by Brad Taylor
“Not the man to make judgments on Dubai? He spent four years there as the ambassador. If anyone should know, it’s him. Anyway, Dubai’s not Yemen or some other country going through a volcano. They’re wired pretty tight.”
Kurt started to say something else, and the SECSTATE held up his hand. “Look, Lucas I’m still okay with. If there’s any fallout from taking him down, I’m sure we can contain it. I’m not so sure about this unknown. We have no idea who he’s connected with or how it will unravel. I’m not willing to risk it.”
I awoke before dawn, having gotten little sleep. The impending operation against Lucas had run continuously in my mind, with my subconscious trying to assess where the curveballs would come from. When we’d have to flex.
Lucas was no ordinary target. He was a predator at the top of the food chain and deserved respect. He’d come close to killing me a couple of years ago, something that few men could claim. I’d decided to keep the plan simple, assuming risk on compromise instead of risk on him turning the tables on us. It wasn’t the usual way an Omega operation went down, because we ordinarily placed Taskforce exposure above all else, but in this case we were pressed for time, and I could only leverage the few facts we had.
We knew two solid things about him: the make and model of his vehicle, and, thanks to his phone, his bed-down location. Which is where we would take him down.
Not much of a surprise, he was staying in the same hotel as the envoy. I’d sent Brett and Decoy out on a recce, and they said the place was now a fortress, leading me to believe he wouldn’t strike there. He just wanted to get close for surveillance purposes. The hotel gave him a perfect staging point, complete with a parking garage that, as a registered guest, he could use without raising a signature.
The plan was a template we used as an in-extremis solution. A battle drill we called a mugging. Basically, we’d simply hide in the shadows waiting for our prey. When he arrived, we’d thump his ass, giving him a little wood shampoo with some clubs like a couple of muggers from New York. It wasn’t imaginative and was usually used as a last-resort, snap-decision thing when the original plan went to pieces. In this case I liked the simplicity. Fewer things to control, like the variables on Samir’s rescue, so fewer things Lucas could manipulate.
The key to the template was getting him to come to us. I didn’t want to crouch in a corner like a Peeping Tom, only to have him head the other way. In this case, I figured we had an ace in the hole with Jennifer.
Lucas had tried very hard to kill her a couple of years ago and would recognize her on sight. An irresistible lure. She would position in the lobby, with eyes on the elevators. When he appeared, she’d simply get up and walk through his cone of vision. I had no doubt whatsoever that her appearance would cause a reaction.
He’d either beeline to his vehicle or try to follow Jennifer, assuming she had something to do with the envoy’s visit. I was betting on the follow-Jennifer option. He’d want to know what the hell she was doing there, a complete wrench thrown into his operation. He’d want to interrogate her, then plug the holes in whatever plan he had created.
Decoy and Brett would position in the lobby to give early warning of his intentions, since Jennifer couldn’t look behind her. She had to act like she didn’t know he was there. Knuckles and I would take him down.
The choice wasn’t random. We hadn’t drawn straws. Lucas had come close to killing both Knuckles and me and had tortured and killed a friend of ours, along with his entire family. His capture was a little personal, to put it mildly.
I rolled out of bed and turned on my laptop, logging into the hotel’s Internet. Lucas was the twenty-five-meter target, but he wasn’t the endgame. We still had the Saudi to contend with, a threat that would have to be removed as well, like stomping out all the embers in a fire to prevent a flare-up.
I pulled up our encrypted “company” e-mail and saw a message from Kurt. The first part was something I should have expected; especially since Kurt had said me running around loose gave the Oversight Council irritable bowel syndrome.
Blaine and support package on the way. ETA eighteen hours.
LTC Blaine Alexander, the element leader for Omega operations, was a pretty good man. He’d been working Omega for a few years, and we got along fine, although I hadn’t done anything with him since I’d left the Taskforce. He’d probably wonder how I would act, since the last time he’d seen me I was literally a catatonic mess. He was the one who had the job of telling me my wife and daughter had been murdered. The one who brought the stalker to my dreams.
