What Lies Behind (24 page)

Chapter 43

Georgetown

XANDER WAS DEEP
into James Denon’s computer files when Sam came through the door with Darren Fletcher fast on her heels. Thor jumped up with a bark and ran to Sam, tail wagging, tongue lolling. Xander watched her greet the animal with a loving caress across the ears, but she had her eyes locked on his, and he felt that jump in his stomach he always had when she looked at him. She was clearly exhausted and running on caffeine; her hands were shaking a little as they stroked Thor’s coat. She was beautiful, though. Beautiful, and his.

He stood, shook Fletcher’s hand, then pulled Sam to him. The hug was brief, but the connection between them was all he needed. He could feel her shivering, though it wasn’t at all cold in the room. Fear, then, adrenaline from the close call.

“I’m so glad you’re okay,” he said in her ear. She nodded, held on tighter, until Fletcher cleared his throat.

“Hey, don’t I get a hug? He nearly shot me, too.”

Xander let her loose and reached for Fletcher, who ducked away, laughing. It felt good to goof off for a minute, but Xander got serious again almost immediately. He jerked his head toward the living room.

“I have Denon here. He’s ready to talk when you are. I haven’t told him yet. About Amanda’s death.”

Sam sighed. She hated this part of the job. “Let’s get to it, then. Living room?”

“That seems to be the best place.”

“Xander, you need to be watching our backs until we find Robin Souleyret. I’m supposed to be getting the background on Jason Kruger any minute,” Fletcher said.

“You really think he was working with Souleyret?”

“I don’t know. But Souleyret’s the closest thing we have to a suspect until she presents herself and proves us wrong.”

Sam glanced through the house, saw the crowd of people gathered. “We need some extra security here. I don’t want to be paranoid, but until we do locate Souleyret, I won’t feel safe. Almost the entire working knowledge of this case is in a three-thousand-square-foot area, and from what I hear, she’s one hell of a shot. I don’t want to get picked off before we finish this.”

Fletcher nodded. “I agree. I can call in a few people.”

Xander shook his head. “Additional protection isn’t a bad idea, but let Chalk handle it. He can be discreet.”

“Screw discreet,” Sam said. “I want a show of force. Make her rethink any ideas of attacking us here.”

“Chalk
is
a show of force. Let me get him going.” He went to the kitchen, conferred with his partner for a minute. Sam saw Chalk smile and nod, then he slipped out the back door with Thor at his side.

Xander came back to her. “I wish we were at the cabin. I could protect all of you better there.”

She gave him a smile, ran a hand along his jaw. “Me, too. But we’re stuck here. So let’s make it work, soldier.”

Her cell phone rang. Daniels was calling. She put up a finger and answered, put it on speaker. “What’s up, Daniels?”

“Dr. Owens, I’ve got something. I’m still staking out Souleyret’s place. We’ve gotten into her files through her wireless connection—sloppy of her. She’s barely got any encryption on it at all. She was looking into her sister’s email. She downloaded a draft email that looks like it came from the State Department, though I don’t know if she knows that.”

“Who sent it? Girabaldi?”

“Nope. Jason Kruger. It came from his email. It says,
‘Did you get it in?’
”

“When was it sent?”

She heard him typing. She could imagine him, sitting there in the car, his laptops spread out, Mouse working by his side. They were going to make a great team—Sam had to find a way to get the girl on board at the FBI full-time.

“It was drafted at eight-thirty this morning.”

“Before State called us in. That’s really interesting. You heard about Kruger, right?”

“That he tried to kill you and Detective Fletcher? Yes. I’m very glad he didn’t succeed.”

“Me, too. Unfortunately, he’s dead, and we can’t ask him what he was looking for, though I think we can guess. I can only assume he was talking about one of two things. The SD card or the vaccines. Which are in the wind, by the way. Someone posing as a CDC courier took them from D.C.’s HAZMAT team.”

“Jeez. Sounds to me like we have multiple people working the angles of this case, Dr. Owens. There’s no way only one person could be in so many places at once. It has to be a full assault team.”

“I agree. Two of them are down that we know of. One had been killed at Bromley’s office. We’re still waiting for an ID on him. And now Kruger’s dead. Assuming the attack on James Denon was a part of this, that’s three assassins down. One got away when Kruger was shot. We can only hope that’s the last player. And Robin Souleyret is still out there somewhere.”

