by Jack Mars
The weapon was not in New York, nor was it headed there. It had never left Illinois.
“You are hurt,” one of the masked men noted in Russian. Samara had taught them fluency, but their accents would still sound strange and non-native to a trained ear.
“It’s none of your concern,” she snapped. “We’re fine. We continue as planned.” She held out a hand. “Phone.”
One of the men handed her a smart phone and she immediately opened the browser. Then she smiled. “Mischa. Come see.”
The girl peered over her shoulder, reading the news article at the same time. The authorities were attempting to evacuate New York, at night on a major holiday—and it did not seem to be going in their favor. More than a million people were fleeing in droves, jamming the bridges and tunnels. Just as many were refusing to leave. There were photos as well, of surging crowds and panic. There was a picture of a multi-car accident and even a fire. The National Guard had been deployed, but it did not seem to be helping matters.
Samara glanced over at the girl. She had a thin smile on her lips.
It was absolute chaos.
Beautiful, absolute chaos.
Samara smiled too as the truck headed southeast, toward their destination.
CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR
Zero sighted in on the rifle-mounted scope, adjusting his trajectory by a few degrees to account for the afternoon’s unusually high winds. He stood on one knee, the butt of a bolt-action TAC-308 tight against his shoulder. The blinds were lowered and closed, except for the bottommost three and a half inches of the open window, through which the barrel was aimed.
He breathed evenly, finger resting on the trigger. Any moment now.
He did not have to worry about being interrupted; the owner of this apartment was currently in police custody. Another agent had followed him on the street and slipped a small bag of cocaine into his pocket, and then tipped off the cops anonymously about being a dealer. Zero had all the time he needed.
He was on the third floor of the building, his aim directed slightly downward and across the street at the glass-fronted entrance of the Windsor Hotel in Dubai. For several minutes now he had maintained his aim, holding the rifle aloft, waiting for the precise moment. He scanned every face of every person that exited those doors, through his scope. Not one was aware they had, however briefly, been in his crosshairs. Not one of them knew that a single slip of the finger would have been their end.
He didn’t know his target’s name. He didn’t even know what he had done to deserve such a fate. It was not his job to ask questions; it was his job to pull the trigger. He knew only that it was a matter of international security. If the CIA said jump, he would jump.
If the CIA said shoot—well, he would shoot.
He didn’t know the target’s name, but he knew his face. Zero had studied a high-resolution photo for more than an hour, memorizing every feature. The curl of his gray hair. The curve of his jaw. The neatly trimmed beard, slowly turning white at the corners of his mouth. When the time came, he would have mere seconds to identify and execute. There was no margin for error. There was no excuse for a miss—or worse, for an erroneous shot.
This man, this Dubai businessman, he was what they called a “domino hit.” It meant simply that while his death would be fairly insignificant in the grandest scheme of things, it would lead to something bigger: the toppling of a regime. The surrender of an insurgent. A terror operation that failed to bankroll. That was his division’s specialty, finding the smaller fish that seem paltry until they’re no longer a part of the equation. And eliminating them.
The doors of the hotel swung open. Zero’s heart rate remained steady, even as the time drew closer. A doorman held the glass door for a young woman, olive-skinned and stunning in red. Zero watched her through the scope as she headed toward a black town car.
Focus. The door swung back slowly. But just before it closed, someone pushed it again from the other side. A man in charcoal-gray suit. Curly gray hair. A neatly trimmed beard, turning white at the corners of his mouth…
Zero pulled the trigger. There could be no second-guessing or waiting. Before he had fully exited the hotel, the man’s head jerked backward. Even before the report of the rifle cracked and echoed, the back of his head exploded into the lobby.
Zero did not wait to watch the body fall. The man was dead. He opened the chamber and the spent cartridge popped out. He caught it deftly and stuck it in his pocket as he stood. He stuffed the rifle into a long black bag made for tennis equipment, slung it over his shoulder, and was out of the apartment before the screams could float up to the partly open window.
*
“Zero? Hey. Wake up, pal.”
He opened his eyes and sucked in a breath. Todd Strickland was standing over him quizzically, one hand on Zero’s shoulder.
“You all right? You were tossing and mumbling.”
“Yeah,” Zero murmured. “Fine.”
You’re on the jet. Headed to New York.
The assassination had been a dream. But even as he thought it he realized that it wasn’t quite true. It had been so vivid, so real—just like the resurfaced memory of the Bosnian boy.
Did I kill a man without knowing what he did or who he was?
That wasn’t him. At least that wasn’t who he was now. He would never just pull the trigger on someone just because the CIA told him to. If he did, if he ever did, then he would be no better than John Watson, who had killed a woman because he was told to. Watson had no idea at the time that the woman was the wife of Reid Lawson.
Zero rubbed his forehead. He had a powerful headache coming on, likely a product of all the questions clogging his brain. “Are we there?” he asked hoarsely.
