“I figured you for a revolver,” Jack said with a grin. It was the first time that they’d had the Murrays over.
“I miss my Python, but the Bureau’s switching over to automatics. Besides, I don’t chase bad guys anymore. I chase memos, and position papers, and budget estimates.” A rueful shake of the head. “What fun.”
“I know the feeling,” Ryan agreed, leading Murray to the kitchen. “Beer?”
“Sounds good to me.”
They’d first met in London, at St. Thomas’s Hospital to be precise, some years earlier when Murray had been legal attaché to the American Embassy, and Ryan had been a shooting victim. Still tall and spare, his hair a little thinner but not yet gray, Murray was an affable, free-spirited man whom one would never pick for a cop, much less one of the best around. A gifted investigator, he’d hunted down every sort of criminal there was, and though he now chafed at his absence from hands-on police work, he was handling his administrative job as skillfully as all his others.
“What’s this sting I heard about?” Jack asked.
“TARPON? The Cartel murdered a guy who was laundering money for them on a very big scale – and doing some major-league skimming, too. He left records behind. We found them. It’s been a busy couple of weeks running all the leads down.”
“I heard six-hundred-plus-million bucks.”
“It’ll go higher. The Swiss cracked open a new account this afternoon.”
“Ouch.” Ryan popped open a couple of beers. “That’s a real sting, isn’t it?”
“I think they’ll notice this one,” Murray agreed. “What’s this I hear about your new job?”
“You probably heard right. It’s just that you don’t want to get a promotion this way.”
“Yeah. I’ve never met Admiral Greer, but the Director thinks a lot of him.”
“Two of a kind. Old-fashioned honorable gentlemen,” Jack observed. “Endangered species.”
“Hello, Mr. Murray,” Sally Ryan said from the door.
“Mister Murray?”
“Uncle Dan!” Sally raced up and delivered a ferocious hug. “Aunt Liz says that you and Daddy better get out there,” she said with a giggle.
“Why do we let them push us warriors around, Jack?”
” ‘Cause they’re tougher than we are?” Ryan wondered.
Dan laughed. “Yeah, that explains it. I -” Then his beeper went off. Murray pulled the small plastic box from his belt. In a moment the LCD panel showed the number he was supposed to call. “You know, I’d like to waste the bastard who invented these things.”
“He’s already dead,” Jack replied deadpan. “He came into a hospital emergency room with chest pains, and after the doc figured out who he was, they were a little slow getting around to treating him. The doc explained later that he had had an important phone call come in, and… oh, well…” Ryan’s demeanor changed. “You need a secure line? I have one in the library.”
“Color me important,” Murray observed. “No. Can I use this one?”
“Sure, the bottom button’s a D.C. line.”
Murray punched in the number without referring to his beeper. It was Shaw’s office. “Murray here. You rang, Alice? Okay… Hi, Bill, what gives?”
It was as though the room took a sudden chill. Ryan felt it before he understood the change in Murray’s face.
“No chance that – oh, yeah, I know Pete.” Murray checked his watch. “Be there in forty minutes.” He hung up.
“What happened?”
“Somebody killed the Director,” Dan answered simply.
“What – where?”
“Bogotá. He was down for a quiet meeting, along with the head of DEA. Flew down this afternoon. They kept it real quiet.”
“No chance that -”
Murray shook his head. “The attaché down there’s Pete Morales. Good agent, I worked OC with him once. He said they were all killed instantly. Emil, Harry Jefferson, the ambassador, all the security guys.” He stopped and read the look on Jack’s face. “Yeah, somebody had some pretty good intel on this.”
Ryan nodded. “This is where I came in…”
“I don’t think there’s a street agent in the Bureau who doesn’t love that man.” Murray set his beer down on the counter.
“Sorry, pal.”
“What was it you said? Endangered species?” Murray shook his head and went to collect his wife. Ryan hadn’t even closed the door behind them when his secure phone started ringing.
