[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
the right positions at all the right times. His time as a battalion commander
had, admittedly, been less than perfect but that was understandable. The
battalion he took over had been terribly poorly managed and undisciplined in
the extreme. It could hardly be his fault that it had failed the annual Army
Readiness and Testing Evaluation Program. He had managed to argue that to
various people who, despite the unit being decertified for combat operations
after two previous trips to the sandbox, had kept him from being relieved and
forcibly retired.
But he was well aware that this position was his last chance to get stars. If
he could manage the conditions carefully enough, if he could avoid serious
incident, he'd pin on stars by the end of the year.
The fly in that ointment was this Kildar character. The local FBI office,
Orange County, City of Orlando, all the other federal and state groups in the
task force, they were all on board with the plan. Maintain a low-profile. Make
the public aware that there was a threat but also ensure they knew the
powers-that-be were on the situation. Avoid serious incident. Reduce public
strain. Deconflict the situation.
This joker's idea of deconflict, though, was "kill them all and let graves
registration sort them out."
Which was why he had called an old friend from the Point. The General was a
couple of years ahead of him and despite being, in Olds' opinion, less than
stellar in the brains department he'd managed to pin on stars almost four
years ago. The General was also in a very good position, the Plans office in
the
Pentagon. Oh, he might complain that he wanted to get back to the sandbox,
preferably with a command, but Olds knew he was just doing the Good Soldier
routine. Plans and Ops ran the Army, commanders just followed Plans and Ops'
directives.
But it also put him in an excellent position to deal with this Kildar fellow.
So Olds had explained his
problems, leaving out that Jenkins had threatened to kill him. The General had
been pretty busy which might have explained the bluntness of his response. It
boiled down to A. Jenkins got things done, B.
Jenkins had the support of the CJCS and the President so the General couldn't
do anything if he wanted to. He'd added that the colonel might want to pay
attention to actions in his AO and not spend time trying to get his support
personnel changed.
Which left the colonel pondering his Rolodex. If this Jenkins character really
Page 132
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
did have support all the way to the CJCS, he refused to believe the idiot had
Presidential backing, then it would take a line of attack outside the chain of
command to get him removed.
He picked up his telephone and dialed a number in Washington. There was more
than one way to skin a
Kildar.
* * *
"Anything?" Mike asked as he walked in the suite.
There simply weren't any houses for rent big enough to take even the teams
he'd brought with him. So he'd rented a floor of an off-Disney hotel. He
wasn't going to be at what he considered ground zero.
"No," Greznya said. "There is nothing. Jay is trying to determine who the
drops were going to but without any more drops. . . We're still getting the
take from Katya but so far we haven't picked up any sign that Gonzales is
directly involved."
"They had one more boat," Mike said. "But nothing to pick up and no fueling
point."
"So what are they gonna do?" Britney asked.
"Strike at us," Mike replied. "They'll either try to hit the yacht or snatch
somebody. Not much they can do else. The VX is in the hands of the US
government."
"Are you going to bring the harem over?" Britney asked.
"Hell of a choice, isn't it?" Mike asked. "But, no, I'm going to leave them at
the estate with Vil and
Yosif's team, what's left of it. Let 'em get a tan. If the Colombians want to
tangle with those teams they're free to. Besides, the further away from me
they are the better."
"Hey, I was driving around with you all day!" Britney pointed out.
"I know," Mike said. "Which was silly, but with you around I look like some
businessman with a doxie. I
don't have Katya and next to her, you're the girl most likely to survive. And
if you don't, well, that's why you wear a uniform."
"That's pretty fucking cold," Britney said.
"Pleased to meet you, won't you guess my name?"
* * *
"Senator Fulbright's office."
Steve Worrel was the Senior Defense and Intelligence Staffer for Senator
Richard Fulbright. He had been an Army intelligence officer, worked briefly
for the Agency then gotten out and gotten a "real" job.
Shortly after hitting civvie street he'd gotten into politics as a volunteer
then worked his way up to staffer to a senator. But given that most of the
senator's committees were related to domestic affairs rather than military, he
wasn't by any stretch of the imagination the senator's most senior aide.
Hadn't been, rather.
When someone started blackmailing the senator with videos that certainly
appeared to be the senator not only in bed with a young woman, two actually,
but strangling one of them to death, he had gained some prominence. That was
because he knew the people to call to, discreetly, start checking out the
DVD. People who could pull it apart, electron by electron, to try to determine
who had made it, where it was made. In the meantime, the senator had
tap-danced. The main demand of the blackmailers had been to kill a
conservative judicial nominee. The senator had instead held the nominee up in
committee, arguing that to vote against him would have been too much of a
reversal to stand up. And hoped like hell that
Steve would pull his chestnuts out of the fire.
In the end, Steve's quiet research had turned out to be moot. Others had found
out about the blackmail operation and "done something" about it. What exactly
the "something" was was unclear. But there was a
Page 133
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]