Back Blast

44

The action in the Metro had Denny in constant telephone contact with Suzanne Brewer in the TOC during the afternoon as the body count grew and the fragmented reports from Brewer’s contacts at the scene radioed in bits of intel. But as soon as it became clear Gentry had managed to survive and escape the area, Denny asked Brewer to give him a few minutes to attend to other pressing matters.

He picked up his phone and dialed Kaz’s number.

Murquin al-Kazaz seemed to be expecting the call, because he answered almost immediately.

“Talk,” Carmichael demanded.

Kaz said, “Yes, I will get right to it. Violator escaped. One of my men died from gunshot wounds, but he managed to make it up to the surface before he bled to death. His body was recovered from the scene before he was compromised. Three more of my men were injured. Two will never work again.”

Carmichael felt a tightening in his chest. Not for the fate of the men; rather for the fate of the OPSEC of his operation. “Captured?”

“No. Another group of my officers arrived in time to make it out of the area of operations with the wounded and dying before they were discovered by authorities.”

Carmichael sighed into the phone. “That’s something.”

Kaz moved on from the talk of his men. “What can you do to make sure the recordings from the camera feeds at the station are lost or destroyed?”

Carmichael replied, “Municipal government mismanagement has seen to that. Our tactical operations center confirmed the cameras on the platforms were operational, as was the camera on the escalators going up and down from street level, but both cameras on the mezzanine level of the station were out of service.”

Kaz said, “So Violator was seen leaving the train with Ohlhauser and going up to the mezzanine, but the incident itself was not recorded?”

“Correct. There may be questions about the D.C. police officers seen on camera entering the station, but as the elevator wasn’t covered with CCTV, there is an explanation for their absence from the scene.”

The two men spoke for several minutes, most of it consisting of Kaz relaying the after-action report of the least wounded of the three men beaten by Gentry in the elevator car.

As soon as Kaz finished the play-by-play, Carmichael asked another question, though he wasn’t sure if he would get an honest response. “And Ohlhauser? Who killed him? Your men, Gentry, or was he caught in the cross fire?”

“The surviving members of my team did not see him killed and the only man on the mezzanine when Ohlhauser was shot said nothing before he bled to death in the back of an SUV. Ohlhauser was alive when the doors to the elevator closed. I gave my men no orders to kill him, so I can only assume he was simply caught in the cross fire.”

Carmichael wasn’t as disappointed with Ohlhauser’s death as he might have been, because he saw an angle in it. A way he could leverage it to fit the narrative he wanted put out for all to see.

But he was worried about Kaz. As dangerous as it was for Carmichael to sanction a proxy force of Saudi Arabian gunmen in the capital city of the United States of America, he continued to see their value. While he had JSOC operators and dozens of CIA contractors hunting Violator, only Kaz’s men had managed to wound him, and only Kaz’s men had managed to get him in handcuffs. The fact that outside forces interrupted his killing was frustrating to Denny, but he wasn’t ready to throw in the towel on the Saudi operators.

Denny’s concern, however, was that Kaz planned on doing just that. He worried Kaz would just shut down his operation and try to forget he’d ever been involved in the Violator hunt.

Denny knew when to use a stick on Kaz to get him to work in the interest of the CIA, but right now it was time for the carrot. He said, “Look, I recognize this was a dangerous operation for you and your men, and your risk of compromise is real. I want you to know that if you will see this through to the end with me, I will be more amenable to your needs here in the U.S. than I have been of late.”

The Saudi intelligence chief said nothing for a long time. When he did reply, it was clear he knew he held a temporary advantage in the relationship. “Specifics, Denny. I want to hear specifics before I subject my men to more jeopardy.”

“All right,” Denny said. “I know of your interest in our export of fracking technology to other Gulf states. You have spent a lot of time and resources trying to get intelligence on this.”

“I will not deny that. We find it troubling that your partnerships with less stable oil producers have injured your relationship with our oil-producing sector.”

“Cut the crap, Kaz. I’m not a politician, and neither are you. I’m offering you primary intelligence on the oil-production capacities and forecasts of our allies. Not everything. That would compromise me as your source. But good, actionable intel. From me to you. That ought to help your profile back in Riyadh.”

