State of the Union (3 page)

G
ary Lawlor had taken his time getting to the apartment. Though more than twenty years had passed, he had not forgotten his tradecraft. After arriving at the airport in Frankfurt, he had taken a short commuter flight to Nürnberg and then a train to the outskirts of Berlin. Two taxis and a short subway ride later, he was back in the heart of a city that he had once known all too well. He dropped his suitcase off at an intermediate location and wandered the streets for a bit, getting his bearings before making his way over to check out the safe house.

The apartment had been selected because of its proximity to the Tiergarten, not far from the heart of what was then the commercial district of West Berlin. Lawlor noted that the reunification had only added to the area’s hustle and bustle. The Bahnhof Zoo, the bombed-out Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gedächtniskirche, and the towering Europa Center all drew large crowds, which made it easy to blend in. With his neutral-colored overcoat and dull gray suit, Gary Lawlor looked like any other German or Western European businessman making his way to an important luncheon meeting.

He took a circuitous route southward from the Nollendorfplatz, doubling back three times to make sure he wasn’t followed. With the situation as it was, it was utterly impossible to be
too
careful.

The nondescript Schöneberg district was filled with smoky cafés and a wide variety of ethnic restaurants. Though some of the businesses had turned over in the last two decades, most of the neighborhood was still exactly the same as he remembered. As Lawlor reached the top of the Goltzstrasse, where the apartment was located, he was ready to breathe a sigh of relief when something caught his eye. Three doors before the apartment, two men were sitting in a black BMW. One was smoking a cigarette while the other appeared to be reading the paper. Ordinarily, this might not seem like odd behavior, except that the car was parked right in front of a half empty café. Europe was all about café society and for these two men to be waiting for whatever it was they were waiting for in their car, instead of inside the café, gave Lawlor more than enough reason to pause. But, he couldn’t pause, not now. It would create too much suspicion. In the world Lawlor had been thrust back into, there had to be two reasons for every move you made, every word you said and every thing you did—the real reason and the completely plausible lie.

There were no stores or businesses to casually pop into where Lawlor was now walking. He had no choice but to keep moving and to hope that these men were just waiting for a friend.

It had been a long time since Lawlor had done actual fieldwork. His heart was pumping faster than it should have been and he fought to get it under control. All of his senses were on fire as adrenaline slammed through his bloodstream with each rapid thump of his heart. This was more than just an overactive imagination or the jitters. No, Lawlor knew the feeling all too well, just as he knew Berlin all too well. It was a feeling he had had many a night walking down the deadly backstreets on the other side of the wall. Something wasn’t right.

As he came up behind the BMW, he could see the cigarette smoker watching him approach in the side mirror. A quick glance toward the driver showed that though he still appeared to be engrossed in his newspaper, his eyes were actually riveted on the rearview mirror. Lawlor’s body stiffened. These men were not idly passing time, waiting for a friend to leave the café. They were conducting surveillance and Lawlor was willing to bet a year’s pay on what they were surveilling. The decision to abandon the apartment came so quickly, it was more of a reflex than a conscious choice, but that was how they had all been trained.

If the apartment had been compromised that could only mean one thing—someone knew about them. But who? How could that be possible? The operation had been one of their most closely guarded secrets.

There was no time to figure it all out now. Lawlor needed to get the hell away from the area and find a way to warn the others. At least he had picked up on the surveillance before entering the apartment building. God only knew what was waiting inside.

As he passed the BMW, Lawlor stole a quick glance at the passenger out of the corner of his eye. What he saw stopped his heart cold. It couldn’t be. The man he was looking at was dead. Lawlor knew this because he had killed him himself fifteen years ago. What the hell was going on? Was he paranoid? Was he seeing things? No, he had no reason to doubt his eyes, or his memory.

Even though nothing was making sense, Lawlor had to trust his instincts and his training. Raising his left shoulder and subtly turning his face away, he continued on. Despite what he had seen, he never once broke his stride.

Now two car lengths past, Lawlor began to entertain the thought that he might be home free until he heard what he knew were the sounds of the men getting out of the BMW and closing the doors behind them.

“
Entschuldigung, mein Herr?
” said the man who had been reading the paper in the car. Lawlor pretended not to hear and kept walking.

“
Herr,
” said the man again, “
bitte Halt!
”

In the reflection of a black panel truck, Lawlor could see the men quickening their pace behind him. If it hadn’t been obvious that he was the one they were speaking to, all doubts were erased when the man Lawlor thought he had killed said in English, “This is the last time we will ask you to stop.”

