Ghost Country

  What’d Finn said?

  He thought about it.

  Seconds passed.

  He remembered.

  “Holy shit,” Travis said.

  Paige stirred in his arms, tilted her head back to meet his eyes.

  “What?” she said.

  For a long moment he couldn’t answer. He was thinking back over every aspect of the past two days, seeing it all as it’d really been. Seeing what everything meant. It was like watching a film of a shattering wineglass being run in reverse. Every jagged piece of the thing twisting and tumbling, pulled inward toward its proper place by some logical gravity. From the first moment they’d looked through the iris, they’d been wrong about what they were seeing. Their biggest mistake had been right there at the outset, and every conclusion they’d built on it had been way off the mark.

  “Travis, what is it?”

  He blinked. Looked at her.

  “I’ll show you,” he said.

  And then against his every inclination, he let go of her and stood from the couch. He waited for her to get up, and they crossed the living room to the hallway and then the den.

  Loose paper files were stacked everywhere in the room—on the desk, the coffee table, the chairs, the floor—in some kind of improvised Dewey decimal system.

  “We’ve narrowed it to five people we’re certain we trust,” Garner said. “I’ve e-mailed them and set up a secure conference call—”

  He cut himself off, having glanced up and seen Travis’s expression.

  Bethany looked up too.

  They stared. Waited for Travis to speak.

  But he didn’t. Instead he made his way through the stacked files to the giant globe by the window. He knelt before it and rotated it until he was looking at the United States.

  “Where could they go?” he said, more to himself than the others. “Where’s the best place for it?”

  At the edge of his vision he saw the others trading looks.

  He rolled the globe upward, pulling South America fully into view.

  “Anyone know a place almost as dry as Yuma?” he said. “Maybe in Central or South America?”

  Garner chuckled. “I know a place that makes Yuma look like Seattle. NASA uses it to test Mars rovers. Every year I was in office they wanted more money for research sites down there.”

  Travis waited for him to go on.

  “The Atacama Desert,” Garner said. “Northern stretch of Chile. Great big sweeps of it have had no observed rainfall in recorded history. Those parts are biologically sterile. No plants or animals. Not even bacteria.”

  Travis leaned closer to the globe. Only three of Chile’s cities were labeled on it. One was the capital, Santiago. He hardly noticed it. His gaze had already locked onto one of the other two.

  The last shard of the wineglass slipped into place.

  “Unbelievable,” Travis said.

  But before he could say more, the stacked papers in the room began to scatter. A cold breeze had blown in from the hall.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  It was over before they could make any move. Just like that, there were men in the doorway—two standing and one crouched between them—with silencer-equipped pistols leveled. No one even spoke. There was no need.

  The gunmen motioned for them to exit the den, and pulled back from the doorway to make room. Garner led the way, and a moment later everyone was standing in the living room.

  There were six gunmen in all. Each had the same weapon: a Beretta 92F with a silencer that nearly doubled its length. There were narrow LED flashlights mounted atop each gun, switched off at the moment. Each of the men also wore a FLIR headset, identical to what they’d had in Yuma, though at the moment they hung from their necks on elongated straps.

  Finn was there too. Holding both cylinders. Behind him, the disconnected iris from his own cylinder was still open. Moist October wind blew in from the pitch-black New York on the other side. Then the iris closed and the air stabilized again.

  Bethany’s backpack, with the SIG inside, still lay where Travis had set it near the couch. He didn’t look at it. Just got a sense of it, and judged the distance to it. It wasn’t an option at the moment. It would take an ice age to reach it, and another ice age to unzip the pack. Time enough for every weapon in the room to acquire him and hit him half a dozen times.

  Finn pointed to a bare stretch of wall. “There. All four of you.”

  They hesitated, but only for a moment. There was no other move they could make. The geometry of the situation was what it was. They went to the wall. Stood there in a row, facing the room. The gunmen arranged themselves in a broad arc before the four of them, no shooter in any other’s line of fire.

  “I need all of you to understand that the following isn’t bluster,” Finn said. “If you give us a reason to start shooting, we’re just going to kill all four of you. We can do that and still get away, and each of you knows it. Clear so far?”

  None of them answered, even with a nod.

  Finn shrugged, took it as an affirmative. Then he set the cylinders in one of the big leather chairs, strode to the hall and disappeared into the den. Twenty seconds passed. They heard keystrokes and a few mouse clicks. Travis pictured the computer screen as it’d been when they left the room. Garner’s e-mail program was open, all passwords already entered. Finn could access everything.

  They heard him curse softly, and a second later he came back out, holding the cordless phone from the cradle on the computer desk. He looked at Garner.

  “The e-mail you sent to coordinate the conference call mentions me by name.”

  “Does it?” Garner said.

  Finn stared at him for a long time, then turned and looked at nothing, and Travis could see him putting together the implications. He didn’t look happy about them. He glanced at his watch.

  “The call starts in six minutes,” Finn said. He looked at Garner again. “When it does, you’re going to join it and tell everyone to disregard the message you sent them. Tell them the situation is already being handled higher up, and not to worry about it.”

