He’d received one marked urgent from Jackson.
TO: Anthony Walker
FROM: Jackson Barlow
SUBJECT: Karatygin
Anthony,
Great job on the story. Got your updated notes. We’re going to run this on the front page with a special report insert. The photographs are incredible.
That was good news. Anthony thought that this meant he was definitely out of the doghouse at work. Only a few more loose ends to tie up.
As his phone finally booted up, he saw he had half a dozen messages. He dialed into his voicemail.
Two messages from bill collectors. One from Carrie—that was interesting—wishing him luck in Afghanistan. Two more from Jackson Barlow, demanding to know when he was coming back from Afghanistan. A final message from Bear. It was terse, giving an address in Falls Church, Virginia and a time: nine o’clock.
It was eight now. He jumped to his feet and slid open the door again. “Hey Carrie—can I borrow your shower? And would it be possible to get the concierge to call a cab? I’ve got to get to Falls Church.”
Carrie looked up and said, “Sure. Maybe one of us can drive you? A cab to Falls Church is going to cost a fortune.”
Alexandra said, “I’ll watch Rachel.”
Carrie said, “I don’t know.”
“Carrie, I’ve got it. You go—you could use a break. And Rachel’s fine. I’ll call you if her fever goes up.”
Carrie sighed. Then she looked at Anthony. “All right. I’ll take you.”
He hadn’t participated at all in that exchange. But he nodded and said, “Thanks. I’ll be ready in ten minutes.”
Anthony was surprised to learn that Carrie drove a giant black Chevy Suburban, one of the biggest sports utility vehicles on the road. But when he thought about it, it made sense. After all, Ray Sherman had been killed in a car accident. It would stand to reason that she would have a lot of residual anxiety about cars.
Regardless of that, she expertly drove them out of the crowded streets of Bethesda and on to the Capitol Beltway. Rush hour wasn’t over, and they sat in the car nearly twenty-five minutes before they made it across the bridge and into Virginia.
Anthony said, “I can’t tell you how much I appreciate the ride.”
She looked at him and said, “I have an ulterior motive.”
For just a second Anthony’s heart seemed to skip a beat. But he looked at her as calm as he could and said, “And that would be?”
Carrie didn’t look at him. She said, “I want in on the meeting.”
“I don’t know if they’ll let you—”
“Let me try to persuade them. I’ve certainly got as much a right as you. And I probably have information they need.”
Anthony opened his mouth to speak, then thought. And closed it. Because she was right. She had
more
right than he did. After all, it was her family being ripped apart.
“All right. Just bear in mind that Schmidt—he’s the head of the IRS investigation—hasn’t even agreed to see me. He doesn’t know I’m coming. So you showing up might make things even worse.”
Carrie was no fool. She changed the subject. “What did you find out in Afghanistan?”
“Few things that really surprised me,” he replied. “But I got hard corroboration, both witness testimony and physical evidence, that Richard Thompson was involved in the acquisition of the weapons.”
“Jesus,” she whispered. “I kept hoping it wasn’t true.”
“I don’t blame you,” he said. “You’ve had—a lot of tough realizations in the last few days.”
She nodded. “Yes. That’s true.”
“I wish it hadn’t been that way,” he said. Not that his wishes made any difference, or could do anything to help Carrie. But it was true. He wished she’d not had such a tough time. “You’re strong, you know. Most people would have buckled under the pressures you’ve faced.”
She gave him a wry smile. “My mother taught me to stand up to all kinds of pressure.”
Anthony’s admiration of Carrie Sherman only grew at that statement.
Thirty minutes later, they finally arrived at a nondescript suburban house in Northern Virginia. The first thing Anthony noted about it was the precision of the bushes, which had been trimmed in perfectly even lines. Even the grass looked freshly cut, with not a blade out of place. Whoever took care of the landscaping here was a fanatic.
Carrie pulled the SUV to a stop. Three other cars were in the driveway, including one with federal government license plates. She took a deep breath.
“You ready for this?” he asked.
She nodded, once.
They simultaneously opened the doors of the Suburban and stepped down to the driveway. Moments later a large man who looked like a former linebacker opened the door.
“You must be Anthony Walker?”
“Yeah. And this is Carrie Sherman.”
