The Project 04 - Black Harvest

know?"
    "I don't have anything to give him, no proof. He's waiting to see if I come up with something."
    "He doesn't know about the Russian approach?"
    "He doesn't need to know."
    Lamont rubbed his arm. "Lodge was bad enough. Now it's the Pentagon?"
    "We can't be certain of that. But it's likely. Maybe not official."
    "Someone setting up a convenient option that just happens to be handy?"
    "That's what I think. A war game scenario is only a scenario, a possibility. The Joint Chiefs wouldn't do this. They don't like Russia, but they wouldn't kill millions of people and march in with an undeclared war under the guise of humanitarian relief."
    "Millions?" Ronnie said.
    "If the crops fail in Russia it will cause famine." Nick tugged on his damaged ear. "The y're not equipped to handle something like that. Hell, we aren't equipped for something like that. The Federation would fragment. It would be chaos. Civil war."
    "Time for assumptions?" Selena looked around the room. "We've done this before. It worked out pretty well."
    She seemed fine. Nick focused on the task.
    "Okay. Assumption number one is that Lodge and Dansinger want to unleash a lethal crop virus against Russia soon. The spring crops are just coming up."
    "How would they do it?" Lamont asked. "Get it started?"
    "Probably airborne. It's the best way. Anything else would take too long."
    Elizabeth made a note. Something she could give Vysotsky. If he contacted her.
    "What's assumption number two?"
    "Number two is someone in the Pentagon is in on this," Nick said. "We have to find out who it is."
    "That won't be easy. I had a heck of a time hacking in."
    "We could look for personal connections, Steph. Maybe Dansinger is buddies with someone over there. Lodge is, for sure."
    Elizabeth made another note. This one wasn't for Vysotsky. She beat a short tattoo with her pen on the desktop. "The big question is how are we going to stop them? Yakov talked about removing Lodge. He meant kill him. We can't do that. We can't let the Russians do it either. If they get worried enough, they'll try."
    "How come we always end up in the middle of something like this?" Lamont said.
    "Because we're super heroes, Shadow." Nick smiled.
    "Yeah? Where's my cape and shield?"
    "Not my fault you can't find them. You had them with you, you wouldn't have gotten shot in Khartoum."
    Elizabeth waved her pen in the air. "Children. Stay on task, here."
    "Maybe we could get them to make a mistake." Selena smoothed a non-existent crease in her skirt.
    "Go on."
    "They don't know we've figured it out. That we know as much as we do."
    "We don't know that, but you're probably right."
    "We could let them know."
    "Make them come after us?"
    "Yes."
    "They already did."
    "That was because we were after the urn. Maybe we should keep looking for it."
    "Forget the urn ," Harker said. "I t doesn't matter anymore. We'll assume Dansinger has it."
    Ronnie said, "We can't go after Lodge, but we can go after Dansinger. Get his attention."
    "I'm listening."
    "He's got buildings in Texas, right?"
    "Lots of them. It's where he develops his products."
    "Why don't we see exactly what he's doing down there?"
    "Recon," Nick said.
    "Yup. Maybe a little sabotage at the same time."
    "And leave a trail."
    Ronnie nodded. "Something obvious. We want him to know it was us. He'd have to react. He's not going to call the cops."
    "He'll probably call Lodge."
    "Works for me."
    "We do this, we'll stir up a hornet's nest." Harker smiled. She looked like a mischievous elf. "I like it."

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

    Alexei Vysotsky considered his options. The results of Besida Gelashvili's interrogation lay on his desk. She'd been persuaded to give him enough to smash Gelashvili's gang. Russia would be a better place because of it. He had his satisfaction. Now it was up to FSB. He'd already forwarded what he wanted them to see. From here on in it was their problem.
    What he hadn't wanted them to see was the connection to the Americans. Besida told him it had been an American who'd sent Gelashvili after the woman in Greece. Maybe it was Lodge. Alexei didn't know who it was and Besida was no longer available for interrogation.
    He thought about Harker. Could she be trusted to go after Lodge? It was in her country's interest, as she'd pointed out to Yakov. In Russia, an agreement like that would be considered treason. Alexei knew Harker was no traitor. He admired her, what she had accomplished with her small organization. His file on the