Black Flagged Apex (63 page)

"Have they figured out the convoy's target?"

"Yes, sir. The shipment was manifested and scheduled for delivery to the United Nations Headquarters in New York City. The delivery paperwork looks authentic."

"Good God. The General Assembly is scheduled to start a two-week session tomorrow. Do we know any of the other targets?"

"Negative, sir. The lead drivers of each convoy were given sealed boxes with preprogrammed GPS units, a satellite phone and delivery paperwork. Only the driver knows the target."

"Where is Honesdale?"

"Near Scranton, sir."

"Have you notified Director Shelby? They have an entire task force in Scranton."

"I've been debating that," Kearney said.

"What? I'm not sure I'm hearing you correctly, General. What exactly is there to debate?"

"This is why I wanted to talk with you offline. Sanderson's team has unfinished business. The FBI task force could interfere," Kearney said.

"Go ahead."

Jacob Remy was shaking his head slowly, expressing the same sentiment that the president was feeling. It had been a big mistake to let Sanderson work his way into the task force.

"One of the convoys is untraceable. It left Honesdale this morning around nine—"

"How is this one untraceable?"

"Sanderson provided the NSA with a list of cell phone numbers for the drivers that were provided by Crystal Source's operations manager. Only the lead driver for each convoy is with True America. The rest are employees diverted from the company's normal distribution schedule. We know that six convoys left the facility. NSA has been able to locate phones in five of the convoys, including the one sitting in Honesdale. The missing convoy was smaller than the rest, consisting of three trucks. NSA is getting no hits from the convoy. Bad luck, really."

"Or they're all equipped with sat-phones. They might all be involved with True America," the president said.

"That's a distinct possibility, sir. This might be their most important convoy. The others consisted of six vehicles each. Either way, tracking that convoy may no longer be important. The convoy left at nine. If its target was located in either Washington, D.C., or New York City, it may have already delivered the water. Sanderson's team has volunteered to take the necessary steps to identify the convoy's destination. If the FBI descends on the bottled water facility too quickly, they'll render the Sanderson option unviable."

"The fact that you're speaking vaguely gives me the impression that I don't want to know the details of Sanderson's operation."

"That's correct, sir. All we're asking for is a few hours."

"We? Are you working for Sanderson now?"

"Terrence has been a close friend of mine since West Point. I trust him without question or hesitation. His methods are unconventional, and he's not afraid to twist arms."

"He twisted mine pretty hard. I didn't appreciate that," the president said.

"The bruises and twists are a small price to pay for the results he consistently delivers. I trust him, Mr. President."

"I can't exactly order Shelby to stand down to give Sanderson's team some time to work their magic. How do you propose I handle this in the situation room meeting?"

"May I suggest a much smaller meeting for now? We can deal with the convoys still on the road using SOCOM assets. Local law enforcement can be called in separately to handle any situations precluding military intervention. We can get a jumpstart on the convoys while we wait for Sanderson to provide the missing convoy's destination."

"Who is tracking the convoy right now?"

"The National Security Agency. They're tracking the convoys live using cell phone GPS locator data and satellite imagery."

"Shelby will go haywire when he finds out this was done behind his back," the president said.

"If Sanderson's team works fast, we might be able to sneak this past him," Kearney said.

"Little has gone smoothly over the past week…and nothing gets by Shelby. This is guaranteed to get ugly," he said and paused.

He didn't look at Remy. This was his decision to make.

"Tell Sanderson that I'll hold off notifying the FBI, but I won't order Shelby to cease and desist if he catches wind of this. General, will you do me a favor and discreetly bring General Gordon to the Oval Office? Notify your source at the NSA. I want them video conferenced into the meeting. Coordinate with Mr. Lee in the watch center to transfer the NSA's feeds to the screens in my study. Be up here in five minutes," the president said, disconnecting the call.

"This is like dealing with the devil," he sighed.

"Preventing a biological attack on the United Nations General Assembly is worth shaking hands with Satan himself," Remy said.

