The Jason Betrayal Read online

  The

  Jason

  Betrayal

  By

  Jack Bowie

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, companies, events, or locales is coincidental.

  Copyright © 2019 by Jack Bowie

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without the prior written permission of the author. If you would like to use material from this book (other than for review purposes), permission must be obtained by contacting the author at [email protected].

  Visit the author’s web site at www.JackBowie.com

  Cover design by Renee Barratt, www.TheCoverCounts.com

  To my wife Sharon, and daughters Lisa and Jennifer,

  with all my love.

  Contents

  Title

  Begin Reading

  Acknowledgements

  PART ONE

  Washington, D.C.

  Chapter 1

  Georgetown University Medical Center, Washington, D.C.

  Sunday, 2:00 a.m.

  Please, God. Don’t let me kill anyone tonight.

  First-year resident Catherine Tanner pressed her back against the cold green wall and leaned into the metal file cabinet that held the unending notebooks describing the policies and procedures of the Georgetown University Medical Center Emergency Department. If learning the clinical procedures of an ER physician wasn’t enough, she had discovered the equally obscure domain of knowledge that was hospital and billing requirements.

  Tanner was twenty hours into yet another twenty-four-hour shift. The isolated corner had become her personal sanctuary: a place of seclusion and brief rest. At least until the next addict or assault victim was pushed through the ER door.

  So far today she had sutured four knife slashes, set three broken bones, treated five drug ODs, calmed four nervous parents who were sure their children had been poisoned and sent three patients to the OR, two with heart attacks and one with a gunshot wound to the abdomen. And then completed the interminable encounter forms on the hospital’s ancient laptop computers.

  Why was she doing this? She was an intelligent, reasonably attractive young woman. She used to have friends. A life outside this hospital. Surely there had to be an easier way to make a positive contribution to society.

  Oh well, only four more hours.

  * * *

  “Tanner. Incoming!”

  The shrill voice of the head nurse sliced through her haze like a scalpel through bare flesh. Tanner shook her head to clear the fuzziness and trotted into the main corridor.

  Smokey Madison, a D.C. firefighter turned paramedic who seemed to be a daily visitor to the ER, was giving the bullet, a.k.a. the patient status summary, as he and his partner wheeled a patient through the glass doors.

  “Carlos Torres, thirty-three-year-old male, no known allergies,” he began. “Apparent hit-and-run victim. Unconscious on scene. Placed on backboard with cervical collar. Broken right femur, faint palpable right DP and PT pulse. Possible cracked or broken ribs. Lung sounds diminished on both sides. O2 sat eight-eight percent ambient, placed on O2 four liters via n/c. BP ninety over sixty. Pulse one fifty. Sinus tach on monitor. IV fluids running wide open through an 18 gauge.”

  “Room Two,” said a dark-skinned man in blue scrubs.

  Shit.

  Giving the orders was Chief Resident Gil Martinez, arguably Tanner’s boss. He must have come on shift while she was hiding out. Martinez was a tall, lanky Texan with an ego as big as his home state. She had heard he had flown through UT Med School paying his bills from rodeo bull-riding prize winnings. Something he never tired of sharing with his ridiculously debt-ridden colleagues.

  The fact that he was impossibly good-looking was the last straw. One of his favorite games was humiliating new residents. Well, there was no way she was going to let him see even the tiniest bit of weakness tonight.

  The paramedics wheeled the gurney into Room Two, in reality simply a curtained-off area on the side of the ER, and followed the well-practiced intake procedure: transfer, hook-up, and examination.

  Madison and his partner silently disappeared into the background as Martinez took charge. He ripped open Torres’ shirt and repeatedly pressed his stethoscope to the bare chest.

  “Tanner,” he ordered, glancing up from the patient. “What do we look for?”

  “Airway,” she replied as confidently as she could.

  “Okay. This guy’s circling the drain. If he doesn’t get some oxygen he’s going to die. Get an airway.”

  “But I’ve never …”

  “Good time to learn.”

  Tanner turned to her left and saw Nurse Parker holding the intubation kit, impatience evident on her face. She knew that Parker could probably perform the intubation with her eyes closed.

  Nurses always knew what to do. They’ve worked in the ER for decades. How was she supposed to learn everything in a few months?

  Tanner tore open the plastic package and set the laryngoscope and intubation blade on a sterile drape Parker had laid out.

  I can do this.

  She remembered the steps they had taught her in med school: “Use the blade to clear the tongue, slide the scope in, visualize the vocal cords, and complete the intubation into the trachea.” But her know-it-all roommate had told her the real secret: “Screw the cords, Cat,” she had said, “you’ll never see them. Follow the epiglottis.”

  Tanner grabbed Torres’ jaw with her left hand, lifted gently, then stared into his mouth. Blood filled his throat.

  Panic froze her in place. How am I going to get the scope in?

  She knew all the possible complications if she messed up: chipped teeth, lacerated cheeks, intubating the esophagus. Or worse. What do I do now?

  As if Parker could read her mind, the nurse stuffed a suction tube into the maw and cleared the space.

  Tanner dropped her head closer and gazed into the throat. “What the hell?” she whispered.

