Girl of Lies (Rachel's Peril)

  George-Phillip stood up, suddenly, his chair rolling back on its casters.

  “What?” he cried.

  “That’s right, sir. We didn’t have any assets on the scene, unfortunately. She was able to overpower her abductors, though. Both of them are dead, and she’s en route to Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore.”

  “How serious were her injuries? Any idea who they were?”

  “Not serious, sir, and we’ve got a lead on one from the surveillance video. This one’s getting massive attention from the Yanks though, so I’ve not put anyone too close to the investigation. One of the kidnappers looks like Tariq Koury. Saudi born, he’s been around ISI and CIA and a bunch of other three letter agencies for decades.”

  “Three letter agencies… like SIS?”

  “He did a couple jobs for us in the early 90s. Nothing since then that I can tell. He works for the highest bidder… not reliable. But he’s a killer. He spent most of the last five years working for Blackwater.”

  George-Phillip shook his head. “And a sixteen-year-old girl escaped from him?”

  “Not just escaped. As best as I can find out, she killed him. I’ll get more info as soon as I can.”

  “We need to know who hired him, O’Leary.”

  “Working on it, sir.”

  “Put some serious assets on it. I want to know who was behind the abduction, O’Leary.”

  They hung up, and he stared out the window. George-Phillip thought about what he knew of Andrea Thompson, which amounted to virtually nothing. The idea that a sixteen year old girl had fought—and killed—two trained intelligence agents simply defied credibility. But then, nothing about this case, from the very beginning, had made sense. Especially not the contents of the file, which he didn’t need to have open to see its contents. The twisted and darkened bodies. They haunted his every thought.

  3. Bear. April 28. 6:30 pm

  It was long past six o’clock when John “Bear” Wyden closed the briefing folder and walked it down the hall to the Classified Materials Officer, who signed for the documents and gave Bear a receipt. Temporarily, Bear occupied a desk on the sixth floor at Main State. For the last three years, he’d been assigned as the deputy Regional Security Officer in Pakistan for the Diplomatic Security Service. An insanely challenging job, where he’d supervised dozens of agents in one of the largest and most strategic field offices.

  In two weeks he’d be taking over as an assistant deputy at the FBI’s National Joint Terrorism Task Force. Bear was forty-three years old, with dark hair starting to turn grey. But he was fit, weighing in at little more than the one hundred eighty pounds he’d carried the day he entered Diplomatic Security twenty years ago. Back then he’d been called Bear because of the thick hair covering his arms, legs and chest, a fact which had embarrassed him for years.

  For now, he had a couple of weeks to kill, and Tom Cantwell, the head of Diplomatic Security, had given him several ongoing files to work with. Busy-work, really, reviewing findings of existing investigations and raising questions and holes. He didn’t mind. Bear Wyden liked to stay busy.

  For now, though, it was time to go home.

  Bear had rented a studio apartment not far from DuPont Circle and walking distance from the office. He didn’t have many needs these days. Leah left with their two dogs and three kids and everything he’d owned two years before. He couldn’t blame her. They’d often worked together, and as colleagues, they were good to go. Not so much as husband and wife. So now he had his apartment and his books, a laptop computer, and way too much time on his hands, and she had a new husband, a new house, and had cut back her hours.

  He locked his temporary desk, and put on his jacket, preparing to leave the office. There were no personal touches—no point, considering he’d be leaving soon anyway.

  The phone rang, and for five seconds he considered ignoring it.

  It was Cantwell.

  “Bear Wyden,” he answered.

  “Cantwell. Can you come up for a few minutes, Wyden? We’ve got a hot one.”

  Bear raised his eyebrows. Cantwell was normally dull, tired, uninterested. He described potential crises as “synergistic opportunities,” not as “hot ones.” Something was definitely odd here.

  “I’ll be right there.”