"This is clearly a politically motivated attack on world stability. Right in line with some of True America's hardcore rhetoric and their mainstream talking points."

I think we go after them immediately. Shut the entire organization down," Remy suggested.

"Greely and his band of nutcases just made that a little easier for us, didn't they?"

"I have a feeling that the rest of the targets will seal that deal. We'll have to move fast to take advantage of the public outrage and prevent their political action group from generating any significant momentum. I'm seeing another primetime television address," Remy said.

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves here. We still have five convoys to stop," the president said.

"I'll bring Beck up to speed and have him prepare a comprehensive strategy that we can implement as soon as we've safeguarded the American people," Remy said, referring to the president's chief political advisor.

"Sounds good. Let's get the study reconfigured to handle this. I want this sealed off from the rest of the staff. Just you, me and the two generals. We'll bring in others as we need them. I have a plan that might help us deal with Shelby, in the short run and the long run," the president said.

"Good. I was beginning to worry about him," Remy said.

"I've always worried about him."

Chapter 57

2:19 PM

Lake Shore Drive

Lake Wallenpaupack, Pennsylvania

Daniel stared out of the window at the lake. He would have preferred a nighttime attack on Owen Mills' lakeside compound, but the clock had started ticking when Anne Renee Paulson's body hit the warehouse floor. Her cell phone indicated that she had called a local number hourly since yesterday afternoon. Her last call had been placed at 1:15, roughly twenty-five minutes before the attack. He expected an inbound call to her phone any minute.

Fayed had suggested leaving the phone for Jessica to answer. Graves and Gupta had a headset microphone that could imitate hundreds of situations and modify her voice. They could mimic severe interference, which might have been enough to keep her contact from becoming overly suspicious. Daniel decided against this option, mainly because Jessica hadn't recovered a fraction of her hearing. Plus, Paulson and her contact might use a code word to start their conversations. He didn't want to tip their hand, especially since they would arrive at Mills' gates in less than two minutes.

Instead of regrouping at their rental house on Cadjaw Pond, they drove the three vehicles south on Route 6 for a few minutes before turning off on an unmarked dirt road. From there, they split into two teams and abandoned the Jeep Grand Cherokee.

Jessica joined Graves and Gupta in the van, along with Wilkins and the two men from the warehouse. With her hearing compromised, she didn't protest the decision. Her team would return to Cadjaw Pond and start to put all the pieces of the puzzle together. The two electronic warfare specialists had everything figured out by the time they arrived at the house fifteen minutes later. Wilkins helped them access Crystal Source's server network to acquire a list of known cell phone numbers for the convoy drivers identified. They also checked the Crystal Source trucks for active GPS signals. As suspected, the built-in GPS trackers had been disabled.

Once this information was passed on to Sanderson, they abandoned the safe house near Honesdale, leaving the men restrained in separate rooms.

Daniel and the rest of the team transferred their equipment to Paulson's Mercedes-Benz GL Class SUV and spent the next ten minutes gearing up for the inevitable assault on Mills' lakeside mansion. Mills was the key to unraveling the entire conspiracy. He had hand delivered the metal boxes containing the target information to Paulson, and at some point, he had given each driver a key to open the box. They had found the key to open the last box on the driver that Melendez had shot. All of this had been carefully planned to keep the target information compartmentalized. Even Paulson may have been kept in the dark regarding the final target selection.

If anyone knew where the convoys were headed, it had to be Mills. Only Mills could have arranged the deliveries, which he would have kept quiet. Mills clearly had some hefty political connections somewhere. Securing a one-time contract to deliver water to the United Nation's Headquarters building couldn't have been easy. Then again, when bottled water was currently the only safe and trusted drinking option on the table in the United States, it may have been a slam-dunk for Mills. It wouldn't surprise Daniel in the least to learn that Mills had been in active negotiations to deliver water to the U.N., when the crisis "conveniently" erupted.