The second part of the message I had to read twice before the words sank in.
No Omega for the Saudi. Lucas only. Work it, then send back status. I’ll re-engage for further operations with what you find out.
I couldn’t believe it, wondering if they got the SITREP about the shaped-charge IED. If they understood the implications of that little device. Whoever made it was imaginative and ruthless. The fact that he hadn’t pinged in any databases until now told me he had been very, very successful. He didn’t wake up with the knowledge of how to create that IED. He’d done it before. Probably many times, and in such a manner that he hadn’t ever come up as a threat. The Council was playing checkers against a man who was a wizard at chess.
And they were betting the envoy’s life on the outcome.
53
The room’s mounting heat caused the Ghost’s thin veil of sleep to dissipate. He fought it, knowing he needed the rest. He threw off the threadbare sheet in a final attempt, but it did little to help. The seedy hotel had no air-conditioning, and the fan in the room was doing nothing to overcome the swelter of the rising sun.
Yesterday afternoon, after getting across the river on a dhow, he had returned to his friend’s flat and waited to hear the news of the car bomb. After four hours, he’d heard nothing, either on the television or on the streets outside. He’d decided to relocate. He knew that simply because he hadn’t heard anything didn’t mean there wasn’t an explosion, but he was taking no chances. If he had been under surveillance, they probably knew where he’d been sleeping. He’d found a small hotel nearby and urged his friend to move as well for the next forty-eight hours. Hamid had said he’d think about it, then had gone to work, apparently unconcerned, showing the Ghost how little experience he really had.
He padded barefoot to the small sink in the corner of the room and splashed water on his face, then peeked out between the shutters of the window. He could see an alley below him, with various wholesale stores selling dry goods. Nothing appeared to be out of place. No one standing around without a purpose.
He placed the batteries in his final IMSI grabber and turned it on. Within seconds, it began registering dozens of numbers. He shut it off immediately, knowing he’d just disconnected quite a few phone calls. He was pleased that it worked as advertised, but didn’t need any anomalies in the cell system to generate suspicion.
He placed it and the WiFi booster he’d purchased yesterday into his knapsack and glanced at his watch. In two hours the envoy would be landing. If all went well, in five he would be dead.
Getting Jennifer in place inside the lobby of the Al Bustan Rotana turned out to be the easy part. Dressed nicely, she blended in well, drinking coffee at a small table next to an espresso bar that afforded a view of the entrance and both banks of elevators.
Finding a place to conduct the ambush had been damn near impossible. The hotel itself looked more like a high-end prison, with metal detectors on all doors and roving men in suits wearing sunglasses and wired earbuds. This, in addition to the cameras all over the place.
Initially, I had planned for Jennifer to walk to the parking garage, getting inside to some corner that was dark and scary, where we could thump Lucas unimpeded. When we arrived, we saw the garage entrance had been converted into a search-and-quarantine section, with every vehicle getting inspected bumper-to-bumper. I was pretty sure they wouldn’t be very pleased with the armament we had brought.
This, coupled with the fact that Lucas’s phone had been stationary outside a spice souk in Deira for the entire morning, had almost caused me to change my mind and simply execute the mugging using the vehicle. Just follow and rip him off the street at the first opportunity.
I really didn’t want to do that given the variables of location and time. I wanted—needed—to control the kill zone, so we kept looking. Eventually, we ended up behind the hotel at a back entrance that led to several attached restaurants. The restaurants were only open for dinner, and the hallway between them ultimately ended up back in the hotel lobby. Even better, the hallway had a single camera at the lobby entrance for the hotel and a single camera at the exit, outside the door. The kicker had been that instead of a metal detector at the exit, it was simply locked. The hotel had decided to shut it down for the duration of the envoy’s visit.
Sitting next to me in the van, staring at his Taskforce smartphone, Knuckles said, “Target’s on the move.” I looked at my own phone, brought over in the support package Jennifer had received, and saw Lucas was crossing the Dubai Creek and headed to us. Or the airport.
