The Second Perimeter (12 page)

E
mma and DeMarco sat in a small conference room in the FBI’s temporary headquarters in Bremerton. In the conference room with them were the two FBI agents who had originally been assigned to Dave Whitfield’s murder. Diane Carlucci was one of those agents. The other agent, the agent in charge, was a young man named Darren Thayer. Thayer was probably in his thirties, but with his wide-eyed, unlined face he could have passed for a college senior. To make matters worse, he had a cowlick, freckles, and protruding ears. DeMarco just knew that his fellow agents called him Kid or Opie, and no matter how smart and how brave Darren Thayer was, his looks would condemn him to being treated like a rookie for half his career.
DeMarco had asked the FBI for an update on their efforts to capture Carmody. Thayer knew that DeMarco and Emma had no authority to ask him to do anything, yet at the same time he knew they had clout back in D.C. And since Thayer wasn’t making any progress on the case anyway, he figured why not talk to them, they might help him. It was rare to find an FBI agent willing to talk to outsiders, much less one willing to admit that he needed help. DeMarco knew that just like his youthful face, Darren Thayer would eventually outgrow these good habits.
Thayer was saying, “Carmody used an ATM in Winnemucca, Nevada, yesterday, one with a surveillance camera. Twelve hours later, he checked into a motel in Buffalo, Wyoming, using one of his credit cards. We got in touch with the locals there and asked them to detain him, but by the time they got to the motel, he’d split. They said it didn’t even look like he’d used the room.”
“And I suppose you have no idea where he’s going or what he’s driving,” DeMarco said.
“No,” Thayer said. “He abandoned his own car in Nevada after he used the ATM. We don’t know what he’s using for transportation.”
“Do you have an atlas here?” Emma asked Thayer. “A Rand Mc-Nally. A U.S. road atlas.”
“I’ll get one,” Diane Carlucci said.
DeMarco, dog that he was, watched Diane’s butt as she walked over to a nearby desk. Nice butt. When Diane turned back with the atlas in her hand, she gave DeMarco a little wink and a smile. Nice smile. Emma had accused DeMarco of asking for the meeting just because he wanted to see Diane again. DeMarco, naturally, pretended to be offended that Emma would think he’d act so unprofessionally.
Emma took the atlas from Diane, opened it to a page that showed the entire country, and studied it for a couple of minutes. “Carmody’s moving in a circle,” she said. “South to Oregon, east into Nevada, then north to Buffalo, Wyoming. It almost looks like he’s looping back here. But why in the hell would he be using his credit cards and bank machines? He has to know we can use those things to locate him.”
“Maybe he doesn’t have any other source of money,” Thayer said.
“Maybe,” Emma said, “but Phil Carmody is a very bright guy, Agent Thayer. So if this very bright guy didn’t have credit cards under a false name why didn’t he just go to his bank before he fled Bremerton and get all the cash he had in his account? And why did he go out of his way to punch a highway patrolman, an action that he must have known would be broadcast to every cop shop in the tristate area? There’s something odd going on here. It’s like every ten or twelve hours Carmody is letting us know right where he is— or where he
was
— and all the law enforcement guys go swarming to that spot and by then he’s gone, of course.”
Emma looked at the map again. “I’ll bet you the next sighting of him will be in western Montana, northern Idaho, or eastern Washington. I’m sure he’s coming back this way.”
“But why?” Diane Carlucci said. DeMarco could tell that Diane was impressed by Emma.
“I don’t know,” Emma said. “I don’t know what the hell he’s doing.”
“I have an idea,” DeMarco said. He’d been silent up until this point. Catching spies wasn’t his normal line of work.
“What?” Emma said.
“He’s creating a diversion.”
“Ah,” Emma said, understanding immediately.
“A diversion?” Thayer said, not being as quick as Emma.
“Yeah,” DeMarco said. “There could be something else going on, maybe right here in Bremerton, right under our noses. You guys— the FBI, the cops, navy security— right now, you’re all focused on Carmody, trying to figure out what he did at the shipyard, trying to catch him, trying to guess where he’s gonna go next. It’s like magic, Thayer: while you’re watching the right hand, the left hand’s doing the trick.”
