Shadow Agenda: An Action Suspense Thriller (36 page)

JUNE 6, 2016, WASHINGTON, D.C.

The President threw the copy of the magazine story back onto the long wooden table that sat in the middle of the National Security Council’s executive meeting room. “I need answers, gentlemen,” he said. “How much of this is true and how much of it is just fanciful reporter bullshit?”

They’d all read Alex Malone’s work; everyone inside the Beltway had been discussing her series for more than a week. The consensus seemed to be that the ACF, at the least, was acting criminally. That mean extended opportunities to investigate, multiple opportunities for Fawkes to be uncovered.

“Mr. President, if I may…” Mark Fitzpatrick said, drawing everyone’s attention. “The intel on Khalidi’s company funding an African insurgency is correct. The handful of other incidents to which she has referred are, as far as I can tell, also legitimate.”

At the other end of the table, David Fenton-Wright kept his opinion to himself. But everyone around the table was aware of how badly the President’s popularity had slid in the prior year. If he wanted to help Younger, the agency man thought, he could best do it by staying off the stump, not dragging his successor down with him. Fenton-Wright considered himself apolitical; but he reserved a special dislike for the commander-in-chief, whom he saw as weak.

“Could this get any worse?” the President asked.

“Well sir, it’s already worse in that the board members appear to have used military force to settle political scores, as well,” said Fitzpatrick. “The incident Ms. Malone’s story mentioned in Harbin, China has been confirmed by our allies in the region.”

“And how are they dealing with this?”

“They’re … not, Mr. President,” Fitzpatrick said hesitatingly.

“I don’t follow.”

“They’re ignoring the story. China and Japan have often treated American domestic reporting with a large grain of salt, and Khalidi’s home nation, Jordan, offers him great deference due to his lineage. Possibly, the powerful father of Fung’s wife has intervened on his behalf; it’s difficult to say at this point.”

The President considered the implications. At least, he assumed, he would be out of office by the time the other powers began to pay attention to the ACF and, by extension, to Lord Abbott’s double life.

“There is another facet to this we need to explore,” Fitzpatrick said. “It’s possible that the sniper who started all of this was going after ACF board members because of its off-the-books behavior; the shooter might even have been employed by a country.”

“So if we take down the sniper, it may lead us back to a diplomatic mess with… who, the Nigerians?” the defense secretary asked. “Christ, what a shitstorm…”

“Where does that investigation stand, David?” the President asked

Fenton-Wright saw his opportunity. “If we’re going to distance ourselves from the ACF and Fawkes, Mr. President, I would suggest at this point that the unofficial and unsanctioned investigation into the shootings be terminated and the asset withdrawn. Really, if we don’t have a horse in this race, we should get out. It’s quiet right now, and the less attention we draw the better.” It was exactly what Faisal wanted, and it solved the problem of Brennan’s ongoing efforts to tie the missing nuke to Khalidi, Fenton-Wright thought.

The President sat quietly for a moment and thought about all of the ramifications. Fawkes had been in place long before he took office, had never become active again until the sniper. Could he use that as an excuse, in posterity, were the agent to be uncovered? Probably. Would leaving a man over there to snoop around potentially lead to more questions being posed than were answered? Also likely.

“Bring him in,” he told Fenton-Wright. “Let’s see if we can extricate ourselves from this mess.”

JUNE 12, 2016, MONTPELLIER, FRANCE

The apartment was hot; it was south-facing and just three small rooms, catching the brunt of the summer afternoon sun in the Languedoc-Roussillon region, adjacent to the Mediterranean.

Brennan sat on the edge of the aging single-bed in the back room, where the shade was somewhat merciful, the thin mattress squeaking on decades-old springs whenever he got up or sat down. It was unseasonably warm out, even for the area. He had just a string undershirt and jeans on with running shoes, and the sweat beaded on his brow and jawline, as a cheap oscillating fan in the corner tried in vain to cool the surroundings.

He flicked the old twenty-inch color television from channel to channel, pausing on each just for a few seconds, just absorbing the sights  with the sound muted, without conscious thought process, allowing his mind to de-stress and unwind.

Everything seemed to have gone south the moment Alex published her story, he thought. Up until that point he’d been making a plodding, dangerous sort of progress; but now Miskin was dead, Khalidi had run an effective duck-and-cover, Alex’s reporting seemed to have ground to a halt … and Brennan was on the run.

He heard footsteps on the metal stairs up to the building’s second story. He got up and moved to the front window, by the door, pulling back the lacy white curtain. The first man was stocky, maybe five-eight, forty five years old, with curly black hair that was beginning to silver. His partner was younger, with a strong physique but not bulky, along with wispy brown hair and a goatee. He had black tank top on and jeans while the older man favored a tight t-shirt and cargo shorts. The younger man was carrying a small athletic bag.

They knocked on Brennan’s door and he let them in.

