ALL ACTION THRILLER BOXSET: THREE MURRAY MCDONALD STANDALONE THRILLERS Read online

  MURRAY MCDONALD

  THREE BOOK THRILLER COLLECTION

  AMERICA’S TRUST

  CRITICAL ERROR

  TRAITOR

  America’s Trust

  by

  Murray McDonald

  America’s Trust

  Murray McDonald

  Published by Murray McDonald

  Copyright 2013 Murray McDonald

  This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Amazon and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  The right of Murray McDonald to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents act 1988.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locations, or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Chapter 1

  Present day

  Tuesday 30th June 2015

  Washington D.C.

  It had been over three years since Jack had been able to walk down the street and open a bar door. The Raven Bar & Grill was just the type of place he needed: quiet, dark and grimy. The shabby exterior gave way to an even shabbier interior. This wasn’t a place that was trying to look like something it wasn’t. Its seventies décor was exactly that and not some hip designer’s cool idea of what the seventies should have been. A line of booths filled one half of the establishment while the other was filled with a long wooden bar. Jack pulled up a stool and ordered a beer with a Scotch chaser. The barman looked at him like he knew him but poured the drinks without a word. Jack sipped the beer, his first real drink in a very long time.

  In the three years since Jack’s life had been no longer his own, he had lost both his wife and his purpose. Constantly under surveillance, he never had a minute to himself. Even at his wife’s funeral, the shackles had not been loosened. What should have been a private occasion had been a very public event. Armed guards watched over his every move, cameras monitored his every step. He had wanted to jump in with her, go with her. He didn’t want to go back. As the funeral ended, he had no choice. He had four years to serve, whether he liked it or not. That was his term. No time off for good behavior, that had been clear from the start. The federal government was a relentless beast and if it had you for four years, you gave it four years, no matter what.

  Jack savored another sip. His wife had hated his penchant for dive bars but he loved the anonymity. Nobody knew him, nobody judged him. He missed her. He regretted every minute of the last few years when he had not been there for her. Her final breaths had been taken while he was hundreds of miles away. It was all his fault. Four years earlier, his actions had torn them apart. She didn’t want him to do it but he had explained to her that he had to. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity. She had begged him not to. It wasn’t like they needed the money. For Jack, it wasn’t about the money, it was the thrill. Despite his actions, she had stood by him as a loyal wife and as the outcome was read out, she cried with him. Four years. It could have been worse. Some had served double that, but he had promised he wouldn’t do it again. They had been the worst and last years of their marriage and he would never forgive himself.

  He reached for his Scotch and downed it in one swift motion. It felt good. The heat of the alcohol burned the back of his throat and instantly cleared his thoughts. The TV was showing a round-up of the football and had the other six customers transfixed. Jack nodded at the barman and was rewarded with a refill. He allowed himself to relax, and began to appreciate his newfound freedom. He had walked along the street; he had entered a bar; he had ordered a drink. He was sitting enjoying the football with a bunch of guys who didn’t care who he was or what he had done - all things that, for the last four years, had seemed a world away. For the first time in six months and probably in four years, he smiled, not a fake smile, not a smile for the cameras, but a genuine warm smile.

  Jack was happy.

  “Good whisky?” asked the drinker to his right.

  “Great whisky,” said Jack, raising the glass and looking at it before taking another drink. “Join me?”

  “Don’t mind if I do,” accepted the drinker. “The name’s Don.”

  “Jake,” replied Jack. It was what his mother had called him, never wanting to name him after his father’s father. He had been, she told everyone who would listen, the most unlikeable man one could ever have the displeasure of meeting. Jack’s father had never once contested his mother’s claim.

  Jack nodded at the barman again and indicated for each of the other drinkers to be offered a Scotch. They all nodded and mumbled their appreciation and, almost as one, returned to the highlights.

  “So what brings you to the Raven?” asked Don, nudging his stool nearer to Jack’s.

  Jack lifted his drink in answer. Don nodded acceptance and lifted his own, joining Jack in his drink.

  After an hour and many Scotches too many, Jack stood up and wished his new friends goodnight. Those capable of responding mumbled a vague goodbye while Don also stood up.

  “I have to head home too and face the music!” he said conspiratorially, dipping his head to the barman.

  “Face the music?” asked Jack.

  “Got laid off today,” replied Don.

  Jack had reckoned Don was mid to late fifties, around five to ten years older than himself, middle-management with a salary that allowed him few luxuries and a tough life. Jack had always been very good at reading people.

  “God, I’m sorry to hear that,” said Jack through the haze of alcohol. “What did you do?”

  “Purchasing Manager for a government contractor, two hundred and fifty of us got canned today.”

  “Insignia DC?” asked Jack.

  “How the hell did you know that?” asked Don, looking at Jack with some suspicion.

