Blue Man looked down. “I’m very sorry to hear that. She’s been a great asset to the agency.”

“We seem to be running out of those.”

“A few bad apples, nothing more.”

“I do care about my people, you know.”

“Yes, sir.”

Tucker doodled on a piece of paper. “Where do you think Robie is?”

“He’s certainly gone off the grid.” Blue Man paused, seeming to choose his next words with great care. “In fact, I was the one who encouraged him to do so.”

Tucker looked stunned. “You advised him to go off the grid?”

“I also advised him to find Jessica Reel.”

“His initial task was to do that,” snapped Tucker.

“I didn’t mean to find and kill her. I meant to find her and thank her for saving his life. And then to team up.”

Tucker’s face turned red and a vein near his temple swelled. “Team up to do what exactly?” he barked.

“To do what needs to be done. There is something going on, sir. I realized it even before Jacobs and Gelder were killed. We’ve had infiltrations at the agency. Robie knew this too. Trusted people who it turned out were working against us.”

“We believed that to be isolated. And resolved, Roger,” Tucker said in a calmer tone.

“Maybe we believed wrong.”

“So you’re saying it’s something more than a few bad apples, then?”

“Conspiracies are supposed to be relegated to popular fiction. However, it’s surprising and a little distressing how often they show up in real life.”

Tucker suddenly looked tired. “We are ill-equipped to handle broad-based conspiracies, Roger. Particularly from inside our own tent.”

“Which is why perhaps Robie and Reel have a shot at this. By working from the outside in.”

“If they do that, we have no way of deploying assets on their behalf. They’re on their own.”

“With all due respect, sir, that’s exactly how they’ve been operating their whole careers here. On their own with no cover, no backup.”

“So maybe they’re ideally suited to crack this thing,” Tucker said slowly.

“I wouldn’t bet against them,” said Blue Man with confidence.

“So you really think Gelder and Jacobs were traitors to their country?”

“I can’t say they’re not.”

“And there are others?”

Blue Man shrugged. “Things are still happening and Gelder and Jacobs are dead. They could have had nothing to do with the attack on DiCarlo.”

“What about the attack on Roy West in Arkansas? What was that about?”

“I don’t know, sir. But from the carnage I wouldn’t discount the possibility that both Reel and Robie were there.”

“What could possibly be the connection? I’ve looked at West’s record. He was a nothing. Hardly left a mark here. And then he was canned for what amounted to being stupid and lax with security measures. Do you think Reel and Robie know of some connection?”

“If they don’t I think they can find out.”

Tucker sat back, looking doubtful. “I hope you’re right.”

“Me too,” said Blue Man under his breath. “Me too.”

CHAPTER

65

“HELLO, CONGRESSMAN,” said the woman as she walked past, her small dog straining on a leash in front of her. “I saw you on TV the other night.”

Howard Decker stood on a path at the park near his home. He was dressed casually in jeans and a button-down shirt, loafers and no socks. He had donned a light windbreaker because the evening skies promised rain. He held a leash with his big Labrador Bruin tethered to the other end.

He nodded and smiled at the pretty woman as she walked past. “Thanks. Have a good evening,” he said. He liked being recognized. It was a nice taste of celebrity that fed his ego.

He watched her go, appreciating her tall, slender figure, tight skirt, and the way her blonde hair swirled around her shoulders. He was very comfortable with his wife, but he had never been able to cure himself of his roving eye. And his exalted position in Washington made him a plum target for a variety of sophisticated, accomplished, and attractive women.

He sighed contentedly. Not a bad life. He was wealthy from his past business successes, in relatively good health, with many years in politics ahead of him. His wife was suitably supportive but not eager to grab the limelight from him. She didn’t often travel with him, which allowed him the latitude for the occasional dalliance in his hotel room with a young staffer.

His children were young and well behaved. They would have good lives. They looked up to their father. He was popular with his constituency and his district had been redrawn to make him election-proof. That allowed him to spend less time fund-raising and more time plotting his political aspirations. Yes, all in all, he led quite a satisfactory life.

There was only one major problem, but it overshadowed all of the positives. He had long since regretted becoming a part of a plan that was spiraling out of control. But his position as chairman of the Intelligence Committee had made him a pivotal player in a scheme so grand it had taken Decker’s breath away the first time he was approached about it.

He was an old-school believer in national security. Nothing trumped that. He had been in New York during 9/11 and had seen the towers collapse. He had run along the streets with thousands of other terrified people as the dust and debris and bodies rained down. He had told himself never again would something like that happen to his country. Not if he had anything to say about it. And he did, more than most people.

And that was why he’d agreed to be part of this colossal plan that, if successful, would right the power balance in the world, bringing it back to where it needed to be to create global peace. He’d thought it a huge, perhaps career-ending risk, but a goal well worth that risk. He had worked behind the scenes to secretly authorize the movement of personnel, equipment, and funds to enable this to happen. Just about everything the Intelligence Committee did was secret, from the funds deployed to the operations on which the members were briefed. Thus he had been in a unique place to assist the plan. He had felt honored to be part of it. He had felt immensely patriotic, particularly as he watched brave young Americans die every week in foreign lands, many of them killed by the very people they were fighting to protect and training to defend themselves. It was a horrendous situation that couldn’t be allowed to continue.

But things hadn’t gone smoothly or cleanly. Problems had cropped up almost immediately. His partners in this venture, principally Sam Kent, had handled these far better than he had. They were used to mistakes resulting in the loss of human life. But Decker was not accustomed to such things. They scared him. And the more they occurred, the more scared he became.

He had come to the park tonight to walk his dog simply to get away from these thoughts, if only for a few minutes. But he couldn’t escape them, not even with big, happy-faced Bruin licking his hand and wanting to play.

Decker was especially afraid of Kent. When the man had said he’d killed a potential assassin, Decker knew that the man was not exaggerating. He hadkilled the man. And it had been a clear warning to Decker not to step out of line.

He had no intention of crossing such men. He’d seen what they were capable of doing. As the chair of the Intelligence Committee he was far more privy to clandestine operations than the average congressperson.