“You Bernie?” the old man said in French.

“Yeah.”

“We’re supposed to say the missus sent us.”

“Okay.” He closed the door behind them and they walked into the room. “You bring what was discussed?”

“Yeah. But the piece was hard to find. It’s going to cost another five hundred.”

Brennan paused for a second as he reached for the money clip in his back pocket. Was this guy just angling for an extra buck, or was it an exploratory request, a chance to see how flush he was? He took the clip out and watched their reactions. Both sets of eyes flitted momentarily to the thick money roll but betrayed no surprise or emotion.

He peeled off three-and-a-half thousand euros in hundreds. The younger man leaned in to take the money but Brennan withdrew it quickly. ‘Ah… not before I see what you’ve brought me,” he said, nodding towards the athletic bag. The older man’s eyes had stayed on the money clip, even as he leaned down to unzip the bag. They dipped south and he looked into the bag, at the same time as Brennan. The pistol he’d asked for was lying on top. The curly-haired man looked at it, then at Brennan’s money, then at the gun again.

And for just a split second, no one moved a muscle.

Things had begun to unravel after the aquarium. Brennan had gone back to his hotel only to find it crawling with both police and federal agents. Disappearing into the downtown core, he’d managed to steal a cell phone from a careless tourist at a street café in order to call Myrna, from the relative quiet and security of an alleyway.

She’d in turn told him that he was a wanted man, his face all over French television stations.

“What the hell is going on?” she’d demanded. They didn’t use each other’s names; despite the public’s general ignorance of the techniques involved, both knew that signals intelligence gatherers could flag individuals from among millions with something as simple as a name, and that a network of countries circumvented rules on monitoring their own civilians by having partner nations do it for them. “They’ve got security footage of you shooting a helpless John Q.”

“What?!?”

“Old man, crown of white hair, brown suit, short, with a moustache.”

The elderly assassin. “That was no ordinary senior,” he said. “But I didn’t do it. Whatever they’re showing, it’s doctored.”

“It’s a hell of a good job then. State has branded you rogue; and local yokels have been told you’re armed and dangerous. And my contacts over there have gone very quiet, which they generally only do to keep me from things I shouldn’t know.”

“If it doesn’t go without saying, I need your help.”

“Of course.”

“Money. There’s a wire office near here; there’ s a chance they won’t have cut me off yet from everything in the system, so I’m going to this place.” He gave her an address, four blocks off the actual location. “South from there, there are three more.” A cue for her to look up the actual locations of the three nearest money transfer offices. “As much as you can manage.” A cue to stay under the trace limit of $10,000, at which point any of the offices by law would have had to report a suspicious transaction.

“The police found the man with two to the head,” she said, sounding momentarily unsure. “Are you certain…”

“Yes! He disarmed me, we fought, I won. But there were no shots fired, at least not from my end. He was damn good, too, despite his age. If someone popped him, it was after I left.”

“If this was Khalidi, he has some exceptional contacts in the agency,” Myrna said. “They had that bulletin out to the civil service and foreign agencies in about sixteen minutes, if the time stamp on your ‘security camera’ appearance is correct.”

“Literally?”

“Yeah. The tape shows you shooting the guy at eleven thirty-six in the morning. The bulletin from State went out to all embassies at…. 11:58. So… okay, twenty two minutes.”

“That’s still impossible. There’s no way they could possibly have even ID’d me by then…”

“Which will work in your favor. Maybe you should let them take you now in one piece, instead of risking a confrontation. There’s no way you lose this at a trial.”

“They won’t let this get to a trial. Think about it: whoever set this up is connected to people who can’t be named publicly, or forced to give affidavits, or testify. I’d never make it that far.”

She understood the implication. “So what are you going to do?”

Brennan had been thinking about the order of the two days prior. He’d have been gone, on his way to Copenhagen, if he hadn’t been told expressly to stay. “DFW. It has to be. He set me up. He’s the only one at the agency outside of Walter who has taken any leadership in this whole thing. I was below board, off the grid, heading out of the country. It had to be him.”

“That means he’ll have crews coming hard, professional assets, maybe even the rest of the team you faced today. You’ve got minutes, at best. Head to the location, I’ll have the cash there for you in thirty.”

He disconnected. The less time they spent talking, the better. To anyone senior at the agency, Myrna was considered off the books, long retired and uninvolved. She’d been careful when she left, letting real-life identifiers lapse, moving, changing her name and doing it properly, keeping her money in cash in a home safe. The last thing Brennan wanted was to compromise her.

It took him ten minutes to find an older-model car he could hotwire without “engine arrest” disabling the vehicle. Another fifteen minutes found him at the first wire office, careful to survey the quiet street before entering, not worrying about the security cameras inside, which wouldn’t typically be networked, catching his face. Myrna had sent three payments of $9,999, one to each office. The number was probably over each company’s own “suspicious transaction” threshold, but without the automatic trigger level being reached, it wouldn’t report them until the next business day at the earliest.

