Black Harvest (The PROJECT) Read online

  "I'd be happy to." She put the papers in her jacket pocket. McCullough saw the Glock in its quick draw holster under her tailored jacket.

  "You carry a gun?" He seemed shocked.

  "I'm a kind of federal agent now, Kevin. I translate things for the government. They insist I wear it. I'm not sure I'd know what to do with it."

  Nick kept a straight face.

  "Well." McCullough stood. "I have to get ready for my afternoon lecture. It's good to see you."

  "I'll get the translation done in a day or two. We'll have coffee." She paused. "Kevin, it's probably a good idea not to mention this. Nick's right. It might have something to do with why your friend was murdered."

  "Yes. All right. Goodbye, Mr. Carter."

  Nick glanced back as they left. McCullough seemed dazed, pushing papers around on his desk, looking for his lecture notes.

  They came out of Healy Hall and stopped by a large fountain. The sky was clear and blue, good weather after days of gray skies and drizzle.

  "McCullough didn't like it when I told him someone might kill for that treasure."

  "He's an academic, Nick."

  "How does he get anything done in that mess up there?"

  Selena was about to say something when the sky detonated in a thunderclap over their heads. The blast knocked them to the ground. The sound rolled away toward the Potomac. Debris rained on the lawns and parking lots and parked cars, rock and smoldering wood and bits of masonry. A flurry of paper drifted down from above.

  "Jesus." Nick stood, helped Selena to her feet. Her knee was scraped and bleeding. Screams and shouts came from the building. They looked up.

  A large part of the outer wall on the fourth floor was gone. Black smoke poured through the hole. Yellow and orange tongues of flame flickered in the darkness.

  "That's where Kevin's office is. Right there."

  "Not any more." He sniffed the air. "Smell that? That's an odor tag for Semtex. The package he just got was a bomb."

  "Why?"

  "Maybe the message he told us about. Someone killed his friend and now they've killed him. What else could it be?"

  She felt her jacket pocket and the paper copy of the tablets. "We could have been there when it went off."

  "Yeah, but we weren't."

  She looked stricken. "Nick, Kevin had a wife and three grown kids. He was a sweet man. I can't believe this. What's so damned important about those tablets someone would want to kill him?"

  "I guess we'll find out when you translate them. I'm sorry about your friend."

  Selena looked up at the smoke pouring out of the fourth floor. People were streaming out of the building. Sirens sounded in the distance.

  "What now?" she said.

  "We go back to the Project before the cops get here."

  "Shouldn't we tell them about that package?"

  "They don't need us to figure it out. We need to talk with Harker."

  They got into Selena's Mercedes. A man in a dented white pickup parked two rows away watched them leave. He noted the time and reached for his cell phone.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Project Director Elizabeth Harker was a small woman. She always dressed in black and white. Today she wore an all black linen suit with a white scarf tie at her throat. The suit matched her raven black hair. Her hair was artfully cut to frame the fine bones of her face. Her emerald green eyes were wide, cat-like. She had milk-white skin, small ears and a slim figure, like an elf or fairy sprite from a Shakespearean tale. Her looks tended to make self-important people dismiss her. It was a mistake they didn't make twice. Harker was no fairy sprite.

  Harker's desk was wide and clean. She had a green desk blotter with leather corners. She had an antique ink stand and a silver pen that had belonged to FDR. There was a picture of the twin towers on 9/11 in a silver frame. A reminder.

  Stephanie Willits sat between Nick and Selena. She had a wide, attractive face and dark eyes. This morning she'd chosen a red dress and white blouse and dangly gold earrings. There were three gold bracelets on her left wrist. Steph was responsible for all computer resources at the Project. She talked to her computers as if they were her family and could make the big Crays on the floor below do things no one else thought possible.

  Nick couldn't put his finger on it, but she seemed different. She'd done something to her hair, but that wasn't it. She'd lightened up since Elizabeth had returned, but that wasn't it either. She seemed more alive. Even happy.

