His fingertips gripped at the icy ledge, temporarily stopping his fall. Suddenly his grip broke free, and he was once again falling. He bounced off the cavern wall and caught a quick glimpse of the hard ice floor thirty feet below rushing up to meet him. He extended his arm to break his fall and felt is snap on impact.
Pain raked through his body.
He lay on his back trying to push through the daze. He couldn't move. At the bottom of the crevasse, deep inside the bowels of the Höllentalferner glacier, his body raked with pain. His brain raced through a self-diagnostic, interpreting every signal his body sent. The bullet felt like a hot ember burning inside his torso. With every heartbeat, every pulse of blood, his body screamed.
Minutes passed and his mind slowly cleared. When it did, panic moved in.
The Austrians.
Painfully, he rolled over. His first thought was that he couldn't let the woman and her men find him. He pulled himself as far under a ledge as he could to hide from the opening above him. With his right arm, he pushed himself into a seated position against the icy wall of the cavern. His left arm throbbed. Glancing down he noticed his elbow was twisted in the wrong direction.
He caught his breath, unbuttoned the top of the coat, and looked at his wound. The side of his shirt was soaked in blood. Fresh blood oozed from the gunshot wound.
As the minutes passed, he wondered what had happened to his pursuers.
At least he was still alive.
Focus.
He surveyed the cavern, searching for any sign of escape but the blue-green walls of ice fully encompassed him. For the first time since he'd plummeted to the ice floor, he felt the bitter cold overtaking him. Next to him lay a 6-foot pile of snow and broken ice, all that remained of the hidden ice bridge that collapsed under his weight. Although the dark sky above was unleashing its fury, the cavern was tranquil, and he came to the realization that his only escape was straight up.
He thought he heard voices yelling through the howl of the blizzard. He tensed but then the sounds subsided and he relaxed. The men with their rifles had been high on the ridge above him when he fell. Surely, the gale force winds and blowing snow had erased his tracks by now. The glacier was so expansive that, in this blizzard, it would be a fluke if they located where he fell. He couldn't take any chances. He knew, when the weather cleared, she would send the Austrians to find him and retrieve the book.
He pulled out the journal. His blood had stained its leather binding. A hole perforated its center, cover to cover, where the bullet passed through it and into his torso. Perhaps the only reason he was still alive. He understood why someone would kill for it; he just didn’t think he would be the target.
He opened the journal and dug around for the pencil he kept tucked inside. Time for one final entry. Identify his killer and hide the book before his hunters found their quarry.
After several minutes he heard shouts followed by a rumble.
The glacier trembled. A sound he recognized.
The blizzard had dumped several feet of snow over the past two days and the vibrations from the rifle blast had loosened its grip on the mountain.
Now, gravity would do the rest.
No need to hide the book, he thought, the avalanche would soon do that for him. He tucked it back inside his coat, buttoned it up, closed his eyes, and waited.
At first it was only a trickle of snow and ice finding its way into the crevasse. Seconds later, a turbulent mass pounded on top of him like a hundred trucks had dumped their loads. The cavern filled with snow, packing it tighter around him. Instinctively he clutched his coat and felt for the book underneath.
His lover had betrayed him and his fate was sealed — all because of the journal.
He had one final thought.
At least she won't have it.
Major Don Adams smiled.
1
Jake’s first visit to the West Wing of the White House promised to be a memorable one. When he and Francesca Catanzaro arrived, a guard escorted them to the Executive Conference Room where their boss, Elmore Wiley, was already waiting.
While in the Navy, Jake had worked at the Pentagon under, then Admiral now CIA Director, Scott Bentley and found the Pentagon didn’t live up to its menacing reputation. In and of it, the Pentagon was a small city with over 700,000 square feet and 24,000 military and civilian employees, most with over-inflated egos who always seemed in a rush to get somewhere.
The Situation Room in the White House was the opposite — intimidating. Created in 1961 by John F. Kennedy after the Bay of Pigs fiasco, the Situation Room was a 5000 square foot complex designed to address the nation's business, as well as the world's, on a real time basis.
He now sat in the same room where the President of the United States and the President's advisors met on a routine basis, the room where many of the most important decisions of the Presidency were made.
Command Central for the National Security Council.
Despite calming reassurances from Wiley, Jake felt like he did on a first date. Nervous yet excited knowing he and Francesca were about to have a top-secret midnight meeting with the President of the United States.
Jake's first encounter with Francesca was in San Sebastian, Spain when she passed him vital information in his relentless pursuit of an al Qaeda cell handler. That operation ultimately led to his current employment as an emissary for the Greenbrier Fellowship under the direction of Elmore Wiley, a seventy-one year old man affectionately referred to as The Toymaker. He was a man who had spent his entire adult life supporting covert operations for every intelligence agency and Special Forces branch in this country, as well as many foreign nations. When asked, he claimed his business was radio frequency and microwave emission technology. What he really did was make "toys for spies." A go-to man for espionage gadgetry.
“Mr. Wiley, can you tell us what this is about?” Jake drummed his fingers on the conference table.
“I would if I knew, Jake.” Elmore Wiley did his characteristic hair swipe. First the left hand followed by the right, front to back across his hair, and always in that order. Followed by pushing his metal-framed glasses higher on the bridge of his nose. “Problem is, I don’t know any more than you do. I was asked by the President to be here by midnight and bring my two most trusted employees.”
Francesca tossed her dark red hair over her shoulder and smiled at Jake. “That would be us.”
The door to the conference room opened and instinctively the three of them stood. No coaching required. Whether you agreed with the current President’s political views or not, it was a fundamental sign of courtesy and respect for the highest political office and the individual who held it.
And besides, who didn’t like this President?
Jake was about to meet the only President in his lifetime to reduce deficit spending and squarely turn around the country’s economy. Only three years into a first term and this President had actually cut the federal deficit by 30 % simply by sticking to the platform outlined during the primary elections.
The country wanted a break from the same old political rhetoric of past administrations. This former Secretary of State, now President of the United States, gave the voters what was promised before the election — change. A positive shift in philosophy fostered by strong character and moral integrity. The President’s No-Bull policies cut spending and government waste while finding creative avenues to raise revenues from previously untapped resources. Markets were up, unemployment down, consumer confidence and spending had increased, which had the economy booming again.