Zero Separation (29 page)

“But the man who tried to kill Michael Ross and Dr. McKenna here in Virginia has been identified by the FBI as part of a jihadist
group trained in Yemen,” Buck said. “How does that fit with a psychotic Israeli soldier?”

“Former soldier,” Keller corrected. “I'm not at liberty to discuss specific recent events, but there is a remote possibility that Strauss may have acquired the means to manipulate certain deep-cover terrorist networks.”

“He's not working alone, is he? Someone's helping him,” Lauren snapped. “Strauss has sources inside your government, which is why you need to find Strauss and then uncover his handlers.”

“This is a potentially devastating dilemma, which is why I need your help, Dr. McKenna. I came here for two reasons. I need to compare those voiceprints without setting off international alarms, and I'm also here to offer you immediate round-the-clock protection to counter any threat that may exist.”

Buck started to talk, but Lauren silenced him with a quick look and a raised hand. “Mr. Keller, I've heard enough. You've got a big problem floating around out there, and I strongly suggest you take this to the FBI. Play the Nathan Strauss crazy card, maintain your deniability, but you need to find him without my help.”

“I understand.” Keller stood and smoothed his suit. He reached into his pocket and held out a business card to Lauren. “Dr. McKenna, I can't thank you enough for your time. I wish you the best. I hope I'm wrong and that your safety isn't in jeopardy.”

Lauren took the card and immediately felt something attached to the back. A quick glance told her it was a small jump drive. Keller had strategically positioned it to be invisible to Buck. When she looked in Keller's eyes, she caught a glimpse of what she could only describe as a final plea for her help.

Lauren slid the card and jump drive into her pocket and let Buck show Keller to the door.

“Are you okay?” Buck said as he returned to the living room.

“I don't really know,” Lauren replied. “That was so strange. I don't know what to think.”

“From my standpoint, this situation just got ten times worse. It's one thing to have some jihadists trying to kill you, and it's quite
another to have a former Israeli Defense Forces team who wants you dead. You might be right about getting out of here and finding a safe house. Right this moment you're far too easy to find.”

“I can't process all of this right now.” Lauren rubbed her temples.

“I'm going to brief Andy—I think we need to bring in some more people and widen the perimeter.”

“Wait.” Lauren reached out and clutched Buck's arm. “Is this beyond what we can do? I mean, I don't want you or anyone else to get hurt because of me.”

“Don't worry.” Buck shook his head. “All that's happened is we have a better idea who our enemy is, and we might need to ramp up security. You're safe, and I'll continue to keep you and Abigail safe. Please believe that.”

“I do.” Lauren tried to smile, but she knew her effort fell short. She wondered how much death he'd been surrounded by as a SEAL. He seemed to know when to talk and when to act. Lauren was thankful and appreciative for his presence.

As Buck went out the front door, Lauren went to the study where she ripped the jump drive free from the card and slid it into the USB port. She discovered two files. One was an audio file labeled “Nathan Strauss”; the second was a JPEG simply titled “Strauss.” She double-clicked the JPEG.

A slideshow started and she watched as one by one, still images filled the screen. Underneath were short descriptions. The first few were black-and-white photos taken inside a living room. There were four bodies; the caption explained the victims were three professional assassins and one FBI agent. It was suspected they were all killed by Nathan Strauss.

The next photos were taken at another crime scene after the victim had been removed. The caption revealed that the blood was Michael's and the outline was where Donovan had found him. Lauren felt her stomach lurch at the starkness of the image. The next picture was from the hospital in Florida—a man lying on the floor
of a hospital corridor, half of his head appeared to be gone. It was the man sent to kill Michael, the one that Montero had stopped.

