The Secret Soldier - Softcover

Alex Berenson

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0755384652 ISBN 13: 9780755384655

Publisher: Headline Publishing Group, 2011

Synopsis

A John Wells thriller and the first Headline title from NYT #1 bestseller Alex Berenson. Those in power always need an unofficial option. Meet John Wells. Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah fears he is fast losing control of his family and his people. A series of terrorist attacks has put his kingdom on edge and, with powerful factions turning against him, the king must turn to the one man he has been told will make the difference. Ex-CIA operative John Wells knows all too well how covert internal battles can undermine a nation. With the stability of a powerful Middle Eastern country at stake, he goes undercover to investigate King Abdullah's claims. But as Wells begins to unravel the conspiracy, it takes an unexpected twist. The plotters want more than the fall of a monarch. Their objective is to spark the final bloody conflagration between Islam and the West. Has time finally run out for John Wells?

About this title

About the Author:

Alex Berenson graduated from Yale University in 1994 with degrees in history and economics. In 1999 he joined the New York Times where he covered everything from the drug industry to Hurricane Katrina. During his tenure he served two stints as a correspondent in Iraq, an experience that led him to write THE FAITHFUL SPY, which won the Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America for Best First Novel and was a #1 NYT bestseller. Alex left the NYT in 2010 to devote himself to writing fiction. He lives in New York City with his wife and dog.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.:

Chapter 1

Montego Bay, Jamaica

“ONE-FORTY-NINE . . .”

John Wells felt his biceps burn as he reached full extension. He held, held, lowered himself again. Beneath him, the world narrowed to a few square feet. The cigarette burns speckling the dirty green carpet were as large as canyons.

“One-fifty.”

Up Wells went, slow and sure. Outside, a spring breeze rolled off the Caribbean. In here, the air was humid, almost murky. Sweat puddled at the base of his neck, dripped off his bare chest.

The room’s door swung open. Afternoon sunlight flooded in. Wells raised his left hand to shield his eyes and decided to see if he could get away with a one-armed push-up. Down he went, balanced on his right arm. He hadn’t tried one in years. Harder than he remembered. Or he was getting old. He tensed his chest, felt his triceps and biceps quiver, held himself steady.

Brett Gaffan stepped into the room, flipped on the light. “Trying to impress me, John?”

Wells ignored Gaffan, pushed, rose. Stopped. Found himself stuck. Sweat stung his eyes. He slipped sideways—

And with a final convulsive effort forced himself up. Once he passed halfway, he felt the power coming from his biceps rather than his triceps and knew he’d be all right. He stood as soon as he finished, before his arm could give out.

“You look like you’re gonna have a stroke.”

“I could do those all day.” Wells tried to stop panting.

“Uh-huh.” Gaffan tossed Wells a paper bag. Inside, a liter of cold water.

“Thankee.” Wells sucked down half the bottle. As part of his cover, he had to drink. And though he was careful to nurse his Red Stripes, he couldn’t be too careful. He’d gone through five or six last night. He wasn’t used to drinking so much. Or drinking at all. Every morning he woke to a cotton-filled mouth and a shrunken skull.

Until a few months before, Wells had been a CIA operative. He’d had a long and successful career at the agency. A few years before, he’d played a highly public role in stopping a terrorist attack on Times Square. But his missions since then had been kept quiet, and the public’s attention was fickle. He was still a legend among cops and soldiers, but civilians rarely recognized him.

Wells would admit that part of him had loved working for the agency. The CIA and its cousins in the intelligence community could arrange a new identity in a matter of hours, get him anywhere in the world in a day, hear any call, open any e-mail, track any vehicle. But the power came with a price, one Wells could no longer pay. He had always been allergic to the Langley bureaucracy, the way the CIA’s executives put frontline operatives at risk for their own gain. After his last mission, the tension had grown unbearable. Vinny Duto, the agency’s director, had used Wells to win an intra-agency power struggle. Wells felt what was left of his honor boiling away in the cauldron of Duto’s contempt.

He saw no choice but to quit, make a life for himself in New Hampshire, a land whose silent woods mocked Washington’s empty talk. The granite mountains would outlast empires and the men who built them. He rented a cabin in a little town called Berlin. But he and his dog, Tonka, spent a lot of time fifty miles south, in North Con- way, with Anne Marshall. Wells had met Anne a few months before, before his last mission. She knew who he was and some of what he’d done, though he kept some details from her. He wasn’t sure yet what their future would be.

NOW WELLS WAS BACK in the field. He had decided to run down a fugitive CIA double agent. Without official approval. Not for the first time on this trip, Wells wondered what he was trying to prove. And to whom.