“Who’s the left hand?” Thayer said.
“Carmody’s boss, his control,” Emma said.
“But what’s the trick?” Thayer said.

S
he hated sex.
It hadn’t always been this way. There had been a time when she had lived for it, when she could hardly wait to have
him
inside her. But he was gone and this man— the man lying on her— was not him and those days were long past. Now sex was nothing more than a tool of her trade— a repulsive, degrading, sweaty tool. But an effective tool.
She could tell the man was almost finished. Fortunately he was fairly quick, and at his age, he could usually only manage to perform once during their brief, clandestine encounters. She stroked his back mechanically and managed a few moans of feigned passion. She needed to keep him enraptured just a few days longer. Finally she heard him grunt in release. Thank God. He murmured a few things into her ear, things she didn’t hear, things she didn’t care about. She let him breathe heavily for a moment then pushed up gently to let him know she wanted him off her. He was considerate if nothing else, and he rolled off her body.
As he went through the predictable litany of how good it had been, how he had never known anyone like her, she rose from the bed. She looked down at him, smiled in a way she hoped seemed affectionate, and ruffled his hair like he was a puppy. As she turned toward the bathroom to wash him from her, the smile vanished and her face became the unemotional mask it usually was. From the bed she heard him say, “Walk slower. Please. You have the most beautiful ass I’ve ever seen.” She gave her butt a little shake, feeling stupid as she did so, and entered the bathroom and closed the door.
Inside the bathroom, she stood naked, her hands on the sink, and looked into the mirror. Her short, spiky hair looked particularly wild as the man had been running his soft hands through it for the last half hour. She stared at the face in the mirror and black, empty eyes looked back at her.
She couldn’t do this work any longer. She just couldn’t. But if she was successful, if she could carry out her plan, she would not have to.
She
could become one of those in charge. She could be the one who assigned beautiful women to fuck for their country. But to gain such power her plan had to work. Because of the woman named Emma, she had been forced to terminate the shipyard operation sooner than she had wanted. The operation hadn’t been a total success but neither had it been a complete failure. At least she didn’t think so; she could only hope that her superiors saw it that way as well.
But it was the man lying on the bed in the other room who really mattered. What Washburn could do and what he knew was more important than everything Carmody had taken from the shipyard— and Washburn was firmly under her control.
Soon she’d move into the final phase, the phase that only she and Carmody knew about, the phase of the plan she had hidden from her superiors. And Carmody, as she had expected, was doing what he’d been told and doing it well. She didn’t need sex to control Carmody.
She nodded to the face in the mirror. Yes, it was all going per plan and in the end she’d have everything she desired.

* * *

SHE TOOK
a shower and by the time she finished, Washburn was fully dressed and sitting on the edge of the bed. She left the bathroom wearing only a towel. She could tell by the expression on Washburn’s face that he was once again having second thoughts. He did this every time they met, and every time she had to convince him again that if he wanted to be with her— forever, she’d said— he must follow through with his promise.
Her country was building up its submarine fleet. They’d recently acquired four Kilo-class nuclear submarines from the Russians and they had started to construct some diesel-electric boats, boats that were incredibly quiet, so quiet that they
might
be able to avoid the American submarines that patrolled continuously off their shores.
The great advantage the Americans had over the world’s other navies was
silence
: American submarines were so quiet they could not be readily detected by enemy sonar. At the same time, the Americans’ ability to find and track other submarines was superior to everyone else’s. Her navy wanted the same advantage: they wanted quiet, undetectable submarines and they wanted the technology to locate the enemy’s boats.
American submarines were occasionally used to launch Tomahawk missiles at Al Qaeda training camps and they provided protection for the giant American carriers, but the primary mission of American submarines was gathering intelligence. There was a book called
Blind Man’s Bluff
written in 1998; the book was required reading for her country’s intelligence agencies. The book told how in 1971,
thirty-five years ago
, an American submarine had snuck into the Sea of Okhotsk off the Russian coast and tapped into Russian military phone cables. In thirty-five years the Americans’ talent for intercepting satellite and radio signals and breaching communication systems had improved dramatically. For her country to collect intelligence as the Americans did, and to be able to compete with the American fleet if it ever came to war, they needed the acoustic technology of their enemy— and John Washburn, the man she had just made love to, was one of the keys to acquiring this technology.
