Mortal Crimes: 7 Novels of Suspense (179 page)

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

Markov led them to a safe house at a farm outside Omaruru, a town in central Namibia. The farm itself had cattle and wheat, but most of it was fenced into a game preserve, including on the far side of the river, with everything from rhinos to ostriches.

The farm was off grid. Some of the electricity came from solar panels, more from a wind turbine, with load balance provided by a diesel generator for when the sun didn’t shine and the wind didn’t blow.

All that power fueled a small, easily disassembled set of servers in the basement. It was the coolest place in the house, with fans and air conditioning. Markov took Ian and Julia to the basement while his men kept watch upstairs.

The first thing Markov did was transfer Kendall’s implant data file from Julia’s laptop onto a USB external hard drive, then wipe clean Julia’s hard drive. She claimed she wouldn’t connect to the internet, but he didn’t trust either Julia to remember, or Chang not to have infected her computer with other goodies. Chang, he guessed, was just in it for the tech-thrill, but better to be safe until he figured out who he could trust.

Markov had his own, clean version of the analysis software. Julia knew how to load the data file from Kendall Rose’s implant. While she worked, Ian and Markov stood on opposite sides of the room, eyeing each other.

Markov found himself wondering if he could take the man. Not now, of course, but in his prime, say fifteen years ago. Ian had six, eight inches on him, a longer reach and all that implied. Markov had always kept himself in superb physical shape and still lifted weights, swam, and ran.

He was also quick. Quick with a weapon, quick to duck a man’s punch and quicker to return a blow to the kidney or larynx. But wasn’t Ian a former athlete? Maybe that advantage wouldn’t hold.

“You sold us out,” Ian said. He crossed his arms and planted a scowl on his face. “Lied to us about why we were infiltrating the camp, then, when everything went to hell, you tried to cut your losses by killing us.”

“I did nothing of the sort.”

“You didn’t try to kill us when things went wrong?”

“I didn’t order the American attack on your position, if that’s what really happened.”

“Oh, it happened. Wait until we get the stuff from Kendall’s implant. You’ll see.”

“Fine, but I didn’t order it. And I didn’t drug you in Windhoek or send you to the psychiatric ward in Utah.” He considered how much to disclose and decided to come clean. “Admittedly, I did track you in Mexico with the goal of eliminating you and bringing Dr. Nolan back to Langley.”

“And it didn’t occur to you, even then, that I might be innocent?”

“It occurred to me,” Markov conceded, “but that’s always a possibility with an extra-legal killing. I have to operate on probabilities.”

“Listen to yourself. Extra-legal killing? Probabilities? You’re cold blooded. Clinical.”

“The word you’re looking for is disciplined.”

“Don’t make me laugh,” Ian said. “You tell yourself that and maybe you’ll feel better next time you hunt down an innocent man.”

“Innocent? I don’t think so. What you did in Africa was one thing, but what about all those guards you killed at the psychiatric ward?”

“Do you have any idea what those guards did to me? They drugged me, beat me, came in with tasers and shotguns and they were going to take me out one way or another. Talk about probabilities. Where’s the probability in that?”

Julia had hunched over the computer, absorbed in her work, but now she looked up and seemed to notice the tension between the two men for the first time. “Guys? Back off, will you.”

Markov said, “Everything is fine. Ian has some unresolved issues. It’s a good time to get them out in the open.”

“Doos,” Ian muttered.

Some part of Markov was enjoying the exchange. Physically, he was no match for Ian, but it was easy enough to provoke the man. Just don’t push too far.

Julia turned back to her work.

“There!” she said with a note of triumph. She stepped back from the computer. Progress bars streamed across the screen, one after another. “Now it’s just a question of sending it off to your friends in the NSA, see what sense they can make of the data.”

Markov had phoned a contact at an NSA data center in the states, called in a favor. The contact was every bit as good as Chang, but more trustworthy.

It would take about two hours until the data streamed back to their computers in Namibia. In the meanwhile, they retired to the veranda. Markov’s men waved Julia over to look for a rhino that they said they’d seen trotting through the brush about ten minutes earlier. It was amusing to watch them compete for Julia’s attention.

He spotted Ian on the far end of the veranda, ostensibly looking over the same expanse of brush and thorny trees, but to Markov’s eyes watching Julia and the three agents. Markov made his way over. Ian turned with a wary look.

“She’s a beautiful woman,” Markov said. “Bright, funny. Guy like Terrance Nolan doesn’t appreciate what he’s got.”

“Their marriage wasn’t so good,” Ian said, “but she’s pretty upset anyway.”

“A lot of people have bad marriages,” Markov said, “but most of them don’t end with one spouse killing the other.”

“Or passing information to a hired killer, in this case,” Ian said with a sideways glance at Markov.

“I guess he could say that it was his job. That’s my own excuse.”

The ranch was well-watered, which meant it teemed with bugs, especially as evening approached. One of Markov’s men turned on the bug zapper. It glowed blue and immediately began to collect a harvest of fried insects.

“It only kills the harmless bugs,” Ian said. “The biters aren’t fooled.”

“Maybe that isn’t the point.”

“Maybe you’re right. The thrill of the hunt and all that. Not exactly big game, though.”

“Are you sure?” Markov asked. “Look at that one. What is that, a beetle? Sounds like a helicopter. You could mount that on your wall and impress all your friends.”

