Day Of Wrath (40 page)

“Could I see your travel orders, too, Mr. Carlson?”

Double damn. Thorn knew there wasn’t any point in lying.

“We don’t have any travel orders, Sergeant.” Time to pull out Mike Stroud’s promised get-out-of-jail-free card, he thought. He reached into his pocket. “I’ve got a letter here for the base operations officer that explains our presence.”

He offered the folded piece of paper to the other man.

“You sure weren’t headed for the operations office when I found you,” Sergeant Thomas said dryly. He shook his head.

“Nope. I think you two folks better come with me to the security office.”

Triple damn.

Thorn eyed the Air Force noncom closely. Thomas had one hand resting on his sidearm, more to accent his authority than because he expected to use it. Still, he’d quietly taken two steps back, out of easy reach, and he’d positioned himself to face both of them.

Thorn tried again. “I suggest you read this letter.”

“I’ll let my boss read your paperwork,” the Air Force policeman said.

“My orders are clear, and I’m not getting my butt fried for letting you two walk off a plane and straight out a gate.”

After a quick glance at Helen, Thorn shrugged, acting far more casual than he felt. “Fine, Sergeant. You want to go by the book, we’ll go by the book.”

The duty security officer was busy. He kept them waiting for thirty excruciating minutes before Sergeant Thomas even made his report. More minutes passed before Master Sergeant Blue and an irritated major wearing a flight suit with pilot’s wings showed up.

Thorn saw Blue shoot him a sidewise glance— a glance he carefully ignored.

The C-17’s pilot and loadmaster were ushered into the security office ahead of them. When they emerged ten minutes later, they didn’t leave.

Instead they plopped themselves down on chairs at the opposite end of the waiting room. The pilot’s irritated expression had now matured into one of near.hatred. Blue looked resigned, like a man awaiting execution.

Sergeant Thomas came back out of the security officer’s inner sanctum.

“Mr. and Mrs. Carlson?” He held the door open for them. “You’re up next.”

Captain Forbes, the duty security officer, was a thin, strongjawed man with thick glasses and a sour look. He didn’t waste time with any courtesies. Instead, he crooked a finger. “Okay, pal. Let’s see this mysterious letter.”

Thorn handed it over without comment.

Forbes skimmed the letter fast, then took a more careful look.

The corners of his mouth turned down. “Have you read this?”

“Yes, sir.”

The Air Force captain ignored him. “It’s supposedly signed by a Lieutenant Colonel Gibbs, the operations officer for the 352nd Special Operations Group at R.A.F Mildenhall, in the U.K. He says I’m to ‘cooperate with your efforts to return to the U.S.”

Now, I don’t like this kind of vague, covert shit. Not at all. Not on my post and my watch. You mind telling me what the hell this is all about?

Or whether or not Carlson is even your real name?”

Thorn shook his head. “I’m sorry, Captain. I can’t discuss any of that.”

“Naturally.” Forbes tapped the letter for emphasis. “Look, anyone could have typed this damned thing up-even if it is on 352nd
SOG
stationery.”

Thorn kept his face immobile with an effort. For all he knew, that was exactly what Stroud had done.

“So I’m going to hold you two while I check this thing out.

And I want some fingerprints, to verify those ID cards of yours.

This whole thing smells.”

Whoa, boy, Thorn thought desperately. Our goose is almost inside that 350 degree oven. He saw Helen’s shoulders slump.

Well, Mike Stroud had given him one last card to play—and it was time to find out whether it was an ace, or just another joker.

He leaned closer to the security officer. “That would be a serious mistake, Captain Forbes. The whole point of this exercise is to avoid leaving a paper trail of our entry into the United States.

And we can’t be fingerprinted.”

“Can’t. the other man challenged.

“Shouldn’t,” Thorn corrected. He stood up and closed the door, then turned back to Forbes. “This is a
CORNICE
matter.”

The security officer shook his head, scowling. “That code word doesn’t mean a damned thing to me.”

“It does to your operations officer,” Thorn said. “Ask him what it means. But I strongly suggest you avoid using it over an open phone line.”

Forbes pondered that for a moment, then grunted. “Okay, goddamnit.

I’ll just do that.” He swept the letter and their ID cards to one side of his desk and nodded toward the door. “Wait outside.”

