The Lucifer Code (7 page)

‘No, thank you, sir.’

‘Nonsense. You need to eat. Keep your strength up. We’ve got a lot to do if we’re going to pull a win out of this.’

Dawson took a roll and put it on the small plate in front of him. The vice-president buttered his own roll, then pushed the butter dish towards Dawson.

‘Indulge. We’ll work it off the next time we’re on the racquetball court together.’ Webster smiled.

Dawson buttered his roll.

‘How long ago did we lose Professor Lourds, Jimmy?’

Dawson glanced at the PDA he’d deliberately placed on the table within his view. The number in the upper left-hand corner revealed how long ago Lourds had gone missing.

‘Five hours and forty-two minutes, sir.’

Webster bit into his roll and chewed thoughtfully. ‘That’s a long time.’

‘I’ve got people on it, sir. We’re using all available intel sources. Including ELINT and HUMINT.’

The vice-president nodded. ‘I know you’ve got good people over there.’

‘
We’ve
got good people over there, sir.’

‘Of course.
We
do.’ Webster sipped his wine. ‘This is my fault, actually. I didn’t get the information to you about Lourds in time for you to make all the preparations you needed to. I shot you in the foot on this one.’

That was another reason everyone liked Elliott Webster so much. When he made mistakes, he owned up to them and then he worked to correct them.

‘I assume the men killed at the airport were our assets?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘What about the other men who were killed in the car crash and in the alley? Do you have anything on them yet?’

‘Yes, sir.’ Dawson pointed to his briefcase. ‘If I may?’

The vice-president nodded and reached for another roll.

Dawson took out the encrypted computer and placed it on the table. He opened it, powered it up, entered his password, and pressed his right forefinger and left ring finger on the two fingerprint scanners. The password changed hourly and the combination of fingerprints changed twice daily. In the beginning, getting the rhythm of those changes had been difficult.

The screen flared to life and quickly searched for the local WiFi connection. Once the connection had been accessed, a red and yellow CIA TOP SECRET screen saver flashed on. But that was just window dressing to scare off normal hackers who might have got their hands on the computer. Dawson entered a series of keystrokes that shut down the main drive and opened up a small partition drive disguised within the computer’s OS file registry.

‘First of all, we haven’t been able to learn anything about the three kidnappers who were killed,’ Dawson said after all the requisite connections had been made.

‘That’s disappointing.’

‘Yes, sir. But the woman is a different story.’ Dawson brought up a picture of her.

‘That’s a pretty young woman.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘She intercepted Lourds at the airport.’

‘Yes, sir. Lourds has an obvious weakness for pretty young women based on the history we’ve been able to dig up.’

‘Young women.’

‘That’s right, sir. Evidently our opposition knows that.’

‘Who is she?’

Dawson’s fingers tapped commands quickly on the keyboard. More pictures of the woman filled the screen. There weren’t very many, but there were enough. Some of them showed her on the street talking to people. Others were of her in a bar.

‘Her name is Cleena MacKenna.’

‘Irish?’

Dawson nodded. ‘Very Irish. Her father, Ryan MacKenna, was part of the Continuity Irish Republican Army. He was responsible for a number of attacks against the British military and Royal Ulster Constabulary. Some reports I’ve seen put his kills at seven, others at thirteen.’

Dawson tapped more keys and photographs of MacKenna’s victims showed.

‘A dangerous man,’ Webster commented. ‘However, the world seems full of them these days. Is he involved with this?’

‘No, sir. Ryan MacKenna was killed six years ago.’ Dawson brought up the news clippings. ‘Evidently he got caught up in an arms deal that went sour. A Chinese street gang called the Hungry Ghosts intercepted him and his seller. Both of them were murdered.’

‘If MacKenna’s not involved with this, why mention him?’

‘Because I think Professor Lourds’ weakness may be exploitable for us.’

‘Explain.’

Dawson went back to the pictures of Cleena MacKenna. ‘When Ryan MacKenna was killed, he left behind two daughters. Years before, his wife was killed in their home, supposedly by police officers seeking revenge for one of their number that MacKenna had slain. No one knows if MacKenna really killed that policeman or even if it was policemen that killed his wife. But, either way, MacKenna moved his girls to Boston.’

