Designated Survivor (17 page)

Grace turned and headed back towards the ramp, staying close to Building 18 now to cut the chance of being seen from a window. Levi now followed him from 20 feet back. At the short wall above the ramp he looked down to watch for any lights and saw none. He motioned with his left hand that he was going down. Levi went around the outside of the retaining wall then did a 180 and proceeded down into the darkness below the building. Grace waited ten seconds and when he heard nothing followed him down.

The lightless garage was the top of three levels. No electricity ran to the building and the stillness of the structure was palpable. There are noises that buildings make, that you generally don’t pay any attention to, humming of air conditioners, the buzz coming from florescent lights. They both reached up and pulled the black balaclavas down over their faces to keep their faces from reflecting any light that might reach them, possibly giving them away. Once all the way down the ramp they made the left turn into the garage. A small amount of ambient light filtered in from the streetlights above through the metal grates at ground level that let exhaust fumes escape. Levi went left and Grace right as they worked themselves through the garage, feet moving slowly to keep from tripping over cement parking medians or accidentally kicking a discarded soda can. Once they both reached the far wall and the steel door that would take them to the stairs they regrouped.

Grace motioned he’d go in first and Levi didn’t argue. Grace grabbed the handle and slowly pushed the heavy thumb latch down. A quiet “clunk” was heard as the bolt slid back into the door. He pulled and Levi grabbed the edge of the door with his gloved left hand to make sure it didn’t slam shut. Once open enough, Grace slipped through the gap. Levi went around the door and came in behind him and kept both hands on the rusted metal until it was rested back against the frame.

They followed their process of moving through the darkness, opening doors and closing them and pausing regularly to listen for noises until they reached the first floor then stopped when they heard the first signs of life. Voices came from one floor up, and flashes of light from a battery powered lantern splashed across the wall to the stairs. They both knew that as long as they could hear the voices, the chances of being heard were lower. It was when everything went silent they needed to really worry and pull their weapons.

The two men looked at each other and nodded. Grace began the ascent up the stairs, keeping his back to the wall to avoid casting shadows from the dancing light. With each step he could hear the voices more clearly and he knew that the five terrorists were not far away. He reached the point where his head would come up above floor level and moved very slowly, keeping his chin tucked to his chest to stop light from reflecting off his eyes, the only part of his face not covered by the balaclava. His head broke the plain of the stairs by five inches and he got his first look at the men on the second floor.

They sat on upside down plastic work buckets and the floor. The LED lantern was on the floor in the middle of their circle. Grace could smell the pepperoni and cheese pizza and the distinct odor of cheap domestic beer.

Good, he thought. Their reactions are slowed from drinking.

He went shape to shape, counting the bodies to account for all of the men they knew of.

He put his hand into his pocket and carefully brought out the black pouch he’d taken from the Honda, opened it, and pulled out a two by three inch square box that Holden had built out of high impact plastic then covered with duct tape and dirt. Grace leaned forward onto his knee on the third step down from the second floor and stretched his body out then reached his arm out and placed the box on the floor just around the corner from the stairs. He moved back down the stairs and the two men made their way back through the building, the parking garage and to the street.

“Did you just put a mic in there?” Levi said.

“I did. Holden put it together for me earlier,” Grace said. He sent another message to Ben to begin monitoring the cellphone-based bug.

“There were more than five men in there, weren’t there?” Levi said.

“Yup,” Grace said. “I counted at least eight, could have been more in the shadows or sleeping.”

CHAPTER 30

The morning light came through the east window of the third floor of Building 18. Arash Abbasi was already awake and going through the day’s plans in his head. It had only been two days since he considered leaving the contract behind and getting on the next flight out of the country. In his opinion the mission had gone according to plan. He’d been hired to infiltrate the United States Capitol and plant the explosives that would be used to bring the House of Representatives to the ground. He wasn’t hired to kill the president or Congress or the Supreme Court. His job was done. He’d handed the code to the detonator to his client in person. He stayed with his team in D.C. only to confuse the investigation that would follow. The first thing the FBI would do was search airline manifests for any foreign nationals that had left the country in the days and weeks preceding the explosion.

