President Elect, page 19
The lead man planted the explosive, molding it to the surface of the plate covering the lock mechanism. The second man lit the detonator fuse, and both men ran. Everywhere, the men took cover, slipping noise cancelling headphones over their ears.
BOOOM.
The explosion was bright and loud. When the smoke cleared, the door was still there, hanging on its iron hinges. But fully a third of the door, and the entire locking mechanism, was gone.
Instantly, the assault squad ran for the door. Each man had a flash bang stun grenade. Each man carried a shotgun. The plan was to ride the elevators to the living quarters, then throw the flash bangs in. If the team was lucky, the blasts and the blinding light might disable the subjects, or simply remove their will to fight.
The third in line, a young man named Kevin, wiped some sweat out of his eyes. It was a cold night in the mountains, but he was sweating like crazy. Truth be told, he was nervous. He didn’t want to die, not for a job.
He had spent four years in the US Army, two full tours overseas, and he was willing to die for his country. But he was a private contractor now, and taking out the occupants of a private underground bunker—how was that protecting the United States? It seemed like a stretch. He didn’t even know who was down there—they told him it wasn’t his job to ask questions.
He had a feeling in his bowels, a loose feeling like how it was before he went into a firefight. He smiled. Loose bowels were his good luck charm. He’d never gotten so much as a scratch in combat.
Stop it. Pay attention.
He brought his mind back to the present moment. The line of men was bottlenecked inside the foyer to the bunker complex. There was one elevator here. This had to happen, and already there was a delay waiting for the elevator. Summoning the elevator to the surface was a dead giveaway they were coming.
Already this operation was FUBAR.
Kevin walked over and checked a door at the end of the short corridor. To his surprise, it opened. An iron stairway snaked down into the bowels of the Earth, lit at every landing by yellow sodium lamps.
“Hey, Top!” he said, calling to the squad leader. “There are stairs here. Maybe we should skip the elevator.”
The squad leader looked at him. He was a guy in his mid-thirties who had clearly let himself go a bit since Special Forces training, if that was really what it was. Kevin had his doubts. The squad leader shrugged.
“You want to take the stairs twenty stories, be my guest. We’ll meet you down there. Personally, I’m going to wait for the elevator.”
Kevin came back just as the elevator door opened and the squad piled in. The door closed and the elevator instantly began to descend. It fell fast, zipping past lights he could see outside the tiny sliver of window.
He pictured it in his mind. The door opens, they throw their flash bangs. BAM! Fall back, wait for the explosions, then rush in. He would be second out the door. Hopefully, he wouldn’t take a bullet from the defenders as he went.
The elevator stopped abruptly and slowly settled to the ground.
“Ready,” the squad leader said. “Look sharp. Ready with those grenades. It’s go time, boys.”
The door slid open and four flash bangs flew out. Kevin ducked back just as the squad leader shut the door again. The men hit the deck, but the sound and light were muffled from behind the door.
The men stood and got ready for the door to open again.
“Eyes sharp!” the squad leader shouted. “Eyes sharp!”
The door slid open again and they burst out, moving fast, securing the area around the doorway. Nothing moved, no one offered resistance. Within seconds, Kevin was running down a hallway, kicking doors and screaming.
“DOWN! GET DOWN!”
His blood pulsed in his head. His heart hammered. His hands were trembling.
After the third door, he and his partner stopped. The room was a living quarters, with two narrow beds, a table, and a lamp. There was no one here. There had been no one behind any door they’d kicked yet.
Kevin poked his head out into the corridor.
“Clear!” someone shouted from a nearby room.
“Clear!” another person shouted from down the hall.
If the people down here were going to defend their bunker, the smart thing to do would have been to try to stop the invasion at the entryways—in particular, when the elevator had opened. But they didn’t do that.
“Clear!” someone shouted from much further inside the complex. The assault squad was moving through very fast, encountering zero opposition.
No one was down here.
CHAPTER THIRTY ONE
5:55 p.m. Eastern Standard Time
Crisfield, Maryland
The dark surface of the water was shrouded in a cold fog.
Luke waited quietly on the rickety wooden boat dock. Behind him, at the very edge, Ed Newsam stood in his brown leather jacket, cradling a shotgun. Nearby, on a different dock, a red fisherman’s shack sat inches above the water.
They were on the eastern shore of Chesapeake Bay, in a town known for its tourism and its summer crabbing contests.
Tourist season was over.
It was full dark now, perfect cover for a clandestine meeting. The area was deserted. In the small harbor, moored boats bobbed up and down in the gentle swells.
“Hello, gentlemen.”
A man had joined them—he had approached silently along the docks. To Luke, it wasn’t much of a surprise. He was beyond exhausted now. The Vicodins weren’t making much of a dent in the pain any longer. He was hardly on full alert.
Ed nodded to the newcomer. His relaxed posture suggested he had watched the man coming the entire way.
“Don,” he said.
Don Morris, former United States Army colonel and Delta Force commander, founder and former director of the FBI Special Response Team, stood and watched them. In the gloom, Luke could barely make out the lines of his face, but he could see the shock of white hair. Even free from prison, Don hadn’t bothered to color it. Once upon a time, it had been mostly black, with gray mixed in. Salt and pepper had become him when he was an authority figure, in command of the SRT. White seemed to become him now that he was… what?
