Falling Stars Read online

  “What? Who is this? What do you mean? What’s wrong with Christophe?”

  “What’s wrong is that he’s about to fall to his death.”

  “Fall? Fall from where? What are you talking about?”

  “We’ll let him explain.” Michael flipped the switch that activated the headset mic.

  “Maureen, oh my God. This thing just pulled me up into the air—” Michael flipped the switch back to the off position. Enough said. They were burning clock. Or rather, battery.

  “Christophe? Christophe!”

  “We silenced his microphone. He’s still talking, but he should be listening. As should you, you see.”

  “Put him back on! I want to talk to my husband!”

  “You need to listen to us now. If you want to save him. Do you want to save him?”

  “Of course I want to save him.”

  “I can drop him right now if you want? You could collect the life insurance, you see. Find another man.”

  “What do you want?”

  “Good question. Good question, Mrs. Martin. That’s the question that will save your husband. Here’s the situation. Would you like to hear the situation?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. Your husband is hanging from a helicopter a mile in the sky. That helicopter is battery operated, you see. If the battery dies, the helicopter falls, and well…”

  “What do I have to do?”

  “Just a bit of typing.”

  “Typing?”

  “Typing. You can type, right?”

  “Of course.”

  Michael said nothing.

  “What do I type?”

  “A password, an account number and an eight-figure payment.”

  “What?”

  “Christophe, why don’t you explain it to your wife.” Michael said, flipping the switch.

  “It’s a ransom payment, honey. Go to my computer. Quickly, please.”

  32

  Barriers

  Moscow, Russia

  AS JO TURNED TO LEAVE, Achilles held up a hand. “I’m not ready to dismiss Vertical Vision just yet.”

  “They make toys, Achilles. The thing that grabbed me was a monster.”

  Achilles didn’t move. “But the drone that shot Rider was about the size of this one. Granted, it was black and the VV1 is white, but a can of spray paint would take care of that.”

  Jo stepped back toward the display case. “Would this be a match if it was black?”

  “I can’t say. My focus was on the gun. But the size and shape are right.”

  “Hundreds of companies make drones of this size and shape. It’s standard. You’re grasping at straws because we don’t have any other leads.”

  “No. I’m trying to think like Ivan.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “Your reaction is exactly what Ivan would be aiming for. Absolute incredulity. No need to look twice.”

  “By that logic, every yogurt factory and turnip farm could be cloaking his secret lab.”

  “Yogurt factories and turnip farms can’t hire cutting-edge aeronautical engineers and material scientists. They can’t explain any of the myriad interactions required for high-tech research and development. The Internet searches, the conference attendances, the tool purchases.”

  Jo pointed at the drone. “They also can’t justify interest in anything bigger than a breadbox. Let’s get out of here. We’ll think it through someplace that’s not patrolled by men the size of major appliances.”

  Achilles still didn’t yield. “We’re dealing with Ivan.”

  “Do you think I’ve forgotten that? Even Ivan can’t hide a mammoth behind a mouse. Come on, let’s go.”

  “Modern windmills are mammoths.”

  “Windmills?”

  “Victor Vazov’s other business. Under this same roof.”

  Jo sucked on that for a second. “Motors and rotors of considerable size.”

  “And batteries,” Achilles added.

  Jo whipped the keycard from her secret pocket and stepped to the rear of the lobby. “What are you waiting for?”

  The click of the keycard revealed an enormous room dimly lit by scattered LEDs. Status lights for plugged-in pieces of electronic equipment.

  The space itself was a cavernous open plan arrangement. The kind that was all the rage in high-tech. A spruced-up warehouse with a ceiling high enough to fly small drones or work with giant windmill blades. Twenty feet by her estimation.

  Although unoccupied, the room was abuzz with the sound of electronic activity, dulled but distinct. Jo looked over to see Achilles smiling.

  He leaned toward her ear and whispered over the ruckus. “Is that how the drone sounds?”

