Blowback, p.15
Blowback, page 15
She’s expecting him to explode, or snap back at her, but instead he shakes his head in what looks to be amusement and says, “Our Miss Himel, looking to dot the i’s and cross the t’s.”
Noa says, “This Miss Himel wants to ensure that her actions are legal. Sir, have the notifications been made?”
Simple answer, and to the point: “No.”
All right, she thinks, here we go.
“Sir, it’s been two months since I began operations in the United States, which is against the CIA’s charter and the law,” she says. “I cannot proceed in the future under your direction.”
“What do you propose to do, then?” he asks, voice still cool and calm. “Go squeal to the New York Times on how poor Noa Himel is being mistreated by that bad man in the White House?”
Noa’s voice rises in response. “Frankly, sir, what you’ve just said is beneath you. I won’t break my vows of confidentiality and I won’t leak to the press what missions I’ve accomplished.”
“Even if they were good missions, designed to protect me and the nation?”
Noa says, “If the missions were done on American soil without congressional approval, it doesn’t matter what kind of missions they were.”
He shakes his head. “Sorry, Noa, I can’t let you go. You will continue doing your job.”
Noa stands up, knowing she’s losing it and not caring. “Mr. President, go to hell. We’re becoming your personal hit squad—assassins—like some Central American dictatorship. It ends with me today, and you can’t stop me.”
“Give me ten seconds,” he says.
She remains standing. Takes a breath.
“All right, sir, ten seconds.”
The president opens a desk drawer, takes out a computer tablet, wakes it, works a few keys, and rotates it so that Noa can see the image on the screen.
An apparent drone photo, taken at about a dozen feet or so in altitude, but showing in great clarity the Virginia landscape and her team and the stopped vehicles, but, most important of all, her with a pistol aimed at the forehead of the Iranian Quds member lying on the pavement.
“It’s also on video,” he says. “Do you want to see it?”
“No.”
“Then sit down.”
Noa returns to her chair, legs weak. The president sighs, closes the tablet, and returns it to the desk. “If I were to show this to a member of the attorney general’s office, how long before you were indicted on a first-degree-murder charge? And what evidence could you provide on your behalf? Was the man threatening you? Was he armed? Or were you performing an extra-legal execution?”
Noa speaks but it’s like someone else’s voice is coming out of her mouth. “I had to make a tough field decision, in an operation sanctioned by you, Mr. President.”
“Really?” he asks. “Do you have in your possession a memorandum from me, authorizing you to shoot wounded and unarmed prisoners in your custody?”
Noa is trapped. She knows it and the president knows it. If she were to go to the press now and reveal all, it would be the president’s word against hers, and he has the video evidence—slippery bastard that he is—to prove his point.
Noa Himel executed a wounded prisoner in cold blood.
The president says, “Noa? Anything to say?”
“No, sir.”
He puts his hands together and leans toward her. “We’re taking a break for a little while. You, me, and Liam Grey and his team. And when we start up again, you’re going to continue to be a valued member of my domestic team. Do you understand?”
Noa hates how faint her voice has become. “Yes, sir.”
“To make it even more clear, so even a woman like you can understand, I own your ass. You will continue to operate in the United States, and screw the laws, and screw Congress.”
A weird, odd laugh comes from the president. “That’s funny. You know why? Because you do have a cute ass, and I could take you now, toss you over my desk, and screw you six ways to Sunday, and you couldn’t do a damn thing about it. Because I’ve got evidence that you’re a stone-cold killer, Noa Himel, safely kept in my hands.”
Noa can’t say a word, can’t move, can’t even bear to look at the man.
“But that’s beneath me, as you said. So think of this. You leave the White House and if I feel like doing it, within the hour, I’ll come for you. You will no longer exist, your records will be wiped, you will become an un-person.”
“Are…you threatening to kill me?”
“Worse,” he says. “I’m threatening to make you disappear. Like you never existed. You think I can’t do that?”
