The Third Option

chapter 10

Peter Cameron sat in one of the plush leather seats of the brand-new Cessna 750 Citation X executive jet. The plane could be configured to carry up to twelve passengers, but for this trip there were only four, not counting the pilots. A woman and two men were sitting at a small table studying maps and photographs. Cameron had with- held the Jansens' full profiles. The less these people knew, the better. As far as Cameron was concerned, the less everybody knew, the better. This problem needed to be dealt with swiftly. Like the first twenty-four hours following the out- break of a disease, this next day was crucial. Nip it in the ass now, and everything would be fine. Leave any unfinished business on the table, and things could spin out of control.

One of the men got up and came over. He sat down across from Cameron so he could study him. His name was Gus Villaume. To a few people in his line of work, he was known as the Frog. A French Canadian from Montreal, Villaume had worked for the CIA in the seventies and early eighties as an agent inside the Dassault Aviation Company. In 1986, he had decided to break out on his own and work as a freelancer. The money was much better, and his work hours were whatever he chose.

Villaume studied Cameron with his hawklike eyes. The Frog had wondered about this Cameron for some time. He was competent enough but a little too quick to use force. He was a yes man, Villaume guessed. Someone else was giving him orders. The way the former civil servant threw money around, it was obvious that his boss was an individual with substantial financial assets. The unknown identity of Cameron's employer was beginning to bother Villaume. When working among thieves, knowledge of that sort could be used as insurance if things got bad.

Villaume stroked the edges of his black mustache and asked Cameron, "So, who are these two individuals?"

"Nobody. They were asked to do a job, they blew it, and now they have to pay."

Villaume noticed how Cameron used a casual tone as if these people were being fired for lack of performance. "So now they die?"

"They knew what they were getting into."

Holding up two black-and-white photographs, Villaume asked, "This is all you can give me? No background on them?"

"You don't need any more information. It's going to be an easy job. In and out."

Villaume studied Cameron's face. "I'll be the judge of how easy the job will be."

"If it'll make you feel any better, I'm planning on taking the shots."

This caused a smile to fall across the other man's face. Leaning back, he said, "Really?"

"Yes, really. Why does that amuse you so much?"

"I've never seen you get your hands dirty before, let alone kill someone."

Cameron let his displeasure show. "There's a lot you don't know about me, Gus."

"I'm sure there is, but all the same, I'd like to know more about these two targets."

"All you need to know is that this will be easy, and you're going to be paid well." Cameron's voice had taken on an agitated tone.

Villaume kept his own tone even. "I will not take my team into a situation without more information. If you refuse, we'll get off this plane when we land in Colorado Springs and take the first plane back to Washington."

Cameron didn't like that idea at all. "For Christ sake, Gus, if I thought this thing was going to be messy, I would have called Duser."

Villaume looked over at his two team members for a brief second. The reference to Jeff Duser had got their attention. Duser was a former U.S. Marine who had been court-martialed and run out of the Corps for a list of offenses too long to recap. A decade later, the sadist was well into his thirties but seemed mentally still stuck in his teens. He and his crew of pumped-up cronies were about as subtle as a sledgehammer. How he had ended up in this line of work Villaume had yet to figure out, but he had a good idea that the man sitting across from him had something to do with it. Duser was not well respected by other freelancers. As a general rule, contracts were to be carried out in as quiet a manner as possible. If possible, a hit should be made to look like a suicide, or, given the right situation, the body should simply disappear.

"Maybe you should call Duser... that way, you can guarantee front-page coverage in Sunday's Denver Post."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"Peter, if you need me to explain that to you"  -  Villaume shook his head  -  "you should find a new line of work."

"Hey, Duser and his boys get results."

"And headlines."

"I'm not going to sit here and argue with you, Gus. This job is a cakewalk. Maybe you're getting too old for this."

