Russell shook her head slowly. “I don’t think he wants to talk to you.”
Drake grunted in pain as a blow to the back of his legs drove him to the ground. His arms were wrenched behind his back and he heard the metallic clack of handcuffs over the shouts of Dave Collen being dragged from the damaged helicopter.
When Drake was pulled to his feet again, Russell was walking across the clearing toward him.
“What are you going to do, Randi? Prosecute me? Do you know how much of this country’s dirty laundry I have locked up in my head? The black ops, the renditions, the backroom deals? And what about you and Smith? Who exactly is it you work for? Could it be that the president has put together a group that exists outside the law? Because that could turn out to be very uncomfortable for him if it goes public.”
She stopped a few feet away, her head tilted slightly as she examined him. “The docs told me that if the shooter you sent to my house had aimed an inch more to the left, the body armor wouldn’t have saved me. At best I’d be paralyzed.”
“You’re a hell of an operator, Randi. I’ll give you that. But you’re out of your depth now.”
“And
“Do you have any idea how naive you sound, Randi? Now, get these damn handcuffs off me. And tell Castilla I’ll be willing to offer my resignation for personal reasons. But that offer isn’t going to last forever.”
“Then off to a lucrative private-sector job, huh, Larry? No need to get bogged down in all this nonsense about you covering up a bioweapon that could kill millions of Americans. And what about all those innocent people in Uganda? Or the ones dying right now in Iran? What about Jon and Peter, who won’t ever be coming home? We’ll just forget all that too, right?”
Her reputation, combined with the very real fury in her voice, was admittedly enough to make him sweat. But it was all bluster. Randi Russell was just another soldier — an expendable cog in a machine that she didn’t even have the capacity to fully understand.
“You can rant all you want, Randi, but Castilla isn’t going to put me on the stand with what I know. And after the Lazarus fiasco, the CIA can’t afford another black eye.”
She laughed and started back toward the vehicles parked at the edge of the clearing. “Who sounds naive now, Larry?”
Drake felt a gun against the back of his head and he was forced to follow. Collen came alongside, similarly motivated by a man carrying the briefcase containing their papers.
Ahead, the back of the panel van was open and Russell’s men were pulling out three large sacks. Confused, Drake watched as they began dragging them toward the helicopter. It was only when they passed that he was able to identify what was inside the black plastic.
Corpses.
“Wait!” he said, stopping short. “What—”
The man behind Drake pushed him forward hard enough that he barely managed to keep from pitching onto the icy ground. Randi grabbed him by the back of the neck, pulling him upright, and shoved him into the back of the van. “Like you said, Larry, the CIA can’t afford another black eye.”
The door slid down, leaving them in blackness as the engine came to life and the vehicle began lurching forward. A moment later, he heard a sound that he’d been dreading — the explosion that would incinerate the helicopter and the three bodies inside.
The entire world would believe he died in the crash.
There would be a state funeral, a eulogy praising his selflessness and service to the country. His wife would accept the flag from a coffin containing the body of a stranger, never knowing that her husband was lying in an unmarked grave carved from the country he’d betrayed.
92
Arfa! Do you copy? Respond!”
General Asadi Daei watched angrily as his men brought an armored SUV down the C-130’s ramp with almost comic slowness. The biomedical team was already suited up and had been standing by the side of the dark road for almost five minutes.
The condition of their primary landing site had been far worse than the deskbound academics at Omidi’s intelligence ministry reported, forcing them to fly over the road to Avass and search for a place wide and smooth enough to set down. It was an unforgivable error that had put them twenty minutes behind schedule and farther from the village than planned.
“Arfa! Respond!”
The radio sputtered to life and the barely intelligible voice of the man in charge of the containment troops became audible through the static. Daei stalked up the road, putting distance between him and the nervous scientists double- and triple-checking their equipment.
“General? Do you read me?”
“Barely. What’s your situation? Have you secured the town center?”
A burst of gunfire came over the radio followed by indecipherable shouts from Arfa.
“Major! Are you there?”
“I’m here, sir. No, we haven’t been able to fully secure the area. It’s difficult to tell the police from resistance, particularly now that we’ve lost the light. And there are civilians—”
“I don’t care who’s who!” Daei shouted. “You’re to eliminate anyone who isn’t actively helping you. Was that not clear?”
“It was, sir, but—”
“There are no excuses, Major! Follow your orders.”
“Yes, sir.”
His commander’s reticence was understandable under the circumstances. What he didn’t know, though, was that heavy bombers were on their way and that, upon Daei’s orders, Avass would be obliterated with Arfa and his forces still in it. The remaining paratroopers would create a wide perimeter, cutting off any fleeing residents, and, in the end, forfeiting their lives, too. The area would be completely sterilized.
“Have you captured a parasite victim yet, Major?”
“We’ve made two attempts, but they’re much faster and stronger than we anticipated. One was killed in a fall and we were forced to shoot the other.”
Daei slammed a fist angrily against the C-130’s fuselage as he continued up the road. The sound of approaching air cover became audible behind him, but he didn’t bother to look back.
“I want to be perfectly clear, Major. If I arrive in Avass and you haven’t secured a specimen, not only you but your family will pay the price. Am I being clear?”
Arfa responded, but between the static and the approaching jets, his words were impossible to understand. Daei spun angrily, looking into the sky at a tight formation of fighters barely visible in the moonlight. What in the name of Allah were they doing?
“Repeat your last transmission, Major. I—”
He fell silent when one of the fighters broke formation and began to climb, displaying an unmistakable profile against the black sky.
Daei dropped his radio and ran for the open desert. “Get away from the plane!” he shouted at the startled scientists watching him sprint across the loose sand. “Find cover!”
The blow seemed to come out of nowhere, lifting Smith off his feet and knocking the gun he’d been so carefully aiming from his hand. He tried to twist himself out from beneath the man who had jumped him but realized