“So you think she’s managing this? Someone has to be calling the shots.”

“I don’t know.”

“If there’s a team, ma’am, you need to be really careful. Even if you think three of the four are down.”

“You’re right, we do. It almost feels like there were multiple assassinations planned to be carried out simultaneously. This is incredibly well-coordinated. If Kruger was behind it, we might be in luck, but since he was out doing the shooting, I’m afraid someone else is running the show. I feel like everything is leading back to Girabaldi. Is she clean? Can you find out?”

“I can. I’ll have to pull out of Souleyret’s files, though.”

Sam thought for a minute. “Okay. Just dump them all, and let Mouse start going through them. You shift to Girabaldi. Be careful, Daniels. This is a very powerful woman were talking about.”

“I will. Hey, hold on a second.”

She could hear Mouse talking in the background.

“What is it?”

“A courier. DHL. He just pulled into the driveway.”

“Where’s he headed?”

“Hang on. He’s driven past the circular drive entrance for the main house. He’s heading down the track to Souleyret’s.”

“Is he for real? Or is this someone coming to eliminate Souleyret?”

“I’m watching. I’ve got night-vision goggles on. We’re well hidden in the woods.”

“What the hell is he doing out delivering so late?”

“I don’t know. That’s pretty sketchy. Want us to intercept? I’ve got another couple of cops here.”

Fletcher was standing to her left. Both he and Xander nodded. “Yes. Intercept him. Right now.”

She heard the squelch from the radio. Daniels was calling to the cops, telling them to get the guy. “I’ll be back to you in a minute. Talk to Mouse.”

And he was gone. Mouse came on the line. “Hi, Doc.”

“Hi yourself. Give me the play-by-play.”

“They’ve boxed him in. The cops are driving right up to him, guns drawn. He just dropped a package on the ground and put up his hands. No one went boom. That’s a good sign.”

Sam laughed. “Yes, that’s a very good sign.”

“Marc’s got the package, he’s opening it now. Looks like a CD of some kind. He just gave me a thumbs-up. It’s nothing dangerous. The guy has ID, looks like he really is just a courier. They’re checking the truck, too, just in case, but we look good here.”

Sam let out the breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. “All right. You and Daniels finish up there and bring that package to me. Right now.” She gave the girl her address.

“I’ve got a copy of Souleyret’s hard drive, too. We’ll be there in ten.”

She hung up. Fletcher raised an eyebrow. “I kind of like it when you take over the show.”

“Hush. What do you think is in that package?”

“I don’t know.”

“Do we know where Girabaldi is now?” she asked.

“Cavort said they have her under protection, so she’s probably reading a magazine in some bunker somewhere. I can push things, bump it up to her bosses, have them release her into my custody.”

“You’re off the case, Fletcher. You better stay put. You can’t lose your job over this.”

She could see the frustration on his face. “Honestly, Sam, right now, I’m more concerned about the idea of a gang of assassins on the loose in my city. I know this Chalk character is good, but I’m going to get some people watching the house, just in case. Armstrong will help with that.” He peeled off into the den near the back door. It was the only unoccupied room on the lower floor.

Xander watched him go, put a hand on Sam’s shoulder, dug his thumb deep into the tissue. She sighed as the muscle relaxed and released.

“That’s better. Thank you.”

He nodded. “No worries. Listen, I do have some news for you. I think Denon’s company is the one Amanda Souleyret infiltrated. I think he’s the money behind the vaccines.”

She reared back, nearly toppling a crystal vase from the small hall table. She managed to get a hand on it before it hit the floor. “What did you say?”

“His IT guy, Everson, just told me he found a back door that’s been in place for several months. He doesn’t know how bad the damage is yet, so we haven’t told Denon.”

“Do we know who’s responsible?”

He shook his head. “Not yet, but think about it. Amanda was sleeping with Denon. The affair had been going on for almost a year. You said she was trained as a honeypot, technologically and otherwise. What better way to bilk a company than bedding down with its CEO and putting a spike in his systems?”

Sam brushed her hair back from her face. It made an awful kind of sense.

“We’ve been assuming all along that she was working the right side of this. Are you saying you think she was behind it instead? And crossed the wrong person, who had her killed?”

“Her, and everyone who had anything to do with this case. They’re eliminating the knowledge base. Systematically.”

“Did you find a money trail for the man from this morning? The Spaniard?”

