Lethal Dose (18 page)

37

They met two hours before dawn on Saturday, September 10, in Slivenec, a suburb to the south and west of Prague. Anders Ljent, the lead CIA operative for the Prague region, flashed the light twice and the van pulled into the small, well-concealed courtyard behind the two-story brick house. Six men emptied from the van and moved quickly to the stairs leading to the basement. Anders joined them in the underground room after closing and locking the outer gate.

“Anders Ljent,” he said, shaking hands with the man who appeared to be in charge. “CIA station chief for Prague.”

“Lieutenant Chris Phelps,” the man responded. He made a slight motion with his head to the five serious-looking men immediately behind him. “My guys. Navy SEALs, Team Six.”

Ljent gave them a perfunctory nod and then spread a map of Prague and surrounding area on the table. “We're here,” he said, pointing to the bottom left corner, “and our target is here.” He moved his finger to the center of the map, just east of the Vltava River. “The lab is on the second floor of a three-story brick house, facing south on Ostrovni Purkynova. It's the third house from the corner, so you have neighbors on both sides to contend with.”

“What sort of opposition should we expect?” Phelps asked. He was young, as were all the SEALs, mid-to late twenties. All had short-cropped hair, intense eyes, and grim looks etched on their faces. They were dressed in street clothes, but all wore Kevlar vests beneath their shirts.

“We've been watching this lab for about four months now. We're positive it's al-Qaeda, as we've identified at least three men of Arab descent on the wanted list, entering and exiting. At this time of the morning, you can expect four to six armed defenders and at least one lab worker. The shift change seems to be about nine o'clock, about two hours after sunrise. We should be gone before that happens, or this will spill out into the street.”

“We'll be long gone,” Phelps assured him.“How do we get in?”

“Front door is best,” Ljent said. “There is a rear entrance, but when they open the door we can see the locks, and if they've got them all in place, that door is almost impenetrable. They've left the front door pretty much the same as all the rest on the street, probably to keep appearances normal. You've got a couple of locks, including a good deadbolt, but nothing that should keep you out for too long.”

“What about the lab?”

“As I said, on the second floor. They've got a series of filters of some sort, and the exhaust vents to the rear. We saw them bring in a filter system recently, and it looked like a HEPA filtration unit. So whatever they're cooking in that lab, it's not nice. I'd try to avoid gunfire inside the lab itself, Lieutenant. For your own safety.”

“We'll keep that in mind,” Phelps said. “Anything else?”

“I don't think so.”

“Are you driving us?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, here's how it goes down. You stop on the street immediately in front of the building and give us fifteen to thirty seconds to assess entry. When we exit the vehicle, pull around the corner and wait in a position so you can be back to pick us up within fifteen seconds of receiving our signal.” He handed Ljent a two-way radio. “The message is simple: Come and get us.”

Ljent adjusted the squelch and tested the equipment. It worked fine. “I'll be ready.”

They left the CIA safe house at 5:35 A.M. and made good time into the city on the Strakonicka Expressway. As he turned onto Legii Bridge, Ljent opened the window to the rear of the van and said, “At the end of the bridge, I'll make a right, then a left. Your target will be the third house from the corner on the left side of the vehicle.” He reached the end of the bridge and made the first turn. This was the oldest part of Prague and the streets were narrow and bumpy, bordered on both sides by three-and four-story stone and brick buildings. Cars lined both sides of the street; passage was easy for one vehicle, tight for two. Ljent made the second turn and slowed. He stopped in front of the third house. “Red door,” he said quietly.

Five seconds passed, then ten, then the locks on the front door literally disappeared in a shower of splinters. Two seconds later, Ljent saw the men streak from the rear of the van into the building, their silenced rifles held in front of them and still smoking. In less than fifteen seconds from the first bullet hitting the wood abutting the locks, the team was inside and the outer door closed. Other than the damage to the door, the street appeared normal for six in the morning. Ljent pulled ahead, circled the block, and got into position to pick them up.

Lieutenant Phelps motioned in three different directions as they entered the house, and his team quickly split into three groups of two. He moved directly ahead to the staircase, taking the risers three at a time. A second team followed him, destined for the third floor, and two SEALs remained on the first floor, moving room to room, looking for anything living. Phelps hugged the wall on the second floor as his third team brushed by and continued up the stairs. Then he pointed to his companion to take the front of the house; he would take the rear. They split and moved into the rooms off the main hallway.

