I Minus 72 (14 page)

Grant raised his eyebrows.
She was one impressive lady . . . er, young lady. That part still
discouraged him. “Nice work, Sam. The gun just might come in handy.
I’ll carry it. And these communicators are nice. Much better than
we had when I was in the field. Oh, by the way, just in case
I
am
a target,
you’d better call the hotel, check out of the room we had in my
name, book a room in your own name and ask the hotel to transfer
all personal items to the new room. Tell them also that if anyone
asks for me, just say that I’ve checked out and tell them not to
mention that we’ve swapped rooms. Do you have a credit
card?”

“Yes, I do. I never leave home without it.”
She laughed at her own corny joke. She used her mobile phone to
call the hotel. They said they would be most happy to do as she
asked and the rooms would be switched within the hour. Anyone who
inquired would simply be told that Mr. Thurmond has checked out
with no forwarding address.

Grant then told Sam he’d decided it would be
safer if they both stayed at the hospital that night. They could go
back to the hotel before dawn the next day. They spent the rest of
the evening talking about a variety of things, then Sam bid Grant a
good night and arranged herself in the easy chair in his room. At
least she had a blanket. Grant’s last thought before drifting off
was how nice it would be if she were lying next to him instead of
in that chair. Sam’s last thought was how nice it would be if she
were lying next to him instead of in that chair.

That night he dreamed. Vivid dreams of his
time in Lebanon. Dreams he hadn’t had for a while. He had been sent
in by DIA to set up intelligence gathering networks that might help
identify terrorists. At that time, the terrorists in Lebanon were
bombing US’ and other western interests and kidnapping both
civilian and military personnel. The goal was to determine who was
supplying the various terrorist cells with weapons and explosives.
Were they also supplying armor and other vehicles? Were other
countries, such as Syria or Iran, supplying not just weapons but
training? They had identified AK47s taken off dead terrorists in
Beirut as originating in the Soviet Union, so how involved were
they? His job was to find out.

Many of his missions were hazardous but many
were also routine, and a major challenge was not becoming
complacent. He traveled with just an Israeli Army translator and
would be away from his operational base in Israel for up to a week
at a time. To provide some level of protection, they didn’t use a
car. The roads weren’t safe. So, a chopper would drop him and his
interpreter off at a location away from people and would meet him a
few days later in another designated location. Although he knew
that a few of the towns in the area were terrorist strongholds, he
felt reasonably safe asking the local town leaders to give him
information about whom they saw passing through. His goal was to
set up a clandestine network of villagers who would keep track of
who they saw and feed that information back to him. He had
photographs of uniforms of the different armies in the region,
including Russia, and would show these to people living both in the
countryside and in towns. Sometimes the people would respond and
sometimes, out of fear, they would keep silent. The terrorists were
brutal to informers.

The mission he dreamed of while sleeping in
the hospital had ended in disaster. As usual, the town he
approached had only one main road. He guessed there were about two
hundred residents. He had been there a few times before and had
been greeted warmly, been fed and offered a bed at night. He had
never stayed, fearing the terrorists would come in the night. Given
this history, he felt he had nothing to fear as one morning he and
his interpreter walked straight into the middle of the town with
their sidearms concealed. The village was normally very quiet, but
as he approached he realized there were absolutely no people
around. Almost as if the village was deserted. Before he could draw
his weapon and take cover, more than fifty armed men in all sorts
of dress came out of the buildings and surrounded them, shouting
for them to lie down on their stomachs. They were quickly disarmed,
hands and legs tied, then beaten, kicked and dragged around the
dusty streets of the village for what seemed like hours. There was
lots of cheering and celebrating, with men firing their rifles into
the air. For three nights they were kept in a barn, with the
beating and taunting continuing during the day.

On the fourth day, someone completely
dressed in black and with only his eyes showing began to question
them. Thurmond was accused of being a CIA spy because he was
American and in civilian clothes. His interpreter was accused of
being an Israeli spy. He was informed that he would continue to be
beaten until he admitted he was a CIA spy and confessed to war
crimes of aiding Israel in killing innocent Muslims. Of course,
Thurmond couldn’t admit that he was part of an American military
intelligence organization without confirming he was a spy and he
would die rather than betray his country’s trust in him.