Moment of truth.
The envoy’s party was due to land in about thirty minutes. If Lucas bypassed the hotel and made any indication that he was headed to the airport, we would be forced to take him down with the vehicle whether we liked it or not. I was betting he wouldn’t, though. He’d had the time to come up with something ingenious, and with the Saudi unknown helping him, I didn’t think he’d do some ghetto drive-by. He’d want to get away clean.
I keyed the push-to-talk on my radio. “Everyone set?”
Brett said, “Roger. I got the line of sight down the hallway.”
Decoy said, “Yeah. I got the front door and the roundabout outside.”
Jennifer said, “I’m still good. No change.”
“Remember,” I said, “he doesn’t bite on the way in, we recock and try again on the way out.”
Knuckles did a functions check on the new EMP gun we’d received in the drop, making sure it was ready to take out the camera above the door. I busied myself with my electric lockpick gun, mentally rehearsing in my mind the sequence I would go through.
Our part of the mission was the one big risk to discovery. I had to get the door open before Jennifer reached it, which meant Knuckles would have to kill the camera before Lucas committed to the trap. If he didn’t, we’d have to cross our fingers that someone wouldn’t come out and investigate why the camera wasn’t working while we waited on round two.
Knuckles said, “He’s made the turn on the road to the hotel.”
I felt the adrenaline rise, knowing we were about two minutes out. Knuckles shut off the phone, slid open the door to the van, and said, “Decoy, your target.”
“Roger.”
Decoy was the trigger. The minute he saw Lucas, we’d be in motion.
Sooner than expected, I heard, “Target at entrance. Held up with security. They’re searching his backpack.”
That was one good thing about this location. We’d know positively that Lucas had no firearms. Knuckles handed me his radio and cell phone, then exited the vehicle, me right behind him. We slid down the wall of the hotel, doing whatever we could to stay out of the camera’s field of view.
He reached within forty feet of the ball hanging above the door and began sighting. I backed up a few yards to prevent any backsplash from destroying our electronics. Especially my lock gun.
The EMP hummed and Knuckles said, “Go.”
I raced to the lock, taking a knee and sliding in the thin needle. I inserted the tension wrench, then began pulsing the lock gun. It rattled like crazy, much louder than I remembered.
Decoy said, “Target’s passed. Jennifer, your show.”
I continued to work the lock and told Decoy to give me a play-by-play. Jennifer had done a timing run, and I knew the hallway was two minutes from the lobby to the door. Unfortunately, the last bend, right in front of a Chinese restaurant, was only one minute and thirty seconds away. From it someone would have a view of the door and me behind it through the plate glass.
“Jennifer’s up and looking sexy, giving Lucas an eyeful. Come on, baby, show him some skin.”
Asshole. I grinned in spite of the seriousness of what we were doing. Decoy was busting my balls because of a fight we’d had last year in a similar situation involving Jennifer. He’d made some inappropriate comments, and I’d about taken his head off. Now, he was poking me in the eye for the fun of it.
“Okay, Lucas has lock-on, and he definitely recognized her. He stopped for a second. He’s now staring at her back, but headed to the elevator. Target unsighted. Brett, it’s your ball.”
Shit. Come on. Follow her.
Brett said, “I got him. He’s at the elevator. Jennifer’s about fifty feet from the hallway. He’s still looking.”
I continued working the lock, having trouble getting the pins to the shear line. One seated, then another, but slower than my rehearsal earlier in the van.
“Bingo. He’s coming her way, walking fast. Jennifer, pick it up or he’s going to catch you.”
I heard Jennifer acknowledge, and I started to sweat. “Time?” I asked Knuckles.
Knuckles said, “Easy. You still got over a minute. Slow and smooth.”
I felt another pin reach the shear line, realizing I was going to make it with half a minute to spare. The next call popped that illusion.
