Bullseye

An Original Will Robie / Camel Club Short Story

By David Baldacci

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CHAPTER 1

It was five minutes to noon on a Saturday.

The streets of Georgetown were filled with shoppers. The sun overhead was warming and the breeze brisk and refreshing. The waters of the nearby Potomac had some light froth from the wind. Many boaters were out enjoying the weather.

It was all in all a delightful day to be alive.

Yet there were a few people clustered in the vicinity who were not thinking about the pleasant weather or fun things to do. They had other things on their minds.

Oliver Stone walked down the crowded sidewalk. In his pocket was his paycheck from the Mt. Zion Cemetery where he was the caretaker. His destination was a bank in the luxury mall located on M Street. He would just be able to deposit the check before the bank closed. He did not make much money and had to take care with what he did earn. Yet his needs were few, and his salary also included a cottage in which to live. And he liked being around the dead. They were a quiet bunch. He’d had enough excitement to last him the rest of his life.

Behind him walked another man, partially hidden by a group of giddy teenage girls overburdened with shopping bags filled with purchases from upscale stores. Texts were flying from their collective phones—youthful gossip was now delivered almost exclusively electronically. Indeed, one girl was energetically texting the friend walking beside her, as though actually turning and speaking to her would be somehow uncool or an unimaginable burden.

As he walked along, Will Robie looked up and watched the seagulls drift across the clear sky. It was a beautiful day to do many things, but dying was not one of them. It was never a good day to die, he thought. Yet oftentimes one didn’t have a choice on the actual timing. Sometimes your death was caused by someone else’s agenda.

Robie had nearly been killed by such agendas several times, quite recently in fact. He couldn’t say that he cared for it.

He looked at Oliver Stone, who was about fifteen feet ahead of him. The man had close-cropped white hair. He was lean and wiry and about six-two, nearly two inches taller than Robie. It was a sad testament to the state of general health in America when a lean older man made one immediately think he was suffering from a serious illness. Robie knew who Oliver Stone was, and he also knew that he was not someone to take lightly. And despite his not exactly being a spring chicken, Robie knew the man could hold his own against just about anyone or anything.

Stone turned into the mall entrance. Robie broke off from the giddy girls and turned in there as well, about ten paces back now. Stone hurried up the steps and onto the main level of the multistory mall that had a clear glass elevator leading to the upper floors. Stone didn’t bother with the elevator. He just walked briskly up the steps to the next level, turned left, and continued on.

Robie mimicked these movements, rotating his line of sight to take in what he needed to. The mall was crowded but the section where Stone was headed was not. The bank was down here, as were some other businesses that were either not open on Saturday or were, like the bank, about to close.

Next to the bank entrance was a long corridor leading to a service area and restrooms. This was the cheaper section of the mall and none of the popular stores were located here. But banks were notoriously frugal on everything except executive pay, and thus it was the perfect location for one. That was why banks had all the money. They didn’t spend any more than they absolutely had to.

Stone passed the service corridor and walked through the large opening into the bank. He nodded at the security guard posted near the entrance. The guard was older, with white hair and a paunch that stretched his rental cop shirt to its fullest extent. The guard checked his watch.

Stone smiled. “Don’t worry, I’ve got two minutes, Charlie.”

“You know you can use the ATM outside to deposit your funds, Oliver.”

“I like dealing with real people. If the machine chews up my check, where’s the proof?”

Charlie smiled. “I bet you don’t have an online account either.”

“I’ve heard of the Internet. I’ve just never used it.”

“I only do because of the grandkids. Never in all my life thought I’d be on something called Facebook. Or Google. Have a good weekend.”

“You too.”

Charlie put his security key into the lock and turned it to the left. A solid wall with the bank’s name and logo on it came partially down over the bank entrance. Charlie turned the key back to its original position and the wall stopped descending. He would wait patiently for the customers to finish their business and then he would close up shop fully. He was itching to get home to watch Virginia Tech play Alabama. Kickoff was at one.

Stone went up to stand in line for the next available teller. There were four customers ahead of him and three tellers behind the polycarbonate shield, which would stop most bullets. He looked to his right and saw a youngish dark-haired man in an ill-fitting suit sitting in a small glass-enclosed cubicle. The nameplate on the glass said this was the bank manager. To Stone the man looked like he was half asleep.

While two of the tellers serviced customers the third was counting cash. To the left of the tellers’ enclosure, but outside the bulletproof glass area, was the vault, its thick steel door standing open.

Stone did not turn around when Will Robie entered the bank, ducking under the partially lowered door at one minute to noon. He didn’t have to. As he waited in line, he watched Robie in a security mirror bolted to the corner of the ceiling. Stone had never seen Robie before today, but his experienced eyes told him that the man was not here to fulfill a banking transaction. Stone had seen Robie behind him on the street. And so he wondered why he was here.

Is it me? thought Stone. And if so, how should I handle it?

Charlie frowned at Robie’s popping in at the last minute. He had evidently been hoping that no more customers would show up. The college football game was calling his name. He desperately wanted to see the Hokies knock off the heavily favored Crimson Tide.

Robie did not go to stand in line. He went over to the information table and started looking through some form documents kept there in small cubbies.

Fifty-eight seconds later the clock on the wall clicked to noon.

Charlie turned to tell another group of people attempting to enter the bank that it was closed. There would be no more customers today.

A moment later Charlie tasted his own blood, arterial spray that reached his mouth. He was already dead, but didn’t know it.

His attacker held the older man up while he expired. His colleague turned the key in the lock all the way to the left and the wall rapidly descended. In a few seconds what was going on inside the bank was sealed off from the rest of the mall.

Robie had turned at the moment the knife blade severed Charlie’s neck arteries. He would have pulled his weapon but there were two guns pointed at him.

There were four people in total standing at the entrance. They were dressed in blue jumpsuits with hoodies. They slipped their hoodies off and revealed black ski masks underneath covering their faces.

One of them pushed a rolling laundry cart that had a sheet over it. Robie noted the gunmen had heavy weaponry—both machine pistols and subguns. It was a lot of firepower for a bank branch robbery.

One teller saw Charlie drop dead to the floor when his killer let him go, and screamed. Everyone else turned. Everyone else except Stone. He was watching all of this in the surveillance mirror. His gaze methodically panned over each of the gunmen, taking in as much information as he could. It was certainly true that the situation was bad, but that didn’t necessarily mean it was impossible to rectify.

The customers and tellers froze when the guns were pointed at them. One gunman held his finger to his lips and walked forward into the bank lobby.

His name was Adam Chase, he was the leader of this group, and he had very little time to accomplish something exceedingly momentous.

“Listen up, everyone. I’m a simple man and the rules are straightforward. You do what we say, you get to go home. You don’t, then Sunday does not come for you.”

He pointed at dead Charlie.

“That does.”

CHAPTER 2

Chase pointed at the tellers behind the glass.

“First, you keep your hands in plain view. If you hit any alarm button, silent or otherwise, everyone out here is dead.”

The two women and the man looked at each other and slowly lifted their hands.

“Good, now, the three of you come out here and join us.”

They didn’t move.

A second gunman strode forward and put his pistol against Stone’s head. “Now, or the geezer gets his brains blown out,” he said.

One of the female tellers unlocked the door and the three of them filed out.

“Thank you,” said Chase politely. He stepped inside the tellers’ cage and examined the set of alarm switches hidden under the counter. None of them had been activated. He looked at the tellers. “Very smart of you.”

The second gunman slapped Stone on the side of the head. “Congratulations, Grandpa, you get to live.”

“He was a grandfather,” replied Stone, glancing over at dead Charlie. “I’m not.”

“Then this is your lucky day,” said the man, slapping Stone’s head again.

Stone’s jaw tightened ever so slightly when the man struck him a second time. Robie noticed this. And he knew Stone would kill the man given the chance.

“Okay,” said Chase. “Everybody line up against that wall.” He pointed to his right.

Everyone did as he said and they were methodically searched. Out came all phones, electronic tablets, and other communication devices. They were collected in a basket. When Robie’s gun was found, Chase held it in his gloved hand.

“Why do you have this? You a cop? A Fed?” He nodded to one of his men, who searched Robie for a badge or creds but found none. He did hold up Robie’s gun permit.

“Just a law-abiding citizen,” said Robie.

Chase glanced at the permit and then wheeled around and clocked Robie in the jaw, nearly dropping him to the floor.

“I don’t like law-abiding citizens. Now get back in line,” said Chase, shoving Robie away. “You give me trouble I will shoot you with your own weapon.”

Robie staggered over and stood next to Stone, rubbing his jaw.

One of the gunmen produced zip ties. Each hostage’s hand was bound to another hostage’s. By virtue of their proximity, Robie and Stone ended up cuffed together.

“Now sit,” said Chase, waving his machine pistol at them.

They all sat on the floor, leaning against a wall.

While one gunman watched over them, the other three set to work. From the laundry cart several duffels were pulled. They had taken the key from the door lock and also confiscated the spare security door key from behind the tellers’ stand. There was no way out now.

Chase looked first at the open vault and then at the bank manager. “The vault has to be closed by twelve-fifteen or the central office will know something is wrong.” He waved his gun. “So do it.”

Stone glanced at Robie and then back at Chase.

The manager was tethered to one of the bank customers. When he rose, so did she. They were hurried over to an electronic pad next to the vault door. With a gun pressed to his temple the manager punched in the requisite numbers and the massive door slowly swung closed and then locked into place.

“Thank you,” said Chase.

“Just please don’t hurt us,” mumbled the manager, who was breathing heavily.

Chase slapped him. “You don’t speak unless you’re spoken to. Now we have to go through the bank closing protocols so the central office will believe everything is just fine and dandy here. Let’s go.”

Chase led the manager and the tethered customer over to the manager’s cubicle. “Give us the protocols and the passwords,” ordered Chase, “and my colleague here will input them. You slip up on any one of them, you die.” He put his gun against the manager’s head once more.

Stone and Robie watched as another of the gunmen sat at the desk behind the glass cubicle and started clicking keys on the computer keyboard, following the instructions of the frightened manager. He was sending out preauthorized emails with special passwords that would confirm that nothing was amiss at the bank branch.

Stone’s gaze swiveled to the third gunman. Slighter in build than the others and shorter, the person was affixing some devices to the wall entry door. When the ski mask rode up a bit on the person’s neck, Stone saw the eagle tattoo there. When he glanced at Robie, he was staring at the exposed neck too. That had been a mistake, both men thought simultaneously. A big mistake. As good as a fingerprint, actually.

Chase escorted the two hostages back to the others.

“Okay, on your bellies and face the wall,” he ordered. “Do it now.”

Stone shot a glance at Robie, who returned it. The two men seemed to be silently sizing the other up and then communicating a message: offers and acceptances of an alliance that might allow them to survive this somehow.

The hostages scooted around and lay on their bellies. Though on their stomachs, Stone and Robie made sure to lie face-to-face.

“They closed the vault,” mouthed Stone.

Robie nodded and mouthed, “So what’s the target?”

