“I’m fine,” she said through her teeth. “This isn’t about me. What’s happening, Venable?”
He shrugged. “Okay, okay. I might be feeling a little guilty that you’re—” He shook his head. “I never thought you’d be a victim. I thought I’d kept it all under control. Doane appeared much weaker than his son, and there was no evidence that he was actively involved in any of the murders. He might have just been a father grieving for his boy. Even when he took Eve, there was a chance that he only wanted to have her do the reconstruction. She might not have been in danger. Hallet, that farmer, is missing, but there’s no proof of violence toward him.”
“My men are dragging the lake for that farmer now. And there’s a grave out there in the woods that proves differently,” Joe said. “Dukes had his throat cut. He was your agent, your responsibility, Venable.”
“Do you think I don’t know that?” Venable said roughly. “I realized when we found Dukes that I’d been fooling myself. Doane is as bad as his son, Kevin. Perhaps he’s worse, though that’s hard to believe. I knew I had to put him down no matter whom it hurts.”
“And whom will it hurt?” Caleb asked.
Venable glanced at him. “Why don’t you take a hike, Caleb? This isn’t your concern.”
“The hell it’s not,” Jane said fiercely. “It’s anyone’s concern who is willing to help Eve. She’s the only one who is important.”
“At last,” Margaret murmured as she leaned against the porch rail. “That must include me. Yes, whom will it hurt, Agent Venable?”
“You want a list? One, General John Tarther, an honorable man who spent his entire life fighting to keep the country safe. Two, several Pakistanis who will be beheaded or thrown in prison if their countrymen find out that they helped track Bin Laden.” He paused. “And at least five embedded CIA agents whose cover might be jeopardized if those Pakistanis are tortured and reveal information. It will be a chain reaction.”
“That chain reaction is not going to include Eve,” Joe said coldly. “Because we’re going to get Doane.”
“I’m not arguing,” Venable said wearily. “I’ve already started to pull our agents out of Pakistan. It will take time. I just hope that Doane is holding off on releasing that disk on the chance he can use it as a lever in case of an emergency.”
“Disk?” Jane asked. “Dammit, start at the beginning, Venable.”
“The beginning?” Venable gazed out at the lake. “That was probably the day that son of a bitch Kevin Relling was born.” He shook his head as if to clear it. “No, that’s not what you want to know. Brief and to the point, right? Okay, I was working in the Middle East several years ago when I became involved with the group that was hunting for Bin Laden. Kevin Relling had already killed Tarther’s daughter as a gift to his al-Qaeda friends. He sent photos of the kill to all his terrorist group. They were both explicit and brutal.” He paused. “And he also sent the photos to Tarther. It nearly killed him. The only thing that kept him going was the chance to hunt Kevin Relling down and get him convicted of murder.”
“Kevin Relling,” Jane said. “Joe couldn’t find any record on him. You buried it, didn’t you. Tell us about Kevin Relling.”
“Yes, I buried it.” He shrugged. “I told you the beginning started with Relling. I’ll try to keep it as short as possible. It’s not pretty…”
CHAPTER
15
“AND KEVIN RELLING’S FATHER HAS this disk?” Joe asked when Venable had finished. “That house where he lived in Colorado has been searched?”
“Am I an idiot?” Venable asked sarcastically. “It was the first thing I ordered done when we realized Doane had split. Nothing has been found. The second thing was to set a team of agents to try to find him.”
“Zero there, too,” Joe said coldly. “And you wouldn’t give me all the information I needed to go after him myself.”
“You’re getting it now. I couldn’t justify endangering that many innocent people until I was certain that Doane actually presented a danger and that there was no way we could snare him ourselves.”
“And if you’d been able to do that, would you have sent him back to his safe house and just tried to reinstate your deal?” Jane asked.
“There’s a possibility if I thought Doane wasn’t a real threat and controllable.” Venable saw the expression on their faces and said harshly, “I won’t make excuses. My life is all about compromises and control. That disk is important. I need to take Doane alive and take it away from him. It’s life or death for too many people not to try to grab it and keep it safe. It’s worth taking a risk.”
“Not if it’s Eve’s risk,” Jane said jerkily. “Screw your control. And there won’t be any compromises where Eve’s concerned. If there are I’ll—”
“Easy.” Joe put his hand on her arm. “I feel the same way, but we have to work together.” His glance at Venable was icy. “We have to use him for the time being. Afterward, it may be a different matter.”
“So use me.” Venable’s lips twisted. “I never thought I’d say that. It should tell you how much I want you to find Eve.”
“If it doesn’t get in the way of CIA business,” Jane said. She held up her hand. “I know, Joe. I’m not being cool and logical. I’m just so damn mad.” She added in a whisper, “And so damn scared.” She drew a shaky breath. “All right, I have to get everything straight in my head, Venable. It’s all been hurled at us in bits and pieces. This Kevin Relling was a monster of the first order. He was in the Special Forces and became an expert assassin. He was also some kind of megalomaniac who was trying to grab power by joining the terrorists who were protecting Bin Laden.”
“The children,” Margaret whispered. It was the first words she’d spoken since Venable had begun his narrative. Her face was pale and stricken. “Those poor children.”
“The fact that he was also a child killer was merely his casual entertainment,” Jane said. “Venable wouldn’t regard it as important as political ramifications.”
Venable flinched. “Not fair, Jane.”
“I don’t want to be fair. It’s going to take a long time for me to forgive you.” She added, “But that’s not important right now. General Tarther was authorizing illegal action in Pakistan to catch the terrorist group who was protecting Bin Laden. Kevin Relling killed Tarther’s daughter as revenge, but the general went on the hunt and brought Relling in to face a criminal trial. When the charge was dismissed on a technicality, Tarther couldn’t believe it. When Relling escaped, the general almost went crazy. He hired a contract killer to find and kill Relling. He accomplished his mission, and that was the end of Kevin Relling.” She glared at Venable.”Do I have it right?”
“But it was the beginning of your dealing with Doane,” Joe said. “What the hell were you doing protecting him?”
“Doane came to us and demanded we protect him from his son’s former al-Qaeda buddies. He said he’d lost his son and all he wanted to do was start a new life. He wanted to be placed in a witness protection program.”
“And you did it?”
“He also said that he had a disk his son had given him and told him to use it if he felt threatened. He didn’t want to use it, but he had to protect himself if we couldn’t do it for him.”
“And you believed him?”
“I’m a cynical bastard, but there was a chance he was telling the truth. He was very, very good. He seemed so sincere, a grieving father who’d had no idea his son was anything but a soldier serving his country.” He looked at Jane. “You drew that sketch of him from Ben Hudson’s description. He looks like a nice guy, sympathetic, kind. He’s even more convincing in person. He strikes just the right note. It’s incredible. I researched him thoroughly, and I couldn’t connect any of Kevin Relling’s crimes to his father. It was worth a chance if I kept him under close surveillance. I set him up in a small town in Colorado.”