  She dashed his hopes. “No. That’s the wrong pitch and it’s much too varied.”

  Achilles found a bank of switches just inside the door. He flicked the furthest and augmented the glowing LEDs with dim emergency lights, creating the atmosphere of an overnight airplane flight. “Shall we explore?”

  Clusters of low partition cubicles filled the foreground, one flavor workstations good for every rank. Some dedicated to drones, some to windmills, others to administration. Beyond them were long white workbenches, steel shelved supply stations, and organized tool racks. The only enclosed quarters were off to the sides, common areas or whole departments, judging by the spacing of the doors. All the way at the back, banked by packaging and storage stations, a modest production area beckoned.

  “Looks pretty lean,” Jo said, surprised.

  “That’s the name of the game these days, along with flexibility and collaboration.”

  They wandered about until they found the source of the mechanical noise that Achilles had hoped was drones. A bank of six large machines lined up beside tool racks. Each with rapidly moving parts, vibrating, twisting, or turning behind clear polycarbonate walls. “Stress testers,” he said. “Putting parts through millions of cycles to check for fatigue. The engineers probably just run them at night, due to the noise.”

  They spent ten more minutes wandering from table to table, workbench to workbench, talking little, taking everything in. Nothing reminded Jo of the drone she’d seen in Versailles.

  When they reached the back of the room, she turned to Achilles. “Conclusions?”

  “I saw no sign of the big drone here.”

  “Me either.”

  “Surprisingly, they’re not making the little drones here either.”

  “Sure they are.” She pointed to stacks of VV1 boxes off to her right.

  Achilles shook his head. “This is a quality-control testing and packaging operation. Likely just enough for the made-in-Russia stamp, but no more.”

  “So what’s our next move?”

  Achilles gestured toward the perimeter.

  “The conference rooms?”

  “Not just conference rooms. One function you never leave out in the open is finance. These identical cubicles give everyone the appearance of equality, but you can be certain that illusion stops short of their paychecks.”

  Accounting proved easy to find. One of the back corners was dedicated to it. Achilles translated the sign on the door, which of course was locked. Jo’s stolen white card generated a red-light response. She rapped her knuckles on the door, confirming its metallic nature. “There’s nothing to pick, and it won’t be easy to break down.”

  Achilles backed up a couple paces to study the scene. He smiled after a few seconds then held up a finger. “Hold on a minute.”

  He trotted back to a workbench they’d passed. She expected him to grab an electronic gadget, something he could use to overcome the lock with sheer computing power. A CIA hack. But Achilles went the opposite direction on the evolutionary spectrum. He came back holding a utility knife. A box cutter.

  Jo was no handyman, but she knew her way around locks and doors. She didn’t see this working. “You’re going to get us in with that?”

  “I am.”

  She pondered tha
t proposition for a second. “Are you going to short the lock?”

  Achilles slid out of his suit coat and dropped it on the floor. “No.”

  “Do you know some trick to retract the latch.”

  “Nothing like that.”

  “What then?”

  “Use your lateral thinking.”

  He had a habit of doing that, she noted. Guiding her toward his conclusions rather than presenting them. She rapped on the metal again. “My lateral thinking tells me even an axe wouldn’t cut it.”

  “An axe was my first choice, but I didn’t see one lying around.”

  She stepped aside. “Have at it.”

  Achilles stepped aside too, in the other direction. He lunged forward and stabbed the knife into the wall at hip height, burying the entire inch of exposed blade. He left it protruding perpendicularly and turned to face her. With a stiff arm, he grabbed the handle and dropped his weight onto it. The drywall yielded. The blade cut a straight line from hip height down to the base board.