Once they were seated again, Helen leaned close enough to whisper in his ear. “Good grief, Peter! I never knew you were such a smooth-talking, thoroughgoing liar.”

“Years of playing poker,” he whispered back. “It’s sure nice to know I didn’t lose all that money for nothing.”

Helen chuckled.”

, That’s right. Build up my confidence and then tear it right back down

...”

She fell silent.

More minutes passed, dragging by while Thorn worked hard to avoid staring back at the two C-17 crewmen. Getting caught was bad enough for the two of them. But this was snowballing fast into a fiasco that might drag a lot of other good people down with the m. The only small mercy so far was the fact that the
FBI
arrest order must have been sent only to bases in Europe. If Forbes had been given a copy with their pictures on it, he and Helen would already be staring through the bars of the nearest cell.

The outside door banged open and a silver-haired Air Force colonel holding a walkie-talkie strode in. He swept the outer office with his eyes for an instant until his gaze landed on Thorn and Helen. Then he headed straight into Forbes’ office.

Sergeant Thomas came out a couple of minutes later, still shaking his head in disbelief. He motioned them back inside.

Captain Forbes was now standing beside his desk, while the colonel sat perched casually on a corner. “My name’s Callaghan, Mr. and Mrs. Carlson. I’m the operations officer here at Dover.”

He handed their ID cards and the letter back to Thorn. “I’ve explained the situation to Captain Forbes. I’m sure he now sees the error of his ways.”

The duty security officer tried his best to look indignant without crossing the line into insubordination.

“One of my people was supposed to meet your plane—but you landed early,” Callaghan explained. “Sorry about the mixup.”

“That’s okay, Colonel,” Thorn said with enormous relief, grateful they hadn’t wound up in jail within minutes of arriving home.

Callaghan glanced sideways at Forbes and then turned back to them.

“I’ve explained to the captain and Sergeant Thomas here that there will be no official record of this event. You weren’t on that C-17. You’ve never been inside this office. This meeting never happened.” He smiled thinly. “In fact, you don’t even exist. Will that be satisfactory?”

“Perfectly, Colonel,” Thorn said. He silently blessed Sam Farrell, Mike Stroud, and
CORNICE
whatever deep-black covert operation that code word represented.

“Great.” Callaghan swept his walkie-talkie off the security officer’s desk and motioned them toward the door. “My car’s just outside. I’ll tag along to make sure you get off base without hitting any more snags.

And then I’ll have my duty driver take you into town. From there, you’re on your own.”

Once they were at the main gate, the colonel clambered out of the staff car and then leaned back inside. He handed Thorn a sealed envelope.

“A mutual friend sent me this fax last night.”

“Thanks, Colonel. Thanks very much.”

“Don’t mention it,” Callaghan said flatly. “And I mean, really don’t mention it.

I never met either of you, remember?”

Thorn nodded his understanding. If he and Helen were caught later, the Air Force colonel had one possible line of defense—that he’d simply helped government employees claiming they were involved in some secret operation code-named
CORNICE
. But if they were caught, it would be far, far better for Callaghan if they just “forgot” to tell the
FBI
how they’d returned to the U.S. “Corporal Milliken here will take you where you want to go,” the colonel said. He shut the door and slapped the car roof to signal his driver to move on.

The sentries waved them through the gate and outside onto Highway 113.

Thorn sat back in the seat and tore open the envelope. He scanned the single sheet inside with intense interest. It was a list of economy-priced hotels and motels—all in the Washington, D.C area, and all on a Metro line. Each had been assigned a different code name.

He smiled broadly. Trust Sam Farrell to do his homework.

They pulled up to a major intersection.

“Where to, sir?” the driver asked.

Thorn handed the sheet to Helen. “What’s the best way to get to Wilmington, Corporal?”

“You can hop a
DART
bus for about four bucks a head, sir. Should get you there in an hour and a half or so.”

“That’ll be fine,” Thorn said. “Just drop us at the nearest bus stop, please.”

Helen leaned closer. “Wilmington? We’re taking Amtrak south then?” she asked quietly.

He nodded. The main New York-Washington rail line ran straight through the northern Delaware city. “Yep. We’re going cash-only from now on.

No point in sending up flares.”

“Good point,” Helen said.

