Edge of Honor (32 page)

“This is the actual photo of Maura that the British published. This isn’t a first-generation photo taken from the original negative. Consequently, we cannot do our normal checks like microscopic frame-mark analysis. However, we have done others, such as vanishing-point analysis and stereoscopic viewing. I can tell you, this is one of the best fakes we’ve ever seen. But it is a fake. We checked the grain pattern using a digital-enhancement program. Three separate images were used in this photo. On the screen next to you, look at the disruption of the grain pattern where the man’s hand is touching your mother’s shoulder.”

Turner studied the screen. “You said there were three images used. What’s the third?”

The DCI blushed. “Actually, that’s what gave it away. Like I said, this is the one of the best—”

“Gary,” Turner said, interrupting him and using his first name.

The DCI’s blush grew brighter. “It’s the man’s penis. It’s not his.”

“Talk about penile implants,” the vice president quipped.

Durant asked to see the photo. “How many people are capable of doing this quality of work?” he asked.

“We’re not sure,” the DCI answered. “I suspect the number isn’t large.”

Durant studied the photo for a moment before he committed. This was a perfect test for Cassandra, the new intelligence-gathering system he was developing for the government. “Madame President, I’d like to turn this over to my people and see what they can discover.”

“Thank you, Nelson, I’d appreciate that.”

On the thirtieth lap in the pool, Maddy turned and swam for the far side. Her breath came in an easy rhythm.
I’m not pushing myself
, she thought.

A pretty and athletic Secret Service agent walked along the side of the pool beside her. “You need to pick up the pace, Madame President.”

An image of Noreen Coker flashed in front of Maddy. Then it was gone. She stroked harder, pulling hard. Suddenly, she felt better. She increased the pace and flip-turned, determined to do one more lap. Now she swam hard and the agent was calling the count. “Stroke, stroke, stroke.”

Maddy touched the edge of the pool and looked up. “Thank you.”

The agent smiled. “Almost like old times, Madame President.” Maddy pulled herself out of the pool and the agent handed her a towel. She wrapped a terry-cloth robe around herself and headed for the dressing room, the agent still behind her. “Mr. Parrish and Mr. Litton are waiting for you. But they said to wait until you were finished.”

Strange
, Maddy thought,
important enough to come
down here but not important enough to interrupt my swim
. She steeled herself for what was coming.

Both men stood when she entered the dressing room. Litton spoke first. “Sorry to intrude, Madame President. Liz Gordon backdoored this to us.” He handed her a tear sheet from one of the national scandal newspapers. “It’s hitting the streets this afternoon. It’s a screamer.”

PRESIDENT’S MOTHER POSES NUDE

The headline couldn’t have been more explicit. Directly underneath was a photo of Maddy and Maura during one of her campaigns. “At least they didn’t print
that
picture.”

“According to Liz,” Litton replied, “they did. It’s on page three. But she couldn’t get a copy of that. She did say they blurred out your mother’s breasts.”

“Does my mother know?”

Parrish shook his head. “The crisis team is waiting in the Oval Office.”

She stared at them, rigidly holding the offending article. “What is the matter with these people?”

Litton was embarrassed. “They’re reporters, Ma’am.”

Warsaw

The chief of the American embassy’s administrative section thumbed through his notebook, making sure all relevant questions were answered. Of all his duties, he disliked formal investigations the most. Most of the time, he knew the person being investigated and that put him on the spot. But more important, he was at risk if the person was well connected and could boomerang the investigation back onto the investigating officer. And the subject of this investigation could certainly do that. Like so many things, survival depended on who you knew. He glanced at his watch. It was just after eight in the evening.

“It is late, General Pontowski, thank you for being so patient.” He reviewed Pontowski’s answers, looking for a way to exonerate him and, at the same time, please the
new ambassador. “You mentioned that the fighters were Flankers, which, I believe, are Su-27s.”

“Actually, they were Su-35s, a much improved variant of the Su-27.”

“I see. Does that make a difference?”

“It does if you’re up there hassling with them.”

