Bodyguard of Lies

CHAPTER 31

Pittsburgh was windy and chilly and raining. Morgantown, West Virginia was an hour and a half from the airport. Neeley had spotted their trailers before they got to the rental car counter. Pretty incompetent Neeley decided. As the women loaded the compact sedan the men kept well out of sight. Neeley decided to forget about them for the moment. She had not yet told Hannah what she had read in the papers.

Hannah pulled the small bag of cookies she had saved from the flight from her tote. She offered one to Neeley who refused. "So where exactly are we going?"

"To Morgantown, West Virginia. It's near the Pennsylvania state line. It's Gant's hometown."

"And the videotape is cached there?"

Neeley tried not to look exasperated. She had not slept the entire flight like Hannah had. "Yes, near there. It's also where Gant's wife and son live."

"Have you ever been there before? Do you think we could stop and get some coffee?"

Hannah was eating one cookie after another.

"Yes and no. Gant and I visited Morgantown every year. On the sly of course. We came at different times and surveilled the place. Gant wanted to make sure Jesse and his son, Bobbie, were safe."

"Why can't we get some coffee?"

Neeley shook her head in wonder. "Has anybody ever told you that you are an odd duck?"

Hannah stopped chewing, her eyes widening with surprise. "No, why?"

Neeley smiled. "You know, I believe you."

They drove for a few miles in silence before Neeley spoke again. “I’ve read the papers Jean-Philippe gave us.”

“And?” Hannah asked.

“The bomb Jean-Philippe gave me was made by Racine on orders from Collins in order to kill Gant and destroy the video and the papers which were supposed to be in the package also.”

“We knew that,” Hannah said. “We probably should have killed Racine in Kansas City.” She said it flatly, as if discussing the weather. Neeley realized Hannah had a very quick learning curve.

“Racine also used an RPG to shoot down one of the helicopters in Mogadishu thinking he was getting Gant’s chopper, along with Masterson, the video and the papers. He made a mistake.”

“That’s a good chunk of the iceberg,” Hannah murmured. “How many men got killed because of that?”

“Eighteen all together,” Neeley said.

“So what else were in those papers?” Hannah pressed. “There was more than just a note about Racine.”

Neeley nodded. “There were copies of money transfers. Stuff I used to do for Jean-Philippe. Collins was helping Cintgo negotiate for rights for two oil pipelines from Turkmenistan across Afghanistan. One would terminate in Pakistan and one on the Arabian Sea. The problem wasn’t so much the pipelines, but rather security for them. It would make no sense to invest billions of dollars in building them if they got blown up every other day as the Taliban had done to the Russian pipeline.”

“So?” Hannah said. “That’s all out there in the open. I even remember talking about some of that with my husband. The pipelines were never built.”

“True,” Neeley said. “But to get a guarantee of security from the Taliban—“

Hannah sat up straight. “They paid them off.”

Neeley nodded. “Three hundred million dollars. Fifty million of which was the good Senator’s own money, illegally redirected from campaign funds and pay-offs.”

“Geez,” Hannah whispered. “No wonder he wants this squashed. He paid that money to the people who blew up the Trade Center and Pentagon. He helped finance the 9-11 attacks.”

“Right. And we’ve been caught in the middle over a decade later.”

Hannah tapped a finger on her lip. “Nero didn’t know about the money transfer or Racine shooting the helicopter down.”

“How do you figure that?”

“Because Collins and Racine wouldn’t be around if he did,” Hannah said simply. Her finger continued to tap as she thought. “But—“ she drew the word out.

“But what?” Neeley pressed, glancing at the rear view mirror and catching a glimpse of the car that had been trailing them since the airport.

“There’s still more to this,” Hannah said.

“What more?”

Hannah shrugged. “I don’t know yet.”

“That’s helpful,” Neeley said, but without an edge of sarcasm.

“I will never again trust that what I see in front of me is the truth,” Hannah said. “I’ve learned my lesson.”

“Amen, sister,” Neeley said. She spotted the car once more. Neeley kept one hand on the wheel and put the other in her jacket pocket. She handed Hannah the small cassette recorder.

"What's this for?"

"The guys trailing us."

Hannah's head whipped around. "Where?"

"For God's sakes, they're not in the back seat. Let's just say they know where we are. I need to get rid of them. We need to get to Jesse alone. I have to talk to her."

Hannah was playing with the buttons on the recorder. "OK, what's the plan?"

She started to nod as Neeley told her. “You’re learning,” she said when Neeley was done. “We have to use our strengths and their weaknesses.”