Force of Nature (34 page)

NATE NOTED
that late at night, after the inevitable long dinner in the tent of their hosts, after he’d fed and secured the falcons on
their stoops and tightened their hoods and gone to bed, Nemecek would gather his pack and slip outside without a word. He’d be gone for an hour or more and return silently and slip back into his blankets. Nate never asked Nemecek where he went, and Nemecek never explained.

But Nate knew that along with personal items and clothing, the satellite phone was located within the small pack he took along with him.

ON THE MORNING
of the fourth day, as the wind picked up and sandblasted the fabric of the tents with the sound of angry rattlesnakes, Nemecek appeared and said, “Let’s go.”

They left the peregrine falcons, and the drive back to the airport through the makeshift camp and parked jetliners seemed strangely hollow to Nate. Nemecek, however, was buoyant.

When they were seated together in first class on the commercial airplane on the way home, Nemecek said, “Establishing and nurturing relationships with these people is more important than anything else. We’ve got billions of dollars of hardware and technology, but what we don’t have is on-the-ground human intel. It’s like the Jetsons versus the Flintstones, and we’re the Jetsons. But that doesn’t mean the Flintstones might not win in the end if we don’t figure out a way to relate to them on a human level.”

Nate nodded, not sure where the conversation was going.

Nemecek said, “Now all those men back there know us and respect us on a basic level. We can sell them planes and rockets and technology, but that doesn’t mean they like us. But appealing to their actual wants and needs, like we did back there, puts us on a different level. We can now call on them if we need something, even if it’s personal. They’ll receive us in their homes and palaces. If the diplomats
and the politicians can’t get them to do what we want, they’ll ask
us
to help out.”

His commander grinned at Nate, an expression Nate had rarely seen before.

“If you think you were valuable to our government as an operator,” he said, “imagine how valuable you are now. Imagine how valuable
we
are. Suddenly, Mark V is the tip of the spear in Special Forces because we know these people personally. And the Middle East is where everything will happen when the shit hits the fan.”

Then he turned, still smiling, and closed his eyes. Nemecek slept for the remainder of the flight. Nate spent his time wondering what he’d just been told.

Nate’s incomprehension grew deeper the next time he was called into Nemecek’s bungalow.

“THAT’S WHEN
he handed over two million dollars in cash to me,” Nate said. “A full military duffel bag filled with bricks of hundred-dollar bills. He said it was my share.”

Haley gasped.

“The peregrines performed so well there was a bidding war between the emirs,” Nate said. “The final price was a half million each. Or so Nemecek said. It might even have been more.”

Nate paused and said, “I’ve been living on it ever since.”

HE TOOK
the duffel bag of cash back to his quarters. He sat next to it on the bed for the entire night, thinking. How many other operations was Nemecek involved in that provided such huge payoffs? How many other Peregrines were tethered to Nemecek because of off-the-books operations that resulted in personal wealth?

Of course
it wasn’t right. Operators didn’t become operators for the money. But if by doing good and valuable things for their country and risking their lives every time they went out resulted in rewards that would provide for them (if they lived) and their families for years, where was the harm? After all, the only other logical recipient of cash would be the U.S. Treasury. Might as well feed the bricks of cash, one by one, into the garbage disposal, right?

The next day, he drove back to Nemecek’s bungalow to return it. Nemecek was gone, cleared out. Nate guessed he’d moved—as he often did—to one of his other small offices throughout the world.

He went back to his quarters, expecting a secure set of orders for his next operation or at least a communication from his commander. But there was nothing.

Over the next year, Nate spent a good deal of his time deconstructing the mission and analyzing everything that had occurred both at home and in Afghanistan. Because of the vertical and decentralized design of Mark V, he never saw or heard from Nemecek. That in itself wasn’t unusual, except for the special circumstances of Nate’s relationship with his superior officer. Nate had questions and concerns. And later, guilt.

