William Tyree - Line of Succession

“The guys that tried to kill Eva up in Martha’s Vineyard. I decided to hack into Veteran’s Affairs and see if I could find something from there. They’ve got these ancient legacy systems that are virtually held together with paper clips, so it was pretty easy.”

“Are they extremists?”

“As far as I can tell, they’re just mercenaries. They began their career as part of an elite Army sniper unit called the 1-501. After a tour of duty in Iraq, they both left to join the USOC unit. Pay was way better, I can tell you that. They were put under the command of a man named Chris Abrams, who was an unspecified consultant.”

“Never heard of him.”

“Back to Abrams in a moment, but moving on, please turn to page twelve of your handout.” O’Keefe flipped to page twelve as Nico resumed his story. “For kicks, I looked up our favorite Baltimore resident, Elvir Divac. Lo and behold, the name Chris Abrams pops up again. I looked up his partner in crime, Ali Lahari. Also listed as assigned to-”

“Chris Abrams?”

“Cha-ching. But strangely, there is no VA file for Chris Abrams, which I thought was odd for a Ulysses consultant, since they tend to hire veterans as a rule. So I looked him up on the Social Security database, and there was no man by that name within his age group.”

O’Keefe wriggled in her seat. “I know I’m a captive audience, but you’re boring me. Cut to the chase.”

“On page eighteen of your program, you’ll find what I discovered in the log files of a site called PrivateMilitaryNews.com .”

O’Keefe turned to the printout. It was a photo of General Wainewright with Chris Abrams. The article caption: General Wainewright with Chris Abrams, one of Ulysses’ top guns in Indonesia .

“This is the guy?”

“It is. But what’s interesting is that nobody knows this page still exists. It never made it to the live site. It was held in an editor’s queue in the Web site’s content management system, but it still lives on through the wonders of Web dev versioning software.”

“Just tell me what it means!”

“The article’s a smear piece, showing that Wainewright owned millions in Ulysses stock options and was thus violating anti-trust laws by pitching them DOD-financed contracts. Abrams’ inclusion as a Ulysses employee in the pic was just a happy accident.”

“Proves nothing,” O’Keefe said. “General Wainewright is very open about how pleased he is with Ulysses’ performance.”

“With one crucial exception. The General’s photo with Chris Abrams. I found myself wondering why someone went to such lengths to make sure it didn’t get published.”

“What lengths?”

“Double homicide.”

“You lost me.”

“Turn to page twenty-six.” O’Keefe did. “I looked up the name of the journalist to see if there were any follow-up pieces that saw the light of day. Instead, I found what you’re holding on page thirty-two.”

O’Keefe flipped to the page. It was an obituary. “Go on.”

“The writer was stabbed in a supermarket parking lot the day before the article was due to be published. That night, his editor was killed by a hit and run driver.”

Had she not been cuffed to the table, O’Keefe could have kissed him. Nico had found a direct link between Eva’s would-be assassins and Ulysses, and it even had a name — Chris Abrams. Even if Abrams was just a blunt instrument, O’Keefe figured if they dug deeper, there would be a connection to their own investigation of Ulysses as well. She shuffled anxiously through the rest of the files Nico had printed up.

Static hum erupted over the room speaker. Then the Desk Sergeant’s voice cut in: “Riots in 8th Precinct. All hands reports.”

Right on time. Nico himself had hacked into the precinct messaging account moments before waking O’Keefe and issued the emergency broadcast.

He stood. “So I guess this is goodbye.”

O’Keefe nodded. “Thanks, Nico. This was nice of you. All things considered, I mean.”

He slipped out of the soundproof room and switched off the light on his way out. Around the corner, he found the open cabinet with a half dozen riot helmets, Kevlar vests, and shields. He put a helmet on first. Then, as police ran past him, he calmly dressed in full riot gear and made his way toward the building’s entrance, where similarly costumed police officers were making their way to the street. Walk with purpose, he told himself. Stay with the pack. You are a cop in riot gear. Be the riot gear.

He continued following the other officers until he saw a public phone in front of a library. He went to it and lifted the shield on his riot helmet and picked up the receiver. When the operator came on, Nico said “Collect call to Burlington, North Carolina, please. Margaret Howland. H-O-W-L-A-N-D. You’ll have to look up the number.

Rapture Run

10:49 a.m.

General Farrell felt his intestines tighten as he entered Wainewright’s quarters. He was accustomed to being the calming influence in Wainewright’s life. But he didn’t feel calm now. Wainewright looked up and saw the rage in Farrell’s face. “Shut the door,” he said as he pressed a button on his desk to frost the door glass.

“Why wasn’t I told about Angie Jackson?” Farrell demanded.

Wainewright leaned back in his chair. “Your plate’s full. You didn’t need any more distractions.”

“Abrams’ crew failed, and now Eva Hudson’s people have Angie. I think we can count on Eva going public with this.”

“We can’t let that happen.”

Farrell’s voice turned wobbly. “We’ve already played our hand. We’ve got to tell Dex his wife is alive. What choice do we have? Better that he hears it from us first.”

“Calm down.”

“Don’t tell me to calm down. Eva’s alive, and that means she’s next in line. Maybe before we could’ve forced Dex into office, but not now. We’re going to have to make some kind of deal with Eva. Maybe tell her we’ll support her presidency in exchange for immunity. We could maybe give her Jeff Taylor. Or Abrams.”

Wainwright peered up at Farrell with red eyes. “You’ve completely lost it.”

“Don’t you see how this is going to look? The plan was to blame this on the Allied Jihad. That’s falling apart now. It looks bad. We look bad.”

The Chairman remained calm. “Get a grip. We look golden. Besides, if we give up now, the country would be right back where we started. Bogged down in the Middle East for a generation. Vilified by the world. Buying our water from Canada or going to war with Mexico to get it.” He stood, walked around the circumference of his desk and spoke mere inches from Farrell’s face. “The most patriotic men in America are standing right in this room. I really believe that. And I’m not afraid to put my reputation, and my very life, on the line for the good of our country. Are you?” He poked his index finger into the middle of Farrell’s chest. “Are you? Because it sounds to me like you’re only concerned about saving your ass.”

Farrell stepped back. He took an unfiltered cigarette out of his pocket and lit up. Thick ropes of smoke roiled throughout his esophagus and lungs.

TEN MONTHS EARLIER

Northern Colorado

The Chairman’s private hunting cabin was nestled within sixty private acres of golden windswept plains and dense aspen forests. It was not accessible by road. Being an avid hunter, General Farrell had been angling for an invitation for more than a year. With armies in three war zones, a single weekend off for any of the Pentagon brass was a rarity.

Wainewright finally relented in early October, just in time for deer season. They had come in on a Wednesday morning by private helicopter. The 110-year-old outpost had been a remote ranger station until the late 2000s when the State of Colorado, its tax revenue crippled by the housing bubble collapse, had been forced to sell off chunks of prime public land. Wainewright snapped the place up for just over a million in cash.