man by himself, against the explicit orders of the unit’s commanding general.
“They found Stojanovic two days later. He was sitting in a chair, his throat cut from ear to ear.
There were three dead bodyguards in the house, each shot twice in the head.”
The tingle started to ease its way up the taut muscles of her back, but it wasn’t the story. The
story did not bother her, could not break through her defenses. “And this was in 1995? I
thought he didn’t leave the army until 2001.”
“He didn’t. There wasn’t enough evidence to court-martial him, and there wasn’t a lot of
support for it, either, let me tell you. There was a preliminary hearing, but it didn’t go far. All the
soldiers that were interviewed covered for him. Up until that point, Kealey was a hell of a
soldier; his evaluations were nothing less than stellar. There was already talk about giving him a
company command, but that incident fucked it all up.” Hale laughed, shaking his head. “Excuse
my language. You spend enough time around the troops, that’s what happens.”
Naomi gave an understanding smile and pointed at his beer. “I think I will have one of those, if
you don’t mind.”
The old soldier hopped to his feet. “Sure, I could go for another myself.” When he went into the
house, she was left alone with her thoughts. My God, what kind of man is he? He had risked his
life, thrown away a promising career, all over a little girl who he didn’t even know… Who would
go to those lengths? Although she couldn’t appreciate the sentiment in his actions, she
recognized that Kealey had risen once more in her regard.
Hale was back out the door, handing her a beer. Reclining in his chair, he took another long pull
and looked out across the grassy field. Only the very tip of the red sun was visible; it almost
looked as though the horizon was on fire. Turning to look at him, Naomi noticed a thoughtful
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expression on the man’s face.
“You know, Bosnia was Ryan’s last assignment before he came under my command at Bragg.
Obviously, the rumors about him had already drifted my way before he first came into my office
to report for duty. In the military, everybody has a story and everybody likes to embellish the
facts. It’s easy to conjure up some history because no one knows if it’s a lie or not, and there’s no
way to find out. But I wanted to know, so I asked him straight up — ‘Did you kill those four
people in Bosnia?’”
Naomi waited expectantly. “And?”
The general turned toward her. His face was hard to read. “Ryan didn’t say anything. He just
stood up, saluted, and walked out. That was when I knew it was true.”
Naomi shivered again, but the air was still… She was glad that she had taken the time to see
Hale. The deputy director would never have given her access to this kind of information. For
some reason, she really wanted to know the name of the little girl. It seemed important.
“General, there was something else, wasn’t there? Something that happened between March and
Kealey—”
The general’s head whipped around. “Where did you hear that name?”
“It came up between the deputy director and Kealey,” she said quietly. “In connection with the
death of Senator Levy and the bombing of the Kennedy-Warren.”
Hale’s eyes were closed, his face pale. Naomi noticed that his hands were gripped tightly around
the edge of his seat. For a panicked instant, she thought he might be having a heart attack. Then
his breathing eased and his iron grip on the chair loosened.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “It’s just been a long time since anyone’s brought it up…”
“Who is he, General?” she asked softly.
“Please, call me Peter.” His hand moved to wipe the shocked expression from his face. It
seemed like an eternity before he spoke again. “Ryan Kealey became part of my 3rd Special
Forces Group just after he left Bosnia, in November of 1995. It was nearly two years before he
was sent into the field again. During that time, he was the CO of ODA 304.”
“ODA? What does that mean?” Naomi asked.
“Operational Detachment Alpha. It’s Special Forces nomenclature — almost everything in the
army has some type of acronym. Anyway, he was honing his skills as a leader, getting the troops
ready. Everything was great for a while, I had no trouble with anyone in his company. They were
the best I had, even though Kealey bitched all the time because I wouldn’t deploy his unit. I
wanted him to get his head right, though; that’s why I kept him at Bragg. After a while, he came
to me with a complaint about one of his sergeants.”
“The sergeant was March?”
Hale nodded. “He was the platoon sergeant. At first, I was a little skeptical, because he couldn’t
point out what the specific problem was. I mean, Jason March was a hell of an NCO. He didn’t
have a college degree, otherwise I would have pushed him kicking and screaming into Officer
Candidate School. He was a little arrogant, but all leaders have self-confidence… Anyway, I just
didn’t buy into what Kealey was saying. Even he was embarrassed to bring it up, because it
didn’t sound like much.”
