Betrayal (20 page)

~ ~ ~

Four hours later, Cassi was feeling better. Wilbanks had proven to be cooperative, and most of her suggested security measures were already in place. The rest would be implemented by morning. She doubted that the assassin would have had time to plan and execute his next hit within twenty-four hours of the Rollins job, so she felt Abrams was reasonably safe.

Riding up to the twelfth floor in one of the glass elevators that overlooked the flower-and-fountain festooned ASIS quad, Cassi was pleased with the agreement that Abrams would no longer be riding them. If she were the assassin, her tactic would be to watch them through the business end of a sniper scope, waiting for Abrams to step aboard. Killing him here would be like shooting a big fat fish in a small glass barrel. With that thought, Cassi realized that this might be the perfect place for her to set up a trap. Her weary mind kicked back into overdrive.

She looked up at the other glass elevator as it descended a couple of yards away. There was a lone soul riding in it now. If she were the assassin, he would be toast. Surely she could make that work in reverse—if she knew what the assassin looked like. Cassi was confident that her profile was accurate, but it was not discriminate enough to be the basis of a kill shot. Statistically speaking all that she had done was whittle the US population down to about ten thousand contenders.

As though sensing her stare, the man in the other lift turned to face her. They locked eyes and stared, neither one believing. A second later the elevators’ opposing movements cut their line of sight like an umbilical cord. Cassi’s heart began pounding, as it never had before. She continued to stare downward in disbelief as conflicting emotions took the fight from her knees. She sank to the floor with a pathetic thud. She had just seen a ghost.

Chapter 31

Chesapeake Beach, Maryland

A
S
THE
HANDS
on Charlotte’s antique clock lined up on twelve, Odi heard a friendly ta-dong from his computer. He smiled. Midnight on the Chesapeake Bay was seven-thirty A.M. in Tafriz. Ayden was now on line. He took his feet off the kitchen table, leaned forward in his chair, and typed, “I’m screwed.”

A second later he heard the zzhing announcing the arrival of Ayden’s reply. “What happened?”

“Abrams just beefed up his security. This morning all I had to do to get into ASIS was swipe an employee ID. This evening they had guards in place checking photos. I got out just as they were sealing the executive tower.”

“So Abrams is scared, but not scared enough to come forward and confess,” Ayden summarized.

“He’s hiding behind an army of corporate security.”

“You’ll think of something.”

Given a little time, Odi knew that he would think of something. Strict procedures were good for the weaker links, but they conditioned brighter people to stop using their heads. That created new opportunities and opened new gaps. It would not take him long to identify a snafu that he could exploit.

If only it were that simple.

He typed, “I was spotted.”

“You know someone at ASIS?” Ayden asked.

“It was my sister. Wiley must have brought her in. The bastard. That means he’s figured out it’s me.”

“Did you speak to her?”

“No, but that doesn’t matter. She saw my eyes. In her mind, there’s no question. Now my airtight alibi has a leak.”

“Only if she tells someone.”

That was true, Odi thought. He was not sure what Cassi would do with the news. She would certainly feel torn. “I saw her eyes too, Ayden. I saw her emotions change from shock to jubilation to horror over the course of two seconds. She thinks I’m a cold-blooded killer.” His fingers trembled as he typed.

Ayden’s reply was mercifully swift. “Only because she’s ignorant. She doesn’t know about Iran, about Adam and Flint and the others. Look, Odi, I see children stare at their parents like they’re Benedict Arnold every time I pull out a needle. The kids scream of betrayal but the parents always go through with the shot. They accept the temporary emotional backlash because they know that the pain is for their child’s own good.”

Odi stared at the keyboard and thought about that. Ayden had a good point. Still, he was not sure he could go ahead with the Abrams execution, much less Wiley’s. The danger was at a whole new level now, and with his sister aware and watching, it just did not feel right. He contemplated that for a moment longer with his fingers poised over the keys. Finally he typed, “I think I’m through.”

Ayden took a long time to write back. When he did, he said, “Don’t quit just because it’s getting hard. You owe it to your men to see this through to the end.”

Ayden’s encouragement helped, but Odi needed more. He typed, “Abrams is in a vault now, and he knows I’m coming. There’s a good chance that I’ll get caught, which is the same thing as being killed. Remember, since I’m already dead, they can kill me with impunity. Besides, maybe the pressure will get to Abrams and he’ll come forward and confess—now that Rollins is also gone.” Odi fully expected Ayden to retort with a scornful assault on his continued naïveté. Instead he got a shock.
 

“I can handle Abrams.”

“What?”

“It turns out that I have a friend who can get close to him, close enough to slip him some Creamer. All you need to do to be rid of Abrams is get her a dose.”

Odi stared at his computer screen. Tactically, that would be perfect. Strategically, it was dubious. He ran the back of his palm over his sweaty brow. Ayden’s plan meant that somebody else would be involved. By involving a third person in their plans, they were multiplying the risks exponentially. What was that old saw: three people can keep a secret—as long as two of them are dead. With nervous fingers he typed, “Tell me more.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea. The less you know the better. Better to just leave a dose of Creamer at a drop and move on to your next target.”

Odi was relieved to find Ayden half-a-step ahead of him. He asked himself what he had to lose—and came up empty. Besides, he was anxious to get back to Iran and wake up. Still, he had promised himself never to give Creamer to anyone else. It would be a disaster if his invention ever got released to the world.

He stared at the cursor for a long minute, weighing the pros and cons with a heavy heart and a troubled mind. Finally, he typed “Agreed.”

