Cold Pursuit (Cold Justice) (Volume 2) (34 page)

“The real irony is the president just sent a message to my office via the director requesting your presence during his visit. He wants to meet all the ‘heroes’ of the attack.”

Jed wasn’t a hero and Frazer knew it. A sour taste coated his mouth. “Does this mean I don’t get fired until next week?”

“I guess it all depends on whether or not you make a good impression.” Frazer laughed, but he sounded strained. The BAU-4 had had a hell of a month.

“Can Pentecost protect them?” Jed asked.

“Yes. He’ll have arranged good security, if only for his own sake.” There was a long pause which put Jed on edge. “Parker traced more calls made to the US from this guy, Sargon Al Sahad. All we’ve found so far is an endless array of burners, but a couple of those burners look like they might still be active. He’s got alerts for any further activity.”

Alex Parker was turning out to be a good guy to have around in a crisis.

“Keep me posted,” said Jed.

“I don’t like this business with a professional hit man coming to your cabin—it was a man, right?”

Jed rubbed his jaw. “They don’t make females that big.” At least he hoped not. “You have a female assassin out there?”

No answer.

Interesting. “This was a big, hairy guy, and we have his DNA. If he’s in the system we’ll find him. There was one thing though.” Jed told him about the weapon the man had carried.

Frazer grew very quiet. “It seems a little obvious for the most respected intelligence agency in the world, don’t you think?”

“Maybe arrogance got in the way. They weren’t expecting me, certainly not Vivi, to shoot back. You should make some inquiries.”

Killion had also gone quiet. Jed figured his people were already making inquiries—as to the whereabouts of every Mossad and Aman agent the Israelis had.

Frazer finally spoke. “Keep your head down. Meet and greet the man in charge and get the hell back here before I regret not already firing you.”

“Ask him for a transfer to Fargo,” Killion quipped.

Jed raised his middle finger.

Frazer rang off.

Killion made another of his million phone calls, put his hand over the receiver. “Precision drone strike just wiped out the house where Sargon was staying. Killed at least twenty people.”

“President Hague ordered that?” Already? A military op on foreign soil? Jed was shocked. The guy usually avoided violence at all costs.

“The White House held a press conference and said that this was what happened to terrorists who attacked Americans—wherever they might be. Sent quite the message. Needless to say, the whole area is now on the edge of war.”

Great. They weren’t even certain Sargon was the man behind this yet. Maybe someone had just made sure they never would. “It’s getting worse, not better,” Jed said.

“Ain’t that the fucked up truth,” Killion said. “How is Lincoln Frazer?”

Ding
. “You know my boss?”

Killion shrugged nonchalantly. “We’re acquainted.”

“And you owed him a favor.”
Ding. Ding. Ding
.

“Not anymore.” Killion adjusted his chair and settled back, closing his eyes.

Jed didn’t know whether to be pissed or grateful Frazer had sent backup. But it didn’t matter now.

His mood dropped as he thought about his earlier conversation with Vivi. She’d told him she loved him, but from her tone of voice it hadn’t been a happy or optimistic revelation.

There was so much he hadn’t told her—about Mia, about his work—and yet he was starting to think none of it mattered. He wasn’t some hormonal teenager. He was a grown man and he’d begun to fall for this strong, yet vulnerable woman.

That redheaded temperament of hers was going to give him trouble. They hadn’t even started dating yet—although they had lived together and had sex. He wanted to take her out to dinner and make her feel special. But she was stubborn enough to never want to see him again, especially as he’d not only abandoned her, but also Michael, to his shit-head father.

His mouth went dry, and his fingers tightened on the steering wheel. Deal with the terrorist threat first. Then figure out the woman.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

P
ilah had dressed with extreme care that morning in her best black dress pants and a pretty fuchsia top with a beaded hem. She hadn’t watched the news or turned on the radio. She didn’t want anything to intrude on her calm or disturb her resolute state of mind.

