Countdown to Mecca (13 page)

The general's incessant browbeating finally got the better of him. “Sir, I
do
know more. What would you say if I told you your reporter is the half brother of the whore's neighbor?”

Brooks turned slowly toward his companion. “Go on.”

“What if I told you it was he who saved her and called for reinforcements, persons unknown—and that it's he who is probably hiding her, now?”

There was no explosion, no change in the general's demeanor. Brooks looked as if Morton had just relayed some interesting sports scores.

“What I'd say, Monty, is—‘I know.'”

Morton gaped at Brooks incredulously.

“I saw the security footage, too,” Brooks informed him. “Being a three-star general who enjoys a close relationship with the NSA has its advantages. Why do you think I would rather recruit Hatfield than have him killed?” Brooks let that sink in, then actually laughed at Morton's confused reaction. “How long have we known each other? Thirty years? I'm the godfather of your kids. You named them after me, for pity's sake!”

“Yes,” Morton sighed, fighting to control himself. “Yes, I did.”

“Why do you think I only shot a ricochet round at Captain Reynolds's foot?”

“I don't know, sir.” His voice shivered at the memory.

“When you can't change what's been done you embrace it. You work on it from up close. Who had the most successful attempt at killing Hitler? Not the French Resistance, not Allied bombers—the men closest to him. We've come too far to go off the rails now. Just a few more days, and it will all be over. The truth is, no one can stop it now, not your whore, not the reporter. So we keep him close. We keep Schoenberg close by keeping him wanting to see me.”

Morton nodded, feeling from Brooks's approach—and the general's own confidence—that the operation was unstoppable.

“So, what do we do with Schoenberg?” Brooks asked.

“He wants to talk to you in person. Tomorrow, if possible.”

“Fine,” said Brooks. “Tell him I'd like to meet him at the factory in the morning.”

“The factory?”

“The factory, yes. The company we had Schoenberg buy for the nano switches. You know, the krytrons. Tell Schoenberg to be there at seven.”

“But you've got a morning's worth of appointments,” Morton reminded him.

Brooks's smile would not have been out of place on a jackal. “Just tell him to be there. And Monty?”

“Yes, General?”

“Make sure there's no record of the call.”

 

16

San Francisco, California

Because Sammy had worked through the night the first day they were at the safe house, sleeping arrangements were not an issue. Today, they were. It was the first time Ana slipped into his safe house bed beside Sammy and he'd tensed. He'd assumed she would sleep with one of the other girls, though he realized they were already sleeping together in another bed. She embraced him from behind in the comfortable spooning position. Sammy tried to relax but comfort wasn't the foremost thing on his mind.

“You know you don't have to do this just because I helped rescue you,” he whispered, not wanting to disturb the other safe house residents nearby.

Ana's softly accented words seemed to slip into his ear. “In my professional life, I do what I have to in order to survive. In my private life, I never do anything I don't want to.”

For a few endless moments in the dark quiet of the night, they lay there together, wearing what had already become the standard safe house sleepwear: T-shirts and boxer shorts. But it was too good to last. Sammy couldn't just go with it. Innocent though this might be, it was still intimate. He could not just jump into it, even if ‘it' was just sleeping close together.

“I'm sorry I wasn't able to find anything about Morton,” he apologized quietly. “But military secrets are the best protected information in the world.”

“Except when they aren't,” Ana pointed out. “As when there is a working girl in the lavatory.”

“Yes, loose lips still sink ships. But other than that, even on his home computer, the firewalls have fire walls.”

“Don't
worry,
” she softly reassured him. “Only one thing matters right now.”

“What's that?”

She replied, “I feel safe here with you.”

“I wish I could relax,” he said apologetically. “I was just lying here thinking. I'm sure his wife and children have their own PCs.”

She resisted a simple way to make him relax. “You think there may be information that is helpful?”

He shrugged. “We can hope.”

Ana smiled. “My father used to say something about ‘hope,'” she said. “It was from the Bible, Isaiah. ‘But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.'”

