Kill Shot (5 page)

Gabe’s voice was low, but each word was
clear. “I assembled this team for reasons that you’ll never know or
hope to understand. It’s not your place to say or question
anything
I decide to do. Everyone here starts on a clean
slate. And if you have a problem with that, then you’re free to
leave and go through debriefing. Have I made myself clear?”

Grace winced and looked at Jack. Being
debriefed was a nice way of saying that Ethan would be drugged and
brainwashed until he couldn’t remember who Gabe was or anything
they’d been working on. She’d heard they’d tried to do that to Gabe
when he resigned from the CIA and that they could never break him.
Gabe was lucky he hadn’t been taken out by an inside source.

Ethan stared down Gabe, trying to get his
temper under control. “Yes, sir,” he said between gritted
teeth.

Gabe nodded and backed away, avoiding her
gaze as he headed toward the conference room. “Now let’s get some
work done,” he called over his shoulder. “Because we’ll all end up
dead if we don’t catch this bastard.”

Tension vibrated in fine waves from everyone
in the room, and Gabe sighed. Grace sat there stoically, pretending
it didn’t matter what Ethan thought about her when he knew damned
well that somewhere deep inside of her it did. Jack sat beside her
like a guard dog ready to defend her honor. And Ethan sat sullenly
on the far side of the table. By the time Logan walked in and gave
him an arched look in question at the atmosphere, all Gabe wanted
was a drink and maybe a good fight.

Logan took a seat next to Ethan, and Gabe
slid thick black folders to each of them.

“All of this information is in your packet
in greater detail, but I’ll hit the high points.” Gabe took his
seat at the head of the table and flipped open his folder. “Before
World War II, the United States began research on a biochemical
weapon called The Passover Project. It started much like its
counterpart—The Manhattan Project—as an experiment for
annihilation. But it was never meant for mass destruction like The
Manhattan Project was with the atomic bomb. The Passover Project
was meant as an assassination tool designed for one specific
target. Of course, the target at the time was Hitler. All The
Passover Project needed to become viable was a single strand of
DNA—a piece of hair or skin cells to add to the basic formula—and
the weapon would turn live. In theory, once it was launched, it
could seek out its DNA match from a crowd of hundreds of thousands
of people and eliminate the target once contact was made.

“Holy shit,” Jack said under his breath.

“To say the least,” Gabe said. “The core
formula could be modified for any specific target by changing the
DNA.”

“I’ve never heard of The Passover Project
before,” Ethan said. “I’ve never even seen it mentioned in any
Pentagon or CIA files.”

Gabe nodded and stood up to move around the
room. He never liked being in one place very long. It made him
restless.

“It never came to fruition,” he said. “The
Passover Project began production in 1939 in an underground
laboratory in Nevada. The whole purpose for experiments like The
Passover and Manhattan Projects was that intelligence indicated
that the Nazis were already working on similar weapons. At that
point, it was just a race to see who could finish first.

“Clearance was so restricted on The Passover
Project that there were only four scientists on the original
development team. Dr. Josef Schmidt, a biochemistry professor from
Stanford, was the project’s creator and lead scientist.”

“And what happened to Dr. Schmidt?” Grace
asked cynically. “Knowing our government the way I do, they
wouldn’t let a man with that kind of knowledge live very long.”

“The lab, the research, and the weapon’s
developer were all destroyed in an explosion before it could do
what it had been created for. The lab wreckage was carefully
searched, and all traces of The Passover Project were removed and
taken to the Pentagon. It was hushed up and swept under the rug.
Not even Roosevelt knew of its existence.”

“Whoever was responsible for the explosives
did a piss-poor job,” Logan said, his English accent barely
noticeable. “If it had been my job, my first priority would have
been to make sure there was nothing to sift out of the rubble.”

“Well for our sakes, I’m glad you didn’t
handle the demolition.” Gabe went back to the table and took out
the photographs he’d shown Grace on the plane. “As you can tell
from the pictures, someone is trying to resurrect The Passover
Project.”

