The Second Shooter (10 page)

"Just what I said. I'm doing my best to help you get out of this with your job and your reputation intact. Not to mention your pension." Blackstone pointed at Donahue's hands, gripped tight on the lapels of his suit jacket and holding him against the wall. "Do you mind?"

Slowly, Donahue released him and stepped back. "I've got almost twenty-five years of service without the slightest blemish."

Blackstone straightened his shirt and tie, thinking that twenty-five years without a blemish meant Donahue hadn't done anything except keep the pencils sharp and shuffle paper from one pile to another. But he didn't say that. What he said was, "This can only end one of two ways: with your indispensible cooperation...or your criminal culpability."

"Criminal culpability? Have you lost your goddamned mind? Do you know who you're talking to?" Donahue pointed to a set of frosted glass doors at the end of the hall. Etched into one door was the FBI seal, and into the other, the Bureau's motto, Fidelity, Bravery, Integrity. "And do you understand where you are? This is the Washington Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. We decide criminal capability. Not the spooks from Langley. And certainly not their contract flunkies."

"Then by all means," Blackstone said, "call your SAC. and brief him on the situation."

Donahue's eyes narrowed.

Blackstone could almost see the wheels grinding inside his head. He decided to give the FBI man a nudge. "I can disappear like that." He snapped his fingers. "And the Agency will deny it's ever even heard of me. Can you do that?" When Donahue didn't answer, Blackstone continued. "What just happened across the river is a big bag of smelly shit. There was a lot of gunfire, maybe some casualties, I don't know. But I do know that a car went up like a Roman fucking candle, and that the fire department and the police are there by now. And both are going to be asking a lot of questions. Like I said, a big bag of smelly shit. And do you know what always happens to a big bag of shit? Somebody gets stuck holding it."

Donahue was actually starting to sweat. "You said there was...a way out of this?"

"Maybe."

Donahue swallowed hard, his Adam's apple bobbing. "How?"

"Let's think about that," Blackstone said, savoring the quick turnaround but still wanting Donahue to feel like he was part of the solution. "Favreau is a dangerous fugitive. I mean, he's clearly proven that by shooting two of my men and trying to blast us out of the sky, right?"

Donahue nodded.

"And he's taken two FBI employees hostage, Miller and... your intel girl."

"Chapman, Stacy Chapman."

"Chapman, right," Blackstone said.

"But you said Miller was cooperating with Favreau and helped him escape."

Blackstone shrugged. "There are no absolutes in this game. The situation, and the truth, is always fluid. It changes. What at first appeared to be a rogue FBI agent helping a wanted terrorist escape custody, may have, upon further review, actually been a courageous FBI agent attempting to stop a terrorist from escaping."

"But we've already leaked the story," Donahue said. "Part of it anyway, and the media is going to be digging for the rest."

"Let them dig," Blackstone said. "Because the confusion only proves what smart military commanders already know, The first report is always wrong. Meaning, we can't ever be one hundred percent certain of anything." He held up a warning finger. "Except that we need to get our hands Favreau."

Again, Donahue nodded in agreement.

"So we notify state and local law enforcement and issue a national security alert...with a top secret shoot-on-sight order."

"What about my people?"

"If they cooperate you can pin medals on them."

"And if they don't?"

Blackstone stared hard at Donahue. "Then you can carve their names into the memorial wall at FBI Headquarters."

Other than a couple of pole-mounted mercury-vapor lamps, the tiny airport in Marshall, Virginia, was very dark and very quiet two hours before dawn. With no runway lights and no air-traffic control, flight operations shut down at sunset and didn't resume until the following morning. The single runway was only long enough to handle small propeller aircraft. Marshall Field was a general aviation airport for private pilots only. It didn't offer enough support services to interest even small commercial operators. Thus, it was dark, quiet, and empty.

Favreau worked a screwdriver into the crack in the office door, between the lock and the jamb, and pried the latch back.

Jake stood beside him. "You said your friend was going to leave the keys to the airplane out for you."

Favreau pulled open the door. "He must have forgotten."