But his client didn’t see it the same way and 50 percent of the money due to him was still in a holding account in the Cayman Islands. Nothing else would be transferred to him until the client was satisfied. The rules were changing and he had no choice but to follow if he wanted the rest of his money. He had eight men left that he had to pay, though he’d several times considered killing them and keeping the money for himself. It would be safer, cleaner. Eight men is a lot of opportunity for secrets to be spilled.

He heard heavy footfalls running up the cement stairs. He stood up from his blanket spread on the cold, linoleum floor to be ready for whatever news was so important to bother him. Efraim Khouri came to the door along with Ormand Baasch, a German mercenary Abbasi had come across while working a contract in Russia two years earlier. They stood outside the doorframe, waiting for him to speak first.

“What is it?” Abbasi said.

“We found something,” Khouri said. He glanced to the tall man beside him. “Ormand found something.”

“And what did you find, Ormand?” Abbasi said.

The German’s English was flawless, having perfected the accent in his teens watching American television shows. The team came from six different countries so they spoke English to each other. “A bug. It appears to be a microphone hidden inside a taped up box.”

Arash Abbasi turned and looked out the window, multiple layers of dirt and grime filtered the winter light. He had seen the shadow on the stairs the night before as his men talked and laughed and ate their pizza and the non-Muslims drank their beer. He had seen the shape of a head looking out over the edge of the stairs at them, the light from their electric lanterns casting enough of a glow to silhouette the shape against the slanted stairwell ceiling behind the figure. At the time he wasn’t sure if it was a vagrant looking for his sleeping place for the night, a respite from the cold D.C. sidewalks, or something more nefarious. The thought had crossed his mind that it was the man who had taken his second in charge, Efraim Khouri, but he believed if it had been that man he wouldn’t have come in and left quietly. Guns would have been fired and blood would have been shed.

He’d not alerted his men to the intruder, truly believing it had been one of the District’s many homeless and not wishing to kill a man already at the lowest rung of the society in this country. To him it was better to leave alone the counterpart to the excess that America craved, an eyesore to the luxury car driving heathens. Though he didn’t consider himself an Iranian anymore, choosing instead to relate as Persian, he did find truth in some of the Ayatollah’s rhetoric.

“Thank you,” Abbasi said. “Speak quietly to the rest of the men and inform them to keep their voices low. I’ll be down in a moment.”

The men left, confused at the lack of concern over being bugged. Abbasi had more important things on his mind. Breaking with every unwritten rule of their trade, he was to meet, face to face, with his client again. It was not something he wanted to do but it had been made clear it was a requirement of receiving the rest of his funds. Abbasi intended to demand more money if there was to be another act to their mission. If the increased fee was refused, he had decided to kill the client right there and be on an airplane out of the country within an hour. He grew restless, as did the men who followed him, sitting in hiding.

He turned from the window and went down the stairs where the men were staring at the small, duct taped box that sat on the floor beside the top of the stairwell to the next level down. Abbasi motioned to Khouri who joined him directly above the bug, and spoke in Farsi, a language he knew he had in common with Khouri.

CHAPTER 31

“Have you been up all night?” Grace walked into the workroom to find Ben Murray sitting at his desk, a row of empty paper coffee cups lined up to the edge.

“Most of it,” Ben said. “I started getting the signal from your bug. Picked up several voices. I listened for a while but they weren’t talking about anything of interest so I set up a voice activated recorder to kick on whenever there was anything other than ambient noise.”

“Did it get anything?” Grace said.

“Shows activity a few times then more consistent at about six o’clock this morning for 20 minutes,” Ben said. “But it sounded like Farsi so I haven’t listened to all of it.”

“Get it on a drive and I’ll review it,” Grace said. His training with the NSA and CIA had given him a level of comfort with understanding Farsi though he couldn’t speak it well at all.

