Out of Range: A Novel (22 page)

Chapter Forty-one

T
he rattletrap van driven by the four men Charlie had hired was leaking oil and belching blue smoke as they caravaned along the A377. His stolen Mercedes could easily have been cruising along at a hundred miles per hour, even on these thump-and-bump Uzbek roads, but he had to cut that speed in half in order to accommodate the shortcomings of the other vehicle. So he found himself checking his watch every four minutes, muttering under his breath and trying to push aside his nightmarish fantasies about what Julie might be going through.

At this speed, Charlie calculated that they’d be at Byko’s compound in less than forty minutes, but what then? He knew where the bathhouse was and had a vague idea about where he was headed when he’d managed to capsize the Escalade into the river, but he really had no idea where Julie was being held. And the compound had to be at least a hundred square miles.

So as soon as they passed through the provincial city of Kokand and Charlie had a strong enough cell signal, he put in a call to Garman. It rang four times before going to voice mail. Charlie hung up and tried again—with the same result. He wondered if Garman was too ashamed to pick up the phone. So he borrowed Salim’s mobile and tried again.

After two rings, there he was with the blandest of greetings. “Garman.”

“It’s Charlie.”

“Oh hey,” Garman replied with far too much enthusiasm. “Good to hear your voice. Where are you?”

“Still in the Valley. And I managed to pick up some local hires. I’m heading back to the base but I’m going to need some help.”

“Like I told you, Charlie, I’m really not sure what I can do for you at this point.”

“Look, I know that Byko had her in some kind of ultrasecure compound near the bathhouse. They were driving me north on a road that crossed a river, supposedly heading right to her. Do you have any idea where they might have been taking me?”

“That’s really remote country. I don’t know that area at all.”

“The bathhouse was part of an old Soviet missile complex. That mean anything to you?”

“Yeah, yeah, that was Vasilevsky,” Garman replied. “I remember Byko bought it after it got decommissioned.”

“Well, someone somewhere must have some old maps of the area.”

“I could check into it, but I really don’t know what that’s going to tell you. I mean, you need some pretty specific intel if you’re going to be storming the place yourself with a half-dozen amateurs.”

“Don’t you think I know that?” Charlie snapped. “Jesus Christ, Garman. I get you have to protect your family, I get you couldn’t throw together a unit at the eleventh hour, but now I’m asking you to do whatever you can. From behind your goddamn desk. After I told you Europe and America are going to burn. Do you have a shred of honor left in you at all?”

There was a long pause.

Charlie cursed himself, certain Garman was about to hang up on him.

But when Garman finally spoke, the tone in his voice was suddenly different—he was grave and focused. “You said SAS was supposed to hit the location? That MI6 was putting their satellite on it after you gave them the tip?”

“That’s right,” Charlie said.

“Look,” Garman replied, “this is a long shot, okay? But I know this guy who worked for the contractor that built the British spy satellites. There’s absolutely no way to snoop on the imaging—the encryption is totally secure—but he told me once that there was some kind of bug in the telemetry.”

“What kind of bug?”

“MI6 has to send TopSat a GPS location to point the camera at. If you could intercept that GPS coordinate, you’d know exactly where the satellite was looking. Presumably by now MI6 has been over every inch of that compound and homed in on their best guess as to where Byko is.”

“And if he’s already fled the compound, the satellite should be tracking him to wherever he’s going.”

“That’s right. Hopefully for you, that would lead you to Julie.”

“Make the call,” Charlie said.

T
he moment he got off with Garman, Charlie dialed Becca. On the third ring, Charlie heard someone fumble for the phone, then his sister-in-law’s English-accented voice, slightly muted, “Careful, sweetie, hold on to the side of the tub! Ollie can help you. Ollie, can you . . .”

Charlie felt a rush of emotion. He had dialed Becca almost reflexively and told himself he was merely calling to get an update on Ollie and Meagan. But hearing them now, splashing around in the tub, falsetto voices chirping, he was faced with a rather grim reality. Considering what he was about to do, this might be the last time he ever spoke to his children. And he realized that was in fact precisely the reason he was calling.

“Hello, is that you, Charlie?”

He did his best to put on an optimistic tone of voice. “Sounds like everybody there’s doing okay.”

“Yeah. We’re good.”

“Oh good,” Charlie responded, not knowing what else to say.

“Do you have an update for me?” she asked tentatively.

“I know where she is. And I have some help now.”

She lowered her voice to an urgent whisper. “Can you tell me what this is all about, Charlie?”

“Now’s not the time.”

In the background he heard Ollie shout, “Is that Dad?”

“They’ve been asking about you,” Becca said. “Obviously.”

“Well put him on.”

There was some rattling and rustling, then Ollie spoke, his voice sounding tentative and uncertain. “Hey, Dad.”

“Hey, tiger!”

“Where are you?”

“A place called the Fergana Valley. Where your mom and I used to work.”

“Isn’t that where I was born?”

“That’s right, it is.”

