The Ascendant: A Thriller Read online

  Garrett shook his head. “Not bullshit. It’s true.”

  Celeste fell silent. She rubbed her hands together, squeezing at her fingers hard. They had been talking in strained whispers. Around them Garrett could hear the constant click of fingers on keyboards. Finally, Celeste nodded her head. “I’ll need to call my mom. And pack.”

  “You won’t regret this.”

  “I’ll leave this afternoon. And I already regret it.”

  She collected her laptop and her bag and hustled out of the war room. As she left, Garrett had the realization that he was sending his first soldier into combat, so he ran after her and caught her by the elevator. He didn’t know quite what to say, and she looked distracted and slightly confused.

  “Is there something else?” she asked. “You want me to bring you back a T-shirt?”

  Garrett gave her a brief hug. “Just be safe. And good luck.”

  Celeste gave him a baffled look, said, “Okay,” and then disappeared into the elevator.

  Garrett hurried back into the war room and brought Bingo and Jimmy Lefebvre to a quiet corner in the rear. He told them what Celeste had found.

  “That’s brilliant,” Lefebvre said, eyes dancing with the news. This was the kind of thing he, as a War College researcher, lived for: political and cultural foment was happening right in front of their eyes, on one of the biggest stages in the world, and only he and a few other people in the entire country knew about it. Garrett could tell he was ready to spin out theories on the Tiger for days.

  “We need to tell Kline. And the State Department,” he said. “And also—”

  “No,” Garrett cut in. “That’s exactly who we don’t need to tell.” If he had learned one thing since telling Avery Bernstein that the Chinese were selling off U.S. Treasuries, it was that information was a valuable commodity, and he had no intention of disseminating it to the rest of the military before he was good and ready.

  “If we don’t tell them, we could be in deep shit.”

  “And if we do, then we lose all leverage. If you’re worried about getting into trouble, fine, walk away now. I’ll swear I never told you anything. But don’t expect any more information out of me. Ever.”

  Lefebvre hesitated, then agreed, reluctantly, to keep quiet. But even in his reluctance, Garrett could sense a change in the lieutenant: up until now, there had still been a formality with Lefebvre, and a reserve between him and Garrett. But with this news, a final wall had been breached: Lefebvre was all in. He even gave Garrett a spontaneous squeeze of the arm.

  “This is big,” Lefebvre said. “Really big. You did good.”

  “Not me,” Garrett said. “Celeste.”

  “Okay,” Lefebvre said, beaming. “We did good.”

  Bingo shuffled his feet and grimaced, as if he hadn’t quite made up his mind how to feel. Then he nodded in agreement. “It’s pretty cool,” he said. “Way cool.”

  Garrett didn’t tell anyone else in the war room. He was beginning to like a few of the Ascendant staffers better—Patmore, the Marine liaison the most—but he still didn’t trust them. He decided it would be best if they just kept their minds on video games and online trading.

  It wasn’t until late that night, when he stepped through the front door of his apartment in Bolling and saw his laptop on the kitchen table, that he remembered his furtive e-mails from that morning. He grabbed his laptop and jogged back out to the bushes at the edge of the Air Force Base. And there it was. An encrypted response to his account. Garrett decoded it quickly.

  The subject line said, simply: “Orange Line tomorrow.” And in the body of the e-mail it read: “Ride it, Hans.”

  Garrett immediately deleted the e-mail, then canceled the entire account. He knew that accounts and deleted e-mails often stayed on servers for months after having been erased, but it was a chance he would have to take. From what Garrett could tell of the inner workings of the military, if they caught on to what he was doing in the next twenty-four hours it would be a miracle. They were two steps behind in everything, all the time. They were like the post office, but with guns.

  He considered the various options for losing his minders that night as he went to bed, and had come up with a plan by the time he was out the door at six the next morning, jogging down to the waiting military police car. It had been the same MPs driving him to and from the Pentagon every day for the past week now, so they had grown accustomed to his routine, which was what Garrett decided he would use against them. Two of the last three days he had asked them to stop at a Starbucks in northern Alexandria so he could buy a tall, nonfat latte. One of the MPs stayed in the SUV, the other stood guard at the front of the Starbucks. They never went inside with him, and they never accepted his offer to buy them each a grande drip.