The Hideaway, located only a few miles from the Luray Caverns, was a modern building despite its deliberate lack of some modern amenities. While there was no in-room cable television, no pay-for-view satellite service, no complimentary paper outside the door every morning, there was air conditioning, running water, and the room-service menu was six pages long, supplemented by ten full pages of wine listings. The hotel catered to newlyweds who needed few distractions and to others trying to save their marriages from distractions. Service was on the European model. The guest wasn’t expected to do anything but eat, drink, and rumple the linen, though there were saddle horses, tennis courts, and a swimming pool for those few whose suite didn’t include a bathtub large enough for the purpose. Moira watched her lover tip the bellman ten dollars – far more than he ever tipped anyone – before she thought to ask the most obvious question.
“How did you register?”
“Mr. and Mrs. Juan Díaz.” Another embarrassed look. “Forgive me, but I didn’t know what else to say. I didn’t think” – he lied haltingly. “And I didn’t want – what could I say without embarrassing myself?” he finally asked with a frustrated gesture.
“Well, I need a shower. Since we are husband and wife, you may join me. It looks big enough for two.” She walked from the room, dropping her silk blouse on the bed as she went.
Five minutes later, Cortez decided that the shower was easily big enough for four. But as things turned out, that was just as well.
The President had flown to Camp David for the weekend, and had barely showered himself when his junior military aide – a Marine lieutenant had the duty – brought him the cordless phone.
“Yes – what is it?”
The lieutenant’s first reaction on seeing the President’s expression was to wonder where his pistol was.
“I want the Attorney General, Admiral Cutter, Judge Moore, and Bob Ritter flown here immediately. Tell the press secretary to call me in fifteen minutes to work on the statement. I’ll be staying here for the time being. What about bringing them back home? Okay – we have a couple of hours to think about that. For now, the usual protocol. That’s right. No, nothing from State. I’ll handle it from here, then the secretary can have his say. Thank you.” The President pushed the kill button on the phone and handed it back to the Marine.
“Sir, is there anything that the guard detail needs -”
“No.” The President explained briefly what had happened. “Carry on, Lieutenant.”
“Aye aye, sir.” The Marine left.
The President put on his bathrobe and walked over to the mirror to comb his hair. He had to use the terrycloth of his sleeve to wipe the condensation off the glass. Had he noticed, he would have wondered why the look in his eyes didn’t shatter it.
“Okay,” the President of the United States told the mirror. “So you bastards want to play…”
The flight from Andrews to Camp David was made in one of the new VH-60 Blackhawk helicopters that the 89th Military Airlift Wing had just acquired. Plushly appointed to carry VIPs from place to place, it was still too noisy for anything approximating a normal conversation. Each of the four passengers stared out the windows on the sliding doors, watching the western Maryland hills slide beneath the aircraft, each alone with his grief and his anger. The trip took twenty minutes. The pilot had been told to hurry.
On touching down, the four men were loaded into a car for the short drive to the President’s cabin on the grounds. They found him hanging up the phone. It had taken half an hour to locate his press secretary, further exacerbating the President’s already stormy mood.
Admiral Cutter started to say something about how sorry everyone was, but the President’s expression cut him short.
The President sat down on a couch opposite the fireplace. In front of him was what most people ordinarily took to be a coffee table, but now, with the top removed, it was a set of computer screens and quiet thermal printers that tapped into the major news wire services and other government information channels. Four television sets were in the next room, tuned into CNN and the major networks. The four visitors stared down at him, watching the anger come off the President like steam from a boiling pot.
“We will not let this one slip past with us standing by and deploring the event,” the President said quietly as he looked up. “They killed my friend. They killed my ambassador. They have directly challenged the sovereign power of the United States of America. They want to play with the big boys,” the President went on in a voice that was grotesquely calm. “Well, they’re going to have to play by the big boys’ rules. Peter,” he said to the AG, “there is now an informal Presidential Finding that the drug Cartel has initiated an undeclared war against the government of the United States. They have chosen to act like a hostile nation-state. We will treat them as we would treat a hostile nation-state. As President, I am resolved to carry the fight to the enemy as we would carry it to any other originator of state-sponsored terrorism.”