Miles To Go Part 19

The woman nodded, her eyes wide.

"Rennie Vogel. FBI."

The woman nodded again and seemed on the verge of becoming emotional.

"We need to set up shop here."

Rennie stepped back into the hallway and called for Hannah, instructing her to free Margot Day. As Hannah worked on the agent's bindings, Rennie dragged Garrison into the room and closed the door. She retrieved his small suitcase from the hall.

It was caved in on one side where it had smashed into the wall and she had to force it open. Dumping the contents on the bed, 0.

she found nothing out of the ordinary. She opened every seam in the lining but found nothing. Then she turned to Garrison.

Whatever he had for Armin must be on him. He was still lying on his stomach and she had to roll him to his side to check his front.

She found the envelope in the inner pocket of his suit jacket. She was about to raise the flap when Hannah removed the gag from Day's mouth.

"Wait."

Rennie turned to her. Margot Day was regaining her composure fast.

"What?"

"You don't have clearance."

Rennie's fingers were still on the flap. This could be her only chance to know what Garrison had that Armin wanted. Day's hands were free now. Rennie exhaled in frustration and laid the envelope on her lap. It was time to call in.

"Hannah, I need the phone."

Hannah had finished releasing Margot Day's binds. It was strange to be with Hannah around other people and Rennie realized it was the first time she had used her name.

Is it all finally over?

Hannah handed Rennie the satellite phone and sat on the bed, exhausted. For so long, time had crept along without meaning. Suddenly the world seemed to be spinning wildly on its axis. Hannah looked at Garrison lying on the floor. He was awake now. They stared at one another for a long moment before Hannah turned and lay on the rumpled bed. She heard Rennie's voice and the voice of the other agent but she couldn't take it in. Was her future being determined? Once again beyond her control?

She thought about the Baltimore apartment building where she and her parents had lived. There had been one Gentile family on their floor. They had a dog, that's what she remembered most, and a little girl her age who she played with one summer and never saw again. The dog, who always had a lint-covered joint from the butcher, would approach its bone warily, unsure what to do with it. The poor animal seemed torn between two natures. Was he a creature of the wild? Or one whose instincts had been transformed into something wholly unnatural? Hannah never quite trusted the animal, never having been around dogs, unaware of their ability to adapt their nature, like people, to the ever changing world. Hannah, too, had adapted her nature, but in the opposite direction and now she had to fight her way back.

Living in D.C., she regularly went to the National Gallery. On the lower level was a room, not particularly large, with a famous Pollock. There, too, was a Rothko, vast and deep, and this was what she came to see. A field of orange and yellow ceding to an ambiguous black border. Standing before it she'd often heard the remark, Well, anybody could do that. In those moments, Hannah, who was a cynic, felt for all of mankind, for those who could see the Rothko and want to drown in it and for those who couldn't.

Closing her eyes, she thought of the orange and the yellow, its vibrancy and fecundity, and of the monochrome fields of black and gray that Rothko produced before his suicide. How long had she lived with the black and the gray, keeping that glorious burst of color her heart's secret?

When she returned to life, she would bring in the orange and the yellow and maybe even red. Yes, red. She would place a beautifully cut red sofa in the midst of her monochrome world.

As a reminder of what she had learned and must never forget.

CHAPTER TWENTY.

Martin Garrison had lived his life walking the precarious line of simultaneously adhering to the rule of law and flouting it at every turn. At home, he'd done what was expected of himattended meetings on time, applied the social graces appropriately and climbed the Agency ladder, skipping a rung here or there but never climbing over anyone. But when he was on a.s.signment, on foreign soil, and tasked with undermining the existing power structure, all bets were off. There was only one priority, one ruleallegiance to your own country. Aside from that one restriction, he was a free man, with leave to maim and kill, lie like a sociopath and illegally obtain whatever he required for his mission. Many agents crossed the line, drunk on a kind of autonomy most people who were fortunate enough to live in civilized society never had a chance to taste. Garrison had crossed the line before, but never so far that he couldn't cross back. Until now. He had betrayed his country in an attempt to repair the nearly rotten fabric of his relationship with his son.

Garrison shifted uncomfortably in his seat on the military transport. He had no knowledge of where he would be taken.

His colleagues, the CIA agents Rennie Vogel had handed him to, weren't telling him anything. He heard the engines of the plane rumble to life, a deep, almost comforting vibration beneath his shackled feet. His hands were shackled as wellthe metal cuffs tight, biting into his skin. It was a familiar sensationhe had gotten himself into sc.r.a.pes all over the worldbut never had it felt so permanent. A small tornado formed in his brain as the knowledge that he was no longer free, and would likely never be free again, gripped him like a vise.

