time, he wouldn’t want to be too far away. When it’s done, he has to travel with it. That’s a risk in and of itself.”
“So, what then? Virginia, Maryland…?”
“That’s where I would start. Recent rentals would be a good place to begin. If we go with the idea that he’s storing explosives, he’s going to need access to a house. Of course, that’s a huge area to cover, so we have to limit the search parameters. He’ll need a decent amount of land, not to use, but to ensure his privacy. We have to look in rural areas; start from farms, then move out to the suburbs. He’ll want access to escape routes, and that means major roads — anything more than five miles from an interstate highway won’t be a consideration.”
Harper was staring at him. “Where is all this coming from, Ryan?”
“It’s called OPSEC — operational security. The whole point is to minimize the chance of discovery. Vanderveen understands it as well as I do, but there are no guarantees and it requires a lot of guesswork on our part. It’s why I was hesitant to suggest this in the first place… If we commit resources and I’m wrong, we’ll be giving him a huge advantage.”
The deputy director was nodding slowly. “All the same, at this point I think we have to take the risk. I’ll talk to Andrews about making this a priority at Tyson’s Corner. Of course, that will serve a second purpose by getting the Bureau and the Secret Service involved.” Harper smiled wearily. “I have faith in you, Ryan, but I don’t want the Agency running solo on this. We don’t want to be the ones left holding the bag if it all goes to hell.”
Vanderveen was intently focused on the most delicate part of the process, hunched over the magnifying glass and carefully examining his mechanical joints. It would take only a touch of solder, but the wiring would have to be thoroughly tested to ensure that his heat sinks had functioned as intended. Otherwise, it was possible that the heat of the solder gun might have damaged the sensitive components of the cell phone’s ringer.
Frowning, he turned when he heard a noise behind him.
Nicole Milbery was contorted in the fetal position, her arms clenched fiercely over the wound as if to squeeze out the terrible pain. She had managed to drag herself perhaps four feet. The route was marked by an erratic trail of blood leading back to the glistening pool, but she was still no fewer than five feet away from her cell phone.
Vanderveen had searched her soon after she fell, a task made much more difficult by the fact that she was slippery red, screaming, and writhing in agony. He found the phone almost immediately, then felt a sweet rush of relief when he checked her outgoing messages and saw that the last one had occurred more than three hours earlier.
He was safe, but she had almost ruined everything.
In his anger, out of spite, he had placed it next to the straw on the edge of the cement. As the pool of blood continued to spread around her, she had questioned him, begged him, screamed obscenities, but every word had been met with silence. Then, when the realtor was all but forgotten, he had turned again to watch in fascination as she pulled herself toward the phone, moaning in anguish as each little movement sent jagged spears of pain racing through her abdomen.
He shook his head. Where did she think she was going? Surely she must know that he would never allow her to actually reach the phone.
She was much stronger than he would have imagined, but it was clear that she had finally given up. The determination of the dying woman had given way to pitiful sobs almost ten minutes earlier. Now she hardly made any noise at all, and the light was already beginning to fade from her soft brown eyes.
Once approved by the National Security Council, the NSSE designation put things into rapid motion on Water Street and the surrounding area. Around the marina itself, wire fencing was rapidly installed by a company whose twenty-five full-time employees had been thoroughly screened by the Secret Service advance team, which was already on the scene and working hard. The Sequoia was scoured from top to bottom for hidden weapons and explosives, and background checks were ordered for the residents who lived in the buildings that lined the waterfront.
It was determined, after heated debate, that the White House press office would take care of developing and distributing passes for the event. The list of people with access to the presidential yacht was reserved to a few choice aides whose pictures, backgrounds, and fingerprint cards were sent by diplomatic pouch from Paris and Rome to the head of the advance team. She examined the pictures and made sure that her people saw them. Then they went back to their preparations.
He would not be satisfied without first test-firing the device. It was already laid out across the cement. Standing in the shadows cast by the late afternoon sun, he quietly examined the work that had cost him the better part of the morning.
From the battery, the bare copper wire separated into two distinct paths, then came back together at the exposed terminals of the toggle switch. Conduit would be used to insulate the wire from the sheet metal of the van, but it would not be necessary here, as the cement served the same purpose. The wire split from the switch and reunited after 10 feet at the exposed circuit board of the cell phone. From there, it began to resemble a ladder. There was nothing unusual about the rails, but each of the four rungs was covered by a five-pound sandbag. Each sandbag, in turn, concealed a number 6 blasting cap. He had wanted the number 8 caps: the seismic detonators were both more powerful at eight grains of PETN per cap, as opposed to six, and safer, with a lower chance of hydrostatic discharge. All the same, he was relatively satisfied with what he had. It would do the same thing in the end.
He hadn’t taken any chances, though. He had used the digital ammeter for the first time that morning to check the resistance over each blasting cap. It came out to roughly 1.9 ohms per cap, and a little more than 2 ohms over the switch itself.
The calculations had appeared in his mind like a sudden gust of wind on a calm summer day. The reciprocal of the sum gave him the total resistance in the circuit, 0.384 ohms, which in a parallel circuit is always less than the resistance over each component. From there, 12 volts divided by the reciprocal provided him with the total current moving through the circuit: 31.26 amperes. This translated to a little over 6.31 amps moving through the legwires of each electric cap. Using the ammeter to check his calculations, he had allowed himself a small smile at the numbers that appeared on the LCD display. Everything was working out perfectly.
Vanderveen understood how dangerous a test fire could be. Even now, with nothing more dangerous than four blasting caps at his immediate disposal, he took all necessary precautions.
After all, he didn’t need to see the detonation. He only needed to see the effects.
He stood behind the bulk of the Econoline van and pulled the second cell phone from his pocket. The number to the first was on his speed dial. His breath came faster than usual, despite the fact that nothing important was about to happen. His finger hovered over the button. All around him, still air and dust particles floated in the dim light of the barn.
There was no sound from the woman. Why not? He peeked around the corner of the van to examine her still form. He realized, with a start, that he had not heard her move for at least twenty minutes. She must have died when he first started to run the wire out over the cement.
He was a little surprised that she had gone so quietly, but it didn’t really matter. He returned to his position, completely focused on what was about to occur. His back was against the cool metal of the van, the number was on his screen. He breathed deeply, felt the dry air of the barn enter his lungs.
He pushed the button.
Joshua McCabe, the assistant director of the Secret Service’s Office of Protective Research, arrived at midday to confer with the head of the advance team. Jodie Rivers was a petite, pixie-faced woman with inquisitive hazel eyes and shoulder-length auburn hair. At thirty-two years of age, she was young for her position, but a sharp intelligence, combined with the ability to spot problem situations long before they developed into full-blown situations, had earned her rapid escalation through the ranks, along with the grudging respect of her superiors.
After instructing his driver to wait with the Lincoln Town Car, McCabe followed her along the gangplank as she pointed out the various implementations that had been made. The assistant director knew her reputation within the Service as a go-getter with unparalleled energy, but he thought Rivers now looked tired and overwhelmed by the magnitude of her task.
“As you can see,” she was saying, “the security fencing closes off the end of Water Street underneath the bridge. It’s a dead end anyway, but we’re waiting on concrete barriers that will go up on the other side of the fencing. We’ll have at least three, and probably five checkpoints for pedestrian traffic moving through the area — I