The next series of shots were of Donovan and Montero. They were talking to an overweight man in what appeared to be a gun shop. Montero was throwing bills on the counter. The scene that came up next looked like a back room where the same overweight man sat at a computer. Lauren covered her mouth as Nathan Strauss pointed a gun and fired. The overweight man's brains splattered onto the screen. The next image was a close up of the computer monitor. Lauren forced herself to look beyond the carnage until she understood what she was seeing. It was Donovan and Montero—earlier footage from when they were in the shop. Strauss had been looking for this, and when he found it, he'd killed the man. The pictures that followed were in vivid color. A dead girl lying in a parking lot. Another body in a different parking lot followed by a man stuffed into the trunk of a car. The slideshow ended. Keller wasn't being subtle. He wanted her to believe that Strauss had killed them all, as well as Kyle, Montero, and Donovan.

Lauren pondered her options, and decided that as persuasive as Keller was, she wasn't going to help him. It was his responsibility to be proactive—not hers. If Strauss was involved then the world could deal with him without her involvement. She yanked the jump drive out of the computer and jammed it into her pocket, suddenly very tired of her surroundings, exhausted by the ever-changing complexities of her current situation. Everything around her in this house spoke of her life with Donovan. He was dead, and when it was revealed that Donovan Nash was in reality Robert Huntington, Donovan's existence would evaporate and cease to exist. This home would simply be a house. She'd married a ghost, a mirage, and now there was no reason to stay. Why fight the inevitable? The life she'd had was over. When she finished packing, she and Abigail would get on the chartered plane and be gone by tomorrow morning.

The tent flap was thrown open and Strauss, wielding a knife, went straight to Montero. He quickly sliced the restraints holding her to the tent pole and yanked her to her feet by her wrists. Then he hit her in the stomach with a savage blow that dropped her to her knees. He moved behind her, cut her ankle restraints, and pulled her to her feet by her hair.

“Need any help?” Strauss's sidekick stood in the doorway, a pistol in his hand. “She's quite the hellcat when she's awake.”

“I dare you to come closer and say that,” Montero spat.

“I've got this, Rafael,” Strauss said. “Make sure all the charges are set. I don't want anything left of this place after we leave.”

“They're ready.” Rafael leered at Montero. “I'm just saying we might have time for some fun. Last time we met her we were in a bit of a rush.”

Montero tried to leverage Nathan's feet out from under him, but her leg kick found only air.

Strauss pressed the blade of his knife hard against her throat and whispered, “If you fight, I'll give you to him. He'll hurt you before he's finished, and you'll suffer enormously all the way to D.C.”

Montero's struggles ended, but hatred burned in her eyes. Strauss shoved her from the tent.

The flap on the tent hadn't fully closed. Donovan twisted against his restraints and was rewarded with his first view of the outside world. The setting sun cast long shadows, but it was still light out. Through the trees, he could see the back half of the
da Vinci
under the camouflaged netting. The baggage door was open,
and on the ground next to the Gulfstream sat a worktable and a toolbox. He spotted two orange boxes on the table—the
da Vinci's
cockpit voice recorder and the flight data recorder. Nathan had removed them so no taped evidence would be on board when it was found. Donovan had no idea what modifications had been made to his jet, but the thought of what Nathan had planned seemed all the more real at the sight. He'd also told Montero that Washington D.C. was the target.

They were getting ready to leave. Charges had been set to obliterate the camp. True to form, Strauss was following his scorched-earth policy, leaving nothing in his wake that would trace back to him. He thought of Meredith, she'd been alone as well. Had she known the bullet was coming? Had she been afraid? Donovan had no problem admitting that he didn't want to die—that he felt the fear. He'd left so much undone, so many loose ends that would forever be neglected. With everything he knew about being the survivor, the guilt that never ended, how had he managed to leave Lauren and Abigail with so many unanswered questions?

It didn't take long. Donovan offered no resistance when Strauss came for him. Once his ankle restraints were cut, he found his balance to be precarious after having been prone for so long. Strauss propelled him forward by pushing the barrel of a gun into his spine.

Once outside the tent, beyond the
da Vinci
, Donovan could see what passed for a runway. The jungle gave way to a narrow ribbon of compressed oil and dirt. He recognized it for what it was—an old oil company service road. It was once a common practice. Oil was mixed with and compacted with the soil to harden the surface of the road. The method also cut down on the dust and kept the jungle from encroaching on the road.

