Dead Shot (18 page)

Before the agent could lean back, Kyle grabbed the man’s neck in a tie-clinch and jumped up in one fluid move. Brown was instantly off balance, and Swanson pulled down hard on the head while smashing his knee upward. The agent fell, grabbing his shattered nose and fractured eye socket.

Swanson was now able to face Kepo’o, who had recovered from the momentary surprise and moved forward, just close enough for Kyle to lean back and telegraph that a kick was coming. The 275-pound Polynesian saw the slight position change and put his arms down to protect his stomach and groin. Instead, Kyle snapped into a complete fast spin and landed a roundhouse kick that sailed over the lowered arms and slammed against the man’s temple so hard that it knocked Kealoha Kepo’o unconscious on the spot and dropped him sprawling to the floor. Swanson stepped forward and kicked the fallen man hard in the unguarded balls. “That’s for the punch,” he said.

Then Swanson grimly faced the mirror and sat back down as Walker, Dave Hunt, and two other agents burst into the room with their guns drawn. Kyle allowed himself to be strapped back into the chair without a struggle.

“Okay, so you’re a tough guy. Are you willing to talk to us now?” asked Carolyn Walker.

Kyle stared back. “No. Fuck all of you. It’s almost six o’clock. Can I have some dinner?”

“You’re a real bastard, you know that?” Dave Hunt snarled as he turned on his heel and walked out, passing an EMT team coming in to tend the agents. The suspect had taken down Evan Brown and Kealoha Kepo’o as easily as swatting a couple of flies. Hunt said, “We go to Level Four, Carolyn.”

“No Level Three?”

“It would be idiotic to unstrap him again to make him kneel on a broomstick or hold his arms out with weights attached. We can’t take the chance, so we waterboard him instead. Then probably the battery and electrodes, too. Hell, I may even take a baseball bat and a meat cleaver to the son of a bitch! How did he know what time it was?”

“Cool down, Dave. What about getting permission?”

Hunt sighed. This thing was escalating, popping up out of the ordinary run of business and therefore likely to get noticed. The bosses would want to know how two agents had been injured and what was going on, but somebody in Washington would have to sign off on the waterboarding, and few would want their names on such an authorization.

Walker was also disgusted. “It may take a few hours, but it will be worth the wait. No way should you and I take the fall for this all by ourselves.” She spent some time drafting the request message in careful, legal language, then signed it.

WASHINGTON, D.C.

G
ENERAL
B
RADLEY
M
IDDLETON WAS
in the spacious office of the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Dark furniture. Framed handshake pictures on the wall. FBI symbols everywhere. It bespoke power, as did the quiet and competent man across the desk from him, who never took off his dark suit coat, even while he was sitting.

“What do you mean, Mr. Director? You’ve lost one of my people and can’t tell me where he is or even if you have him? How does that work?” Middleton cocked an eyebrow.

Director Samuel Banks spread his arms wide, palms up. “I can only repeat what I just told you, General. As of now, I have no report whatsoever of any unidentified suspects being picked up yesterday.”

“Our alert came straight from your FBI computer system, Mr. Director. Your machine talked to my machine and said one of our hot sets of prints was being examined. The link activates only for that specific reason.”

The director nodded in affirmation. “And our system shows that indeed a query was made, and that we replied that there were no such prints on record in the NCIC. But our people were not the ones who initiated the inquiry! Anyway, you are military. How can your people not have fingerprints on file?”

“Sorry, Mr. Director. Need-to-know basis on that one.”

“I’m the director of the FBI!”

“I apologize and suggest you take up any questions you have about this with the White House. I do not have authorization to discuss it. Back to business. If the FBI system was pinged last night, where else could it have come from? Can just any hacker or country cop do it? Or could the NSA or a foreign government run something without a trace?”

“No, of course not. There are high-level security protocols and firewalls and passwords that I can’t discuss with you. Need-to-know.” The eternal Washington game. My dick is as long as yours.

Middleton smiled, and the director grinned back. “Mr. Director, I don’t care about the inner workings of your computer and databases as long as we continue to have authorized access. I just want my operator back.”

“I understand that, General. Here’s my suggestion. I will put a tag on the query. If anything pops up, I will personally give you a call.” He scribbled on the back of a business card and handed it to Middleton. “Here’s my private number in case you need to contact me directly.” The general looked at it. There was no telephone number, just
DHS??

Middleton put the card in his jacket pocket and rose, shook hands and left, wondering why Banks had chosen such an odd method of communication. Was he concerned that the office of the director of the FBI might be bugged? No, it was simpler than that. Banks
knew
the conversation was recorded, because he was the one recording it. Just in case questions were asked later.
Weird world we live in,
Middleton thought, getting into his waiting car.

“Sar’nt Johnson!”