There was a brief pause, then Ollie said, “The police are here. They’re checking around everywhere. In my drawers and closet and everything.” Ollie paused, his voice quivering. “They said you might not be coming back.”

“Of course I’m coming back!” Charlie said sharply. “I would
never
leave you.” In truth, there was absolutely no way he could promise that and Charlie hated himself for lying.

“What about Mom?” Ollie asked. “Did you find her?”

“Not yet. But I will.”

He was digging himself an even deeper hole now.

“You swear to God, Dad?”

Deeper still.

“By all the angels in heaven,” Charlie said.

“Okay.”

“I love you, little man. You know that.”

“Yeah.”

Charlie wanted to give his son some words of wisdom, something for him to hold on to, in case they never spoke again, but what could he say to a six-year-old that wouldn’t scare or confuse him?

“Take care of your little sister,” was the best Charlie could come up with.

“I always do,” Ollie said and that nearly broke his father’s heart.

“Can I talk to Becca again?”

Becca came back on. “Hey.”

“The cops are there?”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t know what good it would do to upset you.”

“You keep those assholes away from the kids. They have no right to talk to them.”

“I know. I will.”

“They told them I wasn’t coming back?”

“They’re just trying to get to you.”

“Well, it’s not going to work. And you can tell them as much.”

The line was silent for a moment. Then Becca called his name. There was a strident urgency in the way she said, “Charlie!” and he was pretty sure he didn’t want to hear what was coming next. “No matter what happens now, you know I’ll be there for Ollie and Meagan, but . . .” Becca’s voice broke and her words trailed off. “I don’t know what kind of risks you’re taking over there, but if there’s any danger of you not coming back . . . you know she’d tell you to come home.”

Charlie swallowed hard. He knew what it took for Becca to say that. “And I’d tell her to cut the shit.”

“All I’m saying is you don’t have anything to prove. You know that, don’t you?”

“That’s not what this is about,” he told her.

“Okay,” she said softly. “I love you. And I’m sorry I lied to you.” Her voice cracked a bit and he heard her crying.

“I love you, too,” he told her. “Everything’s going to be all right.”

“Okay,” she said. He could hear how desperately she needed to believe that.

“Put Meagan on, okay?”

Charlie heard more splashing around and childish banter, then Meagan came to the phone. Unlike Ollie, she was chipper and playful. The power of denial, Charlie thought. It started so young. Oh, how he wished he could tap into some of that now. They talked about her preschool and Ollie’s habit of stealing her toys. She didn’t ask where he was and he didn’t volunteer it, she didn’t ask if he was coming home soon and he didn’t make any uncertain promises. She said Becca had to wash her hair now and he told her that was a good idea. She said she loved him and he tried to keep his voice from cracking as he said he loved her, too. Then he hung up, staring at the red button which had disengaged them.

“End,” it said.

He put the phone away and felt Salim looking at him.

“My children,” Charlie explained.

Salim half-nodded. “I am very sorry for what happened to your wife. You are one of only people tried to help us. You left before we could say thank you.”

“Well, I’m back now,” Charlie said ironically, thinking about what Becca had said. That he should come home. That he didn’t have anything to prove.

“Tomorrow is birthday of Andijan,” Salim continued. “There will be many people there. For the memory of what happened. There will be candles and singing and remembering.”

Charlie couldn’t imagine the regime sanctioning something like that. “Is there usually an event staged on the anniversary?”

Salim shrugged. “This is first time I have heard of such a thing.”

So while mourners were sitting vigil for their lost friends and family members, Byko would be creating more mourning families all across the globe. Charlie still couldn’t fathom what had happened to Byko that it would come to this.

“I will go there,” Salim said. “Unless you still need my help.”

Charlie looked at him. He knew this was the boy’s way of trying to connect. To acknowledge Charlie’s sacrifice. But he couldn’t fight back the urge to warn him: “You shouldn’t go there. No matter what.”

“The government cannot come again, not to the same place on the same day. With the world watching.”

“The world isn’t watching, Salim. The world doesn’t care.”

“The world is getting smaller,” Salim replied. “That is why Byko plans what he plans. Yes . . . ?”

It was an unusual insight for a boy who’d spent his entire life in an isolated little border town. Charlie considered Salim’s wisdom for a moment, but rejected it. Salim was giving the drug-addled megalomaniac too much credit.

“Byko’s suffered,” Charlie said. “Now he wants others to feel the same. It’s nothing more than that.”

Salim nodded. He’d seen his own share of suffering and that seemed to be a concept he could understand. “Then we must stop him,” Salim said quietly. “At any cost.”

Charlie looked at him. Two days ago, he was making dinner for Julie and the kids in Santa Monica, waiting for them to come home from Disneyland, wondering if he could find a way to save his job. Now here he was, driving a stolen Mercedes through the oustkirts of Uzbekistan alongside this brave kid with his battered rifle, contemplating what they needed to do to alter history.

He nodded grimly at Salim.

“At any cost.”