Although the
FBI
seemed to be focusing its search for them on Europe, it was a safe bet that the Bureau had the warrants necessary to trace all their credit card expenditures. If they rented a car, the odds were the agents looking for them would have the make, model, and license tag within an hour or so. The train would be slower and less comfortable, but it offered one priceless advantage—anonymity.

JUNE
17

Vienna, Virginia

Sam Farrell snapped the afternoon news off and spun around to grab the phone on his desk. “Farrell.”

“Sam, it’s Chris Carlson. My wife and I are in town for a conference, so I thought I’d look you up. Hope you don’t mind.”

Farrell breathed an inward sigh of relief. He’d been waiting for hours to hear from Peter Thorn—always aware that any one of the half-dozen links he’d so carefully forged could easily have come undone. His worries had intensified after Colonel Stroud had let him know about the
FBI
warrants out for Thorn and Helen.

“Damn, Chris,” he said honestly. “It’s sure good to hear your voice.

Who’ve you two staying with?”

“The Mcintyres.”

Farrell pulled the coded list of hotels he prepared closer and ran his finger down it until he came to
MCINTYRE
. Peter and Helen had checked into the Madison Inn, a small bed-and-breakfast near the D.C. zoo. He nodded to himself: They’d made a good choice. That section of the city—Woodley Park—was quiet and almost entirely residential. Anyone conducting a search for them or trying to set up a surveillance net would stand out like a sore thumb.

“The Mcintyres are nice people,” Farrell said. He eyed the clock on his wall. It was a little after three in the afternoon. “You two free for dinner tonight?”

“Our social calendar is completely open, Sam,” Thorn said dryly. “Come by at your convenience. Will Louisa be with you?”

“Not this time,” Farrell said. “I’m an acting bachelor just now.”

He’d put his wife, Louisa, on a plane to visit their son and daughter-in-law as soon as he’d realized how many rules and regulations he was going to have to break to get Peter and Helen home safely and not in handcuffs. While he doubted the military or the administration would be too eager to try a highly decorated retired general for obstruction of justice and aiding fugitives, he didn’t see any point in making his wife an accessory to the crimes he’d committed.

“You take it easy now,” Farrell warned. “It’s real hot out there right now. Real hot. Sunstroke weather, if you ask me.”

There was a pause while Thorn digested the renewed warning.

“Understood, Sam,” he said finally. “We’ll lie up here in the shade until the heat dies down.”

“Smart move.” Farrell stood up. “I’m heading out the door now.”

After hanging up, he went into the master bedroom and pulled open the nightstand drawer closest to his side of the bed.

Inside lay a 9mm Beretta, a spare magazine, and a Milt Sparks holster that fit inside the waistband of his pants. As a former commander of all the U.S. military’s counterterrorist units, he’d found it remarkably easy to obtain a special federal concealed weapons permit.

Sam Farrell strongly doubted he’d need the pistol, but he’d listened too closely to Peter Thorn’s accounts of the nightmare ambushes at Pechenga and Wilhelmshaven to take anything for granted. And more than three decades of active Army service had taught him the wisdom of the old Boy Scout motto—”Be Prepared.” Hand-to-hand combat might work out okay for Peter and Helen in a pinch, but he preferred to be ready to meet trouble with three or four steeljacketed slugs.

Planning Cell, Caraco Complex, Chantilly, Virginia (D
MINUS
4)

Rolf Ulrich Reichardt listened intently, trying to ferret out the hidden subtext from the welter of moronic American banalities and idioms. He turned to Jopp. “Rewind the tape.”

The wiry sound specialist nodded and flipped another series of switches on his equipment.

Reichardt heard the conversation begin. Halfway through he saw Ibrahim appear at the door. The Saudi prince spent two or three hours each day at the complex now—monitoring each phase as the Operation came ever closer to fruition.

The German said nothing and kept listening, letting the voices play their childish dance of secret codes all over again.

When the tape ended he pulled off the headphones.

“Well, Herr Reichardt, what is your report?” Ibrahim asked sharply.

“Hashemi said you had news of our friend, General Farrell.”

“Yes, Highness,” Reichardt said. He offered the other man the headphones and signaled Jopp to recue the phone intercept. “We picked up this telephone call on the American’s private line an hour or so ago.”