“Just to play devil’s advocate, why would
you make that leap?” Grace asked. “It does look like something
bigger than an assassination attempt on one person happened in all
of these photos. These places have been completely
obliterated.”

“You’re right. But I had a little help in
connecting the dots. Former Deputy Director of the CIA Frank
Bennett sent me this information eighteen hours before his death.
He made copies of everything that was left from the 1943 explosion
site, and he included the current photos of the destruction done to
these different locations. All he said in his note was that he
trusted I would take care of this and find who was
responsible.”

“I heard Bennett’s death was ruled a
suicide,” Ethan said. “And I’ll look to be sure, but I believe
that’s the final ruling in Frank Bennett’s CIA file. Rumor was that
he was being forced to retire because of a drinking problem, and he
just couldn’t handle being let go. His whole life was the
agency.”

Ethan shifted uncomfortably in his chair as
Gabe’s eyes narrowed to thin blue slits and addressed the rumor in
question. “Bennett was found hanged in his office, and a suicide
note was left on his desk in his handwriting. The medical examiner
said it was an open-and-shut case, but everyone in this room knows
how easy it is to fake a suicide and forge a note. It’s a basic
tactic learned early on. Not to mention that Frank would be the
last person I know who’d kill himself. I was the closest friend he
had, and if anyone at the CIA had bothered to check before they
started the rumors that he had a drinking problem, they’d know that
Frank Bennett had never touched a drop of alcohol in his life
because his father was an alcoholic and beat the shit out of him
and his mom as often as he could. Frank Bennett was murdered.”

Gabe stuck his hands in his pockets and
leaned against the bookshelf. Bennett’s death was still a bitter
pill to swallow. The man had been like a father to him—more than
his own father had ever been. There was no way in hell Frank had
killed himself. Frank was dead because of The Passover Project.

“So if Frank didn’t kill himself, who did?”
Ethan asked.

“I don’t know, but I know the documents in
these folders are the reason he’s dead. Frank did all the beginning
legwork for us. A portion of the formula base was found in the
wreckage of the lab. It seems pretty obvious by the testing pattern
in these photos that someone is trying to recreate the formula.
They haven’t hit on the right combination just yet, but it’s only a
matter of time. All I know is that we have to stop whoever it is.
If we find out who’s behind recreating The Passover Project, then
we’ll find Frank’s killer.

“They’ve got a pretty big hunting ground to
choose from for these experiments,” Jack said. “We can’t keep eyes
on every small, unknown tribe around the world. Hell, we both know
there are tribes in the jungle that aren’t even documented. They
have languages we’ve never heard spoken.”

“We’ll start with the scientists behind the
testing. The list of those capable of recreating something like
this can’t be long. But we have to hurry. The next step in any
scientific experiment is moving to the next level—raising the bar
higher. We don’t want them to start testing in major cities around
the world.”

“If the knowledge of The Passover Project
has been sitting in the CIA vaults for half a century, then it has
to be someone high up who’s behind it all,” Grace said. “Especially
factoring in Frank’s death. Only someone who had high-level
security clearance would know what Frank had access to.”

“That’s not necessarily true,” Ethan said.
“I hacked into top-level CIA security when I was a sophomore in
high school. Nothing electronic is fail-safe. I’m guessing the only
reason I’ve never heard of The Passover Project is that everything
is still in hard copy. Breaking and entering that doesn’t involve a
computer isn’t my style. So you’re looking for someone who has
access to the vault and enough money to pay off the guards, or
someone that could break into Langley and sneak past the guards
without being noticed. The only person I know who could do that is
you, Ghost.”

Ethan had his feet propped up on the corner
of the table and was drumming his fingers restlessly on the arm of
his chair. He seemed to be back in an affable mood, their earlier
tension already forgotten. Gabe didn’t remember what it felt like
to be that young or carefree. And he hoped above all else that
Ethan grew up soon. He’d really hate to have to kill him.

Gabe sighed. “There’s always someone younger
and better coming up behind you, kid. You’ll learn that someday. As
far as suspects to Frank’s murder, no one is popping to the
surface. I’m hoping you’ll have more luck in that regard once you
start digging a little deeper.”