Across the aisle from him, Maria had her nose buried in her tablet screen. “Almost. ETA is twenty minutes,” she told him. “But the evac is not going well. Word got out, someone in the mayor’s office spilled about the possibility of a terror attack. The whole island is trying to get out at once. Reports are coming in all over Manhattan of riots, looting, car accidents…”
I need to see Dr. Guyer. His only hope was that the Swiss doctor could tell him if these memories were real or not. But Guyer’s conference wasn’t for another two days, and there was no way Zero could just abandon the op.
“Are you listening?”
He looked up to see Maria glancing expectantly at him. Had she kept talking? He wasn’t sure. “Yeah. Sorry. I missed some of that.”
“Two people have already been reported dead in this evacuation mess,” she said somberly. “Many more missing. Stores are being mobbed for emergency supplies. Others are being looted. Homes, broken into.” She shook her head.
“Well. New York is a bad idea,” he said shortly.
Maria gaped at him, her brow furrowing at the same time. “Are you kidding? You told the president you agreed with me that we should evacuate.”
He had said that. In the moment, it felt like the right thing to do. But now he was far less than certain. “I changed my mind. I think New York is a distraction. We won’t find anything.”
“Oh. Great.” Maria scoffed loudly. “Hear that, everyone? Kent changed his mind. We can just pack it in, turn the plane around. No need to even investigate.”
“Don’t you see this is what they wanted?” he shot back. “The panic in the streets, the looting and mobs, this is what they’re after. When the dust settles and nothing happens, people are going to be pissed off. And the next time we have a legitimate lead, they’re going to think we’re crying wolf. It’ll be that much harder to get anyone to take it seriously.”
“They’ll spin it,” Strickland cut in. “The White House will tell people that the evacuation scared the terrorists off, forced them to abandon the plan.”
“Yeah, but they’ll have nothing and no one to show for it,” Zero countered. “No matter how you spin it, if there’s no attack in New York tonight, we’ve lost. We’ll have nothing to go on. They could be anywhere. Th
ere could be another attack happening, right now.”
“Then we’ll find them,” Strickland said adamantly. “If they act, we’ll get there, and take them down.”
Zero shook his head. “Don’t be simple.”
Strickland’s eyebrows rose precipitously. “Excuse me? Who are you calling simple?”
“They won’t let us just find them,” Zero argued. “They are toying with us, and it’s working—”
“Enough!” Maria stood from her seat, staring him down. “You asked me earlier if my head was clear.” Her tone was low and tight. “Is yours?”
“Yeah,” he muttered. “I’m fine.”
“Because the Kent I know would not ignore a threat. He wouldn’t leave any stone unturned. He would use his head and figure this thing out. We are going to New York because we have a legitimate lead on an attack in New York, and we are going to see it through. Now unless you have anything of substance to add, sit down, and shut your mouth.”
Zero sighed and sank into his seat. They couldn’t see it. Not like he could. But she was right; he had nothing else to add, nothing to go on. Only their twisted mindset.
“We’re over New York,” the pilot said over the intercom. “Buckle up back there.”
Zero pulled on his seatbelt, but he didn’t feel the usual anticipatory flutter of excited and anxious nerves like he usually did on an op. He felt nothing—because he was certain there would be nothing to find. The next attack would most certainly be somewhere else, and he had no idea where.
CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE
The West Point campus was nearly empty. The place was a veritable ghost town: unusually still, silent, most of the lights off, hardly anyone around. But Maya didn’t mind. After all, that was how she had spent her entire first year there; she hadn’t gone home for the holidays then, and had used the alone time to remind herself that she didn’t need anyone else, that she was strong. That she could get by just fine, even better than fine, on her own.
The dean of West Point, Brigadier General Joanne Hunt, knew who her father was. It was, quite possibly, the reason that Maya had even been admitted. Whether that was true or not, she didn’t really want to know. Even if she patched things up with her dad she was still determined to prove herself, to distance herself from whatever legacy he might have.
And she had been. Maya excelled in every subject. She had the second fastest fifty-yard dash in the school, and regularly made fools out of guys much larger and older in her extracurricular judo class.
Yet there was a significant downside to all her achievements.
It was night out by the time she arrived at the campus and back to her dorm, the air growing brisk and chilly. She unpacked her bag and tried to read for a short while, but found herself a little stir crazy. Though the flight from Virginia to New York had been brief, she needed to stretch her legs. Or maybe do more than just stretch her legs.
She changed into shorts and an old T-shirt and headed down to the gym.
The halls were eerily silent, only half the lights on so that shadows fell in corners. Maya passed by an open classroom doorway and saw Melvin, an older gentleman and janitor who didn’t have any family to speak of but seemed to enjoy his work at the academy. He smiled and said hello as Maya passed. She headed downstairs, her sneakered footfalls echoing in the stairwell. The gym was on the first floor and on the opposite side of the building from the dorms. She was just glad she didn’t have to go outside into the blustery cold to get there. She could hear the wind picking up, howling and rattling windows.
As she neared the gym entrance, she saw movement down the shadowy corridor and frowned. There was a boy, slight-framed and looking very much like a first-year, standing stock-still and no more than twenty-five yards from her.
“Hi.” She gave him a small wave. But the boy didn’t respond. Instead he spun and strode quickly the opposite way.
Weird. But she didn’t pay him any mind. He probably thought he was alone in the halls and got freaked out.