His face darkened. “The assassin I killed, you mean? Not yet, but we’re working on it.” He rubbed a big hand over his face, smoothing out his eyebrows. She could see he was tired, bone-deep. They all were. “This is a clusterfuck, you know that.”

“I do. And we have a bunch of possibly deadly drugs out there, most likely in the wrong hands. Who knows what they’re planning.”

“Let’s talk to Denon.”

“First, Xander, hon, are you okay? Tell me the truth.”

He glanced over her head, then put a hand under her chin, lifted her face so she was staring deep into his coffee eyes. He gave her a quick but thorough kiss, then a grin. “Are you?”

“I am now.”

He hitched his arm over her shoulders. “Then let’s do this.”

Chapter 44

THEY SAT WITH
Denon in the living room—Sam, Fletcher and Xander, a triumvirate of frustration and exhaustion and hands shaky from too much caffeine, facing their last hope for an explanation of the day’s events. Sam sipped on a cup of tea, wishing for a stiff shot of Scotch, knowing it would just put her to sleep. Still, a girl could dream.

She set the cup down. Denon watched her motions. He knew something was up; she could see it in his face. He looked from her to Xander to Fletcher, then cleared his throat.

“You might as well tell me. I can see you have bad news.”

Sam nodded. “Then I’ll be blunt, Mr. Denon, and please forgive me. We know where Juliet Bouchard is. And who she is. Her real name is Amanda Souleyret. She’s a deep undercover agent run out of the FBI, and I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but she’s dead. She was murdered last night, quite near here. There was a man with her, a young researcher named Thomas Cattafi. He’s alive, but barely.”

The color drained from Denon’s face as she spoke. “We don’t know who killed her, but it stands to reason, considering she came in on your plane, it was the same people who tried to murder you this morning. So anything you can tell us about her would be a huge help in ending this mess.”

He was silent for a moment. Closed his eyes. Breathed out once through his nose, heavily. When he opened his eyes again, his emotions were mastered, but still raw and on the surface, like the tension of a bubble’s edge. A breath in the wrong place and he would burst.

His voice was shaky. “I know the name. Tommy Cattafi, I mean.”

That got her attention. “From where?”

He stood, walked to the edge of the room, called into the dining room. “Mo? Maureen? Hang up, right now.”

She did, stood, brushing her hair back from her face. Sam hadn’t really noticed her before now, but she was a pretty girl, with one bright blue eye and one brown, that took her from interesting to exotic. “Sir?”

“Remember that kid Tommy Cattafi? Juliet sent him your way. You brought him on as an intern to work on the offshore pipeline we were planning into Sierra Leone. He was working with the Doctors Without Borders organization there. You said he knew the area and could help us liaise with the locals.”

Heedles shook her head. “I don’t remember that name. But, sir, we have so many interns. And not all of us have your eidetic memory.”

“I’m sure that was it. I’m not losing it all quite yet.”

She bit her lip. “I’ll have to check the personnel files.”

“Do that.”

“I’m on it, but it will take me a minute.” She sat down and started typing furiously. Everson gave her a long glance, then followed suit. Bebbington, though, came over to his boss. He turned him away from the table, and they walked back into the living room to where Sam was standing, watching the exchanges with interest. So Amanda had sent Tommy into the fray. It made sense, he was her recruit. He would have been a great candidate for anyone to hire on.

Bebbington shot Xander a knowing glance. He had a quiet voice, befitting a mathematical genius.

“Sir, I’ve found an anomaly you need to know about.”

“Speak up, Louis, I can barely hear you.”

The man swallowed hard. His voice was shaking. Sam saw him swipe his palms against his too-tight pants leg, leaving a small dark smear on the fine worsted wool. “Someone has siphoned off an exceptionally large amount of money from the accounts.”

She didn’t think it was possible for Denon to get any whiter, but he did.

“What in the bloody hell are you talking about, Louis? Who?”

“I don’t know yet, sir.”

“How much?”

“In the range of forty to fifty million pounds. Out of the African pipeline project.”

“How is that possible? We closed that down last year. We don’t have an African pipeline project anymore.”

“Sir, I can’t believe I’m telling you this, but someone kept a line open on it. They’ve been funneling money out of the program budgets for all the Venezuela accounts. A little here, and a little there. Nothing that would cause us to notice. Until it was too late.”

Denon’s fists clenched. He looked like he was about to knock the younger man to the ground. “Louis, you’re my CFO. How is it, exactly, someone has managed to embezzle fifty million pounds out from under your nose?”