A former hero? A mass murderer?
Luke caught a glimpse of Don’s deep-set, penetrating eyes. His body looked as strong as ever—broad arms, chest, shoulders, and legs. He remembered Don telling him about the workout routine he invented, which required no equipment, and which he could do inside his tiny cell in the supermax federal prison. Squats, pushups, chin-ups, yoga, and martial arts. Don had claimed to spend hours a day exercising.
“Ed, how are you doing?”
Ed nodded. He didn’t seem interested in meeting his old boss’s eyes. “Better than you, I’d say.”
“Two and a half years in solitary confinement,” Don said. He patted his flat abdominal muscles. “Don’t knock it until you’ve tried it.”
“Did you finish the book you were writing?” Luke said. “Your memoir?”
Don nodded. “I did. I’d love for you guys to read it some time. You’re both in it.”
“I’m sure we’ll both look forward to that,” Luke said.
The three men stood on the dock. There wasn’t much to see in the swirling mists. About a mile away, there appeared to be lights on the back deck of a waterfront bar. Laughter and music came to them through the damping effect of the fog.
“How are Becca and Gunner?” Don said.
Luke shrugged. “Becca died of cancer two years ago. I don’t see Gunner much anymore.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. Was it a long battle?”
Luke waved that away with a quick swipe of his hand. “Let’s save the family updates for another time, Don. You contacted us, and there must be a reason for it. Monroe secured your release. Are you working for him now? Did you come here to ask for some kind of a truce? Because I can tell you, I’m not in a truce kind of mood.”
Don shook his head. “Absolutely not. Whatever you think of me, and I remember from the last time I saw you that they are not kind thoughts, know this: I’m an American and a patriot. I’m not interested in working for these people. They are a threat to our country, our way of life, and indeed, the world. You probably felt that way about Bill Ryan and myself, but you were wrong.”
Luke didn’t know what to say about a man guilty of conspiracy to commit three hundred murders calling another man a threat to America.
Don went on. “They released me for their own reasons, which have not been communicated to me. But I’m out and there are things that I know. If you’re fighting Jefferson Monroe, then I’m on your side. And I came here to give you a gift—two gifts, actually.”
Luke turned and looked back at Ed. Ed grunted. It could have been the sound of mirth. It could have been the guttural sound an animal makes before it rips out the throat of its prey.
“What are they?” Luke said.
“The first gift is a piece of advice. I was your commander for a long time, Luke. And yours too, Ed. Once upon a time, you would have valued any guidance you received from me, and I hope that’s still true.”
“Depends on what it is,” Ed said.
“It’s this: you’re moving in the wrong direction. I know what you were after today, and I’m far from the only one. I know about all about the MK-ULTRA mind control program, and the fallout from it. It’s not a secret that Sid Gottlieb was killed today, and it’s no secret you were there when he died. It didn’t make the newspapers or the TV, and it’s not going to. But that’s because they sent in cleaners to make it go away. Gottlieb’s going to be found dead of a heart attack in the next couple of days, alone at home.”
Luke nodded. That wasn’t a surprise. “Okay.”
“No. Not okay. No one knows what Gottlieb told you before he died. This goes beyond Gottlieb, and beyond Jefferson Monroe and his right-hand man, O’Brien. They are minor players. This goes all the way down the rabbit hole.”
Don paused and considered his next words.
“The mind control program never ended, Luke, not really. That’s what I’m telling you. And if you try to follow that path, I promise you won’t get anywhere. Sleeper assassins are the least of it now. Mind control is too deeply embedded in our society for it to end—too many interested parties have too much to lose. You’ll make too many enemies, powerful enemies, who would prefer to see Monroe run this country into the ground, or bring on the End Times, than be exposed themselves. You don’t have time to sink into that quagmire. World War Three is scheduled to start less than thirty hours from now.”
“So Jefferson Monroe didn’t send you,” Ed said. “But someone else did.”
These were Luke’s sentiments exactly. Ed just beat him to the punch.
Don ignored the accusation. “When this ends, if it ends, and you want to make stopping the mind control programs your life’s work, I won’t say a word. It’ll probably take you that long—until the end of your lives. But for now, if you want to unseat Monroe, then you have to take a different tack.”
“What do you suggest?” Luke said.
Don didn’t hesitate. “Election fraud. That was the original investigation, and its validity still stands. He’s as dirty as can be—there’s no way he won that election. If exit polls are to be believed, he lost by thirty percent. But somehow he won instead. There are people in this world who know how that happened. All you have to do it find those people, and help them go public with what they know.”
“Help them, or force them?”
Don shrugged. “Whatever it takes.”
Luke thought about it for a moment. Maybe Don was right, maybe he wasn’t. Maybe he was deliberately leading them down a false path. Luke would never fully trust Don again—every word the man uttered had to be examined for hidden agendas and motivations.
Don was already turning to go.
“What’s the second gift?” Luke said. “You said there were two.”
