Page 44 of Cross Down
We get to the porch and in the moonlight see the lake and a dock with two moored kayaks. I send one last volley out to the front and another at a shadow moving across the yard. I see the shadow collapse.
Mel sets down suppressing fire too, and I follow, hitting the dirt, and we crawl, then leap across the road in front of the cottage and take cover in the woods.
We catch our breath and I’m tempted to open fire again, but I don’t know how many guys we’re up against, how well armed they are, or whether they have backup.
Mel says, “Look.”
As I burrow into the dirt and leaves around the base of a wide pine tree, I say, “What the hell am I looking at?”
“Lights,” Mel says, lifting his head a bit. “My neighbors tend to keep to themselves, but they won’t ignore the sound of a flash-bang or gunshots. We keep low, we can keep to the shoreline, and—”
A sharpsnapand the top of Mel’s head is blown off.
Chapter
53
In one ofthe Pentagon’s conference rooms, the dreary status meeting is coming to an end, and General Wayne Grissom is struggling to keep a positive outlook. At least he and his assistant, Colonel Carla Kendricks, a rising star at the Pentagon, will have a short walk back to his office. Nearly two years ago, impressed by the colonel’s work ethic, Grissom chose her for a position usually staffed by a lieutenant general.
The short walk back is about all there is to be thankful for this evening. He takes one more look around the shiny table at the meeting’s attendees. With each successive meeting, there’ve been fewer and fewer leaders and more and more followers. Those in positions of power are sensing failure, and by not attending the meetings, they can claim they were out of the loop.
Sitting next to Grissom in a dark blue power suit and white blouse is the president’s chief of staff, Helen Taft, who’s been uncharacteristically quiet in representing the White House.
OnePostcolumnist had referred to Helen Taft—who’s red-haired and red-faced, though the shades of red are different—as the most even-tempered person in Washington because she was constantly in a rage. But it’s not Taft whom Grissom feels has it in for him; it’s another woman.
Now the only person who’s made every meeting, the only one who hasn’t given up, catches Grissom’s eye and speaks. “Is that it, General?” asks Doris Landsdale, secretary of homeland security.
Grissom says, “Unless someone is holding something back, I suppose it is.”
She taps the fingers of her right hand on the table. “To repeat, then, our friends at the NSA and the CIA are still listening to the chatter, and so far there’s been no increase of encrypted messages at cell towers we’re surveilling. Meaning what? They’re waiting for further orders? Or they’ve decided to give up and go back to their moms’ basements?”
Grissom thinks with envy of his predecessors, especially the generals of World War II. Marshall, Eisenhower, Patton, Truscott, Bradley, Abrams—they all had one advantage that Grissom does not. Back then, the enemies were clear, well defined, out in the open. They didn’t hide in the shadows or at home like the people who’ve been killing Americans over the past several months.
To Secretary Landsdale, he says, “We don’t know what we don’t know. The moment we get clearer intelligence—perhaps a target—we’ll inform you. In the meantime, Secretary Landsdale, with all due respect, our terrorist opponents aren’t basement-dwellers. They show sophisticated planning and technical proficiency. Agent Mahoney? What do you have to say?”
Like most of the others at the table, the FBI man looks exhausted. “We’re still chasing down leads. We’re even bringing agents home from embassy assignments overseas. But as you noted, General, nothing concrete, nothing solid.”
Landsdale shakes her head. “Given the YouTube videos showing how to make IEDs, car bombs, and other types of weapons, I don’t think so.”
“Meaning what?” Grissom asks.
“I still don’t see the evidence of a large-scale operation that’ll result in us curbing civil liberties, putting troops and armored vehicles on the street, and trying to control news coverage. That kind of shit happens in Venezuela. Not here.”
Grissom says, “Then we’ll have to agree to disagree on this issue, Madam Secretary.”
She snaps, “Unless we do this the right way, this will be the new normal. Don’t you see it? Every time a bunch of knuckle-draggers get together on the dark web and start raising hell, we’ll overreact and go after them. More cops and police departments using tactical gear, using armored cars, tear gas, machine guns. It’s like using a sledgehammer to kill a mosquito.”
“Then what do you suggest, Madam Secretary?”
“Let local and state law enforcement take over,” she says. “They know their turf; they probably know the players. Give them support where asked. The federal government should be in an assisting role, General, not taking lead.”
The eyes of everyone at the table are going from Grissom to Landsdale and back. Mommy and Daddy are fighting.
Grissom looks for an ally, says, “Ms. Taft, do you have anything to add?”
Just a crisp shake of the head. Grissom thinks,No, she doesn’t want to get in the middle of this.
Looking back at the homeland secretary, Grissom says, “If we don’t do this right, pretty soon we might not have a federal government. And then you’ll get what you want—the states will be on their own.”
