The Ajax Protocol-7 (16 page)

"Still there, Alexei?"

"What are you going to do about it?" he said.

"Track down the conspirators and stop them," Elizabeth said. "I don't know who can be trusted. Someone got Vice President Edmonds to tell me to back off. I don't know if he's involved or not, but I've got no support from the White House until Rice recovers. Once I find out who talked to him, I'll have a better idea of who is behind it."

Vysotsky said, "Others are looking at what happened at Novosibirsk. They are certain to discover that your satellite sent that signal. Once that happens, there's nothing I can do unless I can show significant progress against the fascists who committed this crime."

"Understood. Alexei, I'm only asking for a little time. I understand that you need to protect yourself and that the interests of your country comes first. A militaristic take over in our country would be very bad news for everyone, especially Russia. It cannot be allowed to happen. We have a mutual interest in preventing it."

Vysotsky considered what she had just told him. She was right. Russia and the US did have an interest in common.

"Very well, Director. I'll keep this to myself as long as I can."

"I may need your assistance."

"What kind of assistance?"

"I was thinking of one of your special units," Elizabeth said. "It depends on what I find."

"Zaslon? You contemplate a joint operation?"

"I know it's unorthodox, but yes."

Vysotsky could hardly believe what he was hearing. Harker was director of one of America's most secretive intelligence agencies and she was asking him if he would be willing to deploy Russian special forces on American soil. He would mull over the implications later.

"If you have need of assistance..." Vysotsky said.

"Thank you. When this is over, perhaps you and I can meet again, like we did in Denmark."

"You are not worried that you will be considered a traitor?"

"No more than you."

Vysotsky laughed. "If I did not know better, Director, I would think you were proposing an assignation."

"Purely an exchange of views, Alexei. In the interests of international cooperation."

After he had hung up, Vysotsky thought about the conversation. Had she been flirting with him, at the end? In his mind's eye he conjured up a picture of Harker, her petite form and milk white skin.

She's a lovely woman, he thought. Attractive. I wonder what will happen if we meet again?

Vysotsky dismissed the thought and considered what he had learned. He didn't doubt that Harker's information was correct. She would never have called him if she was not certain of what she had learned. If the American plotters succeeded, it would almost certainly mean war. Harker wanted help. The act of sending a Zaslon unit into the United States could be construed as an act of war. If he did it without authorization from higher up, he would either end up against a wall or making ice cubes in Siberia.

Vysotsky lived for these moments when the great game took on urgency. Sometimes he missed the old days, when he'd been a field operative in the KGB. Now he had power, but with the power came the need to deal with the endless bureaucratic nonsense of the Kremlin bureaucracy. Elizabeth Harker was like a breath of fresh air.

Not for the first time, Vysotsky regretted that she was American.

CHAPTER 34

The next morning, Nick, Selena and Ronnie had landed in Washington and were on their way back to Project headquarters. Elizabeth, Lamont and Stephanie were in Harker's office. Elizabeth phone signaled a call. She looked at the display.

"It's Hood," she said. "Hello, Clarence..." she began, then stopped. "What? You're sure?"

The others watched her. "You're certain. All right. Yes. Thank you." She ended the call. She looked at the others, her face tight.

"Edmonds is sending a security team to shut down our operation. Hood thinks he intends to take us into custody with some excuse about national security."

"What?" Lamont said. "Are you kidding? He can't do that. Why would he do that? I thought only Rice could shut us down."

"Only Rice can," Harker said. "But it looks as though Edmonds thinks he has the authority. Until it gets sorted out he can create a lot of trouble for us."

"I guess you really pissed him off," Lamont said.

"It's more than that," Elizabeth said. "Something else is going on here."

"What do we do?" Stephanie asked.

Lamont was about to say something when the klaxon hammering of the security alarm drowned him out.

"What the hell..." he said.

Elizabeth flipped a switch on her desk. The monitor on her wall came alive. Three white Suburbans with Department of Homeland Security markings were coming down the drive toward the building.