As Phelps moved into the first room on the right, two men in jeans and T-shirts opened fire with automatic weapons. Bullets chewed into the door frame, and the noise was deafening. Whatever stealth they had hoped to achieve was now gone, and the clock was ticking on a short fuse until the police arrived and cut off their escape route. Phelps leaped back from the door, dropped to the ground, thrust the barrel of his weapon around the doorjamb, and pulled the trigger, spraying the room with automatic fire. He heard grunts and the familiar sound of air escaping from punctured lungs. He rolled across the opening to the room, his eyes seeing one man down, the other still standing. He fired as he rolled and saw the second man take three direct hits in the chest. Blood gushed from the wounds. No Kevlar.

He jumped to his feet and entered the room. It was some sort of a coffee room with a card table and a microwave oven. A couple of couches faced a television, which was switched off. Other than the two bodies, there was no one in the room. Phelps ran the length of the hall to the rear of the house and kicked in the door.

Two slugs hit him in the center of his chest as he flew into the room. The impact knocked him back a few feet and winded him, but he didn't lose his footing. The assailant was directly in front of him, a pistol leveled at his chest. He instinctively fired, the slugs from his M16A2 slamming into the man and knocking him back into a bench covered with lab equipment. He crashed over it, his finger tightening on the trigger as he died. One errant shot smashed into the wall just to the right of Phelps's head, missing by less than an inch. Phelps sucked in the deepest breath he could and called his team.

“All clear, second rear,” he said into his microphone.

“All clear, main front.”

“All clear, rear third.”

“One bad guy, main rear.”

Phelps could hear the gunfire from the main floor. He had two men on that floor, and that was enough. He needed his science expert and he needed him fast.

“Joey,” he said. “Where are you?”

“Third, on my way down, LT,” came the response. A few seconds later, Joe Jameus burst into the room. “I'm on it, LT,” he said, swinging his rifle onto his back and assessing the mass of lab equipment in front of him. A small fridge sat off to one side, and he made a beeline for it. Inside against one side were a number of vials, all filled with a white powder. A glass canister containing what appeared to be large beans sat against the other side. Jameus snatched one of the vials, popped open the container with the beans, shook a few into a plastic bag, and resealed the container. He glanced at the system of beakers and test tubes, the centrifuge, and nodded.

“We're done, LT.”

“Then let's get the hell out of here,” Phelps said, calling to his men on the microphone. Extraction time. He called Anders Ljent. “Fifteen seconds,” he said, moving full speed for the front door. Above and below him, his men were on the move. The gunfire on the main level had stopped, and as Phelps came down the main staircase he saw both his men waiting. They had been successful in taking out the last defender. Behind him, two more SEALs came flying down the stairs. They met at the front door just as Ljent pulled up. They piled into the rear of the van, the sounds of police sirens now very audible and very close. They pulled onto Narodni, the main access to the bridge, just as the first police car entered Ostrovni Purkynova from the far end. The sounds of the sirens diminished as they put distance between themselves and the target.

“Good job, gentlemen,” he said. “What was our opposition?”

“Two on the main floor, LT.”

“Three on the third.”

“And three on the second,” Phelps said. “Eight bad guys, nobody injured. Excellent job.”

One of his men pointed at Phelps's chest. “Good thing you had your vest on, LT.”

“Yeah,” he said. “Forgot to shoot him before he shot me.”

There were a few chuckles, and Phelps turned to Joey Jameus. “What have we got, Joey?”

Jameus held up the beans he had taken from the fridge.“Castor beans.” Then he pulled the vial of powder from his front pocket.“And unless I'm totally out to lunch, we have ricin.”

“Ricin,” Phelps said. “That shit's pretty deadly, isn't it?”

“Absolutely. Ricin inhibits protein synthesis in the body. If you inhale this stuff, you can suffer pulmonary edema and asphyxiation. Inject it and you get kidney and liver necrosis. Either can result in death.”

“So we just shut down a seriously dangerous lab,” Phelps said.

“Sure did, LT,” Joey said, tucking the ricin back into his pocket.

“Excellent,” Phelps said. “Let's just hope it was what they were looking for.”

38

“I think I might have found a way to get into that floor safe in the basement at Albert Rousseau's town house,” Gordon said, accepting the beers from the bartender and setting one in front of Jennifer Pearce.

“How? You said it's embedded in the cement and you don't have the combination,” she said, pouring the beer into a glass and taking a sip. They were in Richmond's hottest sports bar, Out of Bounds. The old Chicago brick building, with its huge green-and-white-striped awning, eighteen televisions, and live bands, was infamous for drawing big crowds when big games were on. It was Saturday night but still early evening, and the bar was only about half full. The band had yet to set up.

