Traitor (28 page)

Walid grabbed his things and joined him. “Bad?”

“Not something I want to talk about,” replied Nick. “But let’s just say it’s one of the reasons I’m here today.”

“Understood,” said Walid. “You’ll be pleased to hear that we’re staying in the valley this time,” he said, leading the way as the door opened to reveal a SUV awaiting their arrival.

Nick kept his face pointed to the ground as he covered the short distance to the SUV, which wasted no time setting off. The road soon disappeared as the driver favored an off-road route which, as Walid had said, headed south. It took less than an hour for them to arrive at a desolate looking farmhouse on the banks of the Kurram River. The SUV drove beyond the farmhouse and was guided by a waiting man into a large and just as shabby looking barn. The barn was already packed with a number of other vehicles. The driver squeezed in the SUV and, safely out of sight of any passing satellite or drones, he unlocked the doors for his passengers.

“Larbi will take you across to the meeting,” said the driver, pointing to the man who had guided them into the barn.

Nick stepped out of the SUV and took a gulp of air. The enormity of what he was about to do finally hit him. He had promised the Caliph he would deliver and he now had the chance to do that. The men that could make the plan a reality were sitting, waiting for him, just yards away.

Larbi ushered them on, raising a hand to stop Walid when they neared the farmhouse door while beckoning Nick forward.

Nick looked at Walid, who looked as confused as Nick did.

“Walid?” asked Nick.

Walid shrugged. “I was told to come with you.”

Larbi ushered Nick forward towards the door where a number of guards surrounded the entrance.

Nick’s plan was foolproof up to a point. The point being that he had to stay alive to deliver it. A crushing feeling hit him when the door opened to reveal a wooden block in the center of a large room. An executioner stood by its side brandishing a gleaming scimitar. That was not the sight Nick had hoped for. The men he had hoped to meet were in the room but rather than around a table, they were lining the walls smiling at him and beckoning him to join them in the room.

Before he had a chance to consider their offer, two guards grabbed him from behind and propelled him into the room. Nick considered fighting back but the odds were just too overwhelming. He didn’t stand a chance.

NCTC

Two weeks later, Monday 28
^th
July.

Reid walked back into the center, having spent the previous two weeks in various locations across the Middle East with Flynn. All had proven to be wild goose chases. Nick Geller had quite literally disappeared off of the face of the earth. With no new videos having surfaced over that same period, the news stations had even managed to broadcast unrelated stories. Some semblance of normality was returning across America. Food supplies had been bolstered in stores, although there was still a significant minority insisting on bulk-buying and perpetuating food lines that weren’t quite back to what they had been just three weeks earlier.

Gas stations, however, had recovered more quickly. There was only so much fuel people could fit in their gas tanks. Once full, they were topping up just as they had when they had run their car at nearly empty. People weren’t using more gas, they just had more gas in their cars.

Reid knocked on Turner’s door before entering. “Deputy Director Turner,” she said, as she walked into the office.

“Special Agent Reid, good to have you back,” replied Turner, delighted to see his number two. Without her on site, he had spent more time on the main operations floor than he would have liked. He had also realized just how much work she did behind the scenes that he had been blissfully and happily unaware of.

“Any news?” she asked hopefully.

“Nothing. Not a sighting. Not a whisper, anywhere, even of his name,” he replied.

Carson, having heard Reid arrive, crashed the welcome party. “Sarah! Good to have you back,” he said warmly.

“Thank you, Harry,” she replied with a smile.

“Quite a trip you had. Is there anywhere you haven’t been in the Middle East?”

“I don’t think so. It was a fairly comprehensive trip but a complete waste of time.”

“Nothing anywhere. Even the chatter has dropped to levels we’ve not seen in years,” said Carson.

“The calm before the storm?” asked Reid rhetorically.

Both Carson and Turner nodded, the worry of that exact thought etched on their faces.

“Anyway, great to have you back,” reiterated Carson, heading out of the office.

“I found Speaker Lopez’s mole!” Turner called after him, causing Carson to stop in his tracks.

“You did?” asked Carson in surprise, closing Turner’s door as he stepped back into the office.

“It wasn’t easy. I had to call in a few favors at NSA. They tracked all calls from all cells from this location on the day in question.”

“Good thinking.”

“They’ve just come back and informed me that there was nothing. No calls to Speaker Lopez or anyone connected to her.”

“But I thought you said you found the source?” said Reid.

Carson smiled, as did Turner.

“What’s there to smile about?” asked Reid, looking at them grinning at each other.

“There’s not a chance in hell the NSA would have run that check without Harry knowing. He already knew the result because he made sure that’s what it was.”

Carson put on his best offended look.

“Furthermore,” continued Turner, “the biggest winner out of that debacle was the President. Speaker Lopez has been put firmly back in her box by the media. Her trip here was a public relations disaster that will be replayed for years to come.”

Carson nodded in agreement. “Yes, Madame Speaker was shown to be a little naïve when it comes to dealing with national crises. Don’t politicize or try to score points when people’s lives are at risk.”

“Emptying the center was genius and couldn’t have played out better if it had been
orchestrated
,” Turner said, looking directly at Carson.

“What, you think I set that up? Sending her a secret message from a ‘
friend’
and telling her to bring a press pack and catch the center having a nap?”

“Did you?” asked Reid, finally catching up.

“If only I had thought of that!”

Turner shook his head as Carson walked out of the room.

“You think he did it?”

“Of course he did. The son of a bitch plays us like a grand pianist plays the piano!”

