"What in the world is going on?" she said.

He held the paper up and let it unfold. SENATOR COOLEY FOUND DEAD! screamed the large letters on the front page.

"Oh, no," Stromeyer said.

"It gets worse. The article implies that his investigation into the Colombian pipeline bombing played a role in his death. It says the FBI raided Darkview's offices yesterday looking for clues."

Stromeyer reached for the paper. "They were at our offices yesterday, but it wasn't a raid in response to his death; they were executing a subpoena signed while he was alive. Dead men don't sign subpoenas."

"And you have stalkers. Two guys. One sitting in a car three s.p.a.ces down the street and another in the alley. Mean-looking. You shouldn't leave the house alone. Maybe you call Banner? Ask him to escort you?"

Stromeyer waved Stan into the kitchen. "Banner's on a plane to Dubai via Frankfurt. Mean guy about thirty-five? Pockmarked face? Bad khaki trench coat?"

Stan nodded. "That's him."

"Alley or front? He claims to be some sort of agent."

"Alley," Stan said. "He doesn't look like an agent. He looks like a thug."

"He's got issues."

"Do these issues involve stepping over the line? Because if they do, I still have contacts in the White House. I can make some calls, get them to back off."

Stromeyer contemplated Stan's offer. It was tempting, but she hated to waste it on Tarrant and Church. She had bigger problems to address.

"Can you get our side of the story placed in the paper? Let people know that we're being targeted, too?"

"Targeted? How? And by whom?" Stromeyer told him about Banner's being attacked after his meeting with Cooley. She kept the incident with Cooley to herself.

"I'll talk to a few people. Get the ball rolling. Meantime let's go over the fence to my garage. You can hunker down in the car's front seat and they'll never know you've left."

Stromeyer held up the coffee carafe.

Stan extended his mug for a refill. "I'm actually finding this to be much more interesting than retirement."

She shelved the carafe and headed down the hall. "Anything for you, Stan," she called behind her.

Thirty minutes later Stan turned at the top of the street in front of Darkview's offices. News vans lined the road. Press crews hung out in front, drinking coffee from paper cups and looking bored.

"This is not good," Stromeyer said.

"To be expected, I guess. Want me to take you somewhere else?"

She sighed. "No. I'll get out here. I'll go in the back." She grabbed her tote. "Thanks, Stan. I owe you."

"Anytime. In fact, take this." He handed her a small remote on a key chain. "It's for my garage. Feel free to cut through on your way to the fence."

Alicia manned the reception desk, looking determined. She held an enormous white phone receiver with a coiled cord that Stromeyer had never seen before.

"I told you, Mr. Banner is out of the country." Alicia listened for a moment. "Mr. Banner is not running away from you. He's doing his job, which often takes him out of town. If you want to leave a message, I'll be happy to give it to him when he gets back." Alicia listened some more. "I can't tell you where he is." Stromeyer marched across to Alicia. She put her palm out for the phone. Alicia handed it to her. The caller was still talking, his voice flowing out of the receiver. "He wants an interview with Mr. Banner," Alicia said.

Stromeyer put the phone to her ear. "You can have an interview anytime you'd care to fly to Mogadishu." She hung up.

Alicia giggled. "Guess that ends that." A concerned look crossed her face. "Mogadishu? Is he going to be okay?"

Stromeyer patted her on the shoulder. "He's in Dubai." She pointed to the phone. "Where'd you get it?"

Alicia beamed. "My grandmother had a couple of spares. She said they were called Trimline phones, which is funny, because they're huge. I put one in your office. I figured we need something, since they took the console, and I didn't have time to buy one this morning. But a lot of calls are going to voice mail. It's driving me crazy. I need some real equipment if I'm going to do my job right."

"You're doing great. I'll retrieve the ones that you miss." Stromeyer's office phone was the same style as Alicia's, but Stromeyer's was a strange shade of avocado green.

Stromeyer leaned back in her chair, thinking about Cooley, the FBI subpoena, and her stalkers. The phone rang, pulling her out of her reverie.

"Major Stromeyer? It's Susan Plower. I need to talk to you."

"If what you're about to say is at all cla.s.sified, you shouldn't say it over the phone."

"Are you still having problems with it being tapped?"

