Текст книги "Hidden Order: A Thriller"

Автор книги: Brad Thor

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Текущая страница: 6 (всего у книги 26 страниц)

CHAPTER 15

WASHINGTON

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

Harvath pulled up in front of the chipped brick warehouse and checked the rusted numbers above the door against the address the Old Man had given him. He appeared to be at the right place.

Though he normally didn’t leave anything of value in his SUV, he did a quick visual sweep of the seats just to make sure. This neighborhood wasn’t exactly in the town’s garden district and the last thing he wanted to do was tempt some passing thug into a quick smash-and-grab.

Preparing to exit the vehicle, he adjusted his weapon. He was convinced that one of the biggest reasons D.C. was so dangerous was that its citizens weren’t allowed to defend themselves and legally carry firearms. The criminals knew this and took full advantage. A proponent of the belief that it was better to be judged by twelve than carried by six, Harvath always carried his .45-caliber H&K USP Compact in a custom Blackhawk “Check Six” holster placed securely behind his right hip, wherever he was. One of the few exceptions was that afternoon when he had gone straight from the airport to the Federal Reserve Building. As a rule, any weapons used overseas stayed overseas.

By and large, most of the rules Harvath lived by served him well. Some, though, were more difficult to reconcile with circumstances than others. His maxim that there was no such thing as a perfect crime was a prime example. Whether it was a terrorist attack, a kidnapping, or a murder, there were always clues to be found. But in the case of the kidnapped Fed candidates, the clues were proving to be extremely hard to find.

With some help from the Old Man, Harvath had turned his study into a makeshift war room and they officially launched their investigation. They began with what Harvath had hoped would be the easiest and quickest route to uncovering potential suspects—the Internet.

Though he didn’t know much about the Fed, he did know that their critics were fairly outspoken. Some of the better known ran the gamut from pundits to business leaders and members of Congress, while the lesser known were simply day-to-day citizens. He used every mix of search terms he could come up with. He began with a generic search for the “Sons of Liberty” and because of its historical relevance was gifted with over a million prospective returns.

He tried to narrow it down by adding the term “Federal Reserve” to the search and ended up with just over thirteen thousand possibilities. From there, he added the names of the kidnapped candidates and hit a digital wall. As best he could tell, none of the terms appeared together, at least not openly anywhere on the Web.

Stripping out the “Sons of Liberty” from his search, he entered the hostages’ names along with the term “Federal Reserve.” He even tried adding the Henry Hazlitt quote about today being the “tomorrow” that the bad economist told us to ignore. The results were a mixed bag and not very helpful. There wasn’t anyone, at least not on the open Internet, calling for any of the victims to be harmed, much less killed.

Harvath turned his attention to the police reports. He had been through Claire Marcourt’s file a hundred times. It felt like there was something missing, but he just couldn’t put his finger on it.

He read through the reports of the other kidnap victims, searching for some common thread, but the only thing he seemed to be able to come up with was that the kidnappings had been very well executed. They had all happened on the same night, but in different cities, which meant that multiple teams had to have been used. That was a plus, as far as Harvath was concerned. The more people involved in any plot, the greater the chances were that one of them would screw up. The challenge, however, was allocating enough assets to a case in order to see the screw-up the moment it happened, jump on it, and leverage it to your advantage.

The Carlton Group, though, didn’t have many assets, much less extra ones they could move from project to project, as they’d been forced to let most of their people go. At the moment, Harvath was it, conducting the entire investigation himself out of his house, with his study acting as ground zero and the overflow spilling into the hall.

Even the Old Man was limited by how much time he could spare. He had spent a few hours with Harvath on the assignment before having to leave to deal with the fallout from the Sienna Star operation.

Though he didn’t come right out and say it, Carlton had also been troubled by Claire Marcourt’s murder. Harvath could see it in his face and by how much time he had spent with the file. He’d scanned all the contents onto his laptop and uploaded them onto a secure FTP site before walking outside to place a lengthy phone call. When he came back in and announced that he was leaving, he handed Harvath a slip of paper with the address for a warehouse and WWII written on it.

The initials stood for William Wise II. “He’s expecting you,” the Old Man had said on his way out the door.

“Expecting me for what? Who is he?”

“He used to work for the Agency, brilliant guy. Knows something about everything. I gave him the file. He might have some insight.”

