Payback (14 page)

“I hope
you’re right, but I have my doubts.”

Koroma shifted
in his seat, examining his friend and confidante. “Why haven’t you said
anything before?”

“I have,
Adofo, I have, but you would not listen. You have been set on this plan from
the beginning.” He raised a finger, cutting Koroma off. “Don’t for a moment
think that I don’t support you and your plan one hundred percent. All I mean is
that I don’t have the same confidence that the results will be what you
expect.”

Koroma’s
head bobbed slowly. His friend was right. As a commanding officer he was used
to having to express everything with confidence, as a leader in his community
doubt could never be expressed. But Mustapha was right. There were no
guarantees and success was a long shot. If they succeeded in what they hoped to
accomplish, their names would definitely go down in history, as would Sierra
Leone. The question was whether or not the infamy of their actions would spur
the change they hoped.

When
desperately poor people struck out at the mighty nations, not in the name of
some religion but in the name of human decency and mutual respect, would it
trigger a sea-change in public opinion among Westerners more concerned today
with preserving their lifestyles than with the misery five billion of their
fellow human beings lived in?

He put
his hand on Mustapha’s shoulder, lowering his voice and leaning closer. “I too
have my doubts, my friend, but we must try, otherwise millions more will
continue to die.”

“Then
let us proceed.” Mustapha pushed his plate away, looking at his friend. “When
do you leave for America?”

“Soon.”

CIA Headquarters, Langley, Virginia

“What have you found?”

Leroux
swiped the touchpad on his laptop, his palms sweating like they hadn’t in
months. Dating Sherrie had given him a newfound confidence that was failing him
today. The Vice President himself and his wife were here, and over speaker was
the commander of the Delta Force team that would be acting on his intelligence,
along with untold others from the Pentagon, White House, NSA and every other
agency that had been brought in to try and rescue Sarah Henderson.

It was
more pressure than he could remember ever dealing with.

Except
maybe that first date with Sherrie.

He
thought back on how they had met, how she had been assigned to try and seduce
him, to see if he would spill agency secrets, all as a test by Director Morrison
to see if he could trust him.

He had
passed, spurning the advances of the hottest woman he had ever met, and by far
the sexiest woman who had ever tried to get biblical with him.

It had
shocked him, her and the team assigned to protect her.

What he
hadn’t known at the time was she had been having second thoughts about her
mission. She was certain he wasn’t a mole and was quickly developing feelings
for him, even calling her handler to try and get the mission called off before
being ordered back into her living room to sleep with him, to pump him for
information about his friend and CIA operator, Dylan Kane.

He had
gone home with the worst set of blue-balls he could remember, but had done the
right thing. The truth had crushed him—devastated him. Learning that she was
merely coming on to him as part of an assignment had been the final blow to his
already fragile ego. He had never wanted to see her again, see any woman again.

It was
Kane who had recognized that they both loved each other and forced them
together.

And he
had been happier than he could ever remember since.

But the
pressure today was getting to him. His orders were to provide the results of
the intel but not how it had been obtained since the Vice President’s wife
didn’t have the proper clearances. Under normal circumstances she would never
have been allowed in the room, but when the President calls and insists, you
listen.

And
he’s probably listening in too.

Leroux
pointed to the screen which now showed a picture of Sarah Henderson and Tanya
Danko. “Our two subjects are Sarah Henderson and Tanya Danko. Both are
volunteer doctors with Médecins Sans Frontières working out of the Hastings
Ebola Treatment Center in Freetown.” He clicked the button and an image of
Doctor Jacques Arnaut appeared. “Yesterday evening local time the body of Dr.
Arnaut was found nearly beheaded in Miss Henderson’s quarters. It is believed
that she and Dr. Danko were abducted together at the time of the murder.”

“How can
you be sure?”

It was
Mrs. Henderson that asked the question, her voice cracking slightly.