  Five minutes later he’d ridden the temperamental old elevators up to the seventh floor, the inner sanctum. Secretary Kerry had his office here, as had predecessors throughout his career: Hillary Clinton, Madeleine Albright, Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice. It might be a little old fashioned and hokey, but Bear was a believer. He was a believer in democracy. He was a believer in his country. And sometimes he was a little bit in awe of the stature of the place he worked, when he wasn’t overwhelmed by the bullshit. Whenever his work took him to the seventh floor at Main State—not very often—he felt that sense of awe.

  Cantwell did not awe him. A political functionary, appointed to the job after the shakeup following the Benghazi attack, Cantwell did little to offend and little to inspire. He occupied his desk, let the department work underneath him, and periodically testified on Capitol Hill.

  Bear supposed there could be worse people sitting in this chair.

  “Bear. Good, I’m glad you were still in the building. I need to brief you in on a case, and it’s one with potentially serious implications.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “All right. Do you happen to know Ambassador Richard Thompson?”

  “The new Sec Def? Of course. I ran the security detail for the Embassy in Brussels when he was there. We had to provide protection for the entire family, along with some of the other high profile people, if I remember correctly.”

  “What’s your impression?”

  Bear tilted his head. His impression had always been that Richard Thompson was a cold fish, and a dangerous one, and that his wife… what was her name? Something Spanish, he thought. She was way too young for Thompson, way too passionate. It was a bad match, he thought. But Diplomatic Security agents weren’t paid to have personal opinions about their charges.

  “I can’t really give one, sir. That was more than twenty years ago. I knew the Ambassador and his wife, and I arranged for their security detail.”

  “Anything unusual?”

  Bear shrugged his shoulders. “Not really. There were some specific threats against his family, if I remember correctly. They had two… no, three little girls. I think the oldest was ten or so at the time.”

  “What sort of threats against the family?”

  Bear shrugged. “The usual. It was all stuff out of the Middle East… remember this was about a year after the Gulf War. What’s all this about?”

  Cantwell sat back in his seat. “Ambassador Thompson ended up having six daughters. The youngest was abducted this afternoon.”

  “Son of a bitch,” Bear muttered.

  “Exactly. Sixteen years old. She escaped. But we’ve already got indications there may have been a foreign power involved.”

  “What? Who?”

  “Tariq Koury was one of the kidnappers. We’ve got a positive ID, though he came through with fake papers. He flew to the States right next to her in first class, and then they grabbed her plain as day. It was dumb luck and quick thinking on her part that got her free.”

  Tariq Koury. That was… odd. He was a low life, a mercenary, and an opportunist. Bear had encountered him a number of times in the course of his work in Pakistan. Koury wasn’t driven by ideology or religion or political loyalties; his only desire was money. But he typically didn’t get involved in serious wet-work, and kidnapping the daughter of an American cabinet member was as serious as it got.

  “Who else was involved?”

  “We’re still trying to identify the other perp.”

  “All right. Who’s running the show?”

  “Who isn’t? Fucking Pentagon wants a piece of this. FBI, maybe Secret Service. But the Secretary talked to the President and Ambassador Thompson half an hour ago. DSS is running
the show. I want you to head the investigation. I’ll get Joyce Brown or someone to run the back office stuff. You get out there while things are hot and find out what’s what.”

  “I want to talk to the girl, if I can.”

  “They’re flying her to Johns Hopkins.”

  “Is she seriously hurt?”

  “No, just a precaution, from what I understand. Everybody wants to close the barn door now the horses have escaped.”

  Right. Just like Cantwell. He grimaced and checked his watch. It could easily take two hours to drive to Baltimore from downtown DC at this time of day. He’d requisition a uniformed officer and official car with lights and sirens, and hopefully that would shorten the trip. In the meantime, he’d scramble Leah and have her get a protective detail organized. She’d be just thrilled.

  “All right. I’m on it.”

  Twenty minutes later, Bear Wyden was in a car, speeding up the Baltimore-Washington Parkway.

  1. Andrea. April 28. 8:00 pm

  ANDREA THOMPSON WAS losing her patience. For nearly two hours she’d been poked, prodded, examined, and exhausted. She’d been questioned by the police, subjected to a host of blood tests, x-rays and a CT scan. “Just as a precaution.” She’d drawn the line at a rape kit, finally threatening to call the police if they touched her any more.