“THE WEEK
after 9/11,” Nate said in a whisper, “I walked away. I didn’t say goodbye to anyone, and I didn’t file any papers. I didn’t submit to debriefing, which was in my contract. I just threw that duffel bag in the back of my Jeep and started driving. I ended up in Montana.

“All along the way,” he said, “I saw American flags on every storefront and in every yard. I remember looking out once over the prairie near Billings, way out in the distance, and seeing a single flag flying above a ranch house. The world had changed, good people had been
killed and damaged, and I was partially responsible for it. And when they needed me most, I quit.”

Haley had wrapped her arms around herself, and she shook her head from side to side. She seemed deeply troubled.

“I don’t get it,” she said. “I don’t see why you just left them when they probably needed you the most. It doesn’t seem like you.”

Nate snorted.

“Why did you do it?” she asked. “Why did you desert our country and your service?”

Nate took a deep intake of breath. “I was young. I was stupid. I was devastated.”

He turned away. “I believed in Mark V and John Nemecek. I devoted my life to the cause, and I killed human beings all over the world on their behalf. I knew what we were doing was questionable in terms of laws and treaties, but I thought it was for the greater good. But when I found out Nemecek was using the Peregrines for his own benefit, and that much of what we’d been doing was all a game, I lost faith in the entire system. I just wanted out. I couldn’t look at myself in the mirror anymore, and I sure as hell couldn’t go on another operation. So I went to Montana to leave Mark V and the rest of the world behind.”

She asked, “And why do you say you were responsible for innocent lives lost?”

“I told you the story,” Nate said, “except for the most important parts. It all became clear that week after September eleventh. I watched those buildings go down in New York and the speculation on who was responsible. Then they showed the old video of who had masterminded the attack. Until then, I didn’t know.”

“Know what?” she demanded, her tone shrill and accusatory.

He took a deep breath and held it. Then: “The visitor to the camp that night, the lover of westerns, was Osama bin Laden. His friend
was Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri. Together they were the heart and brains of al-Qaeda, and at the time they were putting the final touches on the 9/11 attacks.”

“But how could you know that?” she asked.

“I didn’t, and nobody did at the time,” Nate said. “But our government wanted to kill bin Laden for things he’d done already—the USS
Cole
bombing, the embassy bombings. They were watching that camp with satellites while we were there, ready to launch cruise missiles and take him out. In the end, the reason they didn’t pull the trigger was because they were afraid of collateral damage—they didn’t want to be responsible for a bunch of dead princes in the desert as well.”

Haley shook her head. “But you said the visitors had a camp a few miles away. They could have hit
that
camp and everybody else would have been fine.”

“Exactly,” Nate said.

“So how are you responsible for that bad decision?”

Nate turned his head, his eyes slitted. “Because our government man on the ground called them up each night on his satellite phone to tell them bin Laden was staying in
our
camp. So we wouldn’t risk our lives and so we’d personally get rich with blood and oil money.”

Haley recoiled. “Oh my God.”

“Now, apparently,” Nate said, “Nemecek has gone semi-private, like a lot of the old spooks have with all the defense cuts. His company is up for a massive contract to do clandestine counterintelligence, and he looks like a shoo-in, at least according to that poor bastard I got the information from back in Jackson. The skids are greased for him to make millions more and do what he’s best at. His reputation in Washington is stellar because of the great work of the Mark V Peregrines. But if the staffers and senators awarding the contract knew that he did his damnedest to save bin Laden’s life before 9/11 …”

“He’d lose the contract and his reputation and probably go to jail,” Haley said, finishing Nate’s sentence.

“And there’s one guy who could blow it for him if this ever got public,” Nate said.

“Now I understand,” she said. “So your friend Large Merle? He knew?”

Nate nodded.

“What about Oscar and Gabriel and the rest back in Idaho?”

“No. But Nemecek thought they might. So he had to take them out.”

“What about your friends in Saddlestring? The ones you called and told to leave?”

“No,” Nate said. “But it doesn’t matter.”

“I don’t understand something,” she said. “I don’t understand why you never went to the government or to the press with your story? You could have put Nemecek out of business.”

