4:06 P.M. Central Time
The mosque
Dearborn, Michigan
There was a thrill to being only inches away from one of the deadliest nerve agents known to man. A nervous, queasy thrill. Jamal al-Khalidi felt the beads of sweat trickling down his face and wished for a moment that he could wipe them away. The hazardous materials suit shrouding his body made that difficult.
Getting the HAZMAT suit hadn’t been much more difficult than any of the other equipment—with emergency services across the U.S. downsizing from lack of funding, he’d been able to pick one up online, the ad describing it as “gently used”. Americans and their semantics.
He picked up the rotary saw and consulted the schematics strewn over his lab tables one last time. The shell had been disarmed, the explosives rendered inert. The next step was to cut open the casing and extract the paper-thin metal container holding the powdered soman.
Jamal took a deep breath and moved to the table where the huge artillery shell lay, held in position by a pair of clamps.
What was it one of his classmates called it? The moment of truth. He took one final look around, assuring himself that everything was in place.
La illaha illa Allah, he breathed, whispering the essence of his creed. It might be the last time he said it in this life, before he repeated the words of praise and homage to Mounkir and Nakir. Muhammad rasul Allah…
A noise broke upon his reverie and his eyes flew open. Tarik Abdul Muhammad stood just within the formerly airtight door of the lab, arms folded easily across his chest. He was dressed in his street clothes.
“Ignore me,” he announced. “I am only here to observe.”
“B-but, shaikh,” Jamal stammered, “there is only one suit—if the saw pierces the metal containing the soman…it will be your death.”
The eyes of a prophet stared back at him. Calm, mesmerizing. Unrelenting. “Allah will guide your hands…”
6:13 P.M.
St. Louis, Missouri
The Mississippi. The Father of Waters, as it had once been called. It was a magnificent river. Korsakov dialed the number from memory, standing by the side of the Suburban.
“Are you sure?” he asked, turning back to Viktor. The boy nodded. They’d pulled off the road after his discovery, and now they stood in an alley overlooking the river.
Four rings and the phone picked up. “Yes?” a voice asked in clear, if accented, English.
“We have a problem,” Korsakov announced without greeting or preamble. They didn’t have time.
“I could tell that much from CNN.” There was sarcasm in the tones. “I brought you into this country because I trusted you to do the job, Sergei. Was my trust misplaced?”
The assassin took a deep breath. “Nyet. The contract will be finished as we agreed, but there is something you need to know.”
“And that would be?”
“As we speak, the target is within thirty miles of you. It is only safe to assume that the CIA officer is still with her. You may be in danger.”
A curse. “What do they know?”
Neither of them had the answer to that question. “Where are you now?”
Korsakov glanced over at Viktor. He could be signing their death warrant. “We’re in the city of St. Louis.”
“I will send my Gulfstream for you—be at the airport in five hours.”
“Spasiba bolshoi, tovarisch.” Thank you very much.
And it was done.
7:53 P.M. Eastern Time
The abandoned apartments
Clarksville, MD
It was the first target. He was sure of it. Short, stocky, his deep tan hinting at his Mediterranean background. There was a military bearing to his gait as he walked across the street in the pale glow of the streetlights.
Yuri adjusted the magnification ring, enhancing the zoom as his reticule centered on the man’s face, watching him exhale, steam billowing into the cold night.
Caruso paused at the door of the apartment complex, unsure whether to go on in or not. Marika’s contact was Agency. His favorite people.
As it turned out, he didn’t have long to wait. Altmann materialized out of the twilight, a heavy jacket shrouding her lithe figure, a Ravens baseball cap pulled low over her eyes. “What are you waiting for, Vic? An engraved invitation?”
“They’re inside. Are you in position?”
“Almost,” the man called Kalnins whispered, pulling himself onto the top of the concrete wall that ran around the back of the apartment complex. He dropped down on the other side, unslinging the Uzi from around his neck.