Lawlor knew that the men would be armed. Outrunning them, at least at this point, was not even a consideration. That being said, he was prepared in case something like this might happen and quite literally had something
up his sleeve
.

As he wouldn’t risk coming into the country with any weapons on his person or in his luggage, he had made a quick stop at a small shop near the train station in Nürnberg.

Lawlor stopped walking, his back to the two approaching men. He could still see them in the reflection of the black truck. Carefully bending his left wrist, he gently maneuvered the polished blade of the knife, which was hidden inside his sleeve, until he could feel the point in the palm of his hand. He then slowly shifted his weight to his right foot and drew his left arm across his chest. In one swift move he would drop his arm, delivering the handle of the blade into his palm, and lash out with the knife, hopefully killing the first attacker while he hit the other with the empty titanium briefcase he carried as a prop in his right hand. Unfortunately, Lawlor never got the chance.

The laser sight of the TASER X26 Shape Pulse Weapon painted a perfect red dot right in the center of his back. The men following him were more than six feet away when they saw his left arm disappear and his weight subtly shift to the right side. They didn’t plan on letting Lawlor get the better of them. There was a quick pop as the nitrogen propellant sent the barbed ballistic probes ripping through the air at over 180 feet per second and straight through his trench coat. The probes were attached to thin insulated wires, which delivered a series of high-voltage energy bursts, overwhelming Lawlor’s central nervous system. The result was an instant loss of neuromuscular control. In less than a second, he had slumped helplessly to the pavement and curled up into the fetal position, unable to think, speak, and—more importantly for his attackers—cry for help.

Stunned onlookers saw the knife drop from Lawlor’s hand. When they saw the two men expertly cuff and place their victim into the backseat of the BMW, they were convinced that they had just witnessed a very legitimate undercover police action.

As the car sped away in a cloud of burning rubber, no one had any idea how dangerously far off the mark they were.

T
hroughout the entire flight back, Scot tried to figure out what in the world could be going on.
Where the hell was Gary and what was the urgent matter of National Security that Driehaus was talking about?

Upon their arrival at Reagan National Airport, there were two cars waiting. One was there to take Meg Cassidy back to Scot’s apartment in Alexandria, while the other brought Harvath directly to Homeland Security headquarters.

When Harvath entered the director’s secure conference room, Driehaus gestured to a chair about halfway down the smooth oak table. Sitting to his right were CIA Director Vaile and FBI Director Sorce. Harvath nodded at Vaile and Sorce as Driehaus said, “We appreciate your coming back so quickly, especially considering the circumstances which had taken you out to California in the first place.”

Harvath was feeling guilty as hell for backing out of his father’s memorial service and wanted to put those feelings behind him for the time being. “You said this was a matter of urgent national security?”

“It is,” replied Driehaus as he extracted a thick blue folder from the accordion file sitting on the table in front of him, removed a series of glossy eight-by-ten photographs and handed them across the table to Harvath. “Do you recognize any of these men?” he asked.

Harvath was taken aback to see that the pictures were a mix of crime scene and autopsy photos of ten men who looked to range in age from their late forties to mid-sixties. Most looked to have been shot in the head while a couple had had their throats cut. After going through them a second time, he slid them back over to Driehaus and said, “I’ve never seen any of them before. Do their deaths have something to do with Gary’s disappearance?”

“Maybe,” responded FBI Director Sorce. “The bodies were found over the last several days and from the limited amount of information we’ve been able to uncover, all of these men were part of an Army Intelligence unit based in Berlin at the same time Gary was. What they were doing was highly classified and there is no record of it.”

“So what? Gary was already out of the army by the time he moved overseas. The fact that these guys were also with Army Intelligence is nothing more than coincidence.”

The minute the words were out of his mouth, Harvath wished he could take them back. He knew how lame he sounded. He also knew that even he didn’t really believe what he was saying. Of all people, Harvath was usually the first to say that there was no such thing as coincidence. That simple belief had saved his life more times than he cared to remember and he knew it was one of the primary tenets of the intelligence community.

“Agent Harvath, let’s back things up a bit here. I can appreciate your loyalty to Gary,” said Driehaus. “Why don’t we begin by having you tell us what you know about him.”