Stone gave a brief shake of the head, which stopped when the muzzle of a machine pistol sliced between them.

“I don’t believe I said communicating was permitted,” said the voice.

Stone and Robie looked up to see Chase staring back down at them.

“If you’re going to be problems,” said Chase, “we can deal with that right now.” He drew his knife with Charlie’s blood still on it and placed the serrated blade against Stone’s neck. He let the edge bite into the skin and a dribble of blood leaked onto the floor.

Chase withdrew the knife and stood. He stared down at the two for a few moments and then turned and left.

Ten minutes later Chase reappeared next to the hostages.

“Okay, everyone up and into the back room.”

The hostages managed to stand with difficulty and then were herded into the back room, which was outfitted as a small conference room. The door was locked behind them.

Stone and Robie looked around.

“Why in here?” Robie asked.

Stone said, “Because they’re doing something out there they don’t want us to see.”

He went over to the bank manager, who was obviously petrified and muttering to himself, while the female customer tethered to him stood awkwardly looking at the floor.

Stone said, “What’s worth stealing that’s not in the vault?”

The man looked up at him fearfully. “We’re not supposed to talk. They’ll kill us. They already killed Charlie.”

“I’m aware of that. But they can’t hear us in here if we keep our voices down. And it doesn’t appear that they care if we talk or not. Or else they would have fully bound and gagged us.”

Robie added, “Simple enough to do. They obviously brought a lot of equipment with them.”

“Are you a cop or something?” asked one of the tellers, a woman who looked to be in her late twenties. “You had a gun.”

“I’m not a cop,” replied Robie. “And even if I were they’ve got all the weapons.”

“But can’t you do something?” implored the teller.

“No,” snapped the manager. “We have to do what they say. If we try to screw around with this, they will kill us.”

“They’ve already killed one person,” said Stone. “They may not want to leave any witnesses behind.”

“We haven’t seen their faces,” countered the bank manager as the customer tied to him nodded in agreement. “So we can’t identify them.”

“Seeing someone’s face is not the only way to ID them,” Robie pointed out.

“We’re not doing anything,” barked the manager. “Nothing.”

He sat down in a corner, forcing the woman tied to him to do the same. He studied his hands and avoided their gazes.

Stone and Robie moved away and looked around the room. There had been a phone in here but it had been removed, as had a fax. There were a few pieces of furniture, and two cheap prints on the wall, and a pitcher of water and some glasses on a credenza. On the wall were some outlets and USB ports and a phone line and port for the fax.

Robie said, “They were thorough.”

“They obviously had plans of the bank layout beforehand.”

Robie nodded. “And they knew the bank protocols. With the closing of the vault and all.”

“Good prep all around. But they didn’t have to kill Charlie. That’s going to cost them.” Stone turned to one of the female bank tellers. “What could they want that’s not in the vault?” he asked in a low voice out of earshot of the bank manager.

She looked nervously over at her boss.

Stone said, “He’s entitled to his opinion, but it doesn’t mean he’s correct. I have some experience in these matters and I find it highly unlikely that they will leave here with us still alive.”

She said in a low, quavering voice, “We received a shipment of blank credit cards, about ten thousand of them.”

“Aren’t they in the vault?” asked Robie.

“Not yet. They just arrived today. We were going to load them into the vault after we closed. They’re in the storage room in cardboard boxes.”

“Blank credit cards,” said Stone.

The teller nodded. “You can steal them and then sell them. Criminals can input stolen IDs on them and they can be used as legit cards.”

“But if the bank knows they’ve been stolen won’t they simply put a stop on all of them?” asked Stone.

“If they can get the cards operational before the bank finds out, they can run up a lot of charges. They can also reencode the magnetic strip on the back with stolen account data. The bank has had problems with that in the past. They lose millions of dollars that way.”

Stone did not look convinced by this. “What else?”

“Well, we have customer account data on our computers. They could download that and sell it or use it to encode either homemade credit or debit cards or reencode stolen ones.”

“That might be it,” said Stone.

Now Robie did not look convinced. “But can’t they hack into the bank’s computer systems and do the same thing? Why come here and kill somebody? Now they’ve got a murder charge against them.”

“I have no idea,” said the woman, who started to shake and looked like she might be sick.

“Here, have some water,” said Stone. He crossed the room with Robie and filled up a glass with water and brought it back to the woman.

She thanked him and drank it down.

Stone and Robie walked off and stood in a corner.

“Do you hear that?” Stone asked.

Robie nodded.

Stone said, “Sounds like someone sawing.”

“And I don’t think they’re cutting into the vault. Not with a hand saw.”

“And if they were going to rob the vault they wouldn’t have closed it.”

Robie added, “And the blank credit cards are in cardboard boxes. You don’t need a saw to open cardboard.”

“Which means they are trying to go from here to somewhere else,” reasoned Stone. “And I wonder where that ‘somewhere else’ could be.”

CHAPTER 3

Stone looked at Robie. “Know the configuration of this mall well?”

“Not really, no.”

“I do. I’ve been coming to this bank for years. And while I don’t really have the financial means to shop at the stores here, I have walked around this mall many times.”

“So what’s in the vicinity?” asked Robie. “What’s the possible target?”

“There’s a jewelry store on the floor above. A fur shop next to it.”

“Jewels are easier to get away with than furs. But aren’t the stores open now?”

“The fur shop is closed on Saturdays. The jewelry shop closes at two today.”

“So it could be either one,” said Robie. He looked over at the door. “You think they plan to kill us?”

“I don’t want to wait to find out,” replied Stone. He peered closely at Robie. “You like your job?”

Robie stared back at him. “My job?”

“When were you assigned it?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Really? I thought it was obvious.”

“What do you mean?”

“You just picked today to do some banking?”

“Saturday is errand day.”

“But you claimed you’d never been here before.”

“No, I said I didn’t know the configuration of the mall.”

Stone smiled. “My mistake.”

But in that look it seemed that Robie could sense that he was the one who had made the mistake.

Stone looked away when the door to the room opened. It was Chase.

He said, “Just to reiterate, if you cause no trouble, you will not be harmed. The reverse of that is also true.” He glanced over at Robie and Stone when he said this. Then he looked at the bank manager. “You, come with me.”

The color drained from the manager’s face. “But I haven’t done anything wrong. I’ve just been sitting here.”

“Now.” Chase pointed his pistol and the manager hastily rose to his feet. “And just remember, I don’t need a reason to kill you,” added Chase. He cut him loose from the woman he was tethered to, put his arm around the man’s shoulders, and propelled him out of the room. The door shut and locked behind them.

Robie said, “What do you think that was about?”

Stone shrugged. “Possibly he’s recruiting an informant. Or else the man has some more security codes that they need.”

“If they want him to be an informant I think he’ll finger us pretty quickly. The head guy is suspicious of us already.”

“Which means we probably should act with some urgency.”

Stone looked over at the fax and communications port.

“Got a way to turn that into a working phone?” asked Robie.

“Actually, I might,” replied Stone cryptically.

He took the pitcher of water and poured it into the slots of the electrical outlet. There was a loud pop, a flash of electrical current, the smell of smoke, and the lights went out.

There were screams and a few seconds later the door burst open.

Stone had by then set down the pitcher of water and stepped far away from the outlet.

A flashlight beam cut across them.

“What the hell is going on?” barked a voice. It was Chase.

Stone called out. “We don’t know. The lights just went out.”

Robie added, “And we smell smoke. There might be a fire. Did you guys hit something out there?”

They heard Chase mutter, “Shit.” Then he said, “Out this way, now. Follow the beam of my light.”

They did so and were soon back in the main bank area. It was dark out here as well. Stone couldn’t tell if the lights were still on outside in the mall or not.

One of the other men sidled up to Chase and whispered, “This is not good. We tried the circuit breaker but something got fried. Maybe we cut a line with the saw.”

“The plan goes on. We have portable work lights. Have somebody check out the other room. The last thing we need is the fire department showing up. Then I want them back in there as fast as possible.”

“But it’s going to take longer now.”

“We have a time reserve built in. Just do it.”

The other man said something else and Chase turned back to him.

While the pair had been speaking Stone and Robie had drawn close enough to hear enough of this to understand that the gunmen were on a tight timetable.

And Stone had been able to see enough of the room through the sweeps of the flashlight to become reoriented to the outline of the space. Now that he was out of the other room, he had to execute the plan that had started with him pouring water into the electrical outlet.

While Chase and the other man were still talking, he and Robie felt their way along the edge of the wall. Stone found what he was looking for, did a quick search entirely by feel until his hand closed around something, and then placed that object in his pocket. Then he edged back along the wall to where he had been originally. A second later the flashlight beam hit him in the face.

Chase drew closer to Stone and said, “I really hope you’re not trying something.”

“All I’m trying to do is stay alive, along with everyone else here.”

“Get back in the room, all of you,” Chase snapped.

They filed back into the room and the door was shut and locked behind them once more.

They sat in the darkness. Stone had turned away from the others and was working away on something he held in his hand.

“Calling the cops?” whispered Robie. He had seen that the thing Stone had taken was his phone from the basket in the other room.

Stone shook his head. He was doing his best to block the small amount of light coming from the phone screen so that the other hostages would not see it.

“A friend,” he said in a bare whisper.

“And this friend is better than the cops?”

“We’ll find out,” replied Stone. “But I have great confidence in my friends.”

Stone punched in the number and spoke quietly into the phone when it was answered. When he was done the person on the other end said simply, “On it.”

Stone put the phone away in his pocket.

Robie asked, “How could you tell which was your phone in there?”

“By feel. It was the smallest. Everyone else, including you, has one of those large-screen smartphones. I’m a little more old-fashioned. My phone is simply, well, a phone.”

“Who did you call?”

“A friend, like I said.”

“And what will this friend do?”

“Call my other friends.”

“You have a lot of friends?” asked Robie.

“Not a lot. But the ones I do have are quite capable. We’ve actually done some pretty extraordinary things together, my little club and I.”

“Club?”

“Yes. Didn’t I say? We’re known as the Camel Club.”

He took a moment to study Robie in the bare light of his phone.

“I’m surprised your briefing didn’t include that,” said Stone.

CHAPTER 4

Annabelle Conroy, tall, lean, and auburn-haired, was the newest, youngest, and only female member of the Camel Club. She was also a first-class con artist, though she had mostly retired from the field.

Mostly.

She had already reached all the other members, except for one.

Secret Service Agent Alex Ford had not answered his phone.

Reuben Rhodes, Caleb Shaw, and Harry Finn were already on their way to the mall in Georgetown.

Ten minutes later Annabelle was standing outside of the mall entrance waiting for them to arrive.

Reuben’s battered pickup truck screeched to a halt and he called out the window to her, “Any developments?”

She shook her head. Reuben eyed a car pulling out of a parking space on the street while a late-model Porsche convertible waited to pull in. Available parking spaces on the streets in Georgetown were unheard of and tended to be fiercely fought over.

