The American (29 page)

T
he storm system had finally dissipated over central Virginia, leaving behind damp earth and tree limbs made heavy by weeks of rain. A steady wind blew in from the southwest, pushing scattered clouds across the early-morning sun and beads of water against the weathered timbers of the barn.

Vanderveen was in the dark shadows of the house, visible only when the clouds left the sun behind and let hazy light stream in through the open windows of the kitchen. He was looking in the refrigerator for something to drink and thinking about his plans for the day.

He finally settled on a small bottle of Tropicana orange juice. He was extremely tired, having slept little the night before. On his return from Washington he had watched the house for nearly four hours, half-expecting to see some sign of police activity. By the time he had finally deemed it safe, the sun was already topping the trees in the east. The fact that the house had not been raided meant one thing: the woman had followed through on her promise. He didn't feel any sense of sorrow over her death, nor did he feel any gratitude for her sacrifice. In fact, he was glad she was dead; she had been the most dangerous link between him and the Iranians. With the woman out of the picture he was safe, at least for the moment.

Everything was on schedule. He would complete the main charge by early afternoon, securing the more fragile components of the device in the van before testing the circuitry again. In the evening he would begin the arduous task of arranging the heavy concrete blocks that, once lined up against the metal partition that separated the cab from the cargo area, would serve to direct the force of the blast out through the rear doors of the vehicle.

The screen door slapped shut behind him as he walked out across the black soil toward the barn, stopping dead in his tracks when he saw the realtor's Ford Escape parked next to the barn. The sliding door, which he had eased shut but not locked, was now open wide to the cool morning air.

He cursed low, under his breath. Lost in his thoughts, he had not heard her arrive, and the kitchen window did not allow a view to the main road, from which he might have seen the vehicle approaching the rear of the house. After a few brief seconds of deliberation, Vanderveen kept walking forward.

 

She was standing next to the van, on the bare cement surrounded by straw. He looked around quickly to see what she might have touched before examining her face, which was almost lost in the shadows of the barn.

She had come to please. He could tell that from her tight jeans and stomach-baring halter top, from the light touch of strawberry-colored lipstick to the way her honey-blond hair carefully framed her high cheekbones. It was also clear that she had seen too much.

“Hi.” She was uncertain, he saw with some amusement, because her planned argument had been ruined. He tried to remember her name.
Nicole.
“I was just…I just wanted to stop by because…Well, you know.”

“Hi, Nicole. You don't have to explain anything. I'm glad you came.” He flashed a winning smile and moved forward without missing a beat. She took two steps back, but there was nowhere to go. Pulling her close, he kissed her on the lips and let his hands slide down the length of her back. She didn't respond to his touch, and he immediately registered that she was too afraid to move.
Interesting.

Vanderveen pulled away abruptly and walked over to closely examine his worktable. He couldn't be sure, but he thought that the light to his optical magnifier had been off, and now it was on, clearly illuminating the contents of the desk. He felt a trickle of annoyance.

“I—I was only in here for a second. I ju—just wanted to see you again…If you don't want me to come back, I—I won't. I'm sorry, I really am…”

The words were getting farther away. He thought that the conduit had been resting in a wooden crate, and now several pieces were sitting
next
to the crate. The trickle turned into a steady stream of anger.

“I—I didn't touch anything. I'm…Well, I'm so sorry I just walked in here, I—I should have knocked. I should have come up to the house first, I know…”

He thought, and he was almost certain, that his detonators had been in a tight group of four, and now one was separated from the pack, resting on the other side of a .40 caliber pistol. The stream gave way to a river of rage. He picked up the weapon, feeling its reassuring weight in his palm.

She was almost at the door, walking backward and still talking. “I—I—I didn't see anything, I sw—swear…” Her voice began to rise when he turned and she saw the gun. “Please let me go.
Please! I'm sorry! I didn't see ANYTHING, I SWEAR TO GOD!”

He lifted the pistol and shot her once in the stomach, then watched with satisfaction as she collapsed to the cement.

 

They were seated in Harper's seventh-floor office, lounging in the same chairs they had occupied a few weeks before. Naomi was at home recuperating, at Harper's insistence. She had shown up that morning at Langley, hunched over with the pain. Harper had ordered her home to get some rest, but her initial refusal to leave had impressed Ryan. He didn't want to think about what that meant.

The deputy director was in a glowing mood. The Bureau had already managed to track down a taxi driver who had taken the Iranian woman to National Airport several days in a row during the first week of November. Since she had never actually boarded a plane, it wasn't hard for the agents tasked with the investigation to figure out what she had been doing there.

“She was using a locker,” Ryan said.

“That's right.” Harper leaned back in his chair. He looked pleased with himself. “They never found any ID in the apartment, but the locker was under the same name she gave to the landlord: Theresa Barzan. They found Saudi passports for her and her minder inside.”

“Did
those
names come to anything?”

Harper's jovial mood seemed to fade a little. “Not yet. The investigation is drawing a lot of resources, though. They're going to start looking at banks—that's a lot easier to do since the passage of the Patriot Act. The Bureau thinks she might have been moving money for Shakib.”

Kealey looked skeptical. “It's going to take forever to go through the banks, John. They'll fight the Feds every step of the way. What about Vanderveen? Was she supposed to be moving money for him as well?”

The deputy director shrugged. “Who knows? It's certainly possible. Anyway, there's been a development you need to know about. The director has been stuck in meetings all week—one of the upshots is that the visit by Chirac and Berlusconi is getting the NSSE designation.”

