The Outer Circle (The Counterpoint Trilogy Book 3) (12 page)

Richmond, Virginia, USA

“I like what you’ve done with your office!” exclaimed Bob Johnson, looking around a bright, sparsely furnished room. A glass wall allowed a panoramic view of the city. The space communicated business, simplicity, elegance: an uncluttered work desk, a side conference table with a speakerphone, a few chairs. Pictures on the wall added a touch of luxury, a seriousness of big money.

“Are these the originals?” Johnson studied a painting of a table with a pitcher and two bowls of fruits.

“Of course! This is Cezanne. On the other wall, Kandinsky,” replied Erik King. “Bob, it’s been a long time since our service in Iraq. This is business. It won’t do for the CEO of FreedomShield to display fakes.”

“Business must be good?”

“Bob, it’s very good! Demand for private security is exploding. All these people in big mansions, all the gated communities, they want real, heavily-armed protection from people that know how to use their guns. Government organizations also supplementing their resources with ours. All this money that we pay to politicians and lobbyists, they come back hundred-fold. You need trained force on demand? We are here and we’ve got it all.”

“I hear we’re expanding internationally?” asked Johnson.

“Carefully. We’re keeping to the Americas. Let other mercenaries dabble in Europe and the Middle East, too easy to lose people or get bad publicity. We’ve been focusing on protection technologies. Do you see anything unusual about this glass?”

Johnson walked over to the full-wall glass, touched it, and looked closely.

“It looks different. Slightly opaque, shimmery...”

“It is different!” laughed King. “It is a special blend of reflective polycrystalline magnesium aluminum oxide with some other magic. I have learned the name because it makes closing sales easier. This glass will stop an air-to-surface missile while also preventing any kind of electronic or sound snooping from the outside. We charge a hell of a lot to install it as a part of a “FS Protection Plus” package and we have an eight months waiting list.”

Johnson leaned into the glass, knocked on it. The glass made a dull sound.

“Will stop a missile?” he asked incredulously.

“Depends on the size, of course. We have a training site fifteen miles out of town. For the customers willing to place a seven-figure order, we do a little demonstration of firing an actual missile at a glass just like this. They are offered to be in the room on the other side. For whatever reason, everybody refuses,” chuckled King.

Secretary’s melodic Southern drawl filled the room:

“Mr. King? Mr. Smith is on the phone.”

“Thank you, honey.” King turned to Johnson. “He could have been more creative with his pseudonym, but with the money he pays us he can call himself whatever he wants.”

He motioned Johnson to the round conference table, sat down and punched a button on the speakerphone.

“Mr. Smith?”

“Mr. King?”

“Yes. Bob Johnson is here with me, as you requested.”

“Good. I know it’s redundant to ask, but I will ask anyway: this is a secure communication?” Smith’s pronunciation was precise and clear but unmistakably accented.

“Of course. The line, as you know, is encrypted with extra-long codes that change every four hours. The room we are in is completely electronically shielded, swept for listening devices twice a day, physical access is strictly controlled.”

“OK, I would expect nothing less. Mr. Johnson, I watched Mr. Dimon’s speech at Gettysburg. I am glad you are keeping him safe.”

“Thank you, Mr. Smith,” replied Johnson deferentially.

“Now, it’s not enough to keep him safe. We need for him to win. Mr. Dimon represents a very significant investment for us. And a very promising future for your company, Mr. King.”

“Yes, of course,” responded King. “We very much want Mr. Dimon to win. He is a true American patriot.”

“It’s nice that you want for him to win. But we may need more than your desires. That Jeff Kron remains a problem. Even after the Gettysburg speech, the latest polls have him only four points behind Dimon.”

“What would you like us to do about this?”

“I’ll talk to Dimon separately, I have an idea for neutralizing Kron while guaranteeing Dimon’s win. But for now, run by me your capabilities again.”

“Mr. Smith, we have over a hundred people and sixteen drones dedicated to protecting Mr. Dimon!” exclaimed Johnson.

“That’s not what I am talking about.”

King motioned for Johnson to be quiet:

“Mr. Smith, FreedomShield can mobilize thousands if needed. Back in 2022, we helped the government with anti-riot activities. We have a network of loosely affiliated freelancers that helped with dispersing crowds while keeping ours – and the government’s – hands clean.”