Jake followed him inside the dark office. Somewhere, an alarm indicator beeped. "I don't suppose your friend gave you the alarm code."

The Frenchman rushed around the small office looking for something. "He must have forgotten that too."

Pointing to a metal box mounted to the wall, Jake said, "Try over there."

The box was locked. Favreau pried it open. Inside were half a dozen sets of keys hanging from hooks. Beside each hook was a small hand-lettered description of a rental airplane. Favreau scanned the small print, then plucked a set of keys from the box.

The alarm indicator started beeping faster.

Stacy was waiting for them next to an old Cessna 310 twin-engine propeller plane. "What took you so long?"

"He had to break into the office," Jake said.

She turned to Favreau. "You broke in? What about your friend?"

Jake rolled his eyes at her.

They quickly released the plane's tie-downs. Then Favreau and Jake squeezed into the cockpit and Stacy climbed into one of the four cramped back seats.

"What's in Shady Point, Oklahoma?" Jake asked.

Favreau was rushing through the startup procedure, setting the controls and flipping switches on the instrument panel. "Someone who can help us," he said.

"Who?"

Favreau turned the starter for the left motor. The engine popped a few times and belched black smoke from the exhaust port. Then the motor coughed to life and the propeller began spinning.

"Who's in Shady Point?" Jake demanded.

"It's better if you don't know."

"Why?"

"In case we don't make it," Favreau said. "If we get caught, you can't be forced to reveal something you don't know."

Favreau turned the other starter switch. Just outside Jake's window, the right motor popped and sputtered. Then the pistons fired and the propeller started to turn.

"We better get moving," Stacy said.

Something about her tone made Jake look back at her. She was staring straight ahead through the front windshield. He turned to see what she was looking at. Favreau had already seen it. Across the airfield, outside the fence, racing along a service road, was a police car with its blue lights flashing. "Oh, shit," Jake said.

Favreau released the brakes and goosed the throttles. The Cessna rolled forward.

They didn't follow the taxiway. Favreau drove the Cessna across the grass in a straight line toward the runway. Jake glanced around but couldn't see the windsock in the dark. "Which way is the wind blowing?"

"Doesn't matter," Favreau said.

"I'm not a pilot," Jake said, "but I know you're supposed to take off into the wind."

The airplane's wheels bumped onto the runway.

"You're supposed to," Favreau said as he turned the Cessna to line up with the airstrip. Then without pause he shoved both throttles all the way to their forward stops. The engines groaned with the added power. Favreau glanced at Jake. "The direction of the wind doesn't matter if the police are chasing you."

Jake glanced over his shoulder. Through the cabin window he could see the police car on the apron now, racing at an angle toward the runway.

The airplane was steadily picking up speed. Jake scanned the instrument panel looking for some kind of speedometer, but he couldn't find one in the jumble of dials and gauges. He turned back to check on the police cruiser, but it had disappeared somewhere behind them. The Cessna didn't have a rear window, so Jake couldn't tell if the police car was gaining on them. He heard a siren wailing over the drone of the airplane's engines. "Are we going to make it?"

Favreau nudged the throttles, but they were already as far as they could go. "We'll make it," he said, but he didn't look sure.

A flash of blue lit up the cockpit. Jake turned and saw the police car twenty feet from the right wingtip, charging alongside them. He could see the policeman behind the wheel shouting and waving. The cop in the passenger seat had his pistol in his hand, resting on the dashboard. He was half-turned in his seat, looking at the airplane.

Then the Cessna lifted off the runway. Just a couple of feet at first, until the wind really got under its wings and it climbed much faster. Jake twisted around in the small co-pilot's seat to keep his eyes on the cops. At the end of the runway the police car skidded to a stop, its front tires smoking from the hard braking. As the Cessna banked left, Jake caught a last glimpse of the two policemen as they bailed out of the car and glared at the fleeing airplane.

At 4:00 a.m. Blackstone watched the same UH-1 Huey helicopter that had carried him and Donahue to Fort Marcy Park and back on their unsuccessful strafing run land on the rooftop helipad of the FBI Washington Field Office. This time the helicopter's side doors were closed. This run had been strictly transport. The helicopter had picked up a single passenger from an executive airport in the suburbs. An airport where no passenger manifests were required.

