Ice Cold Kill

by Dana Haynes

  Asher blinked up at the big man. “Perfidy?”

  “It’s a perfectly good word.”

  Will Halliday rounded the corner.

  * * *

  Schullman and Halliday took the three surviving mercenaries in an Escalade to conduct the initial reconnaissance of Milan’s Piazza del Duomo. They found parking. Schullman deferred to the American, instilling him with confidence. “How do you want to handle this?”

  Halliday checked his watch. “We’ve got two hours. See that café over there? That’s the meet. Everybody split up. Walk to the edges of your sight lines. Get some elevation if you can. We meet back here in thirty minutes. Go.”

  The men trotted off in different directions. Schullman, too.

  Will Halliday stuffed his gloved hands into the pockets of his long tan duster and walked to the very center of the expansive plaza. It was the latter part of November and not too cold—maybe thirty-five degrees, he guessed, maybe a bit less—and the plaza was bustling. Businessmen in fitted overcoats and polished shoes strode carefully, watching for patches of ice amid the geometric patterns of the stone pavers. Schoolchildren on group excursions flitted about, laughing or flirting. Milanese young women, flawless and thin, strutted past him in gleaming riding boots, fur hats and collars, gaily colored gloves, and coats that floated behind them like superheroines’ capes.

  Will grinned. A guy could fall in love with Milanese women.

  In the dead center of the plaza, he stood and turned slowly, smiling, drinking it all in. Nannies from the Far East pushed prams. Tourists carted wheeled luggage. He saw a couple dozen bicycles. More than half of the people walking through the plaza paid no attention to the art or history; they were texting.

  The cathedral itself was fantastically huge and as spiky as a cactus, with its gothic pointed arches, its marble saints, and hideous gargoyles. It looked like an alien spaceship ready to launch. The monument had taken centuries to build, at a time when a man’s life could run forty to fifty years. Who puts a lifetime of work into something his great-great-grandson won’t see completed? Will wondered. He was from California, where a building from the 1960s can be considered historic.

  He turned and took in the façade of the Galleria Vittoria Emanuele, which looked like it could have been government or high church offices, back in the day, but now was a glorified shopping mall. He spun on, slowly, watching the automobile traffic flow along via Torino and via Mazzini to the south, via Orifici to the west, via Meravigli to the north.

  Lots of police cars, he noted. Mostly Fiats, some in black, some in white. He couldn’t read Italian but could tell that more than one agency handled day-to-day security for the shrine.

  He turned, watched the pedestrian patterns. He noted the difference in speed and direction between the tourists and the Milanese.

  He looked up at the sky. It was nice, even overcast, the clouds pearl gray. Good. Snipers prefer a steady overcast to direct sunlight—less change of squinting at a back-lit target or having the target alerted by lens flare from the telescopic sight.

  The men regathered at the Escalade.

  “Whacha think?” Will asked.

  Each man made a report, detailing the best spots to put shooters, the interferences, the wind and weather.

  Will leaned against the SUV and winked at Eli Schullman. “You know these badass mofos better than I do. How should we deploy?”

  Schullman blew on his ungloved hands. He pointed to his men. “These two are our best snipers. Set them up to the north and west.”

  Will nodded. “Classic cross fire.”

  The hulking man with the cranial ridge pointed to the third mercenary, a buzz-cut blond, the battle-hardened Croat he had used in New York. “Tuck this man in close, at another table at the café, behind the bitch. He’s an able street fighter, good with knives.”

  “Cool.”

  “You and me in the piazza. Close but not too close. Daria’s exit strategy will be to run that way”—he pointed north—“to lose us in the Galleria, or into the restaurant, to lose us in the kitchen or upstairs in the businesses.”

  “So we cut off those exits.”

  Schullman nodded.

  “Solid. And she meets the Commie at one of the outside tables. He gets here first, so we can determine which way she faces.”

  Schullman shook his head. “Commie? The Russians are better capitalists than you guys, these days.”