Reuben timed it just right and slid into the parking spot before the Porsche could beat him there. The young man and his friend in the sports car immediately began yelling and cursing at him. The passenger jumped out and approached the truck. He was lean and buff and his hair was impressively tousled. He was dressed like a movie star trying to look hip. Everything he wore was expensive but tried desperately not to seem so.

With one look at him all Reuben wanted to do was knock him right into the waters of the nearby Potomac.

The guy stuck his face through the truck’s open window. “You took our space, asshole. Now move this pile of shit, old man.”

Reuben turned off his truck and stepped from the cab. At nearly six foot five and two hundred and seventy pounds he had the enormous size and breadth of shoulder of an NFL lineman. If he had had money he would have bought his clothes at the Big and Tall Men’s Shop, with the emphasis on big and tall.

He looked down at the far smaller young man, who had taken several steps backward when Reuben stepped from his truck. With a thick beard shot with gray and wild, tangled hair, Reuben looked more than a little unstable. And he could act crazy with the best of them.

Sometimes it wasn’t an act.

He grabbed the front of the man’s shirt and jerked him off his feet. “Do you think I’m too old to kick your ass?” he growled, his eyes boring into the younger man’s. “Because if you do, then I suggest you and your punk friend give it a try. I haven’t had the chance to shit-kick some pricks since Vietnam and I’m getting damn tired of waiting.”

The young guy was shaking hard as he took in the old army jacket that Reuben wore and then stared back at the wild eyes and the huge frame.

“We can find another space, dude.”

“Damn good idea. Because I’m busy right now.”

Reuben hurled him away and hurried down the block toward Annabelle.

When he reached her, Caleb Shaw was just getting out of a cab.

Caleb was in his fifties, paunchy, with gray hair and a trim beard. He wore wire-rimmed spectacles and looked like a librarian, which he was. He worked in the Library of Congress’s Rare Book Reading Room. Although he was the most sedate and overtly timid member of the group, he had proved his mettle in action many times in the past.

Caleb said, “A bank robbery? In Georgetown?”

Annabelle said, “Oliver doesn’t think the target is in the bank. He thinks they’re going after something else using the bank as a launch point.”

“Well, that’s a bit odd.”

“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” replied Annabelle. “But then odd is usually the only thing we get.”

A moment later Harry Finn came rushing up to them. In his thirties, lean and fit, Finn had first run into Oliver Stone because he’d wanted to kill him. Now Harry was one of Stone’s closes allies. He had a duffel bag over his shoulder.

“Nothing on the news,” he said. “No one must know yet.”

Reuben said, “So if not the bank what’s the target?”

Annabelle said, “There’s a jewelry store and fur place that the robbers might be able to access from the bank. At least that’s what Oliver said.”

Harry said, “Then we need to cover them both. But what about Oliver? Did he give you the lay of the land in there?”

“He’s one of ten hostages. Four bank employees and six customers. There are four robbers, heavily armed, and they put booby traps at the bank entrance in case someone tries to get to them that way.”

“Pretty well prepared,” said Reuben. “Doesn’t bode well.”

Annabelle nodded. “And he said they knew the bank’s protocols. The closing of the vault by a certain time and emails that had to go out to ensure the central office would believe nothing was wrong.”

Caleb said, “What can we do other than monitor the possible targets?”

“I tried to get a hold of Alex but he’s not answering.”

“Probably on an assignment,” said Reuben. “Otherwise he always answers.”

“But we don’t know for sure that the target is either the jewelers or the fur place,” said Harry. “That’s just speculation.”

Annabelle said, “And there’s something else. The robbers killed the security guard.”

“Which means they’ll have no compunction about killing anyone else,” said Caleb ominously.

Reuben said, “Well, we just have to make sure that doesn’t happen. But first things first. We need to cover the two potential targets. I’ll take the jewelers. Harry can take the fur place.”

“Are you armed?” asked Annabelle.

Reuben smiled. “You’re asking me that kind of a question?”

Harry said, “I have a pocket and there’s something in it. But what about the cops? The FBI? Shouldn’t we call them in?”

Annabelle shook her head. “Oliver said not to. The robbers may have a spotter out here. If a SWAT team comes barging in they’ll know it. And the robbers might start popping off hostages. We have to use stealth.” She looked at Caleb. “While Harry and Reuben cover the two possible targets, you and I have to figure out if there might be another place in the mall we’re missing.”

The four of them split up. Reuben and Harry entered the mall while Annabelle and Caleb went back to her car, where she snagged her laptop. They entered the mall and went to a coffee shop on the ground floor. Annabelle started clicking keys while Caleb accessed the Internet on his phone.

She said, “Search for anything having to do with this mall. See if you can get the building layout, what all is here, that sort of thing. I’m surfing the Web to see if anything pops.”

After thirty minutes Caleb looked up. “I’m not finding much. But there is a place in the garage that is blocked off. I can’t find anything on the Web to tell me what it is.”

“The garage?”

Caleb nodded.

“Forget the Web, let’s go see for ourselves.”

CHAPTER 5

Robie studied Stone’s face.

“My briefing?” he said.

“You look surprised.”

“That’s because I am.”

Now Stone studied him, his gaze moving up and down Robie.

“What do you do for a living?”

“Is that any of your business?”

“I’m just asking. I work in a graveyard. And you?”

“I’m a lobbyist.”

Stone shook his head and pointed at Robie’s right hand. “Not with those calluses on your thumb and forefinger. I can’t think of anything that gives those marks other than firing thousands of rounds of ammo.”

“I’m a weekend skeet shooter, “said Robie.

“Of course you are. And I’m trying out for American Idol.”

“You must have me confused with someone else.”

“I am rarely confused on points such as this.”

Muffled sounds from outside the room interrupted them. Both men jerked when they heard them. More hand tools operating. A saw again. And what sounded like a hammer. And then a crowbar.

“Can’t people hear that from outside?” asked Robie.

“Doubtful,” said Stone. “Since we can barely hear it.”

Robie looked around at the other hostages. “You’d think folks would start missing some of the customers in here. Or the workers. They probably have families and homes to go to.”

“Which means whatever these men are doing can be done relatively quickly.”

“A jewelry store and fur shop will have vaults that have to be broken into.”

“A good point. An obstacle that would take far more time to get through.”

“I don’t think that’s it,” said Robie.

“I really don’t think so either. My friends will probably arrive at the same conclusion. But there is something else that is located here.”

“What’s that?” asked Robie.

“Private residences. On the upper floors. Very exclusive private residences inhabited by very rich, exclusive people.”

“You think that’s the ultimate target?”

“I don’t know. But we can’t discount it.” In the dark he looked closely at Robie. “How is Shane Connors doing?”

Robie said nothing.

Stone continued, “He was a protégé of mine. I haven’t seen him in years, of course, but once he did mention an up-and-comer in our profession, and his description pretty well matches you.”

“Never heard of him.”

“Well, it’s not a priority right now,” said Stone. “We have other things to concern ourselves with, don’t we? But tell him I said hello.”

The two men stared at each other for a few brief if telling moments.

“How many floors hold residences?” asked Robie, finally breaking the silence.

“Several, up to the penthouse.”

“Who lives there?”

“I don’t know exactly. They’re rich, like I said. They would have to be to afford a place like that. Probably some VIPs thrown into the mix.”

“But I wonder why today? Why strike a target like that today?”

Stone looked thoughtful. “You’re thinking that some sort of an event might be taking place today and that’s what triggered all this?”

Robie nodded.

“Interesting thought for a lobbyist skeet shooter,” noted Stone. He turned his back and slid out his phone. He called Annabelle and told her this information.

He clicked off the phone and was putting it away when they heard footsteps approaching. A few seconds later the door to the room burst open.

In the dim glow of his flashlight they could see that it was Adam Chase. He shone his light around, checking them over one by one.

A moment later emergency lighting kicked in, allowing them to see him more clearly. He clicked off his flashlight.

“It appears that someone has been making a phone call from in here.” He held up his machine pistol, to which he had attached a suppressor. “Now, which of you was it?”

None of them said anything. Chase came forward.

“Which one of you was it?”

He put the muzzle of his gun against a female teller’s head. “Was it you?”

She whimpered, “No, I swear to God it wasn’t me. I don’t have my phone. You took it. You can search me. I don’t have a phone. Please, please.” She jerked back away from him.

Stone stepped forward.

Chase pointed his gun at him. “The manager said you were trouble. Said you were stoking the fires back here.”

Stone ignored this. “None of us have phones,” he said. “You can have your men search us all. Your information must be wrong.”

Chase pointed his gun at Stone’s head. “How about I start with you?”

Stone said, “Feel free.”

Chase spoke into a walkie-talkie and a few moments later another man came in and thoroughly searched everyone in the room. No phone was found.

Chase looked at Stone and Stone looked back at Chase.

“What exactly are you?” asked Chase.

“I work in a cemetery in Georgetown. I have for years. That’s what I am. I just came here to deposit my paycheck, just like I do every Saturday. That’s how I knew the guard, Charlie. The man you killed,” Stone added.

Chase said, “We get a hint that any one of you is trying anything, I will personally come back here and shoot each of you in the head. Do I make myself clear?”

“Very,” said Robie.

The door closed and Chase was gone.

Robie and Stone moved over against one wall. In a low voice Robie said, “What did you do with it?”

“When I heard the door opening I slipped it behind the outlet cover that got fried. They’d pulled it out earlier to see what had happened to it.”

“So our communication lines are gone.”

“For the time being.”

“So I hope your friends are really good.”

“Oh, they really are.”

CHAPTER 6

Before Stone had to hide his phone, Annabelle and Caleb were walking around the garage area under the building. She spotted it first—a fenced-in area that housed a parking lot only accessible by key card.

Caleb stared through the chain-link fence and then read the sign hanging on the access gate. “They’re for the private residences, Annabelle.”

She nodded. “This must be the blank on the plans you found online.”

“I guess they didn’t want to publicize this aspect of the place. I’m sure the folks who own these apartments want their privacy. People with money usually do, unless you’re the Kardashians.”

Annabelle’s phone buzzed.

“It’s Oliver.”

She listened and said, “Understood and on it. Oliver, how is it going in there?”

She listened again, nodded, and said, “Watch your back.” She clicked off and stared at the concrete looking anxious.

Caleb edged closer to her and asked nervously, “Is he okay?”

“You know Oliver. He could be in front of a firing squad and he’d say he was just fine.”

“But what did he say?”

She glanced up. “Ironically, he wants us to check out the private residences. He thinks the target might lie there.”

Caleb gazed through the fence again. “So these people might be going through the bank to get to the residences? Why?”

“Residence,” she corrected. “I doubt it’s more than one. There wouldn’t be enough time.”

“Okay, but which one? There are a lot of parking spaces. And they’re all filled with Mercedeses and Jags and BMWs. And there’s a Bentley over there. These people definitely have money.”

“Well, whichever one it is we need to narrow down quickly. I doubt these guys will take too long to get to wherever they’re going.”

She punched in a number.

“Harry, I just got a call from Oliver. He thinks the private residences on the top floors of the building might be the target, we just don’t know which one. Can you check around up there and see if anything hits you? We’re on our way too.”

