Chapter 20
Andrew Strong spoke by phone to the Assistant Attorney General—Civil Litigation Division of the Justice Department, and explained what was happening with Paul Tanner.
He told him the truth, then told him what lies were necessary to cover it.
Paul’s immediate supervisor and his colleagues would be informed that he was recovering slowly in a Paris hospital from a near lethal bout of food poisoning.
Many of his colleagues were friends who had attended the wedding and had been concerned by his sudden disappearance.
As the narrative went, Paul and Chelsea had both eaten the wrong dish in a seafood restaurant and ended up in the hospital, violently ill.
Her case was lighter than his and she was already back home, recuperating.
His prognosis was good but he would not be allowed to travel for some time.
He could not accept phone calls, and personal visits were out of the question.
Friday afternoon, Strong was finally summoned to the office of Huff Norton, the Director of the FBI.
Huff was in his ninth year of a ten-year-term and was apparently trying to make everyone as miserable as possible before being shoved out.
Strong had been in the “big office” a dozen times during his career, with each visit an event to remember.
Huff sat at the end of a long conference table, an assistant on each side, and growled, “What’s on your mind, Andrew?”
“We have another kidnapping in France.”
“So I’ve heard. Go ahead.”
“A week ago. Honeymooners again. They were snatched, separated, and held for ransom. We were not called. Her family paid two million bucks. She was released and flew home with her father. His family paid the same but with a different result. The gang took the money and kept the groom.”
Huff grimaced and inhaled as if swallowing bad news. “Sounds familiar. Who’s the boy?”
“Name’s Tanner. Works for Justice, here in town.”
“Military?”
“Oh yes. Naval Academy cadet, class of 2005. Law school, JAG Corps, the works.”
Huff swallowed more bad news. “Is this the third or fourth?”
“Third.”
“Mind recapping?”
“Three years ago a couple was abducted near a winery in Bordeaux. They had just gotten married near Portland and wine was their hobby. Very similar case. Her family paid the ransom and she was released. We were not called. His family paid it too, but he has not been seen. Eleven months ago in Paris, same thing. The newlyweds were from the Tampa area.”
“Any word from the kidnappers?”
“Some. About two months after the first one, the groom’s family got a video. He was still alive. About five months ago, the bride in the second incident got a video of her husband.”
“I remember that.” Huff glared at an assistant who dutifully slid over a memo, which Huff ignored and said, “All three are military?”
“Were. None active at the time of the kidnappings.”
“And we’re now investigating all three?”
“Yes sir. The trails are pretty cold. We haven’t had a decent lead in months. No idea where they are. Obviously, we have jurisdictional issues. The French are in charge.”
“God help us.” Huff let off a deep, frustrated sigh, as if the last thing he needed to end his week was another crisis. “Same tactics?”
“Almost identical. Grab both, separate them, contact the families immediately, threaten against calling the cops, demand two million for each. Make it easy for the girl to go free. Keep the groom for some reason.”
“Gotta be the same gang.”
“Sure looks like it. Throw in the military angle and we’ve got a nasty situation.”
Huff glanced at his two assistants as if he didn’t know their names and had no time to learn them.
He growled, “Gimme the room.” In perfect unison, they snapped their laptops closed and bolted to their feet, as if they got the boot five times a day and always expected it.
They vanished without another sound. The next sound was another guttural discharge from Huff as he rubbed his red eyes.
Then he locked his hands behind his head and gazed at the ceiling. “This could be serious, Strong.”
“I believe it is.”
“And all three situations have been kept away from the press?”
“So far. The three brides were traumatized with fear when they were released, though they were not mistreated. The threats made an impression. Then the thugs sent videos to tease and torment. Presumably, the boys are still alive.”
“There’s no benefit in going public, but I’m surprised this has not surfaced.”
“Well, for obvious reasons the French want it buried. Tourism is their biggest business, after wine, of course. They can’t have American tourists worried about kidnappings.”
“How deep is our investigation into the first two?”
Strong shrugged and replied, “Going through the motions. These are not our crimes. On top of that, the families stayed quiet until the trail was cold. There’s only so much we can do.”
“Sounds like a problem for Langley.”
“I agree.”
“Do they know?”
“Who knows what they know? We need a meeting.”
Huff almost grinned and said, “It’s a loser. Let’s dump it on the spooks.”
—
Late Friday afternoon, Chelsea posted a chatty message on social media.
She followed the company line and explained that their lovely honeymoon was interrupted by a bad batch of bouillabaisse in a popular Parisian brasserie.
At almost the same moment, both were stricken by severe food poisoning that required hospitalization.
