Viral

“No. The only thing that can shut it down is the truth. You have that now. All you have to do is put it together and tell it.”

“Are you going to be a part of it?”

“I am a part of it. It’s our story, Jonny. Okay?”

Jon felt a welling of emotions. He had been writing the story for two days now, working with Roger Church, and his feelings of anger and revulsion over what he had seen in Sundiata and what had happened to him in Mancala had receded. The story gave all that a purpose. He had been a witness.

“You saved my life, Jon. I don’t know what to say.” Charlie sighed, and shoved his hands into his jacket pockets. “I thought you were someone who kept your head down and just waited for things to pass. The way most people are. But you’re not.”

“Sometimes I am.”

“Not when it really mattered, you weren’t.”

Chaplin brought in two Heinekens, handed one to Jon, then one to Charlie. He went into an adjacent bedroom and pulled the door closed.

“Chaplin will take care of you. It won’t be like in Switzerland. Things are going to break in another day or two. You can stay here for now. Okay?”

The beer tasted good. Jon waited for Charlie to look at him again before asking the question that had been on his mind for weeks. “Why did you really get involved with this?” he said. “And bring me in. I keep thinking this was really about Dad.”

Charlie looked away for a moment, his eyes confirming it. “The story’s on that stick,” he said, pointing with his beer bottle. “It started there, yeah. He knew about this. He knew the sketchy details, anyway. He contacted me ten days before he died. He had this idea that we could work on it together. And that maybe you could write about it. It was his idea getting you involved, not mine.”

Jon let that idea settle in his thoughts. “Was he killed because of it?”

“I think so.” Charlie sighed and drank his beer. “I think he had talked to too many people by then, saw too much of what was happening. He didn’t want to just go away quietly.”

“Who killed him?”

“I think it was the Hassan Network. Mehmet Hassan.”

“Why?”

“Business. Protection. But the person to blame isn’t the one who pulls the trigger. It’s the one who pays to have it pulled.”

“Perry Gardner?” Jon said, guessing.

“That’s where the road leads, yeah.”

“Why?”

“I guess because he could. He was able to purchase anything, and in the process to get away with things that no one else could get away with. And so he purchased a terrorist group. He was infected with an insane idea that he thought made sense. With the notion that he could play god. And that infection spread among a very powerful group of people. That’s the story you need to tell.”

Jon leaned back in the armchair, trying to assimilate what Charlie was telling him. He drank his beer.

“Did Dad know about Gardner?”

“I don’t think so. That would have made it easier. But he hadn’t gotten that far yet. He might have thought Gardner was involved tangentially. As an investor. But he didn’t have the whole thing. He knew about VaxEze and the investments. But Gardner hides well.”

“Why did he want to bring me in?”

Charles Mallory looked at the carpet, then at his beer label. “Because he thought you could do it. This needs to be told. If it isn’t reported, it goes on. Dad understood that. He actually respected the power of the media.”

“Really?” Jon smiled, thinking of his father complaining about the “irresponsible” media.

“He didn’t let on, but yes.”

And then he told him the rest: The details about what had happened in Mungaza and in Kampala. How Gardner and Pine had created Priest. How Priest had hired Ivan Vogel and tendered the deals in Mancala. How Gardner had brought in Russell Ott to set up their surveillance operation and Ott had hired Gus Hebron, using a middleman named Douglas Chase. How Pine was supposed to ride off to another life after October 5, so that Gardner and his group could move in.

Jon absorbed the details, working the story’s architecture in his head.

“Why did they let you get away? In Kampala?”

“I think because Gardner wanted to see who I would contact. Where I would go. It was simply a means of gathering information. Knowing the enemy. And he was able to do all that from afar, with other people doing the dirty work. Primarily Landon Pine.”

“Who did you contact?”

Charlie shook his head and smiled. “In retrospect, they probably should have killed me when they took out Paul Bahdru. That’s when I realized this wasn’t a well-coordinated organization, just a well- funded one. I didn’t know it was one man playing video games with the world’s future. But that’s when I understood that they could be brought down. I took care of Paul’s remains first. And then I returned home.

“Once they realized they had made a mistake, they followed you, thinking you would lead them to me.”

He took a long drink and set the empty bottle on the writing desk.

“How did you get me into Sundiata?” Jon asked.

“Trent.”

“Tom Trent. He was with you.”

“He came to me. Long before the government did. He had business in Sundiata. That’s how it started. I should have listened to him more. That was another mistake I made.”

“So what’s going to happen now?”

“Write the story, okay? Chaplin will stay with you, provide twenty-four-hour security. I suspect there will be a Justice Department probe into Perry Gardner very soon, and a congressional investigation. Start by writing about the investors, the Champion Funds, and what their money was paying for. Write about the fact that two billion dollars of investors’ money has gone missing. Call me, through Chaplin, whenever you need to ask a question. Okay?”

Charles Mallory was standing now, already somewhere else, it seemed. Extending his hand.

But before he reached the door, Charlie turned and looked at his brother.

“You know, I just want to say: I admire you, Jonny, okay? I wish I could live the way you have. Not needing to look over your shoulder all the time.” Jon thought he heard a quiver in his brother’s voice. But then he wasn’t sure. “Anyway—”

Chaplin was back in the room, the gun in his left hand. Charlie spoke to him in a low voice. Then Chaplin opened the door, looked into the hallway.

“Wait,” Jon said, remembering something. Charlie turned. “I wanted to ask one other thing.”

“All right.”

“What do the initials of your company stand for? D.M.A. Associates?”

Charlie Mallory shrugged and then frowned, as if he hadn’t thought of it before. “Doesn’t mean anything,” he said. He winked just before turning to go.

MEHMET HASSAN PARKED his rented Ford Explorer on the crushed shell drive in front of Room 7 at the Sea Breeze Motel. Eight miles down the road, his partner was sitting in another motel room, studying aerial surveillance maps on his laptop computer. Waiting for the word from his boss.

Hassan had been mentally preparing for this assignment for several days, in the way that he normally did: Focusing. Visualizing. Avoiding all distractions. Every thought furthering the ultimate objective.

But he had really been preparing longer than that. Ever since the moment he had received the message that Ahmed had been killed in the south of France.

The Administrator was paying Mehmet Hassan more for this assignment than he had for any of the others. But it wasn’t the money that motivated him. This time, it was personal. The Administrator insisted this be a two- man operation, and that Mehmet use computer surveillance. Not necessary, but it would make the job easier. The