believed that any information Kennedy gained in this meeting would be passed on to Rapp. The human species’ ability to believe whatever it wanted was truly incredible. Barnett would overlook everything Rapp had done for America and believe any attack on him—no matter how far-fetched—without question.
“I think we’ve said enough on that subject, Bob.”
And then something completely unexpected happened. Woodman glanced at Barnett and moved his hand to scratch his left temple. When he was sure the senator wasn’t looking, he raised his middle finger.
Kennedy barely managed to suppress her smile. The DEA chief would be fully aware of what went into creating an undercover legend sufficient to get close to a major cartel. At a minimum, he would keep his mouth shut. With a little luck, he could be counted on for some minor assistance if it could be kept under the table. Kennedy gave him a nearly imperceptible nod as Barnett started into one of her infamously indignant speeches.
“It’s hard for even me to believe that this is happening, Dr. Kennedy. The two men that Mitch Rapp murdered were our only lead in finding Sayid Halabi and intercepting the next package of anthrax that’s probably already on it’s way. This is your fault and the fault of your agency. The fact that for twenty years you haven’t noticed that you have a psychotic working for you is hard to believe. That you didn’t notice the multimillion-dollar house of cards he’d built, though, frankly suggests more than incompetence.”
And there it was. Barnett was going to play this as complicity. She was going to drag Kennedy in front of an endless string of congressional hearings in an effort to find something that could be used to prosecute her criminally. And to send a message to anyone else who might be feeling defiant.
Barnett let the accusation hang in the air, hoping to coerce Kennedy into responding to it. Instead the CIA director reached for her briefcase and stood.
“If there’s nothing more, I obviously have a lot of work to do.”
She turned and went for the door, barely getting her hand around the knob before Barnett spoke again.
“Have you heard about Rapp’s partner Claudia? Apparently she left him for Scott Coleman and they’re now in hiding because they’re afraid that he’ll kill them.”
The malignant glee in Barnett’s voice was clearly audible and Kennedy took comfort in it. The senator wasn’t as calculating as she was given credit for. At her core, she was at the mercy of her infinite greed for power.
This was going to get ugly and no one was going to escape without getting bloody. But, as Stan Hurley had been fond of saying, it’s not how you play the game, it’s whether or not your opponent ends up dismembered in the woods.
CHAPTER 29
SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
USA
WHERE were these assholes?
It was Rapp’s second night sleeping in a foxhole stacked with five hundred pounds of coke. And while the drugs themselves were surprisingly comfortable, the impermeable tape wrapped around them left him wallowing in a shallow pond of sweat.
Even worse was the tree above him. Coleman had undoubtedly chosen that location for the additional cover the foliage provided, but hadn’t considered the sizable spines that constantly dropped from it. So while he was all but invisible and had a good line of sight to the house, his back and ass were covered with tiny, infuriatingly itchy wounds.
How hard could it be for Esparza to find him? Maybe Claudia had overestimated the capabilities of his outfit. At this point, she’d dropped enough hints to lead a nine-year-old to his door.
Rapp looked past the offending tree at the stars and then glanced over at the vague outline of the house. It contained a comfortable bed, a well-stocked fridge, and satellite TV. Just twenty-five yards of dead-flat terrain away.
When he was in similar holes in the Middle East, he never thought about creature comforts. He was almost always in the middle of nowhere, often surrounded by people who had never even seen a microwave or automatic coffeemaker. But lying there within earshot of the air-conditioning unit somehow made every cactus spine, scorpion, and tarantula that much more irritating.
Not that there was anything he could do about it. Esparza’s men were coming and there was no way to be certain from what direction or in what kind of numbers. The design of the house made it more of a trap than a viable defensive position, and if the team the cartel sent was smart enough to surround