After getting the final delivery, he’d bought a newspaper from a kiosk and checked the classifieds to figure out where the cheapest rentals in town appeared to be, then driven that area looking for the crudest, most obviously home-made “for rent” sign he could find.

The townhouse appeared to have been sweating since the 1950s, with mold spotting the upper corners of the ceiling. But it was only a hundred euros per week. It was disgusting, but there was a small convenience store at the end of the block and the section of the city was utterly anonymous. He’d ditched the car several miles away and taken a cab back to the corner store, then walked from there.

In the ninety minutes it had taken, Myrna had tapped her contacts and found someone willing to provide a driver’s license and a gun. “I’m sending them over,” she said. “A warning: these guys were low down on the list of suppliers. That means there are a few who said no, and if they figure you for the intended, they might try flagging it, getting in good with the agency or state. Or even taking you out themselves. And the guys coming over are straight-up dirty, so be on your toes.”

“Over and out,” he said.

They disconnected, and Brennan began his wait for the suppliers.

The three men stared at the gun as it lay on top of the driver’s license and government benefit card. The older man looked at the gun, then Brennan.  He reached into the bag and picked up the nine millimeter.

Then he handed it to Brennan. “A Glock 21, like you asked,” he said in French. “Careful: there’s one in the chamber.”

So much for no honor among thieves, Brennan thought. “Thank you,” he said. “I’ve had a long day and an absence of too much drama or bullshit right now is much appreciated.”

The senior of the two began counting the money. “It’s probably not a surprise when I tell you your picture is all over the television right now,” the older man said.

“Not really.”

“You should change your look.”

“If I did and needed to travel, could you get me a passport?”

“The price will go up,” he said. “A driver’s license and social card is one thing. But if you’re looking to travel, that’s going to be a rich buy. Passports don’t come cheap.”

“Okay,” Brennan said. “You’re not worried about whether I did what they say?”

“Not really. Business is business.”

The small chrome canister crashed through front window and landed at the younger man’s feet. He picked it up even as Brennan and the older man instinctively looked away and closed their eyes. The flash-bang grenade went off in the younger man’s hands and face and he went down just as the battering ram knocked down the front door in a hail of splinters.

Brennan grabbed the bag with one hand and the older crook with the other. “My partner…!” the man yelled, but Brennan ignored him, heading for the back room, where the window sat just high enough in the wall to discourage kids from climbing out, but was still accessible. He’d left it open in case, and he jumped up and over the frame, dropping onto the dumpster below, its lid closed. Even as the older crooked clanged loudly down beside him, police tactical officers were leaning out the back window. An officer had been stationed behind the building as well.

“Down!” the cop yelled. “Down on the ground, now!” He had an Ingram machine pistol, Brennan noted as he sprung outwards, kicking off the dumpster lid and flipping over the officer’s head, then sweeping his leg backwards, taking the officer’s legs out from under him even as the Ingram sprayed fire into the air. As the policeman’s back hit the ground and the older crook jumped down to join him, Brennan hit the cop with a short, sharp jab to the center of his chin, where striking a small group of nerves can quickly knock a man unconscious if done with precision.

“Do you have a car?” Brennan asked.

“A block up and to the left. A blue-and-grey Citroen.”

It was perfect, anonymous, Brennan thought. “Go! Quickly!” They sprinted to the old Citroen DS. “You have somewhere we can hole up?” Brennan asked as they flung the doors open and climbed inside.

“My cousin Gerard has a flat in Beziers,” he said. “It’s just down the coast…”

“I know it. Let’s go…”

“Wait a second,” the older crook said. “They just nabbed my partner and I already helped you out. I get the whole honor among thieves thing, but…”

“I’m not a thief,” Brennan said. “And those aren’t regular cops chasing me. They’ve seen your face, which makes you a liability. You can stay in Montpellier, if you wish, but they will hunt you down and kill you. And I’m sorry to tell you, but there’s a good chance your partner is dead already.”

The veteran crook shrugged. “Okay.” He extended a hand, and Brennan shook it. “I am Victor. Let’s go.”

JUNE 14, 2016 ,WASHINGTON, D.C.

The President sat, uncharacteristically, behind the Resolute Desk in the Oval office, the two chairs across from it both substantially lower than his to ensure that the representatives of the NSA and the CIA understood their place.

A few feet away, new NSC advisor Bill Freeman and director of intelligence Nicholas Wilkie stood waiting to be called on, if necessary. It was Freeman’s first such meeting since taking over the post from Sen. Younger, who had personally recommended him.

Fitzpatrick and Fenton-Wright both looked cool and collected, which the President expected. They were trained to behave with dispassionate disconnection. He was pretty good at it himself. Most of the time.