She clicked off and said, “Let’s go, Caleb.”

* * *

Before Annabelle called, Harry and Reuben had together been scoping out the jewelry store and furrier. The jewelry store was closed but they could see employees inside, no doubt going through their closing procedure before leaving. As both men watched, the jewelry cases sank down into the floor, and then the top of the floor, which they could see was lined with steel, closed on top of them.

Harry said, “I don’t see anyone breaking into that too quickly. Plus, the entrance doors are glass. No cover.”

Reuben nodded. “And I don’t think you can steal enough furs to make killing a security guard worth it.”

Then Harry’s phone buzzed and he spoke with Annabelle. When he clicked off he conveyed to Reuben what she had told him.

“So private residences, huh?” said the big man.

“Appears so. At least Oliver seems to think it’s a possibility.”

“So a robbery of the rich or something else?”

“No clue,” said Harry. “But let’s see if we can find one.”

They hurried through the interior of the mall until they reached the entrance to a private bank of elevators that led up to the residences. A sign on the entry wall said that only residents and their confirmed guests were allowed past this point.

“Looks like something is going on,” observed Reuben.

There was a table set up near the entrance to the elevator bank. People in business attire were lined up in front of a reception table being checked in. Then they passed through a security checkpoint where men in suits were standing. The men looked in the women’s purses and then allowed them through to the waiting elevator.

“There’s a magnetometer everyone has to pass through,” observed Reuben.

Harry nodded. “And guys in suits, shades, with earwigs and shoulder holsters.”

“Must be the Secret Service. I’d say that whoever they’re guarding might be a target. They don’t get called up for the small-fry.”

“But who?” asked Harry. “The Secret Service protects lots of different types, including foreign dignitaries. I don’t remember reading about any kings or queens visiting here.”

“Might be one of ours,” replied Reuben. Politicians all over this town. President. Supreme Court justices. Agency heads. Military types. List goes on and on.”

“Well, they’re definitely Secret Service. I see their lapel pins. So that narrows it down a bit.”

“But not enough. And then there’s the problem of letting them know there might be a threat without causing some kind of panic.”

Annabelle and Caleb joined them a minute later and Harry filled her in on what they had found.

Annabelle gazed over at the people waiting to be cleared into the event.

“But what kind of event is it?” asked Caleb. “That might tell us more about who the target might be.”

Annabelle said, “I’ll find out.” She walked over to one of the men standing in line and gave him a warm, coy smile.

“Okay, this is going to sound really stupid, but aren’t you on Breaking Bad? The brother-in-law of the meth dealer, Walter White? Right? The DEA guy? Oh, what was his name again?”

“I wish,” said the man. He was about fifty, portly and balding. He was dressed in a suit and tie.

She looked over his shoulder. “Oh come on, you have to be. Are you attending some sort of entertainment function? Is Bryan Cranston here? I’m a huge fan. Please tell me I’m right.”

“I’m afraid it’s just a very dull but necessary political fund-raiser for a friend of mine. Congressional race.”

Annabelle tried not to look disappointed.

“Oh,” she said. “Politicians.”

He smiled and handed her a card. “I know. Not as much juice as Bryan Cranston. But it’s a necessary evil. Maybe more evil than necessary in these days of paralyzed, do-nothing government. Anyway, here’s my card. Give me a call if you ever want to run for office.” He appreciatively eyed her long, slender figure. “Or if you just want to have a drink, for that matter.”

She looked down at the card. When she looked up, Annabelle caught a breath. Heading into the elevator from what appeared to be a private entryway was Alex Ford. He was there along with the rest of the protection detail. She tried to catch his eye, but he was gone before he could see her.

And when Annabelle saw the person they were guarding, she knew who the target was.

She looked down at the card again and read off the name. When she looked up she had put on her most enticing, flirty smile.

“Okay, I feel really bad, I mean really stupid, Bob.” She eyed him shyly. “I’ve never been to a political fund-raiser. I bet it’s not as boring as you say it is.”

Bob looked amused. “I could lie and say you’re right, but I’m too nice to do that to a beautiful lady like yourself. What’s your name?”

“Annabelle.”

“Annabelle? Wow, don’t hear that name much anymore. Don’t get me wrong, I like it,” he added when her face formed a pouty look.

He eyed the reception desk. “Well, I was supposed to come with a guest and she couldn’t make it, which leaves me one body short. You want to sub in? My treat.”

The pout turned to a smile. “That would be so cool.”

He looked at her tight black slacks. “Not packing heat, are you? The Secret Service frowns on that.”

She slowly slid her hand along her thigh. “I doubt I have room. What do you think, Bob?”

Bob gave a little shiver and laughed. “Sold! Let’s go. Now, I’ll need to talk you into this thing. Everybody had to be vetted beforehand, Social Security numbers and everything. But I wrote a big fat check for this guy and he owes me, so let’s go pull a Salahi.”

They walked over to the reception desk.

Annabelle glanced back at the others. She caught Harry’s eye. He confirmed with a nod that they all had seen what she had.

The target had just gone up in the elevator.

It was the vice president of the United States.

And apparently somebody wanted to do him harm.

Today.

CHAPTER 7

The sounds of the tools being used stopped.

Robie looked at Stone. “Think they’re done?”

“Possibly but we need some more information to make sure of what’s really going on here.”

They walked over to the two female tellers who sat on the floor tethered together. Stone and Robie knelt down beside them.

Stone said, “Have you worked for the bank long?”

One of the tellers, the younger woman, said, “About three years.”

The other woman, in her forties, said, “I’ve been here ten. And I’m scared to death. We’ve never had even a hint of a robbery before.”

Stone put a calming hand on her shoulder. “It’ll be okay.”

The woman looked up into Stone’s steady, calm eyes and relaxed noticeably. Stone looked like a rock-hard pilot steadying a passenger’s nerves while they flew through a storm.

“Thank you for saying that,” she replied.

Stone looked at the door leading into the room and then at the room itself. “Every time I’ve come here I’ve noticed that the configuration of the lobby is very irregular. And there’s a large pop-out on the wall over there where you lost more space. And it goes all the way into the lobby.”

Robie glanced at him and then at the pop-out. “There’s a corner of dead space in both places,” he said. “On the left side next to the teller stand and then in here, which is a continuation of that dead space from the lobby.”

The older teller nodded. “When I first came here I asked about that. Like you said, it just seemed like a huge waste of space. I wouldn’t have noticed it except my husband is in construction and I’m guess I’m more attuned to things like that.”

“So what was the reason?” Stone asked.

“The way it was explained to me was that when the building was first being constructed an elevator bank was going in there. But at the last minute they changed the location for it. But they’d already built out the shaft and all, and they didn’t want to go back and redo that—an expense issue, I’m sure. So they just did the next best thing.”

Robie said, “They covered it up.”

“That’s right. The bank didn’t mind. They got a deal on the rent because of it. Not only were they not charged for the dead space, but they also got a reduced square-footage rate. Most stores didn’t want this space for that reason and also because it was off the beaten path in the mall. Not enough foot traffic. But banks don’t care about that. They don’t want people to come to the bank. That means they have to hire people like me to service them. They’d much prefer you use the ATMs or bank online. Saves them a ton of money.”

“Does it affect all units on this vertical?” asked Stone. “I mean, do they all have dead space on all the floors?”

“No, I don’t think so. At least not as severe as ours. Where the bank is now there was going to be an anchor store, but the deal fell through. Where the pop-out is located was going to be the location of two elevators. They’d already built some of the support structure for it, which made the space basically unusable. It also had something to do with load-bearing components, which nobody wants to mess with. When the bank leased here they just walled in the shaft. But I remember someone telling me that the shaft had not been fully built out, so they didn’t have to reconfigure the other units, or at least not as much.”

“But does the shaft go all the way up to the top of the building?” asked Stone. “I mean, if they were going to have an elevator here that would make sense. Why build an elevator that doesn’t reach all the floors?”

“I think that it must,” answered the woman after giving it some thought. “I know the elevator bank was going to start in our space, so there’s a solid floor inside the pop-out.”

“What about the private residences on the top floors?” he asked.

“Oh, I know they have their own elevator bank.”

“So maybe this shaft doesn’t go up there?”

“No, my husband put a bid in to do some work here, and that included preliminary site plans and the like. The original plans did not have private elevators. But once it was clear how much the residences were going to cost, the idea of a private set of elevators became sort of a priority. You know, the rich don’t like mixing with the rest of us if they can afford it,” she added huffily.

“Was there something special about the bank’s location?” asked Robie while Stone looked at him intently.

“Like what?”

“Something that made it different from the units above and below it, as related to the elevator shaft?”

“I don’t think so. When my husband was shown the plans I remembered him telling me about the pop-out and what was behind it. He said they’d just drywalled around the shaft at our location. I suppose they did that all the way up.”

Stone said, “But there must be some reason the robbers chose this space over the others on the vertical. Most other stores don’t have armed guards. They had to take that into consideration.”

Robie glanced toward the door to the room. “It’s the entrance,” he said quickly.

“What?” asked Stone.

“Most stores have walls that come down and doors that lock that you can see through. Either glass entry doors or metal link roll-down doors. The bank doesn’t. If they had to work on something in the lobby of the other stores they’d be seen, even with the store closed. But not here. It’s opaque. Complete privacy.”

The older woman nodded. “That’s right. Not sure why they designed it that way. I guess they assumed that even if someone broke in they’d have to punch through the roll-down wall and it would be noticed.”

Stone added, “And the fact is most stores here don’t close at noon on Saturdays.”

“Almost none of them,” said the teller. “I used to be in retail. Weekends are where the money is made and rent gets paid.”

The other teller said testily, “But what does that matter? They broke into the bank. They’re robbing us! Why are we wasting time talking about pop-outs and construction crap?”

“You’re right,” said Stone. “I was just curious. Just try to remain calm. I believe this will all be over soon.”

The young teller glared at him. “Right, with us dead or not?”

“Hopefully not,” replied Stone.

He and Robie moved away from the two women and sat together in a far corner.

Robie said, “So that’s where the tools come in. They cut into the shaft and they have a direct way up and into another floor without anyone being able to see them work.”

Stone nodded. “Perhaps all the way to the penthouse.”

“Quite the security flaw if that’s true.”

Stone said, “Well, I don’t suppose anyone thought someone would break into a bank in order to do so. But now we know why it was the bank. They could work unseen, as you said.” He glanced at Robie. “Very observant of you. Shane would be proud.”

“I wonder what your friends are doing?” asked Robie, ignoring this comment.

“Exactly what they need to be doing. I don’t think I can risk calling them again.”

“I wonder why they haven’t brought the bank manager back.”

“I doubt we will see him back.”

“Hostage for their escape?”

Stone said, “Possibly. Or some other type of insurance.”

“And when they go up the shaft?”

“They’ll have to leave someone here to guard us.”

“But the odds will be more in our favor, then. Fewer guns to deal with. There are only four of them total. Divide and conquer, right?”

“Yes.” He looked at Robie. “Are you up to it?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean switching assignments midstream like that.”