Harvath tried to ask what kind of work Wise had done and what made him so special, but Carlton was in a hurry and gone before the conversation could go any further. He figured he’d learn soon enough.

Walking up to the front of the building, Harvath noticed several low-visibility security precautions. While they may have been in response to the neighborhood’s crime rate, Harvath suspected there might be another, much more realistic reason. Whoever this Bill Wise person was, he had some very dangerous enemies.

CHAPTER 16

Bill Wise looked like Santa Claus crossed with one of the toughest bikers the Hell’s Angels had ever produced. He had white hair, a thick white beard, and towered over Harvath by a good five inches and an additional seventy-five pounds.

He wore dark jeans, a pair of black Frye boots, and a faded Dallas Cowboys jersey. On his right wrist was a copper bracelet—the kind used for warding off arthritis, and on his left was an expensive Panerai diver’s watch.

As Harvath stepped inside, Wise stole a quick glance toward the street, closed the door, and then offered his hand.

“Thanks for seeing me on such short notice, Mr. Wise.”

“First of all, it’s Doctor Wise and second of all, give me a break with all the formalities,” he replied with a smile. “If Peaches says you’re okay, then that’s good enough for me.”

Peaches was the nickname the Old Man had been known by back in the day. According to legend, he was one of the roughest interrogators the Central Intelligence Agency had ever produced. He had a reputation for taking the hardest cases, the worst of the worst, and could be absolutely brutal with the enemy. It was said that if lives hung in the balance and time was of the essence, Reed Carlton was the man you wanted on the job. The fact that he was willing to go to some pretty extraordinary lengths in his interrogations had earned him the amusing and also chilling sobriquet of Peaches. He was anything but sweet.

Signaling for Harvath to follow, Wise led him into the warehouse. They passed through a small reception area, its walls covered with pictures. In addition to noticing that Wise had traveled the world, often heavily armed and in the presence of indigenous fighters, he discerned that the man was a scuba diver, private pilot, Eagle Scout, photographer, motorcyclist, NASCAR and IndyCar fan, and a hunter with a ranch in San Saba County, Texas.

“Do you hunt?” Wise asked after noticing Harvath admiring his ranch photos.

“Strictly bipeds these days.”

Wise chuckled and led him through a heavy sliding door into the main section of the building. It was a large, loftlike space with thick metal trusses and a pristine, epoxy-coated concrete floor. Parked near a wide roll-up door was a trio of perfectly restored vintage SUVs—a green 1960s Land Rover, a metallic gray 1970s International Harvester Scout, and a white 1980s Jeep Grand Wagoneer with wood paneling. Beyond them were a handful of older motorcycles in varying states of refurbishment. Harvath could make out a Triumph Bonneville as well as an Indian and what looked like a Crocker.

“Are you the force behind all of these restorations?” Harvath asked.

“I am,” Wise replied. “Ever since I was a kid, I’ve loved taking things apart and putting them back together.”

As Harvath admired the machines, the man added. “Don’t ever retire. You’d be surprised how expensive ‘puttering’ turns out to be.”

This time, Harvath chuckled. He still had no idea what Wise had done for a living, but if he was like any of the other retired spooks he’d met in his lifetime, Wise had probably done his share of consulting after leaving the Agency and had made quite a few bucks doing it.

The garage portion of the warehouse ended at an enormous floor-to-ceiling glass display case. Inside was row after row of vintage typewriters and antique sewing machines. The display delineated the beginning of Wise’s living area.

There was a stainless steel kitchen, a massive library with columns of twelve-foot-high bookshelves that went all the way to the structure’s rear wall, and a giant drafting table that served as the man’s desk. Hanging on the wall near it were a myriad of degrees, one of them a Ph.D. in psychology, as well as several diplomas and commendations from the Army’s 75th Ranger Regiment and 5th Special Forces Group. Next to those was a sleeping area, then a living room with a sectional couch, and finally a wooden bar that looked like it had been salvaged out of some small Irish pub.

“Something to drink?” Wise asked, walking around behind the bar.

“What do you have?” said Harvath, regretting the question almost as soon as he had asked it.

“Whiskey or ice tea.”

“I guess I’ll have an ice tea.”

“Whiskey it is,” said Wise, removing two glasses and setting them atop the bar. “I’m all out of ice tea.”

There was a brightly colored oil painting collage of George Washington hanging behind the bar. Harvath thought he recognized the artist. “That’s a Penley, isn’t it?”

