The Frenchman’s recent unanswered call perplexed her.
Guzzling Gatorade to recover from her hangover’s dehydration, she ran down her mental checklist of possible items on Renard’s mind. A chance to wrap a thin thanks around boasting of his successful campaign? A manipulative request for more weapons? Or possibly bad news she couldn’t fathom?
To brace herself for any news, she sat on the edge of her living room couch. The voicemail from Renard revealed urgency in his tone and a request to call him back immediately.
She drew a deep breath and tapped his number. His voice carried anxiety.
“Thank God you called me back,” he said.
She feigned levity.
“I’m sure you would keep calling if I didn’t,” she said. “I also wouldn’t put it beyond you to send a ninja to my apartment to wake me up if I ignored you.”
“Perhaps I would. Forgive me for forgoing pleasantries, but I must be curt.”
“Sure.”
“I suspect that I’ve made a grave error in judgment.”
Renard never made errors in judgment — not since he picked the wrong side in a Sudanese civil war eighteen years ago and armed a massacre of innocents. His dossier and their relationship — she dared consider it a friendship — told a story approaching two decades of perfection in his selection of clients.
“What happened?” she asked.
“I fear that President Gomez has betrayed me.”
“How?”
“Jake believes that one of Gomez’s submarines launched a war shot torpedo at the Ambush.”
A sickening feeling rose in her stomach, adding to her nausea. Her authorization to arm the Argentine air attack on the Falklands left her exposed, and her career would implode if Gomez turned the Falklands into an incendiary bomb.
“Are you sure?”
“I could use your help getting the recording of the encounter analyzed at an American acoustics lab,” Renard said.
“I appreciate the free intelligence.”
“It is part of our deal. But regardless of what your labs might find, we don’t have time to await their analysis. We must assume that Gomez meant to destroy the Ambush. It’s also unlikely coincidental that he’s restricted my access to Argentine tactical information. Right after the paratrooper wave, he rescinded my access to his tactical net declaring that I no longer had a need to know. We now must assume that he’s operating outside of my control.”
He paused, as if encountering his forgotten human fallibility.
“I should have sensed this sooner,” he said. “I suspect I was blinded by greed.”
“More like ego.”
“Insightful and direct. I’ve always admired that about you.”
“I’m sorry. I know that criticism doesn’t help.”
“But it does. I need my full wits about me, no matter how painful my awakening. Damn my ego. I consider myself so crafty that I believed I could hunt down any prey as my client and have my way with them. Apparently, I need to rethink this.”
“Nobody’s perfect, Pierre.”
She scrunched her face as the platitude escaped her lips.
“I appreciate you trying to console me. You’re not very good at it, but I trust that your effort is sincere.”
“Consoling people isn’t my strong suit,” she said. “Let’s get back to Gomez.”
“If he’s willing to sink the Ambush, I can only speculate what else he’s planning.”
She recalled Renard’s plan with the Ambush. The Taiwanese-designed limpets would nullify the submarine’s stealth until its crew could pry them off, and that required either surfacing or getting help from a third party. With Argentina controlling the sky, the Ambush was alone and helpless.
“What would Gomez gain by sinking it?” she asked.
“Per my plans, nothing,” Renard said.
“Let’s talk it through. What agenda would sinking the Ambush support?”
“I’ve been so preoccupied with reacting to the attempt that I hadn’t considered why he would order it. I just assumed he was being bullish and aggressive.”
“Softening the Falkland air defenses and taking down a few fighter planes can be forgiven during a negotiation,” she said. “His dossier supports him being aggressive but not stupid. If he went after the kill with the Ambush, he either assumed that his show of power would make the British cower in negotiations…”
“We agree that he’s not that stupid. I’ve seen haughtiness and ego blind men to the obvious, but he sees the world clearly enough. The British are anything but cowards, and I’m sure he’s well aware of it.”
“Then he’s not planning on a negotiation.”
“Dear God,” he said. “He’s not. Damn it! I’ve been a fool!”
“What?”
“He’s planning an invasion.”
A spike of shame and fear impaled her as her career and life of wild success slipped away. She wished for Renard to say something to placate her, but the prolonged silence tormented her. Wanting to cry out, she choked back her suffering and squeaked out a shrill but coherent response.
“You have an idea to counter him, don’t you? You always have an idea to clean up your messes.”
“Correct.”
“What do you need from me?” she asked.
“You will recruit his political adversary to our side.”
“Ramirez? The Provisional President of the Senate?”
“Yes. Had I not meddled in Argentine affairs, I suspect that Senator Ramirez would win the next presidential election. If we are to contain this mess I’ve created, we now need Ramirez to step up.”
“Step up and force an emergency vote of no confidence in Gomez?”
“Indeed, at least to secure his automatic rise to the national presidency by succession. But he must also take action outside any procedure of governance. He needs to move faster. Immediately. Troops mobilized tomorrow.”
“Troops? A coup?”
“Just enough to convince the British that Argentina is undergoing civil unrest that will be solved in their favor without their involvement. They need to be convinced that Ramirez will take over the country and that he is the president they wish to deal with for an optimal outcome with the Falklands.”
She mentally pitted Gomez versus Ramirez. The former had the brutishness to pound the Falkland Islands with an iron fist, damn the British retaliation. The latter, a younger career statesman, could set the country on a path to peace and economic recovery. But she didn’t see him having the moxie to take the presidency by force.
“Gomez is creating enough rope to hang himself after he screws everything up,” she said. “Ramirez could just wait until the next elections if he wants the presidency.”
“We can’t wait. Ground forces, especially their marines, are loyal to Ramirez, at least enough of its leadership to prevent an invasion force from storming the Falklands if he ordered it. We need him now.”
“I understand that, Pierre, but what’s his motivation? What does he get out of helping us?”
“A country with its military intact and the oil reserves around the Falklands. If he lets Gomez play this out, the British will spare no lives in quelling the invasion, and there will be no negotiating a transfer of oil reserves, including those they have yet to find.”
“You think that’s enough to motivate him?”
“Possibly. If he’s shrewd enough. But he may need extra convincing.”
“Like what?”
“You could also offer him price increases on imports from Argentina to America, at least for six months while his presidency stabilizes.”
“You know I don’t have that power.”
“But one of your friends soon will.”
Her thoughts turned to Gerald Rickets, her mentor, who had led the CIA and then served as the Secretary of Defense prior to seeking the nation’s highest office. Originally wooed to the Republican ticket, Rickets had found a stronghold as a centrist Democrat.