As the rotors spun down, the left side door slid back and a man sprang out. He seemed underdressed for the weather, in khaki pants with a light jacket over a guayabera shirt, but he didn't seem bothered by the chill temperature. He carried a hard-sided Samsonite briefcase in one hand and a Panama hat in the other.

"Who's the old guy?" asked Donahue, who stood next to Blackstone outside the door to the stairwell.

"A specialist."

"A specialist in what?"

"I'm not sure."

"Who sent him?"

"The bosses," Blackstone said as he watched the man walk toward them. He was Latin, late sixties. A tad shorter than average for an American, but the stocky build and confident stride suggested he still had some gas left in the tank. When he stopped a few feet from them, he pushed the Panama hat down on his head and cocked the brim over one eye. He didn't offer his hand, just said, "Are you Blackstone?" in an accent that pegged him as Cuban.

Blackstone nodded and revised his guess at the man's age. Up close, the craggy face put him at seventy minimum, maybe even a couple of years on the other side.

The Cuban jerked a thumb at Donahue. "Who's he?"

Donahue stiffened and before Blackstone could answer said, "I'm FBI Assistant Special Agent in Charge Wendell Donahue. Who the hell are you?"

The Cuban looked Donahue up and down. "You can call me Donald Duck." Then he turned to Blackstone. "Has he been read in?"

"Negative," Blackstone said.

"Then why is he here?"

Again, before Blackstone could answer, Donahue cut him off. "This is the FBI Washington Field Office," Donahue said. "I'm in charge here and I'll ask the questions."

The Cuban smiled. He had a sliver cuspid on the upper left side. He nodded at Donahue as if to say to the FBI man, go ahead, ask your stupid questions.

This meeting had started off badly and Blackstone was pretty sure it wasn't going to end any better. True to form, Donahue was oblivious to the undercurrent of the situation and plowed ahead. "Who are you," he demanded, "and why exactly are you here?"

The Cuban smiled again and the silver canine tooth peeked out a second time from beneath his upper lip, giving him a decidedly sinister look. "My name is Max Garcia," he said. "And at the behest of certain high-ranking government officials, I am here to clean up this clusterfuck, so I can get back to dismantling my liver one Cuba libre at a time. Preferably, on a warm beach somewhere."

Blackstone saw Donahue wilt at the words high-ranking government officials. It would be tough for the FBI bureaucrat to make a power play when he didn't know how much juice this new guy had. Blackstone had his own questions for the Cuban; he just wasn't dumb enough to ask them.

An hour ago Blackstone had gotten a call on his cellphone. The call had come from an unlisted number, and the unidentified voice on the line was not one he had ever heard before. Nevertheless, because of the two seemingly innocuous identification words-randomly selected and changed daily at 24:00 GMT-used in separate sentences with a third buffer sentence between them-in this case, the words were octopus and poem-Blackstone understood the call had been arranged by his control officer at the CIA.

The voice had told Blackstone to expect help in the form of a heavy hitter who was coming off the bench to provide logistical support. The instructions had not included information about the chain of command, so Blackstone wasn't sure if he was working for the Cuban or if the Cuban was working for him. Though after looking at the man's face and getting a glimpse into his cold, dead eyes, Blackstone was pretty sure he knew exactly who the top dog was in this show.

"I understand you know the target personally," Blackstone said.

Garcia nodded. "I recruited him."

"We had him under surveillance for ten days."

"And you lost him."

"Our briefing packet was pretty thin," Blackstone said.

"You were told what you needed to be told."

"Knowing why he's here might help us find him."

Garcia looked from Blackstone to Donahue, who had wisely decided to keep his mouth shut, and back. "The man we're tracking, whose normal area of operations is...let's just say Western Europe, was recently asked to consult on an operation. Shortly after that, he got on a plane and came here. The people who asked him to consult are worried he might be having second thoughts."

"About consulting?"

"About the nature of the operation."