  “Hey, I’m old-school. Will she bring the Syrian fucker?”

  “No. She’ll hold him in reserve; not sure where. Our snipers will have to find him.”

  The two gun hands nodded. Everyone had been given photos of Daria and Belhadj.

  Will said, “Okay, fellas. No point in freezing to death. Go get warm somewhere. We meet back here in thirty minutes to set up. Smoke ’em if you got ’em. Eat, if you want. Get laid, if that’s your pregame ritual. But we meet back here at three sharp.”

  The men dispersed.

  * * *

  Two blocks north, near Teatro alla Scala, a short, brown bus with tinted windows backed into an alley. Its backing up warning beeper had been disabled.

  Standing next to the driver, Owen Cain Thorson held binoculars up to his eyes and scanned the Piazza del Duomo. Collier, the grizzled Oklahoman with a coarse mustache and SEAL tattoos on both shoulders, stepped up next to Thorson.

  “Lotta collaterals.”

  “Yeah.” Thorson was none too happy about the glut of pedestrians walking the plaza. “That’s the café, there.”

  Collier leaned forward, following the boss’s finger. “Exposed.”

  “Put your guys in civvies. Have them walk the perimeter of the plaza. Get some altitude if they can. I want a sit rep in twenty.”

  Collier stuck a wad of chew in his cheek. “Sure.” It came out shore.

  Thorson turned to Agent Maldonado, who would be handling their communications. “Will we have audio?”

  “Out there?” Maldonado rolled her eyes. “No way. Everyone walking and talking. All those cell phones and Bluetooths, spiking the frequencies. Stone pavers to bounce audio off of. It’d be like aiming a shotgun mic in the stands during the Super Bowl.”

  Thorson absorbed that. “Any word from the Italians?”

  Maldonado glanced around to see who on the team was listening in. “They have taken our request for weapons-hot status under advisement and reminded us not to proceed unilaterally.”

  Thorson smirked.

  Collier got his shooters off the bus and began their reconnoiter of the plaza.

  Thorson considered his request for the use of lethal force on Italian soil. Gibron had infiltrated U.S. domestic intelligence. She had badly embarrassed Thorson—the kind of embarrassment from which a CIA career does not recover. Indeed, she had turned the CIA itself into a laughingstock. She had conspired first to kill the president, then targeted the leadership of the Western world.

  Thorson had not requested permission to use lethal force. He had politely informed the Italians that they were going to need body bags.

  * * *

  A communications techie in the Shark Tank doffed his headset and handed it to Nanette Sylvestri. “John Broom.”

  Sylvestri held one of the two earpieces up against her head, the voice wand near her lips. “John?”

  “Hey! We’re on the ground, heading into—”

  “Do you have my personal cell number?”

  “Um, yeah.”

  “Wait ten minutes, then call me.”

  She disconnected, turned to the man watching a live satellite feed on one of the flat-screens. “Is that the Pentagon bird?”

  He nodded without looking away. “They retasked it from over Fallujah, after plenty of kicking and screaming.”

  “Okay. You have the room.”

  She grabbed her coat off the rack, left and took the elevator up to the ground floor. She wound her way through the corridors of Langley until she came to the little-used VIP entrance, with parking large enough for the pre
sidential motorcade. Security signed her out.

  Sylvestri stood just outside the reinforced doors and thought about cigarettes until her phone, already in her hand, rang.

  “John?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Policy expressly forbids analysts from being deployed into an active, tactical operation.”

  After a beat, his voice came back, along with a rumbling in the background. “It sure does.”

  “Which is why, if I were to inform you that Gibron is meeting with your Tajik doctor at four P.M., Italy time, at a café in the Piazza del Duomo, and that Swing Band is on site, it would in no way constitute my permission to get your ass there, fast. Understood?”

  Another longish beat. “Nanette?”

  “Yes, John?”

  “Christmas is four weeks away. What do you want Santa to bring you?”

  “A new pair of eyes. Daria Gibron did a couple of big things in New York this week. One of them was to derail Owen Thorson’s career. John? I cannot have this thing be about that thing.”