  While she shook her head at her own shortsightedness, Achilles repeated the procedure half a pace to the left, creating a parallel slice. Then a hearty stab and heavy two-handed tug across the top completed the third side. At that point he set aside the knife, rolled onto his back, and used his feet to punch out a door. Well, half a door. He had to repeat the procedure for the drywall on the other side of the studs, cutting a slit down the middle and kicking from there. Before she knew it, Achilles had a sweaty brow, a sheen of gypsum dust covering his pants, and a hole large enough to crawl through. “It’s not elegant, and they’ll know someone was here, but we’ll get what we came for.”

  33

  Bingo!

  San Francisco, California

  THE VERY BEST THING about being an FBI agent wasn’t the pay, or the brotherhood, or the work itself, although all of those were wonderful. The big prize was the badge. Whipping one out was like presenting a golden ticket. Everyone respected it. Everyone feared it. And guilty or innocent, everyone gave you their full attention when they saw that shiny shield.

  Flashing your credentials wasn’t nearly as effective over the phone.

  Character limitations on the length of caller ID ruled out displaying Federal Bureau of Investigation, and FBI just wasn’t as intimidating when delivered in the same plain electronic print that displayed toll-free numbers. People who would never slam the door on a badge might not hesitate to hang up. But Rip decided to give it a try before involving the New Jersey field office.

  “EarthCam. How may I help you?”

  “Good afternoon, this is Special Agent Ripley Zonder with the FBI.” He spoke the three familiar letters with crisp enunciation. “I need to speak with your head of technical operations.”

  EarthCam made money selling ads on webcam streams from places like Times Square and the Eiffel Tower. Included in their lineup was a 360-degree camera showing the skyline in San Francisco. By the grace of God, that camera clearly captured the InterContinental Hotel as seen at rooftop level. But the devil also got his due. The view was from the south, so the restaurant where Rider was killed was not in view. Still, Miss Ooh La La had said to check the skyline, and the skyline was in view. Crisp and clear.

  But it was the current skyline. EarthCam displayed live coverage. Rip needed historical footage.

  Did EarthCam record? If so, for how long? Video sucked up a lot of memory, so surely any recordings would be regularly overwritten. Daily? Weekly? Monthly? He was about to find out.

  The Jersey girl manning the phone at EarthCam snapped to with due deference. Minutes later, CTO Ron Stotyn gave him the good news. Each of his cameras had a dedicated eight-terabyte drive. Enough to store four weeks of recordings when utilizing the same sophisticated software that streamed television. Best of all, Ron could grant the FBI remote access to the drive, with EarthCam’s compliments.

  To Rip’s further delight, the recording offered the same user interface as the live camera, permitting him to change angles and zoom. Rip adjusted both, rewound to the time ten minutes before Rider drew his last breath, and hit play.

  Having watched many a surveillance tape over the years, Rip had come to his desk prepared. Pastrami on rye with Swiss and a big fat pickle. The first thing he noticed beyond the superb quality of his sandwich was the big difference in midnight lighting between El Paso and San Francisco. The sky over El Paso was nearly black at night, whereas San Fran was a medium gray. The second thing he noticed was serenity. Despite the active luminescence, very little was happening.

  The scene stayed still as a painting right up to the minute of the murder. Then an object fell from above. It just dropped down onto the hotel, landing beyond his view but presumably on The Top of the Mark. Rip nearly choked on a fat piece of pastrami as he rocketed forward in his chair. He hit rewind and then slow motion.

  There it was again. Not an illusion. Not a camera glitch. Neither a fly buzzing past nor a drop of water on the lens. Rip paused with the object near the top of the building and zoomed in. It was the size of a basketball and shaped like a T. Its color was black. Rip rewound a few frames and then played the recording forward at normal speed. The object wasn’t dropping—it was flying. He was looking at a drone. “Bingo!”

  It got better.

  And then it got worse. Much worse. Bad enough that Rip immediately summoned his entire team.

  The four agents who were in the office gathered around Rip’s computer. “This recording is from the night of Director Rider’s murder.” He hit play.

  “Whoa! What’s that?” Oscar said.

