Fatal Conceit (3 page)

Fauhomme shook his head. “Jesus, don't you spooks ever get tired of ‘stirring the pot'? It never seems to pan out, or is Iran-Contra such a distant memory that the lesson has been forgotten?”

Stung, Lindsey countered. “No more than you get tired of manipulating voters.”

“Yeah,” Fauhomme snorted. “But I get results.”

“No offense,” Lindsey replied tersely, “but you have no idea what has worked and what hasn't. All you hear about is the occasional foul-up that is bound to happen now and again, but believe it or not, we have reasons for doing what we do that might not be apparent to someone who isn't in the loop.”

Lindsey made his last comment pointedly, but Fauhomme just brushed it off with a wave of his cigar. “If I want in the loop, I'll get in the loop,” he replied. “But we have experts, like yourself, to muck it up just fine on your own.”

The fat man rubbed his face with his pudgy fingers. He had been in the political game for most of his adult life. The son of an auto worker and avowed communist, he'd joined Students for a Democratic Society when he arrived on a college campus in Illinois in the late sixties. But when the SDS wasn't radical enough in its plans to topple the Establishment, he'd signed on
with the violent Weathermen faction, hoping to plant bombs and kill cops.

However, times changed and he and his fellow “revolutionaries” decided that they would have a better chance of bringing down the corrupt capitalist system if they worked insidiously from the inside. So he turned to the political party most closely aligned with his politics, even though the party leadership was far too close to the middle and away from the left for his tastes. Then he made a name for himself as a “community organizer.” That was where he'd met the president, a kindred spirit, and a few years later ran his first political campaign for alderman.

Fauhomme had gone on to run other campaigns for candidates who fit his left-wing profile, but always dropped whatever else he was doing if the then-future president called asking for help as he climbed the ladder from state to federal offices. He was a true believer, and what he believed in was a socialist America, whether its population chose to identify itself that way or not. The men and women he helped elect were those he thought would push the United States further to the left with every election cycle.

Over the past few years, it had helped that the opposition party seemed bent on self-destruction, trotting out pathetic candidates who seemed to relish snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. It went hand-in-hand with his favorite campaign ploy, which was to attack the candidate on a personal level and avoid talking about the real issues whenever possible. With the economy in shambles, two foreign wars, and massive debt, the opposition should have run away with the upcoming election. But instead, the other party selected a candidate who fit the stereotype Fauhomme himself had worked to convince the low-information masses was their biggest enemy—wealthy, out of touch with working people, and part of the good old white boys' club that was “holding them back” and unfairly hoarding all the wealth. Toss in a few Neanderthal candidates to spew insults at minorities and women—which the opposition party had not countered successfully while Fauhomme, with
the help of a willing media, used to paint the entire party with the same broad “mean-spirited” brush—and that runaway victory was instead a double-digit lead in the polls for the president.

Still, not everyone in the country was buying the bullshit he was spreading. Many
were
paying attention to a stagnant economy, trillion-dollar deficits, runaway entitlement programs, the haphazard and dangerous foreign policy, and a steady encroachment on rights and traditional values. Not everyone believed that the government could spend its way out of a deep recession or trusted the manipulated employment numbers. Thus the election was not a shoo-in for Fauhomme's man either.

In fact, three weeks earlier, the normally wooden opposition candidate had delivered a surprisingly passionate performance in the first debate that had centered on the economy and had the president up against the ropes by its end. The drubbing had shown up immediately in the polls with the opposition closing that double-digit lead to mid-single digit. Reeling from the disaster, Fauhomme immediately fired the team appointed to prepare the president for the debate, even though the real problem had been the candidate's arrogance.

As a result, two nights earlier the president had rebounded with a strong showing in the second debate, which had centered on foreign policy and terrorism. For reasons even Fauhomme couldn't fathom, the opposition candidate backed off attacking the weaknesses in the president's policies, saying that “in these dangerous times, we need to come together and present a united front to America's enemies.”
Bullshit,
he'd thought when he heard that,
you are the enemy
.

