by D S Kane
Avram grunted. “This is too complicated. I think it will fail. But tell me the rest.”
Jon held his anger. “After reaching the airport, if the bus hasn’t drawn fire, it would head up Interstate 95 as fast as possible to catch the first bus. If there’s a skirmish, that bus heads south and travels away, drawing the hostiles with it.”
Avram was silent for a few seconds. Jon heard Ben-Levy’s and Cassie’s voices, back and forth in conversation with Avram. Then Avram came back on the cell. “This plan is likely to fail, but it’s better than the ones we came up with, and better than no plan at all. Give us a few minutes to talk about it. I’ll call you right back.”
Within minutes, Avram had them all on conference again.
Ben-Levy spoke first. “Your plan is fatally flawed.”
Jon felt a flare of anger. “You have an alternative? What do you suggest?”
“I want something that concentrates our force and brings us to the UN soonest. Your plan takes at least three extra hours just to reach Manhattan.”
Jon sighed. “I’ve worked through a bunch of plans, looking to minimize risk, not minimize time. All the alternatives that take less time make us a bigger target. Not only aren’t they foolproof, they’re nasty bad deathtraps.”
“Jon, we have a limited amount of time. The UN is in session today, tomorrow, and the day after. If we arrive after that, it would be a waste.” Yigdal Ben-Levy’s voice was a hoarse whisper by the end of the sentence.
Jon thought for a second. “You’d all be sitting ducks in a single vehicle. And easy targets if you have three vehicles close together. If we all die before we get there, what purpose is served?”
He heard the hesitation while Ben-Levy thought about his retort. “Jon, I’m dying. Terminal cancer. At most, I have a few days. There will be no time for any contingency plan if I’m not there before the General Assembly session closes. Think of a plan that is more compact.” He terminated the call.
Jon sat at the desk in a total state of shock. He couldn’t imagine a world without the old spymaster.
He examined alternative plans and devised one with a lower probability of success, but one which might take an hour less. While he did this, time passed, at least an hour. He smiled at the irony that the hour he’d used canceled out the hour he saved. He transmitted the plan.
Standing next to Jon, William scanned the plan on Jon’s cell. “Wow, Jon. Mother dying. What a concept.”
“Yeah. Not much to say about that. What about the plan?”
“It works for me. And I have something to report about the method of communications between the Russians and their Chinese partners.”
Jon smiled. He knew William wouldn’t fail. “So?”
“They’re using the Extranet. Very few even know about it. It works like short-wave, bouncing all over. Very public, but easily encrypted and impossible to stop. If this is their tactic, it indicates they might be about to bring down the electric grid in the United States and need something that will work after the grid comes down.”
“So, it’s to be a cyberwar that starts this, not just a kinetic war. What are they saying?”
William seemed unhappy as he spoke. “They have an encryption key to make it secure. Betsy and I have been working on it for over an hour.” He shrugged, his shoulders sagging. “We can’t break it open.”
Jon grimaced. “Keep trying.” He punched in Avram’s encrypted cell number.
“Avram. It’s Jon. What do you think of the new plan?”
“No go on that one either. Ben-Levy wants us to fly to MacArthur Airport, Long Island. Much faster. It’s his decision. We’ll be using chartered Cessnas. Not sure which airport we’ll fly out of. Depends on weather and if our trackers have it staked out. We’ll first try to fly from Reagan. You should too. If you can’t fly because of the storm, drive there and meet us.”
Jon headed back to the ticket counter and bought a one-way to Newark Airport, the only one still receiving commercial flights in the metropolitan New York area. By the time he reached the gate, they had announced his flight as the last commercial aircraft flying from Reagan until after the storm subsided.
CHAPTER 21
American National Bank,
351 Park Avenue, New York, New York
February 23, 8:41 p.m.