Noa’s mind is a blank.
“Now I will allow you to leave,” he says. “So do so.”
Defeated, face warm with humiliation, Noa gets up and tries to walk leisurely to the door leading out and away from this man, but she feels like running.
God, she feels like running out of this place.
CHAPTER 50
LIAM ISN’T SURE what time it is, consumed as he is by an internal struggle to prioritize two sworn duties: to uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States and to keep confidential—forever—his work within the Central Intelligence Agency.
He’s sitting on a park bench, nearly in the dark, waiting. He’s in Maywood Park on 22nd Street North, in Arlington, waiting, his senses at high alert, looking and listening and just feeling.
It took him more than an hour to get here, going dark, doubling back and checking and rechecking, and he’s convinced he’s “gone black,” avoiding all surveillance. Liam has left his cell phone at home and he’s wearing new clothes and sneakers he bought at a local Walmart. So unless he’s got a transponder implanted in his skin, he’s sure he’s clean.
He hears traffic whiz by and then spots a shape coming in through the open gate of the small park. The woman’s stride is instantly recognizable, and in a few seconds, his ex-wife, Kay Darcy, sits down on the bench next to him.
Liam says, “You left your phone, iPad, anything electronic back at your condo?”
“Hey, nice to see you, too, Liam,” she says. “The answer is yes, and my question is, what the hell is going on here?”
“Besides me violating my oath along with a number of federal statutes, just a little meet and greet to see how single life is treating you.”
Even in the dying light, he senses a change in Kay’s attitude and body language. “Got it, Liam. Sorry. Go on.”
He keeps moving his gaze around, checking and rechecking the landscape. They are under a grove of trees, meaning no drone surveillance. Scanning the traffic, he doesn’t see any repeats, like a white van going by again and again.
Liam says, “Thanks for meeting me. Means a lot.”
His ex-wife says, “It was interesting to be in your world for a while. The anonymous text message. Me going to a Barnes & Noble, picking up the latest Lincoln biography, turning to the page number associated with our wedding date and finding a note with the time and place of this meeting. Liam, what’s this all about?”
“I need to ask you some questions.”
She laughs. “Nice change of pace.”
Liam says, “But I need to set the ground rules. Whatever is said here, stays here. On deep background. Not even mentioning anyone connected with the CIA. Only a government official. Agreed?”
“Agreed,” Kay says.
“Last time we chatted at Bullfeathers, you said you were working on a story about the president. How he’s using his connections in Langley and the Pentagon to set up a back-channel network to go after whoever’s on his enemies list. True?”
“Quite true.”
“How’s the story going?”
“Slow,” she says. “Practically nonexistent.”
“How did the story start? A source at the Agency?”
Kay says, “Sorry, we’re going to need a bit of quid pro quo here, Liam. You don’t get to haul me out here and grill me. I’m going to need some information in exchange.”
Liam remembers back to his Army training when he stepped out of a perfectly good aircraft, in his first parachute jump. That initial step out into air and nothingness, hoping you knew what you were doing and that your equipment was going to work.
He says, “Your story is correct. One hundred percent. President Barrett has set up a back-channel and probably illegal network to attack terrorists abroad and in-country, without Congressional oversight or knowledge. It’s been going on for just over two months.”
“How do you know this, Liam?”
The words seem to come out weighted with lead. “Because I’m leading one of the teams. How’s that for a quid pro quo?”
“Pretty damn good,” she says. “You’re right, I’ve got a source in the Agency.”
“Who is he? Or she?”
“Sorry, Liam, I’m not burning my source. But…you’re confirming my story. What now? Can you tell me more?”
“Not at the moment,” he says. “But you’ve got the story. Work it, work it hard, and tell your editors that it’s the real deal. Where and when I can, I’ll pass on information to help you. But only on my schedule and terms, Kay.”
“Agreed,” she says. “But why are you telling me this? What’s going on?”
“Bad things are going on,” Liam says. “That’s what’s going on…and I can’t stand it anymore.”
