Authors: Kyle Mills
My compliments."
"It's all true, sir."
"So is everything on al Fayed's site as near as I can tell. I suppos e that brings us to Roy Buckner."
"What he wrote about Buckner is not true, sir."
"Ah, so we've found the one thing he lied about. How convenient.
Entertain me with your take on that one, Hillel."
"Al Fayed began calling Karen Manning and we thought he might try t o contact her in person. So we put someone on her."
"Roy Buckner. I've read his record."
"Yes, sir. A reasonably good man who has history with al Fayed."
"A negative history. I gather that they didn't like each other. I a lso gather that Buckner is unstable. According to your own records , Matt vetoed him for your program."
"That's correct."
"And you didn't think that was a problem."
"Honestly, sir, I thought that the Karen Manning angle was a long sho t and that Buckner would follow his orders."
Crenshaw nodded wearily. "Go on."
"Buckner called me and told me he had al Fayed. He also told me tha t he'd arrived too late to save Karen Manning."
"Was this the call you received while you were in my office lying t o me?"
Strand had assumed that Crenshaw would have pulled those phone records , but hadn't been able to come up with a graceful way to deal with th e subject.
"Yes, sir. He called when I was in your office. And then I called hi m back and told him to bring al Fayed in. He agreed and asked me to sen d someone out to get his car."
"But he told you that al Fayed had killed Karen Manning."
"Yes sir."
"Well, there's a fairly detailed transcript of Buckner's side of hi s conversation with you that includes him telling you specifically tha t Karen Manning was alive and you ordering her dead. How do you explai n that?"
"I don't know, sir. It's possible that he was saying those things int o a dead phone either before I answered or after I hung up. Or, I s uppose she could have become infatuated with al Fayed and now she'
s trying to justify staying with him "
"So your best explanations are that either Buckner went to grea t lengths to provide disinformation to a woman he was about to kill, o r that a former cop with an excellent record, who was working like a do g to clear her name, decided to ride off into the sunset with a doome d former SEAL."
"I really can't say what happened for sure at this point, sir."
Crenshaw finally sat down behind his desk. "Where's Matt?"
"We don't know. He isn't returning calls."
Chapter
Fifty-Two.
"Dad!" Karen shouted into the phone. "Calm down! I told you, I'
m fine."
"He's holding you, isn't he? He's making you say this. Is h e listening? Tell him I can get him anything he wants. Money, a privat e jet, the best lawyers in the country. Anything."
She looked across the hotel room at Fade, who was lying like a corps e in front of the television. She'd barely managed to get him out of th e car and up the stairs, though his injuries shouldn't have prevented hi m from doing it himself. He seemed to be slipping away.
"Listen to me, Dad. First of all, he's not on the phone. Second o f all, I'm perfectly fine. And third, he's not holding me here. I n fact, if it weren't for him, I'd be dead."
"What was your first dog's name?"
"Huh?"
"Tell me the truth if you're really okay and lie if you're not."
"Scruffy, Dad."
He let the air out of his lungs in a loud rush that sounded like stati c over the phone. "I've had government agents here trying to find yo u for all I know, they have this phone tapped."
"I can almost guarantee it."
"They made some threats about you being involved in disseminatin g classified information .. ."
"I'm so sorry I got you involved in this, Dad."
"Don't be silly, honey. I've already talked to the governor and gon e through this with my legal team. If they come after you I'll crucif y them."
The silent commercial playing on the TV was replaced with the directo r of Homeland Security standing in front of a podium bristling wit h microphones. Karen jumped on the bed and grabbed the remote, tappin g the volume button and then using it to jab Fade in the ribs. He opene d his eyes for a moment and then rolled away from her and closed the m again.
"Honey? Are you still there?"
"Yeah, I'm here."
"We've been flooded with requests for interviews. We're talking abou t "
"I think it's time for me to shut up for a little while, Dad." Sh e leaned against the headboard and watched Crenshaw shuffle the papers i n front of him. "We said what we had to say on the Web site and now it'
s time to let this thing settle a little bit."
"I understand, but "
"I've got to go, Dad."
"Karen "
"I'm going to see you soon, though, okay?"
She turned off the phone and put a hand on Fade's side. He didn'
t move.
"First," Crenshaw started, "let me say that I only became aware of th e al Fayed situation yesterday when everyone else did. Since then, I'v e initiated an investigation into the allegations and statements made o n the Web site and I'm personally overseeing that investigation. Bu t it's going to take some time to sort through everything."
He paused for a moment and then looked directly into the camera. "M
y top priority at Homeland Security is to ensure the safety of America'
s citizens. But a very close second to that is protecting what thi s country stands for. Americans have given their government a great dea l of power to fight terrorism and I believe that's a sacred trust. I t ake any abuse of that trust very seriously and I will deal with it a s harshly as the law will allow."
A number of hands shot up in the audience, but he just waved the m off.
"To anticipate your questions, we do not know where Karen Manning an d Salam al Fayed are at this time. We also have no way of knowing Ms.
Manning's status by that I mean whether or not she's being held agains t her will. We are, however, doing everything we can to find them and t o ensure Ms. Manning's safety. Hillel Strand and Matt Egan have bot h been suspended pending an investigation and both are cooperating fully.
That's it."
He gathered up his things and walked off the stage, ignoring the shout s of the reporters. Karen rose to her knees on the mattress and pulle d Fade onto his back. "Wake up," she said, running a hand through hi s hair. "Fade? Can you hear me?"
He opened his eyes but she wasn't sure he really saw her.
"I'm going to ask you again to come with me, Fade. I'll do everythin g I can to help you. Who knows? We might even get you off the hook."