“I got ID’s on a few more of the faces from the video, too,” Ben said. “Their backgrounds are all in line with what we already have.”

“I doubt you’re going to find any tax accountants on there,” Grace stopped to look at the faces matched with the details of their pasts. “That one,” he pointed. “Saw him last night. Maybe some of the others. It was pretty dark.”

A red light began to blink on the wall by the door and was accompanied by a buzzing sound.

“We have company,” Grace said. “Pull up the exterior cameras.”

Ben tapped some buttons and brought up the feed from the security system on the outside of the building. A black GMC Yukon was coming down the dirt drive from the street.

“That’s unexpected,” Grace turned and left the room and went down the stairs and hit the red button to open the garage door. The GMC pulled in and he closed the door behind it. With his hand on the grip of his Glock he stood behind the SUV as the back right door opened and Derek Arrington stepped out. Grace let his gun go and walked up to his boss. “What the hell are you doing here?”

“Nice to see you, too,” Arrington said. “I needed out of the ETTF for a while and wanted to see what you’ve come up with. Looks like you haven’t done much with the place.”

Arrington began to follow Grace and saw Holden and Avery cleaning and packing weapons into large black cases.

“What are they up to?” Arrington said.

“Moving day is coming,” Grace said. “Can’t stay here anymore.”

“Why?” Arrington said.

The men went upstairs and Grace and Ben briefed the NSA director on the events of the last 24 hours, the men they had identified and the infiltration of their building by the terrorists.

“Arash Abbasi was in this building?” Arrington said. “And you let him go?”

“Yup,” Grace said. “That’s why we gotta leave Buzzard Point. The building is burned.”

“Abbasi is wanted on at least a dozen charges in six countries,” Arrington said. “And is obviously behind the attack on the Capitol, and he just walked in and out of your building?”

“He did,” Grace said. “But we tracked him and have eyes on him as well.”

“You should have apprehended or killed him,” Arrington let his usual coolness fade while he paced the room.

“That would have slowed things down, not stopped them,” Grace said. “If he’s still here, and still has as many men with him as we think he does then there’s another act. If we’d nabbed him yesterday we’d still be in the dark about what’s happening. A man like Abbasi doesn’t talk.”

Arrington shook his head, his back to his top operator. “What have you gotten?” he said.

Grace knew Arrington was under pressure to show progress to the president.

“I was just about to listen to this morning’s conversations, but what I do know is we have at least eight terrorists all holed up in DC. I don’t know if they’re awaiting orders or have already implemented them.”

“Just find out,” Arrington said. “Langley is at least ten steps behind you. We have a chance to shine on this one. Richard Graham is breathing down my neck and keeps pushing the president to shut you down.”

“What? Why?” Grace said. “Did I ruffle his feathers that badly?”

“No idea. I think he’s just trying to stay visible in the commotion to be noticed for a better placement in the future. I overheard him pushing to get read in on all security updates.”

“You think he wants the CIA?” Grace said.

“CIA?” Arrington said. “Leighton is doing just fine.”

“Yeah, but he’s looking to retire by end of the year,” Grace said.

“Where’d you hear that?” Arrington said.

“He told me a couple months ago when I was having dinner at his house,” Grace said. “His wife wants them to relocate down to the coast in North Carolina.”

“You had dinner at his house?” Arrington said.

“Sure. The salmon was incredible,” Grace said.

Arrington just stared at Grace then moved on. “I don’t know what Graham wants, I just know he’s annoying the hell out of everyone.”

“The Explorer is moving,” Ben said. Grace and Arrington stepped over to watch the tracker on the large computer screen.

“What are you up to now?” Grace watched closely then dialed Netty’s phone and she answered. “Anything else going on at the building?”

“The SUV left. Looked full,” Netty was sitting in the Honda with Holden watching Building 18. “Several other guys left on foot and got in a white work van that was parked a block up Georgia Avenue.”