“Come on in. I’m Gary Simpson. This is my house, but I’m not in on the meeting. You’re a little late.”
“Traffic.”
Anthony and Carrie walked forward to the door, and had an awkward moment where he stepped back to let her go first, and she did the same thing, causing them to collide.
She stifled a laugh and he said, “After you. Please.”
He followed her in. Carrie stopped almost immediately on entering the foyer, her eyes on a large photograph that dominated the entry. Her eyes jerked to Gary. “You’re married to Leah?”
“Yeah,” he replied.
Tears appeared in Carrie’s eyes. “She was shot protecting my sister. I’m so sorry.”
Gary sucked in a breath, briefly speechless. Then he said, “Thanks. She’s going to recover.” He seemed to bite back tears, then waved them on. “In the dining room.”
Anthony followed Carrie into the room. The first thing he saw was a wall which was almost completely windows, framing a view of woods with a small stream running through them on the far side of the backyard. The backyard was as carefully manicured as the front, including a gravel path leading to a small wooden bridge over the stream.
A dark, most likely antique table with eight chairs dominated the dining room.
At the head of the table was Wolfram Schmidt from the Internal Revenue Service. The last time Anthony had seen Schmidt, the IRS agents had tied zip ties around Anthony’s wrists in a hotel room on the West Coast. Schmidt wore jeans and a button down white shirt, and stood beside a large whiteboard. Halfway down the table, Bear Wyden sat. Files were open in front of him. Next to him, a youngish looking woman in a suit, with nearly white hair and an annoyed expression.
Leah Simpson sat in a recliner in one corner of the room, looking pale with her feet up. Another man Anthony didn’t recognize sat across from Bear, who stood up as Anthony and Carrie entered the room.
“Folks, I want to introduce you to Anthony Walker … and Carrie Sherman. Before you panic, Anthony is with
T
he
Washington Post
, and I
asked
him to be here.”
“Have you lost your mind?” the woman with white hair asked.
Bear grinned. “Anthony, let me introduce Emma Smith, from the Internal Revenue Service. Across from me is Scott Kelly, from Diplomatic Security. He’s an old colleague of mine. In the corner nursing a grudge—and a bullet wound—is Leah Wy— um … Leah Simpson.”
Leah made a sour face at Bear.
Schmidt said, “I don’t know that bringing the press into this is a good idea.”
“Just hear me out for five minutes,” Anthony said. “If you want to throw us out then, feel free.”
Schmidt looked at his watch, making him the first person Anthony had seen in a year who actually wore one anymore. “You have five minutes. Talk.”
Anthony swallowed. “I have information you need for the grand jury. Information that will put Richard Thompson and Leslie Collins away for a very long time.”
Schmidt didn’t respond, but Emma Smith looked skeptical. Anthony continued. “First—in the last few days I’ve interviewed Adelina Thompson and most of her daughters.”
Emma shrugged her shoulders. “We’ve done the same, and probably got the same information.”
“I’m guessing you haven’t gotten in to see Prince George-Phillip.”
Emma sat forward, and Schmidt looked interested. “Tell me more,” he said.
“The Prince’s story lines up with Adelina’s. He is Carrie’s father. And—here’s the kicker. George-Phillip was responsible for the British investigation into the Wakhan massacre, and his conclusions and recommendations were very different from what was made public at the time. I have a copy of that report. And … I got back in from Afghanistan last night. I met with Vasily Karatygin.”
Bear grinned at that news. Schmidt merely raised an eyebrow.
Anthony looked at the others in the room and said, “On Monday morning, the
Post
is going to run a special report which will crucify Thompson and Collins. I’ve got hard evidence of their involvement in the procurement of chemical weapons.” Anthony went on to discuss what he had seen and learned in Afghanistan.
Schmidt said, “All right. What about her? Why is she here?”
Carrie said, “I’m the only person who can tell you anything about the inside of my parents’ marriage.”
“Plus,” Anthony said, “if she doesn’t stay, neither do I.”
Emma Smith closed her eyes. “Wolfram, this is all—”
“Yes, I know. It’s irregular. It’s … all mixed up. On the other hand, we’re taking on the CIA here. I think we might need some unusual allies. Walker—I can’t give you everything we have. It’s an ongoing investigation, and there are things we know that I cannot and will not tell you. But I can give you some information, off the record. In return, you give me everything you’ve got.”
