Divided States, page 3
Without missing a beat, Dom jabs back. “Then why’d they call in the midget patrol?”
It’s always like this with these two. Jeremiah should step in before they end up wrestling on the floor—especially if Zeus is past tipsy—but he doesn’t have the bandwidth. He’s caught somewhere between herding those two and trying to get real information from the higher-ups. And Jeremiah’s only heard from Robb, not his direct supervisor, Greg Daniels.
The group turns when they hear footsteps.
“I’ll never understand why they always call boys to do a woman’s job.”
That woman looks like the coach’s wife from Friday Night Lights but younger and built like Wonder Woman, a five-eleven redhead who takes no shit. The kids wave her off, but Jeremiah’s happy to see Shaye MacLaughlin. She handles communications for the team—and whatever else Jeremiah needs.
Dom and Jeremiah laugh at her dig, but Zeus takes umbrage. “Whatever, Mac.”
Jeremiah tells the guys he’ll be back and walks alongside Mac to the lockers, causing a chorus of catcalls and kissing noises. Mac gives them the bird over her shoulder.
“Glad you made it,” Jeremiah says. “I was not looking forward to a night keeping those two in line by myself. Especially with nothing to keep them occupied.”
It’s never easy keeping stride with Mac—they’re the same height, but Jeremiah gives up at least an inch in the legs—but when she’s this amped, it’s nearly impossible.
“You sure nothing’s going to happen?”
He pauses before answering. There’s no proof. The story is they’re here to reinforce the plant’s safety after what appears to be a coordinated attack, and Republic honchos are trying to piece it together.
Something’s not sitting right with him, but that doesn’t mean Mac should worry, too. “Nah. We’re just a precaution.”
Mac stops at the door to her locker room and stares into his eyes. “Those baby blues of yours are distracting, but I can still see when you’re lying.”
She ducks into the women’s locker room without giving Jeremiah a chance to respond. He’s about to enter the men’s when his cellphone rings. A second call from an unknown number.
“Whoever this is, you better hope we don’t ever meet in person.”
“It’s Eric Fowler. I’m trying to find out if Lori’s okay.”
His ex’s asshole boss. Lori still vents once in a while about the sales calls he gives her. She tells him Fowler is demanding and is constantly trying to win her affection. Jeremiah has no right to be jealous—they’ve been divorced for years—but it still pisses him off.
More upsetting right now is the fact Fowler has never called Jeremiah’s number, not even when he and Lori were still married.
Something is wrong.
“Why wouldn’t she be?” Jeremiah asks.
“So you haven’t heard from her tonight?”
Jeremiah’s about to ask why she’d call so late, but then it clicks. “New Orleans was one of the cities, wasn’t it?”
Fowler says yes, and panic rises from Jeremiah’s gut to his face. He tries to remember if he knows anyone in the city. The state? Nobody comes to mind.
“Are any of your other salesmen nearby?”
When Fowler pauses, Jeremiah gets pissed and nearly ends the call before he finally speaks.
“Yes. But I’m not calling him unless …”
“Unless what?”
Another pause.
“Unless what you cryptic mother—”
“I’ll call you back.”
The call ends before Jeremiah can respond.
4
LORI
Unknown location, New Orleans, Louisiana
The South
Lori’s in the dark but trying to remember the turns and approximate distances. Problem is, she didn’t study a map of the city, so it probably won’t do any good even if she does find a way to contact someone. Fowler’s watch won’t help anyone find her either. She heard one of them open a window for a few seconds, which means they tossed it.
The point of coming here was to leave everything behind for a few days. But being moved to God-knows-where with a sack over her head, which the buzzcut twins added shortly after grabbing her, was not what she had in mind.
“The bag’s a little cliché, don’t you think? I’m not struggling. And I had no idea that watch was a tracking device, so you’re wasting your time with me.”
Fear is giving way to anger. If she’s about to die, she’s going out having told these two what pieces of shit they are.
The SUV stops in the middle of her tirade. Doors open. Bodies move.
The sack doesn’t come off.
“Hey, Tweedledee and Tweedledumbass, you forgot something.”
As if in response, one of them grabs her arm and jerks her sideways, so she bucks her hips and twists.
Lori’s butt barely leaves the seat.
“I can’t take off the handcuffs if you keep doing that.”
Lori turns and throws a haymaker as soon as her right hand is free and nearly falls over when she doesn’t connect. That’s why they didn’t take the sack off first, stupid. She rips it off and sees an office building. A six-story gray square with pane windows in neat little rows and no lettering on the side.
“Guys, I hate to be the one to tell you this, but that’s the shittiest evil lair ever.”
The boys pull her out, one on each arm. One asks the other if he knows who Tweedle-whatever is. She’s docile for a few more steps as they discuss the dated Alice in Wonderland reference, then stomps on a foot with her right bootheel and jerks her arm free. As she drops to one knee, Lori balls her fist and connects with the other’s crotch like a boxer on the speed bag. The goon doubles over, angry words caught in his throat.