Rennie Vogel. FBI. He bristled at that. His capture should have been effected by his own agency. She was obviously a part of their new counterterrorism special operations group. He wondered why she was alone and if she had carried out the a.s.sa.s.sination on Armin. Women in special forces. He'd never thought he would see it, never thought it possible. She was incredibly strong for a woman not more than five-eight. Her body, compact, almost elegant, belied her strength. But Garrison knew that strength could come from anatomy or it could come from desire. And when he'd encountered her, felt her react as he tried to take her down, he saw her will overcome any limitations her s.e.x imposed on her. He thought again of the great Russian novelists and how literature, the great literature of the past, had failed to consider woman in all her many and varied permutations.

Garrison heard the distinctive clank of heavy boots on the corrugated metal steps of the plane. A close-cropped bearded head came into view followed by more footsteps on the stairs these much lighterand then the pale blue eyes of his only child met his own.

His breath nearly escaping him, he stood quickly until the hand of the burly agent next to him clapped his shoulder forcing him back into his seat. Garrison turned to the manthey hadn't exchanged a word since he was escorted aboard the plane.

"Please."

The man nodded. "Just keep yourself in check."

Garrison rose slowly, taking in the vision of his sonwas it an illusion?as he walked toward him. It had been almost a year.

He was still blond as the sun and slight as a girl. How could this frail creature be any son of his? So like his mother.

Jon was cuffed as well, at the wrist and the ankle, and as they made their way toward each other, slow and sure, the links of their chains rang out in the silence of their cabin. They stood, almost chest to chest, staring into each other's eyeswhat was there to say, after all?until finally their heads dipped onto each other's shoulders, as close to an embrace as they had ever shared.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE.

Dushanbe, Tajikistan Rennie sat on the lumpy, standard floral-patterned sofa in her suite at the Best Eastern Tajikistan Hotel. She was clean and wearing fresh clothes. Somehow they'd found her a pair of loose cotton pants and a T-shirt. She warranted a suite because her government wanted to keep her at arm's lengthnowhere near the emba.s.sy or the intelligence officesand they needed enough room for her preliminary debrief. There weren't many decent places to stay in Dushanbe and the Best Eastern was the best of the lot, which wasn't saying much.

Sitting across from her, on what she imagined was an equally lumpy sofa, patterned the same, sat three representatives from the FBI, looking uncomfortable in such a casual setting. Too bad they couldn't order a c.o.c.ktailit would likely benefit them all. The CIA had already come and gonesomehow they had finagled first dibs at herand she was tired, having slept only a few hours on the flight from the village.

Rennie was tense, the weight of all that had happened in the last week pressing hard on her. They had already covered the details of her ordealjust the facts, ma'amand here came the hard part. She could feel the shift in the way the men held their bodies as they geared up for her interrogation.

Agent Randolph, seated in the center of the sofa, his suit slightly shiny at the knees, spoke first. "Agent Vogel, I know the ambush of the team was an intensely traumatic experience, but tell me why you didn't call in after it occurred."

Rennie could have given an excuse, had thought she would when this moment came, but she was too soul-weary to attempt to salvage her career. They would have to take it for what it was.

She began to speak but her voice caught. Covering her mouth with her hand, she cleared her throat.

"I knew that if I called in I would be instructed to turn back.

I thought I owed it to the team, after the sacrifice they made, to continue."

The agent to his left, Abrahms, the most senior of the group, narrowed his eyes at her. "You must have recognized what little chance you had of success. While I respect your sentiment for your team, I think it was woefully misguided. On your own you were at high risk for failure and capture. Caught with a sniper rifle, you would have put the United States in a very bad position."

"But I wasn't caught," Rennie said, meeting his eyes. But she knew they were right.

"Such risks are unacceptable, Agent Vogel. We're not mercenaries. You know we don't operate that way."

Rennie didn't respond. What would her a.s.sent imply? His tone was that of an accusation but she didn't think they would charge her with anythinganything so public would only serve to draw attention to their own misconduct. They weren't even recording her debrief. No, whatever punishment was meted out to her would be on the quiet.

"Do you agree?"

"Yes."

"Good. I'm sure you understand that your decision-making on this issue will be further questioned once we return to the States."

And there it was. She probably wouldn't be fired but she was unlikely to ever have any input into her choice of a.s.signment again. Here was reality. She could win the day and still go home looking like a failure.

They all sat in silence as Abrahms made notes on his pad.

Then he glanced at Agent Gerard at the opposite end of the sofa.

