Three Weeks in Washington, page 23
part #3 of Titus Ray Series
“To what end?”
“I don’t know the answer to that, but I’m betting you do.”
Carlton had told me the Agency had briefed the Bureau on the possibility of a chemical weapons attack on Washington, so I decided to share my theory about the Navy Yard shooter with Benson. I also told him I believed the whole episode had been a suicide mission for Valario from the very start.
He wasn’t totally convinced.
“If that’s true, why was Valario intent on learning to fly a UAV? Why would he have spent the money for lessons only to martyr himself a few weeks later?”
“You’ll have to get those answers yourself, Frank. I have other fish to fry.”
“I will figure this out. You can bet on that.”
“I suspect the key player is Walid Khouri.”
He nodded. “I totally agree.”
I stood up and headed for the door, but then, after taking a few steps, I turned and faced Benson again.
“As I said, there’s a possibility I’ll pick up some new intel on Khouri at my briefing tomorrow. Of course, you’ll probably get that same information ... eventually.”
He stared at me until my pointed remark clicked with him. “Let’s suppose I wanted access to that intel earlier. Is there something I could do to expedite that process?”
I looked up at the ceiling a minute. “Ummm, let’s see, Frank. I can’t really think of anything. Oh, wait,” I gave him my best smile, “there is one thing.”
“Just name it.”
“I know how difficult that Quantico training course can be. If I have your assurance Detective Saxon will get all the help she needs to pass that course, then I might give you a call after my briefing tomorrow and tell you what I’ve learned about Khouri.”
He smiled. “Oh, you bet. I’ll take good care of her.” He pulled a business card out of his pocket. “Here’s my number. Call me anytime.”
I pocketed the card and said, “Let’s be clear about one thing, Frank. The detective doesn’t need to know we’ve had this conversation.”
“You have nothing to worry about.”
If only that were true.
* * * *
As I drove Nikki back to The Waterwheel to pick up her car, I tried keeping the conversation light by bringing up Arkady’s stories about growing up in Tbilisi.
She changed the subject immediately.
“What was really going on with Frank Benson tonight?”
Her voice sounded flat, but the darkened interior of the car made it nearly impossible for me to read the expression on her face.
“Like I told you earlier, he just wanted to talk. He and I go way back. We’ve known each other for years.”
“That doesn’t explain why you drew your gun on him.”
“I can’t talk about that.”
She didn’t say anything.
After a few minutes, I said, “I’m sorry if that bothers you.”
“Look, Titus. I can certainly understand why I’m not supposed to question you about what you do and where you go. I get that. I really do. But maybe keeping secrets has become such a part of who you are, you’re no longer able to share your life with anyone.”
I thought about arguing that point with her, but I reconsidered.
For one thing, she might be right.
“Maybe that’s true, Nikki, but my personality has nothing to do with my refusal to tell you why I drew my weapon on Frank.”
She turned away from me and stared out the side window as if the countryside had suddenly gotten very interesting.
It was pitch black outside; she couldn’t see a thing.
A few minutes later, she shifted her attention back to me. “Are you saying Frank presented some kind of threat to you tonight?”
“Don’t press me on the details, Detective, but, yes, that’s exactly what I’m saying.”
“Did it have anything to do with the shooting at the Navy Yard?”
“We must have a different definition of what ‘don’t press me on the details’ means. I can’t—”
“I was just wondering, because when the subject of the Navy Yard incident came up at our orientation, I got the feeling Frank was upset with someone over at the CIA. Was that you?”
“I’m done with this subject, Nikki.”
She grew quiet once again, and I realized my response had come out sounding harsher than I’d intended.
Several minutes passed without either of us saying a word. Even so, the tension between us only seemed to increase.
I decided I had to break the silence, so I turned on the radio.
Ordinarily, my car radio was tuned to an all-news station, so I was surprised to hear music coming from one of those Oldies But Goodies stations when I switched it on. Seconds later, I realized Carlton must have changed the dial when he’d driven my Range Rover out to The Meadows.
I wasn’t bothered by him changing the channel. What bothered me were the lyrics blaring out of the speakers.
The song, “You Always Hurt The One You Love,” was all about hurt, heartache, and disappointing the one you love.
I immediately turned it off.
* * * *
A few minutes later, we arrived at The Waterwheel, and I pulled up next to Nikki’s car. We sat there a minute, and then I placed my hand on her shoulder and pointed down the lighted path toward the old gristmill.
“Before you leave, would you take a walk with me?”
She nodded, and we got out of the SUV and strolled down the brick walkway leading to the original gristmill, which had been built on the bank of Little Doe Creek.
The owners of the restaurant had remodeled the structure to accommodate a small gift shop and an ice cream store. Both establishments had kept the old-fashioned theme, complete with gas lighting, sales clerks in period clothing, and wrought-iron benches on the sidewalk outside.
The gift shop was already closed for the day, and the ice cream store looked as if it were about to close. However, there were still a few patrons sitting around outside.