“Shit, he just started running. Jennifer, get moving! He’s not going to follow. He’s coming hard to take you out. Jennifer, you copy?”
I heard silence for a second, then, “Target unsighted. I say again, target unsighted.”
I looked through the window, but saw nothing. At a sprint my time went from a minute and a half to about twenty seconds. I returned to the lock, the tension wrench having moved about forty-five degrees, which meant I had about two or three pins to go.
I seated another pin and heard Knuckles say in a monotone, “Got her in sight. You’re out of time.” I looked up to see Lucas right behind her, bearing down like a bull in full charge, both running flat out. Jennifer caught my eye, and I shook my head left and right in an exaggerated motion.
She glanced over her shoulder and Lucas struck, attempting to wrap his arms around her in a full-body tackle. She rotated and drove her foot straight into his stomach, his forward momentum increasing the power of the strike.
I heard his grunt and exhale of breath all the way outside as I frantically stroked the remaining pin.
“Come on, Pike!” Knuckles shouted. “He’s getting back up!”
Jennifer was in a fighting crouch, dancing out of his way, slowly using up her remaining space to the door, attempting to give me time.
He swung a roundhouse at her head, hard enough to knock her out completely. She parried and redirected the energy away from her, then slipped inside his reach and gave him a palm strike to his nose, snapping her hip and driving her body behind it. His head popped back like he’d run into an unseen pole, and she danced back out of his reach. I could see the look of shock on his face, her skill completely taking him by surprise.
He bellowed and rushed, wrapping her in a bear hug and trapping her arms. He slammed her full-force into a wall, and the last pin broke free.
I ripped open the door, Knuckles flying through and running straight at the pair. Lucas heard the movement and turned, still holding Jennifer. Knuckles hit him full-force on the side of his head with a closed fist, rattling him enough to lose control of Jennifer. She rotated out and kicked him hard in the genitals. He shrieked and fell to his knees, attempting to control the pain and continue to fight. He started to rise, and Knuckles gave him an uppercut to his face, knocking him back into me. I put him in a rear naked choke, and in ten seconds his arms quit windmilling. He was out.
Panting, I said, “What the hell happened to using the Taser?”
“I didn’t have a clean shot with him holding Jennifer. And he
deserved a little punishment.”
“Jennifer, you all right?”
Leaning against a wall and breathing heavy, she said, “Yeah. Yeah, I’m okay.”
“Let’s get the hell out of here.”
54
Staring down at Lucas’s battered face, I radioed Brett in the follow car. “Any activity?”
“None. We’re clean so far.”
I’d left him and Decoy within sight of the rear door to give me a feel on whether we’d been compromised or not, while Knuckles, Jennifer, and I had tossed Lucas in our van and driven a couple of alleys away from the hotel, giving Blaine in our makeshift hotel tactical operations center a SITREP. Satisfied we were good to go, I addressed Lucas for the first time.
“Been a while. I’ll bet seeing me walking around was a big fucking surprise.”
He said nothing, his face a blank canvas showing neither fear nor anger.
“Look, I appreciate how tough you are, so I’m not going to go through a bunch of threats. Here’s the deal: The United States Middle East envoy is landing in minutes. I can afford to talk right now, but once that envoy hits the ground, I’ll be out of time. I know you’re out to kill him, I just don’t know how. Tell me that and you’ll spare yourself some pain later, I promise.”
I expected all sorts of stalling tactics. What I got completely surprised me.
Looking relieved, he said, “Pike, I’m on your side. That’s what I’m doing here. I know there’s a hit planned on the envoy, but it’s not me. It’s another guy from Lebanon called the Ghost. He’s the one targeting the envoy. I’m trying to stop him.”
Surprised or no, I lightly slapped his face twice, saying, “Cut the crap. What’s the plan? The clock’s ticking and I’d rather not destroy the envoy’s itinerary by putting him back on a plane.”
Which, of course, was a lie. I had no control over McMasters’s activities, but I didn’t want Lucas to know that.