Early one morning two days after they had
been questioned by the man in black, he and the Israeli soldier
were brought into the center of town and told they were to be
executed for spying. They were both bound, stood side by side and
the man who questioned them, brandishing a semi-automatic pistol,
walked up behind them. He first stood behind the interpreter,
pulled back the hammer and fired one shot into the back of his
head. The man fell forward, face down into the dirt. The officer
then walked up behind Thurmond, cocked the gun and . . . .

At that moment, Grant was startled awake by
someone shaking him violently. He came up quickly with a wild look
on his face, hands up in a defensive posture.

“Grant, it’s me, Sam,” she said, putting her
hand on his arm. “You were really out. You must have been having a
nightmare.”

“Uh, sorry. Yeah, a bad dream about a bad
mission. Sort of a recurring nightmare. Don’t usually sleep that
hard. Did they give me something in the IV?”

“They did pump something into you, but I
don’t know what. Probably IV morphine. That stuff really works. Had
it once in Iraq when I was hit by shrapnel from an IED. A really
pleasant feeling and I slept like a baby.”

“You were wounded in Iraq?” Grant was still
groggy, but was coming around.

“Yeah, painful, but as it turned out, not
serious. I declined medevac to the States. Thought I ought to
finish my combat tour. I was assigned to you as soon as I returned.
They called this ‘light duty’. Looks like I’m even getting a Purple
Heart out of it.”

“Another medal? Seems like I find out
something new about you every day. You’re quite a woman.” Grant
just looked at her for a moment and then finally said, “Okay, let’s
get out of here. I want to be in our hotel room before dawn. Now
where’re my clothes?”

“I suppose there’s no way I can talk you out
of this? What about just one more day in here to make sure there
are no complications?” Sam asked, biting her lower lip again.

“Where are my clothes?” Grant repeated a
little slowly and more forcefully.

Grant found movement a little painful, but
tolerable, and as they walked out of the hospital and headed back
to the Hilton, Sam asked about his dream. Grant told her the
highlights and that he had spent over a month in captivity before
being traded to Israel for an imprisoned terrorist leader. After
nearly two months in captivity, Grant, at 6’2” tall had lost nearly
thirty pounds. They shipped him back to Bethesda Naval Hospital for
treatment and recuperation.

When he finally got home almost nine months
after he’d initially left, he found the note from his wife telling
him she couldn’t take it anymore. He only saw her once since, that
was at the divorce hearing.

When Grant finished, Sam was quiet. “I’m
sorry I didn’t know you then,” she said softly.

Twenty minutes later as they approached the
hotel, Grant said, “At this hour, it’s not likely that anyone will
be watching, but I think we should take precautions. You go in
through the front door and pick up the keycards for our new room.
Examine the lobby very closely to see if anyone’s there. If you see
someone, memorize the face. I’ll go to the side door and wait for
you to open it. They usually lock the side doors at night, but
they’re rarely alarmed. Keep your voice low at the desk. Don’t want
anyone to overhear your name. No use making this any easier for our
tail than we have to.” Grant, out of breath from the walk, sat down
on a low rock fence in front of an old house.

Sam saw no one other than the registration
desk clerk in the lobby, and she and Grant were in their new room
in five minutes. It was hard to believe anyone spotted them going
in. True to their word, the hotel had transferred all their
personal belongings to the new room and, since it was identical to
the other one, all the items were in the same place.

I minus 39

Later that night, after checking and finding
he had no new messages, Vladimir sat back, opened yet another vodka
from the mini-bar and thought about his next steps. There were too
many hospitals in Warsaw to track down the one where Thurmond was,
so he would just have to wait him out. That meant a lot of lobby
time, but it would be worth it. Wonder if Thurmond knew he was
targeted? Probably not. Probably just thinks it was a hit and run.
Maybe some drunk. So he most likely won’t be on guard any more than
usual. If things got too dicey with him, Vladimir figured he could
always snatch the girl and use her to force Thurmond to meet. Then
he would take them both out.