“Yes, sir!”

“Do you know where to find the Department of Homeland Security offices in this hick town?”

“Yes, sir! The Department of Homeland Security. Uh, down at the far end of the Mall in that really tall, skinny building with the pointy top?”

“That is the Washington Monument, Sergeant, and I have no time for your smart-ass comments this evening.” Middleton noted that it was
past six o’clock. He had just wasted hours working his way through the FBI chain of command in order to reach the director for their brief, private conference. He didn’t want to repeat that process over at the DHS, starting with some flunky at the front door who would explain that everyone had already gone home for the day. “Let’s just go back across the river to the Pentagon. If I’m going to be sneaky, I want a whole bunch of Marines around. You do know where the Pentagon is, don’t you, Sar’nt Johnson?”

“Aye, aye, sir.”

MARYLAND

They had turned the thermostat down again to be sure that Swanson, in the interrogation chair, was thoroughly chilled before beginning the water procedure. They were not about to unstrap him again, because bad things happened the last time they tried that.

As far as Special Agent Carolyn Walker was concerned, the bastard could lie there and freeze to death. She gave a look of disgust through the one-way glass and swiveled her chair around to face Dave Hunt.

“Okay, I’m not waiting any longer. We can’t dodge our responsibilities while the bureaucrats argue about conducting a Level Four interrogation on American soil with someone who we think may be an American citizen. An assassin working for a terrorist organization is the most likely scenario.”

“Still a dangerous precedent, Carolyn.”

Walker’s eyes were sharp and her mouth a thin line. “No more waiting, Dave. We can’t afford
not
to do this. We have to find out how he is involved. Anyway, screw my goddam career. I want to know what that bastard knows! We will proceed with the first phase while we wait for authorization. I will take full responsibility.”

“I never said I didn’t want to do this, Carolyn,” Hunt said quietly, trying to keep her calm. “I concur, as long as it remains a limited and
supervised situation. He has brought it on himself by refusing to talk and putting a couple of our people in the emergency room.”

The room was cold. Both Walker and Hunt wore dark blue windbreakers as they watched other agents set up the procedure. The suspect, shivering from the icy air-conditioning, had been blindfolded; his chair was laid back and a large galvanized tub clattered into place beneath his head. This was just the first phase and would be done with no talking, no questions.

A thick towel was draped across the face. Walker pulled out her stopwatch, nodded to an agent standing beside the chair, and started the timer as he tipped over the first bucket.

Kyle was already shivering, and with his eyes covered, he depended on his other senses to keep track of what was happening. The metallic noise of the tub on the tile floor told him it was probably time for some water, and he sucked in deep, regular breaths. Instead of fighting back when the towel was laid over his nose and mouth, which would have expended both energy and air, he hauled in even deeper breaths. He heard someone pick up one of the heavy buckets, and shoes beside the chair squeaked on the tiles as the agent shifted for better balance. Water sloshed as the bucket came up. Kyle got a final deep breath and heard the click of a stopwatch, and five gallons of water was sloshed onto the towel in a single rushing torrent. He remained perfectly still and let his brain be a clock. At fifteen seconds, he intentionally squirmed, but there was little real discomfort.

Carolyn Walker detested doing what she was doing. Only fifteen seconds had passed and the suspect was already wiggling, showing signs of oxygen deprivation. She pushed her personal reaction aside and pressed on with the procedure, signaling the waiting agent to pour a second bucket over the drenched towel.

Kyle lurched against the straps when the cascade of water washed over him. The towel was thoroughly drenched, and no air would come through, even when the waterfall passed. When his count reached thirty-five seconds, he struggled again, harder, pushing against the straps.

He’s drowning under there.
Carolyn held up a finger. Still another bucket was dumped on Swanson, and he struggled while the straps dug into his arms and ankles. When her stopwatch hit one minute, Walker held up her fist. Stop. The agent yanked away the towel, and Carolyn looked down at the suspect, who was coughing and sputtering, gasping for air. A full minute underwater. Let him know what was in store if he refused to cooperate. Now give him some time alone to think about it. The chair was elevated to the sitting position to help him catch his breath, and everyone left the room, leaving the suspect alone to fear what might happen next.

Kyle was wet and shivering. He opened his eyes and blinked and allowed his breathing to return to a regular rhythm. Only a minute under the towel? Piece of cake. Any surfer would think so. Cold and wet? He thought about his big surfboard and the frigid waters at the Wedge in Newport Beach, where he usually had to wear a wet suit and booties even on a warm day.