  Harker played with her pen. "Selena, do you think McCullough was murdered because of the message from his friend?"

  "It seems like too much of a coincidence."

  "I wonder if the bomb was meant for you and Nick?"

  Nick rubbed the scar on his left ear. A Chinese bullet had taken off the earlobe the first day he'd met Selena. Sometimes it burned like fire when everything was about to go bad. This time it was only an itch.

  "It wasn't for us. No one knew we were going there. Besides, there are easier ways to take us out than blowing up a university. That bomb was Semtex, someone with serious resources like a terrorist group."

  "You're sure it was Semtex."

  "I'm sure."

  "Steph, see if you can find out what the police in New Hampshire know about the murder up there."

  "I'll do it now." She got up and left.

  "I wouldn't bet on the local cops finding much," Nick said. "Whoever sent that bomb knew what they were doing. If they killed Campbell they won't have left clues."

  "Why would someone target these men? Selena, I'd like a full translation on those notes McCullough gave you."

  "I'll have it done later today."

  Harker toyed with her pen and set it down. Picked it up again. Began tapping. Thinking. Carter watched her.

  "The Bureau will be on it because of the bombing," she said.

  "Do we want to get involved with them?"

  "Not if we can help it. You know what it's like, they try to control everything. They're good at what they do, I'll give them that. If they get a lead, I'll take it. They don't know about you and Selena being on the scene. They won't have any reason to think it's more than a routine inquiry."

  Stephanie came back into the room.

  "That was quick. What have you got?"

  "I talked with the chief up there. It's a small department. They don't have much. McCullough's friend worked for CDC down in Atlanta. The killer cut off an ear before he cut Campbell's throat."

  "Only one reason to do that." Carter absently felt his ear. It was still attached to his head. "Torture. They wanted something from him."

  "Cash and credit cards still in his wallet." Stephanie sat down. "His laptop is missing. No phone, either. Someone broke into the library where Campbell was working and got into the restricted archives. No one knows if anything is missing yet."

  "No night watchman?"

  "He drinks. He was asleep."

  "Lucky for him, or he'd probably be dead. I think we can guess what's missing."

  "The tablets." Harker thought for a moment. "Stephanie, bring up Campbell's phone logs. Let's see if he called anyone else. Maybe he sent that message to more than one person."

  Steph went to a computer console off to the side of Harker's desk. The console fed into the big Crays downstairs. The Crays linked to the NSA database. Most messages sent over a cell phone or digital line were somewhere in that database. For sure all domestic messages. Campbell's calls would be there. Steph entered a string of commands.

  "Got him. Several calls to Atlanta in the days before he was killed. Two a day to his home number. One long call to someone named Arnold Weinstein at CDC the day before he was killed. On the night of his murder, two calls. One to Kevin McCullough. Another to Weinstein. Those calls are back to back. Sent at 10:09 in the evening."

  She began entering commands on her keyboard. "I'm checking on Weinstein now."

  Nick tugged on his ear. "We need to talk with him."

  "You'll need a hell of a connection
." Steph stared at her monitor.

  "What do you mean?"

  "Weinstein got in his car to go to work this morning. It blew up when he turned on the ignition."

  "A car bomb? Steph, can you retrieve the message from Campbell to Weinstein? Put it on the speakers."

  "It will take a minute. Hold on." They waited. "All set."

  They heard Campbell's voice. A voice from the grave.

  "Arnold, it's James."

  "Jim. Enjoying the weather up there? It was 78 here today."

  "Arnie, I've got something." Campbell sounded excited.

  "Oh?"

  "I've been looking at records from Persia and I found something from the time of Alexander the Great. There was a devastating crop failure in Persia right after Xerxes the First returned from Greece. The famine that followed almost brought down his empire. These tablets I've been looking at might be a clue to the cause."

  "Was there a draught?"

  "That's what I thought at first. But water wasn't the problem. I think it was an unknown variant of Fusarium graminearum."

  "Ah. That would do it."

  "It's possible a store of Fusarium spores from then may have survived."

  "You can't be serious." Weinstein sounded shocked.