“What did he say?” Naomi’s voice was a gentle probe, almost seductive in cadence and tone.
The general hesitated for a moment. “He said that March never showed any emotion.” He
registered Naomi’s reaction and recognized it as his own eight years earlier. “I know, I know. It
doesn’t sound like a serious problem. That’s what I thought at the time. But if you think about it,
you might understand what that means. For a young soldier in peacetime, the military is not a
difficult life. You do what you’re told, show a little respect to your superiors, and take some
interest in your job. Anyone can do it. As you gain rank, though, the responsibility grows
exponentially, while the pay does not. Now you find yourself held accountable for the lives and
well-being of the soldiers under your command… With the responsibility comes stress, and with
the stress comes the occasional outburst. Anything else is unnatural.”
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“Obviously, I’ve never been in the military, but that doesn’t sound like enough,” she said.
“No, you’re right. It’s not enough. Ryan also told me about the strange expressions that would
come over March’s face, and about the fact that he lived off base but no one had ever seen his
quarters. To be honest, my opinion of Kealey dropped after this little speech. I mean, it sounded
paranoid and more than a little unsubstantiated.”
Naomi could see the pain flicker in the man’s eyes.
“He was right, though. I should have listened to him. I finally deployed Kealey’s unit in the fall
of 1997. It was in response to the bombing of the Khobar Towers in Dhahran in 1996. If you
remember, nineteen U.S. airmen were killed in the attack and Hezbollah claimed responsibility.
It took a while, months of gathering intelligence, but we were finally able to pinpoint the
architect of the attack: Mohammed Khalil. He had been granted political asylum by Syria, and
was shacked up in a house on the Mediterranean coast.
“I needed the best because we only had one shot at it, so I gave Ryan’s unit the go-ahead. It’s
called direct action, a mission that results in the capture or death of enemy combatants. It’s
usually the last thing SF is called in to do, but it’s important. March was in an overwatch
position. He was the only one on the squad to have completed the sniper school at Benning, so
he was up on the ridge with the next-best marksman in the unit. It was going to send a message,
it would have counted for something… March was supposed to take out the car with Khalil
inside, and then notify the team on the ground. Instead, he shot the second sniper and fired on
the unit as they came down the hill.”
Naomi couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “They were all killed?”
“All except the captain. The extraction team, which was the other half of the twelve-man
detachment, arrived twenty minutes after they lost radio contact. They didn’t know what had
gone wrong until later, but they pulled Kealey out with a bad chest wound and a punctured lung.
It’s a miracle he survived as long as he did. They found a lot of blood at March’s position,
decided that he would probably bleed out, and that was it.”
“So you just assumed he was dead?”
“There was pressure on us to do it that way. With no witnesses, nobody to dispute our version
of events, we avoided a potentially huge problem. Until now, that is.”
“Until now.”
Naomi could hardly see Peter Hale, the dark having eased through the tiny holes in the screened
walls, discreetly covering the porch with a black shroud. His disembodied voice reached out to
her through the cool night air, along with the gentle chirps of crickets hidden among the long
blades of grass.
“If Harper is sending you after him, then I hope you’re ready. If you miss him once, he won’t
give you a second chance. You should count yourself lucky to have Ryan on your side, but
remember what you’re up against… Whatever happens, don’t let March get his hands on you.
Believe me, that’s the last thing you want.”
She felt a distinct ripple of fear run through her body in response to the general’s last words. The
fear pushed through her imagined wall of stoicism and touched her deep enough to leave her
with a cold feeling that lingered in the pit of her stomach. For Naomi Kharmai, the fear was a
new and unwelcome sensation.
Thanking him quietly for the beer and the information, she rose and pushed past the screen
door. It squeaked angrily on its rusty hinges as she disappeared out into the empty space beyond
the elevated porch.
CHAPTER 11
WASHINGTON, D.C.
Jonathan Harper’s elegant brownstone was located in DuPont Circle on historic General’s Row.