“It is,” the man answered as he handed Harvath his drink. “Great artist and an even greater American. I stumbled onto him a few years ago and now try to get to all of his exhibits.”

“A body in motion,” Harvath offered.

“Tends to stay in motion. Words to live by in retirement.”

“What exactly is it that you retired from?”

Wise took a sip of his drink. “The best way I ever heard it described was ‘armed anthropology.’ I was in the Army for a long time, predominantly the Special Operations community. The Army put me through undergrad and grad school, where I made the art of killing my focus.”

“You mean how soldiers kill?”

“Not just soldiers: anyone or any organization. Soldiers, law enforcement officers, gang members, contract killers and assassins, psychopaths, nation-states, terrorists—you name them and I studied them.”

“Sounds very interesting.”

“Fascinating stuff and I didn’t leave a stone unturned. From how our kill rate in combat skyrocketed once the Army switched from bull’s-eye targets to silhouettes, all the way to how and why mass murderers select their victims and places of attack.

“What I uncovered is that there is a particular mental makeup that excels in combat. Certain aspects of that makeup could be taught, so that day-to-day soldiers are more efficient on the battlefield, but there are other aspects that can’t be learned. You have to come wired a certain way. As we drilled down and began identifying what those mental markers were, our results began to shape the screening process for certain compartments within the Special Operations community.”

Compartments. Harvath found the word choice interesting, as if it were something that needed to be contained. “So the military was looking to select for its most lethal killers.”

“That was part of it, but as you know, Special Operations is about a lot more than just killing the enemy. In my case, we were also trying to teach the Army’s SF teams what to screen for when they infiltrated foreign countries and worked with insurgent groups. Our Green Berets needed mini-Ph.D.s that would help them evaluate the potential in the combatants they were supporting. In essence, they needed to be able to rapidly assess if they were helping elevate and train the right people, or if there were better candidates for certain positions. Like I said, I found it to be fascinating work.”

“The Agency must have thought so, too, at some point if you ended up over there, right?”

“They did,” said Wise, taking another sip of his drink. “It was at a time when they were experimenting with a lot of interesting programs. They made me an offer that the Army couldn’t even come close to matching, so I moved over to Langley.”

“Where you continued what you had been doing for the Army?”

“But with much bigger budgets.”

“Off book or on?” asked Harvath, referring to where the money had come from for these interesting programs.

“What do you think?”

Completely black and off the books, thought Harvath. Wise’s area of expertise was not something the CIA would have likely wanted congressional input on. The politicians would have only watered it down, if not shut it down completely. Members of Congress barely understood the complexities of the military battlefield. What they knew of the intelligence battlefield you could fit in a shot glass.

“Okay, so you’re Dr. Kill, armed anthropologist,” Harvath continued. “Why am I here?”

Wise had been called that so many times, he’d lost count. Normally, it made him smile. This time, though, his face was dead serious. “You’re here because Reed Carlton thinks I might be able to help with your case.”

“Can you?”

“Maybe, but first I want to see how much you know about your victim.”

“Victims,” Harvath replied. “Plural.”

Wise shook his head. “There may be hostages, plural, and a dead body, singular,” he said, gently chastising Harvath for correcting him, “but the object of all this is a singular victim and the sooner you understand that, the closer you’ll be to solving your case.”

CHAPTER 17

BOSTON

MASSACHUSETTS

He had spent the afternoon taking pictures. He liked taking pictures. He took shots of King’s Chapel, the Old North Church, and the Paul Revere House. In the Granary Burying Ground, near the grave of Sam Adams, he found a Gothic-inspired woman with black lipstick and nail polish who let him photograph her posing provocatively against several of the headstones. After the fourth one, she offered to take him someplace nearby and perform a sex act on him for fifty dollars.

She was a junkie who wanted to get high. He offered her ten dollars just to see what she’d say. She told him to fuck himself and flipped him the middle finger as she walked off. She came back ten minutes later as he was getting ready to leave and told him she’d do it for twenty. She didn’t know it then, but she had been smart to approach him in broad daylight in an open, public space. Had this happened at night, had he been drinking or off his medication, things would have ended much differently.

He didn’t know what her drug of choice was or how much it cost, but he removed a dollar bill from his wallet and extended it, telling her to get something to eat. “What? A box of Tic Tacs?” she demanded in her Southie accent. “Go fuck yourself,” she told him again, which sounded more like go faak yaself.