“Good. So you can help to support pro-Dimon rallies and handicap pro-Kron’s rallies. What else?”

“We have over a hundred manned aircraft, almost a thousand versatile armored vehicles, hundreds of observation drones. We have a lot of sympathizers in police and security services; some are secretly on our payroll. We are well plugged into their networks. Many of our people and equipment are under contract to government services; our employees manage some of the key data management functions for them. Our employees are not subject to constitutional limitations that apply to government employees. Some people find it convenient.”

“Excellent! I presume you can put Kron under both human and electronic surveillance.”

“Do you want us to do this?”

“Yes. I want to know every step that Kron and his wife take, every conversation they have.”

“Consider it done. Do you want to discuss the costs?”

“No. I trust you to not be unreasonable. You know it’s not in your interests. What else do you have?”

“Well, we have seventeen secret weaponized drones throughout the world,” King shifted uncomfortably. “This is, of course, top secret. We used some for covert government operations in Central America. They are controlled only by us and can be launched with a twenty four hour notice.”

“So I guess the elimination of certain pro-socialist leaders in Honduras and Guatemala was your handiwork. Are they traceable to you?”

“No. They are Chinese, Russian, and French military drones. Equipped with their missiles. Some of the avionics have been replaced to work with our network. They are also programmed to self-destruct.”

“How are they guided?”

“We can use any of the operational satellite navigation systems on demand: American GPS, Russian GLONASS, Chinese Beidou, European Galileo. If you want us to make it look like a Russian operation, we’ll configure it with GLONASS. If you want to make it look like a Chinese operation, we’ll configure it with Beidou. Reconfiguration from the GPS is an extra forty eight hours.”

“The missile?”

“An equivalent of the previous generation Hellfire IV, hundred pounds, enough to take out a medium-size building.”

“Excellent. You have built some nice capabilities.”

“Err, Mr. Smith,” stumbled Erik King. “We have never used these weaponized drones on the American soil.”

“Well, Mr. King, who said anything about using them? Just good to know what’s available.”

After Mr. Smith hung up, Erik King turned to Johnson:

“We already have comprehensive electronic tracking of Kron courtesy of the U.S. government, the data we get even before the FBI sees it. I tell you, bidding that contract below cost was a brilliant move. I can’t believe I had to fight people on this. We’ll add human surveillance though. I’ll have the Kron surveillance manager report to you daily.”

“Do you think that Mr. Smith is really thinking of us using weaponized drones?”

“Nah, he is just being thorough,” King waived off the question.

“Well, he sounds damn serious about having his boy Dimon win, no matter the cost.”

“We all want Dimon to win. For the sake of the country. And for the sake of our business.”

Moscow, Russia

“All right, Minister Shelkov, run us through your view of the potential Sino-American conflict,” requested President Mosin.

“I believe that Beijing will focus on capturing Taiwan,” started Yuriy Shelkov. “It has both economic and political importance for them. Not only will occupying the island will increase internal support for the government and bring in a significant developed economy under their control, it will demonstrate to others in the region that America can’t protect them anymore.”

“I presume that by the same token the Americans will fight to protect Taiwan,” commented Foreign Minister Karpov.

“Yes, I believe they will,” agreed Shelkov.

“How do you see the attack unfolding?”

“The Chinese forces are greatly superior to what Taiwan has, so without American help the island won’t hold out for more than a couple of weeks. The problem for Beijing is that the U.S. 7
th
Fleet can get there in a matter of days. So I presume that the Peoples Liberation Army, PLA, will combine a surprise attack on Taiwan with a simultaneous attack on the Americans’ space-based communication and reconnaissance capabilities. Then they will attempt to deny or at least delay the 7
th
Fleet from entering the East China Sea and approaching Taiwan using their numerically superior missile and submarine forces. They will likely try to mine the approaches to Taiwan from the east as well.”

“Will they succeed?” asked Mosin.

“Mr. President, a war is a war, it’s not entirely predictable. We’ve done some computer simulations, we think their chances of success are fairly high, perhaps as high as seventy percent, but not a sure thing.”

“OK. Let’s say the Chinese attack and succeed,” Mosin turned to Karpov. “What happens then?”