Anthony said, “This is exclusive? I don’t want to find my information on CNN.”
“Of course. Have a seat.” Schmidt paused for just a moment then said, “Both of you.”
Anthony glanced at Carrie, who flashed him a smile. Both of them took seats at the table.
Bear leaned forward and said, “Before you came in, we were actually trying to figure out—a timeline, I guess. Who did what and when. We’ve had multiple parties involved in this.”
Anthony nodded.
Schmidt wrote on the white board in large letters:
*Who kidnapped Andrea Thompson? Why?
*Who opened the accounts in the Caymans in Richard Thompson’s name?
*Who murdered Mitch Filner and why?
*Who is Oz?
*Who did Ralph Myers work for?
*Who was involved in the shooting in Bethesda?
*Who attacked GP, the Bethesda condo and the house in San Francisco?
When he finished writing, Schmidt said, “And the biggest question is why?”
Bear said, “Well, we know the answers to some of these questions already.”
Schmidt said, “Let’s take them from the top?”
Bear Kelly said, “Our kidnappers were Tyler Coleman and Tariq Koury. Koury is a fairly well-known mercenary; he did a lot of work for CIA and SIS over the years in Iraq and Saudi Arabia. Coleman was a US Special Forces veteran who worked for a shell company until 2011. Brennan Holdings.”
Emma said, “Brennan Holdings is a CIA shell company. Leslie Collins set it up in the mid-2000s.”
Bear said, “We can prove that?”
Emma nodded. “Yes, we’ve got him cold on that. The only question is, was it Collins’ personal operation, or did it have official sanction? We don’t have any way of knowing at this point.”
Anthony said, “In the end, it doesn’t matter. The Agency will deny it no matter what the real answer is.” Anthony thought it was interesting that none of the federal agents in the room disagreed with him. “Can I use that? Off the record?”
Schmidt looked at Bear, who shrugged. Then he looked back at Anthony. “All right. How do you guys usually write it? An
unidentified source close to the investigation?
I’ll verify that the kidnappers worked for Brennan and that Collins founded that organization.”
Scott Kelly said, “We also know Mitch Filner worked with Collins,
and
with Brennan, and turned up dead last week with a stab wound. We’ve got video evidence of Filner and Collins eating lunch together the day after the kidnapping.”
Anthony’s eyes widened. It was a lot of coincidences, but serious ones. He took out his notebook and began making notes.
Carrie leaned forward and said, “Why would Collins want to kidnap Andrea?”
Anthony said, “I actually have a theory about that.”
Schmidt replied in a droll tone, “Please enlighten us.”
“Okay. Number one—Andrea and Carrie’s birth father is Prince George-Phillip. Number two—George-Phillip conducted the British investigation into Wakhan. He fingered Thompson, Collins and Prince Roshan as the key players behind the massacre.
And
he recommended going public with the findings of the investigation. I have a copy here, which he personally handed to me. Number three—Prime Minister Thatcher personally squashed the findings because of the Cold War. Both the British and US Administrations wanted maximum propaganda value out of blaming the Soviets for the attack. I think Collins ordered the kidnapping assuming that it would go off without a hitch, Andrea’s body would have been disposed of and her parentage would never come up. He assumed—correctly—that if it became public Thompson wasn’t her father, then further examination of his life would end up exposing Wakhan.”
Schmidt nodded. “So a public official ordered the kidnapping and murder of a US citizen—and a child—in order to preserve his own position.”
Bear said, “It’s consistent with everything we know.”
“What about the accounts in the Caymans?” Schmidt said.
Emma leaned forward. “All right, what we know for sure is that Julia Wilson had nothing to do with it. After a lot of arm twisting, we obtained video from the banks in question. Yes, a woman opened the accounts, personally. No, it wasn’t her. I’m guessing another contractor for Collins—the accounts were opened only a week after the White House settled on Thompson as the new SECDEF. Collins was laying the groundwork to discredit Thompson, in the event Thompson tried to blame Collins for Wakhan—which he did in the hearings this week.”
“Some of the media’s going along with it,” Scott Kelly said.
“Exactly,” Schmidt said. He looked at Anthony. “No offense. All of this is off the record until we say so, clear?”