With both arms free, Lori bolts forward. But she only gets two steps before one of them dives and trips her up, the pavement digging into her palms and burning her cheek.
She turns over just in time to see the butt of a pistol.
* * *
Lori wakes on a couch, hands bandaged and head pounding.
“You made that a lot harder than it had to be.”
His voice is new. Calm. A distinct East Texas accent.
Lori eases herself up until she’s sitting and facing the man, who’s dressed in a suit and standing beside a large executive desk, complete with a large calendar, desk pads, gold letter opener, and one of those things with the ball bearings that smack each other rhythmically.
“I’ll remember that the next time I get kidnapped.”
“They say sarcasm is the lowest form of wit.”
Lori waits, wondering if she should say it. Her mouth’s gotten her in trouble before. Then again, she’s in some executive’s office with a head wound.
Before she makes up her mind, the man rolls a chair toward her and sits so close she can smell his sweat. “I understand you’re upset. But if you give me a minute to explain—”
Lori spits in his face.
She braces for a slap or worse. When the man reaches into his black suit jacket, she wonders if she overplayed her hand and he’s fixing to shoot her.
Instead, he pulls out a red handkerchief and wipes his face, which takes a few passes over his thick stubble. “We didn’t kidnap you, Ms. Young. We’re recruiting you.”
This is bad. Real bad. “What the hell are you talking about?”
He smiles and replaces the soiled cloth. “My name is Robert Moore. I lead a group of covert intelligence officers, and we need your help. And if you can stop your self-destructive behavior and start caring about people again, you’ll save the world.”
He laid that cheese on way too thick. But she’ll bite. If she keeps him talking, maybe he won’t start beating her. Or worse.
“Oh yeah? How’s that?”
“First, you need to know that Eric Fowler’s business isn’t just a pipeline sales company. It’s a front for another group of intelligence officers. For simplicity’s sake, he’s the bad guy, and I’m the good guy.”
Though her molars feel like they might crack, Lori works them in lieu of speaking. Because of that goddamn watch, this clown thinks Lori is part of some underground spy organization. Fowler is dead if she gets out of this alive.
“Look Mr. Secret Agent Man, I have no idea what’n the hell you’re talking about.”
Moore narrows his eyes but leans back, relaxed. “I believe you. I believe you have no idea how Eric Fowler has been manipulating you. It’s his specialty.”
5
ERIC
FAST offices, Cushing, Northeast Province
Republic of Oklahoma
Eric felt lucky earlier when he saw Lori was wearing the watch. It had been a safe bet, though. She’d told him about missing a similar one, lost after a one-night-stand on the road where no numbers were exchanged.
Now he wishes she’d left it at the hotel. At least then she’d have been Schrödinger’s Traveler, both safe and in danger until he located her. But Lori hasn’t moved in thirty minutes, and the tracker shows her on the edge of a public park, nowhere near any benches or swings or anything else to sit on.
She’s not wearing the watch anymore.
Or she’s lying there dead.
Lori left the Superdome parking lot and was riding in a vehicle, and he assumed she called a cab or—though he hated the thought—let someone she met there take her home.
Reynolds has called three times, but Eric won’t answer. Not before he calls Boudreaux. And that can be dangerous. But when you need someone found and extricated in Louisiana, Boudreaux is the man you contact and hope the body count isn’t high when it’s over.
Eric pulls a satellite phone from his desk and punches in the numbers.
“Speak.” Boudreaux’s voice sounds like someone poured gravel down his throat. That’s not new, but he sounds nothing like the young soldier Eric met decades ago. It’s still jarring after long communication blackouts.
“It’s Fowler. I need an extraction in New Orleans.”
“One of yours?”
“Yeah. ETA?”
“Two hours.”
Eric fills him in on the details. It’s not much to go on, but Boudreaux’s never failed Eric.
After replacing the satphone, Eric rubs his eyes and leans back. That was his last call of the night. His twenty-two officers are safe. He doesn’t count Lori, who’s not yet an officer but a high-value target. Posing as salesmen, Eric has two officers each in The Liberated States, Western Territories, Free State of Utah, Free State of Southwestern Colorado, The Republic of Oklahoma, and The Republic of Texas. There are four each in the Federalist States and United States, and one each in Alaska and Hawaii.
Alaska is technically a Western Territory, but it’s worth making sure the land’s not annexed by Russia. Or—and he laughs every time he thinks it—Canada. Hawaii stayed with the USA to maintain its economy and military defense, assuming correctly that Asia would become more volatile after the split.
The Oahu post isn’t under the cover of working for Eric. Phoebe’s a former colleague there to hit the panic button if anything happens at Pearl Harbor.
All of Eric’s officers used to work under him in the Directorate of Operations. None of them left by choice.