From his position he could cover the maintenance exit from the building, as well as the fire escape. With a smooth practiced motion, the Latvian extended the weapon’s folding sheetmetal stock, bracing it against his shoulder.
“Ready.”
Four flights of stairs—the two FBI agents took them quickly, with Marika in the lead.
“I feel naked without my sidearm,” she grumbled, turning for the final flight. Caruso suppressed a smile. That was the way it was when you’d been in the field as long as Altmann. Things like wearing a gun…a badge—they were more than second nature. They were a part of you.
It had been six years since her feet had last touched these steps. Not that long in the great scheme of things, but it felt like an eternity.
She’d needed his help back then as well, maybe one of the reasons nothing had ever happened between them. She didn’t like needing people.
At the door, Marika paused before knocking, as if checking the apartment number. She knew it by heart.
Footsteps at the knock, a moment’s pause and then the bolt slid back, the door opening by little more than a crack.
Carter’s face. “Come in, come in.” The analyst beckoned nervously and they both followed him into the apartment.
It was cleaner than she remembered—perhaps men actually learned something as they grew older. The thick venetian blinds were drawn, shutting out the night. “What are we looking at, Ron?”
“The Bureau has been compromised, Marika. At a very high level.” The quality of the laser mic’s audio was impressive, that much Yuri had to admit.
They needed to know how much had been uncovered. There were three targets in the apartment now—each of them glowing bright in the Barrett’s thermal imaging, piercing through the closed blinds. Three targets…and a cat.
“You were right,” the black man went on, his voice strained with tension. “The NRO spy sat was commandeered—by a legitimate FBI user account. Username: SunDancer1350. The account was created from scratch two weeks ago and given full access.”
“Full access?” It was the woman this time. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying this joker knew the brand of Haskel’s briefs. Everything. There wasn’t a place on the Bureau’s network that he couldn’t go.”
“Who could have set up an account like that?”
He’d heard everything he needed to know. Yuri’s finger curled around the Barrett’s match trigger, applying pressure…
In cold air, sound travels at an average rate of 1,085 feet per second. The 300-grain slug spat from the Barrett’s muzzle at almost three times that speed. It’s a truism: you never hear the shot that kills you.
Marika would never remember Carter’s answer to her question. She would never forget what happened next. Her first inkling of danger was when something warm and wet sprayed against the back of her neck.
She turned to see Caruso fall, a strangled cry escaping his lips, blood spraying from a ragged hole in his chest. Time itself seemed to slow down, the thunderous report of the shot striking their ears as her partner collapsed, his legs flailing against the faded linoleum of the kitchenette.
“Vic!” She screamed, pushing Carter down and out of the way as a second bullet ripped through the apartment. They fell together by the stove, flattening themselves against the floor.
A third shot came crashing through the window, spraying
fragments of glass everywhere. She started to move, but the analyst caught her by the arm. “Stay down!”
None of that mattered. Not now. She shook off his hand, crawling on her hands and knees across the bloodstained linoleum to where Vic lay. He was bleeding profusely, fading in and out of consciousness.
“Come on, Vic,” she whispered, cursing underneath her breath as she ripped off her jacket, pressing it against the wound in an attempt to staunch the flow. It was a futile gesture. “Stay with me, you coward.”
Taunting him, swearing, trying to provoke an angry response. Any response.
Nothing. His head lolled to one side, unseeing eyes staring across the floor. She bent over his lifeless form, his blood soaking her jeans, a helpless anger flowing through her body. “Vic!”
5:02 P.M. Pacific Time
Los Angeles, California
“You think he’ll come alone?” It seemed an innocent enough question, but Harry shook his head.
“Alexei? No, he’ll have back-up—minimum of two, maybe three—the bistro is only a quarter-mile from the consulate. He didn’t pick it for the view.”
Sammy absorbed the information quietly, glancing out the windows of the hotel room. Out to where the sun was setting over the city of angels. A crimson-red orb disappearing into the sea, bathing the waters in blood. “And you trust me enough to back your play?”