“Well, if the Chinese fail to destroy the 7
th
Fleet, the Americans will isolate them, stop any maritime traffic to and from China and just try to outwait Beijing. China has strategic reserves that will hold them for up to four months, but then they will be in deep trouble,” speculated Karpov.

“And if we get involved on the side of China?” asked Mosin.

“If we direct all our energy and other materials to them, Beijing will be able to withstand a much longer blockade, a least a couple of years,” guessed Karpov. “Enough to outwait the Americans.”

“Also, if our Pacific Fleet will get involved, we believe that China will almost definitely be able to take Taiwan,” added Shelkov.

“Thank you, I now better understand the predicament that Beijing is in,” nodded Mosin. “Minister Shelkov, thank you for your help.”

After Shelkov left, Karpov turned to Mosin:

“So, Boris, what are you going to do? Not long ago you were trying to destroy America.”

“Things have changed, my friend. It’s nice to be needed, to be a potential kingmaker, but I don’t want to forget that we are being placed in a supporting role. We are by far the weakest in this triangle. And once we are no longer needed, well ... it’s best to remain a kingmaker without a king. Besides, wars are terrible and unpredictable. I’ rather hold back. I think that without our commitment Beijing won’t risk going forward with this war.”

New York, USA

Jennifer enjoyed her anonymity in Central Park. The next day, she and Jeff had an interview at SBC. Happened to be the same day when the Secret Service protection would start. For whatever reason, on the inside she was dreading this.

She had her own path through the park: in the past few visits, she retraced her father’s last visit here as described to her by Sarah. She walked through Central Park Zoo, visited the Ballfields Café, then wandered over to the Great Lawn and spread out on the grass.

Her thoughts kept going back to what Jeff said was motivating him: revenge. He was trying to avenge his father. She did not tell Jeff how well she understood this. Because that’s what drove her for the past eighteen years: wishing to avenge her own father’s death. She spoke with Sarah. She spoke with a funny old detective Sal Rozen in Santa Barbara. She spoke with Jack Mikulski and Suzy Yamamoto, who helped Pavel Rostin to investigate suspicious financial dealings. She went to St. Petersburg and met with Police Major Vakunin and with a reptilian character named Yevgeny Zorkin, who bought her grandfather’s flat. She went to Moscow and met Anya Weinstein and her son David. She was curious about her father’s women, trying to comprehend whether there was some of her predestination buried in those tea leaves. She read the grandfather’s diary in Russian and in English. She knew that Pavel Rostin had uncovered some kind of conspiracy and paid for it with his life. But she did not have the names. One day, she’d find out. One day, she’d find a way to make them pay. Whoever “they” were.

Jennifer’s thoughts turned from her father to her husband. She smiled, remembering. March 25
th
, 2007 was another clear, warm spring day in Los Angeles. She was studying and having dinner at the Ronald Tutor Campus Center at USC when a shadow had fallen over her table. Jennifer lifted her eyes to see a tall, blond, good-looking stranger looking at her with an uncertain, slightly goofy smile. She was about to dismiss him as another campus Lothario-wannabe, when the stranger asked:
“Excuse me, but are you Pavel Rostin’s daughter?”

She dropped her drink, making an awful mess that the stranger tried to help cleaning up. He introduced himself as Jeff Kron and launched into his story that was more incredible than anything she could have imagined. For the previous eight months, she had tried to push her father’s death away: the police said it was a suicide, it was too painful to think about it. And this strange man across the table was telling her that her father freed him out of jail, that her father was investigating something dangerous, that this man did not believe for a second that her father killed himself. To this day, she remembered a hot sensation of shame that overcame her that day when she realized that a stranger had more faith in her father’s strength than she did.

It was much later, after Nana was born, after many late night discussions, when she understood that Jeff had an overwhelming need to be attached to something much larger than himself. And that she had an equally overwhelming need to know and understand both him and her late father. It was that understanding, intuitive rather than logical, that helped her to accept that Jeff’s mission, however he saw it, was always going to be the number one in his life. And the only way for her to not be the second fiddle was to share his mission. Which she did, unreservedly and wholeheartedly. Now, she was wondering whether it was this common fire of thirst for revenge that united them.

Jennifer got up, shook off leaves and blades of grass that stuck to her jeans. She was worried about Jeff. She saw how the stress of the campaign, stress of the doubt was wearing him down. She had to be strong for him.