Chapter Forty-two

A
s far as Hopkins knew, both the Prime Minister and the President of the United States had failed to get through to His Majesty Islam Karimov. And when Hopkins had suggested that they pursue a preemptive strike, going around the Uzbek government the way the U.S. Special Forces had circumvented the Pakistanis in the raid on Osama bin Laden, Bryce simply scoffed at him. Bin Laden had been the most wanted man in the world. Alisher Byko had done nothing yet and all they had on him was circumstantial evidence. It was simply impossible.

So here was Hopkins, staring at the satellite image in the War Room. The bird had been glued to the location that Charlie Davis had given them: the bathhouse, several outbuildings, and a parking lot with five American-made SUVs. But there’d been no sign of movement. No guards patrolling, no vehicles in and out, nothing.

“How long has it been?” he asked the satellite tech.

“Two hours, twenty-six minutes, sir.”

It didn’t make any sense. Surely Byko had to be aware that Charlie Davis had escaped. Surely Byko had to know that Charlie would call the Western intelligence agencies. And most surely, that had to make Byko nervous. What then had Byko been doing for the past three hours? Sitting around the bathhouse, taking a steam? Could he be that arrogant?

Hopkins pointed at a small round object on the screen. It was difficult sometimes to make out what things were from the high perspective of the satellite and this one had been puzzling him for a while.

“What is this?” Hopkins asked the image analyst.

The tech was a thin young man whose face seemed to be stuck in a perpetual wince. “Mm. No shadow. That means it’s more or less flush with the ground. Two meters in diameter. Possibly some sort of drainage pipe. Mm. No. Wait. Not drainage. Ventilation. It’s probably the cap on a ventilation shaft.”

Hopkins felt a sudden burst of irritation with himself. “Christ,” he said. How had he missed this? If this was what he thought it was—

“Decrease magnification fifty percent,” Hopkins said sharply.

The tech’s fingers tapped away on the keys of his workstation. The screen blinked and a new image wavered into view, this one displaying a much larger area. Hopkins reoriented himself . . .

There was the bathhouse. There was the ventilation shaft. About two feet higher on the screen, he saw a second small round blob, identical to the ventilation shaft near the bathhouse. According to the scale at the bottom of the screen, roughly three hundred yards separated the two.

“Decrease mag another fifty percent,” Hopkins said.

More tapping. Another view. This time a third blob, now no more than a handful of pixels. The distance from the first to the second to the third shaft was identical. And you could draw a straight line right through the lot of them.

A tunnel. There was a bloody tunnel leading due north.

“Maps!” he shouted. “Do we have maps of this facility?”

One of the techs fiddled with her computer. “No sir. The facility predates our satellites.” She cleared her throat delicately. “Only the Americans had satellites when this facility was built.”

Hopkins quickly dialed Eric Nielsen, his counterpart at the NSA. “Eric, it’s Frank Hopkins. Have you got maps of the old Vasilevsky Missile Complex?”

“Mind my asking why, buddy?”

“Do you have them or not?”

“Of course we do. But what are you looking for?”

“As you know, Byko’s current location is in the complex. But I think Byko escaped from that location through some kind of tunnel. I want to know where that tunnel leads.”

Nielsen was silent for a moment. Finally he said, “Ah. Yes. There is a tunnel leading due north to another location. This map is almost fifty years old. Satellite imagery was in its infancy, so it’s pretty crude. But there was a sort of central node about thirty miles north. As best we can tell, the tunnel went all the way there. According to this map, it was the command center for the missile complex.”

“Damnit! You need to task a satellite on that location right now! Byko’s probably already there. He may even be gone by now.”

There was a long pause. “Actually, we’ve already got a bird on that location.”

Hopkins felt his face grow hot. “And when the hell were you planning to tell us about that?”

“Hey, hey, easy, pal. You asked us to check out the whole area. So that seemed like our next logical step.”

“Might have been nice if you’d told us.”

“Nothing’s popped up yet, okay? But we’re on it.”

How many birds did the Americans have? How many locations were they watching? It was a waste of time even asking. He’d been down this road before with the Americans. The CIA was bad enough. But the NSA? There had been a time when they had employed more than twenty thousand people and had a budget that was literally bigger than the GDP of 90 percent of the countries in Africa, and the Americans wouldn’t even publicly admit that it existed.

“Do keep us in mind if you find anything, Eric,” Hopkins said acidly. Then he broke the connection and turned to the comms tech. “Put Sturbridge on the line.”

A few seconds later, Hopkins was connected to the commander of the SAS. “We may have to change the destination,” he said. He gave Sturbridge the GPS coordinates of the command center.

Sturbridge repeated the numbers back to Hopkins, then asked, “Any word on authorization?”

“Not yet,” Hopkins said tersely.

“We’re twenty minutes from Uzbek air space. What’s the holdup?”

“It’s a diplomatic issue. You’ll be the first to know when it’s resolved.” Hopkins hung up the phone. It was decision time. The UK had only one satellite in that quadrant of the globe. Should he take the chance and vector to the new location?

“Sir?” The satellite tech looked up expectantly. There was no question what he was asking.

“Do it,” Hopkins said.