The Ares Decision

34

Randi Russell emerged from the woods and stopped at the edge of a thirty-foot cliff. Below, the Susquehanna River ran black in the moonlight and patches of snow glowed on the abandoned railroad track running parallel.

There was no way down and she turned east, moving silently along the tree line. It had taken her two hours to get there, most of that time spent on the maze of rural roads that cut through Pennsylvania’s farm country. With the exception of three cars and an Amish horse and buggy, she’d seen no one. It was approaching eleven p.m., and this part of the world obviously still adhered to the adage “Early to bed, early to rise.”

She had studiously avoided the obvious entrance to the railroad cut, instead parking at the edge of a poorly defined dirt road and bushwhacking toward the river. Her preference was to have these types of rendezvous in crowded areas, and the whole midnight thing seemed a little melodramatic, but once her curiosity was piqued she had a hard time letting go.

A gulley appeared to her left and Randi appraised it, calculating the difficulty of the climb down and searching for icy spots. The satellite images had underplayed the steepness of the rock, but there wasn’t much she could do about that now. The clock was ticking.

She dangled her legs over the edge, then flipped over and eased herself onto a narrow ledge below. Her hands were getting numb from the cold, and that, combined with the darkness, made the descent much more treacherous than it should have been. The smart thing would be to take it slow, but even with black pants and parka, she wasn’t comfortable being exposed against the cliff.

The rock became more featured as she continued down, providing better cover and allowing her to move more efficiently. She let go when she was still almost ten feet from the ground, dropping into the gravel and then going completely still for a few seconds to scan for movement.

Satisfied that no one was bearing down on her, she leapt over the old tracks, wincing at the unavoidable crunch of her footfalls. Once back in the trees, she stopped again to listen. Still nothing. The night was completely windless and the animals that normally prowled the area all had the good sense to dig in and get out of the cold.

She started east again, moving deliberately and occasionally looking to her iPhone for an update of her position. The note she’d found in her jacket had been brief — only a set of GPS coordinates, a date, a time, and a very intriguing name: Colonel Jon Smith.

Undoubtedly the man she was there to meet would be disappointed to know that he wasn’t as anonymous as he thought. A life spent in unstable countries full of petty criminals and pickpockets had given Randi an awareness of her surroundings that didn’t shut down just because she was in Langley. And while Brandon Gazenga’s technique wasn’t bad for an Ivy Leaguer, he was no Iraqi street urchin.

The question was, what was a young Africa-division analyst with an impressive, if unspectacular, record doing passing her notes in elevators? And even more interesting, why was the name of an army virus hunter scrawled across the bottom?

Her phone indicated that she was within twenty feet of the coordinates she’d been given and she slid a Glock from beneath her coat. The direction arrow pointed left to a spot that looked to be dead on top of the tracks.

She went right, finding a boulder large enough to protect her flank, and positioned so she could see anyone coming up the railroad cut.

Jon Smith.

There was nothing Gazenga could have put in his note that would grab her attention more. She’d spent a long time blaming Smith for her sister’s death. As unfair as it was, he had provided something she needed — a target for her anger, despair, and helplessness. Strange that she would end up as close to him as to anyone in the world.

Despite that relationship, though, there was a great deal she didn’t know about the man. He insisted that he was just a medical researcher, but then had a way of popping up in places that had nothing to do with his job at Fort Detrick.

The first time they’d run into each other in the field, she’d completely fallen for his beautifully delivered “simple country doctor” line. And she wasn’t too bothered by the second time their lives collided — coincidences happened. Occasionally.

After that, though, things just got stupid. He was clearly an operator and he wasn’t working for one of the normal acronyms.

Usually, this kind of thing would raise the hairs on the back of her neck, but with Jon it was different. As much as she hated to admit it, he was one of the few people in the world whose motivations and integrity she didn’t question. If the word didn’t always get stuck in her throat when she tried to utter it, she might even say she trusted him.

A quick glance at her phone suggested that her contact was late. Five minutes and counting.

The cold was starting to seep into her — something she had become sensitive to since an operation had gone badly wrong on an island near the Arctic Circle. An island that would now be home to her frozen body if it hadn’t been for Smith.

She stood, wrapping her arms around herself but remaining still enough to blend into the trees around her.