Villaume kept his stare focused on Cameron's dark pupils. At fifty-two, he had lost very little, and what was gone in terms of physical ability he had more than made up for in increased knowledge and instinct. And at this moment, his instincts were telling him that Cameron was lying. Villaume had learned long ago that in this line of work, you should use great caution before you threaten another business associate. Once that hand was shown, there was no taking it back, and if often forced the other person to make plans of his or her own. It was clear that Cameron was a man who could not be trusted. The Frog did not like it, but it was time to raise the ante. "I will ask this question one last time. If you don't give me an answer, our participation in this mission is over. If you spread any false rumors about why we backed out, I will have Mario pay you a visit." Villaume glanced over at the large man sitting on the other side of the aisle. He had one continuous eyebrow that ran across an incredibly large head attached to a neck and body that weren't any smaller.

Cameron squirmed in his seat and looked over at Mario Lukas. The man gave him the creeps. Half Frankenstein, half Baby Huey, he followed Villaume as if he were the second coming. Cameron had no doubt he would be dead within seconds of Villaume giving the word. Cameron decided it wasn't a good idea to fight this particular battle. Villaume and his people could be dealt with later.

As if this was all a giant waste of time, Cameron asked, "What would you like to know?"

Villaume responded with a fake smile." Are they cops?"

"No."

"Do they have any military experience?"

Cameron paused. "Yes."

"Both of them?"

"Yes."

"Which branch?"

There was more hesitation on Cameron's part." Army."

"Any Special Forces training?"

"I can't get into that."

Villaume scoffed. "The hell you can't."

"I've given you all of the information you need." Cameron held up his sat phone. "If you want out, tell me right now, and I'll call Duser."

Villaume studied him. He had little doubt that Cameron was full of it. This whole thing was a rush job. Calling his bluff, he said, "Go ahead. Call him."

Cameron looked at the phone for a moment and then swore under his breath. "Fine, Gus." He shifted in his seat, saying, "God, you're a pain in the ass sometimes." Throwing his arms up in surrender, he said," Ask away."

Cameron's slithery ways had Villaume's antenna way up. "Peter, I have been doing this for almost thirty years, and the only thing that has kept me alive is my thoroughness. Jerk my chain one more time, try to bluff me like you just did with that threatened phone call, or God forbid you're dumb enough to withhold information from me... like the fact that these two have spent time at Fort Bragg." Villaume shook his head, and the hawk eyes burrowed in on the plump Cameron. Pointing at the Professor, he said, "You might end up in a tragic accident with that brand-new car of yours."

THE FORD EXPLORER raced across the cement tarmac of the Essex Skypark and pulled up alongside the Learjet. The driver was in a hurry. Kevin Hackett had called to tell him a. storm front was moving in, and if they wanted to make it to Denver by sundown, they'd better step on it. Scott Coleman lifted the back hatch of the truck and grabbed two metal cases. He ran them over to the plane and handed them to Dan Stroble, one of his former SEAL Team Six members. Coleman went back for a large duffel bag and then parked the truck over by one of the hangars. Running back across the tarmac, he looked at the water of the Back River just east of Baltimore. Whitecaps were starting to form, and the few boats that were out were getting tossed around. The sky to the north was dark. It looked as if they would just make it.

A gust of wind whipped across the long runway, catching the bill of Coleman's ball cap. Before it could be whisked away, his left hand clamped down on top of it, and he sprinted the last forty feet to the jet. Coleman hopped up through the small hatch and pulled it closed behind him. Poking his head into the cockpit, he asked, "Are we are all set, Kev?"

Hackett nodded. "As soon as you strap in."

Coleman took off his faded olive bush jacket, revealing a rock-solid physique. Handing the jacket to Stroble, he asked, "Is the gear stowed?"

"Yep."

"All right. Buckle up, and we're out of here."

