The charcoal-haired CEO’s eyebrows went up. “Insane is embezzling from your own agency. It’s hiring a group of burned-out mercenaries to search a river bed and following up their disappearance with a group of civilians who will likely meet the same fate. Insane is your place in the world, my friend, not mine.”
Gibbs stewed. Kaufman had hit the mark dead-on; he’d gotten every fear and every angle just about right. Gibbs was greedy but he wasn’t a traitor, and he didn’t fancy himself a sellout or a politician either. Giving up the future wasn’t his big concern; it would come someday regardless of what he did, but the destroyers, as Kaufman had called them, were not forces to be trifled with. Perhaps Kaufman was offering him something better. He chose to bite, at least enough to taste the dish. “And what would such an offer look like?”
Kaufman obliged him. “First, you’ll receive immediate repayment of all the funds that you or your backers have laid out. That should get the investors off your back and allow you to replace any NRI funds that might have gone missing. Second, you’ll receive a one million dollar payment upon recovery and authentication of the artifacts. And finally, you’ll have a position within Futrex, a six-figure salary and a small residual from all net profits.” Kaufman shrugged. “Your cut will be a rounding error somewhere on the bottom line, but in a few years, you’ll make more than you could in ten lifetimes with the NRI. The more we make, the more you’ll make. That ought to guarantee your full cooperation.”
Stuart Gibbs listened in silence, mulling the offer over. “And if I decline?”
“Then one of two things will happen. Either your group in the rainforest will be eliminated before they have a chance to bring you what you want, or the proper authorities will be informed of your activities.”
Gibbs laughed. Kaufman wouldn’t bring the authorities into this, whatever happened. “My people are well protected.”
“Yes,” Kaufman said. “I know who protects them, and how. I promise you, I have all the firepower I need to take them out. The only thing I don’t have is their location, but sooner or later I will. And once I do, your ability to bargain will have expired.”
Gibbs mulled over the offer: ten million dollars or so, when all was said and done. The buyers he’d contacted had deep pockets but they were skeptical. If he could prove what he had, they might pay ten times what Kaufman had offered. Up front and in cash, not spread out over decades. And even that would be a bargain. The technology itself would be worth an unfathomable amount in that time, more than all the oil in Alaska or all the gold in South Africa, and he was being asked to give it up for a pittance.
He glared at Kaufman, galled by the man’s arrogance. And yet, even as he fumed, his black mood began to fade. He could see the offer for what it was: a thieves’ bargain, even if the division of spoils was mostly onesided. This was the way of things, he thought. The rich take from the poor. They pay only a penny and sell for a dollar, but the poor are always grateful for the pennies.
He threw out a counteroffer. “Why not let my people finish the recovery? Whatever we bring out, I’ll give you the first bid.”
“Why?” Kaufman said. “So you can charge me more?”
Gibbs had expected that. He ground his teeth anyway. “And what about my people?”
Kaufman pursed his lips. “They won’t be coming home again, if that’s what you mean.”
Gibbs was silent.
“I’ve seen your roster,” Kaufman added. “At first I couldn’t understand why you chose this particular mix of individuals. But then it hit me; for the most part, they won’t be missed.”
As Gibbs listened to the last point, his face grew stern, almost angry, but not out of sadness. In fact, he had never planned to bring the team home in the first place, not without an accident somewhere along the way—a plane crash or an explosion. But now, and because of Kaufman, no less, one of them was already here: Arnold Moore.
“More deaths,” he noted.
“Yes,” Kaufman said, respectfully. “But none as shocking as Matt Blundin’s. Then again, I suppose he left you no choice.”
Gibbs’ face went blank, an emotionless slate. He hadn’t wanted to kill Blundin, but the security chief had, indeed, left him no choice. In his zeal to find the party responsible for the data theft, Blundin had dug into areas that he’d been ordered to ignore. In doing so he’d uncovered the loose threads in Gibbs’ setup. And though they were irrelevant to the investigation, Blundin couldn’t help but pull on them.
Sooner, rather than later, he would have realized that only Gibbs could change the funding codes, not Danielle, or the accounting clerks or anyone else in the organization. That would have led him to the missing money, to the funding requests for projects that existed only on paper and to the bland reports and unlogged transactions that had moved the project forward. And before long, Matt Blundin would have realized what it all meant. Maybe he’d realized it already and was allowing Gibbs time to fix things. After all, he had been a friend.
Kaufman broke the silence. “I’ll give you twenty-four hours. Have an answer ready.”
Gibbs focused his attention on the world outside. They were in the business district now; he could catch a cab from here. He looked at the driver. “Pull over.”
With a nod from Kaufman, the driver acquiesced and the Mercedes pulled to the curb.
One last warning came from Kaufman. “Don’t be a fool,” he said. “There’s no other choice for you now.”
Gibbs stepped out of the car, slammed the door and watched the shimmering vehicle drive off. He knew his enemy now, and he knew what he had to do. The only question was how to do it without destroying himself in the process.
CHAPTER 23
The backseat of the old yellow cab had seen its fair share of life. The ripped vinyl with its frayed cords of fabric and stray pen marks, the graffiti and the stains, all of it testified to a long and turbulent existence. From that royal throne, Arnold Moore surveyed the snow-covered streets of Washington as he slowly passed them by.
In a year of strange weather, another storm had reached the nation’s capital, the fourth in six weeks, but the least troublesome so far, as it had arrived on a Friday and would be gone by Sunday night.
On Saturday morning, however, the snow was still falling, covering the lawns and trees in a pristine blanket of white and leaving the streets awash in a layer of gray slush. It was enough to keep the masses at home and the District as vacant as Moore could remember.
The taxi brought him in from the Virginia side, rolling along the Jefferson Davis Parkway and then up onto the Arlington Memorial Bridge and across the Potomac. The Lincoln Memorial loomed in the distance, its great columned shape half-shrouded in the falling snow.
The city was a different place in weather like this, the monuments more grand and worthy in their isolation, the reflecting pools more majestic in their silence and emptiness, more dignified for the lack of tourists, vendors and vagrants.
Moore preferred the city in this dress on any occasion, but especially this one. He was on his way to a meeting, having finally been contacted by someone interested in the Brazil project. The city’s emptiness would make it easier to confer in the open, easier to spot trouble if it came.
The cab dropped Moore off in front of the monument and he took to the sidewalk, the snow crunching and squeaking underfoot.
Feeling the chill of the air, he pulled the lapels of his heavy wool coat tight and thrust his hands into its deep, warm pockets—the same pockets in which he’d found the note, just two days prior. At the door of his apartment, when reaching for his keys, his hand had made contact with a folded piece of paper bearing writing that was not his own. The text began simply “Call” and provided a number. Beneath the number were the words “we can help you.” Nothing else, no mention of the Brazil project or the NRI, but the connection was unmistakable.