Thankfully the gym was unlocked, and clearly empty since Maya had to turn the lights on. She started with stretches, taking care to tune up her quads and hamstrings, and then put earbuds in before mounting the treadmill. She kept her pace loose and leisurely for the three-mile jog, averaging just under nine minutes per mile. Then she slowed to a brisk walk for another mile, wiping sweat from her forehead. She wasn’t really in the mood for weight training, so instead she wrapped her hands and went to work on the heavy bag, practicing her footwork and her punches while her mind cycled through the major points of the Russo-Japanese War, which would be the subject of a history exam come Monday.
She paused to catch her breath and laughed at herself. It was a holiday weekend; there would be plenty of time for studying later. Instead her thoughts turned to Sara. She wanted to call her, to make sure her little sister had settled in okay at the rehab center.
No, she decided. Give her some space, at least for one night. Maya would call her tomorrow evening, after she had some time to acclimate to Seaside House.
She went back to work on the heavy bag, practicing a jab-cross routine while twisting her upper body into the hit. Funny; when she was younger she never would have imagined herself here, smacking at a punching bag in a military academy. Yet it was cathartic.
She couldn’t help but imagine her ex-boyfriend’s face with each solid, satisfying thud of knuckles against canvas. Greg Calloway was like the unofficial prom king of West Point: tall, blond, handsome, well-liked… as well as superficial, self-important, and leaning hard on the dynastical nature of his wealthy family to propel him through life.
How she had ever allowed herself to be smitten by him, she couldn’t remember. Their relationship, if she could even call it that, was all about status to him; she was the top female at the academy, and he the top male. But things soon began to shift, and Maya was surpassing him not only academically, but physically as well. She knew that it bothered him, but he never admitted it aloud. His pride wouldn’t let him.
Then, about five weeks earlier, came the trip home to try to reconcile with her dad. Maya had brought Greg along as a buffer and, in a fit of anger directed at both her father and her boyfriend, she got in the car and sped back to New York alone, abandoning Greg in Virginia. Rumors ran rampant across campus after the break-up and included just about everything except the actual truth, but one thing was universally known: she had made a fool out of Greg Calloway, West Point’s golden boy.
And his friends, all those that looked up to Greg as their leader, the kind of guy they aspired to be, they didn’t care much for that.
They were problems that Maya didn’t want to burden her dad or Sara with. When they had asked her how school was, she simply told them it was fine, but that wasn’t exactly the case. There had been some hazing. Boys she didn’t even know had called her a bitch, a whore, and worse. There had been whispered threats in the halls—“Watch your back, Lawson,” or “You might want to sleep with one eye open.” Twice she’d scrubbed graffiti from her dorm room door.
Through it all she kept a straight face and didn’t give in, didn’t lose her cool. She was certain she could take Greg or any one of his cronies in a fair fight. She also knew that if it came to that, it wouldn’t be fair, and if she knocked a few teeth down someone’s throat she would be summarily dismissed from the school.
She could have gone to the dean. She could have reported the abuse. But this was her problem, and she would solve it in her way. She didn’t need anyone coming to her rescue.
Still, she couldn’t shake the feeling that despite her outward indifference, the hazing and threats were continually getting worse. Her refusal to acknowledge them was causing escalation, rather than wearing them down.
Maya smacked the heavy bag with a right cross and immediately winced as skin scraped away. The athletic tape and gauze wrapped around her hand had come loose. She stuck her bleeding knuckle in her mouth and decided that was enough of a workout for one night.
&n
bsp; The locker room was just as dark and empty as the gym. She flicked on the lights and stowed her clothes in a locker, but didn’t even bother closing it. There was no one else there. Then she stepped into the shower and turned the water up as hot as she could tolerate. She took her time washing her hair, letting the hot water cascade over her sore muscles, the steam billowing in waves.
Then—the lights went out. She was plunged into complete darkness in an instant, her breath catching in her throat.
“Hello?” she called out. “Someone’s in here!”
The lights did not come back on. She fumbled in the darkness for the faucet and turned it off, listening intently for any indication that she wasn’t alone. But she heard nothing other than the errant drops of water from the shower head and her hair.
It was pitch black; there were no windows in the locker room, no sources of any natural light at all. Luckily Maya knew the layout well. She reached for the hook where she knew her towel to be, wrapped it around herself, and took small, shambling half-footsteps. It felt like it took quite a while, and twice she bumped into something. She wasn’t afraid of the dark, but she was keenly aware that someone had to have turned out the lights. It was probably Melvin, the janitor, but the very notion that she might not be alone was enough to set her teeth on edge and keep her breathing shallow.
At long last she reached the switch panel, near the entrance to the locker room, and flicked them on. The lights came up instantly; Maya squinted in the sudden brightness.
There was no one there. No one that she could see, anyway.
Must have been Melvin, she decided. He probably pulled the door open, saw the lights on, turned them off and left right away. She reached for the door to see if the janitor was still around, maybe in the gym…
The door budged about an inch, but refused to open. Maya frowned and pulled harder, but it was stuck fast. It wasn’t locked, she could tell by the slight movement.
