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Authors: Marc Cameron

BOOK: Act of Terror
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C
HAPTER
E
LEVEN
Q
uinn briefed Palmer as they rode, letting Thibodaux watch his back, in case the blue minivan had a partner. The Cajun was linked in to the call via the Chatterbox.
“We'll do some checking into your guy,” Palmer said. His voice was oddly distant for someone who'd just learned one of his men had been ambushed. “How far out are you?”
“Not far at all,” Thibodaux came back. “Be there in fifteen if we don't get hassled by the Man.”
“I'll clear the way for you with the state police. Just get here as soon as you can. Don't know if it's connected to your recent adventure, but we've got two more bags.” Palmer ended the call.
Quinn dropped the bike into fifth gear and began to work his way in and out of traffic. The towering GS flicked easily for something that was a two-story building of the motorcycle world. Still riding on the adrenaline of the attack, Quinn had to force himself to stay off the throttle. He opened his face shield a crack and let the cool air wash around him—calming and exciting at the same time.
When someone asked him why he rode, he often told them, “The same reason a dog sticks its head out the window of a moving car.”
 
 
“Two
more
dead guys?” Thibodaux shook his square head in disbelief. He straddled his bike as he peeled off his gloves. Every rider had a system of order to remove their gear. Jericho was helmet, and then Held Phantom kangaroo-skin gloves. Thibodaux was gloves, then helmet. Towering over six-four, the Marine could straddle the BMW GS Adventure and still flat-foot the ground with both feet. Broad shoulders and a back that resembled a pool table strained at the leather jacket, dwarfing the tall motorcycle. His hair was cut high and tight with just enough in front to call it a flattop.
“Palmer says two,” Quinn grunted, still thinking about the dead man who'd tried to shove him in the moving van. He'd seen months of action working outside the wire in Iraq, but an ambush was a difficult thing to shake off—particularly after the recent attempt on his family. There was no way they were connected. Walter Schmidt and Farooq were worlds apart when it came to causes. Still, Quinn didn't believe in coincidence.
He pushed away a nagging thought and hung his helmet on a hook below his right handgrip. Airbrushed war axes, their blades dripping in blood, stood out brilliantly in the sun on each side of the gray Arai.
He swung off his bike and maneuvered it up on the center stand. The drive out front of the modest white brick house was made up of crushed oyster shells, not the best footing for a motorcycle. He and Thibodaux had found a spot of packed clay at the edge of the ratty grass yard to park their bikes. Over three decades of riding had seen him dump more than one bike because of soft parking. The protruding engine heads on the warhorse GS were protected by brushed aluminum covers and if the bike tipped, the crash bars and aluminum luggage boxes would absorb much of the damage if it did fall. Still, the powerful motorcycle had several new additions courtesy of DARPA and he took special precautions to make sure he didn't walk out to find her lying on the ground.
Once the bike was parked to his satisfaction, he tugged off the reinforced Sidi riding boots and slipped into a more comfortable pair of black Rockport chukkas. He could ride in them if he had to, but running in the heavy Sidis could be a problem.
Both men nodded to Palmer's limo driver. As the president's national security advisor, Palmer rated a small Secret Service detail of his own. His driver, a special agent, stood with his head back, soaking up the fall sun beside a black armored limo. Arnold Vasquez was not as tall as Thibodaux, but the muscles and Sig Sauer pistol under his loose suit coat made it clear he had been hired for more than his ability behind the wheel. As fellow Marines, he and Thibodaux had hit it off immediately. Each time they met it was a contest to see who could bark
semper fi
first and loudest.
“Uuurrrrah!” Vasquez snapped when Thibodaux made his way around the limo. “Hey, Captain Quinn.” The Cajun was a brother in arms; Jericho, as an Air Force officer, was worthy of little more than a polite nod.
“Urrah, Arnie.” Jacques grinned. “How you been gettin' along, beb?”
“Fine, fine,” Vasquez said. He hooked a thumb over his shoulder. “The boss is inside with Bodington and Ross.”
Quinn raised an eyebrow at that. “FBI and CIA Bodington and Ross?”
“The very same.” Vasquez nodded.
“Don't tell my child bride,” the big Cajun mused. “But I always thought Virginia Ross was sorta cute from her photo. Too cute to be the boss of the CIA, that's for damned sure... .”
Agent Vasquez rolled his eyes and leaned in, as if with a secret. “
Mucho jamon por dos juevos
, buddy,” he said. “That don't show up in no press photo... .”
Quinn understood the words, but not the colloquialism. “
Mucho jamon
?”
