Authors: Alan Jacobson
“Have they been compromised?”
“I don’t believe so—nothing that can’t be remedied. But there are risks.”
“Yes, well, if we had an alternative we’d use it. We don’t.” He stepped to the right, where Vail was standing. “This young lady certainly needs no introduction—the source of my pain and suffering. Karen Vail.”
Vail tilted her head. “Excuse me?”
Buck frowned. “Let’s just say that you ruined a perfectly good operation.”
Vail looked to DeSantos.
“Hussein Rudenko,” Buck said. “The Shakespeare manuscript.”
Vail snorted. “It might’ve been a ‘good’ operation if you hadn’t forgotten one key thing—telling me that you were
running
an operation.”
Please don’t say it. Please don’t say that I didn’t need to know.
“Very few were read into that mission,” Buck said. “And you were not one of those select few we deemed necessary to inform.”
“Surely there were better ways of carrying out the objective of—”
“Since you are not an expert on British intelligence or on the vagaries of British society, I suggest you keep your trap shut.”
Vail stepped forward. “What?”
“You heard me. You’re here because I wanted you here, Agent Vail. You are a tool at my disposal. That’s it. If I swing you, you strike the nail. You don’t get to have independent thought.”
Vail put both hands on her hips. “Is that right? Well, to hell with you, director general. This
tool
is taking the express train to Heathrow. Is that independent enough for you?” Vail turned to leave, but the two beefy men blocked her path. “Move it, assholes.” But the men stood erect, hands clasped in front of them, daring her to make a move and doubting she could do anything to challenge them.
“Karen,” DeSantos said evenly. “Karen, let’s not lose sight of the bigger picture. We need to turn our emotions off. Facts and the greater good.”
Vail turned to face him. “Facts and the greater good?”
“Yes. We’ve got a chemical weapon loose. And terrorists trying to deploy it. First here, and if we don’t stop them, in the US. Aden Buck is not our enemy.”
Vail snorted, then turned to face Buck. “Were you responsible for that kidnapping stunt?”
Buck looked at her but did not answer.
“You son of a bitch. I thought I was going to be decapitated!”
“Agent Vail, I thought you were smarter than that.” When she did not answer, he said, “That was the point, you daft fool! You’d served your purpose, and you played your part well. But you were becoming a problem. I couldn’t just have you eliminated, and I couldn’t arrest or deport you without causing a stir—because it’d tip off the very terrorists this operation is designed to capture. You left us no choice but to scare the living daylights from you. And have you decide on your own to go back home.”
Vail felt DeSantos’s grip around her bicep. It tightened as Buck continued.
And it’s a good thing, because right now I think I could strangle the bastard. Now
that
would be for the ‘greater good.’
“C’mon,” DeSantos said by her ear. “We need to get out of here. Before one of us does something we’ll both regret later.”
He gave a gentle nudge and she submitted to his advice. At the moment, she was not exactly thinking clearly.
“Mr. Cruz,” Buck said. “You mustn’t leave before we conduct the business purpose of our meeting. I have something for you.”
One of Buck’s companions handed him a smartphone-type device. The top half of the vertical face was a small screen, with a physical keyboard beneath it.
“To reduce the risk we face by meeting in person, you’ll use a highly secure mobile that sends text messages using a microburst architecture. It’s called CLAIR, though don’t ask me what it stands for because I’m not a tech guru and I wouldn’t remember even if they told me. Suffice it to state that it’s a high bandwidth, low power device that will only transmit a message between my handset and yours. Both units share the same hardware key so the encrypted messages sent between them can only be decoded by them.”
“So even if someone could intercept the messages,” Reid said, “they’ll be unreadable.”
“Precisely.”
“Does it keep a log of the texts?” Vail asked.
“No. Thirty minutes after receiving or sending a message, the flash memory self-erases by writing over itself repeatedly with random bytes. The log and the messages are electronically shred. In brief, it’s safe to use. Just be sure to leave it on at all times so it can make full use of its security features.”
“Do you want manual confirmation of sent messages?” DeSantos asked.
“Not necessary. There’s an encryption protocol built in for the devices to confirm that the text was received.”
DeSantos looked at the handset and shoved it into his pocket. “Charger?”
“It’s a low power device. The battery will last three weeks, well beyond the duration of your assignment. I will make arrangements to get it back from you when you have completed this mission. You will not see me again. It’s too risky.”