“Good for you,” she says.
Liam says, “There’s something else developing.”
“Like what?”
“Like something so out there I can’t even wrap my mind around it,” he says. “Sorry. But if I can convince this guy to talk to you…it’ll be a game changer.”
She sighs. “Sounds like our marriage, Liam. Over-promising and under-delivering.”
“Keep on thinking that, Kay,” Liam says, irritation growing, “but when it hits, it’s going to be like nothing you’ve ever reported on.”
They sit in quiet for a few long seconds, and Kay says, “What now?”
“You keep on pushing, you go back to your source, and work hard. I’ll help when I can, but we have to do it the right way. Which means no phone calls, no email messages, no texts. Same kind of tradecraft as before. All right?”
Kay says, “That sounds a bit much, Liam.”
He says, “You know your Post history?”
“As good as anyone who works there,” she says.
“So you remember Watergate,” he says.
Kay sighs, “Oh, for God’s sake, some of our editors and staff are still going out to lunch on that old story. You got something to add?”
“Yes,” Liam says. “When Woodward and Bernstein were working on their initial stories, talking to Mark Felt—their Deep Throat—they were once warned that their lives might be in danger. Later they realized that the warning was overwrought and over the top. Didn’t think much more of it as the story went on.”
A pause. Kay says, “And?”
“Back then it was probably a bullshit warning, that their lives were in danger,” he says. “Kay, what’s going on now and what you’re digging into…it’s not a bullshit warning. Be careful. Walk in well-lit public places. Don’t agree to meet a new source alone. Be aware, Kay.”
She doesn’t reply. Liam says, “Time for you to leave. Go straight home and lock the doors, put a chair under the doorknob, and don’t let anybody you don’t know in. All right? I’ll leave here in ten minutes.”
She says, “Liam…you’re scaring me.”
“Good,” he says.
He waits to see if she’ll say anything else, but she doesn’t, walking briskly out of the park, not looking back once.
CHAPTER 51
NOA HIMEL IS at home in her condo when the intercom rings and she answers, “Hello?”
“It’s Aldo,” says the voice coming from the speaker. “You never called me.”
She rests her head against the wall. “Aldo…it’s been a bear of a day. Sorry.”
“Can I come up?”
“Aldo…”
“Trust me, Noa, you’re going to want to see this.”
“Okay.”
She buzzes the lobby door open and goes into the kitchen, makes a gin and tonic, and when there’s a knock on the door, she gives a quick glance through the peephole—yep, there’s Aldo—opens the door, keeping the chain in place.
“You alone?” she asks.
“Suspicious?” he replied.
“After the day I’ve had…yeah. Hold on.”
She closes the door, unlocks the chain, and opens it wider, letting in Aldo. He’s wearing blue jeans, a white shirt with a button-down collar, and blue blazer, looking like a hockey player in his first year of retirement.
He holds up a thick manila envelope. “Here it is.”
“What’s that?”
“The reality behind Donna Otterson and how she got into trouble. Long story short, Noa, the official story is so much bullshit.”
She feels both relief and fear. Her suspicions about something wrong taking place in that single woman’s apartment are coming true…
But at what price?
“Come on in,” she says, leading him to the small kitchen. It’s clean, well ordered, with pots and pans hanging from a wooden beam above an antique-looking gas stove.
Aldo says, “Impressive. My place has takeout menus and carryout boxes.”
Noa says, “Don’t be too impressed. I keep it clean for whenever my parents take the train down to visit their wayward daughter. Get you a drink?”
He sits down in a wooden kitchen chair, starts undoing the clasp to the manila envelope. “Nope, want to keep a clear mind.”
Aldo spots the Beefeater gin bottle on the kitchen table and says, “How clear are you, Noa?”
She sits down. “I’m at that weird place where I think I could polish off that entire goddamn bottle and not slur a word. But don’t test me. Show me what you got.”