“I’m up for it,” Robie said quietly. “Though I have no idea what assignment you’re referring to.”

“Good to hear. It will be soon, I think. Very soon.” Stone glanced at his watch.

“And their escape plan?”

“If they have one.”

“They don’t look like jihadists to me.”

“I never thought they were.”

“So they have to have an escape plan.”

“Yes, but it just might not look like one.”

“I’m not following.”

“And I’m not sure what I mean exactly,” admitted Stone. “Only I doubt they’re exiting the way they came in.”

“How do you want to work this, then?” asked Robie.

“I think we’ll know when the time is right. The question will be, do they leave one or two men behind?”

“Depending on how they’re going to attack the target they might need three, which just leaves one with us.”

“But they also might simply need one to attack the target.”

“I would assume the target would have some type of security. You can’t just go in solo on that.”

Stone looked at him, amused. “Surely that hasn’t been your experience? I would imagine you go in solo on every job you do. Just as I did.”

To this Robie said nothing.

“No,” continued Stone. “They might just send one. But if they do, the means of the attack will have to be overwhelming.”

“With one guy you’re not simply talking about a gun.”

“No.”

“You’re talking an explosive or something along those lines.”

“Yes, I absolutely am. You don’t do something as elaborate as this and execute with a whimper. Whatever or whoever their target is, it’s important enough to justify everything they’re doing.”

“So they’ll be willing to die for it,” said Robie.

“And we’ll have to be willing to match them on that,” replied Stone. “Otherwise, they probably win.”

CHAPTER 8

Harry and Reuben passed the bank, each giving it just a brief glance, and continued, turning down the corridor to the restrooms and service area adjacent to the bank.

They found an orange pylon with a CLOSED sign attached to it in a janitorial closet in the restroom and set it out by the door to the men’s room.

Harry knelt down next to the wall on the bank side of the restroom. He opened his duffel and took out a listening device. He attached it to the wall, inserting the other end in his right ear.

He listened for a few seconds and then glanced up at Reuben. “Sawing. And hammers. Hand tools it sounds like.”

“Don’t use those sorts of tools on a bank vault,” said Reuben.

“No, you don’t. I think Oliver’s theory is right. They’re using the bank to get to somewhere else in the building. Maybe the residences. You saw who’s there. The VP has to be the target.”

“I think so too. But we don’t know which residence it is. And until Annabelle checks back in we’re running blind. We need more information if we’re going to have a real shot at stopping this.”

“Maybe we should call in the FBI, Reuben. I mean, it is the VP after all. If this gets beyond us and we haven’t told anyone? They might throw us all in prison and forget we’re there.”

“They might. But though we’re few in number I’ll take the Camel Club over all the suits at Hoover. What about you?”

Harry slowly nodded. “Agreed.”

“Good. Now let’s beef up our intel so we can kick these suckers’ asses.”

Reuben called Caleb and told him where to meet. He clicked off. “Let’s go, Harry,” he said.

“Where?”

“You’ll see.”

They met Caleb in front of the mall’s administrative office, which was now closed. It was also located down a service corridor. Admin offices generated no revenue and were thus relegated to the cheap, retail-unusable space in the mall.

Reuben eyed the door and the lock. “Looks to be alarmed,” he said.

Harry nodded and started searching in his bag while Caleb said, “Annabelle hasn’t called yet from the event.”

“She will, once she gets the lay of the land,” replied Reuben. “She’s the real deal. We all know that. Con the pope, that girl could.”

“Actually, she probably has,” added Caleb drily. “I’ve yet to meet the man who is impervious to her charms.”

Reuben eyed him critically. “Really? Would that include you, Caleb? If memory serves correctly, you spent quite a bit of time in a large van with our gal in a very isolated area where innumerable opportunities might exist to test your theory.”

Caleb sputtered, “Don’t be ridiculous. I’m not that sort.”

“What sort?”

“I’m a gentleman. I would never take advantage of a female professional colleague like that.”

Reuben chuckled. “As if you could. She’d kick your butt all the way to Jefferson’s library at Monticello.”

Caleb’s features swelled with indignation. “What do you need me up here for?” he asked. “I presume you have some plan that requires my participation.”

Reuben said, “You presume right. You have to cover our six. I need you to go to the end of the corridor. Anybody starts to come down this way you have to distract them and give us a heads-up. And then keep that up until we can make a clean getaway. Improvise when you have to.”

Caleb looked incredulous. “Really? Is that all? Do you want me to kung fu them too?”

“Do you know kung fu?” asked Reuben pointedly.

“Right now I wish I did!” Caleb spun on his heel and marched back down the hall.

Reuben’s amused gaze followed Caleb down the hall. But when he looked at Harry his features turned serious. “We don’t have much time.”

“I know,” said Harry.

“You can break in there, right?”

“If I can break into the Pentagon, Reuben, I think I can manage an office in the mall.”

* * *

Annabelle sipped a glass of wine and surveyed the room. There were about fifty people that she could see in the luxurious penthouse apartment. They were clearly all well-to-do and connected and many seemed to know one another. She followed Bob around a bit and listened in on some conversations, but then used a potty break excuse to go off on her own.

She was looking everywhere for Alex Ford but didn’t see him. The vice president must be in another room of the apartment. Maybe one had to pay for the privilege of being in such august company in addition to what they’d ponied up already. Plus, a photo op would probably set one back another five grand. Politics for the people, she thought.

She grabbed another glass of wine and continued her stroll. She nodded and smiled at people as she went, but her gaze kept roaming. The views out the windows were spectacular, but that was not the way they would be coming. The bank was down below. How they would get from there to here she didn’t know. But she assumed they had found a way. Otherwise why would they have invaded the bank at all?

She took out her cell phone and tried calling Alex, but he didn’t pick up. He wouldn’t, she assumed, while he was on duty. But if she could just find him and tell him what was going on…

“Hey, Annabelle!”

She turned to see Bob standing there with some people for her to meet. She smiled politely and turned to the group. But even her rock-hard nerves were starting to crumble a bit. She had to find Alex and warn him. And she could sense time was running out.

CHAPTER 9

Caleb paced nervously in front of the intersection of the main hallway and the corridor leading to the mall offices. He was hoping with all his might that no one would happen along this way. He figured his odds were good. There were no stores around here. It was just dead space in the mall on a Saturday afternoon.

He pulled his phone and texted Reuben. The message was brief.

Hurry up!

Just as he put the phone away, he looked up. His mouth became dry and he gave an involuntarily shudder.

It was a mall cop headed directly his way.

As the beefy man in the dark blue uniform with squeaky belt and shoes approached, Caleb attempted a smile.

“Hello,” he said as the man drew closer.

The man looked at him suspiciously. “Can I help you, sir?”

“Help?” said Caleb in a shaky voice. “No, I’m fine. Just…just waiting on some friends.”

“Up here?” The guard made a show of looking around at the empty space.

“Y-yes,” said Caleb, stammering slightly. “We, I mean they, don’t really know the area. I suggested meeting here, you know, just for—it gets crowded downstairs.” He paused and swallowed hard. “I don’t like crowds.”

The guard looked even more suspicious. It didn’t help when Caleb gave a nervous glance down the corridor leading to the mall offices.

“Can I see some ID?” asked the guard.

“ID?” asked Caleb shrilly.

“Yes, ID,” said the guard, drawing closer. His hand went up and rested on the butt of his holstered gun.

“Cer-certainly, Officer. Do I call you Officer?”

“Sir, the ID, please.”

“But I’m not doing anything wrong.”

“Then you should have no problem showing me some ID. If it checks out we can all go on our way. How’s that sound?”

“But the Fourth Amendment guarantees protection against unreasonable searches and seizures,” said Caleb desperately.

“I’m neither searching nor seizing, sir, and you’re making this a lot harder than it has to be.”

“I’m sorry, I truly am.” Caleb could see the cop was definitely suspicious now. He suddenly brightened. “I saw Paul Blart: Mall Cop with Kevin James,” Caleb said conversationally as he reached inside his jacket for his wallet. “Delightful movie. Very funny. Not an Oscar-caliber film, of course, but quite crowd-pleasing.”

The guard did not look pleased by this at all. “Blart was a moron. I’m not a moron. I served twenty-five years with the metro police.”

Caleb looked horrified. “No, of course not. I didn’t mean to suggest—”

His phone vibrated. As he drew out his wallet and handed his ID to the cop he glanced at the screen.

We’re done, coming out. Coast clear?

Caleb looked up at the cop, who was studying his ID, then quickly thumbed his response. One minute and then hit it.

“Sir,” said the cop. “I’d like you to come—”

Before he could finish, Caleb started holding his chest and gasping for breath.

“I-I-I think I’m having a pa-pa-panic attack. Ca-can’t ca—catch my breath.”

He started to collapse. The cop caught him and supported him. “Just hold on, sir. I’ve got you. You’re going to be okay.”

Caleb pointed to the elevator bank. “Fr-fresh air. Need—outside…quick.”

“Okay. Okay. I’m going to call an ambulance too.”

Caleb drew a painful, shuddering breath. “Out-out…side. Hurry.”

The guard helped Caleb to the elevator and inside. The doors closed behind them and the car started down.

Five seconds later Harry and Reuben appeared in the main hall. Under Harry’s arm was a set of building plans.

“Where’s Caleb?” asked Harry.

“Probably gone off to a bookstore,” grumbled Reuben. “If there’re any left in this place. Come on, we’re running out of time.”

* * *

The door to the interior room opened and Adam Chase stood there, gun in hand. “We are just about done here,” he said. “And then all of you get to go on with your lives. Unless you give us problems.” He looked at Stone and Robie when he said this.

“No problems,” said Stone.

Another man appeared next to Chase. He held a machine pistol in his right hand. His face was, like Chase’s, covered with a ski mask.

Chase looked at him and then indicated Stone and Robie.

“Watch them closely,” said Chase, and the other man nodded. “Any problems at all, just take them out.”

Chase left and the other man put his back against the door, his gaze scanning the room.

* * *

In the bank lobby there was a hole in the drywall at the location of the pop-out. The studs had been sawn apart and some concrete blocks broken through, creating an opening large enough for a man to get past.

Chase and his three associates had clambered through the hole and were now staring up the exposed shaft that was framed in by steel beams for the once proposed elevator bank.

It was dark, of course, which was why they had night optics. They slipped the lenses down over their faces and powered them up.

Chase hefted a backpack over his shoulders. His colleagues did the same. They strung sturdy nylon climbing ropes around their waists and then coupled them using D-links. Then they each picked a section of wall, gripped one of the steel beams, and started to climb. The beams were close enough together that they made good progress. On the lower floors the shaft was formed by concrete blocks, but on the upper floors it was only drywall and studs. Each of them moved expertly, gaining a firm purchase with hands and feet on the beams before hoisting themselves higher. At this pace they would be at their destination very soon.

* * *

Harry and Reuben were back in the men’s room, the blueprints for the mall and the bank branch laid out on the floor. Harry had quickly studied them and then pointed out the optimal egress. He made his living breaking into places far more secure than even a bank. He pointed to a section of wall next to the row of sinks.

