Fallout

CHAPTER 41

Paige remained seated like a statue in the land rover, feeling each droplet of sweat like a tiny bullet popping out of her skin. So far, the desert had soaked up the sporadic raindrops without a trace.

As Sally Montry came over to speak sharply with Mike, the “secretary’s” entire demeanor altered from what she usually showed in the office — now Sally was in control, commanding. The wind caught at her hair, blowing it around in tufts.

The hard-looking woman came to the driver’s side door and scowled in at Paige. “I suppose you’re here to make coffee for all of us, Sally?” Paige said sarcastically.

Annoyed, Sally whirled to growl at Mike. “Why couldn’t you just kill her? You didn’t have any compunctions about smashing Nevsky on the skull — and she’s just as big a threat to us. Too damned sentimental?”

“Yes, I did have qualms about killing Nevsky,” Mike said, clearly trying to stand up to Sally, but weakening. “And I had grave doubts about your wanting to blow up Hoover Dam, and also to kill all those innocent people on the Amtrak train.”

“What about all the innocent people who are going to die from the fallout?” Paige asked. Mike glanced at her, then turned back to Sally.

“But I never questioned today’s action. This is what the Eagle’s Claw is about. Fighting the enemy.” He stabbed a hand toward the Dreamland complex. “Punishing the conspirators — but when Nevsky found out about us, I did what I had to do… much as I hated it.”

Sally continued to scowl. “Don’t talk to me about unpleasant tasks! As far as I’m concerned, I had the worse duty — fucking that slob PK Dirks, just to get him out of the way so we could do our job. You didn’t have to feel that man inside you, enduring his sweaty hands, fighting off the urge to wipe away his slobbering kisses. All you had to do was crack a thick Russian skull.”

Paige’s thoughts reeled, but then anger swelled inside her. This woman, a seemingly innocuous ‘administrative assistant,’ had been behind the deaths, the terror, the conspiracies. This woman had led Uncle Mike down the dark path to madness, brainwashing him, influencing him. After his wife had died, after his good friend and anchor Gordon Mitchell had succumbed to cancer — Sally had twisted Mike Waterloo during the emptiest time in his life, when he had most needed help.

“In killing Nevsky, you only succeeded in bringing attention to yourselves,” Paige said. “Was it so important that you strike a blow against the disarmament team? Sounds like poor planning to me.”

Uncle Mike looked at her in surprise. “The fact that Nevsky was on the disarmament team meant nothing at all to us. The inspection was just a show and tell, a political exercise — but the ambassador went through our paperwork more thoroughly than we expected. He was drunk half the time, but somehow he caught our trail of diverted components. We couldn’t let him blow the whistle, not so close to what we’ve planned for years.”

Paige clamped her lips together and didn’t speak as the puzzle began to fall into place.

Destruction and transportation of nuclear devices out of the stockpile required certain signatures, certain approvals — but the work schedules changed at random, for security reasons. All the militia had to do was wait until the schedules happened to rotate the infiltrators into place, so that Jorgenson could fill out the transportation forms, Mike Waterloo could fill out the DAF receipts, and PK Dirks — the inept but good-natured technician, yet duped in the end — had unknowingly done his part. Sally, being the expert at filing and, if necessary, forging or altering the paperwork, must have succeeded in covering their trail, working until all the right documents were in place. It must have taken nearly two years of maneuvering.

Administratively, the records showed that a specific weapon had been disassembled and sent elsewhere… when in reality it had been secreted away until the Eagle’s Claw chose to use it. On October 24, the anniversary of the formation of the United Nations.

Out here, at Dreamland.

Sally must have poisoned Jorgenson because too much suspicion would have been directed at him for Nevsky’s death; his part in the plot accomplished, the forklift driver had become an expendable fall-guy. And since Paige knew the same coronary-inducing drug had been used on the undercover FBI agent, Sally was no doubt responsible for William Maguire’s murder as well.

The secretary turned away and snapped her fingers. Uncle Mike jumped to attention like a trained dog. “Stop twiddling your thumbs and go do your work,” she said. “Set the timer, take care of the safety interlocks so we can get this show on the road. Our deadline’s today.”

Crunching around behind the vehicle, Mike popped open the back of the land rover and bent to the stolen nuclear warhead.

Sally laughed, looking at Paige. “When this goes off, the only thing left will be a big crater instead of a clandestine UN base… and then the United States can rest easy again. They’ll thank us, in the end.”

Paige drew a deep breath, sickened at what they were doing. “Don’t tell me you believe that nonsense too?”

In the back Uncle Mike intently went through the procedures of arming the bomb, preparing it for detonation. He removed a small plastic card and inserted it into an arming mechanism, keyed in a long string of numbers, then withdrew the card, sliding it back into his shirt pocket. Paige watched as he opened the access panel and began to set the rest of the arming mechanisms one by one, confounding the Protective Action Links. As DAF Manager, Mike Waterloo possessed the security codes, and he had the expertise required. He verified the numbers, then closed the panel and punched the final button.

Mike stood up, then turned away from Paige, as if he couldn’t bear to look at her with his sad eyes. His face wore a dead expression as he met Sally’s gaze.

“It’s armed,” he said.