CHAPTER 1
BRIGADIER GENERAL STANLEY DOMBROSKI HUNGup the phone and listened to the sound of his own breathing, and of the rain beating against the windows of his second-story office. He recorded this moment in his mind, thinking he might want to recall it someday.
He rose from his desk and looked out the window. The heavy downpour pelted the flowering dogwood trees that lined the strip of lawn beside the United States Army Criminal Investigation Division headquarters in Quantico, Virginia.
The spring rains had started early this year, and come on stronger, and would not let up. At least, that was how it felt. But maybe the weather was just the weather, as it had always been, and the thing that was changing was Stanley Dombroski.
This might not be a homicide, Stan. This might not even be a crime.
The phone call had come from his boss, Major General Stephen Hackett, the Provost Marshal General, who was the commanding officer of the Army Criminal Investigation Division and the Army’s top law enforcement official. Stephen Hackett generally did not hand down assignments personally, and Brigadier General Stanley Dombroski was no longer supposed to be directly overseeing cases either. But this was something different. Something big. The rules of rank and responsibility did not apply.
Dombroski walked to the window, where he caught his reflection in the rain-streaked glass, and the glint of the general’s star on the shoulder loop of his green service uniform.
Getting older had its perks. And the promotion to general that he thought would never come finally had. The pay raise was nice, but he lived modestly and hadn’t needed it. What he had needed was the respect and recognition that was owed to him.
He’d finally gotten that five months ago, after he’d taken a big swing on a high-profile homicide case in Berlin. From the point of view of the higher-ups in the Pentagon, it was supposed to be a rubber-stamp job. Let the Germans do the work, nod along, and say danke schön. It was their jurisdiction anyway, and the case looked pretty open-and-shut.
But something inside General Dombroski—then Colonel Dombroski—told him not to follow the script. It was probably the same qualities that had led his wife to leave him: arrogance, paranoia, and a pigheaded will. The good stuff.
So Dombroski had assigned the Berlin case to two CID special agents who he knew would follow the truth wherever it led, which in that instance was into the deepest abyss of human evil.
We’re on the bleeding edge here, Stanley. We need to get this right.
Getting it right meant getting the truth, and in this case, the truth might be dangerous. This was not the time for safe assumptions, or half measures, or ass covering.
He walked back to his desk, picked up the phone, and punched a number. It rang once, and then Special Agent Scott Brodie said, “Good afternoon, General.”
“Scott. Are you at HQ?”
“Yes, sir. Ms. Taylor and I are in our office having a working lunch.”
“I need to see you both in my office now.”
“Yes, sir. Can I bring you some chicken lo mein?”
“No thank you.” He added, “I’m going to need you to clear the decks, so think about who can inherit your caseload.”
“With pleasure, sir. I look forward to our new assignment in an interesting and exotic locale.”
“Prepare to be disappointed.”
“Yes, sir.”
Dombroski hung up. Turning down carbs was a relatively new habit of his, but it was already earning dividends.
Chief Warrant Officers Scott Brodie and Maggie Taylor were two of the most talented and hardworking special agents in CID. They also had intense personalities, problems with authority, and a tendency to strike out on their own under dangerous circumstances, without regard for personal safety or legal jurisdiction. For Stanley Dombroski, assigning Brodie and Taylor to a big case with vast national security implications was never an enjoyable experience as it unfolded, but once it was over, it always felt like it had been the right choice. Kind of the inverse of eating chicken lo mein.
He watched the rain as he waited for his agents to arrive. He could see only the outline of this thing, the bare facts given to him by General Hackett. But it didn’t look good, and no amount of wishful thinking would unring that phone, or undo what was being done by the military’s top scientists and engineers in the name of progress and preparedness.
The road to Hell was paved with good intentions, and General Stanley Dombroski feared that the Army’s best and brightest were out there laying the asphalt.
CHAPTER 2
CHIEF WARRANT OFFICERS SCOTT BRODIEand Maggie Taylor walked down the hall toward General Dombroski’s office. Taylor said, “?‘Disappointed’ means stateside. Domestic military installation.”
Brodie shook his head. “He nuked our caseload. We’ll be out of reach, somewhere we can’t conduct interviews or pull from resources at Quantico. Overseas, somewhere that sucks. Pack your parka for Greenland.”
“You’re wrong. We’re dumping our caseload because we’ll be slammed by whatever this is. Stateside.”
