
.”

“I don’t under—”

“Not everyone’s as smart as I am. Not everyone sees it all the way I do.”

“Huh?”

“There’s one more thing I have to make clear to you before we go in there,” Maddux said quickly as he gestured at the door. “It’s the most important to me.”

“What is it, sir?” O’Hara asked expectantly.

“From now on you must be completely loyal to me no matter what happens. Do you understand that, Ryan? At this point it isn’t about the rest of the Falcons, Red Cell Seven, the DOD, the CIA,
or even the United States of America. It’s just about your loyalty to me. Am I clear?”

O’Hara swallowed hard and gave Maddux a confused look. “Yes, sir, but if I could ask you just one more—”

“Let’s go.” Maddux hustled O’Hara toward the door. He didn’t like the kid asking so many questions. He needed to put a stop to that ASAP.

Maybe it was a generational thing, Maddux figured. Maybe kids today simply couldn’t keep from asking questions because there were so many ways to get information. As a result, they expected answers immediately all the time. Whatever the reason was, he didn’t appreciate it. Young people were made to be seen and not heard, like his grandfather had always said.

He’d always liked his grandfather, but then the old man had up and died right in front of him of a heart attack when Maddux was only seven. And then he hadn’t had any protection from his father’s nightly beatings.

“We’ll talk more after the session,” Maddux promised as he pushed the door open.

“Yes, sir.”

It was rare for Maddux to allow so new a Falcon into an interrogation like this, especially a session that would end up getting so brutal. But he had a good feeling about O’Hara, and he wanted to connect with the kid quickly. O’Hara was an expert marksman, one of the best to ever come along. The kid could literally put a bullet through the eye of an eagle in the sky from three hundred yards. Maddux wanted to practice with O’Hara over the next few days to try to improve his own marksmanship, which was excellent, though nothing compared to the kid’s. Maddux wanted every extra bit of training he could get to make certain President Dorn died with the first shot.

Maddux’s second reason for allowing O’Hara into this session was shock value. He wanted to see the kid’s physical reaction to
an actual torture session even if he couldn’t actually see O’Hara’s face. He’d still know what was going on behind the hood from the kid’s body language and the debriefing meeting afterward. O’Hara had seen several gut-wrenching videos of sessions during his training, but never the live, in-your-face, blood-and-death performance.

He’d puked a few months ago while watching a particularly vicious session during which a subject had been slowly decapitated, but otherwise the kid had passed with flying colors. Most importantly, he’d never once questioned the need for brutal torture sessions as a tool to protect the United States. Not even if it involved American citizens.

Then there was that third reason Maddux wanted O’Hara in the interrogation session, which was the most important reason of all.

As they headed into the dimly lit room, Maddux motioned for O’Hara to move to the wall opposite the one the subject was hanging near. The guy’s wrists were tied tightly above his head by a thick rope leading to a hook on the ceiling, and his feet barely touched the floor. He was moaning loudly while he tried to keep himself balanced on his toes as he strained toward the ceiling.

“Ready?” Maddux called in a low voice to the fourth man in the room, who wore a hood like the ones he and O’Hara were wearing.

His name was Nick Telford, and he ran the RCS counterterrorism division for Roger Carlson. Maddux and Telford had come aboard RCS about the same time twenty years ago. As far as Maddux was concerned they had a healthy respect for each other, but that was it. Of course, that was the most intense relationship Maddux could have with anyone—except Carlson. He loved that old man—as much as his ultimate loyalty to the United States allowed him to love anyone.

“Have at it,” Telford answered indifferently. “He’s all yours.”

The subject’s name was John Savoy. He was fifty-two, but he looked older than that to Maddux, like he was in his early sixties. He had thinning brown hair, pasty skin, and an obvious paunch. He also had a wife and two kids in college, and he worked for the Department of Energy. He was a bureaucratic lifer, and he looked boring because he was boring, Maddux knew. His appearance and his career weren’t covers at all. He was just an ordinary man trying to make a little extra money on the side by selling what he figured was a little harmless information.

He had no idea how big a shit-storm he’d stepped squarely into the middle of by selling that information—until now, anyway.

At Maddux’s orders, Telford and several of his men had picked up Savoy in Arlington early this morning on his way into work, thrown him in the back of a white van, and whisked him down here to the farmhouse in central Virginia. As Maddux stared at Savoy, he could tell the guy was already on the verge of tears.

“Do you know why you’re here, Mr. Savoy?” Maddux asked gruffly.

“No,” Savoy whimpered. “I have no idea.”