“Too much ham for two eggs,” Thibodaux chuckled. “Guess Arnie's sayin' the director of the CIA is a little easier to jump over than walk around... .”
 
 
The kid slouching just inside the half-open front door had an unruly mop of sun-bleached hair and an attitude that made him look like he'd only just graduated from his skateboard to a government job. He lowered mirrored Oakley sunglasses to give both Quinn and Thibodaux the once-over. Black motorcycle leathers and the hard-put gazes of men who had seen more than their share of extreme violence had a way of earning them scrutiny from the authorities.
At first glance it was impossible to tell if the young sentry was FBI or CIA.
“You superheroes looking for someone?” Skater Boy said. He stepped up to block their way, holding up the flat of his hand as if it was a bulletproof shield.
“FBI,” Thibodaux whispered, turning to give Quinn a pained look. “No doubt about it.”
Quinn couldn't help but smile. “Air Force OSI,” he said. During his freshman “doolie” year at the Air Force Academy he'd learned to deal with overbearing people by picturing a red dot in the center of their foreheads. It was a trick he'd failed to mention during all his psychological interviews. “Special Agents Quinn and Thibodaux here at Mr. Palmer's request.”
“Let's see some ID.” Skater Boy snapped his fingers in the overly officious way of one new to the world of badges and guns and a little drunk on the terrible cosmic power.
Quinn sighed, imagining the red dot at the bridge of the kid's nose. He reached for his creds when a familiar voice cut the silence from a long hallway to his right.
“Let them through, Reagan.” Palmer stepped out of an alcove at the end of the hall. He wore khaki slacks instead of his customary suit. The sleeves of a starched white shirt were rolled up to his elbows.
“Thank you for coming so quickly.” He handed Quinn and Thibodaux each a pair of blue nitrile gloves to match the ones on his own hands, then dismissed Reagan the skater boy with a curt nod.
“Hope the double extra-large are big enough for those shovels you call hands, Jacques,” Palmer said as he turned to walk back down the hall.
Quinn unzipped his leather jacket and took a deep breath. Putting on the gloves flooded his mind with memories of the near miss they'd had with weaponized Ebola less than a month before.
Palmer raised his own gloved hand as he walked, appearing to read Quinn's mind. “These are more to protect the crime scene than your health.”
Thibodaux groaned. “Since when do you use your hammer teams to go all CSI?” The mountainous Cajun was fine when it came to killing bad guys or bashing heads together, but he was known to have a bit of a weak stomach when too much time had passed from the point of violence.
“Since someone started torturing American spies.” Palmer stopped at the gaping doorway at the end of the shadowed hall. A white refrigerator stood a few feet beyond the door at the edge of the kitchen. It was covered with photos of what looked to be three separate young families. Each bore enough of a resemblance to the other to suggest they were related. The absence of any male influence in the house led Quinn to believe a single woman lived here. The photos on the fridge were likely her siblings, nieces, and nephews. A framed diploma hung in the hall to the right of the doorway proclaiming the graduation of Nadia Arbakova from the United States Secret Service Training Academy in 1998.
Palmer pointed to the doorway with an open hand. “They're through there.”
A single lightbulb tried feebly to fight away the darkness. Thin tan carpet did little to absorb the sound of their footfalls on the creaky wood. The walls to the stairway were painted glossy white and adorned with a cluttered mix of more family photographs. The broken frames and glass of two lay shattered on the steps, indicating a struggle. The moldy, metallic smell of terror and urine met Quinn on a wall of dank air from below.
“So, the woman who lived here is one of the victims,” Quinn said, half to himself. The air grew moist as they made their way single file down the stairs—it was cooler, but no more comfortable. Even surrounded by people he knew, the heaviness in the house made him grateful for the familiar bulk of a pistol under his jacket.
“Brilliant police work.” Kurt Bodington stepped around a concrete block wall at the bottom of the steps. “I suddenly find myself surrounded by crack investigators.” A sneer dripped from his voice. Quinn had never met the director of the FBI but found it easy to dislike him instantly. The man was, after all, a lawyer.
Palmer stepped closer to a silent Hispanic woman who'd come around the corner behind Bodington. She was tall, with an athletic build that reminded Quinn of a lifeguard. A shimmering dark blue blouse accented the light tan of her suit. Sensible shoes, as black as her hair, made Quinn think she might be FBI. The hint of humility in her amber-flecked eyes made him wonder.
“Agent Veronica Garcia with the CIA,” Palmer said. “She's the one who discovered the bodies this morning.”
“Has an uncanny habit of being at the wrong place at precisely the right moment, if you ask me,” Bodington grumbled.
