Page 88 of Battle Mountain

“Just three of them?” Nate asked. “It sounds like a good start to me.”

Nate could feel Geronimo cringe next to him as he said it.

“I know how this works,” Nate said to Orr. “You ask me provocative questions and later you submit a report saying I lied to you or misled you on material facts. Then they come and get me and prosecute me for lying to an FBI agent in a show trial. Agent Orr, I’m not going to participate in this unless you arrest me or charge me with something. I’d already be gone, except I’m looking forward to my biscuits and gravy. I hear they make the best in the valley here.”

Orr reacted in a way that surprised Nate. He smiled.

“That’s not why I’m here,” he said. “I’m not here to hassle you, although I’ve been following your exploits from afar for years.”

“From D.C. headquarters?” Nate asked.

Orr nodded. “I’ve been involved in a domestic counterterrorism unit for a million years. I’ve been on the scene of dozens of cases, all the way back to Randy Weaver in Idaho and Waco and the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge siege in Oregon. And to make a long story short, I’ve seen a lot of deception and malfeasance from our side on the ground. It sickened me, to be honest.

“If I wasn’t a year from retirement now, I’m pretty sure they’d figure out a way to kick me to the curb for the questions I kept asking my superiors and the commanders in charge of those operations. Instead, they’ve dismantled my unit, and they just ignore me entirely. So, they just sort of let me do my own thing now.”

“You’ve gone rogue?” Geronimo asked.

“That’s probably how they’d describe it,” Orr said.

“Anyway, Axel Soledad came on my radar four years ago. His name kept coming up associated with urban and campus encampments and riots all over the country. Although we couldn’t get enough evidence to bring him in, it appeared to me that he was fomenting and financing domestic violence and acts of terrorism. But he knew how to do it at arm’s length so he could never be directly implicated. I took my suspicions to my betters, but they blew me off.”

“Imagine that,” Nate said. He sat back and studied Orr’s face. The man seemed to be sincere. Either that, or he was baiting them into saying something that could land them in federal prison. For Nate, it wouldn’t be the first time.

“So whyareyou here?” Geronimo asked.

Orr looked down at his mug of coffee for a moment, then back up at the two of them.

“I want to stop Axel Soledad before he does something momentous. I think you two want to do the same thing.”

“With us, it’s personal,” Nate said.

“I get that.” To Nate, he said, “I know what happened to your wife.” To Geronimo, he said, “I know what happened to your home.”

“Then why didn’t you try to stop it?” Geronimo asked. “Isn’t that what the FBI is supposed to do?”

“Back in the day, yes,” Orr said. “But now it seems we have different priorities.”

“What makes you different?” Geronimo asked.

Nate noticed that Orr’s neck was flushed. He looked at a spotover their heads. “I guess I want to enforce the law and protect our country from bad guys, no matter what they represent.”

Their food arrived. Orr picked at his breakfast, while both Nate and Geronimo wolfed theirs down. When they were done, Nate said to Orr, “So are we free to go?”

Orr was silent. Nate thought he read disappointment in Orr’s reaction.

Finally, the man said, “I can’t hold you. I guess I was just hoping you’d cooperate with me, since we share a common goal.”

Nate could feel Geronimo’s eyes on the side of his head. His friend was pleading with him to be reasonable.

“Can you at least tell me what you think Soledad is planning?” Orr asked. “If it’s solid information, I might still have the juice back at headquarters to get a full-fledged investigation going. But it has to be airtight, and I have to bring receipts.”

Nate looked up at him. “We suspect that Axel might be plotting to wipe out the heads of the U.S. military-industrial complex in one fell swoop. And we think he might be planning to do it today or tonight.”

Orr’s mouth dropped open and his eyes widened. He was speechless for a moment. Then he whispered, “When? Where?”

“Come with us,” Nate said. “If we can confirm our suspicions, you can be a big hero. But not before we take out Axel Soledad first.”

When the waitress returned with the check, Nate slid it across the table to Orr. “You get breakfast,” Nate said. “It’s time we actually got some return on our taxes from the government. That is, when I used to pay taxes, anyway.”

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