“The second gift is a resource you’ll need to prove the election fraud. Wait for it. It’ll be here in a minute.”
Don disappeared into the dense fog.
Luke looked at Ed again.
Ed shrugged. “It’s probably a drone strike. The longer we stand here, the better they lock on to us.”
Somewhere nearby, a motorboat engine started. Luke listened as the boat idled, then moved slowly through the no-wake zone, and then opened throttle as it headed out to deep water. At no point did its running lights come on. Gradually, the engine sound faded away. All that remained now was the laughter of the handful of drinkers still on the back deck of the bar.
A figure appeared at the far end of the dock, coming this way. In a moment, it resolved into the figure of a woman. The woman was slim, with long, curly brown hair and a very pretty face. Her nose did a slight upturn at the tip. At one time, she wore funky red-rimmed glasses as part of her style—hipster nerd—but not tonight.
Times had changed and so had the woman in question. She wore jeans, a heavy linen coat, and boots.
Luke thought back to the night he had turned up half-drunk at her apartment in Georgetown. She had answered the door in a long baby blue T-shirt. It hugged her shapely body and barely came down to her thighs.
The shirt had a cartoon of various animals all standing together. A black bear. A moose. A white-tailed deer. A few ducks, and some furry rodents. An elephant. A rhinoceros. Even a small brown boy and a little blonde-haired girl.
Underneath the crowd was a caption: Too Cute to Shoot.
At the same time, Trudy herself had opened the door while holding a big matte black Glock. The gun had seemed gigantic in her small hand. Luke had nodded at the gun.
“You gonna let me have it with that?”
Now, two years later, Trudy Wellington stood in front of them on the dock. Life underground agreed with her. She had been young when she disappeared. She seemed even younger now.
“Hello, boys,” she said. “Long time, no see.”
Luke smiled. It was the first instance when a smile felt genuine on his face in a long time. It was very good to see her.
“Don said he was going to give us a gift. Are you Don’s gift to give?”
Trudy smiled and shook her head the tiniest amount.
“Don is a silly old man.”
CHAPTER THIRTY TWO
7:48 p.m. Eastern Standard Time
34th Floor
The Willard Intercontinental Hotel, Washington DC
The bedroom was very large, with a gigantic California king–sized bed and a girl draped across it. The stone floors were cool on his bare feet. The room’s windows faced the lit up Capitol Building. Wide double doors gave out onto a private balcony.
Room service had left him a cart on rollers with a bottle of spirits, as well as a bottle each of red and white wine. Also, there were some finger sandwiches, a pitcher of water, and a bucket of ice. He barely glanced at the wines or the sandwiches. The spirits were Glenfiddich thirty-year-old scotch, so that was good news. He poured three fingers’ worth into a glass, without ice or water, and sipped it, enjoying the taste and the feel of the fire entering his belly.
Evening was here, and his day was done—Gerry the Shark had decided to call it an early night. He was overtired. He recognized that. And being around the White House was starting to make him feel paranoid—he needed to get the entire place swept for bugs. He would do it every day, if he had to.
They had come a long way very fast.
He looked at the girl. Katie the young campaign worker—she of the rich conservative dad who believed so fervently in trickle down economics. She still had the long straight hair, but she was no longer packed into a sweater and a skirt. Now that she was out of her clothes, she had a body with so many curves it was almost an outlandish cartoon of the female form. That body coming free had reminded Gerry of wild horses galloping on a high plateau.
“Wine?” he said.
“Yes, please. Red, with ice.”
He grimaced at the thought of it, but uncorked the bottle and poured it for her. She drank it fast and he poured her another. She downed it and he poured yet another. She must be nervous to be in his presence like this. He sipped his scotch.
Gerry joined her on the bed. He ran a hand along her leg, and soon forgot about the many things that were bedeviling him right now. He took his time, even though this was all about him, and not about her at all. Once, he looked into her face and saw that her mind had gone away, maybe running on that high green field with all those beautiful horses. Afterward, they lay on top of the sheets, one of her legs draped across both of his. Gerry picked up his drink where he’d left off.
He was very tired, he realized now. He lay back with his glass propped on his chest and closed his eyes. He could sip his scotch with only the slightest movement of his hand and his chin. His mind drifted from its moorings and began to scan through the past, settling here and there on various memories. It was a pleasant sensation. He smiled.
“Why do you want to start a war?” Katie said.
Gerry took a deep breath. He was feeling so good that he didn’t even mind fielding questions from her.
“We have to put a stop to Chinese aggression.”
She seemed to think about that for a moment.
“I don’t believe you.”
He nearly laughed. She was a straight-ahead smart chick, this girl. And not nearly so shy as she acted around the office. She had called his bluff without hesitating. If more people did that on a regular basis, he never would have climbed this far.
“Okay,” he said. “Try this on for size. It’s a bluff, a giant game of chicken. We have a much stronger military than they do. If we push them, and they back down, it’s a huge win for Jeff right off the bat. He will be seen as having delivered for the people who voted for him, and he’s only been in the White House a very short time.”
She nodded. “Right. But what if they don’t back down?”