"What are they doing here?" Lamont said.

"Edmonds must've sent them," Elizabeth said. "I don't think we'll wait and see what they want. It will take them time to get in here. Let's go."

They got up and headed for the spiral stairs leading down to the lower level. Stephanie grabbed her laptop from the desk. The cat was lying on the couch. Lamont scooped him up and held him against his body. Burps had been getting fat and lazy. He looked up at Lamont as if to ask what he was doing, but made no effort to escape.

Their footsteps rang on the metal steps as they hurried down the stairs.

Elizabeth had always been a believer in overkill when it came to security. She had installed an emergency escape tunnel from the computer room. It ran under the lawn and flower gardens and emerged a hundred yards away from the house in a tool shed. The entrance to the tunnel was out of sight behind one of the Crays, the only clue to its existence a thin outline in the wall. Stephanie pressed on a wall panel and the door slid open with a quiet, pneumatic hiss.

Lights came on in the tunnel. The door closed behind them. They walked quickly to the far end and climbed up into the tool shed. Lamont looked out through the screened window. From here they could see men in dark suits standing outside the building, arguing with one another.

There was a door in the back of the tool shed, out of sight from the house. Close by, a thick stand of oaks bordered the building. They slipped in single file from the back of the shed and into the woods. From there, a faint path ran through the western part of the property until it came up against the security fence. There was a gate here, electronically locked. Harker entered a code on a keypad mounted by the gate. It opened with a soft click.

Beyond the fence, camouflaged under the trees, was a single car garage. Another electronic keypad gave access to the interior. Inside was a dark blue Chevy SUV. It looked like any other SUV. There was nothing to make it stand out, but a close observer might have noticed that the glass seemed thicker than usual, the bumpers heavier.

"Slick," Lamont said. "I didn't know this was here. Will it start?"

"There's a solar feed to keep the battery charged," Elizabeth said. "It will start. The tires are a little low, but they'll do. You drive. I'll signal the others."

They climbed into the car and Lamont started the engine.

"Where to?"

"The Marine Corps Memorial," Elizabeth said. "Follow the track through the woods. In half a mile we'll come out on paved road."

Lamont put the car in gear and headed for the highway. Elizabeth looked at her watch. It was 9:30 in the morning. She took out her phone and punched in a series of letters and numbers.

Alpha Red. MCM. 10:00 AM. MAX.

She pressed send. "I gave them a half hour," she said.

"What do you think is happening?" Steph asked.

"What's the plan, Director?" Lamont reached the road. They bumped onto the pavement and headed for Washington.

"I don't know yet. We'll talk it over at the Memorial."

CHAPTER 35

Nick, Selena and Ronnie showed up about 10 minutes after Elizabeth and the others arrived at the monument. When they saw Lamont behind the wheel of the Chevy, they came over to the SUV and climbed in.

Nick looked wired. Selena and Ronnie didn't look happy. It was only the second time Elizabeth had used the emergency signal. She described the raid on Project headquarters. Stephanie briefed them about the Ajax protocol.

Through the windshield, Nick could see the Memorial and the flag that flew for all of the Marines who had died in the service of their country. The Ajax protocol was a betrayal of everything that flag stood for.

"Those sons of bitches," he said. "What are we going to do about it?"

"Before we can do anything, we need a new base of operations," Elizabeth said. "We have to assume all Project resources are either unavailable or monitored. The old safe house is compromised, we can't go there. I'm open to suggestions."

"I know where we can go," Selena said. "My place."

"Your condo? That won't work, they're bound to be watching it."

"Not the condo, not Washington. There's an island."

"What island?" Nick asked. "You never said anything about an island."

"Uncle William owned a private island in the Caribbean. It's not far from St. Lucia. He left it to me when he died. It's got everything we need, a large house, an airstrip, privacy. No one is going to look for us there."