Garcia shrugged off the insult, but her eyes flashed daggers. She kept her hands clasped behind her back, as if to restrain them from slapping Director Bodington.
“Pleasure to meet you, Ms. Garcia.” Quinn raised his blue glove. “I'd shake your hand, but ... anyhow, anyone who Director Bodington dislikes is a friend of mine... .”
“Let's get to the yolk of the egg,” Palmer said, jaw muscles clenching as he glared at both men. “You two can duel at high noon after this is over.”
Virginia Ross stepped around the corner of an unfinished Sheetrock wall. Thibodaux gave Quinn a tiny nod, agreeing with Arnie's earlier assessment. More academic than clandestine operator, Ross wore fancy blue pumps, navy slacks, and a yellow blouse. Smallish shoulders and broad hips made her look like an inverted blueberry ice cream cone.
Operator or not, she was more savvy in the ways of politics than Bodington, and enough of a spy to project a measure of tense civility.
“Officer Garcia was conducting a background check on Agent Arbakova. She stopped by a little after seven this morning and stumbled onto this interrogation site—”
“Interrogation site ...” Quinn mused as they rounded the corner into the stark light of the open basement. It was interesting that Palmer had introduced Garcia as an agent, but her boss had called her “officer.”
Bodington breathed in quickly through his nose, mouth clenched in a tight line, as if disgusted at having to discuss such things with anyone outside his own realm of control.
“Interrogation site?” Thibodaux whispered, swaying like a giant tree as he took in the gruesome sight in front of them. “Is that what we're calling this now?”
C
HAPTER
T
WELVE
T
he nude body of a dead man hung upside down in the center of the ten-by-twenty-foot unfinished basement room. His swollen feet were tied together by rough cords draped over a fearsome metal hook in an exposed rafter. Bare copper wires looped around each big toe, then ran to a small, gas-powered welding generator on a folding table a few feet away. The dead man's fingertips were raw and bloody from clawing at the rough concrete floor. His head-down position had caused his belly to distend horribly. His face was puffed and unrecognizable. Pooling fluids leaked from his nose and gaping mouth to the bare concrete below. A closer inspection revealed circular electric burns to his groin and wrists as well as his ankles. The wires around each big toe sunk deeply into charred, blackened flesh.
Quinn had seen this sort of thing before. A colonel in the Afghan KHED had suspected a teenage goatherd of involvement with the Taliban. The evidence against the kid had been overwhelming, but many Afghans like him had been pressed into service. Few possessed the zeal of their Saudi and Chechen compatriots and gave up information easily.
Quinn had arrived too late to stop the interrogation. The colonel had hung the nude boy from a rafter by his feet, run copper wires to his big toes and increased the voltage until he twitched like a marionette. “The Dance of Death,” the colonel had called it.
The colonel had been from Hazara—a tribe particularly mistreated by the primarily Pashtun Taliban. The boy was Pashtun—and that had been enough to kill him, no matter what he'd known or hadn't known.
Quinn studied the man hanging from the hook in front of him. Like the KHED colonel, whoever had done this had had an agenda beyond interrogation. The depth of human cruelty never ceased to amaze him, even though he himself had caused the death of more than a few enemies of his country—and even a certain amount of pain.
This was not an interrogation. This was someone's entertainment.
Quinn stepped closer to the hanging body, studying the scorched flesh behind the dead man's knees. There came a point in any “enhanced” interrogation when the subject would say anything to stop the pain. That point had come and gone with this one long before the torture had stopped. Anyone trained by an American intelligence agency would know that—if they even cared.
“We know who he was?” Quinn said.
“One of ours,” Virginia Ross said, eyes darting nervously around the room. She took a tentative step closer to the body. Her eyes suddenly locked on the congealing pool of fluids under the dead man's yawning mouth, she seemed not to know where to put her feet. Her words came in short spurts with a hard swallow in between each phrase. “Tom Haddad ... he was an analyst. . . assigned to the Middle East desk.”
“Is his name on Congressman Drake's list?” Quinn asked, knowing the answer before it came.
“It is,” Ross said, swallowing again. “He transferred back to Langley from Cairo three months ago.”
Quinn turned to look at Bodington, but said nothing.
The FBI director returned his glare for a long moment before shaking his head. “We weren't looking at him for anything, if that's what you were thinking.”
Quinn didn't know whether to believe either director. It wasn't unheard of for the Bureau to watch Agency assets without informing their bosses—or vice versa, though the CIA wasn't supposed to conduct operations on American soil. Quinn did a lot of things he wasn't “supposed” to do, so he naturally assumed the CIA did what was necessary to get the job done.
