Out of Time

by David Klass

Genres: Mystery; Terrorism & Assassination Thrillers

Synopsis

Brought to you by Penguin.

America's most wanted man. The world's only hope?

For months, the FBI have been on the hunt for a terrorist who seems invincible. The death toll is rising, yet somehow the killer, known only as the "Green Man", has avoided leaving a single clue.

This is no ordinary villain. Each attack is carefully planned to destroy a target that threatens the environment. Each time, the protest movement that supports the Green Man grows ever larger.

Tom Smith is a young computer programmer with the FBI, trying to escape his father's domineering shadow. An expert in pattern recognition, Tom believes he's spotted something everyone else has missed.

At long last, Tom makes a breakthrough. But as he closes in on America's most dangerous man, he's forced to ask himself one question:

What if the man you're trying to stop is the one who's trying to save the world?

'Provocative, important and very thrilling novel. I loved it' James Patterson

'A gripping story . . . Klass can weave a tale like few others.' David Baldacci

© David Klass 2020 (P) Penguin Audio 2020

Release date: July 7, 2020

Publisher: Dutton

Print pages: 384

Sample

One

The man lay in darkness near the cliff’s edge, staring down through binoculars at the moonlit Snake River as it wound through the Idaho hills toward the dam. Despite the colorful nickname the media had given him, he was dressed in black from his boots to his hood, and the drone beside him was also black, from its four propellers to its nine-​kilogram payload. He had builtthe large quadcopter himself in his hunting shed over the course ofthree months from parts he’d scavenged. Now it perched on the cliffnext to him like a spiky prehistoric bird ready to swoop down on unsuspecting prey.

He stroked the stubble on his cheek. He had not slept in a bed, had a shower, or talked to another person in four days. He had driven his van on back roads through seven states without carrying a cell phone or using credit cards, and he had not logged online since he had said goodbye to his wife and kids and pulled away from his house in Michigan. He had brought his own food, water, and gas with him because any store, no matter how small, might have a camera, and once an image was taken, it became data and could be accessed by those looking for him. He was wearing fleece and an outer-shell layer of nylon to contain body heat, because he was lessthan a mile from a major soft target and they were searching forhim with thermal-imaging satellites.

Below him the ancient Archean formations—the oldest exposed rocks on the earth’s surface—fell away steeply into a ravine through which the Snake River cut westward on its thousand-mile meandering journey toward the distant Pacific. Looking down at this vista in silvery moonlight, the man had the sense of peering back acrossthe ages to a time when the earth was still innocent and pristine and humankind hadn’t mucked things up.

For a moment he was overtaken by a great sadness and sense of futility, and he almost gave up and headed back to his tent. Contrary to the psychological portrait the FBI forensic profilers had drawn up and disseminated so widely that he had read it himself, he did not want to be caught. If they found him, they would lock him up for the rest of his life. He was not afraid of pain, but a lifetime of incarceration was a hell on earth that he desperately wanted to avoid. If they caught him, they would also destroy his family, which was beyond precious to him.

He was acutely aware that each time he struck, the odds of making a mistake increased. The Green Man Task Force now numbered more than three hundred dedicated federal agents, twice the number who had pursued the Unabomber. Eventually, he would blunder and give them the clue they needed to find him—it was a matter of time and luck, but if he continued striking targets, it would happen. If he stopped, they would only have whatever information they had now. There seemed no point in taking further risks—the world was far along on its suicidal course, and he profoundly doubted that anything he could do would reverse what had already been set in motion. The wise course would be to abandon his mission and spend precious time with his wife and kids. But then he saw the headlights of a Jeep blink on as a sentry on night patrol drove across the parapet guard ledge, and the twin pinpricks of light moving atop the four-​hundred-​foot dam spurred him to action.

He took the transmitter out of his large black backpack but kept it enclosed in a three-​sided fiberglass case to mask its thermal footprint. He switched it on, and soon the four rotors on the drone were whirling. He checked the payload one last time—the twenty sticks of closely packed plastic explosive lay snug against the blasting cap. 

