Gordon Kent - Top Hook

“We have to get into Shreed’s house.” Moscowic missed the emotions that flashed across Suter’s face—fear, then hatred.

“You nuts? What for?”

“Computers. There’s a memorial service for the wife on Thursday. You can do it then.”

“Djou hear what I just said? You’re nuts! You think I’m breaking into some CIA guy’s house, you’re nuts. And another thing, he’ll have a security system, which is no big deal if you don’t care who finds out after, but bypass it and try to make it look like it never happens, trust me, you’re nuts.”

“I want you to go into that house.”

“Not Thursday, I’m not. Why?”

“I need a hacker. You know any hackers?”

“Do I look like Bill Gates or something? No, I don’t know any hackers.” Tony stared out the window at a strip mall. “Vietnamese, they’re all Vietnamese,” he said, meaning the strip mall and not the hackers. “But I can find you one.” Meaning a hacker, not a Vietnamese.

“He’s got to be good.”

“Oh, that should make it easy. What I think, some kid’s been busted and isn’t allowed near a computer for two years or something, somebody like that. Itchy, you know? And not a stranger to fucking with the law, because that’s what he’s already done. Am I right?”

“Then we have to get him into Shreed’s house. Only once.”

“So what’s this Thursday shit? You think I’m going to find the magical mystical hacker by Thursday?”

“Time is of the essence.”

“Oh, yeah? well, caution is of the essence, my friend, so I’m not going in anyplace till I’ve scoped it out but good, plus finding your perfect hacker is going to take more than five minutes. Let me out at the Iwo Jima Memorial; I’m meeting somebody.”

Suter drove without saying anything for several minutes. Then, as they approached Arlington, he said, “You keep your mouth shut about this.”

“What’d I say to you the first time we met? You don’t fucking listen to me. Leave me off on the other side of the circle.”

“If you talk about this, you’re dead.”

Tony laughed. And laughed. He got out of the car, looked around, leaned back in and said, “Don’t try it,” still laughing. He watched Suter’s car roll away and, because he wasn’t really meeting anybody, he walked.

Suter, in the car, was trying to digest what Moscowic had said about treason. It wasn’t treason that was proving indigestible; it was the man’s talking about it. Moscowic, Suter saw, would have to be dealt with.

By 1000 next morning, the detachment was showing signs of life. The relief Alan felt at having the admiral off his back had spread to his men: Senior Chief Frazer had located an entire pallett of missing stuff stored forward in the hangar bay; Reilley, Campbell, and Lang were in the back of the ready room, getting a lesson in the MARI simulator from Chief Navarro; and Stevens and Cohen were briefing for a check flight on 902’s hydraulics.

Alan had twenty minutes before his flight with Stevens. He headed toward the dirty-shirt wardroom, cut into line, grabbed a burger, and wolfed it down while hustling back, getting there just in time to see the television change from a movie to the closed-circuit brief. He watched the young female jg intel officer with professional interest; her brief was neither brilliant nor boring. Alan scribbled frequencies as fast as he could.

“No backseaters?” he asked, eyeing the empty chairs behind him.

“We’ve been changed to a tanker.” Stevens still sounded belligerent, but perhaps he always sounded that way. “In S-3s, mostly we pass gas.” Ordinary S-3s do, you mean, Alan thought. He wondered why Rafe had put his det aircraft in the tanker pool. The det wasn’t supposed to handle air-wing crap.

“Is 902 going up for a check flight this event?” Alan tried to make professional small talk.

“Yeah. If the hydraulics check, we can take her out tomorrow.”

“Need parts from the beach?”

“On the way?” This was the closest to civilized discourse Alan had got with Stevens.

“Roger. I sent a message to Aviano to put the parts and the missing Mister Soleck on the same COD.”

“So we’ll get a new aircrew and our spare parts? I’d rather have the parts.” Stevens didn’t look at him. “Sure you aren’t too important to ride along on a tanker, Commander?” And there was that damned tone again, a stubborn refusal to come around.

“How about you lighten up, Stevens? It’s going to be a long cruise, and you’re stuck with me. And, yeah, I’ve done one or two tanker flights before. Let’s walk.” He planned to spend the flight talking to Stevens about the det.

He had planned a reorganization, starting with putting Campbell in Maintenance in place of Cohen, because he had an engineering degree and seemed to have his minor responsibilities organized. Cohen got the liaison slot, a dangerous move—Alan had already seen how prickly Cohen could be. In the long run, the success of the project depended on their ability to exchange information with the F-18 squadrons. Cohen was an LSO with a full qualification in F-18s; he had been to school with some of the nugget F-18 pilots. He hoped Stevens bought it. There was more to come, when he had a chance to breathe.

Alan picked up his father’s helmet and his thermos and headed for the flight deck, a different man from the one he had been yesterday.

Emma Pasternak railed at Mike Dukas over the telephone and said No goddamit he wasn’t horning in on her meeting, but he was already on Menzes’s agenda because he was investigating the Agency’s interference in Navy procedures, and Menzes must have known it was better to have him. So Dukas got to go to the meeting at the CIA, which actually happened late in the afternoon and not at ten a.m. By the time he shook Menzes’s hand and looked him in the eye, he was prepared for exactly what he got: an ethical hardnose. Well, it took one to recognize one. Menzes was thin, dark, fortyish, one of those people who worked out a lot; he must have been thought a hunk when he was younger, Dukas thought. Now, he looked tired.

Emma Pasternak was late. She was doing the Agency one better than it did other people: typically, it was the Agency who kept the rest waiting. Dukas jumped at the opportunity her lateness offered. “Let’s deal,” he said. Menzes looked surprised but led Dukas out of the conference room and down the corridor to the big third-floor lobby, where the gold-and-black memorial to the late William Casey dominated one wall. Some people called it The Shrine; cynics called it the SOB—Shrine of Bill. Menzes led him across the echoing marble floor to a spot below Casey’s left shoulder. Dukas looked at him, then at Casey (real gold), and then he rested his back against the wall and folded his arms. “Let’s deal,” he said again.

Menzes looked skeptical. “With what?”

“What have you guys got on Rose Siciliano?”

“I can’t tell you. What’s your interest, anyway?”

“Straight for straight, okay? She’s a friend. But she’s also Navy, and you guys have fucked the Navy. What’s up?”

“That wasn’t my doing.”

“Upstairs? Okay, I wouldn’t tell some outsider, either. The way I see it, the lawyer lady has you guys by the balls in the PR department, am I right? It’s the way her law firm works—lots of fireworks, lots of media. Unless you’ve got a great case, it’s better to give it up, am I right?”

“I’d buy that.”

“Have you got a great case?”

He waited until Menzes said, “We over-reacted. That’s off the record.”

“Understood. Okay, what I’m going to do is get together with your Inter-Agency people and work out what happened. That’s not your bailiwick, correct me if I’m wrong. Right? Sooner or later, though, you gotta share what you got with us. You see what I’m saying? Our position at NCIS is, will be, you should have come to us with it first.”