She was angry, real angry, and that made him smile. Seeing him smile made her even angrier and she tried to slap him. The speed with which he caught her wrist and twisted her arm behind her back startled her. She was going to scream, but the man sensed it and twisted her arm even tighter as he drew her against him. It was so painful all the air rushed from her lungs.

Her eyes flicked from side to side for anyone who could help her, but the few people she could see were paying attention only to the historic grave markers. He could smell the fear oozing from her pores and feel the exquisite trembling of her body. There was no telling how many diseases she carried, but he didn’t care. He was interested in only one thing from her. Closing his eyes, he listened until he could hear the thumping of her terrified heart as it pounded against the wall of her chest. It sounded like a rabbit running from a wolf.

He pulled up on her arm, right to the precipice of breaking it, and then he let her go. She stood for a moment, frozen in place by fear, and then like the little rabbit she was, she ran away as fast as she could from the big bad wolf.

He smiled as he watched her run. Broad daylight, a public space and commitment to his pills: the trinity that had saved her life that late afternoon in the graveyard and which had given him an appetite.

He was wary about where he should and shouldn’t go, should and shouldn’t eat. Though he had taken steps to disguise his appearance, there were certain risks that were not to be taken. He walked south to the city’s Chinatown neighborhood, where he ate in a small, hole-in-the-wall restaurant that couldn’t afford matching chairs, much less a CCTV system.

The best thing to be said about the food was that it was edible. He gorged himself on fried rice and egg rolls, washing it all down with a syrupy sweet Asian soda he had pulled out of the cooler. Impulse control was something the medication was supposed to help, but when he overloaded on stimuli the way he had in the graveyard, he found his cravings harder to control.

In addition to his eating binge, he also had to contend with the fact that his sexual arousal hadn’t dissipated. Smelling the terror on the woman as well as feeling her fluttering body pressed tightly against his was a heady combination of sensations made only more acute by the danger of it all.

He was drifting into choppy water and being pulled further and further from shore. He fingered the pillbox in his pocket as he stared over at the cooler with its beer and sodas. If he took more medication he could become dopey and slip up. But if he didn’t take any, and he gave in to one of his nastier impulses, he could also slip up. He felt damned either way, which suddenly brought on an additional sensation, anxiety.

He decided to write his own prescription. Walking over to the cooler, he removed two Yanjings, paid the old Chinese woman with the whiskers behind the counter, and sat back down at the table.

He drank the first beer in one long swallow. With the second, he took his time and willed himself to relax. It took several minutes, but eventually the warmth of the alcohol crept into his bloodstream and he began to feel himself relax. The benefit of the anxiety, if you could call it that, was that it was an arousal killer. His erection had completely gone away.

The longer he sat in the restaurant, the more relaxed he became. The more relaxed he became, the more his mind drifted, particularly to what had happened at the graveyard and he could feel the strings of arousal starting to be tugged. He was being pulled out to sea again. What he needed was some coffee.

Finishing off his second beer, his steered his legs out onto the street and into the early evening. Rush hour was already well under way. When he finally found a café it was staffed by wrung-out baristas watching the clock, eager to close up and get home for the evening. He ordered his coffee with a “black eye,” coffee-talk for two shots of espresso. As he had done in the Chinese restaurant, he paid in cash, and then exited the establishment.

He felt the caffeine hit his system faster than the beer. There was a pep in his step and he felt a buoyancy of spirit. Everything was going to be okay. He was actually looking forward to his assignment tonight. It was complicated, but not impossible. Every step had been mapped out in perfect detail. It was like making a cake. As long as you followed the recipe, you had nothing to worry about, and he always followed the recipe.

The vehicle and his supplies were stored in a dilapidated garage in East Boston. He spent an hour casing the neighborhood and an additional hour surveilling the garage before he approached.

The key to the padlock had been sewn into the lining of his jacket. Ripping part of the fabric, he removed it, and let himself in, closing and locking the door behind him.

He slipped a small flashlight from his backpack and cupped the head so as not to throw too much light. The white panel van was unlocked. Climbing in back, he did a quick assessment. Everything was where it was supposed to be.

Opening the lid of the large garbage can, he checked to make sure the final ingredient was in place. Squinting into the beam of his flashlight was a man, bound and gagged, with a two-day growth of beard.

He closed the lid and began to feel very excited as he laid out a blue jumpsuit and stripped off his clothes.