The drone lifted off the cliff, and the man expertly moved the two control sticks to correct for roll, pitch, yaw, and throttle. He steered it away from him, and the large UAV flew out above the ravine, the moonlit reservoir, and the massive dam. It hovered, slowly circling, a black spot against the full moon, and he kept it high enough that they would not see or hear it. It was a calm andcloudless night—a night when God seemed very much in his glorious heaven, and the man had a final moment to hesitate at the enormity of the destruction he was about to unleash and to regret the taking of innocent lives.

The profilers were wrong about that, too—he was not a sociopath; he was in fact highly empathic, and killing brought him no joy. Nor did he have any illusion that the people whose lives he was about to end held any responsibility for the dam’s existence or purpose. Most of them hadn’t been alive in 1970 when it was built, and it was just their bad luck to be around the night it was destroyed. He understood that the dam employees had most likely just taken the job for a steady paycheck. When he was fresh out of Yale and knocking around, he had taken several similar jobs. But there was no way to do what needed to be done without loss of life.

The man lowered his head and prayed. “God, forgive me,” he whispered, and then his fingers moved on the right control stick, sending the drone into a steep, expertly controlled dive. He felt the stab of excitement that always came with the knowledge that it was really going to happen, coupled with the guilty pride of seeing his creation finally fly at its peak speed of sixty miles per hour. Every kilogram of weight made flight more difficult and curtailed speed, so it had taken years for him to learn to build something with such a heavy payload that could fly this fast.

The Jeep was halfway across the parapet when it stopped moving. Had the driver heard something? It was unlikely, and it wasalso too late, unless he was a sharpshooter with the presence ofmind to bolt out and squeeze off a shot in two seconds. More likely the sentry had paused midway across to have a smoke and admirethe same moonlit vista that the man was watching. Framed by the ravine, against the hulking, dark monolith of the vast concrete wall, a stream of silvery water burst from one spill-​gateand cascaded four hundred feet to the gleaming reservoir below.

But nothing happened—time stood still—and the man felt sure that something must have gone wrong. If the explosive device didn’t detonate, they would find the drone and the bomb intact. Despite all his care, they would have a great deal to work from. He panicked and thought of Sharon, Kim, and Gus and how their lives would be upended if he were caught. The kindest thing he could do for them would be to spare them the nightmare of a trial, so he carried a suicide pill with him wherever he went.

He saw the explosion before he heard it. A sheet of fire cloaked the downstream face of the dam from toe to crest. A concussive burst—a wave of violent sound—throbbed through the ravine. But the dam did not immediately crumble, nor did the man expect it to. The attack on the World Trade Center had demonstrated with terrifying clarity that it was not necessary for a blast to instantly demolish its target—it need only do sufficient structural damage for weight, pressure, and gravity to finish the destruction. The man was using the same concept here. The blast had only to undermine the structural integrity of the arched dam at a crucial spot. Thousands of tons of Snake River water would soon do the rest.

For several tantalizingly slow seconds, everything seemed as it was before. The cloak of fire folded back up into itself. The concussive blast reverberated to silence. Then the first tiny spigots seeped through cracks as if a dozen new spill-​gateshad simultaneously been opened above the reservoir.

The man did not wait for the river to punch through—he took no pleasure in destruction and death, even though he had planned this for months. He could already see lights going on and hear sirens. Choppers would be on-site in less than twenty minutes. He gathered his things into his backpack, checked carefully to makesure he hadn’t left even a single wire behind, climbed onto his motorcycle,and sped away into the night toward his van and the long roads that would take him home to the people he loved.

Two

Tom arrived at the hotel bar five minutes early, but his father was already there, halfway through a glass of scotch, glancing at his watch. He didn’t look up as Tom approached from behind, but he said, “Figured maybe you had a hot date. Should have known better.”

Tom noted the thin strip of mirrored glass above the bar that gave his father a sweeping view of the room. The old man still saw everything. He sat down on the barstool next to his dad. “How was your flight?” Tom asked, holding out his right hand. “Dad, come on.”

The paternal handshake was firm and brief, not a gesture o fintimacy but an acknowledgment of male protocol, akin to a salute.“How the fuck do you think my flight was? Fat lady sitting next to me must have weighed three hundred pounds.”