“That's beautiful,” Sammy said. “I thought most Russians were atheists.”

“Many are, officially,” she said. “We were not.”

Sammy was still uneasy. “Listen, you know I'd like nothing better than to stay here with you, but now that I think of it I should get on this right away. Who knows how long it'll take?”

Ana touched him invitingly on the back with her right hand. “If you must go.”

He was on his feet, backing away. “Yeah. I must. Don't wait up, I'll be back as soon as I can.”

Then Sammy turned and headed for the computer console. Ana closed her tired eyes and pushed her face into the pillow. She didn't know what she had done wrong. What she didn't know was that Sammy was afraid of her sexuality; all women's sexuality. He was not gay, he was impotent.

 

17

The phone woke Jack at 5:30
A.M.
He didn't have to check a clock. All smartphones showed the time and date whenever a call activated them. Jack fumbled for the device, noticing Doc's head and shoulders rise up from the apartment sofa like a mummy emerging from its tomb.

Jack saw, again from standard smartphone information, that it was Sol calling.

“Everything okay?” Jack asked.

“Guess who just woke me?” the crime boss said.

“It's dawn and most people are sleeping. But I'm guessing Schoenberg's office is on duty this time of the morning?”

“Nearly bingo,” Sol said. “Not Schoenberg's office. Schoenberg himself.”

Jack was totally awake now. “Schoenberg personally called you at five-thirty in the morning? What did he want?”

“Not me,” Sol said.

“Me? How'd he know—”

“That we were
paisans
? He had eyeballs at the press conference where you and I got cozy. Guess he filed that away, like a good little paranoid.”

“Right,” Jack said.

“So how'd you like an exclusive, warts-and-all interview at 7:30 this morning? Being the nice guy he is, he wanted to make sure you had plenty of time to prep, shower, and breakfast.”

“Where?”

Sol told him. The very address galvanized Jack. As he ran around getting dressed, Doc, who only needed a few minutes to slap cold water in his face and hair, shadowed him while shoving a granola bar in his own mouth.

“A dawn call to Sol means our German buddy was wrestling with this all night,” he said from around the oat clusters and almonds.

“How do you solve a problem like Jack Hatfield?” Doc joked. “You got Kevlar?”

“No. You got the digicam?”

Doc gave him a look and the two hustled down to the Ford Escape. Doc got behind the wheel.

“Good thing this baby's got fog lamps,” Doc commented as they pulled into traffic. “Where to?”

Jack passed on the information and explained the significance. “The professor told us that Iran was using uranium deuteride as a trigger.”

“Yeah,
if
you're building a nuke. We still don't know that.”

“True,” Jack agreed. “But this is a helluva false trail to lay out. It's gotta lead somewhere that we want to be.”

“Fair enough,” Doc agreed.

“So, you need something called a krytron switch to work the trigger. And that stuff can be found in a special gas inside airport runway lights or in special 3D copy machines.”

“Copy machines?” Doc asked.

Jack nodded. “In my research on Schoenberg and Der Warheit Unternehmen's holdings, I discovered they owned a small firm that made 3D printers and components. These included very high-speed switches. DR Incorporated had been purchased four months before for several times their earnings. Even
The Wall Street Journal
had written ‘typical case of Europeans overpaying.'”

“And?” Doc prompted.

“Three months later, Der Warheit Unternehmen announced that it was contemplating a reorganization so production at DR was going to be shut down. Stock analysts called the purchase one of Schoenberg's rare missteps. DR's components were expensive; they couldn't compete with China on price. But they were also very good, far better than their competitors. The krytrons were at least ten times more precise than those used in the highest-end copy machines.”

“Well, I'm sure that's all important,” Doc said, “but you might as well be speaking Urdu.”

“Don't you see?” Jack flatly stated. “Schoenberg bought a company whose technology could be used to make triggers for nukes and other explosive devices—then shut it down.”

“Ah. The question is why,” Doc pondered.

“It is indeed,” Jack agreed. “When we get to DR, let's see if Herr Schoenberg can tell us.”

