Political Suicide (27 page)

The shepherd was crazed. Its jaws were wide open; its fangs, dripping with saliva. In moments, its mouth would be red with blood, his blood. Lou tightened his grip on the branch and forced himself to focus on the animal’s maw. Then, with a step forward, he swung from his heels. One hit … just one. The impact was ferocious. The dog’s momentum knocked Lou backwards onto the ground. But Matador was stunned as well, and went down heavily at Lou’s feet, yelping plaintively while trying to right himself.

Without a glance at matador, Lou sprinted the remaining five yards to the car, climbed into the driver’s seat, slammed the door, and fumbled his key into the ignition. At that instant he felt the weight of the car shift forward. Through the front windshield, Matador stood on the hood, snarling. The corners of his mouth were torn and bleeding, but his teeth were still bared. He forced his muzzle against the windshield, leaving bubbly trails of saliva and blood. Lou turned the key and slammed the gearshift into Reverse.

The shepherd stayed on the hood for as long as he could—a surfer determined to ride his wave all the way to shore. Finally, he jumped off, landing on his feet. Lou backed down the road. Manolo and his mammoth six-shooter had to be close by.

As he backed onto the highway, his thoughts were consumed by Wyatt Brody’s doctoral thesis, and the odd lack of a strong discussion and conclusion. The exchange Lou had just witnessed was proof that his research had not only succeeded, but was also being used on Mantis servicemen. But to what end? Lou wondered as he accelerated north. To what end?

CHAPTER 35

Wyatt Brody strode into the packed dining hall. Seven hundred marines—many of them decorated for valor, some of them more than once—remained seated along Spartan wooden benches. Set out on the long folding table in front of each of them was a seven-ounce plastic tumbler filled halfway with a clear, crimson liquid. Next to each tumbler was a capsule, also crimson. Pale light from the early dawn filtered into the dining hall. The daily ritual had begun.

Major Charles Coon followed close behind Brody. “Attention!” he called out as soon as they reached the center of their table.

The sound of benches scraping back echoed through the hall as the soldiers of Mantis rose to their feet, a forest of the bravest, most skillful fighters the military had to offer. Brody scanned the room, taking in the scene as though he were appreciating fine art.

The men, most of them preparing in small groups for clandestine missions around the globe, were waiting for Brody’s selection for the morning presentation. The honor was not doled out lightly. Typically, Brody or Coon or one of the other officers led the men, but at times an enlisted man who strongly embodied the principles of Mantis would be selected for the privilege. In truth, almost all of them were eligible. The seven hundred remained at attention and waited.

“Staff Sergeant Bucky Townsend!” Brody called out.

Townsend, already stiff as a corpse, forced himself to stand even straighter. “Sir! Staff Sergeant Bucky Townsend, present and at attention, sir!” he shouted.

Nobody looked at Bucky. All eyes stayed forward, locked on Brody as though he were the only living presence among them.

“Staff Sergeant Townsend.”

“Sir, yes, sir!” Townsend remained outwardly emotionless and still as stone, even though it was the first time he had been chosen.

“Come forward to present.”

Townsend stood beside Brody and saluted, his arm at perfect angles.
I am Mantis.

“My brothers,” Townsend said, “glasses up.”

Moving as a single entity, each man held a capsule in one hand and his drink in the other.

“Crimson is the color of courage,” they said in perfect unison, “the color of blood spilled in battle, the color of valor. To justice. To country. To God. To Mantis. Whatever it takes!”

Then, as one with their commanding officers, each set the capsule on his tongue and drained the symbol of their collective strength and bravery. They were Mantis, a brotherhood bound by the power of the crimson liquid.

When breakfast ended, Brody once again stood at his place to address the men. Glancing down at a clipboard, he read a list of twenty names—the tactical team of Operation Talon.

“If your name was read, we will convene in the briefing room immediately,” Coon said.

“Sir, yes, sir,” the twenty responded.

The briefing room was situated inside a crude wooden building about the size of a one-room schoolhouse, only a short walk from the dining hall. There were maps, projection machines, and several computers. The room was kept warm by portable heaters. Coon stood at the front, with Brody seated at a desk to his right.