  Garner didn’t reply. Five seconds passed.

  “Do you understand?” Finn said.

  Garner exhaled, the sound almost a laugh. “If you think I’m going to do that just because you say so, you’re high. Go ahead and shoot us. I’m sure the five people on that conference call, and all their secretaries and staffs, won’t think it’s the least bit suspicious when they read that I got killed a few minutes before it was scheduled to happen. I’m sure your name being in the e-mail won’t bring any unwanted attention onto you, either.”

  Finn didn’t blink, but his eyes drew a third of the way closed. He was thinking again. Visualizing moves and countermoves on the chessboard.

  Then he nodded. “Fair enough.”

  He looked at Garner’s phone and punched in a number. Put it to his ear. Waited. When the other party answered, Finn said, “We’re here,” and described the situation regarding the conference call. He wandered away down the hall as he spoke. Travis heard him say, “No, the e-mail doesn’t go into detail, but it names both you and me, which isn’t helpful.” The conversation continued in low tones Travis couldn’t make out.

  The nearby wall clock showed four minutes left before the conference call.

  Finn came back into the room. He was holding the phone down away from his ear now. Its power light was still on. He looked at Garner.

  “It’s on speaker,” Finn said, and then spoke toward the phone’s mouthpiece. “Go ahead.”

  A man on the phone cleared his throat softly. Even by that sound Travis recognized his voice.

  “President Garner,” the man said.

  “President Currey,” Garner said.

  Travis heard Currey exhale. He sounded tired. “Rich, what are you trying to do?”

  “I’d like to hear your own answer to that question.”

  “That would take more time than we have. Why don’t you take some advice fro
m an old friend and fall in line here, all right? Get on the conference call and say you jumped the gun, and that it’s all good. It’s the only move you’ve got, anyway.”

  “I don’t know about that,” Garner said. “I was thinking I might just stand here and watch the minute hand tick a few times. If I don’t show up on the call, that in itself raises a few flags. I don’t imagine you and your people want any flags going up, if you expect to keep whatever you’re doing secret for another four months.”

  Travis saw something flicker through Finn’s expression at that line. Something like amusement. It vanished as quickly as it’d appeared.

  “Here’s your problem,” Currey said. “From this point forward, your goal is to build a base of support against us. To do that, you need to convince rational people of something no rational person can believe without proof. If you had one of the cylinders, it’d be easy for you. You could show people what’s on the other side. But you’ve lost that advantage now. So who’s going to believe you? It won’t carry much weight that you’re a former president, when the people contradicting your claim include the sitting president and his entire cabinet, among many others.”

  Travis watched the resolve fade from Garner’s eyes. Watched something darker take its place.

  “It’s over, Rich,” Currey said. “All that’s left is to acknowledge it. And the sooner, the better—at least for you. We’d be happy to leave you alone, once you’ve cooperated. It’s not in our interests to stir up any headlines just now.”

  Garner looked at Paige, right beside him, then at Bethany and Travis.

  “What happens to the others?” Garner said. “And don’t bullshit me, Walter. I’ll be able to tell.”

  “I know it,” Currey said. There was a long pause, and then he said, “All right, fine. They die. They go to Rockport Army Depot on Long Island, they get interrogated by some friends of ours there, and then they get a bullet to the temple each. Sound like the truth? The thing is, that part happens regardless of the outcome. You can’t help them. You need to take care of yourself, now. So do it. Get on the call and make it right. I’ll get out of the way so you can.”

  The line clicked dead.

  Finn pressed the button to hang up the phone, then held it out to Garner.

  The wall clock showed thirty seconds left. In all likelihood, Travis knew, the other parties had already called in and were waiting.

  Garner didn’t take the phone. He looked at the three of them again, beside him along the wall. His eyes stayed on each one for a few seconds. Then he looked down, straight in front of himself. Travis saw his eyes track across the floor in an arc, just below the feet of the six gunmen. It almost seemed that he was getting a sense of the men, without appearing to do so. Travis wondered why. He did the same himself. He took in their posture. They were alert but not poised. Their weapons had dropped to their sides over the past couple minutes—but they could be aimed again in a quarter second, so Travis couldn’t see how it mattered. Maybe Garner’s assessment was only the manifestation of a wish that he could do something. Nothing more than that. Already he was staring down at his hands, folded before him. Looking hopeless. Looking like he’d made up his mind.

  He took the phone from Finn.

  “Keep it on speaker,” Finn said.

  Garner nodded.

  “Sir, don’t do this,” Paige said.

  She looked at Garner, but the man could no longer meet her eyes. He punched a number into the phone. It began to ring.

  “Mr. President . . .” Paige said. Travis heard her voice crack. It had nothing to do with fear, he knew. It was simply disappointment to a crushing degree. Paige had known Garner for some time, and couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Or didn’t want to, at least.

  The ringing stopped and a recording came on. It told Garner to enter something called a bridge code. He entered it. There was a tone and a series of clicks. Travis guessed the same recorded voice was letting the others on the call know that Garner had joined.

  A tear overran one of Paige’s eyes and drew a long track down her cheek.

