something. In the meantime, get yourself cleaned up.” Then the feed from Sargasso went dead.
CHAPTER 43
Harvath had always had a good relationship with Gary Lawlor. The former FBI deputy director had been a close friend of the Harvath family for almost as long as Scot could remember. And when Scot’s father, a SEAL instructor, had died in a training accident in California, Gary had become like a second father to him.
When President Rutledge had decided to mount the Apex Project to battle terrorists on their own terms, he wooed Gary away from the Bureau to put him in charge. Though they often butted heads in their attempts to get results, Scot and Gary worked well together.
Even so, Harvath had not spoken with Lawlor since he and Tracy had left D.C. To a certain degree, he felt guilty about that. Gary had always been there for him and his mother. He was tough, but also fair, and had pulled Harvath’s bacon out of the fire too many times to remember. Harvath owed him a lot more than a phone call right now.
It was just one of those things that had gotten away from him. The longer he put off calling, the harder it was to do it. Gary was a real by-the-book kind of guy. Though his job was to be as unconventional as the terrorists he was charged with hunting, there was still an ingrained sense of due process and fair play that had been instilled in him over his lifelong career at the FBI. He had gotten better about it, but only because he’d learned to save his questions until Harvath was done with an assignment or to not even ask them at all.
Scot had known that when he did finally reconnect with Lawlor, the conversation wasn’t going to be about the weather or the places he and Tracy had visited. He wasn’t much for BS. Harvath knew Gary would stick him with tough questions about when he was coming back and what he was planning on doing in the future. That was probably one of the biggest reasons Harvath had been avoiding him. Until he had answers, the last thing Scot had felt like facing was questions.
But things had changed and Finney was right. Whatever message or marching orders Lawlor might have for him from the president, Harvath had no choice but to shelve his animosity and put Tracy’s welfare first.
Routing through a series of anonymous proxy servers, Harvath tapped into one of his VoIP accounts and dialed Gary’s cell phone back in D.C.
The man answered on the first ring. “Lawlor,” he said, a faint metallic hum to his voice.
Harvath cleared his throat. “Gary? It’s Scot.”
“Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.”
“Good. You’ve got every police officer, gendarme, and intelligence operative in France looking for you right now. Do you know that?”
“Popularity is a real pain in the ass,” replied Harvath.
Lawlor chuckled for a moment and then was serious again. “You’ve got big problems, my boy.”
“You wanted me to call you so you could tell me things I already know?” The words came out harsher than Harvath had intended, but he made no effort to pull them back.
“A bombing this morning. A shooting in the afternoon. What do you have planned for this evening?”
“How about a stampede at a local mosque?”
“Don’t jerk me around,” replied Lawlor.
“Fine, I’ll come up with something else,” said Harvath. “What do you want?”
“You drop off the grid for months. No good-byes, no nothing. Just left your BlackBerry and credentials behind along with a smartass note that says
Harvath fought back the urge to defend himself and instead tried to think of Tracy. “You’re right. I’m sorry. I should have contacted you.”
“You’re damn right you should have,” replied Lawlor. “You’re lucky the president feels beholden to you. No other operative would have been allowed to just disappear the way you have.”
“You could have found us any time you wanted. We’ve both been using our own passports.”
“Give me a break, Scot. Tracking you has been like playing whack-a-mole. One day you pop up on the grid entering a foreign country and then there’s nothing for three weeks or a month till you pop up someplace else just long enough to cross another border and get your passport scanned.”
He was right. Harvath and Tracy had not gone completely to ground, but the only trail they had been leaving to follow was dust. “I needed some time off to think.”
“Well, time’s up. You have to get back to work,” said Lawlor. “The president needs your help.”
Harvath reminded himself to keep the volume of his voice under control. “I don’t work for him anymore. And with all due respect, I don’t work for you either.”
“In that case, you can have all the time you want to think. French prisons are very lonely places-especially for a foreigner.”
“The bad-cop routine doesn’t really work with me, Gary. You should know that.”
“And you should know that the evidence the French have on you does not look good. It could take a couple of years before the investigation into all of today’s events is complete and the case against you is finally brought to trial. You might get your day in court, but under their antiterrorism laws, you’re going to sit in a cell counting the months until it comes. And while you sit there, it’ll be as an American tied to a bombing that killed multiple French citizens and a shooting that resulted in the deaths of three French cops. It’s not going to be like shacking up at the Ritz.”
Harvath started to speak, but Lawlor plowed right over him. “And what about Tracy? Do you want to put her through the same thing? Is that the kind of man you are?”
“Let’s leave Tracy out of this,” said Harvath.
“Too late. She’s in it. Just as deep as you are. Probably even worse now. Are you even aware that the French have taken her into custody?”
Harvath’s stomach dropped. He wasn’t surprised, but it didn’t make having it confirmed any easier to take. “Where?” he asked.
“She showed up at a Parisian hospital about an hour ago and turned herself in.”
“Is she okay?”
“She’s undergoing a medical evaluation,” replied Lawlor. “The police have her under guard.”
Harvath was quiet for a moment and then said, “How did you find out about it?”
“The French have video of you at the bombing and the shooting at the Grand Palais. Because of your involvement the president brought me in to help contain things.”
“What about Tracy?” asked Harvath, more concerned about her welfare than his own. “What’s going to happen to her?”
“They’re going to arrest her, book her, the whole deal, but her medical treatment is their first priority. She’s undergoing a CAT scan now.”
“Where? What hospital?”
“No way,” replied Lawlor. “You wouldn’t get within two blocks of it.”
“Don’t be so sure.”
Lawlor knew he was right, but that wasn’t the point. “Okay, you could get to her, but it’s not worth the risk, not right now. She’s being taken care of. As head of DHS’s Office of International Investigative Assistance, the president has me helping the French coordinate their investigations into the bombing and the shooting at the Grand Palais.”
“I want to talk to her at least.”
“Not a chance. For all intents and purposes, she’s in French custody now, and just because she happens to be in a hospital doesn’t mean she magically gets afforded any more special treatment than if she was in a jail cell. Besides, I already tried to call her. The French cops took the phone out of her room. They claim they don’t want her colluding with anyone.”