“I see.” Of course, he didn’t, but maybe someone important would. Back to the original question. “You mentioned that the fighters committed a hostile act. What exactly was that?”

“They were actively jamming us in Polish airspace. That’s a hostile act. We always have the right of self-defense. That’s what all the maneuvering was about.”

The admin officer allowed an inner sigh of relief. He had found what he was looking for and survived another investigation. Now he had to delay submitting the report until some crisis or intervening event would bury it. He calculated five to six weeks would do the trick. Pontowski would be bored, but he too would survive. “Sir, thank you again for your cooperation. Until the ambassador resolves the disposition of your case, you are on administrative leave and relieved of all duties. Your office and most of the embassy is off limits. I’ll need your keys and electronic swipe card.”

Pontowski dropped his keys and swipe card on the desk. Once he left, he was effectively locked out of the embassy. “Can I clear my desk?”

“Of course.” The admin officer closed his notebook and waited. Pontowski gathered up the photograph of his son, address book, and a few mementos from previous assignments. It wasn’t much. Then he walked out and the admin officer locked the door behind him, pocketing the key.

Pontowski sat at Ewa’s desk and stared at his hands. Then he left her a note to please call him at his home.
Damn!
he raged to himself.
How humiliating
. He forced himself to calm down, feeling the need to talk.
It’s after two in the afternoon in Washington. What the hell, why not?
He picked up the phone and asked the operator to dial the White House.

The White House

“Take a seat,” Turner said when Shaw entered the Oval Office. The heads of the six people who made up Turner’s crisis staff turned as one as he found a chair. Shaw’s presence could only mean one thing: she was taking off the gloves and going bare knuckle. She paced the carpet, her arms folded. “I have done some distasteful things in my life,” she said, “but telling my mother about this tops the list. So how do we stop it?”

“I’m not sure we can,” Press Secretary Litton said. “As far as the media is concerned, it’s now a legitimate story. That means we have to start responding to their questions.”

“Treat it as brushfire and stomp it out. I don’t care how, just do it.”

Shaw waited, keying on her every move and gesture as the crisis team discussed their options.
Fuckin’ fools
, he decided. The moment was right when Turner sat down and leaned back in her chair. Now she would listen. “Mizz President, have Joe here call some of his publisher friends and tell ’em this is all a crock. He’s got it from the
highest source
. Maybe a little warning about getting too close to this dog because it’s full of fleas.”

Parrish shook his head. “I can hear the
New York Times
or
Washington Post
hitting the roof. Don’t do it.”

Shaw shrugged, not pushing. But he knew Turner was considering it. She stroked her cheek before nodding. The press secretary picked up a phone and asked the operator to connect him to the publisher of the
Times
.

“Joe Litton here. We’ve seen the headlines and are very concerned.” He listened for a moment, hand over the mouthpiece. “They’re going to run it as a straight story.” Then he was back on the phone. “Right. I’m not telling you to kill the story. But let me tell you, this is a crock. And I’ve got that from the highest source. If you’re going to use it, keep going with your own investigation. It’ll prove what I’m saying. If you go with the story as is, there will be a price, a very steep price.” He banged the phone down. “She got the message.”

“Perhaps,” the domestic affairs policy advisor ven
tured, “it would be best to let Maura respond as a private citizen who has been libeled.”

Before Shaw could step on that, the door burst open and Turner’s secretary rushed into the room. “Madame President, it’s your mother. She’s had a heart attack…”

“Damn those bastards to hell!” Turner blasted. She ran out of the office.

The secretary returned to her desk, deeply worried. The phone rang and she picked it up. “I’m sorry, General Pontowski, but, but,” she broke down in tears, unable to talk.

Shaw took the phone. “Patrick Shaw.”

“I want to speak to Maddy,” Pontowski said.

“Maybe I’m having a senior moment here, but didn’t we discuss this? The president can’t take your call.” He dropped the phone into its cradle with finality.