“Should you not tell someone?”

“Who?” asked Turner, walking over to the door and closing it, something Carson seemed incapable of doing.

“The Director? The President?”

“My proof is a lack of it. I only guessed the NSA would run it by him first. He didn’t deny they had. Even then, what are they going to do? Speaker Lopez is back at her day job and keeping her head down.”

“I guess that helps us too.”

“I know,” said Turner, reluctant to admit that Carson’s maneuver, however wrong, was helpful.

“So anyway,” said Reid trying to lighten the mood and change subject, “what leads are we working?”

Turner pointed sullenly to the white board at the back of his office. Nick Geller’s name was written in large letters across the top. The board below was empty.

“Nothing?” she said, unable to hide her disproval.

“Not nothing. There are little snippets, sightings down on the floor. I leave this board for the leads I think are going to come to something. Leads that might actually help us catch him.”

“Shit,” she said despondently, dropping onto the sofa. Silence filled the room and then she said, “What about Frankie?”

Turner shrugged. “The same, nothing new.”

“But she was hunched over her desk and too busy to even say hi when I came in.”

“To be honest, she’s been a bit strange all week and come to think of it, ever since she got back with Al Zahrani.”

“Strange how?” asked Frankie from the doorway.

Startled, and a little embarrassed, Turner said, “I didn’t hear you come in.”

“Secret Service training. We open doors very quietly,” she said before pressing her question. “Strange how?”

“Quiet,” said Turner.

“After what Frankie’s been through?!” Reid snapped.

“No, he’s right. I have been a bit off this week,” Frankie admitted. “I’d be buried under a blanket! I can’t tell you how in awe I am of how you’ve coped,” said Reid, patting the sofa next to her for Frankie to join her.

“I appreciate that but I’m not here for sympathy,” she said. “I’m here because I’ve got something.”

Sarande, Adriatic Coast

Albania

Gary Truman grabbed his camera and headed out. Daylight was still a half hour away but he planned to hike north into the hills and capture some dramatic early morning shots as the sun crept over the hills that framed the Adriatic Sea below. Albania was still relatively untouched by tourism, certainly from a European perspective, and offered miles of deserted beaches and coves that elsewhere in Europe would have been crowded during the summer.

A keen photographer and wildlife enthusiast, he was also hoping to catch a few shots of the Mediterranean monk seals, one of the most endangered mammals in the world. Thanks to the tranquility afforded by the quite coves and bays of the Albanian coastline, the seals were residents in some of the underwater caves just to the north of Sarande, the tourist town in which Gary’s hotel was located.

Gary walked out on to the street and followed the road as far as it took him into the hills, which wasn’t far. Albania was a country with a checkered history. During the communist era, it had all but closed itself off from the rest of Europe and due to successive regimes favoring a rail network for the people, roads were neglected and private transportation even into the 1980s was mostly limited to a horse and cart. Albania had come a long way in the two decades since the fall of the communist regime but had a lot of building to do to compete with other European countries and economies.

Whatever the case, Gary was delighted when the road disappeared to be replaced by a dust track. It meant that he was travelling the less trodden path and the chances of catching a shot of the seals increased.

He couldn’t have been happier. The warm air of dawn was promising another beautiful day ahead. He was alone in the world. His view from the hillside stretched down into the deserted coves and along the coastline. The only sounds he could hear were his footsteps brushing through the dust. This was in stark contrast to his working life. Although being armed with a camera was no real change, the subject of the photos was somewhat different. He was a crime scene investigator with the Metropolitan Police Force in London. His work shots were not ones he would ever care to share on his Blipfoto account, unlike his holiday snaps.

Gary witnessed daily what one human could do to another. Fortunately, he had always preferred his own company, and had always been regarded as a bit strange by his colleagues. However, no one doubted his diligence when it came to work. Gary Truman was a perfectionist and noted the tiniest of details that many others in his profession would miss. Mildly autistic, Gary was blissfully unaware of any of the idiosyncrasies that set him aside from the rest of the team.

Having captured his sunrise shots, Gary trekked down towards Krorez Beach. He had heard from a local that the seals sometimes spent the early morning swimming in the bay. Snapping off shots as he went, it was only as he neared the beach itself that he noticed for the first time that he wasn’t alone. Still on the hillside above the beach, he spotted something in the water.

What he had initially thought might have been a seal’s head when it emerged around the headland was, when he zoomed in, revealed to be that of a man, a swimmer enjoying an early morning dip in the warm seas. Gary had snapped a couple of shots before he even realized it wasn’t a seal. Slightly irritated, he packed his camera back in his camera bag. Any chance of seeing the seals had been thwarted by the selfishness of the swimmer. Gary turned and headed back for Sarande. He would just manage to catch breakfast if he hurried.

Nick Geller felt invigorated as he walked out of the waters and onto Krorez Beach. His sunrise swim was his one outing each day. The deserted coastline offered a beautiful change from swimming laps in a pool and with the added current, a lot more of a workout. Swimming with the dolphins and seals that had accepted him as a non-threatening addition to their habitat was a very welcome bonus.

He grabbed his towel and spotted the man in the distance, halfway up the hill. He was too far to be able to make out Nick’s features but he was climbing up the hill so had been closer when Nick swam ashore. The man’s pace was normal which suggested he was not rushing away after identifying Nick but he was, nonetheless a risk. Nick swept the hillside. The man was alone, or at least not with anyone he knew. Nick noted a slight movement a few hundred yards behind the man.