“It's a little more than a mile long and not much wider than the wheelbase of a Gulfstream,” Strauss said, as if reading the expression on Donovan's face. “Just long enough to get a Gulfstream in and out.”

Rafael came bounding down the air stairs of the Gulfstream. “I've got her on board. I just need a syringe.”

Strauss handed Rafael a small leather pouch, and then ordered Donovan to walk down a narrow path.

“I'm guessing this place was once used by drug smugglers,” Donovan said.

“It was a long time ago. It was abandoned when I found it. But it was drug smugglers who inspired me. They've been penetrating American airspace with impunity for decades, and your government has been unable to do much about it. It only seemed logical to borrow their techniques—and add a few of my own.”

“You're not just smuggling the anthrax, are you? You're going to disperse it over Washington.”

“It's of no concern to you.”

“Why? You're not a terrorist,” Donovan said, but he still couldn't get any kind of read from Strauss. The Israeli was intelligent and methodical, as well as a blank slate. Was he a soldier so well trained that his focus was single-minded, or was he a cold-blooded sociopath?

“It doesn't matter who I am. Only that the blame is placed on Islamic extremists who would love to commit such an act if they had the ability.”

Donovan was prodded forward until he spotted the latrine. It was nothing more than a three-sided canvas enclosure around a crude seat. He could hear the buzzing insects as he neared and recoiled from the stench.

Nathan gave Donovan a shove with the gun. “Relieve yourself. We have a long flight, and I won't have you soil yourself aboard the airplane. Try and run and you will die here.”

Donovan complied.

Afterward, Donovan was shoved back in the direction of the camp. Nathan forced him up the stairs into the Gulfstream. He spotted Montero lying on the floor. She'd been secured with tie wraps to a steel leg that supported one of the science stations. A thread of bloody saliva ran from her mouth to the front of her blouse. Rafael finished injecting the contents of a syringe and then slid the needle from her vein. He turned toward Donovan and
looked him up and down as if calculating his weight, then picked up a bottle of clear liquid, turned it upside down, and began drawing down the fluid for the next injection.

It was the close proximity he'd been waiting for. Donovan planted a foot and threw his elbow behind him to a point in space where he thought Strauss's head would be. His effort found nothing but empty space, and he nearly lost his balance. Before he could gather himself, Strauss hit him hard in the solar plexus, and Donovan dropped to his knees, gasping for a breath that wouldn't come. Battered, he wanted to get up and fight, but couldn't, so he tried to twist away in an effort to buy more time. Strauss leaned in and hit Donovan savagely in the face, and any further resistance was eliminated.

Strauss whipped out fresh tie wraps and secured Donovan to the science station across the aisle from Montero. Rafael handed him the syringe, and Strauss found a vein, slipped the needle in, and depressed the plunger. Within seconds, Donovan felt the narcotic heat begin to spread through his body. Had they lost their opportunity to stop Strauss? His pain and fear evaporated and his eyelids grew heavy. He felt as if his body weighed only a few ounces—that he could simply float away if he wanted. The darkness pulled at him and he tried to resist, but couldn't. His last drug-laden thought was wondering if he would wake up—or had Strauss just killed him?

Donovan's first sensation was the vaguely metallic taste of blood inside his mouth. He was cold and he fought the urge to vomit. His stomach heaved and he began to gasp in and out, trying not to be sick. Tears trickled from his eyes and when he blinked them away, he found it was dark, though enough light was coming from somewhere that he could make out formless shapes. He was lying on his side. Across from him was Montero.

He tried to reach for her with arms that wouldn't move. Donovan tried to put everything together, but his thoughts drifted in and out, unfocused, unmanageable. A bolt of pain knifed behind each temple as he slowly turned his head. If he moved cautiously, the nausea was less pronounced. He recalled disjointed thoughts of dying and closed his eyes and took one deep breath after another, focusing on the reality that he was still alive.