Gerard was small but strong, his physique apparent under his well-cut gray suit. Sitting with his ankle on his knee, he leaned forward and took a surprisingly delicate sip from the gla.s.s of water on the coffee table between them.

"Renee Vogel." He spoke her given name, which he knew she never used, dispensing with her t.i.tle as if he were personally stripping it from her. "I want to talk about Hannah Marcus."

Rennie met his hard look without wavering. On this one point she was absolutely confident in her actions.

"After making it through the woods, securing a position from where you could make your shot, you discovered Hannah Marcus alive."

"Yes."

"Then, with only minutes before you would lose your opportunity to successfully hit Armin, you left the woods, slit the throat of Fareed Reza, brought Hannah Marcus back with you to your position and situated the M2 explosive under the armory to make a disturbance." He paused as if he couldn't accept the next fundamental point. "Then, you made the shot."

"That's accurate." And it was. Her week from h.e.l.l distilled to a paragraph.

Gerard chuckled and shook his head. "I have to hand it to you, Vogel, well done. You got a lot done in those few minutes."

His demeanor changed. "Of course, you broke protocol at every step."

Rennie accepted his challenge. "You're suggesting I should have made the shot and left Hannah Marcus?"

"I'm not suggesting it, I'm telling you that. You were lucky and your mission was not designed to factor in luck. Sometimes we have to make hard decisions for the good of something larger than ourselves."

Rennie sat forward. She said evenly, "She was right there in front of me. I could see the expression on her face through the scope. An American hostage who no one was going to rescue. Our policy and the economic constraints of her parents guaranteed that. It was a miracle she was still alive. And I knew that even though I would risk exposure by leaving my position, doing so would also allow me to create the diversion with the bomb, which may be the only thing that saved us. The design of our mission was never flawless. Risks were built into it. My actions, though against protocol, only made it more certain of success."

Rennie paused. "Tell me, Agent Gerard, would you have left her there?"

Gerard returned her stare but didn't answer.

For the next twenty minutes they returned to particulars. Had she noticed anyone else in the camp who looked like they might have a position of importance? How would she characterize Armin's men? Rennie knew these were questions designed to corroborate Hannah's account.

"Okay then. That will do it for now."

As they were gathering their things, she stood and spoke. "I understand that my fate in the Bureau is yet to be determined.

Standards or no standards, the FBI will see what they want to see.

You know as well as I do that I got this job done under impossible circ.u.mstances and rescued an American thought lost along the way."Abrahms closed his briefcase and stood. "That will be kept in mind, Agent Vogel."

Rennie suddenly felt directionless. "What happens when I get back?"

"I can't speak to that. Because of the particular sensitivity surrounding this incident, it will likely be dealt with outside of the usual framework."

"Will I see active service again?"

Abrahms glanced at Gerard, his lips tight against one another.

"I wouldn't bet on it."

0.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO.

When they were gone, Rennie stripped off her clothes and stepped into the shower a second time. In a way she felt that she would never be clean. She knew now that the CIA had, indeed, murdered Na.s.ser Armin. They had shown her the photographs Margot Day hadn't allowed her to see. Shown her, and emphasized that the truth could never be revealed. She understood the impact it could have on national security and how it would undermine the credibility of the United States. But how much had the FBI known? She had to question if CT3 had been used to silence Ahmad Armin who was determined to embarra.s.s the United States by proving their culpability in Na.s.ser's death. She might never know if they had just cause to a.s.sa.s.sinate Armin but fully realized that she couldn't consider such things now.

She knew the agents were there as a faction of the organization that had wanted her to fail. And they would write the report that way, no matter what the facts. The administration would accept it and that would be it. And she would be the scapegoat. The FBI's experiment with women in special forces would likely continue.

There was no turning back from that now. But what her role would be was uncertain.

Would there be a place for her? She could never tolerate staring at a computer screen all day. Even after everything she'd been through. She wouldn't go back to that. If active service was no longer possible she'd have to rethink the FBI. She'd have to make her way somewhere else.

As the steaming water ran over her aching muscles, Rennie thought instead of Hannah in the next room. Was this thing, wrought between them in the most unlikely circ.u.mstances, what mattered most in the end? Was their connection born of something real? Or merely a product of two people cleaving together in a desperate situation? How could she know until she tested the watersomething so potentially inhospitable to the safekeeping of her soul that she might drown before she surfaced?

Here they were so close, the government saving expense by keeping them in adjacent rooms to necessitate only one guard in the hall. They weren't meant to see one another ever again.

As they told her, national security was at stake. But here was something she wanted.

You can't always get what you want.