Ian laughed and Markov found himself liking the young South African. It was the kind of easy camaraderie that came naturally to ex-military guys of the same rank, which, for the moment, they were. But when the time came to act, what then?

“Good thing my wife isn’t here,” Markov said after a minute of silence. “She hates bugs.”

“Ah, so you’re married. I was wondering about that.”

“Yes, I am. Seventeen years. Three kids.”

“What’s she like?”

“Realistically, my wife isn’t a head-turner. I think she’s beautiful, though. And she’s a gentle person, good mother, and very patient. And patient is good, because people find me a bit of an asshole at times.”

“No? Really?” Ian smiled. “Hey, at least you admit that you can be difficult. The true assholes never notice.”

Markov changed the subject abruptly. “Kendall Rose was a good man and a hell of an agent. You two had a great partnership.”

“I let him down. That guy saved my butt more than once. When it was my turn, I couldn’t do it.”

“It wasn’t your fault. You were stabbed in the back.”

“I should have known. Things went wrong from the moment the implant told us to get up and leave our tent. That wasn’t in the plans and I knew it was wrong.”

Markov cringed as he remembered how events had unfolded in the operations room. He’d known about the modification to the implants, known about the order to leave the camp. It had been Deputy Director Nelson’s call. Markov had raised an eyebrow, but figured there must be a good reason. It had seemed rushed, careless. After that, things turned chaotic in a hurry, with contradictory pieces of information coming back about a battle, casualties. Nelson immediately called CIA Director Price, and rushed to the Director’s office, who in turn brought in the Director of National Intelligence, Sarah Redd.

Meanwhile, Markov was out of the loop. It was hours before they briefed him on what had happened and now he was pretty sure a lot of what they’d told him was a lie.

“Why did you come back, Ian?”

“I want to know the truth.”

“Of course,” Markov said. “But then what? Say you find out Sarah Redd is responsible, or that I’m lying and that I’m behind it. Or maybe it was just a screw up.”

“I want to find whoever is responsible and make it right.”

“Kill them, you mean. Revenge.”

“No, not that,” Ian said. “I’ve killed people before, but not like that. Revenge isn’t my thing.”

“Then what?”

“We send it up the chain until we find someone who can punish the people responsible.”

“Unless the conspiracy goes all the way up. What then?”

“The newspapers. CNN.”

Markov nodded. It was clear Ian hadn’t thought this through all the way. He was still hurting and angry, and in spite of his assurances Markov wasn’t sure that he wouldn’t go rogue and look for justice from the barrel of a gun.

“What about you?” Ian asked. “You’re not following orders anymore. What are you hoping to do?”

“I
am
following orders. My orders are to serve my country. You get out here, where the rules don’t apply, sometimes you have to follow your gut.”

“Your gut? That doesn’t sound like you.”

“Okay then, your conscience. And common sense. I’m not the one who has gone rogue, it’s the people who screwed up your mission and have been furiously trying to cover up their mistake ever since. Here’s the thing, Ian,” Markov continued. “I’m not in the CIA because I like cloak and dagger stuff. I’m here to advance the legitimate interests of the United States. You get out here—Africa, Middle East, especially—and there are no rules. Terrorists are everywhere, constantly scheming to attack our country in one way or another.”

“Only this isn’t an Al-Qaeda camp,” Ian said. “We attacked some commercial venture. Oh, and a couple of American operatives.”

“Exactly. I don’t care about the Chinese or the Namibians. But go after my men and I start to get annoyed. I’ve got your back.”

“I’m touched.”

“I thought you would be. Do you want to hug now, or wait until Julia isn’t watching?”

Ian laughed. “I’ll take a rain check.”

Julia had gone back inside in any event. She came back a few minutes later and approached Markov and Ian. “Looks like your friend at NSA delivered. We’ve got video, a transcript, some audio files.” She smiled broadly. “Jackpot.”

________

Charles Ikanbo looked through his binoculars at the farm house. There were two men on the veranda, one white, one black. He couldn’t tell if they were locals or foreigners, or if they were armed. Another white man stepped onto the porch a few minutes later, lit a cigarette and gestured at something to the north.

Charles had been watching for ten minutes and hadn’t seen anything to definitively answer his doubts. It had taken twenty minutes of edging forward on his hands and knees from brush to brush until he found a good vantage point to study the house.

There were animals on the ranch, and he didn’t feel overly comfortable lying on his belly, waiting for something to come along and find him. It reminded him of a boyhood spent with his brother, William, herding goats. Two skinny boys, armed with nothing more than a pair of sticks. There had been some thrilling moments in the bush. At least this time he had a gun.

Charles lowered the binoculars, wiped sweat from his eyes, then tried again. He still couldn’t decide.

Two white men and a black could be right—that was the makeup of Anton Markov’s team. But he couldn’t see weapons, and no sign of the short Markov himself, or of Dr. Nolan or the South African who started this whole mess. Just three guys on the porch as the shadows grew long, watching a bug zapper and smoking an occasional cigarette.

Was it possible the information was wrong? Maybe this was just a tourist farm and private game preserve. There were dozens of them around the country.

It would be dark soon and he had to make a decision.

Charles waited until it looked like all three had turned their backs, then he scooted away. A few minutes later and he was walking toward the truck. He dusted himself and tried to look confident as the two men at the truck straightened to attention.