  Then the line opened and several voices were speaking at once, saying hello and asking if everyone was on.

  “Gentlemen,” Garner said.

  The voices went quiet.

  Garner took a breath. Continued avoiding Paige’s stare. He let the breath out slowly.

  “Gentlemen, I seem to have inconvenienced you for nothing. I’ve just spoken at length with President Currey, and I’m now confident that he has control of what I planned to discuss with you. It’s not something any of us needs to worry about. And I’m sorry to cut it short, but that’ll be it.”

  He turned the phone off. Lowered his head.

  Finn looked more relieved than happy. Travis could almost see sympathy for Garner in his expression.

  “You’re a realist,” Finn said. “I could always see that in you. There’s no shame in it. You’re a man who understands his options, that’s all.”

  He took the phone from Garner.

  Garner didn’t look at him, but after a second he finally met Paige’s eyes.

  “You probably want to slap my face as hard as you can,” Garner said.

  “Don’t tempt me,” Paige said.

  “No, I think you should do it. You’ll feel better. So will I.”

  For a moment she only stared at him. His face was devoid of anything but pity, maybe for himself more than the three of them.

  And then Paige slapped him. It had to be the hardest open-handed hit Travis had ever seen. The sound of it, loud and sharp as a whip-crack, echoed off the windows, the opposite wall, the stone floor of the hallway nearby. It rocked Garner’s head sideways, throwing his balance off enough to make him take a step.

  When he looked back at Paige, there was blood on his lip.

  But he was smiling.

  A strange kind of smile. Like he was in on a joke no one else understood yet. He turned to Finn. The smile hardened. Became colder.

  Finn looked puzzled for maybe half a second.

  And then he looked scared.

  “I understand my options better than you do,” Garner said.

  If he’d said another word it would’ve been lost under the sound of the hallway door slamming inward. Travis snapped his head to the side and saw two men in crisp black suits coming through, with MP5 submachine guns shouldered. In almost the same instant he heard similar crashing impacts from elsewhere in the residence—two other teams coming in somewhere.

  He understood at once why Garner had taken note of the six gunmen and their relaxed postures. They were plenty prepared to raise their silenced Berettas if any of their four captives made a move—but the sudden arrival of armed Secret Service agents was a very different matter.

  The effect on the six men—not to mention Finn—was immediate. Their heads turned toward the sounds of the various doors breaking in. From where they stood—the six of them in their long arc—they couldn’t see directly down the entry hall. Travis and the other three could: the living-room wall they stood against was an extension of one side of the hall.

  But Finn’s gunmen knew exactly who was coming. The part of their brains that would’ve told them to drop a hot potato had figured it out in about a hundredth of a second. The result, Travis saw, was a kind of neural tug-of-war between all possible reactions: killing the captives, finding cover, getting the hell out of this place. Not the kind of decision they could make in the almost comically small amount of time they had to work with.

  At least one of the six opted for the first choice. The man nearest to Travis. The guy’s Beretta began to come up toward the four of them, even as the Secret Service men in the hallway advanced at a sprint. They’d reach the living room soon, but not soon enough.

  Travis threw himself forward at the man bringing up his gun. The two of them were lined up in a perfect face-off. Travis crossed the five-foot reach of space between them in the time it took the gun to come up to chest level. He got his left hand
around the silencer, yanked the weapon down and away from pointing at the others, and punched the guy in the throat with all the force his weight and momentum could provide. Which turned out to be enough. The guy’s hand came off the gun with a reflexive jerk. And then Travis was twisting, holding the pistol, going right past the guy and beyond the arc of the others. Not trying to check his speed. Not even trying to stay on his feet.

  He took one more step before his balance outran him, and then he was falling, completing his spin as he dropped. Still holding the Beretta in his left hand by its silencer. He brought his right hand up and took the weapon by the grip. Raised it to sight in on one of the still-armed gunmen. His angle of fire, as he fell, was tilted radically upward. If he missed, the bullet would hit only the ceiling—there was no more of the building above this floor.

  He fired. He didn’t miss. The shot hit the man at the base of his skull and blew it open.

  Then Travis’s ass hit the floor painfully and his gun arm dropped beyond his control.

  By then, everyone was moving. Things were happening too quickly for him to keep track of. He saw Paige and Bethany ducking and running toward him, getting out of the kill zone that was about to open up between the gunmen and the oncoming agents in the hall. He could hear the agents’ footsteps, as well as those of the other teams, still out of sight somewhere behind him. He could see the gunmen scattering, ducking—no doubt they could see the agents now. One man slammed into the leather chair that held the two cylinders. The chair pitched forward, spilling the cylinders onto the carpet. They rolled in different directions—neither one toward Travis.

  Travis raised the Beretta again, looking for a target, when it occurred to him what he was doing. He was holding a pistol, in a room containing a former president, into which Secret Service agents were about to flood.

  Not a good way to stay alive.

  He cocked his wrist and threw the gun sideways, saw it hit the carpet and spin into the gap beneath the couch. At the same time he saw Paige and Bethany diving toward him, and even as they hit the ground the shooting started.