Coleman squeezed himself into the copilot seat, slipped on his shoulder straps, and donned a headset. Hackett had arrived an hour earlier, filed a flight plan, and prepped the plane. Coleman ran down a quick check of the instruments while Hackett maneuvered the medium-range executive jet into takeoff position. They stopped at the south end of the runway and looked right into the teeth of the oncoming storm. Curtains of rain were falling in at least three different areas to the north and east. With no time to waste, Hackett increased the power to the twin jet engines and released the brakes. The small eight-passenger jet rolled down the runway and lifted effortlessly into the air. Moments later, raindrops started to pelt the windshield, the wipers came on, and the craft banked to the west, passing over the northern end of Baltimore. Two minutes later, the rain was behind them. The agile craft quickly gained altitude, and at fifteen thousand feet, they broke through the clouds and were greeted by a bright sun that they would be flying straight into for the next three hours.

Coleman looked over his shoulder and asked Stroble to grab his sunglasses. Both Stroble and Hackett had served under Coleman when he had commanded SEAL Team Six. The three of them had been through the wringer together. They had enjoyed their years in the Navy, but they sure as hell didn't miss the shitty pay and dog-and-pony bullshit. They answered to nobody but themselves now and were very selective about the jobs they took  -  most of them legitimate. Their company, SEAL Demolition and Salvage Corporation, did much of its work abroad. Between contracts, they helped train law enforcement divers from the various counties and cities that bordered the Chesapeake Bay.

Scott Coleman wasn't sure which category this job would eventually fall into. The only thing illegal about it so far was that their fee had been wired into a bank in the Caribbean, where it would avoid detection by the IRS, or anyone else who might be of a mind to track the full activities of the SEAL Demolition and Salvage Corporation.

The old man was dying. That was plain enough to see. Coleman was a little surprised at how this had affected him. He hadn't known Thomas Stansfield for long, but his admiration for him was genuine. In Coleman's line of work, it was hard not to put the old spymaster on a bit of a pedestal. Stansfield had been one of the original covert operators. During World War II, his services were sought after by Wild Bill Donovan and the OSS. As one of the famed Jedburgh team leaders, Stansfield had been dropped into Nazi-occupied Norway during the war to help organize resistance. He had been battle-tested in the field for many years before taking a job behind a desk, a rare thing in Washington. The CIA, and thus America, was about to be dealt a serious blow by the loss of the wise old man.

Coleman's recent business relationship with the head of the CIA was more than a little strange. Several years earlier, Coleman had taken certain political matters into his own hands. He had spent a good portion of his life trotting around the globe, eliminating people who were deemed a threat to the national security of the United States. On one of those missions, he had lost half of his team, only to learn later that the mission had been compromised by a senator with an affinity for booze and women. Coleman left the Navy in disgust when his commanders refused to tell him the name of the man who had compromised the mission. A short while later, he learned from his friend Congressman Michael O'Rourke who the guilty party was. The event changed Coleman's life. He began asking the question: Who is a bigger threat to my country, a terrorist ten thousand miles away or the corrupt self-serving politician down the street? Coleman became involved in an intricate plot to correct the course of the government in Washington. Before the affair was over, a half dozen politicians had been assassinated, and their plan to restore some honor to politics had been hijacked by a cabal of Washington insiders. In the end, Coleman killed two of the cabal's leaders, and a cease-fire was negotiated by Director Stansfield and Congressman O'Rourke. Both parties agreed that it would be best for the country never to know the details of what had happened and who had been involved.

At first, the deal was one of mutually assured destruction. Neither party could harm the other for fear that the real story would be sent to the press. This was how Coleman had become a freelancer for the director of the CIA  -  the men heeded each other. The relationship was strange at first, but they had grown to trust and respect each other.

When they reached their cruising altitude, Hackett engaged the autopilot and turned to Coleman. "So, are you going to tell us what the hell is going on?"

Stroble heard the question and got out of his seat. He kneeled down in the doorway to the cabin to listen to Coleman. "There was an operation, and something went wrong. Two of the players are due back in the country tonight, and we are to collect them and bring them back to Washington."

"I assume they don't know we're coming." Stroble looked to his boss.