Selena's uncle had been a rich man. It was his death that had brought Selena to the Project. When he died, some of his fortune had gone to charity. Some had been seized by foreign governments where he had held investments. Some of it had been embezzled. What was left went to Selena. She had arranged for half of it to act as ongoing investment funding for several charities. The other half was more than enough to keep her in luxury for the rest of her life.

"An island in the Caribbean." Elizabeth looked at her. "You never cease to surprise me, Selena. I don't think they'll expect us to do something like that."

"That's a great idea," Stephanie said. "At the least, it will give us some breathing room to figure out what to do next."

Lamont stroked Burps and was rewarded with a rumbling bass.

"How are we going to get there?" Ronnie asked. "We can't use our plane. They'll be watching that. We can't book a commercial flight."

Selena said, "They can't watch everything, not so soon. I know a pilot who operates a Gulfstream charter out of a private airport near Roanoke. My uncle used him all the time. He knows me, there won't be any credit checks or questions. He can fly us to the island. The airstrip there can handle a Gulfstream."

"I like it," Elizabeth said. "Call him."

They left Burps at a boarding house for cats. A few hours later, they were on their way to the Caribbean. Five hours after that, they were coming in for an approach on Selena's island. Below the wings of the Gulfstream, sunlight sparkled off the waters of the Caribbean. The ocean looked blue and inviting. A band of luminous, turquoise water stretched away from a narrow beach of white sand. Palm trees lined the shore, at the fringe of a dense thicket of jungle.

The southern end of the island featured a steep volcanic peak, covered with trees and thick green foliage. From the air, the island looked like a misshapen boot with the mountain forming the toe. Halfway up the east side of the boot, a small bay with a long wooden pier extended out into the water. A medium-sized fishing boat was docked next to the pier. At the top of the boot a large, square house with white walls and a red tile roof sat on a high promontory that looked out over the water. Beyond the house, the land fell away in a sheer cliff hundreds of feet high. Waves crashed against black rocks below. A second house, smaller than the first, sat away from the main building at the edge of the uncleared jungle.

A single runway of concrete formed the airstrip. A hangar was situated at one end of the runway. They circled the island once and landed. The Gulfstream taxied toward the hangar.

They stepped from the plane into the warm, humid air of the Windward Islands. The air smelled of salt and an explosion of green things growing.

"Welcome to St. Jeanne Island," Selena said.

Nick saw a white SUV coming toward them. "That will be Emile," Selena said. "He's been the caretaker here since before I was born. Let me take care of the plane and then we'll all go up to the house."

They walked over to the shade of the hanger. Selena had a brief conversation with the pilot and came over to join them. The pilot got back into the Gulfstream. In a moment the engines came alive and the plane turned to face the far end of the runway. They watched the Gulfstream accelerate down the strip and lift into the air.

Nick turned to Selena. "Just what I'd always dreamed of," he said. "Stranded on a tropical island with you. Only I didn't imagine we'd be here with anyone else."

She laughed. It broke the tension.

The SUV pulled up next to them. The man who got out of the vehicle was weathered with a lifetime under the Caribbean sun. It was impossible to tell how old he was. He looked like a man who had worked every day of his life. He wore a khaki colored, short sleeved shirt and trousers cut off below the knees. Well-worn brown boots protected his feet. His skin was walnut brown. He was about five feet nine inches tall, wiry and taut. The muscles on his arms and legs stood out like knotted cords under the skin.

His face broke into a grin. "Miss Selena," he said, "it has been too long since you have visited."

"Hello, Emile. It's good to see you."

"But now you are here. Things in the big house are ready for your stay. You will be here long?"

"I'm not sure. Emile, these are my friends. We all work together."

Selena made the introductions.

"Let's go up to the house," she said.

They piled into Emile's truck and followed a gravel drive from the airstrip to the top of the promontory and the house. The house was built of whitewashed stone, two stories high. A wide, shaded veranda with a sloping, tiled roof ran around the bottom of the structure. Wicker furniture with flowered cushions offered places to sit. Tall windows with wooden storm shutters painted green lined the front of the building. The view from the veranda took in the entire island and the Caribbean beyond.