“I think there is the best spot. We have to assume they’ll have the hostages in the interior room there.” He pointed to that area on the blueprints. “Right behind this wall is the bathroom in the bank. They did it that way so they could use the same plumbing from this restroom. Saves time and money.”

“Right,” said Reuben, studying the plans. “But there’ll be sentries, Harry. We have to account for that.”

“I know. That’s why I brought this.” He pulled from his knapsack what looked like a handheld wand that TSA personnel would use at airport security, except that it had a small screen on the handle. “Thermal imager,” he explained.

He moved it up and down in front of the wall and then checked the readout screen.

“It’s clear right now.”

“Well, let’s hope nobody with a gun has to take a pee in the next few minutes,” said Reuben.

Harry drew out a saw from his duffel and began, as quietly as possible, to cut through the drywall.

CHAPTER 10

Stone studied the guard in the ski mask, and the man looked back at Stone.

Finally, the man said, “You got a problem?”

Stone said, “How did you draw the short straw? Are you the junior guy on the team?”

“Don’t know what you’re talking about. Short straw?”

The other hostages looked on nervously as Stone leaned back against the wall with Robie tethered to him.

“Short straw. Surely you understand the concept. They left you here. They left you behind.”

“Important job,” countered the man. “Guarding all of you.”

“Not really. Better to have killed us, drugged us, or tied us up so well we couldn’t escape. Why waste someone? You’re a small team. Why divide your manpower that way?”

“Why don’t you shut up, old man?”

“You should have at least asked for backup,” said Robie.

The man snorted. “Backup? I’ve got an auto pistol. All of you are tied together. You take a step toward me, you’re dead. Why do I need backup?”

“For unforeseen things,” said Stone. “But apparently your mission leader didn’t care about that. About you, I mean. Expendable.”

“You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

“Actually, I do,” countered Stone. “The rear-flank guy almost always goes down. That’s the nature of the beast. And your friends aren’t coming back through here to make their escape. But I bet they told you they were.”

The other man’s shoulders tensed. He snorted and said, “So now you know all about our plan?”

Stone kept staring directly at him. “The motorized outer wall to the bank is key-operated. Charlie had one key. You don’t have it because I saw your leader take it. He also took the other key behind the tellers’ stand. So you can’t open the door to get out.”

“Yeah, but he can.”

“Do you know what those things were he was having positioned on the overhead door to the bank?” asked Robie.

The man glanced at him but said nothing.

Stone said, “They’re either Semtex or C-4 hardwired to a detonator. They’re armed and I bet they’re configured so they can’t be disarmed except remotely. A handful of Semtex can take down a jumbo jet. What do you think those packs will do to this bank and everyone in it? Including you.”

Robie added, “And why put those up if they were planning to exit that way?”

Before the man could say anything Stone said, “Because they’re not coming back this way. Why would they? Cops will be waiting. It’s been long enough that people will know something is up.” He glanced at the bank employees and customers. “All these folks have people who will be missing them. Won’t take long to realize something is off.”

“Shut up,” said the man, but his gun hand was trembling slightly.

Stone said, “A vertical shaft up a building allows for lots of possibilities for escape. Lots of floors. That’s what I’d do. And I’m sure that’s what your friends are planning to do. While you stay behind here. For the cops to arrest. Or kill.”

The man’s gaze darted in the direction of the shaft, confirming for Stone that his speculation had been correct.

He continued, “They have the plans for the building. That will tell them the best place to branch off the shaft after they’ve completed their mission. Different floor, masks and jumpsuits come off. They walk away and out of the mall. Gone. Just like that.” He snapped his fingers.

“But not you,” said Robie. “You’re stuck here with us. And when someone tries to open the door to the bank, we’ll be vaporized. All of us. You included.”

One of the female tellers started to moan. A customer choked back a sob and began whimpering.

The gunman started nervously licking his lips.

Stone said, “So that’s what I meant when I said the short straw. You’re the sacrificial lamb. Maybe the cops will think you were acting alone. I mean, there won’t be anyone alive to say otherwise. That way your buddies get away free and clear. While your ass gets sacrificed. For the cause. Whatever that might be.”

The gunman pointed his weapon at Stone’s head. “I said, shut up. Or the next person to be dead will be you.”

The next moment the man was falling forward, the door having struck him from behind.

Robie and Stone surged forward together. Robie ripped the gun free from the man’s fingers. Stone slammed an elbow into the man’s neck, sending him down to the floor, where he stayed.

The door opened all the way and there stood Harry and Reuben.

Reuben eyed the fallen man. “Now I’d say that was pretty damn good timing.”

“Perfect timing,” corrected Stone.

Harry quickly cut all the hostages loose.

Reuben said, “There are C-4 packs strung across the entrance to the bank. No one’s leaving that way until the bomb squad comes in and clears them out.”

“I take it no one was in the front part of the bank,” said Stone.

Reuben nodded. “That’s right..”

Harry nodded. “But there’s a hole in the wall.”

“We knew they were trying to get from here to somewhere else. Do you know where they’re going?” asked Robie.

“A fund-raiser on the top floor,” replied Reuben. “Lots of elite types attending. Annabelle managed to get in.”

“And the target?” asked Stone.

“The vice president of the United States,” answered Harry.

Stone and Robie glanced worriedly at each other.

Robie said quickly, “Does the Secret Service know?”

Harry said, “Alex is on the protection detail, but Annabelle hasn’t been able to make contact with him yet.”

Reuben hiked his eyebrows and smiled. “VP. Just your run-of-the-mill stuff. Keeps us from getting rusty in our old age.”

CHAPTER 11

The climb up the vertical did not take long. The ascent had been practiced many times on a mockup at a facility in rural Maryland. And now, for real, the trip was measured and swift.

They made only one stop.

At the fourth floor.

It took a few minutes to cut the opening in the wall there, and then they were on their way again. Better to have cut the hole now. When they were fleeing from here they would not want to waste time doing it.

As the four of them climbed, Chase gave final instructions. They would not have long after it was done to make their escape.

The shaft was well insulated from the outside as the building had been constructed around it. Still, Chase did not want to make any unnecessary sounds. The timing would be tight. They had lost precious minutes when the power had gone out in the bank. But he had built in a contingency because things never went exactly according to plan.

He checked his watch as they climbed. It would be okay, he thought. They would make it. They had better make it.

They reached the top floor and Chase motioned to the person directly below him. Everyone stopped. Chase eyed the drywall in front of him and checked the construction plans for this part of the building that he’d downloaded onto his phone, confirming the location. He pointed to the wall and the person directly below him rose up beside him while holding on to one of the girders. Both men withdrew cutting blades from their belt holders and began to carefully slice away.

It would not take long now.

* * *

Robie, Stone, and Harry peered inside the hole revealing the shaft.

“Pretty dark in there,” said Harry. “And stale air.”

Robie said, “And the higher we go the darker and staler.”

Harry opened his duffel bag. “I only have two pairs of night optics.”

Robie held out his hand. “I’ll take one.”

Harry glanced at Stone and said, “I’ll take the other.”

Stone considered this. It was obvious from his face that he too wanted to go up the shaft. Finally, he deferred to their youth. “Keep me posted.” Then he whispered to Harry, “And watch my lobbyist friend.”

Harry nodded and said, “If they get by us, don’t let them get by you.”

Stone gripped the pistol Harry had given him. “They won’t. But keep in mind that what goes up doesn’t necessarily come down. Or at least all the way down.”

As the two men prepared to go inside the shaft, Stone took out his phone and punched in the number. He spoke for one minute. When he clicked off he said, “Good luck.”

* * *

Annabelle looked desperately around the room after her call from Stone. He had filled her in on recent developments, which had only heightened her anxiety in having still not located Alex Ford.

She felt a hand on her arm and almost screamed.

It was Bob, the man she had come with.

“Been looking for you. Have someone I want to introduce you to.”

Annabelle caught her breath and said, “I really hope it’s the VP. Been dying to meet him.”

Bob smiled. “Then it’s your lucky day, Annabelle. Just don’t use the ‘dying’ word around him. Gets the Secret Service in a tizzy.”

She looked at him. “This is so exciting.” But she was thinking, You really have no idea how exciting.

“Hey, stick with me, I’ll take you places.” He gripped her by the elbow and propelled her forward.

They turned the corner and there was the VP.

And on his right-hand side was Alex Ford.

When Alex’s gaze caught on her, his lips parted and his eyes widened. Her panicked look immediately drew his suspicion.

But Bob stepped forward. “Mr. Vice President, I would like you to meet my new best friend, Annabelle Conroy.”

The nation’s second in command held out his hand, his smile wide and inviting. “Ms. Conroy, let me just warn you about this guy. Watch yourself around him.”

Bob laughed. Annabelle managed a titter. She glanced at Alex. He was staring directly at her.

She said, “I know this is silly, sir, but can I take a picture? I have my phone. I can take it myself. I know this is a fund-raiser and I’m probably supposed to be charged for a photo, but it really would mean the world to me.”

The vice president smiled more broadly. “I think we can make an exception.”

Annabelle slid out her phone, stood next to the vice president, held up the phone, and took a shot.

She stepped back and quickly hit some keys. “I’m just sending it to my mom. She’ll never believe this.” But she was actually typing a text. She hit send.

A few moments later Alex’s phone buzzed. Annabelle stared directly at him and then her gaze dropped to his pocket where his phone was buzzing. He slid it out. On the screen he saw multiple missed calls from Annabelle. But the text was what drew his immediate attention.

Assassination attempt coming. Up abandoned shaft from bank. Oliver there. Go!

CHAPTER 12

Adam Chase cut out the last piece of drywall and insulation, and revealed to him was the back of an ordinary wall outlet with electrical lines running to it. He unscrewed the back of the box and handed it to the person next to him. He looked down at the other two people just below him and held a finger to his mouth. He leaned in close and peered between the slits of the outlet plate on the other side of the wall.

He saw people’s ankles and legs at first. When he peered up he saw torsos, and then heads.

He registered on one torso and one head and he couldn’t help but smile. His inside source had been worth every penny. It was fortunate for him that political events like this were so heavily scripted while trying mightily to seem impromptu. But they were organized down to the second and, most importantly, location. It was photo op time and the photo ops, according to the event schedule, were to take place in this very room for the next thirty minutes.

He used duct tape to attach the canister to the back of the wall and pointed one end of it inside the outlet slot. The person beside him cut the duct tape with scissors so as to make no noise and handed the strips to Chase.

They worked away until the canister was solidly supported. The other person checked a small electronic box attached to the canister and then hit a switch on the box. It instantly powered up and he gave Chase a thumbs-up.

Chase placed one last bit of duct tape near the nozzle of the canister, ensuring that it remained directly pointed through the outlet slot. He gave it a pat and smiled.

Then he looked at the other three people with him and pointed down.

They started to descend.

They wanted to be nowhere near this place when it happened. No sane person would.

* * *

Many feet below, Robie put a hand on Harry’s arm and pointed up. Harry looked up and saw a rope dangling barely five feet above his head. He looked at Robie. Both men drew their weapons and continued their climb up the exposed steel girders.