Leroux
looked at her then clicked a button bringing up a timeline of events. “Perhaps
this will help. We know that both Dr. Henderson and Dr. Danko exited the
quarantine area at approximately the same time. The log book shows Dr.
Henderson completed decontamination at 7:35pm local time, Dr. Danko five
minutes later. Dr. Arnaut had finished exactly thirty-two minutes before them.
According to witnesses in the decontamination area, the two doctors intended to
get together for dinner after Dr. Henderson made a call home.”

A cry
escaped from Mrs. Henderson.

“We know
that call was never made, so we assume the events that took place happened
within minutes of her entering her room. We also know that Dr. Arnaut had gone
to the communications tent and was told of a missed call from Dr. Henderson’s
husband. He said he would give her the message, and we believe he then went to
her quarters to deliver said message.” He hesitated. “I must warn you, the next
photos are graphic. I suggest you look away, Mrs. Henderson.”

She
squared her jaw and shook her head. “No, I’ll be fine.”

He
nodded. “Very well.” He clicked the button and a picture of the crime scene was
shown, copious amounts of blood on the floor, arterial spray on the walls.

“Oh my
God!”

She
shouldn’t be here. Neither should her husband.

“I
apologize for the graphic images, but they’re important.” He clicked the button
again and a close up of a wall was shown. “These images were taken by MSF staff
under FBI direction. You can see there is a void in the spray pattern. We
believe that Dr. Henderson was standing between the wall and Dr. Arnaut when
the fatal blow was struck. A preliminary autopsy by MSF staff indicates he was
stabbed from behind by a large blade, probably a machete, then nearly beheaded
several minutes later. We believe he was waiting in Dr. Henderson’s quarters to
deliver the message, she entered, then the assailants arrived. They stabbed Dr.
Arnaut, beheaded him, then took Dr. Henderson.” He clicked again, a shot of the
floor with bloody shoe prints shown. “We believe that they began to leave when
Dr. Danko arrived. You can see from the shoeprints that someone headed for the
door, the other two sets, one of which is Dr. Henderson’s, are standing facing
the door. We believe that Dr. Danko was abducted at this point.”

“So
there were only two assailants?”

It was a
voice over the speaker, a voice he recognized as the Delta Force operator he
had met before during the New Orleans crisis.

“As far
as we can tell. There was so much blood on the floor in Dr. Henderson’s room
that it was impossible to not get it on the soles of their shoes, and there are
only three sets of shoeprints visible. That doesn’t mean however that there
weren’t more outside helping them, however we have this.” He clicked again and
an image outside was shown of muddy prints outside a window. “We believe they
exited through this window.” He clicked again for a close up of the prints.
“We’ve found four distinct sets here, two smaller, suggesting the female
doctors, two larger, suggesting the two assailants. They were the only prints
around that window, and the entire area was quite muddy so it is felt there
were just the two at this point.”

“Have
you been able to trace them?” asked Vice President Henderson.

“There’s
no camera footage in the area, but we did intercept some reports of three
military transport trucks being stolen earlier in the day that were used to
load medical supplies from the port.” He clicked the button. “We were able to
retrieve these satellite images.” A shot of three trucks parked side by side
appeared, a large cargo vessel at the edge of the shot. “We believe these are
the trucks.”

“What
did they take?” asked a Homeland Security representative.

“Medical
supplies.”

“Can you
be more specific?”

“Not at
this time, we’re trying to put together an exact list, however the three trucks
were fully loaded when they left with supplies meant for one of the Ebola
treatment centers.”

“How are
the two events connected?” asked the Delta operator.

“We
weren’t certain until a few minutes ago. We intercepted a report that three
trucks passed through a checkpoint only hours after the abduction with two
female doctors showing their IDs indicating they were transporting supplies to
Port Loko Ebola Treatment Center.”

“Why
didn’t they stop them!” cried Mrs. Henderson. “They could have saved them
yesterday!”