‘That’s where Lourds is from.’

‘Yes, sir. Cleena was twelve when her father moved her to Boston. Her younger sister, Brigid, was six. Evidently Cleena finished high school, started college and joined her father in the family business.’

‘Arms dealing?’

‘Exactly. The FBI has an open file regarding their business. Ryan MacKenna was good at what he did, a very careful man. Nobody ever got a whiff of evidence against them.’

‘Until that night with the Chinese gang.’

‘Yes, sir. It’s hard to clean up evidence when you’re dead. Cleena was nineteen when her father was killed. According to the FBI files I’ve seen, Cleena MacKenna spent seven months tracking down those gang members. She killed sixteen of them before they left the city. Not that we can prove it.’

‘Impressive. Evidently her father taught her all aspects of the family business.’

‘Yes, sir. After she’d finished dealing with her father’s killers, Cleena MacKenna dropped out of college and became a full-time mercenary and arms dealer. She’s hired out since then to do retrieval work—assets and people—as well as assassinations.’

‘Ambitious young woman, isn’t she?’

Dawson nodded. ‘Yes, sir. And very good at what she does. The FBI and Boston Police Department have been on her trail for the last six years. Even Interpol has her marked as a person of interest in some cases they’re working on. None of those people has made a case yet.’

‘Obviously a very careful young woman as well,’ Webster said. ‘I’m sure the law enforcement authorities haven’t been the only threats she’s weathered.’

‘No, sir.’

Webster poured more wine and reached for another roll. ‘What are you thinking, Jimmy?’

‘Whoever this group is that has Lourds, they hired Cleena MacKenna to trail him from Boston to Istanbul. She travelled under a forged passport, but we know who she is. We can find her.’

‘And hire her ourselves?’

‘Or at least pay her for any information she might have about the people who hired her to help kidnap Professor Lourds.’

‘I’d like to know more about these kidnappers,’ Webster said, ‘and how they came to be interested in Professor Lourds at the same time as we were looking for him.’

Dawson didn’t point out that he still didn’t know why the vice-president wanted to bring Lourds in. ‘Yes, sir.’

Webster sipped his wine. ‘Not to rain on your parade, Jimmy, but Cleena MacKenna might be reluctant to sell out her previous employers. People like that have a reputation to live up to.’

Dawson only hesitated for a second. A lot of politicians didn’t like to risk getting their hands dirty. Vice-President Elliott Webster wasn’t one of them, but he didn’t like getting caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

‘If by chance there is some residual moral high ground still lurking inside her mind,’ Dawson said, ‘we can just remind her that we know who she is and where her young sister goes to college.’

‘Do you think you can contact this young woman?’

‘Yes, sir. We have assets that she’ll need to get out of the country. The cover identity she used to get into Istanbul is blown. The local law enforcement people, and part of the criminal element there, are going to be looking for her. Sooner or later, she’ll come to someone we have a relationship with. Then we’ll have her.’

‘That sounds like a good plan, Jimmy. There’s only one catch that I see.’

‘What’s that, sir?’

‘There is the distinct possibility that her employers won’t let her live. They don’t appear to be the trusting sort.’

‘Yes, sir.’ Dawson had already been thinking along those lines.

‘After we’re finished with her, Jimmy, I think we should probably limit our exposure as well.’

‘Of course, sir.’ And that was the best thing Dawson liked about the vice-president: when it came to intelligence work, they thought along the same lines. ‘I’ll take care of it personally.’ He pressed the keys on the computer and the woman disappeared.

CHAPTER

5

Catacombs

Yesilkoy District

Istanbul, Turkey

16 March 2010

L
ourds struggled to wakefulness.

Then he remembered the helicopter exploding overhead, the flaming pieces of it ringing as they slammed into the alley. And he remembered the hypodermic being thrust into his leg. Pain in his thigh suddenly increased.

He forced his eyes open and didn’t think he’d succeeded because he still couldn’t see. Then he realized that he couldn’t see because he was somewhere dark. There was absolutely no light. He felt as though he’d been shrouded in black cotton.