  John said, “Got it,” and hung up.

  * * *

  The reader board on the Malpensa train read: NEXT STOP: MILAN TRAIN STATION.

  John turned to Major James. “There’s a complication.”

  “I’m in the army. There are no complications, just opportunities.”

  John looked the heavy Irishman dead in the eye. “Daria Gibron is meeting Dr. Tuychiev in a really crowded plaza, in about an hour, and one or both of them likely has access to Pegasus-B. Plus, a CIA hit squad with a chip on its shoulder is setting up to eliminate the threat.”

  Theo stopped smiling. “Okay, that’s a complication.”

  “I’m going in.”

  “Well, that sounds sort of dumb.”

  “A little, yeah.”

  The train began to slow down. Theo offered a lopsided smile. “Well, let’s get to it then.”

  Twenty-nine

  The Middle East

  Almost Twenty Years Ago

  In two years, the Tunnel Rat of Rafah, who had dubbed himself Asher, turned twelve and the girl he’d rescued turned eight. By that time, the boy was organizing not only black-market goods in Rafah, but other towns as well. It was 1985 and he had become masterful at breaking into the many Jewish settlements that were sprouting like mushrooms throughout the Gaza Strip. He also had learned how to sneak into the Israeli Defense Forces compounds.

  The girl had become a most capable pickpocket and thief. She looked so damned innocent! Not to mention quick; quick as a cat. Asher had started calling her that, in fact: Chatoulah. Western aid workers and foreign journalists fawned over her huge black eyes as she all but curtsied and picked their pockets clean.

  One day, in an alley near an open-air bazaar on the north side of Rafah, the boy dug into his pocket and held out a bit of leather. The girl has seen Western playing cards and thought the thing looked like one of the suits.

  “What is it?” she asked around a mouthful of rice and raisins.

  Asher grinned and showed her that it wasn’t a single bit of leather but a leather sandwich, with something metal and form-fitting within.

  He flicked the metal bit with a ragged thumbnail. The metal slid out on a single hinge.

  Asher picked up a discarded bit of corrugated cardboard and cleaved it in two with hardly any effort.

  He closed the blade back in its spade-shaped sheath. “It’s sharp. Be careful.”

  He tossed it to the girl.

  “What do I need a knife for?”

  “Because I won’t always be here to protect you, Chatoulah.”

  She shoved his shoulder, thinking the Hebrew word for cat was an insult regarding her lack of size. “Your mother’s only dowry was a sailor’s cock!”

  “Hey!” He nudged her shoulder and grinned. “That’s a pretty good one.”

  He’d been teaching the girl to swear in Arabic. She blushed. She’d been saving it for a special occasion.

  He took some of the rice and raisins, and handed her the bowl. “I won’t always be here to protect you,” he repeated.

  “Yes, you will.”

  “No.” There was something definitive in Asher’s voice. “The cousins want me to work up north, in Khan Yunis and Deir al-Baleh. If all goes well, I’ll be working Gaza City by this time next year.”

  The girl ate, handed back the bowl. “So take me with you.”

  He switched to French, to test her. “Maybe. We’ll see. But keep the knife. You never know.”

  “You never know,” she acceded in French.

  “What is your name this month?”

  Since discovering that “Asher” had been a spur-of-the-moment choice, the girl had shifted her name seven or eight times a year.

  “Daria.”

  “God, that’s awful.” He rolled his eyes. “You sound like a mark. I want to rob you myself.”

  “It’s pretty,” she countered, rubbing her tiny thumb over the leather, spade-shaped sheath.

  “I have been studying American cinema. Back to the Future is number one at the box office. It stars a girl called Lea. That would be a good name.”

  The girl wrinkled her nose.

  “The Color Purple? It has an Oprah.”

  She thought about it. “Is that a common American name?”

  Asher gave her his most worldly scowl. “In America, every fifth girl is an Oprah. Trust me. It’s perfect.”