She was home and recovering slowly. Paul was still in Paris but doing okay.
The doctors were optimistic he would be released in a week or so.
She thanked everyone for their calls and messages and promised to catch up later.
It was all fiction and she felt terrible about the lies.
She then watched and read the responses.
She would deal with them later. Callie, her best friend and maid of honor, arrived at the Clayburn home and the two sat by the pool and talked for hours.
It was refreshing to see her and talk about life, but it was also extremely uncomfortable, at times almost painful, to go through the motions of living through a lie.
A bunch of lies. Callie was the one person, other than Paul, that she could trust with anything.
Yet she couldn’t utter a word about being kidnapped, drugged, buried in a dark room for three days, starved, swapped for ransom, and leaving Paris without Paul.
Chelsea doubted she could play the game much longer. However, the FBI was adamant that the story stay buried. Loose lips could endanger Paul.
—
Virtually all communications between the FBI and the CIA were handled through proper channels and followed strict protocols.
They were scheduled, logged, recorded, then summarized with endless notes.
Neither one trusted the other, and with good reason.
They had feuded and shadowboxed for decades.
Their more serious disagreements often required the involvement of the White House.
The FBI protected the homeland. The CIA took care of the rest of the world.
Some incidents, though, involved both. And some communications needed to be off the record.
The unofficial liaison for the FBI was Ross Joyce, a thirty-year veteran of the turf battles.
His office was directly across the hall from Huff’s and he met with the director every morning.
His counterpart at the CIA was Dexter Maceas, also a career insider who worked as the fixer, the contact, the deep throat, the jack of all trades.
If Maceas had a title, Joyce didn’t know it.
Their preferred meeting place was a rear table in a small pizza dive near Walter Reed Hospital, an unlikely spot. With their unlimited and off-the-books expense accounts, they could choose the finest restaurants in the city, but then so could the people they wished to avoid.
Over iced tea and salads they hurried through the usual small talk. Joyce began the heavier stuff with “We have a situation. Are you aware of two recent kidnappings of U.S. citizens in France?”
Maceas thought for a second and said, “Maybe. I see so much, but it doesn’t ring a loud bell at the moment. Keep going.”
“Three years ago a couple were on their honeymoon and they were sipping wine in the countryside near Bordeaux.”
“I remember my first honeymoon. We stayed in a cheap motel a mile from the beach.”
“Well, I can’t really remember mine. These kids were from the Portland area and serious about wine.
They got themselves abducted. Her family paid the ransom and she came home.
He’s still missing. Eleven months ago, a couple from Tampa vanished near Giverny, near Paris.
Same ransom demands, same outcome. She’s home, he’s not. Any of this sound familiar?”
“Not really. Sounds like a French problem.”
“Maybe. Now it’s happened again. Two weeks ago a couple from here in the city were kidnapped in Normandy. Identical ransom demands, same outcome.”
“Not a bad business model. Are you assuming the three men are still alive?”
“We don’t know enough to assume anything. But our guys say yes, they’re probably still alive, which makes you wonder what the thugs are thinking.”
“Hostages? Some valuable bargaining chips? Why else would they go to the trouble of keeping them?”
“It gets more interesting. All three of the men have military backgrounds. Stockman, the first, is a lawyer who spent six years in the JAG Corps and was working for the U.S. Immigration Service when he disappeared. Snyder, number two, was working for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Tampa.
Tanner, number three as of two weeks ago, was a cadet at the Naval Academy, five years with the Navy JAG Corps, then with Justice here in Washington. ”
Maceas sliced a cherry tomato in two but did not eat it.
He wasn’t thinking about the next bite. He was thinking: Who would hold a grudge against the U.S.
military? But that question was so broad and speculative that any discussion would go everywhere and nowhere.
Instead he asked, “Does Huff want to get involved?”
“No. It’s not domestic. We’re thinking it’s something you should handle. Maybe along with the NSA.”
Maceas ate the tomato and frowned as he swallowed it.
Involving the National Security Agency was problematic.
Involving another intelligence service was complicated: there were seventeen of them, all prickly about their turf, and generally unwilling to share information, often with disastrous results.
The FBI had more work than it could handle.
Getting wrapped up in a foreign hostage or kidnapping crisis seemed the perfect mess for the CIA to screw up.
Maceas and Joyce spent fifteen somewhat humorous minutes reminiscing about cases that both agencies had mishandled and then tried to blame on the other.
Maceas paid the small bill and they agreed to talk early Monday. He would call his boss, Director Keefe, within the hour and ruin his weekend.