  Finally the first round of doctors backed off, replaced by a trauma therapist. Dirty Blonde drifting to grey, with a salt and pepper beard, he shoved his way past the other doctors, nurses, hospital administrators and the morbidly curious, then forced them all out with a few well chosen obscene comments.

  Against her will, Andrea immediately warmed to the man, if only for running off the med students who had been gawking at her. She breathed a sigh of relief as the room cleared out.

  “I’m Will Fisher,” he said.

  “Andrea Thompson,” she replied. “Thanks for… clearing them out.”

  “It won’t last,” he said. “The police are outside clamoring to get in, too. For now I’ve got you on restricted access.”

  She scrunched her eyebrows close to her nose. “My family?”

  “Of course your family can come in. And I expect you’ll be out of here in a couple more hours.”

  “What’s left?”

  “Let’s just talk for a moment.”

  “About?”

  Will gave her a warm, crooked smile, his teeth flashing white behind the beard. “How are you feeling?”

  “Are you a priest?”

  He coughed. “I’m a psychiatrist.”

  “I don’t need a psychiatrist.”

  “I’m sure you don’t,” he said. “You’re a resourceful young lady. But this is part of what we have to do. It’s kind of like getting a chest x-ray, but for your brain.”

  She blinked. “No. It’s not. You can see the results of an x-ray. Your examination consists of nothing but supposition and your own biases.”

  Will’s eyes widened and he grinned. “Humor me, then. Because in order to get you out of here quickly, I have to reassure the hospital administration that you’re fit to go and you aren’t a danger to yourself.”

  Andrea crossed her arms over her chest and said, “All right, then. Psychoanalyze me if you must.”

  Will laughed and gave her a sideways grin. “Tell me about your mother, then.”

  Eye roll. “My mother sent me off to Spain when I was six, and I see her on holidays whether I like it or not.”

  He frowned. “I was actually joking, but… you’ve really lived in Spain since you were six? Who with?”

  “My grandmother,” Andrea replied. “We have a flat in Calella… it’s a small town on the beach, about half an hour from Barcelona.”

  “What brings you to the States?”

  “My sister Carrie… her daughter needs a bone marrow transplant. I’m supposed to be tested to see if I’m a match.”

  He grimaced. “Leukemia?”

  She shook her head. “Thalassemia.”

  He frowned. “It’s been a while since my straight med school days, but my recollection is thalassemia isn’t life threatening, at least not in the short term.”

  She shrugged. “It can be. Depends. If she can’t find a donor, she’ll be dependent on blood transfusions the rest of her life. The typical prognosis is pretty poor.”

  “You’re a pretty smart girl for sixteen.”

  She shrugged her shoulder. “I’m a freak.”

  “I wouldn’t say that.”

  “How else do you explain it? Why didn’t my parents come pick me up from the airport, then? Why do they pack me off to live in Spain? The only reason I’m here is for my sister. The minute we know if I’m a donor or not, I’m on a plane back home.”

  Will nodded. “Tell me about your sister and her daughter.”

  Andrea shrugged. “I barely know her.” Her tone was sharp-edged, bitter.

  He raised his eyebrows. “But you fly thousands of miles to undergo a potentially painful medical procedure to help her daughter.”

  Andrea blinked. Then she said, “I didn’t have much a mother as a child. But what mothering I got was from Carrie.” She choked up a little, and then said, “I’d do anything for her. And she’s had an awful time.”

  “How so?”

  Andrea shrugged. “Husband murdered last summer. Surely you read about it in the papers.”

  He sat back and studied her. She could almost see the wheels working in his brain, as he put together the names Carrie Thompson, the fact of Ray’s murder and her mention of the papers. Then his eyes widened just a little bit. Yep. He got it. Ray Sherman, Carrie’s husband, had been falsely accused and brought before a war crimes court last summer. Exonerated by the court, he was murdered by another soldier.