He dropped the empty water bottle on the floor, where it joined crushed Bud Light cans and the remains of a joint that had rolled under the dresser between the two queen beds. All left here on the unlikely chance that a Jamaican drug dealer decided he needed to check their cover. Gaffan and Wells were sharing the room, which had acquired a funky odor after four days.

“Yo. You have to play that way?”

“Did you really just say ‘yo’?”

“I did.” Gaffan had grown up in northern New Jersey, a rowhouse town called Bergenfield, near New York City. His years in North Carolina and Georgia had coated his Jersey accent with a strange sugar. He seemed to speak fast and slow at the same time. Wells couldn’t explain how.

“Please don’t ever again.”

Wells pulled a dirty T-shirt on with his cargo shorts, slipped black work boots on his sockless feet. He’d owned the boots barely two weeks, but they were as ripe as the room. He tugged a New York Mets cap low on his head and stuffed twenty twenty-dollar bills in his pocket. Wells was a Red Sox fan, but he couldn’t wear the cursive B under these circumstances.

“How do I look?”

“The question is not how you look, it’s how you smell.”

“How do I smell?”

“Like a skeezy pothead dumb enough to think you can buy a few ounces of good shit without getting rolled, mon.”

“Exactly right. Let’s go.”

Gaffan was a former Special Ops soldier who had crossed paths with Wells twice before. They’d stayed in loose touch after the second mission. When Wells realized he would need backup for this trip, he’d called Gaffan, who had quit the army to join a private security firm in North Carolina. Gaffan had happily taken a week of vacation to join him.

At the door, Gaffan stopped. “Peashooters tonight?” Wells’s old Makarov and Gaffan’s new Glock were stowed in plastic bags in the air-conditioning vent in the bathroom—along with two suits, one for Wells and one for Gaffan. For the moment, Wells had insisted they leave the weapons. They were supposed to be small-time dope dealers. Guns would raise questions, and being unarmed didn’t bother him. He’d gone naked on lots of missions. Gaffan obviously didn’t enjoy the feeling. He’d asked Wells to reconsider a couple of times.

“Son. Don’t take your guns to town.”

Gaffan tapped his temple. “Johnny Cash. Like it, yo.”

“Keep this up and there’s trouble ahead.”

“The Dead. Showing your age.”

WELLS AND GAFFAN WERE chasing Keith Robinson, a former CIA officer who had sold secrets to China. After his cover was blown, Robinson fled the United States on a fake passport. For three years, he turned to smoke. Agents never found a credit card or phone connected to him. His name didn’t pop at border crossings. The best guess was that Robinson had altered his appearance and was living in a country that had a mostly cash economy—and enough Americans that he wouldn’t stand out. Selling trinkets in Guatemala. Teaching English in Vietnam. Studying at an ashram in India.

The CIA had promised a five-hundred-thousand-dollar reward for information leading to Robinson’s arrest. The FBI and CIA websites and U.S. embassies displayed his photo and the reward offer. The agency’s best hope was that a tourist would recognize Robinson or that someone who knew him would betray him for the money. Indeed, tipsters had reported spotting Robinson everywhere from Paris to Beijing to Wrigley Field. But none of the sightings panned out.

The investigation had not been closed. It never would be. Robinson’s crimes were too serious for the agency and the FBI to give up on him. Officially, anyway. But after three years without a lead, only four agents were assigned to the case full-time. They spent most days asking local police forces to chase tips. They no longer monitored the phone calls or mail sent to his ex-wife, Janice.

SO THEY NEVER SAW the postcard that dropped through the slot of Janice’s front door in Vienna, Virginia, a few miles from the agency’s headquarters. On the front, a photo of a six-foot-long marijuana cigarette on a beach towel. And four words: “Getting baked in Jamaica.” On the back, a phone number. No signature, no explanation.

Janice hoped the card wasn’t what she thought it was. Suddenly she was thirsty, an itch in her brain as real as a spider bite. She could almost feel the welt. She didn’t have any booze in the house, of course. But she knew every liquor store in Fairfax County. Didn’t have to be hard alcohol. She could have a glass or two of wine. To relax. A bottle. One bottle wouldn’t kill her.

She raised her shirt, looked down at the scar where the George Washington University surgeons had given her a new liver. She’d lost the old one to cirrhosis before she turned forty. Wouldn’t kill her? She might as well put a gun in her mouth. Be quicker and hurt less. She tore the postcard into pieces so small it looked like she’d run it through a shredder. Her hands ached when she was finished. She threw the pieces into the garbage disposal and went to the first Alcoholics Anonymous meeting she could find.

THE SECOND CARD CAME three months later. This one had a photo of Bob Marley above the words “Don’t worry, be happy.” A phone number. Janice couldn’t remember if it was the same one that was on the first card.

This time she didn’t pa...

About this edition

• Publisher: Headline Publishing Group
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 0755384652
• ISBN 13: 9780755384655
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 464