I took Nikki further down the pathway, into the shadows beyond the gift shop, where we could have some privacy. As we sat down next to each other on a park bench, it was easy to understand why the owners had chosen to advertise their establishment as a romantic spot. The ambient lighting, plus the relaxing sound of water from the nearby creek flowing down the rungs of the restaurant’s signature waterwheel, made for an intimate setting.
I put my arm around Nikki and held her close for a few minutes.
Then, because I wanted to gauge her reaction to what I had to say, I pulled away and looked into her eyes.
After pushing a lock of hair away from her face, I said, “I’m leaving tomorrow, and I’m not sure when I’ll be back.”
She bit down on her lip. “I’m sorry, Titus, I shouldn’t have—”
I gently placed my hand over her mouth. “No, let me finish.”
She nodded, and I took my hand away.
“I won’t lie to you, Nikki. This is a risky assignment, and it’s happening in a very dangerous country. If the mission doesn’t succeed, the consequences are enormous. That’s the reason I can’t leave tonight without telling you how I feel about you.”
Suddenly, her face looked flushed.
I was afraid she was about to say something, so I hurried on. “I’m pretty sure I’m falling in love with you.”
It was the first time I’d seen her smile since we’d driven away from The Meadows.
“I know for sure I’m in like with you,” I said.
She laughed. “In like?”
I smiled. “I’m sure you’d appreciate those sentiments if you knew me better. Liking people isn’t my strong suit.”
She leaned over and kissed me. “I’m in like with you too, Titus.”
“I know this isn’t easy for you, not just because of the work I do, but also because I’m not used to being open with people. I agree with what you said earlier. I’m not used to sharing my life with anyone.”
“I’m sorry I said that. I was just frustrated because there’s this barrier between us, and I keep wanting to knock it down.”
“I assure you, Nikki, if you pass your Quantico course, some of those walls will come tumbling down.”
“Like the walls of Jericho?”
“Exactly.”
“I believe the Bible says God had to perform a miracle to bring those walls down.”
I smiled. “You’re right, but if I recall the story correctly, he had the people do something every day. After that, he performed the miracle. So, Detective, here’s what I’m thinking. You do your part in class every day, and God will take care of the rest.”
“I promise I’ll do my best.”
“I know you will.”
“You’ll have to promise me something as well.”
“I don’t make many promises.”
“Promise me when you’re away, especially during those times you’re required to take risks, you’ll remember I’m praying for you.”
I made her that promise, and then we sealed it with a kiss.
Actually, we sealed it with several kisses.
Chapter 31
Monday, June 29
My briefing on Operation Citadel Protection was scheduled to begin at ten o’clock, but I arrived in Conference Room A across the hall from RTM Center A at around nine-fifteen.
When I walked in, Duncan Fredrick, the scheduler from the DDO’s office, was in the process of setting up the conference room, and, after I joked with him for a few minutes about his son’s Little League team, he allowed me to read through the overnight cable traffic on his computer. Mainly, I was looking for any flash traffic from Santiago de Cuba.
Nothing came up. There were no messages from Mitchell.
Ten minutes before the meeting was due to begin, Carlton arrived. I was expecting him to comment on my early arrival, but he only nodded at me and didn’t say anything. Seconds later, when Robert Ira walked in the door, I immediately understood why.
The Deputy Director of Operations seldom left his office, and, when he did, the occasion was never a happy one.
The DDO was a heavyset man with a chubby face and longish gray hair. He was not a well-liked person, and while he may have believed his lack of popularity was due to the nature of his job, in reality, most people were simply turned off by his Machiavellian attitude.
He governed his office with a results-oriented philosophy based on “the ends justify the means” and appeared willing to do anything to accomplish his goals. Using the same duplicitous skills he’d perfected as a covert intelligence officer, he tended to manipulate both co-workers and politicians alike.
On the flip side, he had an uncanny ability to exploit the weaknesses of America’s enemies, a feat which continually earned him the respect of the intelligence community, both here and abroad.
Although I knew Ira and Carlton had gone through several rough patches in their relationship, I had the distinct impression the DDO admired Carlton. I suspected this was because Carlton refused to act as the DDO’s lapdog and also because Carlton knew a thing or two about manipulating people.
The last time I’d seen Robert Ira had been a few months ago when he’d shown up at my debrief following my failed mission in Tehran. After learning of his role in the deaths of my assets, I’d accused him of being responsible for bringing down my network in Iran.
After that, he’d put me on medical leave.
Now that he’d restored me to active duty status, I was hoping for a more amicable relationship with him.
Or, at the very least, a less hostile one.
* * * *
Carlton began the briefing by noting the presence of the DDO, who bobbed his head a couple of times and acknowledged the introduction.
Afterward, the deputy gave his attention to the open laptop in front of him and didn’t say a word until we were more than halfway through the proceedings.
Deputy Ira and Carlton were seated across the table from me. At the end of the table was Nolan Wilson and next to him was Katherine Broward, plus several other counterintelligence analysts. Dispersed along the outer perimeter of the conference room were various Agency employees. Most of them represented Support Services, but I also saw a couple of people from Legal there as well.
