Kim saved Jake by coming out with news from Seoul. “Pam had just gotten back to the office when I sent her the photos of the two dead men. She wants to know if you would consider drawing out those who are after you.”
“That’s my plan,” Jake assured the young officer. “Normally, I’d like to do that here in a remote location, where I can see them coming. But that puts this whole junket in jeopardy.”
“What about me?” Lori asked. “I have to be at the DMZ in two days for the six-party talks.”
Jake stood up and thought for a moment. “Well, it’s not a good idea for you to stay here. The head of your security detail didn’t even recognize you. That’s just incompetent. Plus, their security let those two men past their perimeter downstairs. Of course there will probably be congressional hearings to get to the bottom of their failure.”
“Hey,” Lori said. “We have a vital job to do. We’re the watchdogs of our government.” She sounded serious.
Jake said, “Settle down. I didn’t mean you. You were the only one who asked me reasonable questions.”
Kim raised his hands, as if a school kid trying to get his teacher’s attention. “What’s the plan? I’ve been ordered to stay with Jake wherever he goes.”
“Do you have a safe house, or two, in the Seoul area?” Jake asked.
“Of course.”
Jake looked at Lori and then to Kim. “Put the congresswoman up in one for a couple days. Then I’ll open myself up for those trying to find me.”
“Can you at least keep one alive next time?” Kim asked with a smirk.
“Roger that. But I get to gather the intel.”
“I’m here to learn from the master,” Kim said. “As I said, we respect our elders in Korea.”
“Smart ass,” Jake muttered. He was beginning to like this young officer.
“All right.” Kim was about to text his office.
“Hold off on that,” Jake said.
“Why?”
“How tired are you?” Jake asked.
Kim laughed. “Are you kidding? I haven’t had this much excitement since joining the Agency. I’m wired.”
“Well, you haven’t been hanging around me that long,” Jake assured him. “Keep your head on a swivel. You ready to drive that rental car to Seoul?”
“Yes, sir.”
Lori got up. “Let’s check out.”
Jake smiled. “No. How attached are you to your clothes?”
She shrugged and said, “There’s nothing I can’t replace.”
“Good.” Jake went to her suitcase and started throwing Lori’s clothes around the room. Taking the cue, Kim and Lori helped out by making the room look like it had been trashed by someone looking for something.
Satisfied, Jake considered the security folks out in the corridor. Somehow he and Kim would have to get Lori past them. As it turned out, most of the attention was on the two dead men in Jake’s room. The three of them simply walked down the hall to the stairs in the opposite direction. Moments later they were outside and piled into the rental KIA, Kim behind the wheel, Jake in the front passenger seat, and Lori lying on the back seat as they drove away from the hotel.
The dark Hyundai sedan cruised down the secluded highway along the southwest outskirts of Gyeongju. The driver was a stocky Korean, with limited English skills, his black hair with white highlights spiked up into a faux hawk. His boyish face was speckled with wisps of hair in an attempt at a beard, but he would never grow enough to cover his chubby face.
Alex Yaroslav, in the front passenger seat, combed his fingers through his long hair as he listened to the man on the other end of the phone. The Lobbyist was pissed that they had not captured Jake Adams. Alex turned to look at his friend Danko in the back seat. They both shook their heads. Then he glanced back at the car following them. He knew it was only his Asian comrades — the two unlikely intel officers from North Korea, the intense man in his forties and the hot woman in her mid-thirties. Those two had provided the men to go after Adams, but had obviously failed miserably. Alex listened carefully once the Lobbyist mentioned what Milena had discovered for them. He told his boss not to worry and disconnected.
Danko scratched his bald head and then leaned forward and said, “What’s the plan?”
Looking at the driver for a moment, Alex switched from English to Russian. “He said we should not entirely depend on our friends here.”
“No kidding,” Danko said. “And?”
“And our girlfriend back there was able to hack into the state department database through a back door, which led her to the embassy in Seoul. She cracked the cell phone codes and can track any employee in Korea. The only one currently in the eastern part of South Korea is on an expressway just west of Daegu City.”
“That has to be Jake Adams,” Danko surmised.
“Well, it’s probably that Korean CIA officer,” Alex agreed. “But Adams is with him.” Then he switched to English and told the driver to get them to the train station immediately.
If Adams was driving the whole way, it would take them at least three or four hours. They could catch the next bullet train and be to Seoul in two and half hours. As long as that CIA officer stayed with Adams, they would be able to easily track the man down. And this time he would take a personal interest in capturing the man. Alex and Danko had followed that former CIA officer across Montana, been duped into going to Portland, Oregon, and then almost caught up with him in Washington, DC. Now they had flown halfway around the world to get the bastard. Why hadn’t that bitch just given him the encryption code? Also, there wasn’t a moment in the day when he didn’t think about his old friend Bogden, who Adams killed in Montana. That man would pay for killing his friend. They should have just drowned the man in that metal barrel in DC.
26
Jake glanced back to Lori, who was sound asleep in the back seat. Then he turned back and made sure Kim wasn’t falling asleep on him. “You all right?” he asked the Agency officer.
“Yeah, I’m fine. We’ve got at least two more hours at this speed. You’ve been on that phone and I’m guessing you haven’t been checking your Facebook status.”
“I’ve never even been on Facebook or any other social media site,” Jake assured him. “I do like your internet connectivity through your cell towers in this country. Haven’t found a blind spot yet.”
“You won’t along the expressways,” Kim said. “South Korea is more wired than just about any country. The gamers demand it.”
Jake explained to Kim how he had asked for help from the Agency to trace the background on two men, former intel officers. He had a feeling they were middle men in this entire affair, and had probably been part of the torture of Toni — perhaps even her killers. Kurt Jenkins had found some information for Jake.
“You think they’re here in Korea?” Kim asked.
“I would bet on it. I’m sure they were behind the two Koreans who came to my room tonight. And I’ve been wondering about those two ever since I killed their friend in Montana. Well, perhaps before then, when the two men attempted to torture me in DC. Just before my appearance on FOX.”
“Those were the guys you were warning?” Kim said with a slight chuckle. “You really gave Bill O’Reilly a shock. What has you stumped about those men?”
“We were explaining to the congresswoman that if I was running an op, I might use various operatives from totally irrelevant countries to throw off the FBI or the Agency.”