Andrew Britton - The American

“Yeah, I’ll wait.” Ryan rubbed his face wearily. He was tired, and he didn’t want to sit around for an hour or two and brood about Katie, but he couldn’t leave Naomi alone in the hospital. “Not a problem. I have some things to think about anyway.”

Harper nodded and clapped a hand lightly on Kealey’s shoulder. As he began to walk away, Ryan hesitated, then called out to him.

Jonathan turned. “Yeah?”

“About the woman who shot Naomi…”

Harper shook his head slowly. “It wasn’t Naomi who got her. Naomi managed to get off a few rounds but missed. It was one of the Bureau guys.”

“Okay… thanks.”

“You bet.”

As Harper was walking away again Ryan felt something lift from his shoulders. It was the last thing Naomi needed right now, to live with that burden. He was glad she wouldn’t have to.

He went back in to wait for her.

HANOVER COUNTY. LANGLEY.WASHINGTON, D.C.

The storm system had finally dissipated over central Virginia, leaving behind damp earth and tree limbs made heavy by weeks of rain. A steady wind blew in from the southwest, pushing scattered clouds across the early-morning sun and beads of water against the weathered timbers of the barn.

Vanderveen was in the dark shadows of the house, visible only when the clouds left the sun behind and let hazy light stream in through the open windows of the kitchen. He was looking in the refrigerator for something to drink and thinking about his plans for the day.

He finally settled on a small bottle of Tropicana orange juice. He was extremely tired, having slept little the night before. On his return from Washington he had watched the house for nearly four hours, half-expecting to see some sign of police activity. By the time he had finally deemed it safe, the sun was already topping the trees in the east. The fact that the house had not been raided meant one thing: the woman had followed through on her promise. He didn’t feel any sense of sorrow over her death, nor did he feel any gratitude for her sacrifice. In fact, he was glad she was dead; she had been the most dangerous link between him and the Iranians. With the woman out of the picture he was safe, at least for the moment.

Everything was on schedule. He would complete the main charge by early afternoon, securing the more fragile components of the device in the van before testing the circuitry again. In the evening he would begin the arduous task of arranging the heavy concrete blocks that, once lined up against the metal partition that separated the cab from the cargo area, would serve to direct the force of the blast out through the rear doors of the vehicle.

The screen door slapped shut behind him as he walked out across the black soil toward the barn, stopping dead in his tracks when he saw the realtor’s Ford Escape parked next to the barn. The sliding door, which he had eased shut but not locked, was now open wide to the cool morning air.

He cursed low, under his breath. Lost in his thoughts, he had not heard her arrive, and the kitchen window did not allow a view to the main road, from which he might have seen the vehicle approaching the rear of the house. After a few brief seconds of deliberation, Vanderveen kept walking forward.

She was standing next to the van, on the bare cement surrounded by straw. He looked around quickly to see what she might have touched before examining her face, which was almost lost in the shadows of the barn.

She had come to please. He could tell that from her tight jeans and stomach-baring halter top, from the light touch of strawberry-colored lipstick to the way her honey-blond hair carefully framed her high cheekbones. It was also clear that she had seen too much.

“Hi.” She was uncertain, he saw with some amusement, because her planned argument had been ruined. He tried to remember her name. Nicole. “I was just… I just wanted to stop by because… Well, you know.”

“Hi, Nicole. You don’t have to explain anything. I’m glad you came.” He flashed a winning smile and moved forward without missing a beat. She took two steps back, but there was nowhere to go. Pulling her close, he kissed her on the lips and let his hands slide down the length of her back. She didn’t respond to his touch, and he immediately registered that she was too afraid to move. Interesting.

Vanderveen pulled away abruptly and walked over to closely examine his worktable. He couldn’t be sure, but he thought that the light to his optical magnifier had been off, and now it was on, clearly illuminating the contents of the desk. He felt a trickle of annoyance.

“I–I was only in here for a second. I ju — just wanted to see you again… If you don’t want me to come back, I–I won’t. I’m sorry, I really am…”

The words were getting farther away. He thought that the conduit had been resting in a wooden crate, and now several pieces were sitting next to the crate. The trickle turned into a steady stream of anger.

“I–I didn’t touch anything. I’m… Well, I’m so sorry I just walked in here, I–I should have knocked. I should have come up to the house first, I know…”

He thought, and he was almost certain, that his detonators had been in a tight group of four, and now one was separated from the pack, resting on the other side of a. 40 caliber pistol. The stream gave way to a river of rage. He picked up the weapon, feeling its reassuring weight in his palm.

She was almost at the door, walking backward and still talking. “I–I — I didn’t see anything, I sw — swear…” Her voice began to rise when he turned and she saw the gun. “Please let me go. Please! I’m sorry! I didn’t see ANYTHING, I SWEAR TO GOD!”

He lifted the pistol and shot her once in the stomach, then watched with satisfaction as she collapsed to the cement.

They were seated in Harper’s seventh-floor office, lounging in the same chairs they had occupied a few weeks before. Naomi was at home recuperating, at Harper’s insistence. She had shown up that morning at Langley, hunched over with the pain. Harper had ordered her home to get some rest, but her initial refusal to leave had impressed Ryan. He didn’t want to think about what that meant.

The deputy director was in a glowing mood. The Bureau had already managed to track down a taxi driver who had taken the Iranian woman to National Airport several days in a row during the first week of November. Since she had never actually boarded a plane, it wasn’t hard for the agents tasked with the investigation to figure out what she had been doing there.

“She was using a locker,” Ryan said.

“That’s right.” Harper leaned back in his chair. He looked pleased with himself. “They never found any ID in the apartment, but the locker was under the same name she gave to the landlord: Theresa Barzan. They found Saudi passports for her and her minder inside.”

“Did those names come to anything?”

Harper’s jovial mood seemed to fade a little. “Not yet. The investigation is drawing a lot of resources, though. They’re going to start looking at banks — that’s a lot easier to do since the passage of the Patriot Act. The Bureau thinks she might have been moving money for Shakib.”

Kealey looked skeptical. “It’s going to take forever to go through the banks, John. They’ll fight the Feds every step of the way. What about Vanderveen? Was she supposed to be moving money for him as well?”

The deputy director shrugged. “Who knows? It’s certainly possible. Anyway, there’s been a development you need to know about. The director has been stuck in meetings all week — one of the upshots is that the visit by Chirac and Berlusconi is getting the NSSE designation.”

Ryan was not at all surprised. NSSE stood for National Special Security Event, and the Secret Service, under Presidential Decision Directive 62, was the government agency primarily responsible for security planning and implementation at such events. He realized they’d be completely sealing off the Gangplank Marina on the 26th and that the FBI, FEMA, and the Washington, D.C., Metro Police Department would all be called in to help.