Getting in touch with Simon was never easy.  He'd been living on a yacht for the better part of two years.  Jerry didn't trust the land-sea lines.  So Jerry called someone who called someone who called someone else and shortly thereafter Simon would call back and be able to get a message to Jax.  While he waited for Simon to call back, Jerry called Mike.

"Hey, Mike.   I'm headed back down your way day after tomorrow."

"Laundry problem?"  Mike was actually a Saudi and Mike was not his real name. His real name, Jerry never could remember or pronounce.  Mike had good connections in and out of Saudi Arabia.  He and Jerry had moved a lot of money in the past six months. Thanks to Mike, Jerry had friends in the Saudi government.  The last six months had been lucrative.  Mike was well paid and completely loyal.

Jerry was pretty sure that most of the money he moved for the Saudis just went to greasing palms, moving deals along more quickly and smoothly than they otherwise would.  But he was well aware that some of the money he moved could be funding terrorism. 

He was more than just aware of that, it was his plan. He had a justification for it. He'd been on the run too long. He wanted to return to the US, work with Jax, see what Bobbie was up to.  So he was gathering evidence.  The US government hadn't asked him to go undercover.  Heck, they wanted him in prison.  But information on the financing and planning of terrorist operations was something valuable and he'd be able to trade it for immunity. 

What he hadn't counted on was discovering a terrorist action that was already in motion.  There was no time for trading or convincing or bargaining with the Americans.  No time for any "initials" agency to do a proper investigation.  He figured he had about a week.  Or maybe he didn't even have that.  He hoped he'd chosen well with Concannon.  Marbury usually had good instincts for personnel.  Danny Concannon had been a White House reporter a long time, and Marbury had said Concannon would never back away from a chance at a good story. And Marbury had implied that Concannon had a thing for the press secretary.  Perhaps he'd be motivated if he did have this personal stake.  Jerry would find out soon enough.

"Laundry's neat, clean and fresh smelling.  France went smoothly.  One little wrinkle we need to iron out though... "   Mike never laughed at Jerry's jokes, not the good ones and not out of pity at the stupid ones.  But Jerry never stopped trying. "I've picked up an admirer.  Exotic, beautiful Asian women.  I let her follow me to London so I could keep an eye on her.  I'll get pictures and we'll see if we can figure out who she is."

"You're thinking what I'm thinking?"

"Yes.  I suspect it's the hint we need to figure out the identity of the original owners of the technology.  They know the French boys ripped them off.  I suspect if those boys don't take their 50 million and run far and fast, they won't live long enough to spend it.  Jax will be in Riyadh early tomorrow morning.  He's bringing a company jet.  Meet him at the airport.  There's some ground work to be laid before Concannon and I arrive."

"I'll be there."

"Oh, and Mike, keep an eye open for any out-of-place Asians.  They know I delivered the payment to the French.  It won't take them long for them to connect me to you."

-------------------

"Carol, I have something fairly urgent that we need to deal with today.  You can skip the morning briefing.  Danny Concannon needs a press credential for Saudi Arabia.  As does his photographer, Baden Walker."

"Who?"

"I guess he is a Post free-lancer.  Call the Post.  Get the details you need to make this happen right now."

"I'm not sure I'm understanding this.  If it's just two Post guys and not the White House Press core, why isn't the Post handling the paperwork?"

"Because they need credentials day after tomorrow.  They're covering the story at the request of the White House.  I'll write a personal cover letter for the request.  Dr. Akin from APHIS is providing the background we can use, if you could call the Post and start filling out the forms.  Give the Saudi embassy the heads up that the paperwork is coming.  And Carol, let's keep a low profile on this, please."  The last request was accompanied by a serious look. Carol knew this was not to be the topic of any "what did you do today" conversation with any of the other assistants.

-------------------

This was Danny's first and likely last trip on the Concorde.  Mr. Ayers-Walker, who Danny suspected was probably Jerry Jacks, had spared no expense to get him to London tonight. Danny had to admit it was a magnificent flying machine and impressive way to travel.