Aldo slides out a thick file folder, with the appropriate red slashes and TOP SECRET and NOFORN and Noa feels unease at seeing such confidential material out of a secure area. An immediate firing offense if caught. Aldo seems to notice her attitude and says, “I wouldn’t have gone out on such thin ice if this wasn’t important, Noa.”
“Show me,” she says.
He opens the folder. Noa recognizes the documents and color photos on Donna Otterson that she got from POTUS.
“This is what we worked from, right? And he…where did he get this information?”
“Don’t know,” she says. “It must be his own contacts and friends back in the Agency. He’s pretty close-mouth as to sourcing.”
She looks down at the surveillance reports, the photos of Donna Otterson going to Cherry Hill Park on three separate occasions. The photos show Donna walking to the park’s sign, looking over it, and with a quick move, marking the lowest part of the wooden sign with blue chalk.
The photos shift.
She’s sitting on a park bench.
Bends over like she’s adjusting a shoe.
Sticky-tapes an envelope to the bottom of the bench.
The next photo shows Donna getting up, walking away.
The next series of photos show a young Chinese woman approaching the bench.
She’s pushing a baby carriage.
She sits down on the bench and then retrieves the envelope.
Two other sets of photos show young Chinese males making similar pickups.
Aldo says, “About as clear as it can be, right?”
Noa nods.
He goes back to the envelope, pulls out a similar manila file folder, with the same letters and markings. Aldo says, “This is where it gets interesting, Noa.”
“I hate interesting,” she says. “I prefer clear-cut and to the point.”
“Well, prepare to be disappointed, Noa,” Aldo says. “I have a friend who works in the Counterintelligence Mission Center. During my training module, I gave this friend some…extra guidance to pass the course.”
Noa says, “Female friend, perhaps?”
Aldo says, “Please, stay focused. I asked him about Donna Otterson. He didn’t recognize the name. I said Donna Otterson, financial resource officer, who had been dealing with the Chinese. That confused the crap out of him and did some digging, and sure, Donna Otterson was under investigation. For this.”
The same photos from before are spread out, showing Donna marking the sign with chalk.
Aldo waits, and then spreads out a new sheaf of photos.
In each photo, the same envelope was being retrieved from under the park bench.
But not by a Chinese resident spy.
“Aldo…”
He puts a thick finger on the photo. “Yeah. White woman, early thirties, working quickly to retrieve the envelope, her hair up in a baseball cap so we can’t capture a photo of her face. So no facial recognition. But Noa…”
She picks up the photos and stares at them.
“Donna Otterson wasn’t leaking information to the Chinese,” Noa says. “We were set up.”
“Big-time,” Aldo says. “And I hate to point out something that seems pretty obvious, Noa, but it was the president who set us up.”
“Shit,” she says.
“Yeah,” he says.
CHAPTER 52
Somewhere in South Africa
IT’S THE CHANGE in the lighting that first awakens Benjamin Lucas. As he rolls over on his bed in his cell, the door is unlocked and a Chinese man walks in, carrying a tall paper sack with twin handles, from which a smooth wooden handle sticks out.
Behind him another, younger Chinese man brings in a comfortable chair, and after a brief exchange of murmured sentences, the second man leaves and the first man sits down. He’s about Benjamin’s age, wearing blue jeans, black sneakers, and a white, button-front shirt, top button undone.
“Benjamin Lucas,” he says, in good English.
“That’s right.”
He doesn’t offer a hand but the man says, “Chang Wanquan. I’m the deputy agricultural attaché to South Africa. Officially, that is. You wouldn’t believe the amount of time I waste going out and pretending to be interested in wheat and corn, along with citrus fruits. Then I have to go back to our embassy and do my real job, looking into South Africa’s most important exports. We all know what the most important exports of South Africa are, don’t we? Diamonds and rare minerals. That’s what I work on, when I can scrape enough time together. It can be a real…drag. Yeah, that’s it. A drag. You ever feel that, Benjamin Lucas?”