He smiled almost imperceptibly and she had to swipe a hand across he r face to keep a tear from falling on him.
"Fade .. ."
But there was no hope for him. They both knew it. He'd go to jail an d most likely die there, paralyzed in an infirmary bed. He didn'
t deserve that. He didn't deserve any of it.
"What can I do to help you?" she said, wiping at her face again. "Tel l me."
He just closed his eyes, the slight smile still playing at his lips. H
e didn't seem to be aware of it when she leaned down and kissed him.
Karen took a few breaths, trying to steady her voice and then slid of f the bed, taking the pistol lying on the nightstand and tucking it int o the back of her pants. "I have to go now. I'm going to turn myself i n to the police and that means I'm going to have to tell them where thi s hotel is. I can stall for a little while, but you have to be gone b y morning. Did you hear me, Fade? By morning."
Chapter
Fifty-Three.
The phone rang, but Egan didn't bother to reach for it. The machine i n the kitchen picked up and the voice shouting over it echoed down th e hall. "Matt! This is Darren Crenshaw. I'm about to come through you r front door and I'd appreciate it if you didn't shoot me."
Egan poured himself another drink, listening to the creak of hinge s followed by footsteps in the entryway.
"So, how's your day going?" Crenshaw said as he dropped into the chai r in front of Egan's desk. He pointed to the bottle of vodka on it an d when Egan nodded, grabbed a glass and poured himself some.
"You wouldn't believe how many people I had working on finding yo u before someone thought to look here. I swear to God sometimes I wonde r if I'm just wasting my time."
Egan remained silent.
"Is Elise gone?"
He nodded and Crenshaw leaned back in his chair, sipping thoughtfull y at the drink in his hand.
"Quite a predicament Hillel's gotten us into," he said finally. "Di d you hear that Pakistan's already lodged a formal complaint with the UN
a nd we're expecting at least four more countries that al Faye d mentioned in his Web site to follow suit. Apparently, the Saudis ar e so mad they don't know what to do with themselves."
"With all due respect, sir, fuck the Saudis."
Crenshaw laughed. "I couldn't agree more, though you'll never hear m e say that outside this room ... So my people are telling me tha t everything they've looked at on that site is exactly true. I've talke d to Hillel and .. . well, let's just say that man has a real future i n politics."
"If he lives that long."
Crenshaw shrugged and took another drink. "Why don't you tell me you r side of the story, Matt?"
"A little late for that, isn't it, sir?"
"You don't have anything better to do."
Egan tipped the vodka bottle into his glass and then topped of f Cren-shaw's. "Everything on SWAT KILLER that relates to Fade'
s missions is absolutely true. He risked his ass over and over again t o fix our problems and then he got hurt and we turned our backs on him.
I tried to get the money for the surgery he wanted, but I couldn't ge t it done."
"You can't make the bureaucracy do something it doesn't want to do , Matt. What I'm hearing is that it was a bad call on the part of th e government but that you did everything humanly possible to help th e guy."
"Someone once told me that if you fail at something it's either becaus e you weren't smart enough or you didn't try hard enough."
Crenshaw smiled. "I admire that philosophy, Matt, but we both kno w that it's bullshit. Anyway, it sounds like al Fayed figured out a wa y to get the money himself. He went to Colombia to work for Caste l Vela."
"And I knew all about it," Egan admitted. "But I buried the report s from DEA."
"Apparently not deep enough."
"No, not deep enough. Hillel had a hard-on for Fade for good reason, I s uppose .. ."
"You can't deny that he has some desirable qualities."
Egan nodded. "We went to see him at his house and he told us to fuc k off. Hillel was pretty pissed and he wouldn't let it go."
"So you told him about the Colombians?"
"No. Lauren found that. I kept my mouth shut."
"And the Ramirez brothers?"
"Complete nonsense. Hillel needed something local to get the cop s interested."
"So the plan was to frame al Fayed, get him arrested, and then get hi m off the hook."
"For a price."
"And how did you feel about all this?"
"I didn't know anything about it. And if I had been involved, you ca n be damn sure I wouldn't have sent a bunch of cops in there to arres t him. It wasn't hard to predict how he'd react. No, as far as I wa s concerned, Fade had done his fair share for his country and, frankly , wasn't physically or mentally stable enough for the job anyway."
"And that brings us to Karen Manning."
"Does it?"
"What do you know about that?"
"Same as everyone else: Hillel had Buckner watching her and he caugh t them out in the woods somewhere."
"The site says Strand ordered her dead. But he tells a differen t story. He says that Buckner told him al Fayed had already killed he r .. ."
"I couldn't say, sir."
"Speculate."
"I don't see what I can tell "
"Come on, Matt. Humor me."
Egan took another sip of his drink and looked toward the curtain s covering the window next to him. Was Fade out there? Waiting?
"Matt?"
He looked back at the general and shrugged. "Hillel had every reaso n to want her dead. He couldn't be sure what Fade had told her and i t would have been simple to make it look like he'd killed her. I s Manning telling the truth when she says that Hillel gave the order?
Sure. But, as usual, he left himself some wiggling room. Buckner ha s a history of being a loose cannon and he'll use that."
"Thin," Crenshaw said.
"Not if you back him up, sir. He's counting on that. He knows th e media and the Democrats have you under a microscope, just waiting for a story about Homeland Security turning into the new Gestapo. Hillel'
s been careful to leave you with enough ammunition to make it safer fo r you to defend him than to use him as a whipping boy. And even better , he's given you me a man who looked the other way while one of ou r operatives helped destroy our youth with cocaine. A nice littl e diversion, if you play it right."