“Gentlemen,” Coon began, “you have each had a preliminary briefing on Operation Talon. You are the tactical team, the men who will be feet on the ground. Behind you in support will be dozens of your Mantis brothers. The success of this ambitious mission rests in your hands. From now on, this building and the equipment within it will continue to be at your disposal, but the door will be locked to all except you. The keys are in the envelopes at your desks. I would suggest you spend all your waking hours studying. The time for fun and games is over.”

“We will be studying, sir,” Townsend said, “but as this is the first time we’re all together, could you review the overall strategy of the mission?”

“Of course, Sergeant. Operation Talon is a ‘shock and awe’ style attack whereby we will take out ten high-value terrorist targets in a simultaneous, synchronized strike.”

“Sir, are these targets centrally located?” Fenton Morales asked.

“Negative,” Coon said. “These targets are in ten different geographic locations, five different countries.”

“Will we be using drones in the attack?”

“Negative as well,” Coon said. “We cannot one hundred percent confirm the validity of the location intelligence we have received. Therefore, we cannot confidently strike using our drones without risking high civilian causalities and significant global blowback. We need visual confirmation of our targets before making any kill. We don’t want a mess of dead women and children to give a bunch of jihadist wannabes a reason to join the cause. We ran an operation back in ’03 in Khewa that resulted in a successful target kill, but with lots of local dead. We don’t need a repeat of that.”

“Are we still going to be deployed in ten teams of two?”

“Ten teams of two is correct,” Coon said.

“What’s the timing of this?”

“Deployment in five days or less. What else?”

“And after we locate our target?”

“Each team will infiltrate a suspect location, verify the validity of the target, and in a synchronized manner use a bomb to kill that target. Any team who does not make precise visual confirmation will have to wait for their target to show before detonation. We want ten dead in a twenty-four-hour period. ‘Ten in Twenty’ will be your war cry. This is going to cut the head off of the hydra.”

“Where will we procure the explosives?” Morales asked.

Coon turned to Brody, who stood and faced the men.

“You will be wearing them,” he said.

CHAPTER 36

Lou drove some distance before he found a stretch of highway that offered reliable cell phone reception. He was three hours from D.C. provided the Camry kept chugging, maybe more because it was already getting dark. His hands were still trembling from lingering adrenaline as he keyed in Sarah’s number. It was hard to wrap his head around the ways he could have died in just the past few hours. Mexican drug cartel. Palace Guards. Wyatt Brody. Angry dog. And that did not count Officer Judy Lemon of the West Virginia State Police.

With each piece of the Brody puzzle that fell into place, other gaps seem to have appeared. The power of the man and the pervasiveness of his program left Lou feeling bewildered and frightened for Gary. If Lou’s suspicions were correct, then the murder of Elias Colston was part of a major conspiracy involving supremely powerful players who would stop at nothing to protect their secrets.

Sarah answered on the third ring, and Lou felt his beleaguered spirits lift at sound of her voice. They were a team—maybe not a well-oiled machine yet, but a bond between them had formed—a deepening friendship accelerated by extraordinary circumstances.

“Hey, I’ve been worried sick about you,” she said. “Are you all right?”

“Well, considering I almost became a can of Alpo, I’m doing just fine.”

“Explain,” Sarah said.

Lou recounted for her Wyatt Brody’s guns-for-drugs exchange and his own close encounter with Matador.

“Why do you think Brody is involved with a Mexican drug cartel?” Sarah asked when Lou had finished.

“The cartel’s chemist is concocting large quantities of the drug Brody created for his thesis—a drug that eliminates fear. Sarah, you should have seen how calmly this guy Pedro stuck a revolver in his mouth and played Russian roulette. He was absolute ice.”

“That’s terrible.”

“I came really close to screaming at him to stop before he pulled the trigger, but I don’t think that would have been such a great idea. One of the ingredients of Brody’s juice is methamphetamine, which isn’t something easily obtained via a military purchase order. I’m fairly certain he’s using this concoction on Mantis soldiers.”

“For what reason?”

“That I don’t know,” Lou said. “Wish I did. I could come up with some theories, but they would be speculation. The cartel is cooking up the meth, but they’re not involved in the entire production of the Mantis cocktail.”

“So how does this connect to Reddy Creek?” Sarah asked.