But doing nothing on even the speediest of cross-Atlantic flights was not the best thing for Danny now.  Usually typing at his laptop settled his nerves and stopped his mind from wandering, but he couldn't do that.  He couldn't work on this story, he didn't know what it was yet.  He couldn't work on any of his other pending stories because his life now was all about this one.  He couldn't drink because he had to stay clear-headed. 

So, instead he got out his laptop and started to sift through the research report he had downloaded from the Post database prior to boarding the Concorde. Jerry was a money launderer of some stature, wanted on Ricoh violations.  He'd jumped bail, leaving brother Jasper with a sizable tab.  It had crippled J & J Jacks of Alaska for a short while; but as luck would have it, Jasper had a knack for making money and quickly got the enterprise solvent again. So far, the authorities hadn't found Jerry. The file didn't really contain anything else particularly relevant, if any of it had been relevant.

Danny wondered what sort of danger the White House population -- and much more importantly CJ -- were in; why Jerry Jacks was involved; and why Jerry picked Danny for the story.  He had no answers to any of it.  At least CJ trusted him and was helping him, essentially no questions asked.  He felt good about that.

-------------------

"Simon, where are you exactly?"

"Mediterranean. My Venus says we have to settle down."

"How is the lovely Vee?"

"Beautiful, alluring, enchanting, pregnant."

"Simon, you lucky dog. Are you going to make an honest women out of her?"

"Of course. Perhaps when I have Jax on the line today, I'll ask him to be my best man."

"I'm hurt."

"Jerry, you're on the lam, remember."

"Fortunately, you're helping me correct that unfortunate situation right now," Jerry chuckled.

"This is technical, Simon, so focus. Tell Jax that we're going to get a disk for Andrea. It's a thing about disease threats to public and animal health. Andrea will need to replace it with a disk that looks and works the same. Only our disk will have a friendly, little worm that needs to hack into the network at the Ministry of Health in Saudi Arabia, retrieve some files we need, and do a wireless transfer to one of her special "my camera is really a computer" cameras all while the original program is being demonstrated to the Saudi Minister. I have no way of knowing until I see the machine if the Ministry's computer is wireless equipped, so I'll also need a micro-transponder and some quick lessons on how and where to plug it in. Got a pen? Write down these words..." He spoke very slowly, "gene therapy, Jeddah, antisense, adenovirus, oligonucleotide, White House, leukemia, terrorism. We need the harvesting program to transmit any files containing any of those words in English, French or Arabic. And finally, we need the worm to plant a computer virus that will destroy said files on the Saudi network slowly over the next 48 hours. Okay so far?"

"I'm going to be a father soon. I'm not sure I like the sound of this."

"Second item. We need to engineer a bit of Saudi miscommunication. Andrea needs to hack into the email server at the lab Veterinary Health Lab in Jeddah, get into the email account of the chief Health officer there, the guy that's overseeing efforts to control the outbreak of Rift Valley Fever. His name is Quaboos Al-Thani. Create a communication about the death rate rising precipitously to 1000 per week and send it off to the Minister of Health in Riyadh. Then a couple of hours later, send a reply that a team of American and British doctors, veterinarians and epidemiologists are coming to assist with the effort to control the outbreak. We'll leave the intra-office email alone, but Andrea can hijack all the other email in and out of the lab into cyber oblivion." Jerry smiled to himself, ... "except for spam. We wouldn't want to deprive them of their spam."

"Also Simon, tell Jax to have Mike arrange for the main phone switch out of the lab in Jeddah to fail. Replace some perfectly good transformer with a bad one. That should take the phones out for a couple of days ... just long enough to ensure they don't detect our little deception."

"Cellular?"

"Don't think they've got cellular in Jeddah yet, mate."

"Okay Jerry, I've got it."

"Congrats, again, Simon. Kiss the lovely Vee for me."

TBC