Washburn was an expert on noise— submarine noise. Sonar capabilities. Noise-quieting techniques. Acoustic detection systems. Her superiors wanted this man and the files he could obtain and everything inside his head— and
she
would give him to them. He knew the limits of the U.S. Navy’s current equipment and how to defeat it. With Washburn’s knowledge, they would find the American submarines lurking off their shores, and their submarines would be able to lie in silence off the American coast.
She had met Washburn three months ago, at the same time she was setting up Carmody’s operation. She met him by rear-ending his car. He had gotten out of his vehicle, slamming his door, looking irate, but when he saw her— how lovely she was— he immediately asked if she was all right. When she had said that she needed a drink to calm her nerves, he quickly agreed to buy her one.
She had drawn him slowly and carefully into her net using her beauty as a lure. It was something she’d done many times before, and compared to some past conquests, Washburn was an easy target. His wife was an overweight woman of fifty-six, the same age as Washburn. And according to Washburn, his wife was not only unattractive but bossy and bitchy and every other thing that men say about the women they are wed to but no longer desire. He also had two children, teenage girls, who were unmanageable and unlovable. For years he’d thought about divorcing his bloated hag of a wife but he knew that if he did, she’d take everything from him: his home, his savings, and half his pension. If that happened, he’d never be able to retire, he said. He’d have to work until he died.
So she gave him the escape hatch he wanted.
She had initially planned to blackmail him: have sex with him, take photographs, and threaten to expose him to both his wife and his government. But then she discovered a better weapon: obsession. Obsession was much more effective than blackmail.
She understood obsession because she’d once been obsessed with a man. Obsession was when you couldn’t go five minutes without thinking of the one you loved. Obsession was when you would do
anything
, tell any lie, commit any transgression, to be with that person. Obsession was when a man’s heart— and his balls— overrode his brain. Obsession was what made an intelligent, rational man like John Washburn become reckless and irrational, throwing aside love of country and love of family to be with the one he thought he must have or he would die. John Washburn, after three months, was obsessed with her.
And she had convinced him that the only way he could have her was to leave the country and take with him the information her superiors wanted. If he did that, he could have it all. He could have her, a home on a beautiful beach, and enough cash that they’d never have to work again.
She admitted she was a spy, but she didn’t tell him who she worked for. She said she worked for a private consortium who sold intelligence to several countries, including America’s allies. She even told him of her original plan to blackmail him. Sometimes the truth could be effective for gaining trust. But she also lied to him: she told him she loved him. And he believed her.
Washburn was not an unattractive man. He was tall and slender, with chiseled features and a fine head of gray hair. He’d had affairs in the past; women had fallen in love with him before. His ego convinced him that she wanted him as much as he wanted her.
She said that she had devised a way for him to disappear, a way so he wouldn’t be pursued. And after he left the country she would meet him to begin their new life. The truth, of course, was that he
would
leave the country, but he would be met by agents from her division. Then her country’s scientists would take the files he had copied and they would grill him for months and pick his brain clean. He’d stay alive as long as he proved useful to them— but he wouldn’t be living like a king on waterfront property.
But now Washburn was hesitating again, asking again if there wasn’t a different way. Couldn’t they just flee together? he whined. Couldn’t they just run away from everything, he from his wife, she from her employers? Did he have to betray his country? So again she explained to him the impracticality of what he was saying: if he didn’t do what she wanted, they would have no money. They would be poor and on the run forever. No, her way was the only way, she said gently. If he left and took the files her employers wanted, they would have money to burn and a grand place to live, but most important, they would have each other. She knew that for this particular man the promise of wealth had been a factor in turning him but that the money was not as important to him as being with her. He was obsessed— and she had to keep him that way.
Washburn was still sitting on the bed. She let the towel drop slowly from her body and then knelt in front of him.
She hated sex.