With no warning, Maddux delivered a sharp kick to Savoy’s groin. Savoy screamed in agony and tried to double over against the pain. But he couldn’t because his hands were tied so tightly above his head. All he could do was scream. Then scream even louder and more pitifully when Maddux delivered a second, even harder kick to the exact same body organs. Savoy lifted his knees to his gut, but he didn’t have the strength to keep them there for long.

“We know who you are, you piece of shit!” Maddux shouted at Savoy, who was coughing so violently he was already starting to spit up blood. “We know what you’re doing.”

“I’m just a midlevel guy at DOE,” Savoy gasped. “I’m a nobody in the Office of Fossil Fuels, for Christ’s sake. I swear it.”

“Like hell!” Maddux snarled. “You’ve given away some very sensitive information about LNG tankers heading toward American soil to the wrong person, haven’t you, Mr. Savoy?”

“
What?
No, I don’t even—”

Maddux delivered a blistering right cross to Savoy’s jaw, which sent several of the older man’s teeth flying from his mouth and into the room.

Savoy began sobbing hysterically through his pain when he saw Maddux pull a pistol from his jacket.

“Russian roulette,” Maddux whispered as he moved close to Savoy and pressed the barrel to Savoy’s head. “That’s what we’re about to play. Six chambers and one bullet, and I keep pulling the trigger until you tell me what I want to know or the gun goes off. Got it?”

Right away Savoy began screaming and shouting and doing everything he could to keep the gun away from his head.

Maddux chuckled as Savoy danced beneath the rope. He pressed the gun back to Savoy’s head whenever he tired and went still for a moment. Finally, Savoy had nothing left in the tank and hung limply from the hook, exhausted and defenseless.

Maddux spun the gun’s six-chamber ammunition cylinder so it sounded like a drumroll. As the clicking faded, he pushed the barrel to Savoy’s head one more time.

“What the hell are you doing?” Telford demanded. “This guy doesn’t know anything. He’s a fucking bureaucrat, for God’s sake. Let’s get him out of here.”

“This is my interrogation,” Maddux snapped. “Not yours.”

“Yeah, but—”

“Tell me what you know, Mr. Savoy, or I pull the trigger!” Maddux yelled as he pressed the gun hard to Savoy’s head. “You gave information about those LNG tankers coming at this country to someone you shouldn’t have on the outside, didn’t you? Well, it turns out that someone on the outside was a person of interest
to us.” Maddux dropped the barrel of the gun from Savoy’s head and forced it down the man’s throat so he gagged violently. “
Don’t deny it!
”

“
No, no, I didn’t do anything like that!
” Savoy screamed past the gun barrel in a garbled voice as he gagged. “All I do is watch those ships after they leave port,” he explained when Maddux pulled the gun from his mouth. “That’s it as far as the LNG tankers go. I haven’t given any information to anyone except my bosses at DOE. My information isn’t even that important.”

That wasn’t all Savoy did, Maddux knew very well. He was selling himself short in a big way. Savoy also interfaced with Naval Operations in Norfolk, Virginia, to keep them up to date on where those ships were. So the military could track the tankers in case decisive defensive action was required.

Maddux knew this because
he
was the one who was paying Savoy
not
to tell the Navy that a huge LNG tanker called the
Pegasus
was heading directly for Virginia Beach and not toward Savannah, Georgia, where it was supposed to be heading. He was the one paying Savoy to tell the Navy that the
Pegasus
was still on course for Savannah. He knew all that because he was that person of interest, though Savoy couldn’t tell, thanks to the hood.

Maddux smiled as he pressed the barrel to Savoy’s head one more time. He’d told Carlson that the ship hadn’t even left Malaysia yet. “Tell me, you bastard.
Tell me what I want to know!
” And, of course, Carlson had believed him.

“Please don’t hurt me anymore,” Savoy pleaded.

“Tell me!”

“All right, all right, I’ll tell you what you want to—”

The bullet exploded from the pistol with a deafening blast and slammed through Savoy’s brain. His body went limp instantly as blood and gray matter splattered the wall behind him.

“
What the hell?
” Telford shouted. “
He was about to break!
”

Maddux brought the revolver up in front of his face and stared at it for a few seconds. Then he glanced at O’Hara. “Did you not fix this gun like I told you to?” he demanded accusingly. This was the third and most important reason he’d wanted the kid in the room—so he had plausible deniability. “What the hell?”

Maddux pointed the gun at the ceiling, flipped the ammunition cylinder out to the left of the gun, and pushed the extractor rod. Five live rounds and an empty shell fell from the chambers and clattered across the tile floor. “Jesus Christ,” he hissed. “This thing was fully loaded. What the hell’s wrong with you, kid?”