Puzzle by Nora Phoenix
20
Now that everyone had had a chance to read through the content of the Proud Patriotic Nationalists website, Coulson had set up a meeting with some of his FBI agents and Branson and Ryder. As always, Coulson had come to the CIA building, making it easy for Branson, who hated wasting time on a drive downtown.
Branson sat knee to knee with Ryder—in itself a kind of torture since that unexpected encounter they’d shared Friday evening. Being so close to him, Ryder’s scent enveloping him, triggered too many memories. When he’d woken up, Ryder had been gone, and neither of them had brought it up when they’d seen each other again that morning.
Vegas, Branson kept telling himself. He’d promised not to talk about it, so he wouldn’t. The first hour had been awkward as fuck, but funnily enough, after that, it had become easier. Almost normal again. He’d been surprised, then grateful that they’d both managed to keep things separate. But sitting this close to Ryder? Not a smart idea.
“What do you make of these statements, especially the ones by George Washington?” Coulson asked Branson.
“Remember what we said about the proclamations Al Saalihin made, how over the top they felt? This is along the same lines. So cheesy and extreme it’s like a bad movie script.”
“But do they believe it? Or is it lip service?”
“I think the person they sent those messages to believed it. Donnie Smith did, and if I had to take a guess, so do Naomi Beckingham and Ralph Durrick. They’re the true believers. Maybe Wesley Quirk and Jon Brooks as well. They fit the profile. But Kingmakers? Hell no. They have their own agenda, and while it happens to align with these right-wing nuts, they’re only spouting this to appeal to that base, to those people.”
“I wonder if they all know about each other,” Seth said. “Do they know Hamza Bashir is a hired gun? Do they realize Kingmakers has a different end goal than they do?”
“Mmm, good question. We can identify three distinct groups. We have Hamza Bashir, aka Yazid El Sewedy, and possible accomplices on his end, who do it for the money. The second group comprises the true believers like Naomi and her boyfriend, who think they’re helping their white nationalist cause. And then there’s Kingmakers, who seems to have their own monetary gain as main interest, combined with the political goal of having a pro-war president who would hire their firm. For now, I’m assuming that the military contractors we suspect of election donation fraud are on their side with similar interests, but who knows? They may have their own agenda as well.”
“I’m still not sure how Mrs. Markinson fits in,” Seth said. Branson knew the question of how she’d gotten involved with a plot this dark and sinister kept plaguing the Secret Service agent. Seth had expressed multiple times that he couldn’t reconcile the warm, loving grandmother he’d known with a cold plan to take out her husband.
“I’ve thought about that too,” Branson said. “And I have a comprehensive theory about the whole chain of events, though I can’t prove it. Yet.”
Seth raised his eyebrows. “Hit me with it.”
“Here’s what I think happened. Markinson became the Democratic nominee for president, and when he polled much better than Governor Winkelmann, the Republican candidate, Kingmakers got scared. They figured that if Markinson won, he’d not only scale back the US presence in the Middle East but also limit the use of military operators like Kingmakers. He wanted to rely on US troops only, which would have put them out of business. So they approached some other military contractors and together poured money into Winkelmann’s campaign.”
“But he still lost,” Coulson said. “So they required a plan B.”
“Right. So they came up with the idea for the Pride Bombing. They needed a new 9/11, an attack by Muslim extremists that would make Markinson reconsider his war strategy and maintain a much stronger presence in the Middle East to fight Al Qaeda. So they approached Hamza Bashir or he them. That part I’m not sure about. And initially, their plan worked because after the Pride Bombing, everyone assumed Al Qaeda was back, just under a different name. At least, the public did.”
“It didn’t have the effect on Markinson’s policy they had hoped for, though,” Seth said.
“No. He did limit our overseas commitments, but while he didn’t stop working with Kingmakers and others altogether, he did minimize their influence, and they took a financial hit. So they wanted another president, one who would be much stronger against the supposed terrorist attacks. To do that, they needed to get rid of both Markinson and his VP.”
Seth nodded. “Following you so far.”
“By now, Diane had convinced Mrs. Markinson to approach Henley Platt with classified information on how weak the Secret Service was, thus giving Kingmakers valuable intel on how to get to the president. They had set that in motion already, I assume, but they needed more help. Either they figured out Mrs. Markinson had been the leak for Platt’s article, or they got lucky, but I suspect Basil King knew about his sister’s affair with the president and used it to his advantage. In fact, it wouldn’t surprise me if the affair wasn’t a coincident at all, but a carefully planned attack on Markinson.”
At first, Regina King had only been a name to Branson, someone the president had cheated with on his wife, but then he’d realized that as Basil King’s sister, she might’ve shared characteristics with her older brother. That had made him see the affair in a different light.
“You think he sent her? His own sister? Maybe to blackmail Markinson?” Seth’s eyes widened.
“We said it before,” Coulson said. “If Annabeth Markinson had gone public with the affair, the president would’ve lost the reelection. The idea that Basil King convinced his sister to go after Markinson intending to discredit him is valid. Except it didn’t work.”