"No." Anticipating the next question, Coleman asked him to grab his black duffel bag. From it, he retrieved two large folders. In the business, they were referred to as jackets. He handed one to Stroble and kept the other for himself. "Stansfield was kind enough to provide us with a little background information." Coleman flipped open the folder and looked at a black-and-white photograph of one of their pickups. The man looked vaguely familiar. His real name was Jim Jansen. He was from Pittsburgh and had entered the Army right out of high school in 1974. After serving in Germany, he came back and went through Ranger School. The next stop was Korea and then the Green Berets, where he led an A-team and. Coleman already knew, met his wife, the other person they would be picking up. By the time gaps in Jansen's personnel records, Coleman could tell that he'd been sheep-dipped by the Agency on at least three occasions during his years in the Special Forces. Sheep-dipping was a term used by the folks down at Fort Bragg when the CIA borrowed their warriors for missions that were not recorded in their regular jackets. Coleman skipped ahead to see if there was any mention of what Jansen had done for the CIA. As he expected, there wasn't.

Coleman and Stroble continued to study the jackets and shared the important details they found with Hackett. None of what they read surprised them. It was not uncommon for retired Special Forces types to work for Langley both officially and unofficially.

Hackett eyeballed the plane's instruments and checked to make sure the autopilot was functioning properly. As his eyes danced over the dials and digital readouts, he said, "As usual, the Culinary Institute of America is not giving us the full story." Hackett was not a big fan of the CIA and liked to refer to it by the name of America's most well-known chefschool.

"And what makes you say that?"

"If this is such an easy op, then why are they sending us? Why not send a couple of their own people out to Colorado, or, better yet, why not call them on the phone and bring them in?"

"I never said it was going to be easy. Stansfield told me something didn't feel right about this one, and that's why he called us."

"Did he tell you what in the hell these two did to get into hot water?" asked Hackett.

Coleman looked to Stroble first and then to Hackett. "Do you guys remember Iron Man?"

Hackett's eyes opened wide, and Stroble let out a nervous laugh. "How could I ever forget him?" answered the latter. "He's a one-man army."

"F*ckin' James Bond," mumbled Hackett.

"Well, the Jansens"  -  Coleman held up the folder that had been in his lap  -  "were working with Iron Man on a very delicate operation. Apparently, things didn't go off as planned. The Jansens reported that they had nailed the target, but Iron Man had been lost."

"What?" asked a disbelieving Stroble.

"The Jansens were on the run and didn't have time to get into details, but they reported that Iron Man is dead."

Hackett shook his sun-bleached blond head. "Back to my original point. I still don't see why they need us."

"Because Stansfield has conflicting information about whether or not Iron Man is still with us."

"I'm not sure I understand," said Stroble.

"Stansfield couldn't get into it other than to say that he has other sources who say Iron Man is still alive."

"And," added Hackett, "this op was run without the official knowledge of the president and the Congress, and that's why they called us."

"I would assume that's the case." Hackett, continuing in his pessimistic mood, said, "Well, I just hope we don't bump into Iron Man while we're out in Colorado. People have a habit of dying when he's around."

Coleman took the file and slapped it across Hackett's chest. "People used to say the same thing about us. Read this, and try to relax. I'm telling you right now, this is not going to be a big deal. We'll move slow and cautious, all right?" Hackett nodded and took the file.

Looking out the window of the jet, Coleman's thoughts turned to a night several months ago. He had been at an Orioles baseball game with a date when he'd bumped into an old friend and his wife. They were sitting out in right field, having a beer and a hot dog. When the old friend went to introduce the other couple they were with, Coleman almost dropped his beer. There, sitting across the table, was someone he hadn't seen since he'd left the SEALs. At first he wasn't sure. Not at something as benign as a baseball game. But at second glance he knew it was him. He could see the recognition in his eyes. They were the darkest, most alert eyes he had ever seen, and they belonged to a living legend in the world of black operations. Coleman had seen him operate in the field twice and had heard others utter his name with a shake of their heads. He was at home in almost any city in the Middle East and much of Europe. He was perhaps America's best assassin, and there he was sitting at a baseball game with a beautiful young reporter. It was almost too surreal to believe, but it was him, and now they were about to cross paths again.