Hidden Threat (44 page)

She rapidly went to work opening his My Documents folder and began scanning the subfolders. There were several marked Journalism 101—2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, and so on. She opened the 2010 folder and scanned the documents, recognizing all of the homework assignments. Ruling out the remainder, she continued scrolling through the subfolders: Assignments, Bill’s Wedding, Bank Information, DD, MediaHunt, PTA, Dagus Family, Videos. There were the usual program files mixed in, but she locked onto MediaHunt. Knowing about Dagus’ extracurricular watchdog group, Amanda wondered,
what might be in there?

As she opened the subfolder, she saw several other subfolders, including one labeled CO.
Charlotte Observer
? The same paper that had originally printed the story about her father. She clicked on the subfolder, which showed several JPEG images listed. Clicking on one, she saw an article written and published in the
Charlotte Observer
two years ago about the musical
Les Miserables
, the headline claiming it to be passé. The byline, though, was more interesting to her. Del Dangurs. She clicked on another icon, again a musical review, this time
Miss Saigon
, again by Del Dangurs. She continued clicking, hoping that maybe he had collected all of these articles from Del Dangurs. Maybe he was a personal fan of the writer or perhaps he liked the shows or the reviews.

She skipped ahead to the DD subfolder. Here she found more portable document files of articles written by Del Dangurs. As she scrolled through the documents, she lighted upon one marked Garrett, with a date of three days ago.

“
Unbelievable,” she muttered. She clicked on the icon and up popped the text, almost verbatim, of the article she had recently read in the
Constitution
.

She pushed back in the chair and ran her hands through her hair. “Del Dangurs,” she muttered aloud. Grabbing a pencil from the desk drawer and yanking a piece of paper from the printer, she began playing with the name. It took her three tries to contrive “Lenard Dagus” from the letters of “Del Dangurs.”

“
Dangurs is Dagus? Dagus is Dangurs?”

Again the scratching noise appeared in the front. She stood and walked to the window, her heart pounding like a war drum. Pulling apart the curtain slightly, she peered below into the front yard of the townhome. Nothing.

“
Why would he write that article about my father?”

Sitting back in the chair, she looked at her watch. She had been in the house now about thirty-five minutes and figured she had ten minutes to go, if she was lucky.

Pressing on, she pulled up Dagus’s e-mail and opened a new message. She attached the article and the Adobe file from his subfolders and forwarded them to her personal e-mail account. Then she went into his Sent folder and deleted the e-mail, followed by going into the Deleted folder and permanently deleting the e-mail.

She backed out of the folders, closing them all, and then began scanning his e-mail. There was the usual assortment of advertisements to make his penis larger and sell him Viagra. She noticed an e-mail from an address: [email protected]. Opening it, she read the contents:

“
Dan, I just wanted to make sure we still had a deal. I’m sure you will be happy with the new arrangement.”

That was it. There was nothing more. She closed the e-mail and then clicked on
sender
so that all of the emails would align by sender. There were two others from househunter.

“
Dan, glad we finally reached an agreement. Just wanted to confirm we are all set.”

Again, very cryptic and very carefully worded. The third, which was the original that she could find, read: “Dan, we need to talk. I think you will want to reconsider. Call me.”

She forwarded all three to her e-mail address and then repeated her deleting process. On a whim she pulled up Internet Explorer and typed in Mapquest. The Web page opened quickly, and she found the Address History box. She clicked on the drop-down menu that would reflect any addresses he might have looked up lately.

McClellan Drive, Sanford, NC 28311.

She gasped and backed away from the computer as if it might hurt her. She quickly printed that page, unsure what good it might do.

Looking at her watch she knew she had far outstayed her time, but she had one more folder she wanted to open.
Pushing your luck, Garrett.

She grabbed everything she had printed out, closed anything that she had opened, and then reopened the subfolders, found
Videos
, and clicked on the icon. Each of the files was listed with a date, so she just picked the most recent one. It was dated two days ago. The computer paused a second, then Windows Media Player popped up on the screen. A few seconds later she was watching a grainy black-and-white video of Dagus having sex with someone in his bedroom.

“
Gross,” she muttered, but she was transfixed. The girl’s face was indistinguishable at first, but after a few minutes of Dagus slipping around and grunting, she could see Brianna Simpson wiggling beneath his tall frame.

“
Oh my—”

She was cut off by the low hum of the garage door opening.

***

Dagus nosed his
BMW convertible 330i into his driveway. Getting the call from Amanda Garrett had been a pleasant surprise. He thought he had noticed her Mercedes in one of the general parking spots available to guests. He was glad that she had chosen to wait for him. He pulled into the garage and punched the button to send the door back down.

He switched off the ignition of the car, but let the radio continue to play. The Eagles were belting out “Witchy Woman,” a personal favorite of his. He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel as he contemplated his dilemma.

He was curious how the desire built in him so quickly knowing Amanda was waiting for him. After receiving her phone call he had thought, given his activities of the day, that he would be able to resist the urge. His simple rule had been to never allow his weakness to affect any of his students. He had reconciled in his mind that if he never touched a student of his, well then, it was all okay. Jimmy Buffett’s “Sixteen Will Get You Twenty” played in his mind. Somehow, that thought had never deterred him.

On the other hand, he believed in certain principles, was committed to a higher cause. He had been careful for so long, he considered. What was one more dalliance now?
It is right there in front of me every day, and I never partake.