“I went to see a locksmith today. Told him I had a STAR C-7 floor safe and I'd forgotten the combination and asked him if there was any way to open the safe, even if it meant destroying it.”

“What did he say?” she asked.

“Liquid nitrogen will freeze the metal bolts that slide into place when the safe is closed. Once they're frozen, the metal fatigues, and with a few applications I should be able to snap the bolts like uncooked spaghetti.”

“Sounds easy. Why don't crooks use it all the time?”

“Because most safes are wall mounted. When they try to apply the liquid nitrogen to the bolts on the safe, it just drips down the front. It's useless. But this one is a floor safe, so I can pour the nitrogen in the cracks and wait for it to freeze the metal.”

“You going to give it a try?” she asked, finishing her beer and waving at the bartender for two more.

Gordon shifted on the red vinyl barstool. “I think so. I'll wait until tomorrow when I can use a flashlight and I can't be seen from the street. At night, the light might be visible.”

“Well, you've already been through the place once with the realtor, so if anyone asks what you're doing, you can always tell them you're taking a second look.”

He nodded. “It's not all that risky. Just the problem of getting into the safe.”

A platter of chicken wings arrived and they dug in, Gordon going for the hot and Jennifer for the teriyaki. They finished the wings in a few minutes, had one more beer, then left the bar. Gordon waved down a taxi and they climbed into the backseat. They'd left her car and his rental on the street outside Jennifer's house.

“You sure you want to stay at the hotel?” she asked. “I've got a guest room.”

He shook his head. “Maybe sometime, but not right now. I'm not trying to be rude, but I've got my reasons.”

“What reasons?” she asked playfully.

“Not telling,” he said. “Not yet, anyway.”

“Okay, maybe later.”

“Yeah, maybe later.”

“I'll hold you to that,” she said as the taxi pulled up in front of the Jefferson Hotel. A series of arched porticos cut from limestone and trimmed with brick highlighted the front of the century-old hotel. The grand staircase, constructed from Italian marble, was visible through the main doors. He gave her hand a squeeze and slipped out of the cab.

“Good night,” he said.

“See you tomorrow.”

Gordon watched the cab disappear into the traffic on Franklin, then headed into the hotel. In fact, there were two reasons he didn't want to stay at Jennifer Pearce's house. First, he was beginning to fall for her. And the last place he wanted to end up was in bed with her if the timing wasn't right. She was a beautiful woman, both physically and emotionally. And while she could be soft and tender at times, there was another side to the woman that he found equally impressive. She was highly intelligent and exceptionally focused. She had felt something was wrong when Kenga had died in St. Lucia and she had followed up on her suspicions. Flying across the country and approaching him at his mill must have taken incredible nerve. She was a strong woman with a clear sense of what she considered to be right and wrong, and she was a woman who acted on her convictions.

And she made him feel whole again. He didn't know how, but just being near her somehow eased the pain of the loss he had suffered. He had accepted the fact that Billy was dead, but the sadness that enveloped him was foreign. He'd never been a melancholy person, and the depression he felt in the weeks after his brother's death was new and unwelcome. But now it was lifting. And he saw Jennifer Pearce as the reason. She excited and intrigued him, and he wanted to know her better. But not until the time was right. It had to be when they were both ready.

There was another reason he had refused her offer. At nine o'clock, he was meeting the locksmith he'd visited that afternoon. The man had listened to Gordon's story, then agreed to supply the liquid nitrogen for five hundred dollars. Gordon checked his watch: eight forty-five. He walked through the Rotunda and up the elegant staircase, located an open chair in the Palm Court, and waited under the domed skylight. The stained glass, some of it original Tiffany, reflected the last rays of the day, then darkened as the sun set and the soft moon slowly rose, low on the horizon. At precisely nine o'clock, the locksmith, Brent Waldman, entered the bar, spied him, and headed over to his table.

He set a cylindrical black container about sixteen inches high on the table and reclined in the chair opposite Gordon. “I checked out your story,” he said, ordering a beer when the waitress came by. “There was an explosion in a town house on Cooley Avenue back at the end of April, and the listing realtor recently showed the house to an out-of-town buyer matching your description.”

“You did your homework,” Gordon said, paying for the locksmith's beer when it arrived.

“In our business, we learn how to open doors and safes. We don't often impart that knowledge to thieves, Mr. Buchanan.”

“So you're pretty sure I'm not a thief?”