“Of course,” Harry replied, shooting a look of surprise at his old friend. It was a lie, but it came easily to his lips.
What made it worse was that Han knew it. The SEAL turned away, examining the fruit basket that had been delivered by the hotel.
Silence, and then the sound of water from the bathroom, a showerhead being turned on. Carol. Unfortunately their operations didn’t allow for a great deal of privacy. The room didn’t even have two beds, but a bedroll on the floor would do. “There in Kentucky, I killed a man for you, Harry. Not even a man, really. A kid. A kid with a gun. So don’t lie to me. You don’t trust me now any more than you did in Yemen. You’re not capable of it…”
8:06 P.M. Eastern Time
The abandoned apartments
Clarksville, MD
This wasn’t going according to plan. Yuri lifted his eyes from the scope, only too aware that only one of his targets was dead. They were running out of time, he realized, listening to the police chatter coming across the scanner on the table. People were streaming into the street as though the building was on fire and he could see several on their cell phones. He toggled his lip mike. “I can provide covering fire, Kalnins. Finish this.”
“We can’t stay here.” It was an obvious observation as yet another heavy rifle slug ripped through the apartment, but she made it anyway. “Do you own a gun?”
Carter put his head up long enough to look at her. “Blast it, Marika, I’m an analyst, not a freakin’ field officer. What do you think?”
It had been worth asking. She brushed a silver strand of hair out of her eyes, forcing herself to think, to concentrate. She was getting too old for this.
Vic! They’d both had their service weapons impounded after West Virginia, but Vic…
She crawled to where he lay on the floor, rolling him over on his stomach. His head struck the linoleum with a sickening thud and Marika cringed at the sound. There it was, a “baby Glock” tucked in a holster in the small of his back, a subcompact 10mm Glock 29.
She jerked it from its holster, laying on her back as she racked the slide to chamber a round.
“Do you have a plan?” This from Carter.
A shake of the head in the negative. “The shots should bring the local LEOs running, maybe even SWAT, if we get lucky.”
The thought hit her suddenly, fear seizing hold. “Ron, when they get here—your computer, it’s gonna be evidence.”
It took a moment for her words to strike home, but then the analyst’s face blanched. All the records, every last electronic vestige of his hack into the Bureau’s servers. Evidence…
Kalnins had been in the Spetsnaz for thirteen years before leaving Russia’s special forces for the more lucrative trade of the mercenary. One choice he’d never regretted. The Latvian took the stairs two at a time, the Uzi’s folding stock pressed into his shoulder as he bounded upward.
He half expected someone to come out of one of the apartments to stop him, perhaps one of America’s infamous private gun owners, but it didn’t happen. Everyone was either already in the street or hiding under their beds.
Home of the brave? A smile crossed the mercenary’s face as he reached the fourth floor, pausing outside his target’s door. Time to do this.
“How much longer?” Marika asked from her position behind the overturned kitchen table.
In the semi-darkness of the apartment, she could barely see Carter holding up three fingers as he lay underneath the computer desk. “Data corruption has already begun, but the electromagnet’s gonna need a few more minutes. Then we’ll—”
Whatever the analyst had been about to say was lost as the apartment’s door came flying inward, a burst of machine-gun fire tearing through the night. Bullets puncturing the drywall. Suppressive fire.
In the end, Maxwell saved their lives. As the shooter came through the door, the bobtailed cat leaped from the bookshelf where he had been cowering ever since the shooting started.
Kalnins turned reflexively at the movement, firing a burst into the empty shelf. It was a fatal distraction.
He saw the muzzle flash, down low, near the floor—heard the slug embed itself in the wall beside his head. Another flash, two blasts coming almost as one, and he recoiled backward, gasping in pain. His Level II tactical vest stopped both rounds, but it was like being hit in the ribs with a sledgehammer. The breath driven from his body.
He swayed, reaching back for the doorframe to support himself as he raised the Uzi in one hand, firing a wild burst. No targets.
