The Night Ranger by Alex Berenson Read Free Book Online

price.”
    “You don’t have to beg. Or pay. Just email me a note saying that I’m your representative over there and you authorize me to find your daughter.”
    “Of course. And I’ll tell Jim Thompson you’re coming.”
    “No.” Wells wanted to meet the head of WorldCares on his own terms.
    “All right.” Though Murphy sounded uncertain. “When do you think you might go?”
    “Tonight, if I can find the flights.”
    “Mr. Wells. Thank you, thank you.”
    “I’ll do my best. I can’t promise a miracle. She might be dead already, you understand?”
    Murphy wasn’t listening. “God bless you.”
    As if Wells had already saved his daughter.
    —
    Wells hung up, called Ellis Shafer, his old boss at the CIA.
    “John. Word travels fast.”
    “What?”
    “That’s not why you’re calling?”
    Wells waited. He knew from experience that silence was the only way out of these conversational cul-de-sacs with Shafer.
    “The big man is out. At the end of the year. I speak of the capo di tutti capi. The one we call Vincenzo.”
    Shafer was being cute because this was an open line and because he liked being cute. Vincenzo was Vinny Duto, the CIA’s director. Wells didn’t like Duto, but part of him would be sorry to see the man go. The informal arrangement between Wells and the agency might not survive a new regime.
    “What’s he doing?”
    “Eight ball says running for the Senate. You were right, John. He’s looking at the big one and he needs some real-life political experience.”
    “Does he even have a party? Or a state?”
    “Democrat of Pennsylvania. I know he appears to have arrived on this planet a full-grown sociopath, but he was in fact born in Philly.”
    “Democrats aren’t going to vote for him. He was neck-deep in rendition and all the rest.” As Wells and Shafer knew personally.
    “He can’t run as a Republican. Too liberal on the social stuff. Guess he figures aside from the ACLU types Democrats don’t care about rendition any more than Republicans. He’s right, too. He’s got a shot.”
    “Let’s see how he does the first time somebody asks him a question he doesn’t like.” Duto was not exactly warm and fuzzy. Over the years, he had learned to check his temper. Still, he was a man used to giving orders and having them obeyed, and that attitude was hard to hide.
    “Don’t be surprised if he calls to say bye. I think he’s getting sentimental. He’s got me on the calendar for a valedictory lunch. I’m not sure if I’m the main course or just an appetizer. So what’s up?”
    Wells explained, not mentioning Evan.
    “I’ve only been following it on TV, but I’ll see what we have and call back.”
    Wells spent the next half hour arranging travel. Nairobi was more than seven thousand miles away, and no nonstops ran between the United States and Kenya, not even from New York. It was already past six p.m. He would have to catch an overnight from Logan to Heathrow. Then he’d be stuck in London several hours until he connected on a night flight to Nairobi. With the time difference, he’d arrive the morning after next. A lot of lost time, but he couldn’t do better without a private jet, and even that would save only a few hours.
    Wells booked the tickets under his own name. No reason to be tricky. His diplomatic passport would let him carry a pistol and ammunition and, maybe most important of all, a wad of cash big enough to get out of trouble. Or into it, if necessary.
    With the flights arranged, Wells grabbed his backpack, sending Tonka into hiding. The dog knew what the pack meant. Wells kept his pistol and cash and other unmentionables in a locked trunk in the bedroom closet. He took fifty thousand dollars, the Makarov, two passports, and a satellite phone. He hesitated for a moment and then grabbed a handful of other goodies that might be tough to come by in Kenya. Finally, the vintage Ray-Bans that Anne had given him before his last mission. He kept them locked up so he