  Sticking out of the inside of Torres’ jaw was a shiny, metallic-looking object. She wasn’t sure whether the mass was a loose particle or a botched third-world dental filling. It poked out of his mandible like a gum-ball.

  How could the man even swallow with that in his mouth?

  Martinez finally deigned to help, leaning over the body and looking into the open throat. But without offering any suggestions.

  I have to do something.

  She needed to find out what it was. It might come loose and make the intubation even more difficult. She grabbed the blade and poked it at the mass.

  She heard a soft pop and the object vanished in a pink mist with a strange odor of almonds.

  Chapter 2

  Cerberus Consulting, Tysons Corner, VA

  Tuesday, 9:00 a.m.

  Cerberus Consulting was a boutique consulting firm, based in Tysons Corner, Virginia, specializing in Internet security. The company had been named after a character from Greek mythology: a monstrous three-headed dog with a mane of snakes, the claws of a lion, and the tail of a serpent. It was supposedly the sentry that guarded the entrance to Hades to prevent the dead from escaping and the living from entering.

  When Adam Braxton, Founder and President, had started his information security consulting company, he had decided that this was just the personification of network security he wanted to portray. Over the past three years, he had built a solid reputation among clients in both the public and private sectors. And he hadn’t been lied to, arrested, or shot at for almost a year.


  “Adam, Mr. Nolan from MITRE is here.” Braxton’s admin, Karen Chu, announced through the intercom.

  Braxton automatically reached for his schedule card; an anachronistic index card Chu prepared late every afternoon with his schedule for the next day. It was a throwback to simpler, pre-computer days, but a custom he had fought to maintain throughout his career.

  He had never told anyone, even Chu, that the reason for the practice was that it was one of the most vivid memories of his father. A journeyman electrical engineer, John Braxton had made his son everything he was today. Every morning, his father would sit at the kitchen table, write his schedule on an index card and place it in his shirt pocket. The son never saw his father without that card.

  I haven’t been down to Miami to see them in over a year. I have to schedule that trip.

  The notation on today’s card said “Jack Nolan - MITRE”. Nolan’s name was new, but MITRE was a familiar client. The MITRE Corporation was a unique species in the jungle of animals that fed at the government’s trough. It was an FFRDC: a Federally Funded Research and Development Center. They achieved their uniqueness through their business model: they only contracted with Federal government agencies. The concept was that such organizations would be free of commercial conflicts of interest and could maintain a staff of exemplary technical talent.

  In return for this exclusivity, FFRDCs, like those run by the RAND Corporation, Lincoln Laboratories and MITRE, could receive coveted “no-bid” contracts. The result was a win for the government, who could avoid the overhead cost and lengthy timespan of competitive bids; for the taxpayer, who paid less for high-quality results; and, of course, for the FFRDCs, who gained both technical prestige and corporate revenue.

  Chu showed a short, well-dressed man into the office. He looked in his mid-thirties, about Braxton’s age, but a receding hairline and heavily hooded eyes made him look more like a gnome than a bureaucrat. Braxton pegged him as a corporate gopher.

  “Adam, this is Jack Nolan.”

  Braxton rose from his chair and extended his hand. “Mr. Nolan.”

  Nolan took the offer. His grip was soft and fleshy. “Mr. Braxton. A pleasure.”

  Chu returned to the outer office and Braxton motioned for Nolan to join him at his small conference table under the office’s only window. Outside, the black macadam of the Dulles Access Road rolled west to the airport. Sandwiching the highway were soaring concrete and glass office buildings and rows of picture-perfect condominiums, both housing those that ostensibly did the people’s work: government employees, lobbyists and the never-ending line of consultants ready to tell anyone who would listen how to do their job. Consultants like Braxton.

  “What can Cerberus do for MITRE, Mr. Nolan?”

  “Actually, it’s what you can do for MITRE, Mr. Braxton. One of our, eh, project teams has requested a briefing on cybersecurity. From you.”

  Braxton wrinkled his brow. He had received several contracts for the company over the years; all as part of larger engagements they had with various federal agencies. But he couldn’t remember any time that the client had explicitly asked for Cerberus.

  “Who is the client?” he asked.

  Nolan squirmed in his seat, “Ah, I’m an analyst from the Jason Program Office. The Jason Steering Group has asked for the briefing.” He paused as if for dramatic effect.

  Unfortunately, the drama was completely lost on Braxton. Who the hell is Jason?

  The gnome must have recognized the blank look on Braxton’s face. “Oh, yes. My apologies, Mr. Braxton. Jason is not a well-known organization. Suffice it to say that this is an advisory group of very senior researchers and scientists. MITRE manages Jason on behalf of federal agencies who are looking for independent input on highly sensitive topics. I must also say that, in all of my years with the Program Office, I have never heard of Jason asking for outside input. You should be very honored by this request. It will be a quite positive addition to your corporate capabilities statement.”

  A group of independent scientists? Advising the government? What the hell is Nolan describing?

  ‘Well, thank you, Mr. Nolan. I appreciate your confidence, but I do have some pragmatic questions. How extensive would this briefing be? Specifically, how much time would it entail?”