“Well, fat people have to fly, too.”

His father grunted dubiously and took another big sip of scotch.

“How’s Mom?”

“She says hello.”

“What’s she up to?”

“She’s got her book circle.”

“What are they reading these days?”

“I forgot to check.”

Tom waved at the bartender. “It might be something you would find interesting, and then you’d have something to talk aboutwith her.”

His father put down his scotch and looked at Tom full in the face, and Tom saw how much older he had gotten. The once thick jet-​black hair was almost entirely gone, and the few tufts that remained were wispy and more white than gray. The skin sagged from his cheekbones, and he had a new nervous habit of pinching loose folds and tugging them. It was the sour face of a miserable old man, unsatisfied with his life and not looking forward to his death. “Are you trying to be funny?”

The bartender came over, and Tom ordered a craft beer.

“At least drink with me,” his father said.

“I am drinking with you. I just ordered a beer. For Christ’s sake, Dad.”

“We don’t have to do this.”

Tom forced himself to be calm. “Listen, I don’t want to fight. I’m glad to see you. And I’m glad you came to see me. I’m sorry I couldn’t make it out to Florida for your birthday. You’re looking great.”

“I didn’t come to see you.”

“Fine. I’m glad we met by chance at this bar. How are you feeling? How’s life with a pacemaker?”

“They let you wear your hair that way?”

The bartender brought the beer, and Tom thanked him with a nod and took a sip. “It’s not the marines, Dad.”

“You’re lucky it’s not,” the former Marine Corps captain said.

They were both quiet. There was a TV above the bar showing amixed martial arts match, and one of the fighters got in a control position and began to ground and pound. “I miss boxing,” his father finally said. “This shit killed boxing.”

“They’re highly skilled. Those elbow strikes are Muay Thai.”

“Give me Joe Frazier or Roberto Durán any day.” His dad finished his scotch and waved for a refill. “So,” he said, “how do you like it?”

“You mean the job?”

“I never would’ve figured you for it.”

“Thanks. I’m just starting out, but I like it fine so far.”

“Your mother says they put you on a big taskforce.”

“Just a week ago. That guy who’s been blowing things up. Green Man.”

His father frowned as if he’d tasted something unpleasant. “The liberal media calls him that.”

“Dad, everyone calls him that.”

“It’s to make him a hero.”

“Even Brennan calls him that.”

“Mr. Brennan to you.”

“No, Assistant Director Special Agent in Charge Taskforce Commander God Incarnate Brennan to me. He calls the guy Green Man.”

“Jim Brennan’s a good man. Have you met him?”

“There are more than three hundred agents on the taskforce. He runs the big briefings. I sit in the back and try not to fart too loudly.”

“So he doesn’t know who you are?”

“What are you really asking?”

The bartender poured Tom’s father a generous refill, and he pulled a twenty out of his wallet and smoothed it down on the polished oak bar. “I could put in a call.”

“No, sir.”

“There are lots of people in the world named Smith. He’d want to know—”

“You built your career. Let me build mine.”

His father nodded and glanced at his watch. “Build your career. I got to get to bed soon. I’m leaving early tomorrow.”

“Mom said you were going to see an old friend.”

“Bill Monroe, if you remember him. Out in Mitchellville.”

“Sure. He used to throw lousy Christmas parties and dress up like Santa, and you and Mom would get drunk from the bourbon punch.”

“The party’s over. He’s got advanced prostate cancer. I’m saying goodbye.”

“Very sorry to hear it.”

“So, you got a motive?”

Tom glanced at his own watch. It felt like he had been controlling his temper for a half hour, but only five minutes had actually ticked by. “For what?”

“Green Fuck.”

The craft beer was too sweet and not to Tom’s liking, but he took a big swallow. “The liberal media says he’s an environmental activist who wants to call attention to the way we’re destroying our own planet.”

“And you buy that?”

“Look, I know you don’t agree with this, but I don’t work from motive,” Tom said carefully. “What I do is mostly about crunching data to find patterns. Having one prejudged motive in mind can be misleading if you’re letting the data speak. I try not to impose myself and think about why. But I know we’re different that way.”

