Free Anvil by Dirk Patton Page A

as exactly that.  Twice?  No fucking
way, Petty Officer.  They’re either in the feed again or someone is passing
them information.”
    “You don’t
think it was me?”  Her voice rose a couple of octaves and I could hear
that she was both hurt and indignant.
    “No,
Jessica.  I don’t.  If it was you they would have had me pinpointed
each time and not had to search.  This is someone that has enough
information to point them in my direction, but can’t give them my exact
location.  Who would that be?”
    It was quiet
for a long time and I let her stew and think.  I had originally intended
to contact Admiral Packard directly with my suspicions, but for some reason I
knew I could trust Jessica to do the right thing.  I’ve been around the
military much of my adult life and had no doubt that if I had called the
Admiral he would immediately lock down all personnel with any access to or
knowledge of my whereabouts. 
    Naval
counter-intelligence would start an investigation.  Depending on who was
running things, that investigation could easily become a witch hunt.  With
the current state of affairs, I wouldn’t be surprised if everyone who was even
remotely involved got thrown into a jail cell and left to rot.  I didn’t
want to lose Jessica while the bureaucrats got things sorted out.  She’d
saved my ass more than a few times.  It would be better for her to come
forward with the suspicions.
    Not that she
wouldn’t be looked at closely.  It’s not uncommon for moles and traitors
to accuse others of their crimes in an attempt to deflect suspicion.  But
if I was correct about her, and I was betting my life on it right about now,
she would come out of the other end of this and be just fine.
    “Still
there?”  I finally asked.
    “Yes,
sir.  Just running over a list of possibilities in my head.  And
getting really pissed off.”  I could hear the tightness in her voice.
    “Just be
sure you’ve got your ducks in a row before you talk to anyone,” I
advised.  “And, be prepared to be put under the microscope.  Also, I
need one more thing.”
    “Sir, you
just talked to me directly about this instead of throwing me to the wolves in
intel.  Anything you want, you get.”
    “Get into
what’s left of the CIA’s network.  Find out if it’s still possible to
activate personal locators.  If it is, I’d like you to ping my wife’s
locator and start tracking her.”
    “Your
wife’s?  She’s CIA?  I thought she was with you, sir.”
    Shit. 
Jessica didn’t know.  But then, how could she?
    “She turned,
Jessica.  Infected.  I lost her somewhere south of Mountain Home. 
I’m in a Black Hawk on my way to the front and I’m going to need to find her
when this is over.”
    Jessica was
quiet for a few moments and I could imagine the thoughts going through her
head.
    “OK,
sir.  I’ll do everything I can, but I’m not optimistic this is going to
work.  If that system is even still up and running, the very nature of
what it is means it will have one hell of security layer in front of it.”
    “Do the best
you can,” I said, hope that I’d be able to find Katie again flickering and
threatening to go out.
    “Already
working on it, sir,” she said, the sound of rapid keyboarding coming over the
circuit.
    “Thank you,
Jessica.  And be careful who you talk to about the other matter.  You
don’t know who you can trust.”
    “Yes, sir,”
she said.
    I could hear
an undercurrent of fear creep in when she spoke.  Breaking the connection,
I pulled the headset off and handed it back to the Lieutenant.

13
     
    It was only
a few more minutes before the pilot made a sharp turn and descended
quickly.  One of the Rangers opened the side door as we touched down,
jumping to the ground.  The rest followed and I leapt out right behind
them.  Blanchard, his aide, then Rachel and Irina brought up the rear.
    We were at a
temporary command post.  Five Hummers were parked in a reasonable
facsimile