Bebbington swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing in his thin throat. “It’s an incredibly sophisticated siphon program. I wouldn’t have seen it if we weren’t looking at the back door. Everson found tracks in the system. Sir, we have been compromised. Badly. And, sir, I must tender my resignation. This happened on my watch—”

“Shut it, Louis. Now’s not the time. Where did the funds go?”

The man looked only slightly relieved. “Everson followed the trail to the Banque de France. The money moved through circuitous routes, from numbered accounts in the Caymans to a Swiss bank to the current resting place, a branch in the Côte d’Azur.”

“Can we access it?”

“We can try. There have been regular disbursements, also through coded accounts. It’s going to take a full forensic examination to unspool the thread, though. Weeks, if not months.”

Xander’s cell rang. He stepped away, put it to his ear, listened for a moment. Sam heard him say, “Roger that. Friendlies at the door. Cover us.”

The doorbell rang, and all the Brits started.

Sam smiled. “Relax, gentlemen. That will be Agent Daniels and Rosalind Lowe, who have been working on the SD card Amanda Souleyret brought into the country. They’ve seized a package that was being sent to her sister. We might get some answers from it.”

She started toward the door, but Xander put a hand on her arm. “You let me get it.”

Sam stopped, nodded. Xander already had his SIG out, was moving quickly down the hall into the foyer. Thor appeared in the hallway, followed his master. With a few guttural German commands from Xander, Thor went on alert. Chalk came in from the back door, guns drawn, loaded for bear. With a look toward Xander, who sent him some sort of telepathic shorthand, he melted into the hallway by the dining room where he could see out the front windows.

The doorbell rang again. Chalk called out, “All clear.”

Xander carefully inched open the door, leading with the nose of the gun.

Sam heard Daniels. “Whoa! FBI, man, I’m FBI.”

“Xander, let them in already,” she said.

He opened the door wider, and Daniels and Mouse trooped in, looking exceedingly excited. He slammed the door shut, and the dog relaxed. They were secure again. For now. Sam saw Chalk detach himself from the window and quickly move to the rear of the house, where he disappeared out the back door to secure their perimeter again. She had to admit, she felt safer with him and Xander on such high alert.

There were brief introductions, then Daniels held up a laptop. “We have something major to show you.”

Sam gestured to the mixed company. “Is it appropriate for all, or do we need to find someplace quiet?”

He flipped open the screen, hit Play. “Just watch.”

The video was black, then Amanda Souleyret’s face filled the screen. Her voice was strong, but quiet, as if she didn’t want to be overheard. The room behind her was dark; it was hard to see where she was. Sam thought it looked like a hotel room, but it could have been a private flat. Even subdued, she was so very alive. It was all Sam could do not to remind herself of this same body on the stainless-steel slab, cuts in her neck and back, the heart no longer beating, but still and inert. And Fletcher’s voice:
“You’ve never told me why you do it.”

Quit it, Owens. This isn’t the first time you’ve seen someone from the grave
.

But when Amanda began to speak, Sam felt goose bumps parade up and down her arms.

“Robin, I hope I’ve had a chance to talk to you in person before you receive this message. If not...well, I’m most likely dead. I’m so sorry. I didn’t want to put you in any danger. You’ve had too much to deal with since the accident. No matter what, I want you to know that I love you, and everything that happens from here on out, well, if I didn’t stop them, I know you’ll find the means to do so.

“Gina is in danger. You need to protect her, no matter what. I have done all I can to keep her safe, but I fear it’s too late, and she will get sucked into this maelstrom. She’s too important to us both to let that happen. I also need you to watch Thomas Cattafi’s and David Bromley’s backs. They are the key to all I’m about to tell you, and they must be protected at all costs.

“I was working on a case with a small pharm company in Paris when I accidentally downloaded information about a possible bioterror attack using our own flu vaccines. I briefed Gina, then set about trying to gather information about the attack. From what I found, a small group was testing out a new ‘drug’ in Sierra Leone, claiming it was a vaccine for measles. Instead, it contained a new, undocumented viral hemorrhagic fever that is especially virulent. They were testing a weapon, perfecting it and planning to use it to attack the United States and Israel.”

There was a brief pause, and Amanda shook her head.

