“I’ll tell you this, though. I don’t care how many Americans love this new president, his administration has gotten off to a very rocky start. A mistress would be bad for his image, but a dead one would be fatal.”

Elise thought about that remark for a moment before asking, “Did you see Nikki Hale leave that night?”

“I saw her and the president part company. I didn’t see her leave the estate.”

“Had they been in his bedroom?”

“No, Gallo’s library study.”

“Were they alone?”

Holland nodded.

“What about the drinking?”

“You already asked me that,” he replied.

“And you didn’t answer. Had they been drinking?”

“Maybe.”

Elise studied him. “Maybe?”

“I wasn’t in the room.”

“Max, her blood alcohol content was off the charts. You’re telling me she wasn’t bombed when she left?”

“Maybe she had been drinking with him and it just hadn’t hit her yet. All I know is that she didn’t look pie-eyed to me when she left.”

Elise was confused. “Then what happened?”

“She made another stop before leaving the estate that evening.”

“She did? Where?” asked Elise.

“That, you’re going to have to figure out for yourself,” replied Holland as he stood up from the bar and polished off the rest of his beer.

“Hold on a second, Max. You can’t just leave it like that. If I’ve got to go around asking every agent who was on duty that night what they saw or might have seen, word’s going to get out.”

Holland hadn’t thought of that. Reluctantly, he threw her a bone. “Talk to Hutch.”

“Hutchinson? But he was on Mrs. Alden’s detail that night.”

Reaching over, Holland collected his forty dollars off the bar. “Thanks for dinner. If you want to chat about this some more, I’ll expect to see a process server on my doorstep.”

As he disappeared into the crowd and exited the Town Tavern, Elise thought about what he had said. A mistress would be very bad for the president’s image, and a dead mistress would be fatal.

CHAPTER 33

SPINGHAR MOUNTAINS, AFGHANISTAN

SUNDAY

The cluster of mud brick buildings abutted a summer grazing pasture not far from the Tora Bora cave complex. Even when the roads were clear it was an extremely rough ride. Now, with snow and ice still on the ground at this altitude, it took Mullah Massoud an extra hour to get there, which didn’t do much to improve his mood.

Yelling for his men to get out of the room, he slammed his AK-47 down on the table and let loose on his Russian counterpart, who was sitting on the floor having tea. “I told you to make it look like an accident, you idiot!”

“Calm down,” said Simonov.

“How dare you tell me to calm down!” roared the Taliban commander.

The Russian lifted the kettle and poured another cup. “We’ll have tea and we will talk.”

Massoud took two steps onto the rug and kicked the teacups across the floor. His face was flushed and his eyes were bulging. Simonov had never seen him like this before.

“My village will have to go to war now because of you!”

Quietly, Simonov stood, retrieved the cups, and brought them back to the rug.

The Taliban commander was furious.

“You and I have seen too many battles together to have our friendship end this way, Massoud,” said the Russian. “I am inviting you one more time to sit and have tea with me.”

Removing his boots, Massoud sat down on the rug. As the Russian refilled the cups, he spoke. “Your brother is not wearing the shoes I gave him. Why not?”

“Because I took them from him,” snapped the Taliban commander. “It was to be his contribution to the debt paid for breaking Asadoulah Badar’s jaw.”

“Well, you can give them back to him.”

Massoud snorted. “I might as well. Shoes will no longer cover the debt.”

“No. That’s not the reason,” said Simonov. “Your brother caught Asadoulah fondling the American woman. Zwak warned him repeatedly but he wouldn’t stop. He was protecting her.”

“How do you know this?” demanded Massoud.

“The woman told me herself.”

“Why? What were you doing even speaking to her?”

“I received an email from the mother. Four questions asking for proof of life. I needed the answers to prove that we still had her alive.”

“Elam Badar’s son lied,” said the Taliban commander as it all sank in.

“It would appear so.”

“And we killed him.”

“Correction,” said the Russian. “I killed him, but as far as his village is concerned it is the same thing.”

“You also killed two other men. Tell me what happened.”

Simonov explained how he had carried out Elam Badar’s killing exactly as they had planned, but that he had been seen by two other men from his village and had been forced to kill them as well.

“How did you kill them?” asked Massoud.

“One round each to the head.”

“That was very rash.”

“I had no choice,” said the Russian. “I had to act quickly.”

The Taliban commander shook his head. “And the bodies?” he asked.

“They won’t stay hidden forever.”

Massoud signaled for Simonov to continue. The Russian explained how he had returned to Massoud’s village as quickly as possible, but when he discovered that the Taliban commander was not there, he decided to act.

Gathering several of Massoud’s best men, he loaded gear and equipment into three trucks, collected Zwak and the American woman, whom he disguised in burkas to make it look as if they were traveling with two women instead of just one, and then headed for their fallback location. If Elam Badar’s family or anyone in his village tried to retaliate by alerting the American military or Afghan forces, it would do little good at this point.

It was a small consolation, and the Taliban commander massaged his temples with the heels of his hands. “Now that two other men from his village have been killed, Elam Badar’s death will no longer be viewed as an accident.”

“I agree.”

“And all you want to do is to sit here and have tea?” demanded Massoud, his anger rising again.

“Have tea and discuss my plan,” said Simonov.

“Will your plan prevent my village from going to war?”

The Russian smiled. “No. But it will prevent Elam Badar’s.”

CHAPTER 34

BUTKHAK, AFGHANISTAN

Twenty kilometers east of Kabul on the Jalalabad Road was the village of Butkhak. Of the several small NGOs working in this village, only a handful could afford security. One such group was Clean Water International. Though they weren’t one of Gallagher’s richest clients, they were one of the steadiest, and that meant a lot to ISS’s bottom line.

Baba G liked to joke that instead of referring to themselves as CWI, a more appropriate acronym for their organization would have been PSH, short for pot-smoking hippies.

Afghanistan was awash in vacant real estate, and Gallagher had seen an opportunity for ISS in being able to provide not only physical security for NGOs in the form of armed manpower, but also safe places for them to be housed.

Most Afghans didn’t know the first thing about marketing to the Westerners who were flooding into their country. All they knew was that if they could land even the smallest of fishes, they could make big money.

Through one of Gallagher’s many Afghan contacts, he’d been offered a sizable, walled property in Butkhak. The area was booming with reconstruction projects, and he knew it was only a matter of time before he found a tenant. The main house also had something he’d never seen before in Afghanistan-a Jacuzzi. Gallagher had agreed to represent it on the spot.

What had sold him on the compound had also sold the pot-smoking hippies. From the moment they had seen the Jacuzzi, they were hooked. It was only later that he realized that the property also included a dilapidated greenhouse, which the hippies gladly repaired out of funds from their own pockets. Though the rent and security package Gallagher had sold them was likely a tad more than their office somewhere in Europe had budgeted, the money always arrived on time in Gallagher’s account every month.