Her stomach was too unsettled to eat, but she drank some of her favorite Turkish coffee. Then she pulled on her coat and climbed into her small car and drove to the hospital. She parked a few blocks away, walked through the gray piles of shoveled snow, wishing she’d worn warmer boots because her toes were frozen. She had the pills in her handbag to keep William Green asleep, along with a book she would probably never finish. A buzz of apprehension shot through her when she got to the entrance of the hospital. There were two lines of people and a metal detector to walk through. Her heart fluttered in her chest. It was really going to happen.

She smiled nervously as a man checked her name on the list of expected visitors and another patted her down. This had all been set up with such precision. Considering she wasn’t supposed to live past the mall shooting, they must have scrambled to reorganize.

Abdullah was supposed to have carried out this part of the plan, she realized. The redheaded boy had wreaked havoc on this part of the scheme and she had to wonder if he was still alive. She hoped so, but it didn’t matter. Not now. Not as long as the shadow-man kept his promise and saved her children.

After she cleared security she hurried onward, using the stairs rather than the guarded elevator. The president was coming. All praise be to Allah. Her heart beat faster, pulse tripping. This was the man who’d had the power to intervene in her country and stop the civil war months ago—
years
ago. This was the man who’d refused her children entry to the US in time to save them. Even though she was a US citizen she hated him, the same way she hated the government in Syria and all the organizations who treated people like commodities to be traded and sacrificed.

Her actions would cause war and turmoil, but they deserved it. Not the civilians though. Not the poor, hapless souls caught in the crossfire.

She shivered.

Many people would die…

Tears filled her eyes. Many had already died. She needed to be selfish and think only of Dahlia and Corinne.

She forced a smile at the nurse and ducked into William Green’s room. She dug into her purse and broke a tablet in half, opened his mouth, and placed the pill on his tongue, watching it dissolve. His part in this would be over soon, and she was sorry he’d suffered, but no way would she risk him waking up in the next few hours.

She glanced at the news playing on the TV in the corner of the room. The scene showed a drone strike and an explosion. Then she read the ticker tape. “Mastermind behind mall terrorist attack killed.”

Sargon Al Sahad’s name flashed across the screen and grief hit her like a brick. Her knees dissolved, and she stumbled to the floor. Corinne and Dahlia? Dead? Tears streamed down her face as she watched the missile strike over and over again.

Her phone pinged. She ignored it, but then she remembered who it might be. She climbed up from her knees. She had no reason to carry out their plans now. Threats would make no difference. She was too numb for fear.

She pulled out her cell and opened an image someone had sent her, and there were her girls smiling at the camera. Pilah’s heart squeezed. They were at a beach with palm trees in the background. Dahlia had lost her front teeth. A woman Pilah didn’t know held their hands. She couldn’t see the top half of her face, but her hair was long and blond, uncovered. She wore western clothes. Had she taken them from Sargon herself?

She looked strong and confident. A soldier.

Another text came through.
“I kept my promise. Now it is your turn.”

Pilah nodded even though he couldn’t see her. She reached inside the cabinet that held William Green’s belongings and started assembling the weapon.

***

A beeping noise woke Alex Parker from where he slumped over his computer.

He grabbed the laptop and strode down the hall to Frazer’s lair. He didn’t bother knocking on the door, just walked right in. “One of the burner cells has been activated.”

Frazer rolled off the couch and scrubbed sleep out of his eyes. “Can you trace it?”

“No GPS. I can try signal triangulation and give you a rough location.” Alex waited impatiently for the signal to come through and give him a fix.

Frazer paced. “I don’t know whether to hope this is Syria, Iran, or some independent terrorist group. If it is the Israelis…” He trailed off. “Regardless, shit is about to hit the fan.”

Alex knew all too intimately the cost of war and political backstabbing.

He pulled up a map of the area. “Cell phone is in downtown Minneapolis.” He held Frazer’s cool blue gaze. “Tell me again they wouldn’t be bold or stupid enough to go after the Commander in Chief?”

Frazer was calling someone, probably the Secret Service.

Alex tapped away on his keyboard.