The two groups met just above the fourth floor, one ascending and the other descending. It was a memorable collision.

Adam Chase and his team had superior numbers. But they had been surprised.

Harry and Robie had not.

The few extra seconds this allowed Harry and Robie cost Chase’s team dearly.

Chase cried out and slipped the remote from his pocket. He pointed it upward and was a sliver from pressing the button when it happened.

Two rounds fired by Robie hit him in the head and heart.

Chase’s team had been using ropes and pulleys to more efficiently descend after stringing the block and tackle across two girders higher up. The dead Chase hung from one of the ropes for a moment before his grip failed as he died. His body and the remote sailed past Robie and Harry, bouncing off the walls twice before he hit the floor inside the bank with a thud.

A shot blew past Robie’s head and smacked into the wall, where it stayed.

Harry drilled the shooter right through his optics lens.

Another body fell.

However, this time was different. The falling body hit Harry, causing him to lose his grip. He fell off the girder and would have also plummeted to his death, if an iron grip had not encircled his wrist.

He looked up to see Robie holding on to him, his other hand gripping one of the ropes that dangled down.

Suspended in midair, Harry started to swing back and forth using Robie as his fulcrum until his feet once more touched a metal girder. He regained his balance and breathed a sigh of relief.

Both men looked up, their guns pointed in the same direction.

“Shit,” muttered Robie.

There was no one there.

* * *

Stone had seen the two bodies hit the floor of the shaft in the bank. His gun pointed at them and praying it was neither Harry nor the “lobbyist,” he ducked inside the shaft. He was vastly relieved to see that it was not either of them. He took the masks off, revealing two men. Though he didn’t know his name, one was Adam Chase. The other was a young man in his twenties. Stone checked the neck of the younger man but did not find what he was looking for.

He was alone in the bank right now. Reuben had led all the hostages out through the hole in the wall that connected to the public restroom in the outside corridor. The police and FBI had been summoned. Stone expected them on the scene at any moment.

Stone’s phone buzzed.

It was Harry.

He said, “We got two and missed two, Oliver.”

“So there were four total?”

“Yes. I saw them. Did you expect there to be?”

“Actually, yes.”

“I think the pair went out through the fourth floor. And whatever they were doing up there, I don’t think it happened. I’m going up there to make sure. The other guy you sent with me is following them out from up here.”

Stone clicked off and pushed aside the bodies until he saw it.

The remote.

He gingerly picked it up. It was battery-operated. He slipped the back off and took the batteries out.

Then Stone was on the move. He couldn’t leave through the bank entrance. He didn’t have the key and it was booby-trapped with C-4. So he left the same way Harry and Reuben had entered and the hostages had escaped—through the hole in the wall to the adjoining men’s room.

* * *

As soon as Alex Ford had gotten Annabelle’s text he had launched into full-scale protection mode. Alerting the other agents to the threat, they lifted the vice president off his feet and literally carried him out of the apartment, leaving the other guests stunned.

Annabelle said, “Everyone, please exit the apartment. Don’t run, don’t panic, just leave now.”

But of course everyone did panic. And everyone did run. Annabelle noted that her escort, Bob, trampled over two older women on his way out.

Annabelle helped the ladies to the door and ushered them out. She made sure the place was empty and then closed the door behind her.

* * *

The canister duct-taped to the back of the wall outlet remained silent, the remote meant to engage it safely neutralized. Two minutes later Harry Finn reached it. When he saw the label on the side, his eyes went wide. They had been lucky. Very lucky.

CHAPTER 13

Stone raced up the stairs to the fourth floor. When he reached it he slowed down and started watching. The people he was after had seen him back at the bank. He had not seen them. Well, actually he now knew he had seen one of them.

The bank manager had not been in the bank when the other hostages had been led out. That meant he had gone up the shaft with the other three gunmen, leaving the last man on the team down below.

That meant the bank manager was in on it, of course.

That’s why he had been taken out of the room. Not as a hostage, but as part of the assassination attempt.

Stone dropped back a bit when he saw Robie emerge from down one hallway. Robie looked quickly around, seemed to spot something, and darted off to the right.

Stone kept his gaze moving until it settled on some people nearing an exit door. The two men were dressed in suits. One was slightly larger than the other. They passed a woman pushing a stroller, startling her a bit in their haste.

Stone headed in that direction. His hand was on the butt of the pistol in his pocket. The two men were past the woman and nearly at the exit door. Stone picked up his speed.

The men were through the door.

Stone raced up behind the woman and said, “Please keep your hands in view. If you don’t I will shoot you.”

He pushed the muzzle of the gun into her back. “Do you understand?”

She nodded.

He stepped forward and looked down into the stroller. He drew the blanket back. Revealed inside it were climbing equipment, the clothes she had been wearing, and a machine pistol. The collapsible stroller must have been in the laundry cart they had pushed into the bank, along with the rest of their equipment.

Stone looked up at her and then glanced at her neck. “In your line of work, it’s not advisable to have such a distinctive tattoo. It sort of gives you away.”

* * *

Robie had come out on the fourth floor through a hole cut into a storage closet.

Despite what he had said to Stone earlier, Robie was very familiar with the mall. He had been reconnoitering the location for nearly a week. He couldn’t be sure his target wasn’t lying at the bottom of the shaft back at the bank. But now he had to make sure.

He slowed when he finally spotted the man hurrying down one of the mall walkways, no doubt seeking the nearest exit. He reached for the gun in his pocket.

Suddenly, the man looked back and saw Robie.

And then he started to run.

It was the bank manager.

The man raced down the stairs and into the underground parking garage.

Robie followed.

The men worked their way into the bowels of the place, which was perfectly fine with Robie. He had no need for witnesses.

They ended up in the equipment area on the very lowest level, well away from any cars and cameras.

From behind a support column the man yelled, “Who are you?”

Robie said nothing. He moved a bit closer, angling his approach to give him a sight line on the man.

The man fired a wild shot that clanged off an overhead pipe and embedded itself in the concrete wall.

“I have money. I can give you money,” the man called out.

Robie kept moving forward. He didn’t waste time or concentration on responding. He was in full predator mode.

“I have powerful friends,” cried the man. “They will kill you if you harm me.”

Robie moved to his left and then took a few paces forward. The man was doing him a favor by talking. It was allowing Robie to zero in on his position. The man was also not moving. Staying still in a situation like this pretty much ensured one’s death.

The man fired another shot. And then another. They both were wild and they both ended up stuck in concrete.

Robie kept moving forward and to the right. He had his position locked down now. It was just a matter of getting there.

“I will kill you!” screamed the man. “You are just a customer of the bank. I will kill you. Leave now and you will survive. This is your last warning. I am not to be intimidated.”

As he said this last part he looked up and saw Robie’s muzzle pointed at his head.

His eyes widened and a scream started up his throat.

It would never finish the journey.

One tap to the head, one to the heart.

The man fell forward onto the concrete, dead before he ever got there.

Robie straightened from his shooting stance, turned, and left.

Mission accomplished.

CHAPTER 14

“Sarin gas,” said Alex Ford as Stone, Annabelle, Caleb, Reuben, and Harry listened.

They were all seated around Stone’s fireplace in his cottage at Mt. Zion Cemetery.

Harry nodded. “I saw the canister in the shaft. Luckily they didn’t get a chance to turn it on.”

“They almost did,” said Annabelle. “According to what you said, Harry. It was close. He actually dropped the detonator.”

“He dropped it when the other guy shot him. He also saved my life. I got knocked off balance and lost my grip on the steel beam. I would’ve fallen except he grabbed my wrist.”

Harry looked over at Stone. “You two were in the bank together as hostages. Who was he?”

Stone shrugged. “I never got his name. He did have a gun that they confiscated.”

“So was he a cop?” asked Annabelle.

“He said he was a lobbyist,” replied Stone, but he tacked on a smile at the end of this statement.

Reuben said, “Whatever he was, what happened to him?”

Stone shrugged. “He apparently vanished into thin air.”

Reuben said, “You got the girl before she got away. But they found the bank manager’s body way down in the parking garage. Two shots. One to the head, one to the heart.”

“A professional kill,” opined Alex.

“How is the vice president?” Stone asked him, changing the subject.

“Shaken but okay.”

“And who were the assassins?” inquired Caleb.

“A mixed bag we’re still sorting out. One of the guys we found dead in the shaft is Adam Chase. Gun for hire. Do anything for money, including setting off nerve gas in a residential building. And those C-4 packs might have taken down the whole building if they had detonated.”

“Was that a backup in case the gas didn’t work?” asked Annabelle.

Alex nodded. “We think so. We’re still interrogating the sole survivor, the woman. We still haven’t identified her yet. She’s not in any database. We don’t know if it’s international terrorism or homegrown. Or it might be a combo because of what we’ve found out. And that’s a terrifying thought.”

“The bank manager?” said Reuben and Alex nodded. “Who was he?”

“Bashir Tufail. Pakistani. Came over here eight years ago. No criminal record. Honest, law-abiding citizen. At least as far as we can tell. I’ve heard some grumblings that our ‘friends’ at the CIA might know a lot more about him than we do, but they’re not sharing.”

“A cell? Planted here until he was activated?” said Harry. “To kill the VP?”

“We think so now. He’d been working at the bank for four years but at another location. He’s been volunteering to work Saturdays at that branch.”

“Because they knew the VP was going to that fund-raiser,” said Annabelle. “He was prepping for that.”

“That’s right.”

“And the CIA may know he was not so law-abiding,” mused Stone. “That’s interesting.”

Reuben eyed him keenly. “I recognize that look. What’s gotten in your bonnet?”

“Nothing,” said Stone. “I’m just relieved we all got out of there alive.”

“And a terrorist is no more,” said Caleb.

“No more,” repeated Stone.

* * *

After they all left, Stone was seated at his desk reading when he heard something at his door. He inserted his hand inside a secret crevice in his kneehole and pulled out his pistol. He crouched down, waiting.

And he could wait with the best of them. However, after thirty minutes passed and he heard nothing more he moved to the window and peered out. There was no one on his porch. But he did see a piece of paper tacked to the door.

He opened the door and ripped off the paper and unfolded it.

The message was terse and to the point. He would have expected nothing less.

You were not the target. Tufail was. Didn’t know what their plan was. Got lucky it happened while we were both there. You certainly lived up to your rep. And, by the way, I told Shane you said hello. He told me he’d like to see you and talk about old times. You up for it?

Stone looked up and gazed around the cemetery. Without seeing anything to tell him so, he instinctively knew he was being watched.

He slowly held up his thumb and mouthed the words, “I’m game.”

* * *

From a thousand yards away, Will Robie, himself a very patient man, lowered his long-range optics. He smiled and set off to deliver the message.

Will Robie and Jessica Reel have been assigned to work together on a new mission—one that may be more dangerous than anything they’ve ever faced before…

A preview of David Baldacci’s explosive new thriller, The Target, follows.

The men could not have looked more tense. It was as though the weight of the world rested on their shoulders.

