Brad Thor - Takedown

“Why would you want to talk to me?”

“May I come inside, please?”

Forrester opened the screen door and showed Lawlor inside to a bland kitchen with cheap cabinets and yellow wallpaper. He pointed to a table with a view of the backyard and told his visitor to have a seat. “Can I get you something to drink?” he asked.

“I’ll take a beer if you’ve got it,” replied Gary. “It’s been a long day.”

Forrester didn’t know what to make of a Federal agent having a beer on company time, but something told him this DHS operative was not all he seemed to be. “You want a glass?” he asked as he withdrew two beers from the fridge.

“Please.”

Forrester poured the beers, handed one to Lawlor, and said, “What can I do for the Department of Homeland Security?”

Gary slid the printouts of three service photos Olson had e-mailed him across the table. “Do you recognize these men?”

The captain studied the photographs for a moment, slid them back across the table, and said, “No, I don’t.”

“If you need a little more time, that’s okay.”

“I’m pretty good with faces, Agent Lawlor. If I say I don’t recognize someone, I don’t recognize them.”

“From your glowing assessments, I would have thought these marines unforgettable.”

The man was toying with him, and Forrester didn’t like it. “What do you want?”

Removing the rest of the photos and sliding them across the table, Lawlor replied, “I want to talk about the recruiting operation you’ve been running out of the Marine Security Battalion.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I’ve read assessment reports for each of the marines in those pictures and they were all written by you.”

Forrester took a long swallow of beer, using the time to carefully craft his response. As he set the glass down on the table he looked at Lawlor and said, “I assess hundreds of marines every year. So what?”

“Not like these. These marines were exceptional, and eighteen months ago the ones you gave the highest marks to dropped off the grid.”

The captain rolled the base of his glass on the tabletop and fixed his guest with a steady gaze. “You’re talking to the wrong guy.”

“Why? Because you really don’t know what I’m talking about or you were just following orders? Captain Forrester, I don’t have a lot of time, so I’m going to cut to the chase. Of those marines, the first three I showed you are dead. They were killed today, we think by the same group responsible for blowing up the bridges and tunnels in New York, and something tells me that more marines are going to die very soon if you don’t help me out.”

309 EAST 48TH STREET

NEW YORK CITY

Satisfied?” asked Mike Jaffe as he turned off the monitor.

Brad Harper was stunned. “So those were female DIA operatives dressed to look like his kids?”

“Why do you think the camera never made it into the bathroom until their heads were already bent over the edge of the tub?”

“Why didn’t you just tell me?”

“Because you wouldn’t have given it the same reaction,” replied Jaffe. “It was perfect. Worthy of an Academy Award.”

“But I wasn’t acting.”

“I know. That’s why it was so perfect. Mohammed would have smelled the good cop/bad cop routine a mile away. Right now he thinks you’re terrified of my methods. If he thinks you believe I’m unstable and will stop at nothing, then he’s going to start believing it too.”

Harper didn’t like being used.

“So are we good here?” asked Jaffe in response to the marine’s silence.

Harper wasn’t quite sure how to respond to that.

“Are we good?” repeated Jaffe, slowly and deliberately.

The subtext was obvious. Jaffe wanted to know if Harper was going to continue to play ball, or if he had some sort of a problem that needed to be addressed. Harper had some serious doubts as to how Jaffe might handle any dissension. After all, the man had pointed a loaded pistol at his head, point-blank.

As long as the kids were out of the picture and no longer potential casualties, he figured he could go along with almost anything else Jaffe had up his sleeve. Harper nodded his head and said, “Yeah, we’re good.”

“Excellent. I’ve got three large rolls of Visqueen in the office at the end of the hall. I want you to go get them. It’s going to get pretty bloody in there.”

“Excuse me?” replied the young marine.

“Visqueen,” repeated Jaffe. “Rolls of plastic sheeting.”

“I know what Visqueen is. What are we going to need it for?”

“I just told you. Right after you told me we were good. Did I misunderstand something?”

“No,” said Harper.

“No, sir,” corrected Jaffe.

Harper wanted to deck this deranged piece of shit, but he choked the impulse back and responded, “No, sir.”

“Good, because I’d hate to think you were going soft on me, Harper. I asked for marines on this assignment because marines are tough. Marines have got guts! And we’re gonna need all the guts we have to face down these two shitbags in the other room.”

“I understand,” said Harper, “but plastic sheeting? Are we really going to need it?”

“It’s not for us. It’s for the two foreign intelligence agents who are assisting us. They requested it.”

“Rashid and Hassan? What are they going to do with it?”

“They’re probably going to use it to keep blood off the walls and off the carpeting.”

Harper had figured things were going to really get ugly at some point, but the ugly he had anticipated was from psychological stress applied to their captives. They were in New York City, for Christ’s sake, not some third-world torture chamber.

Jaffe could read the young marine’s mind just by looking at him. “What’d you think this was going to be, son? We call them a few names, withhold everything but high-sugar foods, keep them up for days on end until they eventually crack, tell us what we want to know and then we go home to sleep in our warm beds with crystal clear consciences? Is that how you saw it going down? Because if you did, you’re not the man-wait, scratch that-you’re not the marine I thought you were.”

“Sir, I respect your command, but I’m going to ask you not to impugn my integrity as a United States marine.”

“Fuck that,” said Jaffe, getting into the taller man’s face. “Duty, honor, courage. Fuck all of that. That’s why guys like Humpty and Dumpty in the other room are beating us in the war on terror.”

The man was nuts. Harper was sure of it. And because he was nuts, Harper also knew that he couldn’t be reasoned with.

“You don’t believe me?” said Jaffe.

“No, sir. I believe whatever you say,” replied Harper.

“Bullshit, marine. It’s written all over your face. You think I’m a few cans shy of a six-pack, don’t you?”

“No, sir I didn’t say-”

“Quit lying to me, son. I can smell it from a mile away. You think I’m nuts? That’s fine by me. I probably am to have taken this job and stayed with it as long as I have, but I’ll tell you one thing. If we don’t start executing this war on terror in the correct fashion, we’re going to be overrun.

“We’re fighting for our civilization’s very survival here. They might not talk about it that way in the newspapers or on the evening news, but that is exactly what’s happening. Your country is depending on you. It’s depending on us. You and me. And that’s why what we’re doing here matters. It matters big-time. Because if we don’t stop these guys from going nuclear, thousands if not hundreds of thousands-maybe millions of innocent people are going to die. So keep that in mind the next time you want to question how I’m running this interrogation. Are we clear?”