  Will thought that through, then said, “Your brother-in-law was murdered. Is there any possibility that the kidnapping attempt was related to that?”

  She shrugged.

  “Did your kidnappers say anything to you? Were you scared?”

  She swallowed and thought of Hairy Chest, staring her in the eye as he said, “I fuck you so hard you scream.” She closed her eyes, her mind resting on the death in his eyes. It was terrifying. But it was also oddly impersonal. Hairy Chest and the driver—the best way she could put it was, they didn’t seem to be emotionally engaged in their work. This was just that. They’d been hired or ordered to kidnap her. It wasn’t personal for them.

  But it was damn personal for her, and for that reason, she was glad they were dead.

  There. She’d settled on her answer. “I’m glad they’re both dead,” she replied.

  Will nodded. “How do you feel about that?”

  “About the fact they are dead?”

  “Yes.”

  She gave him an ironic grin. “I’m delighted. It’s like someone bought me an iPhone for Christmas, I’m so excited.”

  “You don’t sound excited.”

  “You don’t sound very intelligent.”

  He rubbed a hand along his forehead, briefly massaging the bridge of his nose. “Andrea, I’m here to help you.”

  “Then sign whatever papers it is you need to sign, and let me go. I didn’t commit the crime here. I didn’t kidnap anyone. I didn’t hurt anyone. I didn’t threaten to rape anyone. I didn’t assault anyone. All I did was fly to help my sister. So there is absolutely no reason for me to be here anymore. If you wish to have me arrested, call the police. Otherwise, I’m leaving.”

  Andrea stood.

  “Andrea, please. I’m very concerned about trauma.”

  She stared at him for a solid thirty seconds. Then she blinked her eyes, and said, “You should talk to your therapist about that.”

  She ostentatiously stepped around him and opened the door.

  The first thing she saw was two Maryland state troopers blocking the door. They wore crisply pressed khaki shirts and matching hats, and both of them had the look of too many cases of beer in between lifting weights.

  Beyond them, to the
right, stood a large man grey suit that looked as if it had been used for a pillow. A leather folder, folded outward, displayed a badge at his pocket. She looked close enough to see he was from the Diplomatic Security Service.

  To the left stood two of her sisters.

  Carrie Thompson-Sherman might have been an older twin to Andrea. Dark brown hair, cut almost savagely short, framed a pert face with blue green eyes. Like Andrea, she was more than six feet tall, with narrow features, high cheekbones and unusually pale skin. Andrea did the math in her head… Carrie was born in 1985, so she must be 29 now. She didn’t look close to thirty, but she didn’t have the fresh look of eighteen anymore either. Worry and strain had given her new lines around her eyes and in the center of her forehead.

  Next to her… and considerably shorter than either of them… was their pixie-like sister Sarah. She was a few inches over five feet, and since Andrea saw her last, Sarah’s leg had healed into a permanent and startling network of scars running up her calf to her thigh. The scarring looked like shoelaces. Sarah had dark hair, dyed black with white streaks, and strikingly pale blue eyes and a nose ring that matched her eyes perfectly. She was still the same girl Andrea had last scene in a hospital bed in August, but something inside of her had changed. Her eyes were cold and distant, as if she’d seen too much.

  Andrea pushed her way past the police and walked to her sisters, silently pulling them both into an embrace.

  “Oh my God, Andrea,” Carrie whispered, her tone fierce. Sarah, almost comically, put her arms around both of them, like a child around both parents.

  “Are you okay?” Sarah asked.

  “Yeah,” Andrea replied. “I’m all right. Just… can we get out of here?”

  “Miss Thompson.” The voice was deep, unpleasant.

  Andrea looked up. It was the large man in suit that desperately needed dry-cleaning. She sighed.

  “I’m Bear Wyden. Diplomatic Security Service. Before you go, I need a few minutes of your time.”

  For just a second, Andrea wanted to cry. She just wanted to get out of this hospital, get away from all these people, and curl up under a blanket.