  Garrett had chatted up a pretty, dark-haired barista on his last visit, and had watched her carry a bag of trash out the back door. This morning, he paid for his latte and made for the bathrooms, but hung a hard right before he got there, sprinting out the back door and into an alleyway. He dumped the latte into a trash can and ran hard, a block and a half, to the elevated Braddock Road Metrorail station, where he pulled off his military jacket and shirt, tossed them into the bushes, and paid his fare. Now he was wearing a white T-shirt and blue Army dress pants, an odd look, but at least he wasn’t in full uniform. He bolted upstairs to catch the train. It arrived two minutes later, and he boarded a Blue Line train into the city, checking out the window to see if the MPs had followed him. They hadn’t. But they would soon, he knew that much for sure.

  He changed trains four stops later, getting on a Yellow Line train into the heart of D.C., then changed again at L’Enfant Plaza for an Orange Line train. L’Enfant Plaza was packed with commuters at seven in the morning, so he had no problem blending in, but he kept his head down anyway, in case the police were looking for him already. Though he doubted they were. It had been half an hour since he had bolted from the MPs. Half an hour was barely enough time to call General Kline at the Pentagon, much less set up a search effort.

  He rode the Orange Line out to the eastern edge of the city, to the last stop, New Carrollton, then walked across the platform and boarded the next train headed west. He moved from car to car, changing at stations so as not to attract attention. At the Metro Center station he found a discarded Georgetown University sweatshirt and put it on, but it smelled like vomit, so he tossed it a few stations later. He thought he saw the conductor staring at him for a few stops, maybe even studying his face, but he wasn’t positive about this, so he tried to put it out of his mind.

  He wasn’t sure how long he could ride the same Metro line back and forth before he became too bored or too hungry, but he didn’t have to wait for the answer to that question, because at the West Falls Church station, just outside of Arlington, a young blond woman sat down opposite Garrett and smiled at him. She was pretty, with platinum hair and carefully applied red lipstick. Garrett had smiled back at her, taking in her long legs, when a man took the empty seat next to him and said in a slight German accent, “It will be best for you if you don’t look over at me and see my face. That way, if they ask you later, you can say, honestly, that you don’t know what I look like. So maybe keep staring at her, yes?”

  Garrett silently cursed himself for being taken in so crudely by a pretty face. He swore to himself that if he survived this train ride he would work hard on this character flaw, because it was beginning to get him into deep shit. He nodded his head and kept his eyes on the blonde, who was watching him carefully now, all the flirt drained from her face.

  “Okay,” Garrett said, bracing himself for a bullet to the head. “Fine. I like looking at her. She’s cute.”

  “I am Hans Metternich.”

  “And I’m Zoltar the Magnificent,” Garrett said.

  Metternich chuckled. “You have a sense of humor, Mr. Reilly. I like that. Even your encryption clues were amusing.”

  “Are you going to shoot me?” Garrett asked, silently c
ounting the number of people in the Metro car. Seventeen, excluding himself, Metternich, and the girl. Enough witnesses to maybe dissuade a killer from an open assassination. “Because there are a lot of people watching.”

  “I have no interest in killing you, Mr. Reilly. Quite the contrary,” Metternich said.

  “Okay, great. That’s a relief. Then can we cut to the chase? Who tried to blow me up in front of my office?”

  “Your own government.”

  Garrett turned his head in surprise, but Metternich quickly raised his arm to shield his face. “Don’t. It would be a mistake to identify me. For your own safety.”

  “Bullshit,” Garrett said. “Why would they do that?”

  “To heighten a pervasive sense of fear. To feed the military-security industry that lives off taxpayer money. And to get you to come over to their side. Terrorism is a numbers game. If there’s not enough terror, then there’s not enough money made available to combat it. If you reduce it down to its essence, terror is money.”