Yeah, considering what we went through to make it here alive, I agree.
“Only your handset and mine can communicate with each other?” DeSantos asked.
“Correct.”
“So,” Vail said, “If I texted that number, he wouldn’t receive it?”
“Precisely.”
Vail pulled out her BlackBerry.
“You don’t believe me?”
“Trust has to be earned. And you haven’t earned mine. Just the opposite, in fact,” she said as she typed out a test message to both DeSantos’s real phone and the MI5 device. After Buck gave her the number, she hit send. Nothing happened.
Buck, wearing a self-satisfied grin, said, “You won’t get service down here. We’re quite deep underground, and we’ve installed signal damping devices to prevent hackers and other unwanted malfeasants from eavesdropping.”
“We’re lacking some key intel,” DeSantos said.
“Right you are. Here’s what we know.” Buck nodded at one of his men, who switched on a handheld LCD projector and aimed it at a square of the wall that had been painted white. An array of five faces splashed across the makeshift screen.
“There are multiple targets. Rudenko is not a target; I repeat, he is not a target. We want him captured alive. We, the US, and Interpol have an array of questions for him.”
Vail had to keep herself from laughing. “You really think a guy like that is going to talk?”
Buck tightened his jaw. “Leave that to us. He is to be captured, not killed. Is that clear?” His gaze touched on the eyes of the three of them.
Clear to me.
Obviously believing that he had made his point, Buck turned his attention back to the faces on the wall. He activated a laser pointer and aimed it at the images on the right. “We’ve identified three lieutenants: Ratib Morsi, Emir Dhul Fiqar, and Nikola Hačko. They’re to be taken alive, if possible. The other two, Malik al-Atah and Farkhad Gogun, are expendable and are to be eliminated, as they’re likely the triggers. If we dispose of al-Atah and Gogun, we may be able to put off the attack, at least until we grab up Rudenko. They’re pawns and will not know anything of value. They’re given their instructions at the last moment.” He pointed at DeSantos’s pocket. “I will send you a secure message as soon as we have locations on any of these people. As well as any collaborators that we learn of. So be aware.”
“Nikola,” Vail said. “A woman?”
“Croatian,” Buck said. “We think she was a love interest of Morsi or Fiqar, but we don’t know for sure. However she hooked on with Rudenko’s group, what we do know is that she’s now intimately involved in the deployment of the weapons. She holds a degree in chemical engineering. One of her specialties is water processing and food treatment. Ideal for ricin.” He turned to Vail. “Are you aware that we’re looking for ricin stores appropriated from Libya?”
“That’s one of the few things I do know.”
“What do you know about weaponized ricin?”
“It’s made from castor beans and it’s a stable toxin. That’s about it. Well, that and I should avoid it at all costs.”
“Yes, well, this is not our first run-in with ricin. Arab terrorists were captured with it in London some years back. If you’re a terrorist, the advantages of ricin are clear: it’s extremely toxic and you can do your damage through multiple vectors: inhalation, ingestion, or injection. As I said, Nikola Hačko’s expertise makes contamination of water or food supplies an obvious threat. But the toxin can also be aerosolized as a liquid or a powder.”
“So it’s nearly impossible to guard against,” Vail said.
“Precisely. And since it only takes one milligram—a grain of salt—to kill an adult, the problem is not to be understated. I fully expect them to announce their attack, but if they don’t, symptoms we’ll be watching for are bloody diarrhea, nausea and vomiting, abdominal cramps, internal bleeding, liver and kidney failure, heart failure, and, well, death.”
“Have you put out a public health notice?”
“Can’t, not without instilling panic—and tipping off the very people we’re trying to apprehend. The National Health Service has put hospitals on alert, but the home secretary classified it as a potential infectious disease of unknown origin. It kills in less than an hour—or overnight—depending on a number of factors. Bottom line, if we’re not diligent, if we don’t do our jobs, this will be disastrous. There’s no vaccine or prophylactic antitoxin, so you people are our one and only front line in this battle.”
Nothing like a little pressure.
“Other than securing the ricin stores,” DeSantos said, “what are our mission objectives? And what kind of support can we expect?”
“You are to capture Rudenko and at least one of his two lieutenants. Dispose of the trigger men. Equally important, after you secure the chemical weapons, obtain any intel on a US attack they’ve reportedly been planning.”
