Troy gazed at his father for a long time. Finally, he nodded. “I am, Dad.”
“Thank you. I mean that.”
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Troy asked as Bill started toward Cheryl and Karen.
Bill shrugged as he turned back around. “Do what?”
“Go to Washington.”
Bill nodded somberly. “I’ll be okay. But thanks for saying something. Your old man’s not as tough as he used to be, but he’s still—”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“Oh?”
“Are you sure you want to tell President Dorn everything?”
“Well, I gave him those files before we met with him at Walter Reed. I feel like I have to tell him everything at this point.”
“Do you think he’s told Baxter about Red Cell Seven?”
“I asked the president not to say anything to anyone about it. But I specifically asked him not to tell Stewart Baxter. In fact, I warned him not to.” Bill paused. “Unfortunately, David Dorn is a stubborn man, and Baxter is his chief of staff.”
“That’s why it was such a risk to give Dorn all those files about what RCS has done in the last forty years.”
“Of course it was a risk,” Bill agreed. “But the fact is we knew Dorn was trying to shut down RCS before the attempt on his life. By the time we’d met with him at Walter Reed after the assassination attempt he’d had a change of heart. I think reading those files helped him with that change.”
“I hope he still feels that way this afternoon, Dad. I hope he hasn’t changed his heart or his mind back the other way.”
“Me too, son.” Bill put his hand on Troy’s shoulder again. “Now help me bury your brother.”
CHAPTER 2
“You can’t be serious.”
“I couldn’t be more serious. Decus septum.”
“Whatever.”
“Protect the peak,” Agent Walker added tersely.
“‘Protect the peak’?” Agent Beam spread his arms wide. “What the hell does that mean?”
So the kid hadn’t heard that part of the greeting yet. Well, that was probably for the best, based on how he was acting. “Say what you have to say, Agent Beam. And do it before Santa comes with all your toys.”
Of course, it wasn’t like Walker knew what “protect the peak” meant, either. Agent Beam was a newbie, but Walker had been with Red Cell Seven for more than a decade. None of the other RCS vets to whom Agent Walker was close knew what it meant.
Supposedly, the words had been handed down as the second part of the cell’s formal greeting since its founding, four decades ago. Just like “decus septum” had as the first part. “Decus septum” made perfect sense even though it was spoken in Latin. Translated, it meant “honor to the seven.” “Protect the peak” made no sense despite being spoken in English. No one knew what peak had to be protected — or why.
“We’ve gotta do the right thing here,” Agent Beam spoke up. “And this isn’t it, goddamn it.”
“I don’t know what you mean by that.”
“Don’t give me that. Don’t act all innocent, Major Trav—”
“What was that, Agent Beam? There’s no way I heard you right.”
“Sorry, sorry.” Agent Beam held up both hands, acknowledging his procedural blunder. Using real names in this situation was forbidden. “I–I mean, Agent Walker.” The younger man took a deep breath and tried to calm down. “You don’t have your go-ahead from COC. You’ve gotta wait. It’s your duty as an officer, Agent Walker. It’s your duty as a human being.”
“My duty, Agent Beam, is to acquire information any way I can. Do you understand?”
“But you can’t—”
“You heard the transmissions, Agent Beam. You read the transcripts.”
“It could all be bullshit.”
“You’ve been with us for six months and you’re going to tell me what’s bullshit?”
“Wait a little while. It might only be a few minutes before they call.”
“And it might be hours.”
“Have patience.”
“I don’t have time for patience, Agent Beam.”
Agent Beam smirked at the play on words as though it was the dumbest thing he’d ever heard. “How could waiting a few minutes really matter, Agent Walker?”
Major Wilson Travers stared intently at the young man who was asking all the annoying questions. Travers was a tall, broad-shouldered African American soldier. He’d been protecting the United States for more than twenty years, invading Iraq as Marine PFC Travers in 1991. Agent Beam barely needed to shave, and he’d never been close to a battlefield — except on his high school field trips. Even more aggravating for Travers, Agent Beam was acting like a battle-tested veteran. The arrogance of it all was absurd.
“Forget minutes,” Travers said. “Seconds could make the difference in this—”
“That’s ridiculous. You have no idea if seconds could—”
“Don’t ever interrupt me again, Agent Beam.”
When it came down to it, Travers didn’t give a rat’s ass what this kid thought. And seconds absolutely could make a difference.
“Something big is on the way,” Travers said confidently. “I can smell it like a skunk in the woods, and we’re running out of time to stop it.” Trust your instincts, trust your instincts. “People are in danger, and my job is to protect them with any and all means at my disposal.” He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder at the stone wall behind him. “Believe me. That man in the next room knows what’s coming. Don’t let him fool—”
“He doesn’t know a damn thing, Agent Walker.” Agent Beam sneered. “You’re just manufacturing the situation out of thin air so you can—”
“It’s coming at us like a thunderstorm on an August afternoon, Agent Beam.”
“What you want to feel is your hands around his throat.”
“Easy, Mister.”
“You can’t act on feelings, Agent Walker. Besides, that man in the next room, as you called him, is really just a boy. He’s not even eighteen.”
It was Travers’s turn to sneer. “He’s at least twenty-four.”
“No way, Agent Walker. Those legendary instincts of yours are off on this one. You need to go on facts, not bullshit, especially when it comes to something like this. We’re talking about a man’s life here.”
“I’m the ranking interrogator,” Travers replied evenly. “I go on anything I want to, Agent Beam. I have that license and that privilege. And by the way, that is definitely a man in the next room, not a boy. I don’t care how old he is. Ten, ninety, or anywhere in between, it doesn’t matter. Age is defined by actions, not years.”
“What if you were wrong for once in your life?” Agent Beam shot back. “What if he’s done nothing? What if he knows nothing?”
“I’ll take that chance.”
“He’s a United States citizen, for God’s sake. I saw his birth certificate. I saw his social security card.”
“So what?”
“So what?” Agent Beam looked to the ceiling and exhaled heavily so his aggravation could not be missed or mistaken. “Despite your job, don’t you still have to remember little things like the Constitution and due process?”
“What I have to remember, Agent Beam, is that you probably still know the first song the band played at your high school prom.”
Travers glanced down at the nasty scar that ran the length of his right forearm. He’d suffered the wound saving the life of a seven-year-old Afghan girl as a car bomb exploded on a crowded Kabul street. Just one glance into the eyes of the parked car’s driver had told him what was coming. If not for his instincts working perfectly on that late afternoon half a world away, the eight-inch piece of metal that had impaled his arm would have sliced the girl’s neck open instead.