Jon Sommers entered the elevator at his office, and watched the doors close. His last hour had been frustrating. The airport in DC had been nearly abandoned, and he was one of only four people on the flight north. Just one hour after takeoff, the flight to Newark landed. Wheels spinning on the black ice of the runway. Jon counted himself lucky, and searched for a taxi in the nearly abandoned airport. After twenty minutes, he gave up and took the PATH rapid transit to the 33rd Street station. From there, he padded through the snow to his office.
Jon took a deep breath as he pulled off his Burberry and fedora, closed the door to his office, and opened the locked door on the side of his desk. Inside, he found and removed several clips of 9mm hollow points and a handful of burners, disposable and untraceable cellphones. He grabbed a cup of cold leftover coffee and drank it, then, redressed in his coat and hat, walked to the elevator.
He thought, plans are one thing, execution is another. For the first time in three years, it was time for him to go operational. He felt excited, but that left him questioning how he’s felt since Ruth’s death. God, how things have changed. I would never have missed this if Ben-Levy hadn’t called me.
He made a mental checklist of tasks, their priorities and sequence. I need to rent a car and not from one of the more popular agencies. Something common and nondescript. The words Rent-a-Wreck tumbled through his brain as he pressed the elevator’s button for the lobby.
Was he safe if Ben-Levy wasn’t? Had those hunting the old man included Jon on their kill list yet? He drew his fedora all the way down to just above his eyes and pulled the Burberry’s collar up, making it more difficult for a hostile to see his face. The elevator doors opened and in he went. He waited while it descended to the lobby without any stops. Figures. After all, it’s getting late.
When the doors opened in the lobby, he poked his head out and swiveled left then right, scanning for threats. It was the first time he’d had to do that in years. It paid off. Even through the heavy snow, he could see two heavies out through the lobby across Park Avenue, about fifty meters away, with handgun bulges barely noticeable through their trench coats. But as his tradecraft and training kicked back in, the heavies stuck out like sore thumbs, standing stock still, their eyes scanning his building’s lobby.
Jon hit the Close Door button, and then the button for the parking garage, at the same time turning to face away from the elevator’s door so the hostiles wouldn’t have time to recognize him. He knew his cover was blown, though.
He expected more trouble to greet him in the garage. An adrenaline surge sent his close combat training from long ago ratcheting through his mind, as if he’d been doing this every day.
As the elevator glided down two flights, he pulled the ceramic Beretta from his coat pocket and loaded a round into the chamber before replacing it in the coat. What awaited him? He hadn’t much time—just a few seconds—to plan his battle tactics.
* * *
The parking garage at the Washington Hilton was empty and quiet. Avram sent a recon team out to scout the four floors of the garage to ensure his tactical plan would work. Several minutes passed before the team reported back. They stated his mercs were safe for now. And there were ninety-seven vacant cars sitting in parking spaces, all suitable for his plans. Most old, but in good shape.
Avram directed the mercenaries to break into seventeen of the oldest cars, ones that could easily be hot-wired. The mercs completed this task in less than three minutes, and Avram filled them with his team’s members and mercenaries.
He directed those he appointed as their drivers to take several different routes to a private air terminal at Dulles.
The trip would take
about twenty-five minutes. He prayed there would be no nasty incidents.
Blowing snow drifted across the highway as the stream of cars made its way toward the airport. Once or twice, they crossed stretches of treacherous black ice during the drive.
They never exceeded the speed limit. It took an hour, slipping and sliding at every turn. But no crashes and no snipers en route. He could see the private air terminal looming in the distance, lit up by its own runway lights.
So far, so good, but what they faced next could be the tricky bit. To be safe, he conferenced all of his cars on his cell.
As the first car approached the Cessna that Yigdal had rented, Avram detected six armed hostiles emerging near the hangar’s entry carrying automatic rifles. This was the worst-case scenario. “Keep driving past the airport and head back to the highway.”
His driver acknowledged the order. He repeated the order on his cell for the other cars. “Abort. There are hostiles at the terminal. We’ll fall back to Jon’s plan.”