  Garrett said nothing, but thought about this statement, while Metternich continued: “Think about it. A big, bombastic attempt on your life that puts you in little real jeopardy. And no one is actually killed. A showpiece.”

  “You have no idea if that’s true,” Garrett said.

  “I have sources inside the government who have vouched for this information’s veracity. Highly placed within the Defense Intelligence Agency. I believe you are working with them. No?”

  “Who the fuck are you?”

  “A very interested third party.”

  “Interested in what?” Garrett said as the train rolled to a stop at Dunn Loring-Merrifield station. “Why are you telling me all this?”

  “Because I want you to know that you are being fed lies. So that you know that what you are involved in is not what it seems.”

  “Why do you give a shit about lies or what I do?”

  “Because you are being used as an instrument of change. And you have no idea what that change actually is. But the reality of it is so enormous that it will shape the future of the world for the next hundred years. And your own government wants you to drive it.”

  A chill ran down Garrett’s spine. A handful of commuters trudged off the train. The doors remained open.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Garrett said.

  “Because you are willfully ignoring the truth,” Metternich said. “Because you like the attention and the praise and the excitement. But there will come a moment when the truth will be too obvious to ignore. When you will have to make a choice. And I want to help you make the right one.”

  “You are completely full of shit.”

  A bell rang, alerting riders that the doors would close in ten seconds.

  “Perhaps, Mr. Reilly,” Metternich said, quietly, precisely. “Or perhaps what I’m saying is truer than you want to admit. According to some people, we are on the verge of war between two global powers. Ask yourself: Who profits most from such a war? Once you answer that question, I would urge you to decide if you want to be a part of it. If you want to lead it. Because a war between the United States and China would just be the beginning. The real war would come next, and that one would be waged against all of us.”

  The doors started to close, and in a flash Metternich and his blond helper were leaping through them. They slipped out of the train just as the doors slammed shut, and all Garrett could see was the backs of their heads as they hurried for the stairs out of the station. Garrett let out a long breath and realized he’d been holding his shoulders tight practically the entire conversation with Metternich. He tried to replay the conversation in his head, but in less than two minutes the train was pulling into Vienna station. The conductor announced the final stop, a bell rang, the doors opened, and into the car rushed a dozen burly men in gray suits, guns drawn, mouths open, screaming at Garrett to freeze or die.

  Garrett tried to put up his hands in surrender, but they threw him off his seat and slammed him to the floor before he could raise them above his shoulders.

  58

  IN TRANSIT—FAIRFAX COUNTY, VIRGINIA, APRIL 15, 10:41 AM

  They kept Garrett’s head covered in a black canvas hood for the entire car ride, which took, as far as Garrett could tell, about thirty minutes. His hands were handcuffed behind his back. No one read him his rights or told him where he was going, no matter how many times he asked.

  No one said anything.

  The car stopped and two men hustled him out of the backseat, up some steps, and inside. Whether it was into a house or an office, Garrett couldn’t tell. He could tell that wherever they were, it was quiet, definitely not the heart of the city. They walked him down a hallway, into a room, then shoved him onto a chair. Someone slapped another pair of handcuffs onto his right ankle, chaining him to the leg of the chair. Then they left the room. Or at least Garrett thought they did: a door had slammed, and no one replied to his questions.

  “Hello? Anyone there? Anyone want to talk to me? I’m feeling kind of neglected.”

  Garrett waited like that for another thirty minutes or so, tugging at his handcuffs, tapping his foot restlessly, but it was very hard for him to keep track of time; the black hood let no light in, and there was not a sound to be heard. Finally, a door opened, there were footsteps, and the hood was yanked off his head. Garrett squinted in the sterile fluorescent light. The room was empty except for a small table and chair, and a digital video camera set on a tripod by the far wall. The camera was pointed at Garrett.

  Two men stood between Garrett and the only door to the room. They were both white males, midthirties, both wearing gray suits, their hair closely cut. Garrett thought he recognized them.

  “Remember us?” the larger of the two men said.