“So what’s the mission?” Jack asked.

Gabe gave his friend a hard smile. “This is
where things get fun. Bennett had done quite a bit of research on
Josef Schmidt. It turns out Schmidt was a Nazi sympathizer and had
plans to turn the weapon over to Hitler when it was completed.”

“How do we know he didn’t succeed?” Ethan
asked.

“I’ve been digging through the German
government files. Their technology is outdated, and their data is
disorganized.”

Ethan’s eyebrows rose in surprise. “Did they
know you were searching? Surely you know you leave a fingerprint
every time you mess with technology. A good hacker could trace it
back to here and find us.” Ethan mumbled something under his breath
about safeguards and amateurs.

Jack laughed at Ethan’s naivety. “There’s a
reason why they call him the Ghost. Stick around kid, and you may
learn something.”

Ethan scowled at being called a kid. “It
wouldn’t hurt for me to double-check and make sure. No offense, but
as much as any of you could kick my ass, none of you are as good as
I am with computers.”

“I know my way around computers, Ethan, but
go ahead and take a look if it will make you feel better,” Gabe
said. “You’re going to be going through all their files again
anyway.”

“Did you find anything useful?” Logan
asked.

“You could say that. When the German
equivalent of the CIA—MAD—was created in the 1950s, they took
control of everything seized during Hitler’s reign—artwork,
journals, correspondence, family photos, everything. Most of the
journals have been transferred to computer, and I found a very
interesting reference to Josef Schmidt.”

Gabe walked back to the table and sat down
in his chair. A dull ache was starting to form at the back of his
neck, and his eyes burned and felt gritty with lack of sleep.

“It seems Hitler met with Schmidt twice. He
writes about his frustration with Schmidt because the man’s demands
for payment kept growing. Each time he met with Hitler, Schmidt
gave him a portion of the formula. They were scheduled to meet one
last time before the explosion destroyed Schmidt’s lab, and Hitler
planned to execute him so he couldn’t sell the formula elsewhere.
But Hitler only ended up with two-thirds of the formula.”

“Did he write them down?” Grace asked.

“No. He painted them.”

Grace sighed quietly, but even that small
sound had Gabe looking at her sharply. Her green eyes were bright
with anticipation, and her spine was straight. He could practically
see the energy running across her skin. He leaned forward and set
his arms on the table to cover the erection that had been plaguing
him for the last twenty-four hours.

“That’s right,” she said. “Hitler was an
amateur artist. He was never good enough to get accepted into the
Royal Academy.”

“No, but after his death his paintings were
sold for millions.”

“Oh, man,” said Ethan. “That is wicked
awesome. Where are they? Do we get to steal them?”

Gabe wanted to laugh at Ethan’s enthusiasm
but kept his mouth firm. God, had he ever been that young and
eager? Maybe. When had the rose-colored glasses come off? After his
first kill? After his twentieth?

“One of them is in the Tehran Museum,” Gabe
answered. “The second was bought by a private collector from a
Sotheby’s auction. The purchaser is hidden behind anonymous bidders
and a couple of private corporations. I don’t have a name yet.”

“So let me get this straight,” Jack said.
“We’re going to Iran to break into their national museum so we can
destroy a painting created by the most hated man in the world?”

“That pretty much sums it up.”

Gabe’s gaze never strayed from Grace, and he
could see the slight stiffening of her shoulders as she realized
what this could mean for them. Tussad spent a lot of time in Iran.
They could kill two birds with one stone. And then maybe, just
maybe, once they’d taken their revenge, they could start to put
their lives back together.

“Everyone get a good night’s sleep,” he
said. “We’ll start recon in the morning at 0800.”

***

Jack stayed behind in the conference room
when everyone else left. He’d known Gabe too long and knew in his
gut that something else was going on. Gabe and Grace had always set
fire to each other, and it looked like things hadn’t changed much.
But very few people knew Gabe’s true identity, and even fewer knew
he’d once had a wife and family. The two of them needed to cool it
in a hurry if they didn’t want Ethan and Logan to speculate.