“It wouldn’t have worked,” Nate said. “Nemecek is inside of the inside. He would have found me before I even made contact with anyone. He used every resource the government has to try to find me, which is why I went low-tech and completely dropped out of society. No credit cards, no phone, no address. But if I’d stepped forward and tried to contact someone, it would have been like signing a death warrant on us both. Very few people in the bureaucracy can operate with complete impunity. They’ve got to report to people and write summaries. Nemecek would have intercepted the communications within minutes and cut everything off and eliminated anyone involved.

“Believe me,” Nate said, “I’ve spent years agonizing over this. I could never figure out a way to take him down without taking down innocents as well. I don’t mind killing people who deserve it, but not those just doing their jobs. So I dropped out. I did what I could to
help out a friend. I carefully made contact with a few others, like Oscar and Cohen. And look what happened to
them
.”

Haley squirmed in her seat. He could guess what she was thinking.

“And now
I
know,” she said.

“I tried to get you to leave,” he said.

“We don’t have a choice, do we? We’ve got to kill him and stop this.”

“It’s our only option,” Nate said. “But an old saying keeps coming to mind:
If you’re going to try to kill the king, you’d better kill the king.
”

AFTER THEY’D
driven a few more miles in silence, Nate looked over at Haley. He said, “It’s a different version of events than you heard from Nemecek, isn’t it?”

The question froze her in her seat. Even in the dark, he could see her face drain of color and her eyes fix on the windshield in involuntary terror. She looked like a frightened ghost with dark, hollow eyes.

“He told you it was me who was in business with bin Laden, didn’t he? And that there was a score to settle? That’s what he told all the other operators, wasn’t it?”

She didn’t react other than to continue staring ahead. But the fact that she didn’t lash back told him everything he needed to know.

“You don’t have to explain,” he said. “I can figure it out. He recruited you for this operation with the story about letting bin Laden get away. Only he reversed the players and the motivation. You don’t know how many others are on the team, and you don’t know who they are or what they’ve been told. And you’ve spent the last few hours trying to reconcile what he told you against what you’ve seen and heard yourself.”

He said, “I think you’ve got a good heart, Haley. I think your reaction
to what happened to Cohen and Oscar was genuine. And I sure as hell know your passion back there with me felt real.”

Her mouth trembled, and her eyes blinked too fast.

“You’ll have plenty of opportunities ahead to take me out,” Nate said. “And if you choose, you can probably find a way to warn Nemecek I’m coming for him. I’m not going to stop you or kill you now. I’ll let fate take its course.”

In a barely audible whisper, she asked,
“Why?”

“Because I think you’ll do the right thing.”

She said,
“If you’re going to try to kill the king, you’d better kill the king.”

He didn’t ask which king.

THE PICKETT FAMILY
sat in a line on uncomfortable red plastic scoop chairs in the predawn at Saddlestring Municipal Airport as the tiny cinder-block structure staggered to life. Their luggage, an assortment of mismatched suitcases and duffel bags, had been checked through by the lone ticket agent, a pierced dark-haired stocky woman of indeterminate age who had communicated via a series of grunts, and who had gone outside the double doors for a cigarette the minute she’d completed grunting as she tossed the bags on a cart.

Joe turned in his chair and watched her out there, the tiny red cherry of her cigarette bobbing in the darkness, until she returned and sulked back to her counter to check the manifest. He’d caught a glimpse of it as they checked in: only five passengers were listed. The Picketts and a local rancher named Donald M. Jones, also known as Rowdy. Rowdy Jones hadn’t checked in yet.

Joe wore civilian gear and his battered hat. No uniform shirt, holster, or equipment belt. He felt lighter than air and vulnerable without his weapons and gear and sense of purpose.

Joe hadn’t slept since he’d returned from following Nemecek into
the mountains, and his sleep deprivation heightened his sense of despair. His thoughts were like too many large fish in a small tank—writhing and intertwining over one another, depleting the oxygen available, in search of some kind of blue-water relief.