Deciding to see if he could worm Thurmond’s
room number out of the clerk, he placed a call to the desk asking
to be connected to his room. The clerk told him Thurmond had
checked out and left no forwarding address. This was not good news.
When could he have checked out? As far as Vladimir knew, Thurmond
was still in the hospital. Maybe the girl had checked him out. But,
when did they get their luggage? Something’s really wrong with
this, he thought. He decided to spend at least the next day sitting
around the lobby in case they showed up to collect their
belongings. He certainly had no other way of picking up their
trail.

Vladimir was an old hand at this business,
but he hadn’t been active in the field for a long time. For many
years he’d had a pretty easy life as a middle management government
bureaucrat, a great cover for passing misinformation to the US, but
it wasn’t a good way to maintain his field skills. This inactivity,
just sitting around waiting to pick up Thurmond’s trail, was
frustrating. And he had this feeling that the Russians were getting
closer to identifying him—nothing solid, just a hunch. He had
another vodka.

I minus 38

Vladimir, feeling a little hung over, woke a
little later than normal and went down to the lobby restaurant to
have a leisurely breakfast. He kept an eye on the lobby the whole
time he was eating, but he never saw Thurmond or the girl.

Garcia, meanwhile, had arrived in Warsaw
early that morning and while Vladimir was eating, Garcia was
watching the front entrance of the hotel. He’d taken up a position
across the street and a few doors down on the bench of a covered
bus stop. Bundled up against the cold in the rough clothes and hat
of a Polish workman, he didn’t think anyone, even Thurmond, would
give him a second glance. Earlier he had checked with the hospital
to find that Thurmond had been discharged, so he had to assume he’d
returned to the hotel. If he left by any of the front or side
entrances, Garcia would see him. Now it was time to just sit at the
bus stop and wait.

To help legitimize his cover, he lit up a
Caro, a popular Polish cigarette. Although Garcia didn’t smoke
currently, he had in college, so he knew how to inhale and make
himself look like a smoker. Wow, these things were stronger than he
remembered, he thought. He coughed as he breathed in the smoke. As
he sat there, Garcia thought about his career at the CIA and about
his secret orders to eliminate the bad guy before Thurmond could
question him. He didn’t know exactly why that was required, but he
knew he had to follow orders. Given where these orders came from,
one simply didn’t question them. He had sworn allegiance and there
was only one punishment for failure.

After eating, Vladimir took up his position
in the hotel lobby and started to read the daily newspaper. The
lobby was busy this morning, but he was sure he would have no
trouble picking out Thurmond and the girl.

Upstairs in their new room, Grant and Sam
enjoyed a full room-service breakfast and were discussing the day’s
activities. Because he was still in considerable pain, Grant had
skipped his normal morning exercise routine of stretching, sit-ups
and pushups. He was not just sore, but really stiff as well. He’d
tried a few stretching exercises when he first got out of bed, but
he just couldn’t do it.

Seeing that Grant was moving slowly, Sam
asked, “Pretty sore, huh?”

Grant responded with a grunt.

“Have you ever tried yoga?” She asked.

“Yeah, that’s me. Yoga man,” Grant
scoffed.

“You laugh, but it’s really good exercise
for both the body and mind. I know a few positions, want me to
teach you?”

Yeah, you bet, baby—soon as my ribs heal up,
he thought, but he said, “Not today. I’m really not up for it.”
Then he said, “We’ve got to pick things up a bit. We’re losing
time. I’ll bet the President-elect is getting nervous right about
now. I know I would be. So here’s the plan. We have just one more
day, today, to meet with the other contacts before I would have to
make another mark and try again. That means another three days here
and I don’t want to waste that much time. Let’s hope at least one
of the others shows up today. Since I’m not in very good shape, I
need your help. I’d like you to leave about ten minutes before I
do. Go to the first meeting place and find a position where you can
see me, but not close enough for anyone else to see you. If you see
anyone who looks like they’re paying me even just a little more
attention than the rest of the people around me, let me know
instantly on the communicator. Got it?”