“Nobody
knew, ma’am,” replied Leroux. “The body wasn’t found for another hour and then
word didn’t reach us for several more. By the time it was realized they were
missing, these trucks were well out of the city.”

“Do we
know where they went?”

“No,
unfortunately we don’t have anything on that yet, but we just received this
report. We’re hoping to get more satellite images before our team arrives in
Freetown.”

“Has
there been any demands yet?” asked Vice President Henderson.

“None as
of yet,” replied Morrison. “There hasn’t been any chatter either. Right now our
only theory is that they wanted two doctors and medical supplies.”

Mrs.
Henderson leaned forward. “But why?”

“We’re
assuming there’s an Ebola outbreak somewhere and they wanted doctors and
supplies to help them.”

“But
this is Sierra Leone right?”

“Yes,
ma’am.”

“And the
Vice President of Sierra Leone was assassinated yesterday in Washington, wasn’t
he?”

Uh
oh.

“Yes,
ma’am.”

“Don’t
you think it’s a little bit of a stretch to think this is a coincidence?”

“At this
moment we have no evidence to connect the two events.”

“But if
their Vice President was killed on our soil, isn’t it within the realm of
possibility that they kidnapped our daughter for revenge?”

“We
don’t believe so, ma’am.”

“But how
can you be certain?”

“Because
this plan seemed to have been well orchestrated. A group was put together,
trucks were stolen, supplies were stolen, the doctors were abducted, and a
definite exit strategy executed. This plan began only a few hours after the
assassination. There’s no way they could have put together something so quickly
as revenge.”

“Oh.”

The wind
seemed to have been taken out of her sails, and Leroux was happy she wasn’t
pressing it. It was his belief that the two events were indeed connected, and
it was all part of the same plan. What that plan was, he had no idea, but he
didn’t believe in coincidences. He had little doubt the events were related, he
just needed more intel to prove it.

“Do we
have any leads on who’s behind this?” asked the Vice President.

Leroux
clicked the mouse button and a digitally enhanced photo of a man appeared,
looking up at the sky as he stepped out of one of the transport trucks.

“We
believe this man was in charge of the operation with the supply trucks.”

“Do we
know who he is?”

“Just a
name. Major Adofo Koroma. He’s in the Republic of Sierra Leone Armed Forces.
That’s all we know for now but this piece of intel is new.”

Henderson
pinched the bridge of his nose, closing his eyes. “I’ve got a son-in-law stuck in
Los Angeles, taking care of my grandson, who’s expecting answers from me. What
am I going to tell him?”

“Tell
him we’re going to find out everything we can on Major Koroma, locate him, and
rescue the hostages.”

“How?”
asked Mrs. Henderson.

Director
Morrison leaned forward. “Mr. Leroux and his team are the best. They’ll find
him.”

The
Delta operator’s voice came through the speaker. “And sir, once they tell us
where he is, we’ll do everything we can to get your daughter back.”

“Please
bring our baby home,” cried Mrs. Henderson, suddenly bursting into tears. Her
husband wrapped his arm around her shoulders and helped her up, leading the
distraught woman out of the room.

“Okay,
Mrs. Henderson is out of the room. Classified data can now be discussed,” said
Morrison. “What’s the latest on the Norfolk hostage takers?”

“You’re
going to like this,” said the Homeland Security rep, leaning forward. “They’re
all American citizens, all originally from Sierra Leone, some having lived here
as long as twenty years. And get this.”

“What?”

“They
were all born within fifty miles of each other.”

Somewhere in Sierra Leone

“Tell her she has to come with us.”

Mustapha
translated, though from the fear on the young woman’s face, Sarah was certain
she understood every word being said. The girl shook her head, violently,
closing her eyes as if to shut out the very existence of the intruders into her
home.

With
their makeshift clinic set up they had begun house by house searches, looking
for the hidden sick. It was the greatest way the disease was being spread. The
stigma of Ebola in West Africa was so great that families would rather hide
away their infected loved ones than admit someone in their household was sick.