The president's performance had for the moment stopped the opposition's momentum, but the losses in the polls had not been regained. The one thing the campaign did not need now was a debacle like the one playing out on the television screen.

“Okay, so we're playing games with the Russians and trying to clandestinely get weapons into the hands of God-knows-who to
get rid of Assad, probably in violation of U.S. and maybe even international law . . . business as usual for you national ‘insecurity' types, I get it,” Fauhomme said. “But I got an election hanging in the balance, and if we lose, not only is it over for the president, it's over for you.”

He let his warning sink in as he stared at Lindsey until the little man looked away. He smiled slightly and stole a glance at the younger man in the corner, a former Marine named “Big Ray” Baum who'd been drummed out of the Corps for brutal acts against civilians in Afghanistan. Baum was smirking, having listened to the exchange.

“Do you think the Russians could be behind the attack?” he asked, turning back to Lindsey.

“I wouldn't put it past them. The attack looked pretty organized, but some of it was haphazard and took a long time considering their superior numbers and firepower, not the discipline you'd expect to see from Russian special forces masquerading as insurgents. But the Russians certainly wouldn't have been happy if they found out what our ‘trade mission' was really about and could have got someone else to do their dirty work for them.”

“So what will they do now after their ‘investigation' turns up dead Americans?” Fauhomme asked.

“They'll blame it on the separatists,” Lindsey replied. “The more they can link the separatists with terrorism, the more they can crack down on the movement. Officially we'd have to go along with it; we don't say anything about the brutal things they do to ‘terrorists' in Chechnya, and they don't say anything when we take out someone with a drone strike. This little incident is going to give them a free pass to go to town on those poor bastards.”

Fauhomme nodded at the television screen. “So I take it you don't think these were the separatists?”

“Doubtful,” Lindsey replied. “We were there to make arrangements to give them weapons and back them up at the UN. They had nothing to win by attacking us and everything to lose, especially
when the Russians let loose on them with our blessing. The bad guys are more likely foreign fighters—Islamic extremists from other countries who flock anywhere Muslims are fighting a secular government or infidels. They're probably Al Qaeda or linked . . .”

“WRONG!” the fat man shouted as he sat up suddenly in his seat. “They're not fucking Al Qaeda!”

Lindsey furrowed his brow. “What do you mean? There's a good chance that they are. One of the reasons we assigned this to Huff was we've been getting reports about Al Qaeda increasing their activities in the area, coming over the border from Dagestan, and . . .” He was interrupted again when Fauhomme slammed a meaty palm down on his desk and pointed his cigar at Lindsey. “Al Qaeda doesn't exist as an effective terrorist organization anymore,” he hissed. “The president said so on national television two days ago. Or don't you remember the last debate? That's when he told John and Susie Q. Public and 300-plus million of their fellow citizens that one of the finest moments of his administration was eradicating Public Enemy Number One, fucking Al Qaeda. Therefore, Al Qaeda doesn't exist.”

“We warned the president against making too broad a statement . . .”

“I don't give a rat's ass about your warning . . . we needed to give the masses something after the first debate debacle, so we gave them the death of Al Qaeda and now we can all sleep safe in our beds tonight thanks to
this
administration.”

There was a knock at the door of his office, which opened before he could reply. A beautiful young brunette woman in a silk dressing gown poked her head in. “Is everything okay, honey?” she asked the fat man. “I heard a bang and I . . .”

“Get the fuck out!” Fauhomme exclaimed. “Jesus, Connie, how many fucking times do I have to tell you to stay out of my office when I'm in a meeting!”

The young woman's face crumpled and it looked for a moment like she might cry, but she quickly ducked back out. Fauhomme
continued to look at the door for a moment as if she might try to come in again, and then shook his head. “Jesus, what a ditz,” he exclaimed. “Great in the sack, but that plane's flying without a pilot.”