Ryan was not at all surprised. NSSE stood for National Special Security Event, and the Secret Service, under Presidential Decision Directive 62, was the government agency primarily responsible for security planning and implementation at such events. He realized they'd be completely sealing off the Gangplank Marina on the 26th and that the FBI, FEMA, and the Washington, D.C., Metro Police Department would all be called in to help.

“The only problem with that, John, is that the designation will find its way into the hands of the press. Vanderveen will find out about it and make adjustments accordingly. There's no way he's going to back out now.”

Harper's face dropped a little bit more. “I don't see what else we can do, Ryan. I know the banks are a long shot, but we're running out of time. Besides, we still don't have definitive proof that he's even in the country, let alone Washington, D.C.”

“He's here, John. I'd stake my life on it.” Kealey was thinking hard. “What about property?”

“What about it?” Harper asked. Then he caught on. “You mean a stable base of operations.”

“That's exactly what I mean,” Ryan said. There was a long pause. “Listen, I think it's time to make some assumptions. I know it's risky to do that, but I don't see that we have a choice. We have a lot of little leads, but we're not tying them together fast enough. We have to assume that Vanderveen is definitely going after all three of them: Brenneman, Chirac, and Berlusconi.”

Recollection flickered in Harper's eyes. “From what Gray said to you in Cape Town.”

“Exactly. Vanderveen was trained as a sniper, but he is an engineer first and foremost. To take out all three of them at the same time, he would almost invariably use a bomb. So if we assume that that's what he's doing, the question becomes: where is he building it?”

Harper thought for a moment. “Not in the city.”

“No.” Ryan was shaking his head. “Not in the city. Too congested, too many potential witnesses. At the same time, he wouldn't want to be too far away. When it's done, he has to travel with it. That's a risk in and of itself.”

“So, what then? Virginia, Maryland…?”

“That's where I would start. Recent rentals would be a good place to begin. If we go with the idea that he's storing explosives, he's going to need access to a house. Of course, that's a huge area to cover, so we have to limit the search parameters. He'll need a decent amount of land, not to use, but to ensure his privacy. We have to look in rural areas; start from farms, then move out to the suburbs. He'll want access to escape routes, and that means major roads—anything more than five miles from an interstate highway won't be a consideration.”

Harper was staring at him. “Where is all this coming from, Ryan?”

“It's called OPSEC—operational security. The whole point is to minimize the chance of discovery. Vanderveen understands it as well as I do, but there are no guarantees and it requires a lot of guesswork on our part. It's why I was hesitant to suggest this in the first place…If we commit resources and I'm wrong, we'll be giving him a huge advantage.”

The deputy director was nodding slowly. “All the same, at this point I think we have to take the risk. I'll talk to Andrews about making this a priority at Tyson's Corner. Of course, that will serve a second purpose by getting the Bureau and the Secret Service involved.” Harper smiled wearily. “I have faith in you, Ryan, but I don't want the Agency running solo on this. We don't want to be the ones left holding the bag if it all goes to hell.”

 

Vanderveen was intently focused on the most delicate part of the process, hunched over the magnifying glass and carefully examining his mechanical joints. It would take only a touch of solder, but the wiring would have to be thoroughly tested to ensure that his heat sinks had functioned as intended. Otherwise, it was possible that the heat of the solder gun might have damaged the sensitive components of the cell phone's ringer.

Frowning, he turned when he heard a noise behind him.

Nicole Milbery was contorted in the fetal position, her arms clenched fiercely over the wound as if to squeeze out the terrible pain. She had managed to drag herself perhaps four feet. The route was marked by an erratic trail of blood leading back to the glistening pool, but she was still no fewer than five feet away from her cell phone.

Vanderveen had searched her soon after she fell, a task made much more difficult by the fact that she was slippery red, screaming, and writhing in agony. He found the phone almost immediately, then felt a sweet rush of relief when he checked her outgoing messages and saw that the last one had occurred more than three hours earlier.

He was safe, but she had almost ruined everything.

In his anger, out of spite, he had placed it next to the straw on the edge of the cement. As the pool of blood continued to spread around her, she had questioned him, begged him, screamed obscenities, but every word had been met with silence. Then, when the realtor was all but forgotten, he had turned again to watch in fascination as she pulled herself toward the phone, moaning in anguish as each little movement sent jagged spears of pain racing through her abdomen.

He shook his head. Where did she think she was going? Surely she must know that he would never allow her to actually reach the phone.

She was much stronger than he would have imagined, but it was clear that she had finally given up. The determination of the dying woman had given way to pitiful sobs almost ten minutes earlier. Now she hardly made any noise at all, and the light was already beginning to fade from her soft brown eyes.

 

Once approved by the National Security Council, the NSSE designation put things into rapid motion on Water Street and the surrounding area. Around the marina itself, wire fencing was rapidly installed by a company whose twenty-five full-time employees had been thoroughly screened by the Secret Service advance team, which was already on the scene and working hard. The
Sequoia
was scoured from top to bottom for hidden weapons and explosives, and background checks were ordered for the residents who lived in the buildings that lined the waterfront.

It was determined, after heated debate, that the White House press office would take care of developing and distributing passes for the event. The list of people with access to the presidential yacht was reserved to a few choice aides whose pictures, backgrounds, and finger-print cards were sent by diplomatic pouch from Paris and Rome to the head of the advance team. She examined the pictures and made sure that her people saw them. Then they went back to their preparations.