The line of town houses had been constructed in the late-1800s and given to former Union army
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generals in lieu of a pension, the federal government finding itself somewhat short on funds at
the time. The buildings had admirably withstood the ravages of time, towering over the narrow
street below, just as they had more than a hundred years earlier.
Surprisingly, it was not difficult for Ryan to find a place to park his car on the street. As he
walked with Katie up the front steps, he found himself wondering if Harper took advantage of
his influence to ensure that the Metro PD kept the curb in front of his home clear of vehicles.
Ryan knew that he would do the same if he were in the DDO’s position. They were greeted
warmly at the door by Julie Harper, a short, slightly overweight woman whom Ryan had known
and liked for as long as he had her husband. He introduced the two women and moved
gratefully into the warm interior of the house. Jonathan was waiting for them in the dining room.
“Ryan, that face looks terrible.” Turning to Katie, he said, “It must be embarrassing for you to
be seen with him.”
Katie smiled and hooked her arm into Ryan’s, pulling against him playfully. “Absolutely,” she
said. “I’ve started walking a few steps behind so people won’t know we’re together.”
Harper laughed as Kealey sent a rueful grin in his direction. “John, this is Katie Donovan. Katie,
John Harper. He’s the deputy director over at Langley — my boss, in other words.”
Jonathan shook hands with her warmly. “Thank you for coming. Ryan talks about you all the
time. It’s starting to affect his work, not that he ever did too much in the first place.”
Katie laughed as Julie emerged from the kitchen with the first of several steaming dishes in her
arms.
The food was delicious, a light meal of grilled lemon chicken with baked potatoes, a fresh salad,
and French bread, all served with cold white wine. The talk across the table became easier and
more animated as the night wore on and another bottle of wine was consumed. Long after the
meal concluded, the two women wandered off to the living room with Julie clutching a third
bottle, giggling softly at a shared joke.
Jonathan laughed as they walked away, shaking his head. “They certainly seem to be getting
along.” Kealey smiled in agreement. His host lifted his glass and stood up. “I need to go over a
few things with you,” he said. “Let’s talk upstairs.”
Ryan followed Harper up to the second-floor study. The walls were paneled in dark mahogany,
a large part of the space consumed by an immense desk of burnished wood centered on a fading
Persian rug. Taking a seat in one of two comfortable leather armchairs, Jonathan noticed the
look on his friend’s face and smiled knowingly.
“I know, it’s a lot different from the rest of the house,” he said. “I needed at least one room
without floral décor and rose-patterned wallpaper. You might have the same problem if you’re
not careful.”
Ryan laughed. “You might be right about that.”
“She seems like a great girl. I’m glad you brought her.”
“It was the least I could do. She flew in from Maine just to see me after the bombing. It’s been
four days, though; I think she’s starting to get tired of being cooped up in the hotel all day.”
“It’s the safest place for her, Ryan. They bumped up the threat level again, you know; we’re at
red now, a ‘severe’ risk of terrorist activity, whatever the hell that means. You should probably
just send her home.”
Kealey shrugged. “I like having her around, and I’m worried about her being at the house all
alone. Besides, she already called the university and dropped her classes for the semester. I tried
to talk her out of it, but she said she needed a break anyway. I can hardly send her back to Maine
now.”
“Yeah, well…” All of a sudden, Harper looked uncomfortable. Ryan wondered why, but the
other man had already changed the subject. “Listen, I want your opinion on something. What do
you think about adding March to the Bureau’s list of Most Wanted Terrorists? The idea keeps
popping up.”
The younger man shook his head immediately. “You said it yourself, John. That would cause a
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huge uproar in the media and it probably won’t get you any closer to catching him. There’s no
way you can do that quietly.”
Harper took a sip of wine and nodded thoughtfully. “The president agrees with you.” Ryan
looked up sharply and Jonathan continued: “The director was asked — and by that I mean
ordered — to appear before the National Security Council two days ago. You can probably
guess that it wasn’t for a pat on the back.”
“I’ll bet.”
Harper shrugged. “To be fair, he wasn’t singled out; the top people over at Customs, Homeland