Actually, it did.

The president of the United States sat at the end of the small table. They were in the White House Situation Room complex in the basement of the West Wing. Sometimes referred to as the “Woodshed,” the complex had been originated under President Kennedy after the Bay of Pigs fiasco. Kennedy no longer thought he could trust the military and wanted his own intelligence overseers who would parse the reports coming in from the Pentagon. The Truman bowling alley had been sacrificed to build the complex, which had then undergone a major renovation in 2006.

During Kennedy’s era a single analyst from the CIA would man the Situation Room in an unbroken twenty-hour shift, sleeping there as well. Later, the place had been expanded to include the Department of Homeland Security and the White House chief of staff’s office. However, the National Security Council staff ran the complex. Five “Watch Teams” comprised of thirty or so carefully vetted personnel operated the Situation Room on a 24/7 basis. Its primary goal was to keep the president and his senior staff briefed each day on important issues and to allow for instant and secure communications anywhere in the world. It even had a secure link to Air Force One in the event the president was traveling.

The Situation Room itself was large, with space for thirty or more participants and a large video screen on the wall. Mahogany had been the wood surface of choice before the renovation. Now the walls were composed mainly of “whisper” materials.

But tonight the men were not in the main conference room. Nor were they in the president’s briefing room. They were in a small conference room that had two video screens on the wall and a row of world time clocks above. There were chairs for six people.

Only three of them were occupied.

The president’s seat allowed him to look directly at the video screens. To his right was Josh Potter, the national security advisor. To his left was Evan Tucker, head of the CIA.

That was all. The circle of need-to-know was miniscule. But there would be a fourth person joining them in a moment by secure video link. The regular staff in the Situation Room had been walled off from this meeting and the coming communication. There was only one person handling the transmission. And even that person would not be privy to what was said.

The VP would normally have been part of such a meeting. However, if what they were planning went awry, he might be taking over the top spot because the president could very well be impeached. They had to keep him out of the loop. It would be terrible for the country if the president had to leave office. It would be catastrophic if the VP were forced out too. The Constitution dictated that the top spot would then go to the Speaker of the House of Representatives. And no one wanted the head of what could very well be the most dysfunctional group in Washington to be suddenly running the country.

The president cleared his throat and said, “This could be momentous or it could be Armageddon.”

Potter nodded, as did Tucker. The president looked at the CIA head.

“This is rock solid, Evan?”

“Rock solid, sir. In fact, not to toot our horn, but this is the prize for nearly three years of intelligence work with our British friends under the most difficult conditions imaginable. It has, frankly, never been done before.”

The president nodded and looked at the clocks above the screens. He checked his watch against them and made a small adjustment to his own timepiece. It looked as though he had aged five years in the last five minutes. All American presidents had to make many gut-wrenching decisions. In many ways, the demands of the position were simply beyond the ability of a mere mortal to carry them out. But it was one person’s job and that one person had to act.

He let out a long breath and said, “This had better work.”

Potter said, “Agreed, sir.”

“It will work,” insisted Tucker. “And the world will be much better for it.” He added, “I have a professional bucket list, sir, and this is number two on it, right behind Iran. And in some ways, it should be number one on my list.”

Potter said, “Because of the nukes.”

“Of course,” said Tucker. “Iran wants nukes. These assholes already have them. With delivery capabilities that are inching closer and closer to our mainland. Now, if we pull this off, believe me, Tehran will sit up and take notice. Maybe we kill two birds with one stone.”

The president put up a hand. “I know the story, Evan. I’ve read all the briefings. I know what hangs in the balance.”

The screen flickered and a voice came over the speaker system embedded in the wall. “Mr. President, the transmission is ready.”

The president unscrewed the top of a water bottle sitting in front of him and took a long drink. He put the bottle back down. “Do it,” he said curtly.

The screen flickered once more and then came fully to life. They were staring at a man short in stature, in his sixties, with a tanned face, deeply lined. There was a rim of white near his hairline where the cap he normally wore helped to block the sun. But he was not in uniform now. He was dressed in a gray tunic with a high, stiff collar.

He stared directly at them.

Evan Tucker said, “Thank you for agreeing to communicate with us tonight, General Pak.”

Pak nodded and said, in halting but clearly enunciated English, “It is good to meet, face-to-face, as it were.” He smiled, showing off highly polished veneers.

The president attempted to smile back, but his heart was not in it. He knew that Pak would lose his life if exposed.

“We appreciate the level of cooperation received,” said the president.

Pak nodded. “Our goals are the same, Mr. President. No more axis of evil nomenclature. Freedom and being a productive member of the international community—that is the goal. For too long we have been isolated. It is time for us to take our seat at the world’s table. We owe it to our people.”

Tucker said encouragingly, “Those are truly inspirational words, General Pak.”

“Details are progressing nicely,” said Pak. “I hope to be able to report to you soon that they are complete. Then you can commence your part in this. Do you have operatives in mind? You must send the best you have. Even with my help, the target is a very tough one, as you are well aware.”

The president glanced at Tucker and then back at Pak. “We do, General. Our best. We would send nothing less for something of this magnitude.”

“Very wise. Neither would I, Mr. President.” Pak held up a single finger. “This will be the number of opportunities we will have. No more, no less.”

Potter said, “And we are sure of both the intelligence and the support?”

“Absolutely sure. We have shared that with your people and they have confirmed the same.”

Potter glanced at Tucker, who nodded.

“If it is discovered…” said Pak. They all became riveted on him. “If it becomes discovered,” said Pak again, “I cannot impress upon each of you enough how calamitous the consequences will be. I will surely lose my life. And America, your loss will be far greater.”

He looked the president directly in the eye and took a few moments to compose his words carefully.

“It is why I asked for this video conference, Mr. President. I will be sacrificing not only my life, but the lives of my family as well. That is the way here, you see. So, I need your complete and absolute assurance that if we move forward, we do so together and united, no matter what might happen. I need you to look me in the eye and tell me this is so.”

The blood seemed to drain from the face of the president. He had made many important decisions during his term, but none so stressful or potentially momentous as this one.

He didn’t look at either Potter or Tucker before answering. He kept his gaze on Pak. “You have my word,” he said in a strong, clear voice.

Pak smiled, showing off the perfect teeth again. “That is what I needed to hear. Together then.” He saluted the president, who gave a crisp one in return.

Tucker hit a button on the console in front of him and the screen went black once more.

The president let out an audible breath and sat back against the leather of his seat. He was sweating though the room was cool. He wicked a drop of moisture off his forehead. What they were proposing to do was quite clearly illegal and thus an impeachable offense. And unlike the other presidents impeached before him, he had no doubt the Senate would convict him.

“Into the breach rode the five hundred,” the president said in barely a whisper, but both Potter and Tucker heard it and nodded in agreement.

The president leaned forward and looked squarely at Tucker.

“There is no margin of error. None. And if there is the least hint of this coming out—”

“Sir, that will not happen. This is the first time we’ve ever had an asset placed that high over there. There was an attempt on the leadership last year, as you know. While he was traveling on the street in the capital. But it was botched. A traffic police officer intervened and the whole plan fell apart. But that was from low-level external sources and had nothing to do with us. Our strike will be quick and clean. And it will succeed.”

“And you have your team in place?’

“Being assembled. Then they’ll be vetted.”

The president looked sharply at him. “Vetted? Who the hell are you planning to use?”

“Will Robie and Jessica Reel.”

Potter sputtered, “Robie and Reel?’

“They are the absolute best we have,” said Tucker. “Look what they did with Ahmadi.”

Potter eyed Tucker closely. He knew every detail of that mission. So he knew that neither Reel nor Robie were intended to survive it.

The president said slowly, “But with Reel’s background. What you allege she did. The possibility of her going—”

Tucker broke in. Normally, this would be unheard of. You let the president speak. But tonight Tucker seemed to be operating on a plane that did not recognize the obvious. He seemed to see and hear only what he wanted to.

“They are the best, sir, and the best is what we need here. As I said, with your permission, they will be vetted to ensure that their performance will be the best ever. However, if they fail the vetting I have another team, up to the task of performing the mission, but the clear preference is not the B squad.”

Potter said, “But, still, why not simply deploy them? Then this vetting process becomes unnecessary.”

Tucker looked at the president. “We really need to do it this way, sir, for a number of reasons. Reasons which I’m sure you can readily see.”

Tucker had prepared for this moment for weeks. He had studied the president’s history, his time as commander in chief, and even gotten his hands on an old psychological profile of the man done while he was running for Congress many years ago. The president was smart, accomplished, but not that smart, and not that accomplished. That meant he had a chip on his shoulder. Thus he was reluctant to acknowledge that he was not always the smartest, most informed person in the room. Some would see that attribute as a strength. Tucker knew it to be a serious vulnerability ripe for exploitation.

And he was exploiting it right now.

The president nodded. “Yes, yes, I can see that.”

Tucker’s face remained impassive, but inwardly he breathed a sigh of relief.

The president leaned forward. “I respect Robie and Reel. But again, there is no margin of error here, Evan. So you vet the hell out of them and make damn sure they are absolutely ready for this. Or you use the B Team. Are we clear?”

“Crystal,” said Tucker.

The Target

Coming in April 2014

About the Author

David Baldacci is one of the world’s favorite storytellers. His books are published in over forty-five languages and in more than eighty countries, with over 110 million copies in print. Baldacci is also the cofounder, along with his wife, of the Wish You Well Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting literacy efforts across America. Still a resident of his native Virginia, he invites you to visit him at www.DavidBaldacci.com and his foundation at www.WishYouWellFoundation.org, and to look into its program to spread books across America at www.FeedingBodyandMind.com.

Also by David Baldacci

Absolute Power

Total Control

The Winner

The Simple Truth

Saving Faith

Wish You Well

Last Man Standing

The Christmas Train

Split Second

Hour Game

The Camel Club

The Collectors

Simple Genius

Stone Cold

The Whole Truth

Divine Justice

First Family

True Blue

Deliver Us from Evil

Hell’s Corner

The Sixth Man

One Summer

Zero Day

The Innocent

The Forgotten

The Hit

King and Maxwell

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Table of Contents

1. Cover

2. Title Page

3. Welcome

4. CHAPTER 1

5. CHAPTER 2

6. CHAPTER 3

7. CHAPTER 4

8. CHAPTER 5

9. CHAPTER 6

10. CHAPTER 7

11. CHAPTER 8

12. CHAPTER 9

13. CHAPTER 10

14. CHAPTER 11

15. CHAPTER 12

16. CHAPTER 13

17. CHAPTER 14

18. A Preview from The Target

19. About the Author

20. Also by David Baldacci

21. Newsletter

22. Copyright

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

Copyright © 2014 by Columbus Rose, Ltd.

Excerpt from The Target copyright ©2014 by Columbus Rose, Ltd.

Cover design by Flag

Cover photograph © Caspar Benson / Getty Images

Cover copyright © 2014 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.

All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher is unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at permissions@hbgusa.com. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

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First ebook edition: February 2014

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ISBN 9781455557288

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