Blame it on ego. Herman's and his.
Herman had set the failure in motion, but Fifteen had blown it all with the deputy in New York by playing games instead of just taking care of the business. All he'd had to do was leave Massey there paralyzed and set the explosives for ten or twenty minutes, instead of toying with him. He had put the deputy into a sealed building with no way out, knowing that he would eventually open that refrigerator if only to scrounge some food. Fifteen had someone stay in the neighborhood until after the bomb went off, to ensure it did. The detonator was set for twenty seconds, not even enough time for Massey to piss his pants. How could he have escaped and ended up in the basement? It wasn't possible, but obviously it had been too possible. It was so damned unnecessary. He had known better, but he had given in to his own stupid arrogance.
Fifteen still couldn't believe that of the eight heavily armed cutouts who had tried to kill Massey on two occasions, he had killed six of them. In total, of the hundreds of rounds they had fired at him, the best killers on earth had managed to put a grand total of one bullet into the deputy's leg. And Fred Archer was dead-all that grooming wasted.
He had honestly believed that it couldn't get any worse, that he had fixed everything Herman had screwed up-had total control of the situation at every turn. Massey's death in that building would have sealed the blame, divided it between Greg Nations and Massey. Manelli's and Russo's deaths and the retrieval of the GPS from that computer would have insured that everything was settled, that the cutouts were out of peril. But that was not to be. Every time he thought he had everything back on track, there was Massey tossing another crowbar into the gears and him running to put it right.
Using information Massey and Fletcher Reed had collected, the director of the USMS, Richard Shapiro, had effectively derailed their dark ops train. Shapiro had the CIA by the nuts, and the agency had reacted by threatening to cancel Fifteen's organization's operating license, cut his ties to intelligence, and even throw Fifteen to a congressional oversight committee. The last threat was a bluff. There was no way the CIA could afford to have the cutout cells made public. But there could be a private reckoning-a bullet in the ear, a knife in the jugular, a heart attack, or perhaps a sans- parachute halo jump into the Atlantic.
Shapiro had somehow gotten his hands on the Global Fifty GPS from Sean Devlin's computer, and unbelievably, knew what it was, how it was used, and that the CIA owned the technology. He said he could prove that Archer's evidence against Greg Nations was fraudulent. Massey had told Shapiro everything he'd learned about Herman Hoffman and Fifteen, and about the existence of the cutout cells.
Fletcher Reed's computer printouts were a map to the members of the cells. And there was the matter of the fingerprint cards from Rook, which matched those of four long-dead soldiers whom Reed identified. Fifteen was still sure he could have gotten all of Shapiro's evidence back if the CIA would have let him-an action they had expressly forbidden.
Fifteen looked back up to the tournament on television. The Asian player had a beautiful, lithe body and coldly calculating eyes.
Shapiro had offered a compromise the CIA had accepted. In return for holding back his evidence, Shapiro had wanted very little. He asked for WITSEC to be cleared, Gregory Nations to be exonerated, and the cutouts to refrain from any further hostilities against Winter Massey and Sean Devlin. He suggested that the FBI might arrest a Russian Mafia leader-they had one named Dobrensky they decided was perfect-who would be linked to the dead cutouts, men who would still be identified as Russian mercenaries. Dobrensky would be tried for conspiring with Manelli to furnish the talent to kill the protected witness. Attorney General Katlin would get a nice show trial and everything would be tied up with a big red bow for the American public. To explain how the mercenaries found Rook Island and the WITSEC airplane, it had been decided that Avery Whitehead, a bachelor nobody was particularly attached to, was to play the money-corrupted villain who had sold the intelligence on the WITSEC locations to Manelli.
Fifteen knew that the compromise would work to everyone's satisfaction. The organization would stay in business, with Fifteen overseeing the cells, although the CIA would have tighter controls on the organization-the inevitable consequence of Rook Island and Ward Field. Fifteen suspected that Herman had done everything he had done, knowing that it would alter, if not destroy, the organization he had fathered, the thing he had owned and couldn't stand to see survive him.
The catch in this all-the thing that had Fifteen worried-was the realization that if Lewis completed his assignment, the deal was off and Shapiro's revelations would create apocalyptic repercussions. The fact was that Fifteen couldn't contact Lewis, his last cutout in the field. Before the CIA had informed him of the developments, Fifteen had already ordered Lewis to complete his assignment at any and all costs.
He remembered something his father had once told him: “You learn from your mistakes only if you survive them.” Herman hadn't, but maybe he still would.
His only hope was to dispatch a team to New Orleans and pray they would find Lewis and stop him before his success made them both dead men. He lifted the telephone receiver and dialed.
110
When Winter got out of bed, his leg throbbed against the bandage, his back hurt, his head felt like his sinuses were filled with BBs, and every joint and muscle in his body ached. Sean helped him, standing firm while he leaned on her and eased into the wheelchair. He hated having to sit in the thing because the idea of having someone push him through the hospital like an exhibit was abhorrent to him. Winter was buttoning his shirt when an orderly wheeled Hank Trammel into the room. A cast held Hank's left arm out even with his shoulder, bent at the elbow.
“I wanted to say good-bye.”
“We're about ready to check out,” Sean said.
“Wish you'd join us at the hotel,” Winter said. “I think we earned a couple days off on an expense account.”
“Place would look like a convalescent ward, and truth be told, I'd like to sleep in my own bed, since last night I was damned sure I'd never see it again. Sean, can I get a couple of minutes with Winter to discuss some marshal business?”
“Sure, Hank.” Sean waited for the orderly to leave and then closed the door on her way out.
“Got a message from Shapiro.” Hank handed Winter an envelope, which he'd opened.
Hank,
Greg Nations and WITSEC are fully exonerated. Winter Massey and Sean Devlin cleared.
The item you sent was a (CIA only) GPS device that transmitted its location over satellite to a designated receiver. It went active when the laptop computer was turned on. With those coordinates, satellites could capture photo images, like the ones Winter saw in New York. The way it was set up, it could also send text messages typed into the computer's word processing program.
Special deputies will keep you, Winter, and Sean under guard until “certain” people are called off for good. Terms are for all concerned parties to develop full memory loss on this entire episode, which, all things considered, should be agreeable.
So it is all over. Destroy this.
“What's the computer deal?” Winter asked.
“The thing Eddie found in Sean's laptop when we got that bullet out. I told you yesterday.”
“You didn't.”
“I thought I did. Can you tear this note up for me?”