Warsaw

Evan Riley sat at his desk and read through the stack of cables, faxes, telephone call transcripts, and e-mail the CIA had monitored coming into the embassy. It amazed him that the foreign service assumed he didn’t do that type of thing. What he learned from this surreptitious activity reinforced his cynical nature while providing many humorous stories for the CIA agents working on the third floor.

As a result, he saw the cable from the State Department ordering the CIA to stop providing intelligence to the SPS before anyone else. But he had also monitored the backdoor messages between Bender and the national security advisor. He knew what the president wanted. And this wasn’t it. The conflict was not new and, in the give-and-take of foreign policy, it only meant the mandarins in the State Department were in ascendancy. Because he considered himself a professional spook, loyal to his masters, he could live with that.

His computer buzzed at him. He spun around in his chair and read the flash message. The CIA had posted a Category-2 warning that the Russian Mafiya was going to attack the SPS in less than eighteen hours. And it didn’t get much better than a Cat-2.

Now he had a problem. “This sucks,” he muttered to no one. He checked his watch. Knowing how the embassy worked, it would take at least two hours before the first message was regularly processed and worked its way to him. Then he would have to act on it and stop providing
intelligence to the SPS. He made a decision and phoned Duncan’s office, but there was no answer. He was hesitant about calling Duncan on a cell phone as the call was easily monitored and, coming from Riley, would set off alarms.

Frustrated, he phoned Ewa Pawlik, trusting her discretion. “Ewa, would you and Peter Duncan care to join me at Blikle’s for coffee? Say, in about two hours, around four o’clock?” She said she’d be delighted and would pass the invitation on to Mr. Duncan. Riley rapidly cleared his desk and left, telling his secretary he would be out for most of the afternoon. How could he act on a message he hadn’t seen?

As usual, the cake shop on Nowy Świat Street was crowded. Ewa spoke to a waiter and he pointed to the back room where there was an empty table. Duncan followed her, fully aware she was drawing more than a few appreciative glances from the men and hostile stares from the women. They sat down and before they could order, Evan Riley joined them. He handed Duncan a note with a simple, “This is the telephone number you wanted.” They exchanged a few pleasantries and Riley left, finally able to return to the embassy where his desk was piled with paperwork and the message he knew was waiting for him. Once he read it, he would make sure that no more intelligence was passed to the SPS.

Duncan waited until after they had finished their coffee before whipping out his cell phone and dialing the number. A pleasant woman’s voice answered and told him about an apartment that was available in Konstancin. But he had to act immediately. She gave him an address.

Duncan cursed the heavy traffic as he drove south out of Warsaw and it took him an hour to reach Konstancin. After flailing around in the dark trying to find the address, he asked a teenage boy for directions. Much to his surprise, the address was across the street from a dingy yellow army barracks located in the heart of the suburb. He turned into a gated drive and was greeted by a Caucasian shepherd, a huge shaggy gray watchdog. A middle-aged woman came out, tethered the dog, and opened the gate.

Inside, another woman was waiting for him. “I’m sorry
but the apartment has been rented,” she said. “I’m not sure you would want it.” She gestured across the street at the barracks. “In the old days girls worked here servicing them.” Duncan almost laughed. The house was a CIA listening post that had been a brothel. She held out her hand and he gave her the slip of paper with the phone number. The way the number was written was his entree. “Forget this number and address.” He nodded and she spoke in a low voice. “The SPS compound at Kutno will be attacked tonight by the Russians. We’re not sure of the exact time or how.”

Again, Duncan nodded. He glanced at his watch. Where could he find Jerzy Fedor at this hour to pass on the warning?

“Do not contact Fedor,” the woman said, anticipating his next move. “He may be compromised.” Duncan reached for his phone to call the SPS. She reached out and stopped him. “Don’t. They’re monitoring the phones at the SPS.”

“Oh, shit.” Duncan ran for his car.

Ewa was still at work at six-thirty that same evening, wading through the paperwork that had piled up on her desk while she was out with Duncan. The last item was a big envelope from the Ministry of Culture and Tourism. She carefully opened it and read the cover letter. Suddenly, the long, frustrating day turned wonderful, full of promise. She reached for the phone and hit the speed-dial button.