What should he do? Amanda needed his help, but who was she? There were others that needed his help, his love, as well. What was that old commercial about the potato chip? You can’t have just one?

“
I guess not,” he whispered to himself as he pulled his key from the ignition.

CHAPTER 60

Kunar Province, Afghanistan

Thursday Morning (Hours of Darkness)

Matt Garrett led the team into the compound, moving quickly. He pushed open the door, using the small Magnum flashlight affixed to the barrel of his M4 carbine to sweep the room. Van Dreeves and Hobart moved into the open space behind him, whispering into their wireless communications gear.

“
Two up.”

“
Three up.”

“
Roger, one up. No contact.”

Rampert and Eversoll were rear security, positioned immediately to the front of the door, kneeling and covering against any intrusion from that direction.

Into the next room they went, first Matt, followed by Van Dreeves and Hobart. Popping up from a floor mat were two individuals. Matt shone the flashlight on them moving it quickly between their frightened faces. Both were Afghans and neither were armed. Van Dreeves moved left, and Hobart moved to the right. There was an adjoining room, and Hobart, on the right, called out, “Room!”

Matt and Van Dreeves cleared to the left to ensure there were no openings or doors while Hobart kept his flashlight on the dark opening in front of him. As Matt turned, he heard Hobart say loudly, not really a scream, just an authoritative “Halt!” While it was doubtful that the elderly man in a white bed dress understood the command, he no doubt comprehended the muzzle of the weapon staring him in the face.

Confused, Matt moved quickly to Hobart’s side and said in Pashto, the man’s native tongue, “Do you have a captive here? An American?” The man had a long, graying beard and thin strands of hair on his head. Matt could visualize him in his traditional headdress looking much more authoritative.

Quickly the man nodded, as if to say yes. He then began waving his arms for them to follow. Cautiously the three men trailed behind the man in the white robe and began to gather hope, the worst of all emotions.

Instantly, as they entered the room, Matt knew that something was wrong. He could see the spot where his brother should have been. A mat and blanket were lying on the floor as if they’d been recently used. Two water bottles were tipped over, empty, against the mud wall.

The man was screaming now, “Taliban! Taliban!”

Matt placed his hand on the man’s shoulder, calming him. Again, in his native language, Matt said, “Time?”

The elder muttered something he did not understand, but the body language indicated that he had just seen him only minutes ago. He was pointing at himself and then back at the mat. He walked over and picked up a water bottle and then pointed at himself again, followed by emphatically demonstrating how he had just provided a bottle of water to his guest.

Matt quickly walked through the other rooms until he found himself back with the others. Van Dreeves was standing next to a window about seven feet above the dirt floor.

“
Look at this shit,” Van Dreeves said, running his hand along the wall. “He went out here. Climbed out, or someone dragged him out.”

“
Damnit!” Matt and the others raced through the front door and around the back toward the fig orchard.

“
Footprints, sort of,” Hobart barked, shining his flashlight on the ground. “You can see one leg is dragging a little bit.”

Matt knelt onto the moon dust to examine the tracks identified by Hobart. He ran a gloved hand across the imprint, as if to touch his brother’s soul. He looked over his shoulder at the nervous old man whose home they had just raided in search of Zach.

“
Where was he hurt?” Matt asked in Pashto. The man immediately began touching his left leg.

By now Sergeant Eversoll was kneeling next to Matt.

“
He can’t be far, sir.”

“
Far enough.”

“
What don’t you see?” the sergeant asked.

“
Other footprints.”

“
That’s right. He thought he was escaping. That’s our Code of Conduct. Always try to escape.”

Matt hung his head for just a moment. So close, yet Zach was nowhere to be found. He was like a zephyr.

“
The river. He probably moved toward the river knowing it would flow south. Hell, he probably thinks he’s in Pakistan.” Sergeant Eversoll was visualizing what he would have done.

The team covered the ground to the river in short order, each searching in an opposite direction. Matt looked to the south, his eyes searching desperately for his brother.

His gaze was met only by the discomfiting beauty of the mountain range angling sharply into the narrow valley through which the river and its rapids ran. He was reminded for a brief moment of his time with Zach in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia. Often, they would raft or canoe along the rocky banks of the South River.

“
Call the pilots and have them fly the river from south to north as they come in to get us. He’ll be on the river.”

Matt felt a trickle of confidence fight his despair. They were close and would soon locate Zach.

The first shot struck Sergeant Eversoll in the chest, knocking him backward into the rock jetties that bordered the rushing water.

Suddenly a fusillade of rocket-propelled grenades and Russian-made PKM machine-gun fire enveloped them from the far bank.

Matt dove for cover near Eversoll and returned fire. Van Dreeves opened his first-aid kit and ripped away Eversoll’s body armor and outer tactical gear.

“
Hang on, buddy, we’re right on top of you.”

As Matt was returning fire, the thought occurred to him that the closer you approached your goal, the tougher your path generally became. The end of a race, preparation for a final exam, or closing in on the enemy leader all shared the same ingredient. The challenge increased as one neared the objective. He could not remember how many Stratego games, the object of which was to capture your opponent’s flag, he and Zach had played as kids. But he had learned an axiom in life after being defeated by Zach’s bombs and swift game-board tactics: the enemy always gets a vote and usually has a different idea than you.

Eversoll’s breathing labored as Van Dreeves worked feverishly to find the wound. Rampert called on the radio to the helicopters. Matt and Hobart returned fire with well-aimed precision.