  “Keep watching.”

  They did. A mere seven seconds later the same object shot skyward again.

  “It’s a drone,” Clancy said.

  “Where did you get this?” Oscar asked.

  “From a commercial webcam. A company that streams live cityscapes to put eyeballs on advertisements.”

  “I saw that but dismissed it along with all the others. It doesn’t show the restaurant or the wall leading up to it. No camera has the right angle. What made you think to study the skyline?” Adams asked.

  “A tip, actually. A French woman calling my cell phone from Russia.”

  The room went quiet while everyone took in the new twist.

  Rip plowed forward. “I want to try tracking the drone. It’s a long shot, but long shots are all we have right now and maybe we’ll get lucky. Start with the FAA. They keep a catalogue of companies in the business. There are about 500 manufacturers worldwide and probably twice as many models of drones. Go through them all and see if you can identify the one in the picture. I know it’s grainy, but have the geeks in the basement do their best to enhance the images. Look for distinguishing features and find the best match.”

  “Sir, aren’t we missing the big picture?” Clancy asked.

  “What big picture?” Oscar asked.

  “No, we’re not missing it,” Rip said with somber voice. “My next call will be to Director Brix. I’m sure within the hour, he’ll brief the National Security Council.”

  “What big picture?” Oscar repeated.

  In answer, Rip pulled up two video stills. “This one’s from the descent. This one’s from the ascent. Notice the difference?”

  “It’s not the same drone,” Oscar said.

  “Yes it is,” Clancy contradicted. “It just left something behind.”

  “And that would be?” Rip prompted.

  “A Glock 19,” Clancy said.

  “Precisely.”

  “Achilles had a drone bring him a gun. That’s how he got it past security,” Oscar said.

  Rip ignored the CIA guy and turned to face the brighter members of his team. “I fear Director Rider’s death marked the birth of a new terrorist threat. I can’t fathom how we’ll defend against it.”

  “Terrorist threat?” Oscar scoffed.

  All eyes locked on Rip’s lips as he slid aside the curtain. “Assassination by drone.”

  34

 
Victor

  Moscow, Russia

  FOURTEEN MINUTES after crawling through the cutout door in strappy heels and a short dress, Jo found what they’d come for. She held the paper aloft like a winning lottery ticket. “You were right!”

  Most modern financial records exist only in electronic form. Gone are the days when “the books” are actual paper ledgers. Storing and sorting electrons is far more efficient. But when products ship, paper goes with it in the form of a packing slip. It’s the kind of documentation that accountants love. No marketing glitz, no legal flimflam, just the facts. Shipped from. Shipped to. Product. Quantity. Date.

  Achilles abandoned his filing cabinet and walked toward Jo. “What did you find?”

  “Packing slips for ‘VV1 Kits’. Shipped six at a time—from France.”

  “Ivan likes France.”

  “Don’t I know it.”

  “Who’s listed as the shipper?”

  “There’s no business name, just an address—on the Côte d'Azur no less.”

  “That has to be it. Pocket one of the papers and put the rest away. No sense making it obvious what we were looking for.”

  “We’re leaving?”

  “What bold begins, moderation must finish.”

  “Huh?”

  “It was a Granger saying. We have enough, let’s not push it.”

  Jo had heard Achilles’ mentor speak during her CIA training, so she understood the deference. Of the powerful men she’d met in her life, only a few had struck her as truly wise. Granger was one of them, and he also had a charitable side. A rare gem indeed.

  She folded the packing slip and slid it into the secret pocket that had hidden the passkeys. Then she squared everything else away.

  While Achilles got the lights, she crawled back out the doggy door—right into the muzzle of a gun.

  Jo had been shot once, at close range. She never saw the weapon and had no memory of the incident, but she’d spent weeks in recovery and her sternum still ached when she stretched. Nonetheless, the doctors told her she’d been incredibly lucky. She wondered now if she had any luck left.