It sounded far-fetched — until Skylar remembered Iran-Contra and Oliver North.
“Because of Kevin McCoy’s quick thinking and bravery, federal authorities were able to stop the sale of those weapons to outlaw nations,” Baxter explained. “The money trails disappeared, so we couldn’t trace the cash back to RC7. But those outlaw countries stopped getting high-tech weapons.”
“How did my father uncover the conspiracy?”
President Dorn shook his head as though he couldn’t believe the answer. “It’s a crazy story with its punch line buried in a classic military-intel snafu. Go on, Stewart, tell her.”
“Red Cell Seven runs black ops in Asia, too. They use U.S. submarines for transport as well. And just like ONI, they use crab boats for pickup and delivery on the Bering Sea. One of them was called the Arctic Fire. So, one night—”
“Let me guess,” Skylar interrupted. “One night my father and the crew of the Alaskan Star—”
“Kodiak Sky for that mission,” Baxter reminded her.
“One night,” Skylar started again, “they pick up somebody off a U.S. submarine who was actually supposed to board the Arctic Fire. That was the snafu. During the course of taking that spy back to land, my father discovered something very sensitive.”
Dorn nodded. “Exactly.”
“And that RC7 agent found out that your father had discovered what was so sensitive,” Baxter continued.
“And then my father had to go underground.”
“The story of the Kodiak Sky being lost at sea during a storm was hatched, and your father went into hiding, with federal government protection,” Baxter explained. “But the story goes that Troy Jensen knew his way around Dutch Harbor, the port up in Alaska a lot of those crab boat captains sail out of during the season. Anyway, after he spoke to a couple of the captains, he didn’t believe the story of the Alaskan Star going down. The storm ONI used as the one that swamped the Kodiak Sky wasn’t that intense. And apparently, those captains in Dutch Harbor told Troy that your father was much too good a sailor to have been beaten by it. So Red Cell Seven put out word that he needed to ‘make himself available or we would take revenge.’ ”
Skylar knew what that meant.
“So your sister was murdered when he didn’t. And it wasn’t because he was afraid. He couldn’t. He was not allowed to make himself available.”
Her chin dropped slowly to her chest. “Why didn’t they come after me?” she asked softly.
“You were already in the military,” Baxter answered. “And as further protection, you were fast-tracked into special forces, into a very dark sector of special forces.”
She glanced up. In fact, she hadn’t asked for the promotion. It had been thrust upon her. “To make me hard to find.”
“No,” Dorn said, “to make you impossible to find.”
“Then, of course, there is that matter of that young man falling off that cliff in Denali.”
Skylar’s gaze raced from the president back to Baxter.
“It would be unfortunate if you were implicated in the death of that—”
“I don’t think there’s any need to dredge up an unsolved mystery,” Dorn said. His eyes shifted smoothly from his chief of staff to Skylar. “Do you, Commander McCoy?”
She said nothing as she stared back at him.
“I didn’t think so.” Dorn gave her his most sincere smile. “Now, what should we call your unit, Commander McCoy?”
“I–I hadn’t given it much thought, sir.”
“Well, I have. You know, I’ve always believed in that old adage of imitation being the highest form of flattery.” Dorn chuckled. “So let’s call it Kodiak Four. I like the sound of that.” He hesitated. “Once word of your unit leaks, as it undoubtedly will, everyone will obsessively try to find Kodiak One, Two, and Three as well. But they won’t, because they won’t exist. What do you think, Commander?”
She was thinking two things. One, the president had been calling her “Commander” for the last few minutes, not Skylar. So, apparently, both Dorn and Baxter were acting the part of the bad cop now.
Second, she was thinking she’d just been hit with a classic one-two punch by two very experienced Washington insiders. The carrot had been dangled. She would see her father if she succeeded, possibly even get him his freedom. And the stick had been wielded though not applied. Somehow they knew what had happened on the Denali cliff. And they would release that information if she didn’t cooperate.
“Kodiak Four,” she murmured. “Okay.”
“I assume you’re ready to go now. I assume we’ve satisfied your concerns.”
Skylar took a few seconds to answer. “Yes, sir, I’m ready.”
“Excellent.”
“I’ll need a place to start,” she said.
Baxter held out a piece of paper. “Here.”
“What’s this?”
“It’s a list of all RC7 agents, Commander. I think it will provide you with an excellent place to start.”
Skylar’s eyes narrowed as she took it. Effectively, she was about to initiate what amounted to civil war. How had her life come to this so fast?
“Skylar,” Dorn said quietly as he rose from his chair and moved to where she sat, “I understand why this is a difficult mission for you to accept. You’ve been trained to kill this country’s enemies, not other members of its protective forces. I know it must be difficult for you to think about soldiers of this country as enemy combatants, particularly soldiers who are much like you.” He paused. “But they are enemies. The agents of Red Cell Seven are trying to kill me, and you must help me. I am your commander in chief, and you must protect me.”
She stood up as the president held out his hand. It was as if he could read her mind. “Well, I—”
“Will you help me?”
Skylar gazed at David Dorn for several moments. He was right. He was her commander in chief, and he was the president of the United States. If she disobeyed his order, she would be ignoring everything she had sworn to protect.
“Yes, sir,” she finally agreed. “I’ll help you.”
“Then I order you to destroy Red Cell Seven. Do you understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
She swallowed hard. But did she really? How could she know who was right and who was wrong in all this?
“How did you choose Leigh-Ann as your stage name?”
As far as Shannon could tell they were in the back of another van. At least she was being allowed to sit up on a seat this time. When they’d hurled her into the back of the van outside the club in Nashville, she’d been roped and tied like a calf at a rodeo as the van sped away. And her abductors had forced her to lie on the hard metal floor that way until they’d gotten to the house she’d escaped from a few hours later — until the dogs had cornered her at the edge of the field and she’d been recaptured.
She was sitting this time, but she still wasn’t comfortable. Her wrists were bound behind her back by metal handcuffs that dug into her skin no matter how she sat; her feet were shackled; and the blindfold was, well, blinding. At least they’d removed the gag. She’d felt herself drooling all over her shirt, and she was parched.
“May I please have something to drink?” She hated the way the man kept stroking her face and sniffing her neck. His breath was awful. “Some water, maybe.”
“Don’t ignore me, damn it.”
“Leigh-Ann is my aunt’s name.”
“Bullshit, Shannon. I doubt there’s anyone in the city of Boston named Leigh-Ann, probably not in the entire state of Massachusetts. Not anyone who’s from Massachusetts, anyway, which you most definitely are.”