It had only been just over a week since Frazer had shut down a clandestine organization called The Gateway Project where Alex had worked. He wouldn’t say they trusted each other exactly, but they both knew where the skeletons were buried. They’d bypassed the usual getting to know your co-worker etiquette and moved straight to effective strategizing.

Frazer covered his mouthpiece. “What’re you doing?”

“Finding a satellite feed over the area. Let’s see if we can figure out what the hell is going on up there.” A better idea occurred. “Hey, can you get us a drone?”

Frazer carried on with his conversation but nodded.

FBI Special Agent Mallory Rooney tapped on the door and walked in. She’d slept on the couch in the conference room after insisting on coming back to work to help neutralize this terror threat. “What’s going on?”

It had only been a few days since Alex’s world had shifted on its axis and irrevocably changed. Mallory was still a little pale from her near-death ordeal, but the shock of confronting her sister’s killer was beginning to wear off. The knowledge that she’d beaten the evil sonofabitch was getting her through the aftermath of finding her twin sister’s remains after eighteen longer years.

She was the most important person in his world—her and the baby she carried. The idea of being a father was still freaking him out—not that he didn’t want a baby or a chance of a normal life—just that he wasn’t sure he was worthy.

He still owed her a first date, but as long as Mallory was happy, Alex was happy. He pulled a chair out for her while he explained.

Frazer put the phone down. “Secret Service says the president refuses to cancel the trip. Won’t bow to terrorism.”

“Great.” Mallory rolled her eyes.

Alex frowned at the screen. He had a satellite feed, but it was hard to get a clean enough image and it wouldn’t be in position for long.

“Get me that drone, Frazer. And get every cop out on the street in case they’re planning another shoot-fest to coincide with the memorial service.” Despite his dark past, Alex had always been a patriot. The idea of the president being in danger, of innocents dying when they could prevent it…

Another attack would completely undermine people’s confidence in whoever was supposed to be in charge. An attack on the president would be a declaration of war. He took another online look at the cell phone in question and hacked into the messages received. He pulled up a photograph, then read the message. A woman holding the hands of two little girls who smiled at him from the picture. He turned the screen toward Frazer. “You need to see this.”

Frazer swore. “Find out where that message originated and figure out anything you can about who is talking to whom. Rooney, see if you can link those children to anyone involved in the mall attack.”

She nodded.

Frazer picked up his phone again. “I need the plane ready to leave in thirty minutes.”

Alex was typing. “It’s encrypted. Hell, this is top quality, military grade stuff. I’m going to need some time. It might go faster if I call in people from my company.” Alex co-owned a firm that dealt with state-of-the-art cyber-security.

Frazer’s eyes bored into his, but eventually he shook his head. “Can’t risk it. If our suspicions leak…”

Alex released a pent-up breath. “Fine. I’ll do my best. No promises.”

Frazer stood and grabbed his coat. “It’s only the life of the American president at stake.”

Alex swore and typed faster.

“And a third World War.”

Alex twisted his lips. “No pressure then.”

***

Vivi smoothed a hand down the scarlet suit David had presented her with.
Scarlet
for a memorial? What was he thinking? Maybe he was hoping the terrorists would have a better target than if she wore black.

Michael was tugging at his tie as if it was something designed to kill him. She caught his hand and smoothed his hair out of his face.

“It’s OK, Michael. We’re going to meet the president of the United States and your father wants you to look smart.”

The face turned belligerent and his hands went back to his tie.

She caught his hand and squeezed. “You’ve been so amazing, sweetheart. I wouldn’t ask you to do this if I didn’t think it would be the least painful way of getting through this, OK?”

Michael’s eyes grew huge and sad. He opened his mouth, desperately wanting to say something. She held her breath. A small sound came out. It wasn’t a word, but it was a sound.

Tears threatened, but Vivi held them back. She hugged him hard to her chest, even though he looked so frustrated with himself.

“You’re going to get your voice back, Michael. You are. But it won’t happen in one day.” She spotted the tablet Jed had given him. “Here, can you spell out what you want to say?”