Stromeyer wanted to say it was more like problems with her ancient phone technology.

"Just being cautious." She gave the name of a coffee shop near Plower's office. They agreed to meet in fifteen minutes.

Stromeyer pa.s.sed a harried Alicia on her way to the back stairs. She heard Alicia say, "Mr. Banner is in a highly volatile country doing his best to keep us all safe from terrorism. When he's done there, I'll be happy to give him any message you'd care to leave." Stromeyer found herself laughing down the hall. Alicia was a gem.

Susan Plower was frantic, however. She sat on a high barstool at a counter that ran along the coffee shop's storefront window and sipped a coffee while her eyes darted around the room. A look of abject relief came over her face when she spotted Stromeyer. She was wearing a shapeless suit with a jacket that was too boxy for her small frame and an A-line skirt with flat loafers. A huge briefcase overflowing with paper sat on the counter next to her coffee cup. Stromeyer ordered a large coffee and sat down next to Plower.

"What seems to be the problem?" she said.

Plower gave a hurried look around the room, then leaned in to Stromeyer. "Undersecretary Rickell has gone off the deep end." Plower whispered this information. Her voice was so low that Stromeyer was concerned she hadn't heard the woman correctly.

"Deep end?"

Plower nodded. "Can you ask Major Banner to go get him? Bring him home? We'll take it from there."

Stromeyer was getting more confused by the minute. There were any number of security personnel that Plower could have turned to if protecting Undersecretary Rickell was on the agenda that day. Stromeyer was positive that Plower knew this as well.

"Did you contact the FBI to find him?"

Plower shook her head. "No, never. He would hate it if they saw him in his current condition. He's a very proud man."

He's an a.s.shole, Stromeyer thought. She tried again.

"Perhaps you can give me a clue as to his condition."

Plower leaned even closer. "He's somewhere in Germany, gambling. He's been there for two days. My sources tell me he hasn't slept, barely speaks, and refuses to leave the table even to eat. He drinks only the alcohol that the waitress brings."

Stromeyer felt the beginnings of fear start at the base of her spine. Rumors that Rickell had a problem with gambling had swirled around him for years. Despite this, his star kept rising. Those in the know claimed that Diplomatic Security agents had hauled him out of several tight spots before the secretary of defense issued an ultimatum: Either Rickell cease or he was fired. Rickell accepted an emba.s.sy post in a small country in Europe, where he'd entered a program for his addiction. Three years later he was appointed to his current position. During his tenure as undersecretary, Rickell had studiously avoided casinos or gambling in any form. Stromeyer heard that once he attended a charity ball where bingo was being played as a way to raise cash. Rickell had made an excuse and left before the games began.

"What would you like me to do?" Stromeyer said now.

"Could you send Mr. Banner to get him? I know that Darkview can keep a secret."

"Banner's headed to Dubai. He lands in Frankfurt first, but I'm not sure he'll be willing to divert to handle this. Time is of the essence, as you know."

Plower looked crestfallen. She placed a hand on Stromeyer's arm. "Could you go? It's not ideal; you're a woman and Undersecretary Rickell is..." She appeared embarra.s.sed to say anything further.

Stromeyer helped her out. "Undersecretary Rickell is a s.e.xist jerk who doesn't give women enough credit and therefore won't take advice from one?"

Plower choked on her coffee. She pinned Stromeyer with a surprised look. "He's not that bad! I was going to say that he thinks of himself as a bit of a ladies' man, and I doubt he'd like it that a woman as pretty as you witnessed him in that condition."

Stromeyer was beginning to see why Plower had kept her job all these months. She seemed to base every decision on whether the course of action would serve Rickell's best interests. He was a jerk, but even he must have realized that not every a.s.sistant would do so much to protect the boss's back.

"I can't go. I'm needed here to run Darkview, but I promise to have Banner check it out before he continues to Dubai."

Plower's BlackBerry buzzed. She eyed the message, then paled.

"What?"

"He's gone. I asked the casino's manager to tell me if he left."

"Call him back. Find out what he knows," Stromeyer said. She watched while Plower hit the redial b.u.t.ton.

"It's Susan Plower. Thanks for calling me. Do you know where he went?" She sat silent while the manager poured information into her ear. After a minute she thanked the man and hung up.