  Garrett stared at him, and then he recognized the speaker and his sidekick: “Agents Stoddard and Cannel. Homeland Security. You asked me about my mother.”

  “That’s right. I’m Agent Stoddard,” the big man said. “And you were an asshole to me. So guess what? Now it’s my turn to be an asshole back.”

  A shiver of fear ran down Garrett’s spine. He tried to force an easy smile to his lips. “How about I apologize for that and we just call it even?”

  Neither of the two agents laughed. The shorter of the two—Cannel—pulled the empty chair close to the desk and sat. Stoddard stood motionless.

  “Who was he?” Stoddard asked.

  “Can you be more specific?” Garrett said, trying to keep things light.

  “The conductor saw you talking to a man. There was a woman with him. You had a conversation for five minutes. Who was he?”

  “I have no idea,” Garrett said.

  Agent Stoddard made a show of sighing loudly. “Here’s the deal, Garrett,” he said. “Every time you lie to me, your situation will get incrementally worse. We will show less leniency. You will be stuck here longer. And then you will face lengthier and lengthier jail time.”

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Garrett said. “Jail time? For what? I didn’t do anything.”

  “You ran away from your military police drivers.”

  “How is that illegal?”

  “It was highly suspicious.”

  “I was bored. Needed to shake it up a little.”

  “By riding Metro trains all morning?”

  “I was people watching. It calms me down.”

  Agent Cannel dropped a manila folder onto the table and pulled a stack of papers from it. “We employ computer experts as well,” he said.

  He read aloud from the top sheet: “Tuesday, 4:38 a.m., Reilly, Garrett, sent encrypted e-mail from an unsecured wireless router on perimeter of Bolling Air Force Base to recipient at [email protected]. Subject e-mail states: I am in DC, am ready to talk. Reply received 10:42 p.m., instructing Reilly, Garrett, to ride the Metro Orange Line, today, Wednesday the 15th. Reilly, Garrett, reported to police by train conductor on Metro Orange Line, 9:30 to 10:00, a.m. Reilly, Garrett, met unknown
subject—white male, forties—on the train, 10:09 a.m., and had discussion for approximately five minutes, after which unknown subject departed Metro and Reilly, Garrett, was apprehended by federal agents.”

  Agent Cannel closed the file and said nothing more. Agent Stoddard looked down at Garrett. “Please. Don’t insult us. At least come up with a lie that’s creative.”

  Garrett sighed. The handcuffs were digging into his wrists. “Okay, fine, how about I get a turn?” Garrett said. “Who tried to blow me up on John Street in front of the Jenkins & Altshuler offices in New York City?”

  “I have no idea. That’s not our jurisdiction. The NYPD are investigating that.”

  Garrett smiled. “Well, now we’re both lying. So we’re even.”

  Agent Cannel scribbled a note down on a legal pad.

  “Is that what he told you? That he knew who planted the car bomb?” Stoddard asked. “Did he say it was the U.S. government? Standard American imperialist conspiracy rumor?”

  Garrett stared at Stoddard and said flatly, “I want a lawyer.”

  “A lawyer? Where exactly do you think you are? We can throw you in jail and have you rot there and you will never see a lawyer again for the rest of your life.”

  “On what charges?”

  Stoddard smiled. The smile had changed from bland to menacing. Garrett could see the veins on the agent’s neck pulse.

  “You were given top-level security clearance and access to military secrets. Now we have reason to believe you met with an agent of a foreign government. That classifies you as a threat to national security, and because of that you belong to me, and only me, and I will do whatever the hell I want with you. I can have you burned at the stake if I so choose. No charges, no trial, no judge, no nothing. And nobody will give a rat’s ass what happened to you. Not your deadbeat mom, not Avery Bernstein, not any of your loser friends, and certainly not Alexis Truffant. Yes, Garrett, we know all about you and Captain Truffant.”

  Garrett fought hard to keep an emotionless smile plastered on his lips, but it was not easy—a wave of despair was rising in his chest. He felt suddenly very, very alone, and Agent Stoddard seemed to know it.