Murquin al-Kazaz seemed to think it all over for a minute. Finally he replied, “Very well. Despite this difficult day for my operation, we will continue to hunt your target for you. We’ll stay at it till the end.”

“Excellent,” Denny said. “As soon as I have something for you I will let you know.” He hung up the phone, proud of his power to compel others to do his bidding.

In the Saudi Embassy on New Hampshire Avenue, Murquin al-Kazaz hung up his secure mobile and sat quietly, puffing his cigarette and drinking tea.

Slowly his face grew into a wide smile.

He’d not expected this. He’d suffered a flesh wound today with the death or disablement of four men, but he’d managed to avoid compromise, and he’d just been handed intelligence of the highest caliber on a silver platter.

And in trade he had conceded nothing, and he would offer nothing.

Murquin al-Kazaz and his men would not stop hunting Court Gentry until he was confirmed dead.

Nothing else mattered.

Court made it back into his room just in time for the six p.m. news. He turned on CNN after resetting his booby traps, and while the show opened he gingerly peeled off his white dress shirt. He had a couple of new bruises, both of them purple-and-black and painful, but his main concern remained the GSW he caught three nights earlier. His bandages were black with dried blood, and a new rivulet of bright red blood had trickled down his rib cage, all the way to his underwear.

He wasn’t bothered by the sight in the least, knowing just how close he’d come to real damage. He was lucky to have only sprung one small leak after what he’d just subjected himself to. He could clean this up and stop any more bleeding with little trouble, other than the searing, unrelenting pain.

Just as he expected, CNN opened live with a shot from Washington, D.C., with a stand-up report outside the Dupont Circle metro station. Court exhaled in frustration when the correspondent announced the shooting death of three transit officers along with one civilian, and the injury of four more civilians. The names were not being released so that next of kin could be notified, so Court didn’t know if Ohlhauser had been among the dead.

Within forty-five seconds of the show’s opening, the erudite and bearded anchor back in Atlanta asked the reporter a question Court had fully expected.

“Andrea, have police been able to determine if this shooting had any relation to the assassination-style killing of Washington area businessman and security consultant Leland Babbitt two nights ago?”

“So far police are not jumping to any conclusions, but they are speculating only that, due to the large number of victims in a public place, this looks like some sort of terrorist act.”

Court closed his eyes. He was hoping against hope there would be something in this report about a group of Middle Eastern assholes dressed up like cops opening fire on Transit Police, but there was nothing of the sort. As the story progressed, he felt his heart sink, as it began to look as if the authorities were going to try to spin this as a lone attacker; the same lone attacker involved in Babbitt’s killing.

Court kept listening for more details as he stripped down to his underwear and pulled a bottle of beer out of his little fridge. He headed back to the bed holding the cold bottle against the bruising just above the bandaged wound on his right side.

As the anchorman was asking another question he stopped speaking suddenly. Apparently he was listening to a producer in his earpiece. After a few seconds he said, “Just a moment.” A pause. Then, “Is this confirmed? We need to be certain before we go live with this.”

Court leaned towards the television. He feared what would come, but when it came, he found himself decidedly unsurprised.

“Ladies and gentlemen, we’ve just received word that one of the victims is someone known very well to our viewers and the CNN family. Police now confirm, officially, that CNN contributor Maxwell Ohlhauser was killed today in what appears to be a terror attack in the nation’s capital. I’ve known Max personally for quite some time and… this is just an awful turn of events.

“On Monday night, the death of Leland Babbitt, who was also in the security and intelligence field, and now this on Wednesday afternoon. We just had Max on this morning to discuss the inherent dangers of working in government intelligence services, even here in the United States.

“We don’t want to get out in front of the investigation, of course, but this obviously leads one to the inescapable conclusion that someone is out there targeting U.S. intelligence officials, or, in the case of Max Ohlhauser, ex-officials. Terrorism here in the streets of Washington, D.C. I fail to see how you could possibly characterize it as anything else.”

Court put his head in his hands, his mind spiraling down into depression. He had come to America to clear his name, but so far, despite his best-laid plans, his arrival had had the opposite effect. Now there were more dead bodies that would be pinned on him, and he had no new plan to get out of the hole he’d dug for himself.

But through it all, one thing kept propelling him forward.

The firm belief that he had been set up, and he’d done absolutely nothing wrong.