The Second Secessions left the intelligence community with the impossible task of divvying up resources, and many were forced out of the Agency. Eric had left early and was ready to scoop up officers unsatisfied with civilian life.
Deputy Director for Operations Randall Gates had known the secessions were coming and told Eric to retire just before Alexia Ramirez was re-elected POTUS. Gates retired a few months later when Ramirez—as he’d predicted—selected a new Director of the CIA with the mandate to clean up his shop.
That’s why Eric started his own company. He and Gates would run the show carte blanche.
When the time came, leaving operations to start the business went smoothly, especially when an old friend with a Stanford MBA moved back to Oklahoma because she couldn’t stand to live in ultra-liberal Palo Alto or San Francisco. He and Rita bought a struggling sales firm, recruited a couple of officers, taught them about pipelines and valves and actuators, and made it profitable again. For a while, their covert activities seemed to take a backseat to bringing in cash by the wheelbarrow.
Then the secessions came, and Gates dropped the bomb.
He had a new adversary on the other side.
Time to scale up.
* * *
Eric’s nearly asleep when his cell rings. He expects Boudreaux, but it’s only been ten minutes.
Reynolds. Again.
“I have someone on it,” Eric says.
“What does that mean?”
Reynolds is whispering and Eric hears other voices in the background. One of them yells. He’s at the plant, which is unusual. Eric listens for another moment before answering Reynolds.
“It means I’ve called the hospitals and she’s not there. The police are too busy to take my call, but I have another salesman in the area who’s on his way into the city to check her hotel room and physically ask someone at the police stations around the city. I should know more in two hours.”
Reynolds ends the call without comment, but Eric gets the message. He’ll provide Reynolds with regular status updates. Lori would want that.
What Eric wants is sleep, even if it’s just for the next two hours. But it won’t come now. There’s more going on than a series of coordinated mass shootings.
How else can he explain the increased activity at Reynolds’ plant—the only facility in the Western Hemisphere that still assembles and disassembles nuclear warheads.
And somebody yelled load up.
6
JEREMIAH
The Plant, Panhandle Province
The Republic
The night is dragging. Jeremiah and Mac are outside running drills with Dom and Zeus, but it’s pointless with only four of them.
And where the hell is Daniels? Jeremiah has his number for emergencies, but so far this hasn’t qualified.
The plant is always considered a target. Old-timers say everyone in Amarillo was worried on 9/11 after the Twin Towers fell. Security was heightened after the secessions were finalized, too. The continent hadn’t been that vulnerable since the Second World War.
But nothing happened then.
And nothing will happen tonight.
Speaking with Robb would settle his nerves, though. If nothing else, Jeremiah should find out how long they’re staying. If it’s all night, the four of them will catch sleep in shifts. He also needs to know if more of the team is coming.
Jeremiah puts Mac in charge and starts walking toward the massive but aging administration building. It’s three miles away, so he flags down a kid hauling ass in a utility terrain vehicle—what his father used to call a souped-up go-kart. “Can I hitch a ride to admin?”
The kid nods.
Jeremiah doesn’t know the guy’s name. More than three thousand workers stream in and out of the twenty-five-square-mile compound every day, and he doesn’t interact with most of them or understand what they do. That hasn’t bothered him until now.
The ride is short, so neither of them engage in small talk. Jeremiah checks his watch. He’s still got a while before Lori’s boss is supposed to call, but that doesn’t keep Jeremiah from worrying. She was the last woman he’d loved. And they connected frequently enough that she almost felt like his girlfriend again.
When the ride stops, Jeremiah doesn’t notice until the driver starts talking. “Crazy night. You know what’s going on?”
Jeremiah shakes his head. Not yet, anyway.
Getting to the building is just the first step. Jeremiah’s annoyed by the heightened security. Then there’s getting to Robb’s office, one of a thousand in the three-story structure occupied by whichever government contractor was earning billions in guaranteed profits to run the plant. And, of course, Robb’s office is on the far end.
The door is open, but Jeremiah knocks on it anyway before entering.
“Reynolds, how are your two guys and a girl?”
Robb laughs at his own joke. Jeremiah doesn’t get it, but he feigns amusement. “Good one, sir. They’re fine.”
Robb’s not a forward-thinking man, but for someone in his mid-fifties raised in Arkansas, he could be worse. He did greenlight Mac’s hiring, though the fact Jeremiah knew her while they served and personally vouched for her abilities probably helped.
Robb motions for him to take a seat. “What’s on your mind, son?”
Why does everything about tonight feel off? “Just wanted to see if you had a timetable for us yet. Are more resources coming in later to relieve us, or should we plan on sleeping in shifts?”
He purses his lips, and Jeremiah hopes he hasn’t been too relaxed with Robb. He’s a folksy guy, but perhaps that’s just a show. When he leans back in his chair and opens the desk drawer, Jeremiah nearly blurts out an apology in hopes of not getting written up.