The fog that typically shrouded San Francisco Bay was in a particularly surly mood, lying thick against the earth. That, and the usual city pre-rush hour traffic, made the going tougher than either man would've liked. So it was not quite seven
A.M.
when they arrived at the DR Incorporated parking lot. The place looked deserted. And if it weren't for the sign near the walkway, Jack would have thought they had the wrong place entirely.

While there had been no photos of the building that he could find, Jack still expected an ultra-modern structure in keeping with the Silicon Valley ethos. It wasn't enough to have the latest manufacturing technology, advanced robots, chip machines, and laser-clean rooms. The exterior design and landscaping had to proclaim the business a worthy depository of venture capital.

But this building was the blandest of bland. It sat on one side of an industrial park that, while well-kept, consisted primarily of warehouses. Long and flat-roofed, the gray-brick home of DR Incorporated wouldn't have impressed a mason, let alone an investment banker.

Concerned that he might have the wrong place, Jack checked the address again. Not only was this it, but there were no other addresses listed for the company. Jack got out, closing the car door gently. Doc stayed behind the wheel, just to be on the safe side, but clicked the digicam on and set it on the dashboard. It watched Jack as he peered through the front door. There was a receptionist's desk, a small waiting area, a low wall. He couldn't see anything else. The light was still dim, the sun barely able to fight through the clouds, but when he looked through the window around the corner he could see enough to make out a solid wall a few feet from the window.

He went and peered in the next, then the next, slowly circling the building. It looked like a corridor ran all the way around the building—a building inside a building? He glanced at his watch; it was two minutes past seven. Twenty-eight minutes until the scheduled interview. Jack headed back to the SUV.

Doc's camera were not the only eyes on Jack.

Pyotr Ansky watched him go through the Nightforce scope of an Accuracy International AX338 sniper rifle. When Jack had first arrived, Pyotr had thought he might be Schoenberg, and had nearly squeezed the trigger when he got out of the car. But he hesitated just in the nick of time. The man who got out of the Ford SUV man was younger, trimmer, and definitely an American.

Pyotr would still kill him, once he had Schoenberg. Why not? The water tower where Pyotr crouched was precisely 1,108 meters from the front door of the building. That was hardly close, but it was well within range of the rifle and its Lapua round. The bullet had been developed as an alternative to the heavier and larger .50 caliber ammunition, which consequently required a far heavier weapon than the one Pyotr was aiming.

There was a light breeze. Pyotr ignored it; it was too variable to factor into his calculations, and in any event he couldn't be sure of either the direction or the speed at the moment he shot. His Russian Army sniper teacher would have been appalled. He was a man who lived by the textbook. His Chechen militia leader would have nodded knowingly. The textbooks had little use on the battlefield.

Another SUV came off the main road of the complex, and headed toward the building. Pyotr slowed his breathing. He was a machine now, every movement mechanical, everything pre-ordained. A bodyguard got out of the passenger side of the vehicle, glanced around, began walking toward the car that had arrived earlier.

A second man got out of the SUV. He glanced in the direction of the first man, then began walking toward the building. Pyotr drew a long, steady breath. He could shoot through the roof of the vehicle if he had to. But he would be guessing where the man was. He didn't like to guess. He would simply wait. If this wasn't the time to kill him, he would find another. Patience was important for a sniper. A bald head emerged from the truck. Pyotr knew before he found the man's face in his crosshairs that it was Schoenberg. He adjusted his aim, and pulled the trigger.

By the time Schoenberg fell, Pyotr had put a bullet into the neck of the bodyguard near the building, and was chambering another round.

Jack saw Schoenberg jerk in midstride, as if he'd been hit by a streak of invisible lightning. A moment later the air cracked as the sound reached Jack's ears. The German CEO fell to the ground, his head opening up like a bony, blossoming, cranberry-sauce-spewing flower. Jack had seen people die, but no matter how many and how often, nothing could prepare him for this sort of sudden, savage, assassination. The bodyguard who'd been walking toward Jack leaped forward and threw him to the ground. Jack yelled as he was slammed into the pavement.