Wet? This was nothing compared to being scrubbed along the sandpaper bottom of the California shoreline after being blown out by a big wave. It could take a minute or so just to get back to the surface. Or being sealed in a fifty-five-gallon drum half-filled with water and rolled down a hillside during a training exercise. Cold? Try trekking over an ice-sheeted mountain during a blizzard with people trying to kill you. In this room, he knew that the water torture was only a mind game to force his cooperation by making him think he was drowning. He would play it out and let them believe they were getting to him. He was, however, cold and hungry, and time was being wasted.
Where’s my damned cavalry?

THE PENTAGON

The Lizard, well aware of how the computer age could be made to work against itself, had been jamming useless data down the information superhighway to the unknown computer where the requests about
Kyle Swanson were originating. For the past two hours, he had been reprogramming, cutting down that computer’s ability to reach out to others without first going through him.

With the help of a friend at the National Security Agency, he eventually narrowed it all down to a half-dozen lines of communication, all of it encrypted on the sender’s end but popping back into readable English on his screen.

Sniffing around the U.S. Department of Homeland Security violated a dozen or so laws, but General Middleton had been very clear with his order: “Find Shake.”

The message for Level Four permission came up. Unidentified terrorist suspect related to Saladin inquiries is in custody at location Delta Two One Sigma. No identification, not even fingerprints. DNA tests were incomplete. Probably ex-military. Subject may have information re poison gas attack. Extremely uncooperative, two DHS agents injured and hospitalized. Urgent request for authorization to conduct a Level Four interrogation. Signed by Special Agent Carolyn Walker of the Department of Homeland Security, with her identification code.

The Lizard didn’t know what a Level Four was, but it sounded rather dire. He went to the general’s office and knocked on the door. “I’ve located Gunny Swanson, sir. He is being held by the Department of Homeland Security at a safe house over on the Maryland coast, used to be a Coast Guard station.”

Middleton was on his feet, walking across his office, and called out, “Captain Summers!”

Sybelle came in. “Sir.”

“Round up some Marines and go get our boy,” he said. “The Lizard will fill you in and arrange a helicopter from here to there.” Middleton was at his private safe, spinning a dial. He opened the door and found an envelope containing a special letter. “You know our charter, and this is your authorization. Show it to the person in charge, but nobody stands in your way, got it? Bring him home.”

At the safe house, Hunt and Walker let an hour pass, waiting for permission that never came, before they went in to question Swanson again.

“You can end this right now. Just talk to us,” said Special Agent Dave Hunt. “What’s your name?”

Swanson remained silent. He was cold, but he would be warm again, someday. This was only temporary. No matter what they did, it was only temporary. He said nothing.

“Damn you,” Hunt muttered. “We need answers—now! Do you understand? It is no small matter, and you’re not in that chair because of back taxes or some fucking parking ticket. Our national security is at risk.”

Carolyn Walker stepped before him and held up the photograph of a man. “This is Saladin. You killed him in Paris. Even if you were not the sniper who first brought him down, we have you on video putting a bullet in his head at point-blank range. We were right across the street at the time, and Saladin was under close surveillance.”

She shuffled that picture to the bottom of a small stack and held up another head-and-shoulders photograph. “Here’s your second victim, a bodyguard.” Then she showed him still another. “Your third was the driver. You massacred three men and then ran inside that house, and that was followed by gunshots and the big explosion.”

She held up a final photograph. “This was the only other person inside, another bodyguard, and I assume you killed him, too, because you came out and he didn’t.” Carolyn Walker stopped talking and stared at Kyle. He had blinked when shown the final photograph. “What is it? You recognize this man?”

Kyle said nothing.
Oh, yeah. I know him all right.
He had been using the entire time since the last procedure to pump in deep breaths to store up oxygen, because he knew more water was on the way. As a sniper, he had been trained to slow down his life in critical moments, to breathe regularly under stress, and, most of all, to never panic. The picture had thrown off his rhythmic breathing pattern.

“You’ll talk,” Walker said. “Sooner or later, everyone talks.” At her signal, the wet towel was thrown back over his face.

He heard water slosh as a bucket was hoisted and he gobbled air, ordering himself to relax rather than fight it this time.
Temporary. Temporary.
His brain ticked off the seconds as the buckets emptied,
pouring over him and into the big tub below. The soaked towel was to simulate the feeling of being smothered but actually helped keep the water moving instead of flooding into his nostrils and lungs. He could hear and sense everything but after the first minute decided to turn off the sound for a while and just lived in his head.

The gnarly pipeline wipeout in Hawaii was one favorite memory. One moment, standing in control on the board with the bright sun overhead and the big wave roaring its protest at being ridden, then the curl catching and dumping him. Down he went into the swirling, powerful wash, and a strong underwater current pushed him beneath a rock. Thought he would never be able to climb out of that hole where the green water was trying to kill him. Two minutes. Chest getting tight, and he let some of the old air bubble in his lungs escape to ease the pressure. Two and a half.