Stroud smiled across the table at Helen. “And you must be this desperate character’s gun moll. Sort of the Bonnie to his Clyde, I hear?”
Helen’s return smile was also forced. “That’s me, I’m afraid.” Thorn concealed a frown. Helen’s behavior worried him.
She’d been abnormally quiet during the past two days. She was her usual self around Andrew Griffin. But she’d kept mostly to herself whenever the Englishman was out of the flat — spending long hours staring out the window or off into space.
He pushed his concerns away for the moment. It was time to show some manners. “Mike, this is FBI Special Agent Helen Gray.”
Stroud shook his head. “I never heard that name, Pete. Or yours for that matter.” He reached into one of his chest pockets, fished out a pair of Department of Defense identification cards, and slid them across the table. “These’ll get you through the main gate at Ramstein with me. From now on, you’re Chris and Katy Carlson. If anybody asks, you’re a couple of number, crunchers working out of the Pentagon. I’ve already booked you into a room at the base BOQ.”
Thorn glanced down at the ID card. It bore a reasonable likeness of him — no doubt courtesy of Sam Farrell.
Helen frowned and held hers up. “If you don’t mind my asking, Colonel Stroud, where did you get this? Phony D.O.D IDS don’t usually grow on trees.”
“Nope, not on trees,” Stroud acknowledged ? “We usually keep ours in locked filing cabinets.”
Thorn knew the other man wouldn’t say anything more. Like Delta, Special Forces teams often tried to keep a low profile during their assignments overseas. And anonymous, low-ranking civilian government employees arriving at an airport in some war-torn foreign country were far less newsworthy than uniformed Green Berets making the same trip.
He put his own new card away. “How long do you think you’ll have us on your hands, Mike?”
“Well, from what Sam Farrell said, the sooner you’re off German soil, the better. So I hope you won’t be staying at Ramstein long.” Stroud sipped his beer appreciatively and then explained.
“I’m wangling space for you on a Mobility Command cargo flight. With a bit of luck, you’ll be heading back to the States in the next day or so. Probably to Dover Air Force Base.”
“I don’t know how we’re going to thank you, Mike,” Thorn said. “Not with all the risks you’re running for us.”
“Shoot.” Stroud grinned. “I’m only helping you obey your original orders to head home. Aren’t you planning to report in once you’re back?”
Helen nodded.
“Then I’m just doing my sworn and solemn duty,” Stroud continued. “Nobody could fault me for that, could they?”
Andrew Griffin arched an eyebrow. “Sounds a bit Jesuitical to me, Colonel.”
Stroud laughed. “Hey, then I guess I learned something during my misspent youth at St. Ignatius Loyola High School, after all.”
Thorn grinned. For the first time since he’d left Delta Force, he had the real sense of being among friends. The jokes were pretty bad, but the camaraderie was very real — and that meant a lot to him right now.
With Farrell sounding the alarm around D.C. and Mike Stroud ready to shepherd them through the gates at Ramstein, he and Helen finally stood a good chance of putting their hard-won data in front of the proper authorities.
Richard Garrett waited until the outer office door swung shut behind him before abandoning the affable smile he usually wore.
The former Commerce Secretary turned Caraco lobbyist dropped his briefcase beside the chair he’d been offered and sat down. Then he scowled darkly. “Goddamnit, John, what kind of idiot games are you people letting the FBI play here?”
John Preston, the current White House Chief of Staff, held up a conciliatory hand. “Whoa, Dick! I’m not quite sure what you’re talking about. What’s all this about the FBI?”
“Save the “I’m innocent and ignorant’ horseshit for the press and other suckers,” Garrett growled. “We both know you were on the phone to the Hoover Building right after I called you this morning.”
Preston held up both hands now, this time in a gesture of surrender.
“Okay, okay, I give. I assume you’re referring to the raid on that Galveston warehouse?”
“No kidding.” Garrett shook his head in disgust. “So what prompted that piece of lunacy?”
“The FBI had a hot tip, Dick. The Army called a priority one alert — claimed somebody was smuggling a nuclear weapon through there.”
“Through a Caraco Transport-leased warehouse? Some pointy-headed general hit the panic button with that as the premise?” Garrett asked sarcastically.
“That was apparently the story,” Preston admitted.
“And you let them do this?”
The White House Chief of Staff shook his own head. “We didn’t let anybody do anything, Dick. Hell, this was an FBI operation. They don’t clear that stuff with us. Christ, I didn’t even know anything about it until you got on the horn!”
Garrett asked, “So John, you mind telling me precisely what this rogue FBI raid on one of my client’s legitimate business enterprises turned up?”
Preston looked distinctly uncomfortable.
“Well?” Garrett pressed.
“Apparently nothing,” Preston said reluctantly. “The agent in charge reported the place was stripped down to the bare walls.”
“Then I can assume that the FBI’s preparing a written apology to Prince Ibrahim al Saud, and that they’ve called off the dogs?” the former Commerce Secretary pressed further.
“Well …” Preston picked up a fountain pen from his desk and began repeatedly pulling the cap off and then putting it back on.
“Not exactly.”
“Uh-huh.” Garrett leaned back in his chair. He steepled his fingers.
“Let me see if I add this up right, John: Acting on some wild-assed story about a blackmarket nuke, the FBI raids a warehouse leased by a respectable international corporation. A corporation that’s been damned generous to this president and his party. A corporation headed by a Saudi prince who’s known far and wide as a loyal friend of the United States, for Christ’s sake! Jesus, the President himself sat down for coffee with Prince Ibrahim just a couple of weeks ago! You with me so far?”
Without waiting for the White House Chief of Staff’s reaction, Garrett drove on. “Now, then. The FBI finds precisely, exactly nothing during this raid of theirs. No nuclear weapon. No stolen blueprints for Plan 999 from Outer Space. Nothing.
“But instead of slinking home in disgrace, the Hoover Building boneheads are still out there — ripping my client’s duly leased property to pieces and exposing his good name to a possible media scandal.” The former Commerce Secretary leaned forward.
“Does that about sum it up, John?”
Preston spread his hands. “I’ve checked, Dick. There’s no media interest in this story. Not yet.”
“And I thank God for tiny favors!” Garrett said. He snorted.
“The publicity hounds at the FBI usually don’t make a move without putting on their TV makeup.”
Preston colored. “Jesus, Dick. What the hell do you expect me to do? I run the White House staff. I don’t run the Department of Justice or the Bureau. They’re out of my bailiwick.”
“Bullshit.” Garrett looked steadily at the other man. “We both know you and the President have the Attorney General right smack in your back pocket. You say ‘jump’ and she’ll ask you what flavor of moon cheese you want.”
The White House Chief of Staff ignored that. “Leiter’s got an independent streak, though.”
“The FBI Director?” Garrett shook his head. “Use your brains, John. Leiter likes his job. Hell, he loves his job.