“Pontowski,” the familiar voice answered.

“This is Ewa. I have a most interesting letter from the Polish government. They’re offering you a chance to visit your family cottage that has been restored as a tourist attraction. Of course, there will be some photographers at the cottage for publicity, but other than that, you’ll be free to explore your heritage.”

“I didn’t know there was a Pontowski cottage. Grandpop only said we were descended from good, lusty, peasant stock.”

“Then it must be a farmhouse,” Ewa told him.

“Where is it?”

She checked the letter. “It’s near Jankowice on the Vis
tula River. I don’t know where that is. But you”—she almost said
we—
“will be staying in Krakow. So it must be near there. You’ll love Krakow. It’s a very pretty city, even in winter.”

“Sounds good. Do I get an interpreter or guide?”

“I’ll check into it,” Ewa promised.

Bethesda, Maryland

The doors leading into the Bethesda Naval Medical Center swung open and the waiting reporters and cameramen waiting outside automatically stepped forward. Just as quickly, they stepped back when Maddy Turner came out. The respectful hush lasted three steps. “Madame President,” a reporter asked, breaking the silence, “how’s your mother?” Turner stopped as more questions were shouted at her.

“She’s stable. The doctors are very optimistic.”

Another question from the back carried over the crowd. The speaker had a deep baritone voice that carried weight and could not be ignored. “Was it because of the photograph?”

Turner didn’t answer at first and fixed the reporter with a hard look. Maura was a tough, savvy woman who knew how the system worked and it was only a matter of time before the doctored photos were published in the U.S. More important, Maura had a history of minor heart problems. But for Turner, it was a moment a politician lives for. It was an opportunity to beat up the media. “I can tell you she was very upset.” Her words came faster, building in momentum. “My God, the woman’s sixty-eight years old. She didn’t deserve this.” Just as quickly, the storm passed and she was in control. “But did that cause her heart attack? I don’t know.”

The deep baritone questioner was back. “Then you don’t hold the press responsible?”

The sharp look on her face said more than any words. But her answer was calm. “I like to think that the media and I have the same moral values. Joe Litton will have a
statement in your hands within the hour.” She walked toward the waiting cars.

“Madame President,” a woman said, her voice cracking, “please give our best to your mother. Our prayers are with her.”

Patrick Shaw was waiting for her in the presidential limousine. The president’s departure from the hospital had been as carefully staged as a Broadway production and he was pleased. The reporter with the deep voice he planted had triggered the answers he wanted. But Patrick Shaw was still a very worried man.

Maddy climbed in and sat down. She leaned back in the seat and closed her eyes. “She’s fine. It was a minor attack.”

The iron bands around Shaw’s heart eased. “That was a perfect exit, Madame President. You held them by the neck and kicked them where it did the most good.”

“I’m not finished yet. Those bastards are going to learn to play by the rules.”

The bands were back, clamping Shaw’s heart.

Near Bialystok, Poland

The operator on duty in the bunker at the Crown East radar site was like a child with a new toy; he couldn’t keep his hands off the controls of the new TPS-59 radar. Unbidden, his right hand rolled the control ball until the cursor was over the only target on the screen. He pressed the ball to the first detent and the computer displayed a wealth of information. The aircraft was a Russian Antonov-124 transport. The huge cargo plane was the Russian answer to the Americans’ C-5 Galaxy and was rarely seen outside Russia, much less at night. The operator checked the flight plan. The Antonov was on a routine mission and not one of the troublesome diplomatic flights.

He tracked the westbound aircraft as it flew past Warsaw. He almost called the tactical threat officer when the aircraft slowed to 140 knots ground speed. But when it remained at 32,000 feet and on the same heading, he
changed his mind. The crazy Russkies were probably having mechanical problems.