“No. In fact, Mrs. Markinson used it to get her way and get Shafer on the ticket as VP. And I think that would’ve been the end of it for her had the president not made the mistake of bullying his grandson. That was Markinson’s big fuckup, coming at Noel Markinson, Mrs. Markinson’s favorite grandson. That set her off, thus priming her for whatever Basil King said to her at that party. Maybe he knew about it, maybe he used the affair to get her riled up, but he played her like a fiddle, using her anger against her husband to get her cooperation to assassinate the president.”
“And it was supposed to be only him, and with a sniper, so no one else would get hurt.” Seth was clearly putting the puzzle pieces together in his brain. “She didn’t know about any of it, not about Hamza Bashir being involved or that they would go after Shafer. She thought they’d take out her husband, and that would be the end of it.”
“That’s my theory based on what we know,” Branson said. “She showed genuine remorse about the Pride Bombing, and that recorded phone call made it clear that she wasn’t a part of that.”
“I concur. She didn’t know the same people would be involved, or she would never have agreed,” Coulson said.
“And the phone calls show her anger that Shafer was targeted and that they were watching you guys, possibly coming after you.” Branson waved his finger between Seth and Coulson. “That’s when she became a liability, and they took her out.”
“But since their attack on Shafer failed, they tried again with having him poisoned by Gavin Wedmore.” Coulson looked at Seth. “Maybe you can update them on what you found out there?”
“Yes, we’ve discovered some new things. I told you we had confirmation that it was Wedmore who obtained a Secret Service pin. My theory is that initially that was all they recruited him for, but then when their plan to kill Shafer didn’t pan out, they needed him again.”
“You think he was approached?” Branson asked. “He wasn’t part of this network already? I know he didn’t show up on that website anywhere. At least, not that we know of…”
“No, he wasn’t. I’ve spoken to various White House staffers who, in hindsight, recognized they were approached as well. I showed them pictures of everyone we’ve identified so far, and they positively ID'd Naomi Beckingham, Ralph Durrick, and Steve Duron. A few staffers also mentioned another man, but we don’t know who he is yet. They chatted them up in social situations, like at a bar, a restaurant, a party, and even in church. They were asked about their lives, their hobbies, their jobs, and in some cases, the questions became uncomfortable. Two of them reported the conversations to a Secret Service agent because they felt too obvious to be coincidental, and it turns out they were right.”
Branson sighed. “They were looking for an in.”
Next to him, Ryder frowned. “An in?”
Branson loved that Ryder was never afraid to ask questions, never feared it would make him look stupid. “They needed background information so they’d know where to search for skeletons, for things they could blackmail people with, anything they could use against them. That’s probably how they found out about Gavin Wedmore’s gambling issues.”
Seth nodded. “Wedmore was approached in a similar fashion, most likely, and gave them enough info to find out he had a gambling problem. We discovered he took out a twenty-thousand-dollar loan with a loan shark, and when he wasn’t able to pay that off, Kingmakers must’ve made him a deal. The loan shark told us that Wedmore’s loan was suddenly paid off…by Steve Duron. Not that he’d known his name, but after Coulson’s agents leaned hard on him, he picked Duron’s picture out of a large lineup.”
“Jesus,” Branson mumbled. “One moment you’re in over your head with a gambling debt, and the next, you’ve murdered the First Lady…”
“We’re convinced by now that he didn’t intend to kill anyone. Our theory is that he was pressured to take out the president, based on the fact that he usually ate a banana and the First Lady didn’t. But Wedmore didn’t put in enough to kill him. If the president had eaten that banana, he would’ve been violently ill, but it wouldn’t have taken him out. The First Lady, however…”
His voice broke, and Branson’s heart went out to him. Seth still wasn’t over losing not one but two First Ladies, and Branson wasn’t sure which death had hit him harder. He smiled when Coulson put a quick hand on his boyfriend’s thigh. Under the table, of course, and maybe others hadn’t even noticed, but Branson loved seeing his care and concern. He’d never have pegged tough alpha male Coulson as a man capable of such tenderness, but now that he’d gotten to know him, he knew better. Underneath that professional, hard-ass exterior hid a kind, gentle man. Funny, for the first time, it didn’t hurt anymore to think of Seth and Coulson together. They belonged, and Branson didn’t. Not with Seth anyway.
“With her pre-existing condition and her much smaller mass, the poison was enough to take her out,” Coulson finished. “And while it doesn’t excuse what Wedmore did, that was never his intention. He most likely didn’t see a way out and figured that if he tried, they maybe wouldn’t get upset with him. Except he ended up killing the wrong person, which must’ve pissed off Kingmakers.”
Silence descended. “So there we have it, their grand plan,” Branson finally said. “It’s the stuff of movies…except in this case, it’s real.”
“We have almost all the puzzle pieces. Now all we need is proof.” Coulson slapped his hand on the table. “Let’s get back to work so we can nail these bastards.”