  Nolan relaxed back in his chair. “Actually very little time, Mr. Braxton. We’re talking about a few hours at our headquarters in McLean. We will, of course, pay for any preparation time.”

  “Very well, then. Please work with Karen to set up an appropriate time for—”

  “Ah, I’m sorry, Mr. Braxton,” Nolan interrupted. “But this briefing is quite time-critical. Jason has a slot available tomorrow morning at nine o’clock. I hope that is acceptable?”

  Nolan may be a gopher, but he sure is a persistent one. Braxton still didn’t know who Jason was, but MITRE was a client he didn’t want to disappoint. And how hard could a simple security briefing be?

  “Alright. I can make that.”

  * * *

  Roger Slattery, chief of the CIA’s Counterterrorism Center, exited the elevator on the seventh floor with the usual trepidation. The top floor of the CIA’s new building was the home of the bigwigs, the Director and all the Deputies that ran one of the most famous intelligence services in the world. Slattery had a rule of thumb that the higher you went in the building, the more political, and thicker, the bullshit became.

  Slattery was here to see his boss, Peter Markovsky, Deputy Director of Intelligence. Markovsky was career-CIA, having seen extensive service in Europe and the Middle East. In addition to being a recognized expert in expressionist art, he was one of the most cold-blooded agents in the history of the Agency. Slattery had known Markovsky for over twenty years and every assignment he had received from the man had caused some major upheaval in Slattery’s life.

  He walked down the deeply-padded carpeting of the corridor and into Markovsky’s suite. Julia Owens, the DDI’s assistant, smiled at the familiar face. “Good luck,” she said, increasing Slattery’s anxiety. “Go right in.”

  Slattery had expected a private meeting with his boss, but Markovsky was not at his desk and the meeting was anything but private. The DDI was sitting at his conference table at the far end of the room and next to him was Deputy Director Claude Stroller, of the National Security Agency. Now Slattery knew what Owens had meant.

  Markovsky and Stroller were lifelong members of the intelligence community who had risen through the ranks to be among the most powerful men in Washington. Markovsky was a small, owlish man, with short white hair and penetrating eyes hidden behind a pair of thick wire-rimmed eyeglasses. He gave the appearance of an academician, moving effortlessly from teacher to advisor.

  Stroller, on the other hand, was tall and thin with dark eyes and swarthy skin, common to those of Middle East descent. Coal black hair was slicked straight back from his forehead, and a carefully-trimmed goatee covered his chin.

  He was the Rasputin-esque power broker, living his life in a hidden, black world and maintaining his position through a carefully-balanced mix of technical knowledge, bureaucratic skill, and a file of secrets that would put J. Edgar Hoover to shame.

  At once both colleagues and competitors, Markovsky and Stroller controlled a frighteningly large percentage of America’s clandestine activities. Seeing them together gave Slattery the chills.

  “Please sit down, Roger,” Markovsky said, gesturing to a chair on the other side of the table. “I hope you don’t mind Claude joining us. There are some developments we should discuss.”

  Slattery’s stomach jumped, but he nodded politely and took his seat opposite the two spooks.

  “Roger,” Markovsky began, “could you describe your work on—”

  “Actually, Peter,” interrupted Stroller, “I was wondering if your colleague could give us an update on the hunt for this Singer character? I’ve heard from my staff that Roger has made a number of requests for electronic surveillance.”

  Slattery
turned wide-eyed to Markovsky. His boss swallowed, then took off his eyeglasses and squeezed the bridge of his nose. Slattery, at the least, recognized it as his boss’s tell when he needed time to think. Stroller’s request was not something the DDI had expected.

  I guess that’s what I get for asking NSA for assistance.

  What was he supposed to say? There’s this guy, average height, average build, nothing physically remarkable, who is also the most dangerous man Slattery has ever known. Thought you might like to help me find him?

  Markovsky finally nodded in acquiescence.

  “Of course,” Slattery replied, the acid in his stomach burning its way up his esophagus. “Alfred Whitehead Singer, named after the famous English philosopher Alfred North Whitehead by his philosophy professor father, was recruited at Princeton when he was twenty-one. He completed training at the Farm and was selected for special ops duty at twenty-five. He executed numerous clandestine operations in the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and South America. The operations were completed successfully, but evaluations suggested Singer liked his job too much. He proposed some rather unorthodox missions and was retired.

  “We heard subsequent rumors that he was free-lancing but ignored them. In hindsight, a mistake. Singer was identified as the actor who coordinated the Liberty Covenant assassination attempt on President Matthews two years ago and was responsible for the murder of a journalist at the Lincoln Memorial. We thought he subsequently disappeared, but recently learned he was the conduit between a group of German industrialists and the Rockwell terrorist group responsible for the recent Middle East assassinations.”

  “As I remember Rockwell was also ex-CIA?” asked Stroller. “And his group made another attempt on President Matthews’ life?”

  Slattery did his best to hold back the outburst that was building in his throat.

  “Yes, that is correct, Claude,” Markovsky replied. Slattery could never have stayed so calm.