Inside Outt

impressive.”
    The Blackwater guys dragged him over to his desk. Clements watched, flexing his fingers open and closed. “I can’t tell you how long I’ve wanted to do that,” he said. “That, and more.”
    They pinned him stomach-up against the desk, his feet dangling just above the floor, each Blackwater guy securing an arm and shoulder. Clements opened a case on the floor and took out a battery-operated power drill. “I want that combination,” he said. “One way or the other.”
    Panting, Ulrich said, “You’re bluffing.”
    To that, Clements only smiled.
    “You won’t get away with this,” Ulrich said. “The cameras in the lobby—”
    “We’ve taken care of the cameras. When we’re done here, I’m going to call some of my favorite
Washington Post
op-ed columnists and leak a few choice details about what you’ve been up to, and what terrorist group might have done this to you. Nothing that could be proven, of course, but you know how those columnists like to traffic in rumors. Makes them feel like they’re savvy, isn’t that what you said? And it’s not as though you’ll still be around to set the record straight.”
    He fired up the drill and came closer. “The good news, Ulrich, is that you’re going to be seen as a martyr. We’ll use your death to sow public fear and get more of what we want. See what I’ve learned from you? I hope you’re proud.”
    Ulrich tried to kick, but the Blackwater guys braced his legs with their knees. He started to tell Clements to wait, just wait for a second, they could figure this out, discuss it, but one of the Blackwater guys covered his mouth with a callused palm. Ulrich struggled desperately, but the Blackwater guys were too strong, and too experienced. He tried to say something, anything, to reason with Clements, to beg him, to get him to just wait, wait, they didn’t need to do this, he could explain, please,
just listen to me!
But he could only grunt into the meaty hand crushing his swollen lips and loose teeth.
    Clements came closer. The sound of the drill was horrifically loud. Nothing was working. He felt a wave of horrible panic. He struggled harder. He began to scream. Clements reached him with the drill. The Blackwater guys pushed down harder. He watched through bulging eyes over the top of the hand smothering his mouth as Clements placed the drill against his left knee. And then the pain was so shocking, so total, that his thoughts were obliterated. The pain consumed him.
    It went on for a long time—both knees and his left elbow. Breaks and questioning in between. Ulrich sobbed and begged. But he held on to the number. The one thing he knew was that once he gave it, they would kill him.
    By the time Clements moved to do his right elbow, the desk and the floor around it were covered in piss and sweat and blood. The Blackwater guys were barely restraining him now, just keeping him from sliding off the desk. He’d lost his glasses, and the room and the faces were a blur. At some point he’d lost control of his bowels and the room stank of shit, of shit and the smell of his own singed flesh. He couldn’t even scream anymore. Something in his throat had cracked.
    “After this,” Clements said, “We do your face.”
    “Please,” Ulrich croaked. “Please.”
    “We can’t let those tapes come out,” Clements said. “Think of the way they’d undermine people’s confidence in government. Imagine what that would do to national security. Be reasonable now. Do what’s best.”
    The drill came closer. A sound came from Ulrich’s mouth, a sound he’d never heard before, a moan, a whine, the involuntary tenor of absolute despair. Clements paused and watched him.
    Crying, Ulrich rasped three numbers, three numbers that a moment earlier had seemed so important to him. But they weren’t important anymore. Nothing was important. Not the tapes, not the Caspers, not anything.
    All he wanted was for it to be over.

CHAPTER 41
The Oligarchy
    H ort hadn’t responded. But he was still smiling, a smile Ben found increasingly chilling.
    “What do you mean, ‘the late Mr. Ulrich’? And how did you know I was there?”
    Hort took a sip of wine. “I mean ‘the late Mr. Ulrich’ because Mr. Ulrich is dead now. I understand he was alive when you left him. Though I’m not sure the building’s security tapes will reflect that.”
    Ben felt the blood drain from his face. “Did you set me up, Hort?”
    Hort regarded him calmly. “How? By