Harvath reached for the carafe of water on the table in front of him and poured a glass. He took a long sip as he collected his thoughts before speaking. “Gary Lawlor was a friend of my parents before I was even born. He’d been involved with Army Intelligence and met my father, who was a SEAL, when they were both in Vietnam. Through their work, they became pretty good friends and undertook several missions together. During one mission in particular, my father told me Gary had even saved his life. So, I guess you could say that if it wasn’t for Gary Lawlor, I wouldn’t be here today.”

Harvath paused and studied the faces across the table from him before continuing. “After leaving the Army, Gary and his wife lived in Europe for a while before he returned to pursue a career with the FBI, where he specialized in areas ranging from counterterrorism to white-collar crime. He was eventually promoted to Special Agent in Charge of the San Diego field office and that’s when I really got to know him.

“When my father died in the accident at the Naval Special Warfare Center in Coronado, Gary took a leave of absence from work to be with us and help us begin to put our lives back together.”

Remembering his father’s death and its aftermath caused Harvath to pause and seizing the opportunity, FBI Director Sorce asked, “Agent Harvath, did anyone ever talk to you about the death of Gary’s wife?”

“My mother did.”

“What did she tell you?”

“Heide had been accidentally hit by a car in Europe.”

“Did your mother tell you where in Europe they were when it happened?”

“It was in Germany, I think. What difference does it make?”

Now it was Director Vaile’s turn to speak. “Agent Harvath, do you know what they were doing in Germany?”

“Heide’s family was from there, and she owned an art gallery while Gary worked in investment banking.”

FBI Director Sorce looked first at Vaile then at Driehaus who both nodded. “Scot, Heide did own a gallery in West Berlin and Gary was on the rolls of an American investment banking firm there too, but that was just a front for what they were really doing.”

“What are you talking about?” asked Harvath, who leaned closer into the table as if it would force Sorce’s words to make more sense.

“Did you know that Gary speaks fluent Russian?”

“Gary? Russian? Are you serious?”

“Extremely.”

“No, I didn’t know he spoke Russian, but there’s lots of people that—”

“His grandmother was from Minsk,” continued Sorce as he removed a file of his own and began reading from it. “She emigrated to the U.S. after her husband died during the First World War. She remarried and had three children, one of whom was the daughter who married Gary’s father. Gary’s parents worked long hours, and the Russian grandmother practically raised him herself.

“He was somewhat of a prodigy. By the time he was six years old, he not only could speak Russian fluently, he was reading and writing it as well. It was a cradle language for him and he took to it as well as he did English.”

“So he’s of Russian descent. Big deal. So are a lot of people in America. If being from a country that embraced communism at one point is a crime, you’d better get ready to lock up over half of the people in Miami and a good majority of downtown San Francisco,” said Harvath.

“Let me finish,” replied Sorce. “It was precisely his Russian skills that made him so sought after in the Army and later with the FBI. Do you have any idea what Heide was really doing for a living before she was killed?”

“You said so yourself. She was an art dealer. My mother still has a lot of paintings from her gallery hanging in the house back in California.” A bad feeling was beginning to build in Harvath’s stomach. He didn’t like the way things were going and he assumed that they were only going to get worse. When CIA Director Vaile chimed back in, he knew his premonition had been correct.

“Gary and Heide Lawlor,” said Vaile, “were two of the United States’ top recruiters of foreign intelligence agents during the Cold War.”

There was a chuckle in Harvath’s voice as he spoke. “Heide Lawlor worked for U.S. Intelligence turning spies for us?”

Nobody else at the table was smiling. The three faces staring back at Harvath appeared to be carved of granite.

“Their focus was on Eastern Europe,” continued Vaile. “Heide Lawlor spoke German, Polish, and Czech. Gary handled the Russian transactions.”

“You’re not kidding, are you?” asked Harvath.

“He’s not kidding,” said Sorce. “In fact, Gary and Heide were so successful, they even received medals from the president in eighty-one at a top-secret ceremony at the White House.”

Harvath had never heard any of this. And though it was difficult to believe, it did fit Gary Lawlor’s character perfectly. The thing that scared Scot the most, though, was the realization of how little he might really know about Gary’s past.

“I had no idea.”

“What you also probably didn’t know was that Heide’s death was no accident.”

Though Scot tried to maintain an impassive countenance, today would not have been a good day to play poker. Heide Lawlor had always been his “Aunt Heide.” As she and Gary didn’t have any children of their own, she chose to spoil him every chance she got. Christmases, birthdays, it didn’t matter. Heide never needed a reason to show how much she cared for him. Now, the realization that Heide had been murdered sent a sharp pain rocketing through his heart.