  “It was on the news earlier, I recognized the number two hundred and fifty,” said Jack, quickly covering his mistake.

  Don continued to study Jack, unsure of him now. “You remind me of somebody.” Don waved his drunken finger. “I just can’t think who.”

  Jack shrugged and immediately got a response from Don. “The president! If it wasn’t for your hair being thinner and wearing glasses, you could be his double!”

  Jack laughed. If it weren’t for the wig and the contacts he had to wear, he would have been a much more comfortable president.

  Chapter 2

  “Sorry,” said Don, gently punching Jack’s shoulder. “You’re much too nice a guy to be confused with that scumbag president.”

  Jack managed to hold his laughter as the words hit home. “He’s not that bad!”

  “Son of a bitch cost me my job!” snapped Don, all joviality dropping from his voice. “Transferred it to China. China, can you believe it?!” he muttered as he staggered off towards his home.

  Jack shook his head. “I’m sure he didn’t!” he called after Don, knowing he damn well hadn’t. He hadn’t heard anything about Insignia on the news, he remembered the contract being discussed. Insignia had the contract for printing all federal brochures and documentation. There was absolutely no way Jack wanted that work going abroad in order to save a few bucks. He had made it clear tha
t under no circumstance was the contract to be outsourced to a foreign company. He’d be asking a few questions the following morning, but he was going have to be careful as to how he came about the information.

  Jack checked his watch as Don swayed off into the distance. He had been free for over four hours. Four hours and nobody knew he was missing. In his two and a half years as president, he had hardly had four minutes to himself, let alone four hours. Of course, he was assuming nobody knew. With no Blackberry or method for anyone to contact him, they may have been turning the White House upside down to find him. Mind you, if he were missing, he had to assume there would be helicopters and police cars scouring the city. He picked up the pace as he headed south back down 16th Street, NW. There was no point ruining a good thing by being greedy on his first outing. He covered the two miles much more quickly than the outward leg. At midnight there were far fewer people around to watch and analyze.

  He hung a left on K Street NW and a right onto Vermont, and as midnight signaled the start of a new day, Jack walked towards the entrance of the Dana Center. As he withdrew the key to open the security door before him, it flew open, knocking him backwards onto the street.

  A man paused briefly before him, recognition registering instantly on the stranger’s face as to who Jack really was. However, before Jack could say a word, the street was bathed in flashing blue lights and the scream of sirens as the street filled with police officers and FBI agents in what, to Jack, looked like full riot gear. The police rushed forward, and Jack anticipated being rushed into a car and being sped back to the White House and most likely given a severe dressing down by the Secret Service and his senior staff. However, he was brushed aside as the focus appeared to be the stranger who had almost knocked him over. The man, who Jack estimated to be in his late forties or early fifties, was thrown unceremoniously to the ground before being handcuffed and marched past Jack towards a waiting sedan. As they rushed past, a young female FBI agent holding one of the stranger’s arms, brushed past Jack.

  “No need to be alarmed, sir,” she said. “Just a routine operation. We’ll be out of your way momentarily.”

  Jack was frozen to the spot. Although they were the words that she would have used with the president, the way she had delivered them was exactly how she would have calmed a member of the public, which is exactly how she had seen him - a member of the public. The operation wasn’t about Jack, it was about the stranger. Jack looked across as the man was being directed into the back of the sedan. The stranger caught Jack’s eye and winked a wink that told Jack the stranger knew exactly who he was.

  Jack continued to watch as the young female agent looked around the street and, satisfied with what she saw, circled her finger in the air. Sirens and lights instantly stopped and with one last look back towards Jack but looking straight through him, she disappeared into the sedan. No sooner had she closed the door than the car screeched away. By the time Jack looked back towards the door of the Dana Center, it was hard to believe what had just occurred. Not a police officer was in sight.

  He stepped once again towards the security door and, a little more tentatively than earlier, he entered the apartment block. Checking that nobody was around, he walked towards the end of the corridor and removed another key from his pocket. This one was far older and the door in front of him was far heavier than the security door at the entrance to the building. The key turned easily, far easier than on his exit. He opened the door and entered the apartment where time had stopped over 60 years earlier. The décor was upmarket fifties. The appliances in the small kitchen were museum pieces, as was the TV set. The dust that had settled suggested, like the furniture, that Jack was in fact the first living soul to enter the apartment since its previous occupant had vacated. Jack looked again at the simple note from his predecessor.