  "I am. One of the tablets describes a sealed vessel, an urn of gold. It's supposed to contain the curse of a goddess."

  "Oh, come on, Jim. A curse?"

  "Not a spell, something real. Xerxes brought it back with him from Greece around 490 BCE. I think it had spores in it, maybe from infected grains. It may even have been the cause of the famine. The Greeks could have isolated the cause without really understanding how it worked. They could have seen it as something to use against their enemies. The myth linked with the urn centers on the goddess of the harvest."

  "You mean Demeter?"

  "Yes. The urn was kept in the royal treasury. It was still there when Alexander defeated Darius III."

  "What happened to it?"

  "Alexander sent it back to Greece, along with the treasure."

  "Then it's gone."

  "What if it isn't? What if we could find it? This could be what the Pentagon has been asking for. If it is, I don't want to give it to them."

  In Harker's office, they heard Weinstein sigh.

  "Jim, this isn't a secured line."

  "I don't give a damn. I didn't get into this field to turn science into a way to kill more people."

  "Jim, please."

  "If we can find this urn and it's what I think it is, we might come up with a way to wipe out Fusarium once and for all. Think of it, Arnie! New genetic material, uncontaminated. We have nothing that old to work with."

  "It might not be different."

  "No. But if it is..."

  "How do you propose to find it? If it exists?"

  "I think I know how, or at least how to begin."

  "When are you coming back?"

  "Tomorrow."

  "Jim. Be careful."

  "They wouldn't dare touch me, Arnie. You either. They need us. See you tomorrow."

  The call ended.

  "What's Fusarium whatever?" Nick asked.

  "Let's find out." Steph's fingers moved over the keyboard. A picture came up. "It's a crop blight. Caused a lot of problems in the past. Spreads quickly, hard to stop, kills grains like wheat and barley. Reproduces with spores. Nasty stuff."

  Elizabeth studied the picture on the screen. A field of wheat, rotten, black, spoiled.

  "Campbell and Weinstein were working on something for the Pentagon and Campbell wasn't happy about it. They were virologists. It must be some kind of bio-weapon." She leaned back in her chair. "Campbell didn't seem to think he was in any real danger."

  "Guess he was wrong about that," Nick said.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Zviad Gelashvili sat sharpening a long steel blade he kept strapped low down on his left leg. He held it up to the light, inspected it, and continued the quiet stoke of the whetstone along the razor edge.

  He was a huge man. His head came to a bald, round top under a workman's hat he wore to remind people of his peasant roots. He looked like a malevolent egg. He was known as "the egg". Not only because of his looks. Because anyone who annoyed or opposed him was turned into an unpleasant omelet.

  The thick flesh of Zviad's face was marked by acne scars and jovial cruelty. He had a large nose and black eyes that glittered without warmth. His lips were large, tinged with purple. He was heavily muscled. The tailored shirts he wore cascaded forward over a mountainous gut balanced by huge buttocks that required special chairs to accommodate them. His shoes were of the finest leather, crafted by the most exclusive boot maker in London.

  Gelashvili had risen to power in the criminal underworld of Moscow by emulating his idol and fellow Georgian, Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili, otherwise known as Stalin. If Zviad suspected treachery, someone died. If someone failed to carry out their assigned tasks, they died. If someone opposed him, they died. Something could always be done to encourage motivation.

  Gelashvili was powerful and rich. He controlled part of Russia's energy deliveries to Germany and Western Europe. He controlled politicians, judges, police. He owned nightclubs and brothels in Moscow, Kiev and St. Petersburg.

  Earlier in the day he'd gotten a phone call from a client he knew only as an anonymous voice over the phone. His accent was American and it was how Zviad thought of him, as "the American". Sometimes he'd hired Zviad to terminate someone, or wanted industrial secrets. Once he'd sought plans for one of the new fighters. It was all the same to Zviad, as long as he was paid. The American always paid very well.