As he terminated the call, he could hear automatic fire behind them. It was a near escape as they sped onto the highway.
Where were they going to find enough buses?
* * *
By the time the elevator reached the basement and its doors slid open, Jon’s mind had transformed into a battle computer, algorithms flashing briefly into consciousness. He dropped prone to the elevator’s floor, his handgun pointing out from the lift into the garage. It took only a few seconds for him to scoot out and crawl across the concrete. He came to rest behind a parked Mercedes. No enemy contact. He took a deep breath. Neat! It feels good. So good. I can’t believe I’ve remained dormant so long. Just a vanilla banker. He found himself smiling before the battle, something he could have never expected.
The garage’s street exit was about one hundred meters away. He reached up and tugged the side-view mirror of the Mercedes back and forth until it snapped off in his hand. He used the mirror to scan the garage. Quiet. No movement.
But his gut told him it wasn’t safe. He was sure it would take three of them to believe they could stop him for sure. He pulled one of his brown leather gloves from his trench coat pocket and readied the mirror, giving him a view of the entire garage.
When he tossed the glove across the garage, the mirror reflected muzzle flashes from the two most extreme corners of the garage at its exit point. A crossfire. It figures. Rats.
So now he’d found two. But what if there were more? He had calculated three.
Even with just two, engaging them frontally would be suicide. And worse, since they now knew he was here, waiting for them to squeeze him into the open meant certain death.
If he survived, he’d need the Burberry as clean as it could be, to maintain the cover of a businessman. He squirmed out of the coat and stuffed the fedora in its sleeve. He took a deep breath and pushed himself under the Mercedes, along the filthy floor past two more high-end cars until he was at the wall, about fifty meters from the exit.
He could just see the top of the head of the closest shooter, crouching behind a car. Jon moved closer on his haunches. The city noises from the street were helpful as cover. He crawled behind the shooter, now less than ten feet away.
A single car separated the two men hunting each other. Jon put the trench coat and hat on again, giving a bigger target, but with less flesh to destroy. He calculated the odds. Do this one first? Well, that would be possible.
He crouched and duck-walked to the back of the car that separated him from his target. He was now directly behind the shooter. He took another deep breath and tensed his legs, before springing toward his target as hard as he could.
The shooter spun around from the noise but Jon reached his target before the man could complete his turn. Jon used a Krav Maga move to disarm the man, and a throat stab with his fist to kill him. He caught the shooter as he fell. Jon watched as his target suffocated in silence. It felt like killing an insect.
He looked at the gun the man had used. It was a Chinese version of the AK-74. More intriguing was the dead man’s face. Asian, probably Chinese. Certainly not Russian.
Avram would need this information.
Street lights bright as day lit the exit ramp up to 52nd Street. To try running up the ramp would be tempting fate. Probability of succeeding was near zero. He thought about trying to cross to the other side of the garage and taking out the second shooter with hand-to-hand moves. No good. He’d be exposed for almost thirty meters. His odds were poor.
What if he tried driving out? A bad option. By the time he had a car jacked into gear with the engine running, whoever was there would be all over him. And if there were really two of them left, the odds were definitely zero.
He needed a plan with better chances of survival, but the other shooter was now shouting in Mandarin. Jon would need to move right now, and be swift.
* * *
Avram considered something that kept intruding into his consciousness. The hostile force seemed prescient in determining his plans. They were right with him, no matter where he went. He wasn’t sure how they knew, but he was absolutely sure they did. He suspected the cars his team had just stolen were compromised. While he already knew the hostiles had command of the traffic cams operated by the city of Washington, they must also have another way. It was unfortunate, but he’d have to try brute force for their exfiltration. There was no other way.
He used an app on his cellphone to find Washington’s central city bus depot. The cars were easy targets now. He conferenced each of the cars on his cell. “Abandon the cars one block away from the central bus terminal.” He took a deep breath, appraising the condition of his former handler. He faced Ben-Levy. “Can you run?”
