"You didn't care if Baktayev was successful or not, did you, as long as the whole thing could be pinned on me? You were setting me up from the beginning!"
"Yes, David. And you made it far too easy."
"Well, I've got news for you, Lukas, McIver got a taped confession from me Sunday night and I gave him your name! As soon as he releases that tape, you're going to have some serious people asking a lot of serious questions and it will be you who's calling me for help!"
"Nice try, David, another desperate attempt to make yourself look innocent."
"Just wait! I may be going down, but I'm taking you with me!"
The phone line went silent and Kemiss brought the device away from his ear to look at the LED. The call timer was flashing. Lukas Kreft had hung up. Kemiss set the phone down on the dresser, next to the television. Slowly, he sank down onto the bed and put his head in his hands. He could feel the heat coming off his skin.
"Senator?" a voice said from outside the room as a hurried knock came on the door. "Is everything okay in there? Senator? I heard someone yelling. Are you okay in there?"
Kemiss could hear his heart beating in his chest and the world around him sounded like it was underwater. Had he really been yelling? He hadn't realized it, but maybe he had been.
The knocks on the door grew louder. "Senator? Are you in there?"
Kemiss reached over to the dresser and unzipped the front pocket of the suitcase he'd brought in. Pulling out a .38 revolver, he caressed the shiny, nickel-plated weapon. He didn't want to be around for the storm that was coming. He couldn't face his children with something like this hanging around his shoulders.
Chapter Seventy-Seven
After going to ground for two days, Declan had finally been able to make his way out of the United States with the help of Fintan McGuire. With both the media and the law enforcement communities completely occupied by the foiled hostage crisis and the fear of other attempts around the country, Declan had been able to slip away undetected. Now as Fintan's Embraer Legacy 500 banked sharply to the left, he looked down on the mid-sized Irish town of Sligo, the crisp, navy blue waters of Ballysadare Bay and the North Atlantic Ocean beyond as the plane began its final approach from the east. Once the plane straightened out and descended, it bounced forcefully onto the runway and the engines screamed as they reversed to slow the corporate jet. Declan could see a line of four black Range Rovers waiting just off the runway, and as the craft taxied to a stop, the vehicles moved forward.
The cockpit door opened and the captain walked out. Declan stood as the man smiled and nodded at him and continued on towards the plane's rear exit. When the captain had opened the door and lowered the plane's wheelchair ramp, Declan thanked him, and descended to the pavement where the grouping of Range Rovers was now waiting.
"There's my old son," Fintan said with a huge smile, as Dean Lynch opened the rear door of one of the Range Rovers and the mop-haired entrepreneur exited the vehicle on his forearm crutches.
"What's all this?" Declan asked, as Fintan arrived at the edge of the ramp.
"You can't do everything you've done in the last week and a half and not expect a bit of a fanfare, mate," Fintan said, as the doors to several of the Range Rovers opened and people began to step out. Declan scanned the gathering group with a smile as Lord Dennis Allardyce, Tom Gordon and Shane O'Reilly arrived at the ramp. Declan smiled the biggest at the sight of Shane hobbling along on a set of crutches. "Now you two can have a race," he said, nodding towards Fintan.
"The hell with that, and these things, too," Shane said, in mock anger.
"Well done, Mr. McIver, very well done indeed," Lord Allardyce said, as he extended his hand and slapped Declan on the shoulder like a father would a son. "A lot of people are going to be very grateful when the dust settles and everything that's happened is revealed in its entirety."
Declan smiled. "I'll settle for a glass of iced tea and no one shooting at me for a while."
He looked past the small group at the sound of more doors opening and closing. Altair Nazari and Okan Osman exited the third Range Rover in the row of four.
"Now, here's two guys I didn't think I would see again for quite a while," he said, as the two approached and they all shook hands. "I thought you'd both be laid up on a beach in Eilat soaking up the sun and drinking martinis."
"And we will be, very soon," Osman said with a laugh. "We just had to make a brief pit stop first." He nodded in the direction of the Range Rover they'd just gotten out of. A tall man with thinning gray hair and a chubby face had left the SUV and was walking towards them.
"Prime Minister," Declan said as Asher Harel arrived and they shook hands firmly.
"Our meeting at airports is becoming a habit, Mr. McIver. I'm glad this time it's under better circumstances," the aged Israeli said.
"Yes sir. So am I."
"I don't want to bring your reunion to a halt, but there's a lot that needs to be discussed. Have you heard the latest news out of the United States?"
Declan shook his head. "No, sir. I've been in the air until just a little while ago. We made a two hour stop in Reykjavik, but I never left the plane."
Harel nodded. "The story developing out of the United States is quite frankly bizarre, to say the least. Senator David Kemiss has apparently committed suicide after meeting with a television reporter." Harel continued to catch Declan up on all of the claims Kemiss had made in the interview that was now being played throughout the world's major media.
"That lyin' bogtrotter," Shane said, when Harel had finished. "He actually took credit for what Declan and your men did?"
Declan grimaced as the Senator's statements from two nights prior flashed through his mind. Had Kemiss really had a partner? If so, was the man Kemiss had identified a further danger or had the events in Virginia been the culmination of his threats? At the time Declan had thought it was all just another desperate attempt by Kemiss to keep people from learning the truth, but now he wasn't so sure.
"I guess my point is," Harel continued, when no one else spoke, "that while your actions certainly saved a lot of lives, it doesn't seem to have done much to end the manhunt for you. You're still very much a wanted man."
Declan nodded. "Maybe this will help," he said, as he withdrew a red flash drive from his coat pocket. "It's the confession Kemiss gave us at his house the other night, the confession that led us to Baktayev. That should help the authorities piece everything together if we can get it into the right hands."
Harel took the drive and turned it over in his hand for a moment. "I'm sure it will. I'll make some calls to my contacts in Washington right away and a copy of this will be in the President's hands by tomorrow morning."
"That will certainly help in the long term," Allardyce said, "but we need to worry about the short term."
"Lynch and I are returning to Dublin as soon as we're done here," Fintan said. "Mullaghmore is your home for as long as you need. I would think you and the missus will be plenty safe there."
"Aye, that's grand," Declan said, "but what we'd really like is to go home, back to our old lives before all of this happened."
"I'm afraid," Lord Allardyce said, "that that is the one thing nobody can give you."
Everyone looked up at the aged aristocrat.
"The cat is out of the bag, as the Americans say," he continued. "Even if, God willing, the truth is discovered among all of the obfuscation Kemiss has put out, the media will not soon forget what they've learned about you. There's a new ripple in their reality and I don't think their fascination with it will go away for quite some time."