Chapter 32

The Horus Club, Washington, D.C.

W
ILEY
WAITED
FOR
the Horus Club’s deaf waiter to set down their drinks and turn his back before giving Stuart the news. “Ayden Archer is a real man.”

Stuart raised his eyebrows, as if to say, Is that all the Director of the FBI was able to learn in twenty-four hours. “Is that surprising?” He asked. “I assumed Odi just stole the passport, or maybe bought it. Either would be easier than trying to generate a fake.”

Wiley enjoyed watching Stuart take the hook. Now he had to make him swallow. “Even overseas, in Iran? Don’t forget, passports have a photo.”

“That’s hardly an obstacle. If I were Odi, I would find a place that serves alcohol—a five-star hotel or an expat function—and look for someone who resembled me. Then I would get him drunk discussing war stories, and pick his pocket.”

Wiley had often found geniuses to be incompetent if asked to perform a hair’s breadth outside their area of expertise, so he was pleased to hear that Stuart’s talents extended from politics to the dark arts—not that that was much of a stretch. His campaign manager was about to need that additional competence.

Wiley pulled a photo printout from the breast pocket of his blazer and handed it to Stuart. “This is Ayden Archer.”

Stuart accepted the photo and studied it under the soft light of a reading lamp. “You’ve just made my point. He looks like Odi would, if Odi were trying to pass as Tom Selleck.”

Wiley took the printout back, crumpled it, and tossed it into the fire. “I went through Ayden’s FBI and CIA files.”

“Let’s hear it.”

Wiley savored a sip of his Dalwhinnie and began. He remembered everything without his notes. “Ayden was born in California in 1968 to an American mother and an Iranian father. Given that he had his mother’s complexion and that they were both well aware of the benefits of having an Anglican name, they gave Ayden his mother’s name.
 

“Ayden Archer lived in California until he was six, when his mother died from cancer. Then he moved with his father, Tigran Taronish, back to Iran. Tigran worked for the Shah as a royal engineer. When the Shah fell in 1979, Tigran took his son and fled to Turkey, where he got a job expanding our air base in Incirlik. He and Ayden lived there for two years until Tigran was injured in a construction accident, and died.

“Are you with me?” Wiley asked, noting that Stuart was staring into the fire.

“Ayden’s Iranian father died when he was 13, orphaning him.” Stuart replied without shifting his gaze.

 
Wiley took a second to check Stuart’s math in his head and found it accurate. He was impressed, but did not show it. “Here’s the rub. Tigran’s accident should not have been fatal. A chunk of concrete fell on him, breaking some ribs and damaging a lung, but he could have been saved through a routine procedure. Since he was not American, however, Tigran was denied treatment at the air base’s modern hospital—the very air base he had worked two years to construct. He died from internal bleeding while waiting for an operating room to open at the local Turkish hospital.”

Stuart looked up from the fire with interest radiating from his eyes. “That’s how terrorists are made.”

Wiley nodded. “Ayden got himself arrested the day of his father’s funeral for throwing rocks at the base commander’s jeep.

 
“After being assaulted by a teary-eyed thirteen-year-old American boy, the Air Force General looked into Ayden’s story and recognized a potential PR nightmare. He shipped Ayden back to California posthaste to live with his grandparents.

“Back in the US, Ayden behaved himself. The FBI stopped keeping tabs on him four years later when he entered Berkley.

“Both Ayden’s grandparents died while he was at college, leaving him an estate worth a couple hundred grand. He graduated in 1989 with a philosophy major and then used half his inheritance to get a medical degree at UCLA. Instead of doing a normal residency, however, Ayden went straight into the Peace Corps. He worked for them in the Middle East for eight years and then quit to stay behind when the Ayatollah got unruly and the Peace Corps pulled his group out of Iran. He has been living in Iran doing his own thing ever since. As a low-priority case, there is not much else in his file, but there are indications that he has been acting as an international aid coordinator of sorts and running a mobile clinic.”

“Who pays him?” Stuart asked.

“Good question. As far as we know, he’s living off his inheritance, or rather the interest from it. That amounted to just five-hundred dollars a month, but to the best of our knowledge he managed to survive on that amount for years in Iran.”

“You’re speaking in the past tense,” Stuart noted.

Wiley jiggled his ice cubes. “Ayden’s situation has changed. About a year ago he began to draw down his capital, dipping into the original hundred grand. Since then, he has been withdrawing ever-increasing amounts. It looks like he’s getting desperate. As of yesterday, his balance was down to forty-one thousand.”

“But you don’t know what’s changed?”

Wiley shook his head.

“One man’s problem is another man’s opportunity,” Stuart said.

“I was thinking the same thing.”

“Do you think he sold Odi his passport?”

“Perhaps,” Wiley said. “But I suspect that their relationship is deeper than a purely financial one. Since everyone else on Odi’s team was killed, it is reasonable to assume that he was seriously injured. Given what we now know, I think our working hypothesis should be that he fell into Ayden’s care.”

“I think I see where you’re going with this,” Stuart said. “All of a sudden Odi is back in the US on a multiple-assassination mission. He’s using Ayden’s passport. Meanwhile we know that Ayden has reason to hate America, that he is sympathetic to Iran, and that his life has destabilized of late. You think Ayden has morphed into a terrorist mastermind, and Odi—motivated by betrayal and rage—is his gun.” Stuart nodded subconsciously as he thought out loud, obviously intrigued. Perhaps even impressed.