After Carlton mentioned C.J. Salazar would not be joining us due to his own ongoing operation, he instructed Wilson to initiate the video call to Keever Pike in Damascus.
Pike had obviously been waiting for the call and immediately came on the screen. He was sitting in what appeared to be a loft, and I was guessing he was inside an Agency safe house in Damascus. The satellite feed was excellent, and he could have been sitting in the room next to us and no one would have been able to tell the difference in the quality of the transmission.
Pike was operating in Damascus as a freelance journalist, a career he’d had before coming to work for the Agency. For almost a year now, he’d been covering the war in Syria for several newspapers who could no longer afford to send out their own correspondents. Pike’s work was high quality stuff, and he’d once been given a SCROLL award in recognition for his excellence in journalism. However, none of the newspapers who paid him for his stories had the slightest inkling he was a covert intelligence operative employed by the CIA.
Pike’s cover made it possible for him to travel throughout the area without being questioned and to scout out potential assets and conduct interviews with known terrorists. His cover story wouldn’t have held up, though, had he not been able to tell the difference between a verb and a noun, which was why I was a little worried about the cover story Legends had fashioned for me as Pike’s friend and fellow journalist.
Unfortunately, posing as an executive from Bub’s Subs wouldn’t have been appropriate in war-torn Syria, so I needed to brush up on my grammar before arriving in Damascus.
Carlton made reference to the seven-hour time difference between Langley and Damascus when he greeted Pike.
“Good afternoon, Keever,” he said. “We’re about to get started here.”
“Ready on this end as well.”
Pike, who was dressed in a loose-fitting brown shirt, with a pair of sunglasses dangling from his front pocket, had an angular face, sandy colored hair, and blue eyes. I’d always found him to be an easy man to read, but as I studied his reaction when he recognized the DDO was present in the room, he hardly showed any emotion at all.
Once the preliminaries were out of the way, Carlton asked Wilson to explain how the Agency planned to get Marwan Farage out of Gitmo and back to Damascus.
Wilson pushed his glasses further up the bridge of his nose and looked over at Carlton.
“If Marwan agrees to be played back into Syria when he meets with you tonight, then the two of you will be flown by military transport to our air base in Morón, Spain. From there, you’ll both be on a commercial flight out of Seville to Damascus. After that, you’ll part ways with Marwan at the airport until Titus contacts him the next day.”
Wilson gestured at me. “You’ll be leaving tonight and taking a commercial flight into Damascus from Washington, with a layover in London. Your arrival in Damascus is scheduled for Wednesday morning and Douglas and Marwan will arrive a few hours later.”
Pike spoke up. “I plan to pick Titus up at the airport myself so we can maintain our cover story of being best friends.”
I said, “Please don’t refer to me as your BFF, at least not in public.”
My remark barely got a smile from the DDO, but it got a laugh from Pike, who was a humorous kind of guy.
Wilson turned and looked over at Carlton. “Douglas, when you arrive at the airport, a group of EAI workers will pick you up and take you across town to the EAI compound.”
Carlton’s legend in Damascus would be a familiar one for him. Whenever he was running his operatives in country, more often than not, he posed as one of the directors of Emergency Aid International (EAI), a not-for-profit relief agency, providing food and other aid for countries whose citizens were living in chaos.
Although EAI was an Agency-funded organization, it was a legitimate non-profit whose workers were committed to helping people. However, no more than a handful of EAI employees knew the organization they worked for was a CIA-run entity.
After Carlton discussed a few more of the logistical aspects of the operation, he turned the meeting over to Katherine for her input.
Katherine stood up and hit a few keys on her laptop, projecting a slide of General Suleiman on a screen opposite the one displaying Pike’s satellite feed.
“We’ve confirmed General Suleiman will be traveling from Tehran to Damascus on July 3rd. He’s booked into the Sheraton, along with a small staff.”
Her next slides showed transcripts of the chatter taking place among Hezbollah’s inner circle in Damascus.
Katherine continued, “While there’s been no official confirmation yet, as you can see in these transcripts, Naballah and Suleiman have set up a meeting for July 4th. That meeting will take place at Naballah’s compound in Damascus.”
She wrapped up her report by emphasizing the volatile nature of the civil war in Syria brought on by the rebel groups fighting the Assad regime on the outskirts of Damascus. She also cited new evidence indicating ISIS fighters were seeking to penetrate the hierarchy of some of these groups, particularly, the al-Nusra group affiliated with al-Qaeda.
“These rebel groups are operating outside the city and shouldn’t pose a threat to you, but we’ll continue to keep an eye on their activities throughout the mission.”
As she sat back down, she looked over at the side of the table where Carlton and the DDO were seated and gave them her best smile. “That’s all I have for now, but I’ll be more than happy to answer any questions you may have.”
The DDO returned her smile, but Carlton simply acknowledged her offer and noted he would reserve time for questions later.
Turning his attention to Pike, Carlton asked, “Do you agree with this assessment, Keever?”