“It gets worse. This new hemorrhagic fever kills in forty-eight hours, and it could be airborne. Right now, it is unstoppable, especially in an unsecured environment like Africa. The data points were absolutely terrifying, and just as I was making progress on discovering who, exactly, is behind this, they shut things down, wiped the files clean, destroyed every bit of evidence, and everything I had went up in smoke. And I knew my word wasn’t going to be enough. You know how this administration works. You have to have a knife to their throat for them to pay any attention to these threats.

“I’d only gotten the name of a single company that was involved
—
Denon Industries, out of London. The money trail led directly to them. They have a charitable arm that has been funding the development of this horrible weapon.”

Denon jumped up from his seat. “That’s preposterous. I had nothing to do with this!”

Sam hit Stop on the video. “Mr. Denon, please, sit back down. We will hear everything Amanda has to say before making any assumptions or judgments.”

“Sir?” It was Bebbington, excited now, standing in the doorway to the living room. “Ms. Bouchard, she’s right. I’ve tracked some of the funds. Whoever embezzled them from us set up a trust under the guise of being a charitable organization. It traces back to the pipeline project, but it’s in your name, under your private accounts. According to the records, you’ve been pumping money into this experimental medical treatment for two years.”

“Jesus H. Christ on a piece of toast, Bebbington. How the hell did this happen?”

“I haven’t been able to trace the information all the way back to the perpetrators yet, sir. Whoever did it has managed to obfuscate their trail masterfully. It’s going to take us a while to figure out who’s behind it. But I’ll keep working on it. I’ll find them, I swear it.”

“You do that.” Denon drew himself up to full height, faced Sam and Fletcher. “Denon Industries will cooperate fully with the FBI and any other international law enforcement organization you see fit to involve here. These actions are clearly of a single person who set out to deceive me and the company. I would never sign off on such a thing. It goes against everything I believe in.”

Sam put her hand on his arm. “Sir, I appreciate that, but please sit down. Let’s hear the rest of Amanda’s story.”

Fletcher moved a step closer, and Denon glanced at him, then sat, looking miserable. Sam pressed Play on the video, and Amanda Souleyret continued her confession from the grave.

“Something seemed odd about the trail suddenly leading me to a single organization, but I had to move quickly. I set up an infiltration strategy and implemented it. It didn’t take long to get inside the company. What I found showed my earlier suspicions were right. I believe Denon Industries is being set up as the fall guy behind this massive genocide. And genocide it is, I’m sure of it. First in Africa, and, soon enough, in Europe and America. It is a perfect weapon.

“You know what I do, Robin. I’ve been intimate with James Denon for nearly a year now. I do not believe he is aware that his company’s finances are being used to fund the operation, nor do I believe him personally capable of knowingly authorizing such devastation. My software found a back door that was bleeding funds, but quietly. He has a mole, but I haven’t been able to figure out who it is.”

Sam saw Denon’s face collapse at this news. He loved this woman, and she’d just exonerated him. Sam felt infinitesimally better. At least she wasn’t sitting in her living room with a mass murderer.

“I sent Thomas Cattafi into the company to see if he could work this from another angle. He hired on to their African pipeline project as an intern, a liaison between the company and the locals, and in that guise was able to get into the areas affected in Sierra Leone. What he saw there was frightening. David Bromley is Thomas’s mentor. He’s a virologist at George Washington University and a preeminent scholar in hemorrhagic fevers. Tommy explained what was happening, and took Bromley’s guidance on testing the blood of the people affected and reporting back with his findings. Tommy told me that there are reports of a British man who comes to the area once a month. We think this is how the bug is being delivered, in the medications that are supposed to be relieving the suffering of those afflicted.

“Tommy brought out the samples, and he and Dr. Bromley have been working for the past few months on a real vaccine. It’s complicated to explain, but Tommy figured out that stem cells from cadavers showed the most promise in combating this disease.”

Sam looked at Fletcher. That explained what Thomas Cattafi was doing at the anatomy lab. He’d been taking samples to use in his fight against the bug.

“Cattafi and Bromley have been working hard to reengineer the stem cells to create a workable therapeutic vaccine against this superbug, which means they can give it to people who’ve been exposed and halt the spread of the disease. I know they’re very close to success. They’ve had to test in the field, with Bromley going directly to Africa to inoculate the infected people, and I understand it’s been rough going, but they are starting to see a positive response. Their work will save the people affected, if they can get to them in time. And if we are attacked, we need to have the means to stop an epidemic.