Brewer pushed back on another front. “Matt… we knew from the beginning that bringing this asset into this program would help us keep our involvement hidden. But in light of what this agent has done in his past… I am concerned he might not be as reliable as you insinuate.”
Hanley had finished his Danish. Now he gulped his hot coffee. “In what way?”
She hesitated, then said, “What if he’s too successful? What if he uncovers the full truth about this operation?” She leaned forward herself. “There is a volatility to him. An unpredictability. What if he finds out he’s being played… and he goes rogue?”
Hanley said, “Strictly speaking… he’s not being played. He is on the operation we sent him on. His mission is Fan. Anything beyond his narrow mission parameters is not his problem. Yes, we lied to him, but only because his moral code would put the lives of good people in jeopardy. We need him; we’re doing the right thing, so he was manipulated somewhat. Not knowing what he doesn’t know doesn’t make him more safe; it makes him more… comfortable with what he’s doing.”
Brewer said, “But if he learns certain things, certain things about the full scope of this operation, then—”
Hanley spoke over her. “He will rebel.” He shrugged his huge shoulders. “But it’s your responsibility to ensure he doesn’t find out anything beyond his mission parameters.” Hanley took another gulp. “Anything more than he’s already figured out, that is.”
“Yes, sir,” she said, but her heart wasn’t in it.
Hanley detected this. “Violator is unpredictable. You look at him as if he’s a ticking time bomb, but I know he has to be the way he is in order to do the job we’ve given him. More than anyone I’ve ever seen, Court possesses the gift of aggression. And believe me, it is a gift. He’d be facedown dead long ago if he hesitated, if he wavered or thought his moves through. He’s as smart and crafty a tactician as exists in this world, but when it comes time for it, he can act and act and kill and kill, no quarter given.”
“No argument there. My concern is that his gift for aggression has been used against us in the past, and it might be directed towards us again if he learns about certain aspects of Operation Aces High.”
Hanley raised a finger. “He won’t ever hear anyone breathe a word of Aces High. Because if he did, you’re absolutely right. He’d go off reservation, he’d become a satellite adrift, and he’d plunge back to Earth like a motherfucking missile.”
Brewer cocked her head. “Help me with your metaphor. The CIA is Earth?”
Hanley shook his head. “No… you are.” He winked. “You’re the handler.” Hanley looked to his watch. “Sorry, I’ve got to get back to that bullshit in the conference room. Outfit Gentry with whatever he needs. Help him locate the Thais who are holding the target. Keep our official cover assets the hell out of his way, and let him do his thing. He’ll find us Fan Jiang. When he does, send in Ground Branch.”
“Yes, sir.”
He pointed again. He was a big man, and the gesture was intimidating. “But keep Court’s blinders on. We don’t want him to know how the fuck we fell into this whole mess in the first place.”
“Right,” Suzanne said. “Because if he knew that, he’d probably come back to D.C. and kill us all.” The comment was sarcasm. Gentry had just left the D.C. area, and he had wreaked havoc trying to find answers to why the CIA turned on him years ago.
Hanley ignored the quip and turned for the door. “Do keep me updated.”
Brewer stood herself and reached for her crutches. With unmasked discomfort she just said, “Sure thing.”
CHAPTER
THIRTY-SEVEN
Fan Jiang had arrived in the capital of Thailand from Cambodia in an old Partenavia twin-engine aircraft, surrounded on the flight by Thai men with guns who had nothing to say to him about where he was going and what plans they had for him when he got there. From the airport he’d been taken directly to a large commercial building somewhere in the heart of the city. There he was led to an elevator, then back out again on the fifth floor. He passed through a massive open room the size of a city block with literally hundreds of men and women working at computer terminals in little cubes. Fan assumed there were more rooms like it on other floors of the building, but he could not know for sure, because he wasn’t given much of a tour. Instead he was simply led through this large room and then down a barren concrete hallway. A back room at the end of the hall was guarded by a pair of armed men in security guard uniforms sitting in plastic chairs. Fan Jiang was directed through the door.
That was three days ago, and he had not left this room since.
This windowless space that had become his home was set up like a cell, which Fan found appropriate, because he was, indeed, a prisoner. There was a sleeping mat on a cold tile floor, and a bucket for his waste, just as he’d had on the boat that took him from Hong Kong to Vietnam. But this room differed from the storage space on the cargo ship in that here he had a laptop computer on a desk that, it had been explained to him, was attached to the company’s network.
Even though the portions of the building he had walked through appeared to be just any other technology-based business, there was one feature in this tiny room that reminded him that he was being held by a criminal organization: a large steel eyebolt cemented into the floor in the center of the room. Fan bumped his feet on it while he sat at the desk, and he surmised others had been kept here at the desk in chains.
It was a horrifying thought, but from what he knew about this place and the people who ran it, it was not surprising.
The group that held Fan Jiang now was the Chamroon Syndicate, and Fan’s earlier research into criminal organizations had taught him this was both one of the most successful and most notorious transnational organizations in Southeast Asia. Not only were they in the business of computer hacking, identity fraud, and spear-phishing schemes; the syndicate was also heavily involved in heroin exportation and human trafficking, primarily bringing Eastern European women to serve as prostitutes for wealthy Asians and Asian women to work as prostitutes in Central and Western Europe.
Fan knew enough about the group to understand they were horrible people, and this was before he’d even met any of their leadership.
Fan realized he was now involved with thugs many orders of magnitude more dangerous than the Vietnamese gang and the Hong Kong — based Triad organization who’d protected him before and, unlike those instances, where Fan was a willing participant to earn his safety and shelter, here he was a simple captive.
When he first arrived, a severe Mandarin-speaking woman told him what they wanted of him. His captors somehow knew exactly who he was and what value he could provide them. As his captors were in the business of, among other things, computer crime, it was no surprise they demanded he engage in criminal acts of fraud via the Internet.
For the first two days he’d given them nothing, and the woman had told him the men watching his work were getting frustrated with his lack of output.
He decided he did not want to test their patience, so today he decided he would show some progress.