“I didn't say that. You're taking liquid nitrogen to a deserted house and pouring it on a floor safe so you can open it and take things out that don't belong to you. That qualifies you as a thief. But I believe you're telling the truth about why you want whatever is in that safe. You see, I also checked with Arnie Boyle, the sheriff back home in Butte, to see if Billy Buchanan really did die a few months ago.” He took a sip off his beer. “Sorry about your brother, Mr. Buchanan.”

“Thanks,” Gordon said. He looked at the container on the table. “That the stuff?”

“Yup. And a pair of heavy-duty rubber gloves as well. Don't touch the nitrogen without putting the gloves on first. It'll freeze your skin in seconds.”

“Strong stuff.”

“You wouldn't believe it. But it'll take a few applications to freeze the bolts to the point where you can snap them. Pour a bit on and give it a few minutes, then give it another shot. Just keep trying the handle on the lid and it'll eventually lift off. Careful when you put your hand in the safe, as the nitrogen may have leaked in and run down the inside of the metal. Keep the gloves on until you're sure there's no chance of touching any of the nitrogen.”

“How do I dispose of the leftover?”

“I've only given you enough to eliminate the locking mechanism on the safe. Use it all. Leave the container in the safe when you're finished and cover it up. Chances are no one will ever notice it's there.”Waldman finished his beer and stood up.

Gordon slipped his hand in his pocket and held out the five hundred dollars. “Payment for the nitrogen.”

Waldman shook his head. “No, thanks. I told you, I don't like to help thieves. I just think what you're doing is probably the right thing. I don't want the money. Good luck.” They shook hands, and the man left without looking back.

Gordon finished his beer and left the hotel with the black package. One of the doormen hailed a cab and he gave the driver a house number a couple down from Rousseau's on Cooley Avenue. It was dark now, the moon just a sliver over the James River. Gordon watched the city slip by, thinking about the quick history lesson his previous cabdriver, Bud, had given him. More Americans had died in and around Richmond during the Civil War than in all of the Vietnam War. Maybe more than World War II, he didn't know. But the grassy slopes leading to the James River were once slick with Union and Confederate blood. Soldiers getting up in the morning, knowing that they were being sent to their death that afternoon. God, what a way to die. March at the battlements and take a musket ball or a hot shard of shrapnel from an exploding cannonball. They entered Carytown and turned onto Cooley Avenue. Gordon paid the driver and watched him drive off.

The street was dark, save for the light from a couple of streetlamps. He walked to Rousseau's condo, stopped on the sidewalk for a minute, then moved quickly into the ruins. He waited until he was in the basement before turning on his flashlight, and even then shielded the beam with his free hand. He carefully picked his way across the piles of rubble and found the floor drain exactly as he had left it. The tightfitting piece of wood came out a little easier this time, revealing the top of the safe. He slipped on the rubber gloves and opened the vial enclosed in the black case, then focused the flashlight into the hole and carefully poured the liquid nitrogen into the cracks between the lid and the body of the safe. He moved the vial around the lid as he poured, trying to get the liquid spread evenly around the entire diameter. He waited a few minutes, then repeated the procedure. Another few minutes and another application. There was a tiny bit of nitrogen left after he had made the third complete revolution, and he kept going until the last drops were out of the vial and on the safe. He screwed the lid on the vial and returned it to the black case. Tiny wisps of smoke exited the crack, and he sat back to wait.

He kept trying the handle, and after about fifteen minutes it moved a bit. He slipped on the rubber gloves, got a good grip on the handle, and gave it a steady pull. It resisted for a few seconds, then the bolts snapped and the lid came away in his hands. He set it aside and shone the flashlight in the hole. There was a solitary object in the safe, and he reached in and gently lifted it out. It was plastic, about three inches long by an inch wide, and shaped a bit like a cigar. On one side, the packaging read
Sony
, and on the other,
Micro Vault.
There was a split in the plastic at the midway point, and he gently pulled the two halves apart. When it came apart, one end was a protective plastic shield, covering some purple plastic and a metal end. He looked at the metal. It was a USB connector for a computer port. The object was a portable hard drive.

He slipped it into his pocket and replaced the lid on the safe after dumping the black case and the rubber gloves in the hole. He jammed the piece of wood in place and slid the drain cover into its slot. Then he picked his way back across the piles of junk and up the stairs. The street was totally deserted, the hour late. He walked a block or two until he hit Cary Street, where he found a cab waiting outside one of the bars. He got in the backseat and asked the driver to head for the Jefferson Hotel.

He retrieved the hard drive from his pocket and stared at it.

What was on the silicon chip inside this piece of plastic? Was it worth Albert Rousseau's life? Was it the evidence he needed to bring Veritas to justice? Right now, he had no answers. Tomorrow. Tomorrow he would know.