The Detachment - Barry Eisler [49]
No. He wasn’t like Larison and Rain, and he didn’t want to be. He’d done his share of killing, most of it at close quarters, but except when it had been self-defense, it had always been under orders. He was part of something, why would he fuck that up? And who was Larison, anyway? A skilled operator, no doubt, but still, a loose cannon, a rogue. And Rain was beginning to strike him as a borderline sociopath. Dox was a buffoon, too dumb to know better. They did what they did for money, which meant they could always be bought. Had he really been considering turning on Hort, turning on the unit, to throw in his lot forever with this group of burnouts?
And then suddenly, he saw a way through this. A way to protect himself, stay on the inside, and get clear of Rain, Larison, and Dox. All at the same time.
“You might be right,” Rain said, over the sounds of the train. “But still, I want to finish Finch. That’s what I was hired to do, and I’m not in the habit of turning on a client just for a better payday, even a much better one. If you and Treven want in, we’ll split the fee three hundred apiece. Otherwise Dox and I can handle it alone, and we walk away with no hard feelings.”
Larison said, “You’re making a mistake.”
“Do you want in on Finch?” Rain said.
Larison looked away for a moment as though considering. Then he said, “What would you do if you found out Hort is lying to us about Shorrock and Finch? About what all this is about?”
Rain said nothing.
“Yeah,” Larison said. “I thought so. All right, I’m in on Finch. Because soon enough, you’ll be in on Hort.”
Later, after they’d split up, Treven did a long surveillance detection run. When he was sure he was alone, he used a payphone at a gas station to call Hort. Hort picked up with a typically noncommittal, “Yes?”
“It’s me,” Treven said.
There was a pause, then, “It’s good to hear your voice, son. Nice work in Las Vegas.”
“That wasn’t me so much.”
“Could you have done it with fewer players?”
“Probably not, no.”
“Then it couldn’t have been done without you. Which is why I wanted you to be a part of it in the first place.”
Treven didn’t answer. He felt like he’d arrived at a fork in the road. Whichever way he went, there’d be no turning back. Ever.
“What’s on your mind, son?” Hort said.
Treven took a deep breath. “There’s something you need to know,” he said.
Faced with intractable national problems on one hand, and an energetic and capable military on the other, it can be all too seductive to start viewing the military as a cost-effective solution.
—The Origins of the American Military Coup of 2012, Charles J. Dunlap
I am beginning to think the only way the national government can do anything worthwhile is to invent a security threat and turn the job over to the military.
—James Fallows
The environment most hospitable to coups d’etat is one is which political apathy prevails as the dominant style.
—Andrew Janos
Vienna seemed an unlikely locale for killing the president’s counterterrorism advisor.
When Horton had briefed Dox and me in Los Angeles, I’d initially pictured Washington, where Finch worked, or maybe some beachside place, where he might enjoy a summer vacation with his family. But as it turned out, Finch wasn’t in Washington just then, and nor did he have a family. What he did have was a single sibling—a sister, who taught at the Universität für Angewandte Kunst Wien, the University of Applied Arts in Vienna, and whom Finch tended to visit whenever he was in Europe on official business. At the moment, as it happened, he was in London, tasked, no doubt, with reassuring the British that the Special Relationship was still special, along with the other important activities presidential counterterrorism advisors are expected to carry out. The problem with London was that the people he was meeting would have their own security details, meaning getting close to him would involve