Baxter jumped in and stated flatly, “Then that gives us justification to deploy nuclear weapons against Venezuela.”
“No, we are close to an arrangement for support from Australia. I don’t need to alienate them again,” Conner interjected.
“But didn’t you say that when you talked with their prime minister they denied involvement?” Fillmore asked Baxter
“Yes, they claim that their minister of defense was involved in the direct transaction. He hid the mass troop movement as humanitarian support for Mexico. Of course, we can’t find him. He’s missing,” Baxter added.
“We need to keep an open channel with Caracas and monitor them. Let’s get back to the PAE,” Conner said.
“Ah, where did we leave off?” Baxter asked. “Right here, okay. Pablo is commanding a large army of over twenty-five thousand men. It’s a mix of light infantry and mechanized infantry. He has no air support and his naval forces were destroyed, thank you, Colonel Barone. The situation on the ground in Sacramento reads right out of a history book about Nazi-occupied Paris. He took the capitol in a massive ground assault. The governor is missing and the lieutenant governor is now his prisoner. Jordan then goes on to report that his insurgency has inflicted some damage on the PAE Army by attacking supply lines and base camps. However, the PAE has implemented a plan to combat this by direct action against the civilian population. PAE commanders have created a civilian paramilitary force called—you’ll remember this name from before—the Villistas. They have just started to deploy them into the civilian population. They are harassing and killing at will anyone they feel is resisting or even providing support. Their tactics are ruthless. They have found records of locals who own firearms through old registration paperwork and are going to their homes to disarm them and confiscate those guns. They have accessed old paperwork from the local VA hospital on any vets in the area. They’re visiting them and forcing them to align with them or be killed.”
“Those sons of bitches!” Fillmore barked.
“I know. They’re using our old bureaucracy against us. The silver lining is the insurgency has stopped the PAE advance. They have been deploying mechanized recon units but their main advance has been halted. The word is once the Villistas are fully implemented, they will begin their march north.”
“And where’s that?” Conner asked.
“We don’t know.”
“Can Jordan find out? Get him to have his source provide that,” Conner ordered.
“Yes, sir,” Baxter responded.
“So what’s our next move, people?” Conner asked, leaning forward and placing his elbows on the table.
“We have air, he doesn’t. Since we don’t have an organized ground force to send against him, we could bring support to the insurgency if it turns out to be real. We can immediately send down what special ops teams we can spare to coordinate attacks that will greatly reduce and impede his army,” Baxter recommended.
Fillmore jumped in. “We use our air to destroy all roads leading north. We level all bridges, et cetera. This will force his army to go overland. With spring coming, the softer ground will work for us and slow down wherever he advances to next.”
“I like what I’m hearing,” Conner said with a smile.
“We can beat him. All he has is an army. It is a powerful force but he can’t fall back to ships nor can he be resupplied now. The main concern I have is if he was the one who was behind the EMP and nuclear attacks, then he might have more of those types of weapons up his sleeve. I know you have removed the option of a nuclear response to the PAE off the table, but we have to have it as an option,” Baxter said.
“No nukes on our soil. I won’t do it,” Conner said flatly. “Do we know his overall motives for this attack?”
“We have some info on that, sir. This guy Pablo fashions himself a new Napoléon.”
“So we’re dealing with a total psychopath?” Conner asked rhetorically.
“Yes, sir, a total nut job, but a nut job with an army.”
“Where did he go?” Pablo asked the young man, a former staff person of the governor’s.
Both men were walking in the outside garden of the governor’s mansion. The man stuttered repeatedly as he told Pablo about Pasqual’s movements.
“So you saw him actually go inside the house?” Pablo asked. Apparently, Pasqual had taken a vehicle, and by himself left to go into a residential part of Sacramento. Given the conversation that he’d had with Isabelle, his interest was piqued.
“Yes,” the man answered.
“Did you know who he was seeing? Anything?”
“No, sir. He-he-he went in and sta-sta-stayed for about thirty minutes, then came out. I-I-I didn’t see anyone else.”
“You saw nothing unusual about his interactions with other officers?”
“No, sir. Looked, ah, ah, normal. Talking, laughing,” the man said.
“What can you tell me about the area?”
“Like what, sir?”
“Was it nice? Was it a ghetto?” Pablo asked.
“Average, not too nice, but-but not a ghet— bad place,” the man stuttered.
“Fine, keep watching him. I want to know everything he does. I need you to see who he’s following and next time, get me the address. Be smart and look for a name or mailbox,” Pablo said, patting the man on the back and ushering him off.
Pablo walked the gravel path that meandered through the now-dead garden. Where rosebushes and flowers once bloomed, brown, dried-out dead plants remained. As he pulled an old rosebud off a plant, he pricked his finger.
“Damn,” he yelped.
“You hurt yourself?” Isabelle said, walking up behind him.
“Yes, this rose bit me,” he answered her, then placed his bleeding finger in his mouth.
“It’s sad, but things of beauty like the rose need thorns to protect themselves,” she said as she put her arms around him.
“Or maybe it’s a lesson that those things we think are beautiful also have ugly parts.”
“You are so cynical.”
“I am but that cynicism has served me quite well. I don’t intend on giving it up.”
“Who was that with you just a bit ago?” she asked curiously.
“Nobody.”
“He’s somebody, meaning you wouldn’t be talking to him if he wasn’t someone,” she pressed.
“It’s not your concern. Why are you so interested anyway?” he asked with a hint of an edge in his tone.
“You know us women, nosy. I just never saw him before.”
“And you might see more of him. He’s just helping me with some business that’s not all that important. But, then again, you really don’t need to ask me about my business,” Pablo said, harshly.
“Yes, my emperor,” she answered obediently, deflecting his more aggressive tone. She took him off guard by reaching down and grabbing his crotch. “Shall I be of service to the emperor?”
He pulled her hand away and said, “Not now.”
She pressed her body against his and tried again. “Are you sure?”
This time he couldn’t resist her; her sexual magnetism was intense. When he was with her he couldn’t think of anything but her. He knew this and would attempt to ignore it, but when she pushed, he caved. He took her by the hand and they both vanished into the small greenhouse located at the rear of the property.
Nelson’s truck rumbled to a stop at the gate that edged Truman’s long driveway. Judging by the amount of packed snow against it, it hadn’t been opened in a long time.
Nelson thought about ramming it but he didn’t want to damage his truck. He looked to the left and right but a large drainage ditch lay to either side, so that cut out the possibility of going around it. They would have to run the quarter mile to the house.