“Don’t be silly,” the old spymaster said.
“Can you walk?”
Ben-Levy shrugged.
When they were close to the terminal, they exited the car. Avram motioned to three of his mercs. “Carry him.”
They all trotted, forced-march style, along an alleyway for several hundred yards over snow and ice until they reached the city’s main bus lot.
When they arrived, he let them rest for five minutes. He scanned the area. About fifty city buses were locked down for the evening after the end of rush hour.
How long before the guards miss three of their buses? How long will the guards search for them before calling it in to the police?
One of his mercs dismantled the lock on the fence. In seconds they were hot-wiring three of the older buses while everyone boarded.
Avram placed thirty-eight mercs in the first bus, going directly up Interstate 95. They left the lot first. The remaining sixty-seven mercs were split among the two other buses. Avram and Cassie went with Yigdal Ben-Levy in the second bus, taking streets and local roads. Cassie’s bodyguards would go in the third bus and leave last, heading back to Dulles.
The plan we’re using is exactly what Jon suggested.
Avram pulled his cell from its pocket. He conferenced the other two bus drivers. “Go now.”
Three buses started their engines and made their way out the gate at low speed onto Washington’s city streets.
* * *
Near the back of the garage, Jon found a car he thought would work for his next battle tactic. A red Pontiac, polished and clean, but old enough for him to easily hot-wire. He scanned its exterior to make sure it didn’t have a car alarm, then picked the lock on the door and squirmed inside.
Jon left its driver-side door open while he worked. He readied the AK-74 and loaded the breech with a full clip taken from the dead shooter’s coat. He brushed the red and black wires, and the car’s engine sparked to life. He dropped the car into reverse and used his hand to push down the accelerator as he rolled away from the vehicle.
The second shooter jumped into the driving lane about twenty meters from where Jon lay. Another man emerged beside him, also armed. Aha! There are three! They both sprayed rounds at the empty Pontiac. Neither had cover.
&nb
sp; Jon locked the trigger down and picked them both off.
With the exception of Jon, the garage was now empty. He expected the gunshots would get attention from the two heavies he’d seen across the street when the elevator had stopped in the lobby. He’d have to move fast.
He pulled the hat down on his head and marched up the garage’s ramp onto Lexington Avenue near 52nd Street. He headed away from the building’s Park Avenue entrance, north. Where are the heavies? He swung his head left and right but they weren’t yet in sight.
When he merged into the mass of pedestrians at the next corner, he took a deep breath. The crowded sidewalk gave him unexpected cover as he walked up Lexington Avenue. Then 53rd Street, and 54th, and still no problems. Now he was sure: They’ve gone to the garage!
If he remembered correctly the Rent-a-Wreck office was at the corner of Third Avenue at 55th Street.
CHAPTER 22
Southwest Airlines, Reagan National Airport,
Washington, DC
February 23, 10:38 p.m.
William Wing and Betsy Brown scuttled down the ramp from the 747 into the terminal. She punched his shoulder. “Tell me again, Willy, why are we doing this?”
“Because I feel useless when all of them are being hunted and we sit on the sidelines. At least now we can join up with Avram and his mercs so we don’t play phone tag.”
“Willy, we’d be safer in Woodbine.”
“Not with Daddy’s hit men looking for me. They’re probably inside your house right now.”
“Crap, Willy. I didn’t sign up for this. You owe me bazillion orgasms for doing this with you.” She crossed her arms in sullen silence as they walked to the taxi line.
William put their bags in the back seat with them. “Take us to Dulles, the private air terminal.” The cabby nodded and put the car in gear.
She put her lips close to his ear. “What if they’re not there?”
His face fell. “We’ll figure it out if that happens.”
She pushed her elbow into his ribs. “Make a plan now, sweetie.”