“Uh-oh, what have we got here?” Baum interrupted.

The other two turned to look back at the television. Although the images were small and grainy, they were clear enough; a crowd of armed men were pushing and shoving three prisoners toward the open area between the main building and the compound's outer fence. They could see that one of the captives appeared to be a slightly built woman; the others were definitely larger males. One of the men suddenly turned on his captors and began to fight, but he was quickly clubbed to his knees and then dragged forward to where they were all forced to line up side by side.

A man, apparently the terrorist leader, stepped in front of the prisoners. He then turned and looked up and appeared to be staring right at the Predator. Holding up a finger, he tracked the circling drone that he could hear but not see as though to say he knew he was being watched. He then turned back to the captives.

Walking over to the prisoner on his left, a tall man, he pointed his gun as if he was going to execute him. But then he lowered the gun and stepped over to the female captive, where he seemed to say something to her. He then reached out and appeared to touch her face before moving on to the last male prisoner, who was still on his knees. The leader pointed his gun at the prisoner, who looked steadily up at him; there was a flash and the prisoner pitched sideways and lay still.

“Jesus,” Lindsey muttered.

“Better for us if those sons of bitches kill all of them,” Fauhomme replied.

Lindsey frowned. “What the hell kind of man are you? Those are Americans.”

“What kind of a man am I?” Fauhomme repeated rhetorically. “I'm a man who sees the big picture, and sometimes sacrifices
need to be made for the greater good. I'm the man who cleans up everybody else's fuckups, including you James Bond wannabes. And I'm a man trying to win an important election that could determine the course of this country for the next century.”

Suddenly there was another knock at the door. “Yeah, what is it?” Fauhomme shouted.

When the door opened a clean-cut young man poked his head in and looked at Lindsey. “Excuse, sir, but you said to let you know if there were any more communications from Chechnya,” he said as he walked in and shut the door behind him. “We just learned that a call was placed to the U.S. embassy in Moscow about ten minutes ago. The caller left a message.” He held up a small digital recorder. “Want to hear it?”

“Yeah, Augie, go ahead, play it,” Lindsey replied.

Augie pressed a button and a young woman's voice, cracking with strain and fear, entered the room. “This is codename Wallflower. We are at the compound in Zandaq. We've been attacked and overrun. They're trying to get in. I don't think it will be much longer. They are not Chechen; they're speaking Arabic, several native Saudi speakers, a Yemeni, not sure of the others, but I repeat, they are not Chechen. . . . I'm with David Huff.” The woman's voice paused and a loud pounding could be heard. “They're here,” she said, then the phone went dead.

Lindsey motioned for Augie to leave. “Let me know if anything else comes in.”

“Who the hell is Wallflower?” Fauhomme demanded.

Lindsey shook his head. “Couldn't tell you. There was no one with our people using that codename. In fact, I didn't think there were any women on the mission.”

“Well apparently there is, and it's somebody who knows the difference between a Saudi and a Yemeni speaking Arabic,” Fauhomme retorted. “She sounded American.”

“I'll have to ask around, see if some other agency was in the area,” Lindsey said. “So what now?”

“I want every copy of that fucking tape. And nobody, I mean nobody, says anything about it; it doesn't exist.” Fauhomme stopped talking and looked at the television screen, where the remaining two hostages were being herded onto a flatbed truck. “Tell the drone operator to light 'em up,” he said.

“Light who up?” Lindsey asked.

“The hostages, who the hell do you think?” Fauhomme said. “We've got a hostage situation, and I won't have this administration's chances of re-election pulling a Jimmy Carter on me. They need to go!”

Lindsey punched a number into his cell phone. “Take out the truck with the friendlies,” he said quietly. “Yeah, you heard me right, the friendlies; in fact, take them all out, as many as you can, but make sure you get that truck. Am I clear?” He put his cell phone down and looked back at Fauhomme. “Then what's our story?”