It was possible that Gazenga was playing the same waiting game, but there was no way she was going to go stand out in the open with nothing but a note from someone she’d never met. She’d collected far too many enemies over the years to offer up that easy a target.

Randi Russell slipped behind the wheel of her borrowed car, turning the heater on full blast and confirming the road was completely dark before pulling out.

Her thumb hovered over her phone’s number pad for a moment, and then she thought better of it and dug an untraceable satellite phone from the glove box. No point in taking chances.

She dialed and listened to it ring for a while, immediately hitting redial when it flipped to voice mail. The third time was a charm.

“Yeah?” a groggy voice said. “Hello?”

“Trip, it’s Randi.”

“Randi? What…Do you know what time it is in the States?”

She wasn’t in the habit of broadcasting her whereabouts and didn’t see any reason to correct her friend’s assumption. “Two p.m., right?”

“No, it’s two a.m. As in two in the morning.”

She’d known Jeff Tripper for more than five years — ever since they’d teamed up to track down an Afghan terrorist who’d managed to slip over the Mexican border. Since then, his career at the FBI had been in overdrive and he’d recently been made the head of the Baltimore field office.

“A.m.?” she said innocently. “Sorry, bud. It’s a subtle difference, you know?”

“Not from where I’m sitting,” he said, now awake enough to be suspicious. “Is it safe for me to assume this isn’t a social call?”

“I’m insulted.”

“And I’m tired.”

“Okay, I’ll admit it’s not entirely social. How are your contacts with the Virginia cops?”

“Good. Why?”

“I need you to have them send a black-and-white to a guy named Brandon Gazenga’s house.”

“Why?”

“I don’t care. Say a neighbor was complaining that he was playing his stereo too loud.”

“I mean, what are we after?”

“I just want to make sure he’s okay.”

“Do you need to know now or would nine o’clock work for you?”

“Are you going to make me remind you that you owe me?”

Tripper swore under his breath. “I’ll call you back.”

Randi had just crossed into Maryland when her sat phone began to ring. She put in an earpiece and picked up.

“What’s the word?”

“I’m not a happy man, Randi.”

“Have you considered meditation?”

“Brandon Gazenga’s body was found late this morning.”

Randi glanced reflexively in the rearview mirror, cataloging three sets of headlights behind her and estimating their distance. “How?”

“A coworker went to his house when he didn’t show up for work and found him on the floor of his bedroom. They’re thinking food poisoning.”

“Food poisoning? You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“Do I sound like I’m kidding? According to the cops, it’s not as uncommon as you’d think.”

“Was there anything suspicious about the circumstances?”

“Beyond getting a call from a CIA operative at two in the morning, you mean?”

“But you never got a call from a CIA operative at two in the morning, right?”

“Right. Look, I talked to the investigating officer — who really appreciated being called in the middle of the night, by the way — and he said the guy’s house was a complete pigsty and his fridge was crammed with moldy takeout. He said it’s a miracle Gazenga survived as long as he did.”

A new set of headlights appeared behind her, and they were coming up fast. Randi waited until the last possible moment before swerving onto an off ramp. The car stayed on course, passing harmlessly by.

“Okay. Thanks, Trip.”

“Now hold on a minute. That cop also told me that Gazenga worked for a certain government agency you’d be familiar with. What are we talking about here?”

“We’re not talking at all, remember?”

“That’s fine and good, but consider the position you’ve put me in, Randi. I just made a very suspicious call about a CIA agent whose body isn’t quite cold yet.”

“I have complete confidence that you’ll figure out a way to explain that.”

There was silence over the phone for a few seconds. “Hey, Randi?”

“Yeah?”

“About that favor you did me. We’re even.”

The line went dead and she immediately began dialing a number from memory. There was no choice at this point.

It rang twice before transferring to voice mail.

“You’ve reached Jon Smith. I can’t take your call right now, but leave me a message and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.”

“Hi, Jon, it’s Randi. You know, it’s getting close to Sophia’s birthday and I’m feeling a little blue. Just wanted to talk. Give me a call when you get a chance.”

She disconnected the call and tossed the phone into the passenger seat. No one hearing that message would think much of it. Even if they were thorough enough to check, they’d find that her dead sister’s birthday was indeed at the end of the week. But Jon would know better. She had never been one for melancholy reflection, and her call would set his alarm bells ringing.