The Latvian swore, gritting his teeth against the pain as he moved deeper into the apartment, the submachine gun against his shoulder. Every instinct of his mind screamed caution, but police sirens sounded in the distance.
He was running out of time. “Hold fire,” he ordered, keying his lip mike. The last thing he needed was to be shot by his own team.
Caution to the wind. He stepped into the kitchen, the barrel of the Uzi leading the way.
“Don’t shoot!” A man’s voice and Kalnins turned on heel, seeing the black man on his knees near the computer desk. His hands locked behind his head.
Perfect target…his brain never had time to finish processing the thought. Something cold and hard struck him in the back of the neck and he felt himself falling, the Uzi slipping from his fingers. Then everything went black.
Never leave your partner. It had been her life, the mantra of her training. Second nature.
A life that had now been turned upside down. Old rules now. There was no help for it. Marika pulled her gaze away from Vic’s corpse, looking over to where Carter knelt crouched by the desk.
Pull yourself together. Let the dead bury their dead.
She hit the Glock’s magazine release and slid the double-stack magazine out into her hand. Seven rounds left.
“On my signal—head for the door. Don’t stop till you reach the landing. Keep your head down.”
A nod. She took a deep breath, visualizing her target. Replaying the mental image of the muzzle flashes, the open window. Now!
“Go, go, go!”
She fell forward on one knee, the subcompact coming up in both hands. There. The window across the street—just as she had envisioned it. The Glock recoiled into her hand, the slide cycling. One, two shots.
Cover fire.
Next moment she was up and on her feet, moving toward the apartment door. She caught up with Carter on the landing.
No time to stop, no time for words. Her hand came down on the analyst’s shoulder, pushing him forward. On into the night…
No shot, no clear angle. Yuri swore, slamming his gloved hand
against the sandbagged firing rest. Just like that, his targets were gone.
Sirens jarred him from his trance. Focus. Think. He took a final look down the Barrett’s scope, picking out the heat signature of his partner, laying on the apartment’s floor.
He wasn’t dead.
The assassin made his decision in a trice. Forget loyalty. Forget honor—there was no such thing in this business. It was simply the practicality of the matter. You didn’t leave someone behind, someone who could talk. Be identified.
And his mission had changed. Recover Kalnins.
Chapter 14
12:03 A.M. Eastern Time, December 18th
Clarksville, Maryland
A chill breeze tugged at the flap of Kranemeyer’s trench coat as he pushed open the door of the Agency Suburban, stepping into the street.
Flying blind. He didn’t like that. Never had. Never would. Blind left you crippled—as he knew all too well. Approaching the line of police tape, he held up his CIA identification, transfixing the young Bureau agent there with a hard stare.
A moment, and then she waved him through. “Director’s in the building—top floor.”
It was Carter’s building, he knew that much. Didn’t explain getting a call in the middle of the night from the director of the FBI.
As it turned out, the FBI director was coming down as he made his way up. “What’s going on, Haskel?”
They weren’t on a first-name basis, at least as far as Kranemeyer was concerned.
“What isn’t, Barney?” The forty-four-year-old Haskel possessed all the easy familiarity of a skilled lawyer. Which he was. “Do you know a Ronald Jefferson Carter?”
The DCS never blinked. “Name sounds familiar. Is he in the movies?”
“Don’t give me that need-to-know crap, Barney,” Haskel exclaimed impatiently. The oiled façade slipping. “We know he works for the Agency, we know he works for you.”
“Then why waste my time with rhetorical questions?” He didn’t like being played with. “Get to the point.”
“The point is I’ve got an agent DOA upstairs and your man Carter is nowhere to be found.” The FBI head cleared his throat, continuing on down the stairs. Kranemeyer fell in step beside him. “Shell casings all over the apartment, at least two weapons—9mm and 10mm. Sniper in the abandoned complex across the street. Care to know what we found over there?”
Day of Reckoning (Shadow Warriors) Page 22