Five more convoys were likely headed to similar, but unknown targets. The NSA was tracking four of them. Their mission was simple: acquire the missing convoy's final destination as quickly as possible. Based on the information available, the convoy in question had left the warehouse around nine in the morning and could have already delivered its cargo to a target as far away as Washington, D.C. This possibility precluded the best assault options, like a water approach at dusk, or a multiple-point perimeter breach. They had barely carved out enough time to survey the compound.

Located at the tip of Boulder Point on the western bank of northern Lake Wallenpaupack, Owen Mills' estate occupied a vast stretch of the most desirable real estate on the lake. With sweeping views of the water spanning east to west, his lone mansion commanded most of the point. A single looping road swung down from Lake Shore Drive, closely following the shoreline and passing several luxury homes on its journey to the front gate of the estate. The road turned inland at that point and crossed the small peninsula, depositing cars back onto Lake Shore Drive. A formidably tall, yet elegant black wrought-iron fence spanned the peninsula, actively discouraging tourists from taking a closer look at the massive house in the distance.

From Ledge Point, a smaller peninsula to the east, they had spent close to fifteen minutes observing Boulder Point, counting guards and looking for patterns. Their first obstacle would be the gatehouse. Manned by two armed guards and located one hundred feet from the eastern shoreline, the stone shack guarded the only road leading to the mansion at the southernmost tip of the small peninsula. The property itself was relatively featureless, with the exception of several thick pockets of towering pine trees. One of the pine tree clusters stood between the gatehouse and the main structure, hopefully obscuring the view between the two structures. They planned on using Paulson's car to approach the gate without raising any alarms. Once the guards were neutralized, they would ditch the car and approach on foot. Taking the car any further would attract too much attention.

Beyond the gatehouse, several lone guards armed with assault rifles patrolled the property. Unfortunately, their observation detected no discernible patrol pattern. None of them came any closer than three hundred feet to the wrought-iron fence, giving Daniel the impression that Mills didn't want to attract the wrong kind of attention. Even the guards at the gate kept their weapons concealed inside the shack, though Daniel could see the barrel of an AR-15 through one of the windows. Clearing the patrols wouldn't be a problem. He was more concerned about what waited for them inside the house.

The guards patrolling the estate looked better trained than what they had encountered in the warehouse. They were heavily armed with optics-enhanced assault rifles, outfitted with body armor and apparently taking their jobs seriously. They constantly communicated using hand signals or talking into their shoulder-mounted microphones. It appeared that Mills had reserved the best operatives for his personal security detail. On the eve of True America's greatest moment, he supposed this was appropriate. Or maybe Mills had VIP guests, which raised a completely different realm of possibilities. The men on patrol didn't look like Secret Service agents, but they could easily pass for civilian contractors assigned to a VIP-protection detail.

"There's the turnoff for Boulder Point Road. We're about a minute from the gate," he said, applying the turn signal and easing the car over the dashed yellow line.

Despite the fact that they were about to jump headfirst into a battle against a numerically superior force, he started wheezing in laughter. He couldn't help it. With one of Jessica's blond wigs jammed over his head, Munoz looked like a transvestite prostitute that had long ago given up trying to maintain the pretense of being a woman. Before leaving with Graves and Gupta, she had tossed it into the back of the Mercedes, thinking it might come in handy approaching the gate. Anne Renee Paulson had blond hair. Laughter erupted from the van, causing Munoz to slam on the brakes and spill everyone forward.

"How about a little fucking professionalism?" he hissed, slamming them all back into their seats by rapidly accelerating.

"Just be glad we're not taking pictures. You look beautiful, by the way," Daniel said, igniting another round of snickering.

"Fuck you, Petrovich."

Munoz continued along Boulder Point Road until the gatehouse appeared over a slight rise in the road. Melendez lowered the rear passenger side window. If the guards reacted before they reached the gate, Melendez would raise himself out of the window and fire his suppressed P90 over the top of the SUV. He was their long-distance insurance policy.