“That’s all?” Vail asked. “I mean, where’s the challenge? We should be able to wrap all this up in a couple of hours.”
Buck squinted and stepped forward. “I don’t like you, Agent Vail.”
“Understood, sir. Not all men are good with tools.”
“As to backup,” Buck said firmly, keeping his eyes on Vail but addressing DeSantos, “you’ve got a skeleton crew. Reid here. Carter from our Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre. I might be able to bring a couple more assets on board, but the fewer we read in, the better for everyone involved. We’ve got a serious compromise of the Security Services, and we’ve been unable to identify the individual or individuals responsible. We’re making progress, but it’s been slow. It’s being done by a select number of trusted men and women.”
He walked to the desk on his left and opened an envelope. He turned it upside down and dumped several small digital cards into his hand. “SIMs, for your phones. Four for each of you. Use them wisely.”
Vail took them and distributed the small, plastic-encased devices to Reid and DeSantos.
Buck dropped the envelope back on the desk. “Now, time to get you three back out there. You’re not going to solve these problems standing around in a disused tube station, are you now?”
“We have a slight problem that’s gotta be dealt with,” DeSantos said. “I’ve left a body count behind me and my—
our
forensics are all over every crime scene, not to mention that one of Rudenko’s men had to be disposed of in Agent Vail’s hotel room.”
Buck chewed his bottom lip as he considered this. “Because of the infiltrators, the manpower I’m able to devote to this is slim. And I have to be extremely discreet in who I share your mission with. So there’s only so much I can do. I’ll see if we can run a counter op to divert the Met’s investigation. Or at least slow it down. I’ll see if the home secretary can play a role.” When there were no other questions, he said, “Now, be gone.”
As they turned to leave, Buck said, “Except for you, Mr. Reid. I have some internal files to review with you. If we can root out this mole—or at least narrow it down—I may be able to free up some assets.” He looked at Vail and made a shooing gesture with his hands. “Go on.”
34
D
eSantos put on the dark-rimmed glasses and Lundberg Stetson hat Vail had gotten him, and Vail pulled on her wool cap, carefully tucking in all of her red hair. She slipped on a pair of sunglasses.
DeSantos’s jaw was tight as he fingered the communication device Buck had given him. He was silent as they walked along Lincoln’s Inn Fields public square, and Vail could tell something was bothering him.
“What is it?”
“Nothing.”
“You realize trying to put one over on a profiler isn’t usually a very successful strategy.”
“Believe me, Karen, you don’t want to know.”
“See, that’s where you’ve got it wrong. I do want to know. But you don’t think I need to know. If there’s one thing you should know about me, it’s that I always want to know.”
“If you’re trying to make me laugh, to make me feel better, it’s not working.”
She pulled him through the glass door entrance of the Starbucks on High Holborn Street and ordered two lattes. When she rejoined him at the table, as far from the window as they could get in the small café, his brow was hard and he was shaking his leg.
“I got you decaf. Looks like you’re amped up enough.” She looked around to make sure no one was picking up on their conversation. It was loud and the coffee grinder groan echoed off the walls, so she figured they were safe to talk.
“Enough brooding. What the hell’s crawled up your ass?”
DeSantos took the drink and sipped it. He looked at her over the top of his mug, as if deciding what to tell her. Finally he set it down and leaned forward, across the table. She joined him somewhere in the middle. To anyone observing from outside, they would look like lovers sharing an intimate moment.
“My orders are to take out our man.”
“As in kill?”
DeSantos looked at her. “What do you think?”
Would’ve been nice to know.
“Go on.”
“There was a standing order issued by President Whitehall years ago to eliminate him using any means possible. Kind of like bin Laden, but much lower profile. Whereas we announced we were going to hunt down and kill bin Laden, we kept this a tightly guarded secret. Two years ago, the Agency got rare intel that our guy was at a meeting in a desert villa in Syria. We launched a drone strike, but he narrowly escaped and went deeper underground. We talked about numerous missions to hunt him down, but President Nunn rescinded the order.”
“Why would he do that?”
“No idea.”
“And now? What’s changed?”
“The Middle East. The Arab Spring, Libya’s fall. Assad’s collapse. Chemical weapons, missiles, grenade launchers, all sorts of sophisticated munitions that were once under tight control were suddenly available for the taking. Knox, Tasset, and McNamara knew this meant that our man would resurface—and be on the hunt for whatever he could get his hands on. So they met for five weeks hammering out a plan.”