Near Kutno, Poland

The six-man crew on the Antonov-124 were warm and comfortable on the fully pressurized upper deck. On command, the flight engineer depressurized the cargo deck and closely monitored the cabin’s pressure as the rear cargo doors opened. The pilot felt the big aircraft pitch up slightly as the ninety-four men in the rear bailed out. He readjusted the trim while the cargo doors closed and the copilot pushed the throttles back up to cruise speed.

Outside, the jumpers deployed their highly modified parachutes, checked their oxygen for the long descent, and clapped their hands to stay warm in the freezing night air. Thanks to the small Global Positioning System receiver each man carried, they had no trouble steering for the target fifteen miles away. The lead man checked the big watch strapped to the emergency chute on his chest. They would be on the ground in twenty-one minutes.

The commander of the SPS was caged fury when Duncan told him about the impending attack. But he was far too professional to act rashly. He glanced at his watch: almost midnight. “They’ll be monitoring us, if they’re any good.”

“Assume they’re good,” Duncan replied. “If the attackers are in place, activity in the compound will key the attack. If the attackers are still moving into position, activity will probably force an abort.”

The commander uttered a fine Polish profanity. “They’ll go for the communications center first. Unfortunately, most of my people here are cadets. My instructors have taught them ‘silent alert’ procedures but we’ve never practiced it.” He studied the clock on the wall for a moment and made his decision. “We still have some time.” He picked up the phone and set the alert in motion.

The communications center responded first. The duty officer prepared an attack message and opened a line to
the Army’s central command post. The two sergeants on duty secured the bunker doors and opened the weapons safe. Inside the barracks, two instructors moved silently from bed to bed waking cadets. The commands were simple. No lights and no noise. Wear battle fatigues, vests, and helmets. Stay low and gather by the door. On command, run for the armory and draw your weapon. Go to a defensive position as instructed.
This is not a drill
.

Duncan followed the commander to the armory where they had to wait for a weapons custodian. It seemed an eternity before the sergeant arrived. The commander told Duncan to stay and help pass out weapons until more custodians arrived, then join him in the command post. The commander was issued a side arm and a Heckler and Koch MP-5 submachine gun. A smooth bolt action and long silencer made it the perfect weapon for close-in fighting. Then he disappeared into the night. Duncan felt the tension slowly coil like a spring being wound up.

The first batch of cadets piled through the door and were rapidly issued weapons. An instructor sent them to guard the command post and the communications center. “Try not to do yourself any injury,” he said, motioning them into the night. He swore when they collided with the next group of arriving cadets. Two more weapons custodians arrived and Duncan was issued a side arm, vest, and helmet before he too left for the command post.

Outside, he paused for a moment to let his eyes adapt to the night. He wished he had night-vision goggles, but the limited number available were going to squad leaders. The third group of cadets ran past him, heading for the armory. Duncan took a deep breath as primeval instinct emerged from its hidden niche. Adrenaline surged through him and he was more alert and alive than he had been in years. He looked around, now fully accustomed to the night. Instinctively, he looked up. Four dark shadows drifted across the darkened sky.

Parachutists!
Duncan raged to himself. His heart raced as the shadows passed overhead and drifted over the trees south of the compound. For a moment, he couldn’t move, frozen with fear. He had never been trained for this type of combat and it was totally beyond him.
Run!
he told
himself. Another thought came to him.
These are my friends. I’ve got to warn them
. He ran for the command post.

A cadet stopped him with a challenge. “I don’t know the fuckin’ password,” he growled. “Look up.” The cadet did as two more shadows passed overhead. “Those are parachutes. Pass the warning.” The cadet ran into the command post and the heavy steel door banged shut, stranding Duncan outside. “Ah, shit,” he moaned, his fear back. Another dark shadow drifted over, this time much closer to the ground, obviously about to land. Duncan crouched in the shadows as the parachutist touched down. The man gave a little grunt on impact, his feet protesting in pain after the long exposure to the cold. He expertly collapsed his parachute, his back to Duncan.

Duncan never hesitated. He glided across the thirty feet separating them as he drew his weapon. He held the automatic low on his waist as he poked the rigid forefinger of his left hand against the man’s neck, just below his left ear. “Freeze, asshole.”