Shifting, he tried to sit up, then discovered he was in fact sitting. Not only that, but someone had tied him to a chair. The rope pulled tightly into his flesh. His kidneys also suddenly declared they were losing the war against containment.

He cleared his throat and heard the sound echo.

Sudden fear spiked through him when he realized that the echoes sounded muffled, like he was in some kind of cave or box. He cleared his throat again and listened more carefully this time. The echoes, short and repetitive, definitely indicated he was within an enclosed space. He held his fear at bay with difficulty. He wasn’t afraid of the dark—he had been in plenty of dark places before while working on transcribing hieroglyphics in Peruvian ruins. He wasn’t afraid of enclosed spaces—he had crawled around plenty of those while exploring digs and while dating a couple of aggressive spelunkers. However, he
was
afraid of what was going to be done to him by whoever had taken him. Stiff patches on his shirt told him he’d been at least unconscious long enough for the blood to dry. He felt more dried blood on his hands and face.

He thought about just sitting there, hoping that whoever had taken him had forgotten about him. But his kidneys were screaming for relief and he thought he’d rather die with some dignity. That meant no wet pants.

Of course, as soon as you see a gun or knife in someone’s hand, that’s subject to change.
Lourds had never been one to fool himself about his personal bravery. He was brave neither by habit nor by choice.

Quietly, he cleared his throat again, then called out politely, ‘Hello? Is anyone there?’

Cleena MacKenna lounged against the wall of the catacombs where her latest employers had brought her. She wasn’t surprised to find the city was honeycombed with tunnels. Most port cities and older cities in this part of the world were. In the beginning, the builders had needed places to store water and dump refuse. Smuggling had also figured in the construction of tunnels in port cities. While growing up in Boston, she had explored several of those tunnels with other kids her age who had been into ‘urban archaeology’. They’d called themselves creepers and swore they were uncovering the lost past of the city. Actually, they had just been kids going places they weren’t supposed to go.

At first, Cleena’s father had been angry with her when he’d found out where she was. Later, after she’d shown him some places they could use to hide the weapons he had bought, sold and traded, he hadn’t been as angry. He just hadn’t liked the idea of her crawling around dangerous places in the dark. Cleena had enjoyed it, had relished the excitement of going through those tunnels. It had been like entering another world.

A dozen men occupied the stone room she sat in now. They sat on crates and kegs brought by earlier visitors to the catacombs. Heavy-duty battery-powered lanterns pushed away some of the darkness inside the room, but Cleena still felt it was like a scene from one of those silly horror movies her younger sister liked to watch.

The men were passionate about whatever had brought them together. The tense and strident tones in their voices told her that. They didn’t speak in English, which was frustrating because Cleena wished she knew what they were talking about. Several of them kept glancing in her direction, and she was all too aware that she was the only woman among them.

The comfortable weight of the pistol she had picked up during the fire fight rested at her back. Her right hand was never far from the weapon. The men knew that. They had the watchful eyes of trained killers.

‘Hey,’ Cleena said interrupting them.

The man turned and looked at her, but said nothing.

‘I don’t mean to bust up your little tea party,’ she said, ‘but I want my money and I want to get gone from this place. In case you’ve forgotten, there’s a huge dragnet going on throughout the city right now. I need to get out before it closes in on me.’

For a moment, the men continued staring at her without speaking. The whole experience was creepy and just a tad threatening.

‘Anyone?’ Cleena prompted.

One of the men stood and approached her. Cleena’s hand slid down slightly to grip the butt of the pistol.

‘Please accept my apologies, Miss MacKenna.’ The man looked like he was in his thirties, dark skinned and dark haired. Lean and handsome, he could’ve been a ladies’ man if he’d wanted to be. But there was something that burned in his eyes that told Cleena he would never be satisfied with anything as trivial as that. ‘My name is Qayin. Given the circumstances, I must ask you to be a little patient with us. Things did not go as we had planned.’

‘Things did not go as I had planned either.’ Cleena put an edge on her words. ‘You should be grateful that I don’t ask you for a bonus on this job.’