“I’ve been thinking about that,” Lou said. “There’s a logic chain here we can follow—a chain that I think leads us to a conclusion that’s irrefutable and surprising.”

“Go on.”

“We agree that Reddy Creek is Mantis, right?”

“Well, according to Edith, the two marines who were shot and killed raiding the armory had Mantis tattoos—so, yes, Reddy Creek is Mantis.”

“And we agree that Brody is Mantis.”

“Without question.”

“And Brody’s thesis is dedicated to whom?”

“Spencer Hogarth,” she said. “I got it.”

“So if Hogarth is Brody and Brody is Mantis and Mantis is Reddy Creek, then…”

“Then Hogarth is Reddy Creek,” Sarah said. “Goodness, Lou, what is this?”

“I’m not sure. But I think my pal Gary inadvertently got himself stuck on the flypaper. I also think the whole business goes far beyond Reddy Creek.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning the guns-for-drugs exchange is an ongoing thing. I can’t imagine Brody and his Palace Guards keep hitting the same supply depot each time they need to feed the cartel.”

“Multiple armories?”

“A nasty conclusion, but an unavoidable one, I think. And I suspect Brody would need somebody high up on the food chain to help him pull it off. Somebody with enough political capital to buy the information and cooperation needed to make this scheme work.”

“Hogarth,” Sarah said in a half whisper.

“That’s right.”

“Do you think he would know if Wyatt Brody killed Elias Colton to keep him quiet?”

“It’s possible,” Lou said. “Even if he doesn’t know, we can help him find out. He’s not going to want to be embroiled in any major scandal. Not with his political ambitions on the line. Either way, we get Gary off, which is our goal here.”

“That’s not our only goal,” Sarah said. “I promised Edith I’d help her find the people responsible for blinding her and killing Mike. Now I know where to start.”

“All roads lead to Hogarth,” Lou said.

“It may take a while for me to get a meeting with him, but I’ll make it happen.”

“You’ve got to be careful. Your friend Edith may be proof of how dangerous Hogarth can be if he’s threatened.”

“We’ll keep our backs to the wall, don’t worry.”

“Teammates worry about teammates.”

“And there’s no
I
in
team,
” Sarah said. “Got it. Thanks for caring about me, Lou.”

“Thanks for letting me.”

“Okay, so I’m going to go after Hogarth and be extremely careful doing it. What are you going to do in the meanwhile?”

“I think I’m going to hug my daughter and play a marathon session of Monopoly.”

“You’re lucky to be alive,” Sarah said.

“Don’t I know it.”

“You need to lay low,” Sarah said. “Don’t go poking hornets’ nests with any sticks. Let Edith and me work on Hogarth. And remember, Brody may not know it was you there in the forest, but he’s been alerted someone may be on to him, and you’re on a very short list of people that might be.”

“Consider me hung low,” he said.

“I mean it, Lou. You could have at least told me you were going to do this.”

There was an edge to her voice. Clearly their newly established alliance was a branch that would hold only so much weight.

Lou cringed at the notion that he was in the process of holding back the truth from Sarah, but given her reaction, he felt convinced that his decision was the right one. In fact, his scheduled weekend overnight with Emily was just a couple of days away. Much as he would have loved to hang with her today, there was no marathon
Monopoly
game in his immediate future. Instead, resting in his bureau drawer was a round-trip plane ticket for a late evening flight tomorrow—a flight to Minneapolis.

CHAPTER 37

The Pine Forest Clinic, as Lou had suspected, was not for patients faint of wallet. The directions took him well off any beaten track to a walled and gated entryway surrounded by snow-covered gardens, with a uniformed guard, who checked a guest list and passed him through to a sprawling mansion. The atmosphere was sedate, but the air inside was still tinged with aromas Lou knew well—scents of disinfectant, human illness, and treatment.

Lou accepted tea from a doe-eyed receptionist who spoke with a British accent and looked as if she might have stepped from the pages of
Vogue
. A clipboard of demographic forms and a brief medical record followed, but nothing extensive. Dr. Sherwood would take care of that, he was informed. He felt fairly certain he would not be kept waiting long, and in that regard was not disappointed. The real question was how long he would last when the doctor learned the purpose of his visit.