“But?”
“But the president said no.”
“Nunn refused to reinstate the kill order?”
“Right. That’s why OPSIG’s involved. That’s why I’m here. That’s a big reason why this is a black op.”
She looked down at her latte. “Again, you haven’t been honest with me.”
“Need to know. Are we going to go through this again?”
She took a drink, trying to sort through her emotions. “Fine. Go with me on this. What happens when you kill him, and Buck tells the home secretary that you were the one who did it, and then it gets back to those people in the government who don’t know about your black op—like President Nunn? Isn’t the idea of a black op that those in charge—even the entire country—has deniability?”
“More or less.”
“You’ll be hung out to dry.”
And so will I.
“Sometimes that’s what you have to do. Greater good, remember? Those weren’t just hollow words, Karen. I meant them.”
“Don’t you think you should’ve leveled with me from the start?”
“No.”
Two large men in suits entered. Though they didn’t give Vail and DeSantos so much as a once-over, Vail now had a visceral reaction to a well dressed man—something she hoped to get over before returning home.
She set her latte down. “Let’s get out of here.”
They walked in silence toward the Holborn Underground station. After making their way to the platform, the train pulled to a stop in front of them. “Mind the gap,” the female voice said.
They got onto an empty car. “You’ve drawn me into this mess,” Vail finally said. “I’m risking my career—not to mention my life. I didn’t sign on for that.”
“When you became an FBI agent, you swore to protect and defend the United States of America. Yeah, fine, you now chase serial killers rather than terrorists. And you’ve saved dozens of lives over the years. But I’m talking about something on an entirely different scale: the lives of thousands, hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people. All hinging on what we do, or don’t do, next.”
Don’t you think I know this?
Vail sat down in resignation. “You should’ve given me that choice. Wouldn’t that have been the fair thing to do?”
“Fair? Life isn’t fair, Karen. But I know you. You wouldn’t have done anything different. Even if I’d told you everything up front, you still would be at my side looking to find these WMD and taking Hussein Rudenko out of circulation. Tell me I’m wrong.”
“I don’t know.”
“Bullshit.”
She sat through a couple of tube stops before answering. “It’s not as simple as that for me. I applied to the BAU because I wanted to be off the streets so there’d be less chance that I’d be involved in gun battles and bank robberies and terrorist attacks. I had a young son.” She laughed. “And I ended up chasing serial killers, almost getting killed by one of my own, tangling with drug cartels—” Vail looked up at him. “Not exactly safer than being on the street, is it?” She began to realize she was reminding herself of this as much as telling DeSantos of the resulting absurdity of her career decisions.
DeSantos grabbed the overhead handrail to steady himself. “Hey, you’re the shrink here, but I have some decent training and insight into people’s motivations, too. And I know that you care deeply about what you do, about keeping the public safe and catching the bad guys. That disease afflicts a lot of law enforcement officers, no matter what agency they’re with, no matter what city or government they work for. We all have different reasons for how we got where we are, but bottom line is, maintaining law and order, rounding up the vermin, working for the betterment of the good people on our watch—it’s in our DNA.”
Vail thought a long moment until the train lurched as it approached a station.
“I’ve got a son who’s fatherless. What about him?”
“He’s got Robby.”
Vail nodded. “And that’s been huge. But…”
“But.” DeSantos thought a moment, then squatted in front of her. “Maybe it wasn’t totally fair that I didn’t tell you the whole story. That’s the way I’ve operated almost my entire DOD career, and sometimes I forget that’s not what you’re accustomed to. So you’re free to go. If you want out before we get any deeper, I’m good with that. I understand. No hard feelings. And I’ll do my best to shield you. Tell them I forced you into it, blackmailed you, whatever. I’ll support your story. I’ll handle it on my end.” He stopped and waited a moment for Vail to respond. She sat there, unmoving, staring at the ground, tears straining her lower lids.
DeSantos stood up. He touched her shoulder and said, “Like I said, no worries. Thanks for all your help. I enjoyed running from the cops and chasing down the bad guys with you. But be careful. They’re still out there and still have you in their sights.” The tube car stopped and the doors opened. In the far reaches of her thoughts, she heard, “Mind the gap.”
When Vail finally looked up, DeSantos was no longer in front of her. She saw the back of his head through the window as the doors slid shut and the train pulled away from the station.