Harvath asked, “Did Gary know?”

“Yes,” said Vaile, “Gary knew.”

“Who did it? And don’t just tell me it was the Russians. I want to know who specifically, killed her.”

“His name was Helmut Draegar.”

“
Was?
”

“Yes,
was
. He was undoubtedly the best operative the infamous East German Stasi had ever produced. His reputation was larger than life itself. It was said that he was the only man Carlos the Jackal ever feared. He was an extremely proficient linguist, an assuredly deadly assassin, and an operative’s operative.”

“Meaning?” asked Harvath.

“It means that his tradecraft was above reproach. He was a master of disguise and human nature. In the blink of an eye he could disappear, or have you eating out of his hand. Though the Russians had not given birth to Draegar, he was given honorary Russian citizenship—that’s how highly they thought of him. In short, he was the ultimate spy.”

“As you’re talking about him in past tense, I assume he’s dead. Am I correct?”

“Very,” replied Vaile. “Lawlor killed him.”

“Why was Heide targeted for termination?” asked Harvath.

“When you were as good at your job as she was, it causes the enemy to want to reward you with something other than a medal.”

“But you said Gary was just as good. Why not target him as well?”

“Exactly our question,” replied Vaile. “For a long time, we thought it was because the agents Heide had turned amounted to such major intelligence coups. Don’t get me wrong, Gary had his successes as well, but Heide’s were far and away of greater value. In short, while Gary might have been worth spending a bullet on, the prime target for the Russians was Heide.”

“But they were always together, weren’t they? I would have thought you could have gotten the two for the price of one very easily.”

“It would make sense, wouldn’t it?” asked Vaile. “Gary Lawlor had been credited with being extremely adept at keeping himself and his wife alive.”

“Until Heide was hit by the car.”

“Exactly.”

Harvath placed his right elbow upon the conference room table and pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. He wished they would get to the point.

Sensing his frustration, Vaile offered, “Maybe I can be a little more clear. Toward the end of the time Gary and Heide were operating in Europe, Berlin in particular, we suffered some major intelligence losses. Somebody provided the Russians with highly sensitive information.”

“And you never caught the person,” said Harvath.

“Correct. We looked at everybody, including the Lawlors—”

“Who obviously were cleared.”

“At the time yes, but in light of recent events, Heide’s death has been drawn into question.”

Harvath was incredulous now. “Are you trying to say you think Gary had something to do with it?”

Vaile put up his hand to silence Harvath. “The Lawlors were working on agents from different parts of Russia and the Eastern Bloc and as such, reported to different supervisors. Shortly before Heide’s death, she mentioned to her supervisor that she was concerned about Gary.”

“How do you know this?”

“It took some digging, but I was able to track down a copy of her report in our files at Langley. She said Gary had changed somehow. She suspected he was working on some sort of project outside of his normal duties. He would disappear in the evenings and sometimes even for days at a time. He claimed it was work-related and he couldn’t discuss it, but when Heide’s supervisor looked into it, he informed her that there was nothing he could find to support Gary’s story. Shortly thereafter, Heide was killed.”

“This is ridiculous,” said Harvath. “Gary must have been questioned up and down afterward.”

“He was and he appeared very distraught over her death. It seemed genuine. It wasn’t until he saw a copy of the report from Heide’s supervisor that he started talking. At first, he said that he didn’t want to sully his wife’s good name. A couple of days later, Gary claimed that Heide had been growing paranoid before her death, that she had even been taking medication for it. She didn’t know whom she could trust and she had even started disbelieving him. It was a difficult scenario for us. It was
he said, she said
, but she was dead and couldn’t corroborate or deny anything Gary was telling us. We debriefed him extensively, but everything held up. A private doctor even confirmed that he had been treating Heide for paranoia and depression and that he had also been prescribing pills for her. Case closed.”

“So what’s the problem?” prodded Harvath. “You don’t actually think he was up to something he shouldn’t have been?”

CIA Director Vaile took a deep breath before responding, “At this point we have no idea what to think.”

“All of this because there’s been a string of murders of Army Intelligence operatives who were in Berlin at the same time Gary was? While I’ll grant you that the murders are obviously connected to each other, you’ve failed to make the biggest connection of all—Gary to the victims.”

“Actually,” replied Driehaus, “we have made the connection.”

Harvath was stunned. “What is it?”

“Several of the victims placed calls to Gary right before they were killed.”