Page 64 of To Die For

There, Jackson watched as a gate manned by an armed guard in a brown uniform opened and the SUV passed through. In the darkness she could make out shapes of various buildings, some of them quite sizable.

Ten minutes later a chopper appeared in the sky and landed near one of the buildings. The body-bagged men were swiftly placed in the chopper, which lifted off, but not before Jackson also took a video of it. She’d seen a bird like it before and even ridden in one. All black, even the rotors. From its shape she knew modifications had been made to the “dog house,” or the nose, which contained the gear box and engines, as well as the motor’s intakes and exhaust system; the latter had an infrared suppressor, designed to reduce its radar signature. She also observed it had a unique canard configuration, which would give it enhanced maneuvering capabilities and an increased top speed. Its fuselage was covered with canted flat panels, again to reduce its radar cross-section. And the main rotor was hinge-less and she was certain the tail rotor had no ball bearings, all to reduce vibration with the ultimate goal of diminishing detection.

As it soared away, its visual, radar, infrared, and acoustic signatures were substantially minimized. In a matter of seconds it vanished into the night sky.

There was really only one conclusion to all this.

My old agency, CIA, is involved somehow.

As she had sped off, Jackson’s mind whirled far faster than her wheels.

The chopper she’d seen only reinforced what she already suspected. The hit put out on Devine tonight was one that sherecognized because it had been done to someone close to her, an ally in the intelligence service of another country friendly to the United States. The reasons for it were political, convoluted, a cover-up of past transgressions with an unhealthy dash of ego. The blame for the murder had then been placed on a tried-and-true enemy of America.

Jackson had told her superiors about some of their own colleagues’ involvement in the person’s death, and she had been assured that heads would roll. And unfortunately,herseventually had.

They set me up all the way.

The very next week Pru Jackson had been left behind in hostile foreign territory because she had blamed some at her agency for the murder of her ally. With that knowledge she could bring down people in high places. High enough that those very same people would probably gut their own grandmothers to save themselves. That was what power did to you. It allowed you to rationalize anything you ever did or would ever do, no matter how wrong or cruel.

As she stood here now observing the trailer, Jackson mused,So why is CIA apparently involved in this family drama of the Odoms, with their little house in the woods on one end and big, bad Danny Glass on the other? And Travis Devine trapped smack in the middle?

She would have to find out that connection. And Jackson also well understood that Devine was no doubt going to do his best to accomplish the same thing. And whoever got there first, without being killed, might get the grand prize.

Jackson had risked her life for a spot in the American intelligence service. If she had perished in the line of duty, she was supposed to go up on the Memorial Wall at Langley, which honored those men and women who had given their final, full measure serving their country.

And I would have been honored to be on that wall. Then they betrayed me. Well, now it’s my turn.

Jackson twisted the throttle, and the bike soared silently down the lonely, cold road, with only a billion stars in a cool, vast sky as silent witnesses.

CHAPTER

29

DEVINE STARED UP AT THEceiling of Betsy Odom’s old bedroom. There were shiny plastic stars glued there to form perhaps a universe of possibilities, maybe representing something that was as unlike the girl’s life as it was conceivable to be?

While he didn’t routinely wax philosophical, this mission was hitting Devine in unexpected spots, like a journeyman fighter who got in lucky punches on a better foe, and managing to do damage in sensitive places.

He pulled out his phone and went over the notes he had kept on the case. Clearly, no one from Ricketts was going to get back to him, so there would be no items from the Odoms’ car for him to inspect, and no further examination possible of bodies now turned to ash. Dr. Coburn was certainly not going to contact him, and neither were the first responders to the Odoms’ deaths.

He hoped that Campbell could work a miracle with the request Devine had made of him, but that was far from guaranteed. He then called the man to report in. He was simply going to leave a voicemail. Yet despite its being very late on the West Coastandhis being three hours ahead of Devine, his boss answered promptly. Devine wondered when and if Emerson Campbell actually slept, or maybe the man had just risen to begin his day. After Devine told him about being kidnapped, he asked Campbell, “It wasn’t your people who saved my butt?”

“No. You think Glass is behind them snatching you?”

“I can’t think of anyone else. They might have been planning to interrogate me in the woods before they killed me. But I screwedtheir plans. And whoever saved me blew up those plans even more. Any luck on my request for info?”

“Still working on it. It takes time to move mountains, even for the U.S. government.”

“Right.”

Campbell noted, “We discussed before that perhaps Glass believes Perry Rollins told you something incriminating about him.”

“But he’d have to figure I’d take whatever I knew to the cops.”

“My point is, maybe you know something valuable, only you don’tknowyou do. What did Rollins say to you again, right before he died?”

“It sounded like ‘cuckoo’ and then maybe ‘gas.’ I have no idea what that means, if anything. The guy was about to die, so it could be gibberish,” added Devine. “Although I suppose by ‘gas,’ he could have been trying to say ‘glass.’”

“I think it more likely than not, but the other reference is pretty muddled. Okay, I’m going to work some angles on my end, Devine. You watch yourself.”

---