“If he's not on anyone's radar, how'd he get on the list?” Thibodaux asked. “Maybe he really was a mole.”
“We've yet to figure that one out,” Palmer said grimly, nodding toward an empty chair with shreds of duct tape at the arms and legs. “There's one more.”
Someone had been tied there, likely made to watch.
“Worse than this?” Thibodaux moaned. He turned to Quinn. “I'm gonna need one of my grandmama's good-luck gris-gris bags to protect me. This place is chockablock full of evil, beb.”
“It's a woman.” Palmer held open the door to a small unfinished storeroom. “This is ... was her house.”
Quinn stepped through the narrow doorway to find a small room awash with blood.
As a younger man, just starting out in the business, he'd been amazed at the amount of fluid inside a human body. There was a reason they called it “wet work.”
The pallid corpse of an amber-haired female was thrown back over a collapsed stack of cardboard boxes. She looked to be in her late thirties—maybe Quinn's age. Her throat had been cut, all the way to the bone—Quinn guessed with some sort of wire. She was naked but for the beige bra that was bunched up cruelly under her armpits. A high-school yearbook and a small wooden music box—presumably things precious to the woman—had fallen out of the boxes and lay below the ashen white of the woman's trailing wrist. Droplets of coagulating blood pooled below the tips of curled fingers. High cheekbones and the steep angle of her jaw made Quinn guess she might have a hint of Asian blood. Her storm-gray eyes were thrown wide in a silent scream of terror.
Quinn turned away after he'd taken in as much as he thought he needed. Each time he saw a woman who'd been hurt or killed—and he'd seen far too many—he couldn't help but think of Kim. “Anything I can learn from this one?”
“FBI techs say she was raped,” Palmer said.
Bodington leaned a hand against the door frame. “Too early to tell if there'll be any DNA. Son of a bitch bit a chunk out of her shoulder though—probably trying to subdue her. My guys can get a good cast of his teeth from the wound. Looks like the old girl put up a fight.” He nodded to the tip of a female finger, complete with oddly untouched pink nail polish, lying on the concrete floor. “Killer probably used a garrote. Old girl must have gotten a finger inside the piano wire before he yanked it tight—”
“The old girl's name was Nadia,” Veronica Garcia interjected from the doorway, behind Director Ross. She was icy, detached. “Nadia Arbakova. She worked for the Secret Service in their Protective Intelligence Division.”
“Was she on Drake's list?” Thibodaux asked.
“No,” Palmer mused, almost to himself. “Oddly enough, she was not.”
“She's on my list,” Garcia offered.
“Oh.” Bodington gave a sarcastic smirk. “You've been in the field a half a day and you already have your own list?”
To her credit, Garcia ignored the pompous attempt to keep her in her place.
“She has a relationship with an agent on the vice presidential detail. He's one of the priorities you gave me.” She looked at Palmer, who gave her a reassuring nod. “I'd planned to review her background information with her this morning.”
“So,” Bodington mused, “you just happened to drop by at exactly the right time to find two dead bodies in the basement?”
“I decided to stop off and chat with her this morning,” Garcia said. “Her house is on the way in from mine. Thought I'd kill two birds with one stone, so to speak.”
“Damn appropriate metaphor.” The FBI director smirked, nodding at Haddad's body. “Maybe that's exactly what you did.”
Quinn had had enough. “You need to shut your mouth,” he hissed, suddenly losing patience.
The FBI boss blustered, rising up on the balls of his feet as if he might actually get physical.
“Calm down, Kurt.” Palmer held up a hand. “He'd kill you before you could make a fist.” He turned to a grinning Garcia. “Please continue, Agent Garcia. What's the boyfriend's name?”
“James Doyle,” Veronica said. “He's working day-shift at the Observatory today. I have an appointment at three-thirty to talk to the agent in charge of his detail.”
“Very well,” Palmer muttered. “One victim on the list and one not ...” He walked back toward the stairwell door as he thought, ignoring the grotesque, bag-like figure of Tom Haddad's bloated body. When he reached the base of the stairs, he turned to face the rest of the group. “It goes without saying we have a cold-blooded son of a bitch at work here, maybe more than one. This idiot congressman has crossed the line by going public with the existence of his list.”
“Has he released the names?” Thibodaux asked. “I thought he said it was a secret.”
“Drake has his own version of WikiLeaks. The entire list blasted out over the Internet last night right after his show.” Palmer reached in his shirt pocket and removed a folded sheet of white paper, looking directly at Quinn. “Take a good look.”
“Think I'll recognize some of the names?” Quinn took the paper.
“I'm sure you will, son.” Palmer sighed. “You're one of them.”

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