  This time the client wanted Zviad to go to Greece, kidnap a woman and deliver her alive to a place where someone would take charge of her. A picture was faxed. The fee was generous. Zviad decided to send his younger brother to handle it. Bagrat was just as ruthless as he was. He could be trusted to do what was necessary.

  Gelashvili lived in the heart of the city, just outside the Garden Ring and next to Gorky Park. He could see the park from the large French windows of his study. His wife had wanted something central, close in. He liked to indulge Bedisa. She rewarded him with sexual improvisation that made up for the inconvenience she represented. She'd disappointed him with two girls. Perhaps next time it would be a boy.

  The gossip Bedisa heard in the posh salons and shops frequented by the wealthy women of Moscow often provided useful intelligence. She was shrewd. Overall, it was a good bargain. Zviad hoped she would never do something indiscreet. It would be a shame if the children lost their mother.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The headquarters building of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, the Sluzhba Vneshney Razvedki, was in a part of the city very different from the neighborhood where Zviad Gelashvili contemplated the usefulness of his wife. There was no park across from SVR headquarters. People were not encouraged to loiter and feed the birds near the SVR building.

  SVR was Russia's equivalent of the CIA, but operated with none of the restrictions that hampered Langley's operations. It carried on the old KGB tradition of espionage and assassination abroad. Not much ever changed about state security in Russia except names and technology. It had been that way in the days of the Czars. It would be that way tomorrow.

  There were eight departments in the SVR. Deputy Director Alexei Ivanovich Vysotsky ran Department S, which included an Operations Department. The Operations Department in turn included an elite Special Operations Group known as Zaslon. Zaslon did not officially exist.

  All Zaslon personnel were Spetsnaz, the best fighting men in Russia. Every member of Zaslon was trained for specialized foreign assignment and spoke at least three languages. Every member had demonstrated superior performance in a variety of secret military units. All had proved their courage under fire. They were fiercely loyal to the Rodina, the Motherland.

  Zaslon was the sword of the Motherland. No enemies of Russia survived when Zaslon went looking for them.


  Internal security within the Federation was handled by the FSB, the Federal'naya Sluzhba Bezopasnosti, headquartered at the old KGB headquarters in the Lubyanka east of Red Square. One area of friction between SVR and FSB concerned the growing power of the criminal gangs. The gang bosses controlled too much of Russia's wealth. Their wealth was manipulated from within the country, which made it FSB's problem. But gang operations extended far out into the world. As far as Eastern and Western Europe. As far as America. That made it Alexei's concern.

  Sometimes carefully planned operations against the gangs went wrong, especially when operations concerned Zviad Gelashvili. General Vysotsky suspected a leak in the Lubyanka. Gelashvili was getting too powerful. He had become a danger to the Motherland. Alexei was determined to take him down.

  Vysotsky was a genuine patriot. With the new administration things were changing. Alexei had high hopes. Hopes for a Russia reborn, without corrupt criminals shaping the future. A Russia respected and feared by the world.

  Alexei was a handsome man in an elegant and menacing way, but he hadn't gotten where he was on good looks. Nor was it his ruthlessness. That went with his job. What had carried him to his position of power was instinct, a real sense for feeling out danger to the Motherland.

  In his hands he held a report from an agent embedded deep in the American NSA. The report concerned the deaths of three scientists in America. As he read, the top of his skull tingled.

  On the surface it didn't appear to be a security threat. Yet it was odd that all three were top researchers in the study of viruses. The report provided a translation of the cuneiform tablets and noted the possible connection to Alexander's treasure. It speculated that the killings might have been motivated by greed.

  Not obviously a threat. Yet he had that tingle, that buzz of warning on the top of his head. Alexei always paid attention to that tingle. He decided to follow up on the report.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Afternoon sun poured over a set of glossy pictures spread out on the L-shaped kitchen countertop in Nick's apartment. The pictures were of a new luxury condo for sale near Du Pont Circle and the Convention Center in downtown D.C. A glass of Cabernet stood close by Selena's hand. Nick poured a fresh Irish whiskey. It was his third. He had a good buzz going.