“So you don’t need to worry about motive?” His father finished his scotch and put down his glass on the bar. “Or maybe the truth is you’re really afraid to consider it?” Tom knew that they were almost done, and what his father was going to say next was going to be the old man’s nastiest shot. “You admire him, don’t you?”

“Green Man?”

“Green Lantern. Superman. Batman. Green Man. He’s a superhero to you.”

“That’s tremendously insulting, and it’s also not true.”

“You and your sister were always tree huggers. You don’t want to save the world?”

“He’s killed thirty-one people. Five children.”

“Saving the world’s a bitch. The end justifies the means, doesn’t it? If you have to kill five kids to save our planet, isn’t that worth it? Come on, we both know you agree with him. You were out there inthe streets marching for green this and green that. So Green Man’s fighting your battle, and he’s doing it well.”

“I’m gonna say good night, Dad. You’ve got an early drive out to Mitchellville.. . .”

Tom started to stand, but then his father’s heavy hand was on his shoulder, and the old man was speaking in a muted, confessional tone that Tom had never heard before. “I’ve never said this to anybody, but there’s a part of us that always admires them. We hunt them and we hate them, but on some level they’re doing the forbidden things we want to do and getting away with it. They’re smarter than we are until the day we arrest them, and they’re having more fun than we are ,and if we didn’t have a bit of their dark side we couldn’t understand them and we couldn’t possibly catch them. Right?”

Tom was silent for several seconds. He was surprised at the depth and honesty of his father’s admission. “Okay, right,” he finally admitted. “On some level I guess I admire his goals, even if—”

“I was bullshitting you,” the old man said, very pleased with himself. “You think I admired the serial killers and scumbag rapists I was hunting? That’s the kind of horse manure FBI agents say in bad movies. There’s not a bone in my body that wanted to be like them. Never. Not for one second. But now we’ve established that you admire the man you’re hunting, and for that reason alone, you’re never gonna catch him.”

Tom’s hand clenched around the beer glass. “I’ll catch him,” he said softly.

“Why didn’t you go to Silicon Valley, Tom? You interviewed. You went to all the fancy schools. You could be pulling in some big bucks.”

“I’m doing okay. Dad, I’m gonna go now.”

“Finish your beer. Was it to honor me? Because I don’t have long left?”

“No, that’s ridiculous.”

“You’re damn right, it is ridiculous. Because—to be very frank—you never gave a flying fuck about what I did. And it’s too late now. Live your life.”

Tom shrugged the hand off his shoulder and stood up to face his father. “It wasn’t to honor you. But maybe I’m doing it for the same reason you did. To catch bad guys. It’s the family business, isn’t it?Grandpa Vic. Uncle Will. You. And now me. And he’s definitely one of the bad guys. There’s no way to justify the killing of innocents, no matter the ultimate goal.”

His father stood also. They were almost the same height, but his dad still had him by half an inch. “I suppose it is the family business. Good night, Tom. Go out on a date once in a while, try toget laid, and make your mother happy.”

But Tom was looking past him at the TV, where a news flash had interrupted the third round of the MMA fight. There was footage ofa moonlit river winding through a dark and mountainous ravine and a wrecked dam and people being evacuated in ambulances andon helicopters. Tom glanced at his watch and then back at the TV. “It’s him.”

His father turned and studied the TV screen. “Green Man? Howcan you tell?”

“The dams on the Snake River are perfect targets for an environmental terrorist. They stopped wild salmon runs, and there have been legal challenges to them for years. They’re important infrastructure, but they’re also deeply symbolic—exactly what he looks for.”

“You glanced at your watch,” his father said. “Does he always strike at the same time?”

“No, he doesn’t.”

“But the timing is important somehow? It’s part of his signature?”

“I can’t talk about that,” Tom said.

“You can’t talk about it to me?” his father repeated, and suddenly there was rage in his voice. “The fuck does that mean? Like I can’t keep my mouth shut? Listen, you little asshole.. . .”

But Tom wasn’t listening to his father anymore. He had climbed up onto the bar and turned up the volume manually, and he listenedas the newscaster mentioned the first casualty reports and how a family of six on a houseboat in the reservoir beneath the dam had drowned—including four young children.