Brown, Dale - Patrick McLanahan 02 (49 page)

 
          
“Don’t
give me that crap, McLanahan.” He stood up suddenly, filling the room with his
size, but Patrick was immediately drawn to the lines of dried tears in the
corners of his eyes. “For the past ten years,
Colonel,
that’s all I’ve been hearing from her, from you, from
everyone at that damn place. When she moved to Vegas it was as if she’d moved
to Mars. Now she’s lying in a hospital in Texas probably dying from these
horrible injuries and you’re still playing hush-hush games with me? Goddamn, I
want some answers—”

 
          
“For
God’s sake, Joe, that’s my wife lying there—”

 
          
“She’s
your wife? Where’s your ring? Where’s
her
ring? You got a marriage certificate? We weren’t invited to any wedding . . .”

 
          
“Joe,
please . . .”

 
          
“The
last we heard, you two weren’t hitting it off all that well. You know what I
think? I think you didn’t marry my daughter. I think you’re saying you’re
married just so we can’t sue the damned Air Force for the accident. The spouse
of a military member can’t sue the government, right?”

 
          
Betty
Tork was staring at her husband.

 
          
“This
is a rip-off. I was in the Marine Corps for six years, I know about this crap.”
Joe Tork moved closer and wrapped his big hands around the lapel of McLanahan’s
flight suit. “Answer me, you lying sack of mick shit.
Answer
me ...”

 
          
Patrick
held Joe’s wrists gently as he could. The big exMarine could have taken his
frustrations out on Patrick, and for a moment it looked like he might actually
swing on him. But at the very moment Patrick thought he might do it, Tork’s big
shoulders began to shake. His narrow, angry eyes closed, and his grip began to
loosen.

 
          
“Damn
it, goddamn it all to hell . . . Wendy . . . she’s been so all-fired
independent ever since she was a kid. I’d get letters from Betty when I was in
Vietnam telling me how smart and grown up she was. When I got back she wasn’t a
kid any more. I never saw her that way . . . Now she’s lying there helpless as
a baby and I still can’t do anything for her ...”

 
          
Patrick,
feeling the same sense of anger and helplessness, could say nothing. It was
Betty who broke the silence. “Patrick, when were you married?”

 
          
“What?
Oh, the day before yesterday.” He looked up. “Did they bring in Wendy’s things?”

 
          
“In
the closet.”

 
          
He
went to the closet and retrieved a cardboard box, took something from the box
and returned to Wendy’s bedside. “We’re not allowed to wear rings on the flight
line,” he said. “Too dangerous, they say. So we started keeping each other’s
ring until we saw each other again.” He opened his hand and revealed a tiny
purple velvet bag, loosened a thin gold drawstring, dropped a hammered gold
band into his palm, then slipped the ring on his left ring-finger. He then got
an identical bag from a flight-suit pocket and took out another hammered-gold
band, this one with a gold engagement ring fused to it. He slipped it on
Wendy’s finger.

 
          
The
three were silent for a while. The ICU nurse came by, checked and recorded the
monitor readings and left. “Finally Joe said, “Patrick, I have to know what
happened out there? Can’t you tell us anything?”

 
          
“Joe,
you know I can’t.”

 
          
“But
I’m a vet. I wouldn’t tell anyone . . .”

 
          
“I
know, but I still can’t.”

 
          
Tork
ran his hands through what little hair was left on his head. “All right. But
tell me this, just this one thing, because I’m Wendy’s father. Just promise me
you’re going to nail who- ever’s responsible for doing this to my daughter.”

 
          
Patrick’s
eyes were fixed on Wendy’s scars and burns, he saw her muscles convulse, heard
the sucking sounds as machines drew fluid from her lungs to keep her from
drowning.

 
          
“Yes,
Joe,” he said in a low voice. “That I can promise you . . .”

The Kremlin,
Moscow
,
Union of Soviet Socialist Republics

Thursday, 18 June 1996
, 2109 EET (1309 EDT)

 
          
Vladimir
Kalinin walked briskly into the General Secretary’s office to find several
members of the Kollegiya already assembled there, all nervously pacing the
floor or circling the conference table. They began to take seats immediately—obviously
they had all been waiting for KGB chief Kalinin’s arrival. Boris Mischelevka,
the Foreign Minister, sat at the head of the conference table and presided over
the meeting.

 
          
“The
General Secretary is enroute from West Germany,” Mischelevka began. “He has
directed me to begin this meeting and assemble the entire Kollegiya at ten A.M.
tomorrow morning when he arrives. He will expect a briefing on our meeting
first thing in the morning.

 
          
“This
deals, of course, with the incident that took place yesterday morning in the
United States. A fighter aircraft was stolen from a top-secret research center
and flown through Central America to Nicaragua after a stop in Mexico. Apart
from that information we have no details.” Mischelevka turned immediately to
Kalinin and asked if he could explain what had happened.

 
          
“I
believe this should wait for the General Secretary,” Kalinin said. “I see no
reason for three separate meetings.”