  If you are reading this note and have come from beyond the park, enjoy the freedom it allows, I know I did! HST

  Jack instantly recognized the initials ‘HST’- President Harry S. Truman, the man who had rebuilt the White House in the late forties. Obviously, his building had gone beyond the confines of the White House. Jack pulled back the rug and, lifting the hatch, he reentered the hole that led down to a subterranean tunnel. He shut the hatch and pulled the cord that ensured the rug would slip back into place. He climbed down the ladder and mounted the small bike that he had ridden what he guessed to be around a quarter of a mile from the White House. As he neared the end of the tunnel, he once again entered the coffin-sized vertical capsule and, by turning the handle at his waist, wound the small capsule up, by some hidden mechanism, back into his private office, previously his wife’s dressing room.

  Stepping back into the room, he noticed a small note on the floor of the capsule. He looked around the dressing room; it definitely hadn’t been there when he left. He had searched every inch of the capsule when it had appeared earlier that evening. It wasn’t something he had ventured into lightly. It wasn’t every day that a decorative column which had stood in situ for the three years you had been in residence spun round and revealed itself to be an elevator of sorts. Jack had spent a long time looking at every detail and it had been with great trepidation that he ventured in and moved the lever that had lowered him to the tunnel below.

  He bent down, retrieved the slip of paper, and read it.

  Mr. President, if you are reading this and have not spoken with me, they have me. I must speak to you urgently. Our country and our very way of life as Americans depends on it.

  Find me and beware The Trust.

  Tom Butler

  Jack’s memory flashed back to the face of the man being arrested in front of him and the recognition on his face. He had known Jack was the president. It was Tom Butler he had witnessed being taken away. Tom Butler knew about Jack’s escape route. Tom Butler had a key to Harry Truman’s apartment. The apartment had been locked when Jack had returned. Tom Butler was a man the president wanted to talk to but Tom Butler was a man the president couldn’t possibly know anything about.

  Jack stepped back from the column and watched in panic as the column spun back to reveal its original and more normal decorative façade. His escape route had gone without him fully understanding how it had ever really appeared. He stepped forward in the hope that walking towards the column would elicit a response, but nothing happened. He shook his head. It wasn’t that simple, otherwise his wife would have found it many years earlier. Not to mention every cleaner that had ever worked in the private apartment. He studied the column in great detail. Nothing, certainly nothing visual, suggested any hint of the hidden mechanism.

  Jack crossed the small room and sat staring at the column. The alcohol had dumbed his senses, he wasn’t thinking straight. He was missing something obvious. He must be.

  Daylight hit him like a sledgehammer. The small room took the full brunt of the sun’s early morning reveille. Jack covered his eyes desperately but the ache in his brain failed to dissipate. It wasn’t the light. The memories of the previous night came flooding back. The beer and the whisky had taken their toll. He wasn’t as young as he used to be and certainly wasn’t used to drinking anything like the quantities that had so easily slipped down in the past.

  He opened his eyes and found himself staring at the column, just as he had been when the fatigue and alcohol had ended any chance of uncovering the secret. He stood up unsteadily; the pounding in his head was going to take some getting used to. Hangovers had been a thing of the past. The President of the United States did not drink to excess and did not gamble - just two of the long list of his previous behaviors that were absolutely forbidden in his current office. Forbidden is perhaps too strong a word, thought Jack, ‘not expected’ is perhaps more accurate. The expectation levels of a president were, to say the least, extraordinary. The expectations of a president who had lost a wife were inconceivable. He had to be strong at all times, even by her graveside. Weakness was not an option. Bullshit, it was all bullshit. His strength had never been do
ubted. It was exactly why he was where he was. After years of poor leadership, the country had been desperate for a strong and capable leader to take control. General Jack King, former Army chief of staff and former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, offered that in spades. Jack was exactly what the country had craved, a politician who they could believe in, a man of his word, a man who put his country and its strength above all else. The Republican nomination was secured even before Super Tuesday, with every other candidate unwilling to add to the humiliating defeats they had already suffered at the hands of the country’s clear favorite.

  With debt spiraling, unemployment out of control and what seemed no end to the downturn, Jack King had won the 2012 election by one of the clearest margins in modern history.

  Jack was ready. His presidency was going to be one of legend, one of resolve. He was going to turn the country around in four years. In and out. That was his motto throughout his military career. Hit the problem hard and fast. He had promised his wife just that. His country had needed him and he couldn’t say no. Four years was all he needed.

  That was until the day of his inauguration and the revelation that was about to be bestowed on the new president, America’s Trust.

  Chapter 3

  Wednesday 1st July 2015

  Washington D.C.

  When the key turned in the lock at 4:00 a.m., Tom Butler knew he was about to die. After his arrest by the FBI, he had been marched into the local office and watched as the lead female agent had gesticulated wildly on the phone. When she had ended the obviously angry exchange, she had subsequently kicked a wastepaper basket clear across the room. “Put him in a fucking cell!” she had shouted before storming out of the building. Tom knew then he was in trouble. The tentacles of The Trust had reached far deeper than he thought possible.