“Is it really you? My God, it's been…”
“A long time.”
Megan looked past him at Sophia's grave. “I'm so sorry, Jon. I didn't know that anyone would be here. I didn't mean to intrude.”
“It's all right. I did what I came to do.”
“I guess we're both here for the same reason,” she said softly.
She drew him under the shelter of a massive oak and looked at him keenly. The lines and creases on his face were deeper than she remembered, and there was a host of new ones. She could only imagine the kind of year Jon Smith had endured.
“I'm sorry for your loss, Jon,” she said. “I wish I could have told you that sooner.” She hesitated. “I wish I had been here when you needed someone.”
“I tried calling but you were away,” he replied. “The job…”
Megan nodded ruefully. “I was away,” she said vaguely.
Sophia Russell and Megan Olson had both grown up in Santa Barbara, had gone to school there, then on to UCLA. After college, their paths had diverged. Sophia had gone to complete her Ph.D. in cell and molecular biology and had joined USAMRIID. After receiving her master's in biochemistry, Megan had accepted a position at the National Institutes of Health. But after only a three-year tenure she had switched to the medical research division of the World Health Organization. Sophia had received postcards from all over the world and had pasted them in a scrapbook as a way to keep track of her globe-trotting friend. Now, without warning, Megan was back.
“NASA,” Megan said, answering Smith's unspoken question. “I got tired of the Gypsy life, applied to the space-shuttle candidate school, and was accepted. Now I'm first alternate on the next space mission.”
Smith couldn't hide his amazement. “Sophia always said she never knew what to expect from you. Congratulations.”
Megan smiled wanly. “Thanks. I guess none of us knows what we can expect. Are you still with the army, at USAMRIID?”
“I'm at loose ends,” Smith replied. It wasn't the whole truth but close enough. He changed the subject. “Are you going to be in Washington for a while? Might give us a chance to catch up.”
Megan shook her head. “I'd love to. But I have to go back to ouston tonight. But I don't want to lose touch with you, Jon. Are you still living out in Thurmont?”
“No, I sold the place. Too many memories.”
On the back of a card he jotted down his address in Bethesda, along with a phone number that he was actually listed under.
Handing her the card, he said, “Don't be a stranger.”
“I won't,” Megan replied. “Look after yourself, Jon.”
“You too. It was good to see you, Megan. Good luck on the mission.”
She watched him walk out of the overhang and disappear into the drizzle.
“I'm at loose ends…”
Megan had never thought of Smith as a man without purpose or direction. She was still wondering about his cryptic comment as she walked over to Sophia's grave, the rain drumming on her umbrella.
CHAPTER TWO
The Pentagon employs over twenty-three thousand workers ? military and civilian ? housing them in a unique structure that covers almost four million square feet. Anyone looking for security, anonymity, and access to both the world's most sophisticated communications plus the power centers of Washington could not ask for a more perfect venue.
The Leased Facilities Division occupies a tiny portion of the offices in the Pentagon's E block. As its name implies, Leased Facilities oversees the procurement, management, and security of buildings and land for the military, everything from storage warehouses in St. Louis to vast tracts of Nevada desert for an air force testing ground. Given the decidedly unglamorous nature of its work, the men and women in the division are more civilian than military in character. They arrive at the offices at nine o'clock in the morning, put in a dutiful day's work, and leave at five. World events that might keep their colleagues at their desks for days on end have no impact on them. Most of them like it that way.
Nathaniel Fredrick Klein liked it too ? but for altogether different reasons. Klein's office was at the very end of a hall, tucked between doors that were marked ELECTRICAL ROOM and MAINTENANCE. Except there were no such service rooms behind those doors and their locks could not be opened even with the most sophisticated key card. That space was part of Klein's secret suite.
There was no nameplate on Klein's door, only an internal Pentagon designation: 2E377. If asked, the few coworkers who'd actually seen him would describe a man in his early sixties, medium height, unprepossessing except for his rather long nose and wireframed glasses. They might recall his conservative and somewhat rumpled suits, perhaps the way he would smile briefly when passed in the hall. They might have heard that Klein was sometimes called before the joint chiefs or a congressional committee. But that would be in keeping with his seniority. They might also know that he was vested with the responsibility of checking the properties the Pentagon leased or had an interest in throughout the world. That would account for the fact that one seldom saw him at all. In fact it was sometimes difficult to say who or what Nathaniel Klein really was.
At eight o'clock in the evening, Klein was still behind his desk in the modest office that was identical to all the others in the wing. He had added a few personal touches: framed prints depicting the world as imagined by sixteenth-century cartographers; an old-fashioned pedestal-mounted globe; and a large, framed photograph of the earth taken from the space shuttle.
Although very few people were aware of it, Klein's affinity for things global was a direct reflection of his real mandate: to serve as the eyes and ears of the president. From this nondescript office Klein ran a loosely knit organization known as Covert-One. Conceived by the president after the horror known as the Hades Project, Covert-One was designed to be the chief executive's early warning system and secret response option.
Because Covert-One worked outside the usual military-intelligence bureaucracy and well away from the scrutiny of Congress, it had no formal organization or headquarters. Instead of accredited operatives, Klein recruited men and women whom he called “mobile ciphers” ? individuals who were acknowledged experts in their fields yet who, through circumstances or dispositions, found themselves outside the mainstream of society. Most ? but certainly not all ? had some military background, were holders of numerous citations and awards, but had chafed under structured command, and so had elected to leave their respective services. Others came from the civilian world: former investigators ? state and federal; linguists who were fluent in a dozen languages; doctors who had traveled the world and were accustomed to the harshest conditions. The very best, like Colonel Jon Smith, bridged the two worlds.
They also possessed one factor that disqualified so many Klein looked at: their lives were strictly their own. They had little or no family, few encumbrances, and a professional reputation that would stand up to the closest scrutiny. These were invaluable assets for an individual sent in harm's way thousands of miles from home.
Klein closed the folder on the report he had been reading, removed his glasses, and rubbed his weary eyes. He was looking forward to going home, being greeted by his cocker spaniel, Buck, and enjoying a finger of single- malt scotch followed by whatever dinner his housekeeper had left in the oven. He was about to get up when the connecting door to the next room opened.
“Nathaniel?”
The speaker was a trim woman a few years younger than Klein, with bright robin's eyes and graying blond hair done in a French twist. She wore a conservative blue business suit accented by a string of pearls and a filigree gold bracelet.
“I thought you'd gone home, Maggie.”
Maggie Templeton, who'd been Klein's assistant for the ten years he had worked at the National Security Agency, arched her neatly sculptured brows.
“When was the last time I left before you did? Good thing I didn't, too. You'd better have a look at this.”
