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Pitt looked up and grinned. He lifted and tilted the old headlight's reflector that revealed Jordan's image on its silver surface. "I observed your tour of the hangar. Your entry was most professional. I'd judge it didn't take you more than twenty seconds."
"Missed spotting a back-up video camera. I must be getting senile."
"Across the road on top of the telephone pole. Most visitors spot th
e one hanging on the building.
Infrared. It activates an alert chime when a body moves near the door."
"You have an incredible collection," Jordan complimented Pitt. "How long did it take you to build it?"
"I began with the maroon forty-seven Ford club coupe over there in the corner about twenty years ago, and collecting became a disease. Some I acquired during projects with NUMA, some I bought from private parties or at auctions. Antique and classic cars are investments you can flaunt. Far more fun than a painting." Pitt finished screwing the headlight rim around its lens and rose to his feet. "Can I offer you a drink?"
"A glass of milk for an overstressed stomach sounds good."
"Please come up." Pitt gestured toward the stairs leading to his apartment. "I'm honored the head man came to see me instead of sending his deputy director."
As Jordan reached the first step, he hesitated and said, "I thought I should be the one to tell you.
Congresswoman Smith and Senator Diaz have been smuggled out of the country."
There was a pause as Pitt slowly turned and glared at him through eyes suddenly filled with relief.
"Loren is unharmed." The words came more as a demand than a question.
"We're not dealing with brain-sick terrorists," Jordan answered. "The kidnap operation was too sophisticated for injury or death. We have every reason to believe she and Diaz are being treated with respect."
"How did they slip through the cracks?"
"Our intelligence determined she and Diaz were flown out of the Newport News, Virginia, airport in a private jet belonging to one of Suma's American corporations. By the time we were able to sift through every flight, scheduled or unscheduled, from airports within a thousand-square-kilometer area, trace every plane's registration until we nailed one to Suma, and track its path by satellite, it was heading over the Bering Sea for Japan."
"Too late to force down on one of our military bases by a military aircraft?"
"Way too late. It was met and escorted by a squadron of FSX fighter jets from Japan's Air Self-Defense Force. Aircraft that were built in partnership between General Dynamics and Mitsubishi, I might add."
"And then?"
Jordan turned and gazed at the gleaming cars. "We lost them," he said tonelessly.
"After they landed?"
"Yes, at Tokyo International. Little need to go into details why they weren't intercepted or at least followed, but for reasons known only to the idiot mentality at the State Department, we have no operatives in Japan who could have stopped them. That's all we have at the moment."
"The best intelligence minds on the face of the earth, and that's all you have." Pitt sounded very tired.
He went into his kitchen, opened the refrigerator and poured some milk, then handed the glass to Jordan.
"What about all your big specialty teams in Japan? Where were they when the plane touched down?"
"With Marvin Showalter and Jim Hanamura murdered--"
"Both men murdered?" Pitt interrupted.
"Tokyo police found Hanamura's body in a ditch, decapitated. Showalter's head, minus the body, was discovered a few hours ago, impaled on our embassy's fence. To add to the mess, we suspect Roy Orita is a sleeper. He sold us out from the beginning. God only knows how much information he's passed to Suma. We may never be able to assess the damage."
Pitt's anger softened when he read the sadness along with the frustration in Jordan's face. "Sorry, Ray, I had no idea things had gone so badly."
"I've never had a MAIT team take a battering like this."