 
          
“The
reason is simply that the General Secretary wants it,” Mischelevka told him.
“Obviously he intends that we be able to explain to the various governments
involved
what
is going on.”

 
          
Kalinin
said nothing at first. The Americans called it “dam-

 
          
age
control”—everyone get their story straight and coordinated before going outside
the government. With foreign journalists flooding Moscow and a press center set
up in the Kremlin itself, “damage control” was more and more important nowadays
. . . “All I can tell you is that the incident involved a Soviet helicopter and
a Soviet airbase in Nicaragua. That is all I can discuss here until I brief the
General Secretary.”

 
          
“We
need more than that, Kalinin,” Mischelevka said. “I have received a dozen
demands for explanations from several countries, including, naturally, the
United States. It is important that we respond—”

 
          
“You
will respond when the General Secretary decides you will respond. I will not
release any information until the classification of that information is
determined—”

 
          
“But
we must brief—”

 
          
“Brief
no one.
Is that clear enough?”

 
          
“What’s
wrong with you?” Mischelevka asked. “What’s going on? Is this a special KGB
operation in Central America? What . . .?”

 
          
“You
will please not discuss your opinions of the incident either,” Kalinin snapped.
“Say nothing.
Glasnost
does not apply
here.” With that, Kalinin got up and walked out.

 
          
They’re
like sheep, Kalinin thought as he quickly exited the dark halls of the Kremlin.
They have been lulled into complacency by the garbage that has been fed to them
over the years, that openness was good, that secret information is free to all
for the asking. They were going to be this government’s downfall . . .

 
          
.
. . And when it had fallen, with a little help from patriots like himself, he
was going to be the leader of a return to the old, traditional ways, to the
future world eminence of the
Soviet Union
.

Arlington
,
Virginia

Thursday, 18 June 1996
, 1905 EDT

 
          
The
Barrel Factory Racquet Club used to be just that—an old factory and warehouse
that, in pre-Prohibition days, made casks and barrels for beer and wine. It was
one of the worst eyesores in the
Washington
,
D.C.
, area for decades until
Arlington
’s renaissance in the late 1980s and early
nineties, when it was remodeled into a first-class tennis, racquetball and
health club. But the area kept its old slum reputation, so the Barrel Factory
was having a tough time attracting members.

 
          
But
for National Security Adviser Deborah O’Day, the place was perfect for many
reasons. The dues were modest, it was easy to get a racquetball court—especially
during the week after seven
P.M.—
and
the usual D.C. crowd avoided the place. She could take off the White House
senior-staff facade and act like a normal human being, and as such was rarely
recognized—all of which made the place ideal for an occasional surreptitious
meeting.

 
          
She
tossed a couple of the soft blue rubber balls out into the court and chased
them, jogging up and down the court to loosen her ankles. She was pleased with
how flexible and fit her body was, even at fifty-one. Exercise was never
important to her until just before learning that she was being considered for
the NSC position. No one much cared what you looked like as U.N. ambassador,
but as part of the White House staff her image had to merge much better with
that of the President, and that image was relatively young, lean and mean.

 
          
She
crash-dieted during her last few weeks in New York, begging off all the bon
voyage parties that she could. During the confirmation hearings, she had no
time for any meals anyway, so dieting was very easy then. The same was true for
her first few months in Washington. Now that the dust had settled a bit, she
found that her once-a-week trips to the gym were invaluable and at times
virtual life-savers. She enjoyed the challenges, relished the appreciative
glances of the men in the club (some less than half her age), and felt good
when she looked around the room during the White House staff meetings and knew
that she could probably whip half the men in that room on the tennis or squash
courts.

 
          
These
late-night trips also had other valuable uses—such as tonight.

 
          
She
had finished stretching out and had begun hitting the ball around when she
heard a tap behind her. A tall, darkhaired, pear-shaped man in an old gray
sweatsuit, elbow and knee pads, brand-new Reebok tennis shoes, wearing eye
protectors and carrying an old aluminum-framed racquet, was tapping on the back
Plexiglas wall of her court.

 
          
Just
as he began tapping again, from seemingly out of nowhere Marine Corps Major
Marcia Preston moved behind him. She was dressed in a red jogging suit, a towel
wrapped around her neck and carrying an open gym bag—which, Deborah O’Day knew,
contained a Browning PM-40B automatic machine pistol with a twenty-round clip
and laser sight. The pear-shaped fellow seemed to sense someone behind him and
turned to face Marcia. If he made the wrong move, Marcia could disable him in a
few seconds or kill him in less time. They exchanged glances, and Marcia
Preston never got closer than a few feet from him, but there was no doubt that
the man knew he had been efficiently intercepted.

 
          
But
at a slight hand motion from O’Day, Marcia moved on past as if she hadn’t
noticed he was there. O’Day could see the man nervously swallow, then open the
half-size door to the court and step inside. Major Preston went over to the
drinking fountain nearby, wandered around looking in the other courts, then
disappeared back into her previous unobtrusive hiding place.