  They finished the rice bowl.

  “Why do I need an American name?”

  Asher sucked rice off his fingers, then wiped them with the hem of his T-shirt. “There’s a war on, Chatoulah.”

  “Where?”

  He hesitated. “Here. I think.”

  “A war between who?”

  He shot her a look. “I haven’t figured out all of the angles. Even the Bedouin cousins, God grant them huge profits, don’t know all the details. I just think a war is coming. And…”

  The girl was half paying attention, fingers playing with the leather-and-blade sandwich in her small hands. “What?”

  “I think,” Asher switched to English, to see if she could keep up, “we need to align ourselves.”

  “With who … whom?” Her English was stilted.

  “With the side that wins.”

  The girl said, “It’s hot.”

  The boy didn’t seem to hear her.

  Daria Gibron said, “It’s hot!”

  Belhadj said, “Wake up. You have a fever.”

  * * *

  Daria snapped awake. “Ash—?”

  The blue-and-white Volkswagen bus rounded a tight bend, eight kilometers out from Milan. “You were complaining about the heat.” Belhadj looked worried. “You’re sweating. You have a fever.”

  Daria’s fingers rose to her upper lip. She wasn’t bleeding. But her elbows and knees ached.

  “You’re not well. You—”

  “Get us there,” she interrupted, her eyes on the traffic.

  He drove, jaw set.

  “There’s something about Asher Sahar you’re not telling me.”

  Daria leaned back in the cracked plastic seat, skin glistening.

  “Were you lovers?”

  “No.”

  “You always call him Asher.” He drove, his mood deepening. “Are you siblings?”

  Daria turned to him. She mopped her forehead with the sleeve of the jean jacket. “Not by blood.”

  “Don’t be so damn cryptic!”

  A half-assed smile twitched to life on her lips, then guttered out.

  “We were orphans.”

  Belhadj drove in silence.

  “Another battle, another neighborhood destroyed. A … group of Israeli loyalists read the tea leaves and realized Israel would never know peace. So…” Her voice drifted away.

  “Daria?”

  “They collected orphans. Street urchins. Pickpockets, beggars, child prostitutes. The unwanted fruit of the tree of war. Asher was one. So was I. He was almost four years older. He p
rotected me.”

  “How old were you?”

  She shrugged. “Six? Eight? Something like that. I don’t know my real age. Nor my birthday.”

  “Why?”

  “To train us.”

  “To train children? I don’t understand. Are you saying…” Belhadj kept his eyes on the road. “Are you talking about the Group?”

  Daria was quiet.

  “My God. I thought they … you … were myth.”

  “Like the golem.”

  He didn’t know the reference and just shrugged.

  “Golems. Protectors turned monsters.” She wet her lips with her tongue. “You called them the Group. As good a name as any. Believe it or not, we never had a name for them. They were just … the club, I suppose. But only Asher and I called them that. They taught us to fight. To sabotage. To infiltrate. To murder. Then they found us foster homes in Israel and hid us among the farmers and merchants, where no one would look for us. They knew that someday, somewhere down the violent path of statehood, Israel would need its monsters.”

  They rode a few blocks in silence.

  Belhadj thought long and hard before speaking. He knew she would be either crushed or acknowledge the truth of his observation. “Israeli jihadists.”

  Daria didn’t move. After about a block, she reached out to Belhadj and tucked a disheveled lock of graying hair behind his ear. His voice carried such a wide array of emotions, although his face remained passive.

  “Killers,” she corrected or acknowledged. “Killers who could do the unthinkable, who could do terrible deeds. Deeds that politicians and conscripted soldiers could never be asked to do.”

  “Like kill a member of the Israeli Parliament and blame the Palestinians, to set up another holy war.”

  “Yes. Asher was just following his programming. I tried to stop him. You have to believe, I never wanted him dead, never wanted him imprisoned. Just stopped. It wasn’t even a bad plan. It could have worked.”

  “But you did stop him.”

  She didn’t reply.

  “Why didn’t you become like him?”