"Well?" Stromeyer said.

"He left several hours ago. He said he was headed to another game in what he called *a famous area of Frankfurt.'" She gave Stromeyer another frightened look. "Do you know of any famous gambling areas in Frankfurt?"

Stromeyer pondered the question. "In fact, there are a couple of famous casinos nearby. One in Bad Homburg."

Plower sagged against the counter, like a balloon that had deflated. Stromeyer felt sorry for her.

"Don't look so glum. There's one bit of good news in this picture: I'll send Banner a text message right now asking him to wait there until he receives further instructions from me."

Plower nodded her head forcefully up and down. "Tell him to go right to this Bad Homburg casino."

Stromeyer was already tapping out the text. She put up a hand to Plower. "Hold up. We don't know if he's there. I hate to send Banner on a useless trip."

Plower hauled her overstuffed briefcase off the counter. "It's not a useless trip. Rickell must still be gambling. What other explanation could there be for him not checking in with me? He's due to speak in"-she consulted her watch-"eighteen hours, and he doesn't even have a copy of his itinerary." She thumped the briefcase with her hand. "It's in here, for G.o.d's sake. Oh, no, Major. He's gambling, you can bet on it."

"Once he's back to normal, I want you to ask him if at any time in the last three days he could have been poisoned."

Plower's head snapped up from her BlackBerry, where she'd been tapping her own text. "Poisoned?"

"Yes. Delivered in the form of a p.r.i.c.k from an EpiPen. If so, then call me on my cell. I need to know as soon as possible. If Banner finds him, I'll have him interview Rickell. We need to determine if he indeed was the subject of a poison plot."

"And if he was?"

"Then he'd better be careful. I think Senator Cooley was poisoned, and now he's dead."

43.

MUNGABE WATCHED HIS LATEST CREW COME LIMPING BACK TO the mother ship. Three men were dead, two injured, and none had ever reached the Kaiser Franz. Mungabe set his teeth together while Talek asked the questions.

"What happened? How is it three boats were unable to take the cruise liner? A bunch of weak tourists overcame you?" Talek screamed his derision at the crew. One of his lieutenants screamed back.

"We were hit from behind! A second craft hid in the shadows, waiting to attack. It launched grenades at us as we fought forward."

"Who was on this boat?" Mungabe asked. The crewman turned to him, fear in his dark eyes.

"An African. Maybe Kenyan, I don't know, and two Westerners. But, Mungabe, this is the thing-I could have sworn that the boat they used was Ali's."

Ali the thief held few loyalties, but generally he would not cross a warlord unless under great pressure. Whoever paid for the boat held enough power to frighten Ali or was many times smarter than him. Mungabe lowered himself to his deck chair to think. An a.s.sistant brought him a pot of hot tea, bowing as he backed away. Talek began his screaming once again, but Mungabe flitted a hand at him to silence him.

"You"-he pointed to the crewman-"go below and tend to your injured. Be prepared to tell me everything that occurred."

The man nodded and limped away, keeping his eyes averted from Talek's the entire time.

"Talek, get Roducci on the phone. He has not given me the information I need, and by now the wire transfer must have cleared."

Ten minutes later, Roducci's voice flowed out of the satellite receiver's speaker.

"There is rumor of a significant sale going down soon in your region."

"What arms are they selling?"

"Not arms, a weapon. Chemical. Some say it is a new poison."

Talek's eyes widened as he listened. "Where is it?"

"There are many different stories, some impossible to believe, and it is difficult to say which is true, but there is one that says the weapon is on a freighter somewhere in the Gulf of Aden trade route."

"Why do you say the stories may not be true? Tell me all the rumors."

Roducci sighed over the line. "One source told me that the weapon may actually be hidden on a cruise liner. There are some buyers on the ship, having a vacation while they wait to cut a deal."

Mungabe smiled to himself. So the Vulture's precious cargo was actually a weapon, not a medication. "What kind of weapon is it?"

"Chemical. But there's more. The rumor is that the buyers are other arms traders and are actually being set up. The seller has no intention of holding the auction. Rumor is that the seller lured them onto the ship but intends to either attack the ship or sink it. Either way he gets rid of the compet.i.tion. You wouldn't happen to know anything about this, would you?"