Swanson charged. The result was certain, but a few heart pumps were required for the drug to circulate to the brain and vital organs; until then, the victim would be able to resist. Swanson kicked Gibson in the ribs and sent him sprawling. “How you doin’ down there, Number One? You look like a porcupine.”
Gibson tried to crawl, but Swanson stomped on the back of his knee, then kicked the shotgun away as he reloaded his own weapon — a test model of the anti-personnel, multiple-projectile, remote drug-delivery system straight from the Excalibur laboratories. It was supposed to be nonlethal, but dosage was a still a problem. At the moment, Swanson didn’t care. He had been dropped off six miles from the house early this morning and found a hide on a ridge from which he could see most of the spread. When Gibson ran out, Swanson trotted up the trail behind him.
“You’re dead.” Gibson croaked as his energy evaporated. The bright cone of the helicopter light came back and painted a circle around them. “You’re dead!”
“Oh, go to sleep,” Swanson said. He punched Gibson hard in the temple as FBI black-clad fighters slithered down long ropes to the forest floor.
An anesthesiologist at the Kalispell Regional Medical Center efficiently brought Luke Gibson back. The patient was secured to a hospital bed in a guarded part of the facility, where he had been flown while still unconscious. A doctor had plucked out the quills and closed the little wounds. Blood work had taken a while, because of the complex formula used as ammunition in the darts, but the recovery was relatively swift. Dose like that, delivered by a shotgun blast, could kill a man.
When Gibson finally became aware of his surroundings, he saw two women standing on each side of the bed. One was a nurse in pink scrubs who had a lousy bedside manner as she shook him awake. The second wore a brown uniform with blue shoulder flashes and a duty belt.
“Hey! Hey! Can you hear me?” the cop barked. She also gave him a shake. “Wake up.” Her voice was young but firm.
Gibson was irritated and still groggy, close to barfing. “Yeah. God damn it, I can hear you. Where’s Kyle?”
“I don’t know any Kyle,” she said. “My name is Danielle DeLaittre of the Montana Highway Patrol, assigned to District Five. Do you understand that?”
She came into better focus. Lean and muscle-toned, with a turtleneck sweater beneath her shirt, and looking very young. “How old are you?” he asked.
DeLaittre had been expecting such a comment. She had been briefed by her training officer to emphasize her lack of law-enforcement experience with the prisoner. The federal officials who had brought this guy in wanted him to be treated like a common criminal. “I’m twenty-five years old and a member of the most recent graduating class of the Montana Law Enforcement Academy. Before that, I worked my way through college by cleaning motel rooms and making sandwiches at a Subway over in Billings. Now, are you coherent?”
“You’re a damned rookie!”
“Lowest of the low, sir. They made me leave my .357 Sig outside because you’re some kind of bad dude. However, I consider you somewhat special because you’re my first arrest.”
“And I’m fresh out of nursing school,” chirped the nurse. Both cop and nurse grinned in amusement.
While Luke Gibson groaned at the intentional insult of being treated like pond scum, Danielle DeLaittre took a small card from her pocket. “I will now read you your rights,” she said.
The lawyer from Manhattan looked out across the plains and felt nervous. This was cowboy-and-Indian country, and probably not a decent bagel within a hundred miles. He had flown out yesterday and spent the night in a hotel, hoping not to be scalped. As Leonard P. Flagler climbed the steps of the federal building, he felt that he was reaching the safety of a frontier fort, and put on his business face.
He presented his card and was ushered directly into the office of Melissa Jacob, an assistant U.S. Attorney in the Criminal Division for the District of Montana. She was an attractive woman, dressed in blue jeans and a flannel shirt, plus Western boots. No, this was not Manhattan.
She apologized for the casual look, but said it was a paperwork day for her, just to clean up some loose ends; she could have worked from home had she not made this appointment. She put on a pair of rimless glasses and read briefly from a file. “So you’re the attorney of record for Mr. Lucas Gibson?”
“I am.” He read the body language. This woman wasn’t cowed by his courtroom reputation. In fact, it looked as if this might be a short meeting.
“And Gibson wants to make a deal?”
“I visited with my client earlier today, and he is willing to become a fully cooperative government witness in a number of important investigations in exchange for…”
Melissa Jacob leaned back and crossed her arms. “Whoa up right there, Mr. Flagler. I’m afraid you’ve made a long trip from New York for nothing. There will be no deal. Period.”
Flagler felt a trickle of sweat on his back. He might be out in the badlands but he knew how to make prosecutors crawl. “That’s highly unlikely, Ms. Jacob.”
“Tell your client he does not have a single thing we want. Nothing at all. In fact, we’re finishing up the paperwork today, declaring him to be an enemy combatant and a national-security threat; he’ll be transferred into military custody. Any trial will be in secret, and he will not be allowed a civilian lawyer.”
“That’s preposterous, madam! On what charge?”
“I cannot tell you that because you do not have proper clearance for top-secret material. Just assume we start with treason and murder and work our way down. I suggest that you get your payment up front, Mr. Flagler, because we’re seizing all of Mr. Gibson’s assets as soon as possible.”
“He’s an American citizen and has constitutional rights!”
“Read the fine print in his employment contract with the CIA. Oh, sorry, you don’t have clearance for that, either.” Melissa Jacob came around the desk and extended her hand. “Look, Mr. Flagler, I’m doing you a favor here. I know your firm defends drug dealers and other such criminals, and everyone deserves a robust defense, but you do not want any part of Luke Gibson. We intend to bury him. Spend your time elsewhere.”
Flagler was being dismissed. He sputtered, “My client demands to confront his accuser, a man named Kyle Swanson.”
“Ain’t gonna happen,” she said. “Go tell your client what I said, and that he will be transferred tomorrow to the United States Disciplinary Barracks at Fort Leavenworth, down in Kansas. His future after that is unknown. You will never see him again. Have a nice trip back to New York, Mr. Flagler. Thanks for dropping by.”
Epilogue
Swanson and Gibson never met again. Gibson was convicted in a secret trial of the single charge of murdering fellow CIA contract worker Nicky Marks, a cover that kept intelligence issues off the table. He was on a long, slow, never-ending road to nowhere.
The man whose reputation meant everything to him was ruined. Guards were ordered not to speak to him except to give orders. He was allowed one hour a day in an exercise area, alone, then back to his small single cell. His bed was made up at eight o’clock in the morning, and he was not allowed to sit or lie on it until nine that night. There was a single chair and a steel desk bolted to the wall. A steel commode and a small sink was in a corner. His only visitors were occasional federal investigators, never senior in rank or experience, who practiced their interrogation skills on him concerning various things. The information the government had gleaned from the one-time friends of the Prince, who had been tracked down through a drug lord and a careful perusal of his family history, had brought down a dozen major criminal enterprises and rolled up the few rogues inside the CIA, and the investigations were ongoing. The result was that Luke Gibson became a practice dummy for trainees to question; always men, never women. After a few years, even they stopped coming.