by Brad Thor
Two blocks later, the man turned left and a block after that, Harvath realized he had been given a gift. Leaning out a second-story window was a buxom woman with flaming red hair. She looked half the tobacconist’s age. Seductively, she blew him a kiss as he approached. Harvath had a pretty good feeling she wasn’t the man’s wife.
Slowing his pace, he removed his city map and pretended to study it as the tobacconist entered the building and disappeared. Ten minutes later, Harvath went in after him.
The locks were easy enough for him to pick, and once inside the small apartment, he quietly made his way toward the sounds of lovemaking from the bedroom.
He stood in the doorway for a moment waiting to be noticed, and then finally cleared his throat.
Looking over and seeing Harvath, the woman shrieked and clutched the sheet to her chin as she rolled off her partner, leaving the tobacconist completely naked.
Before he could find something to cover himself with, he saw Harvath’s pistol and his look of anger shifted to fear. He told the woman in Spanish to shut up. “Callate. Cierra la boca!”
The man gestured at the bedspread, asking if he could cover himself and the woman. Harvath nodded and said, “Go ahead. Slowly.”
“Englishman? American?” the tobacconist asked in heavily accented English.
Harvath ignored his question. “You don’t remember me?”
The tobacconist studied him for a moment. “No.”
“I bought some cigarettes from you over the summer.”
The man smiled. “Señor, I sell cigarettes to tourists all day long.”
“These were ETA cigarettes,” he said, referring to the Basque separatist organization. “I was told to ask for your Argos and Draco brand.”
Whether the man recognized the pass phrase or not, he couldn’t be quite sure, but there was an unmistakable microexpression that flashed across the man’s face. It was a subtle “tell” that Harvath had been taught to look for in the Secret Service. It indicated when a person was under duress because they were not telling the truth or intended to do harm.
“I don’t sell any ETA cigarettes and certainly none with that name. I think you have made a mistake.”
Harvath saw the tell again. “I don’t think so. I was told to see you and only you. When I asked for that brand, you sold me a pack of cigarettes. Inside was a car key and an address to a garage not far from here.”
The woman, who had been staring at Harvath, must have understood enough English to figure out what was being said as she turned to him and asked, “Eso cierto?”
The tobacconist ignored her and motioned with his head toward his cigarettes on the nightstand. Harvath nodded that it was okay.
He removed a cigarette from the pack, lit it up, and adjusted the pillows behind him with his elbow before sitting up and taking a deep drag. “I do favors sometimes.”
“I know you do. And now I need a favor.”
The man shrugged. “How can I possibly do you a favor?”
“After you sold me the cigarettes and I left your shop, two men followed me.”
“Two men? What two men?”
Harvath described the pair and their very distinct features.
The tobacconist’s eyes went wide. “It’s you.”
“So you do remember me.”
“Those men were very angry for what you did.”
“That’s not my problem,” replied Harvath. “Right now, you’re going to contact their boss for me.”
The tobacconist grimaced and drew in a deep breath. “He was not happy with what you did to the men.”
Harvath raised his weapon and pointed it at the man’s forehead. “There’s only one person’s happiness you should be concerned with at this moment and that’s the guy holding this gun.”
The tobacconist raised his hands in self-defense. “I don’t have contact with him. He calls me.”
Harvath noticed the wedding ring on the man’s hand. “Does your wife know where you are right now?”
“Ay, dios mio,” said the woman as she launched into a tirade about not wanting his wife to find out.
“Cierra la boca!” he ordered once more before turning to Harvath and saying, “As I told you, I do not know how to make contact. But there is someone else I know who can get a message to him.”
Harvath lowered his weapon. “Do either of you have a car?”
The man looked at his paramour, then back at Harvath, and nodded.
“Good,” Harvath replied. “Both of you get dressed. We’re going for a drive.”
CHAPTER 8
Parked alongside a narrow country road outside Bilbao, Harvath allowed his two guests to get out of the car. Removing the keys from the ignition, Harvath slid them into his pocket.
The tobacconist lit up another cigarette while his mistress spread a blanket on the grass. Before leaving her apartment, Harvath had suggested she bring along something to eat. The people they were waiting for wouldn’t be in any hurry to get here.
It was pretty basic fare as far as picnics were concerned, which was understandable considering the hasty circumstances in which it was thrown together. The woman had brought bread, cheese, a few apples, and some sausage. She had also brought a plastic bottle filled with homemade wine, which Harvath declined.
He had no idea what the tobacconist had said to her, but she had lost her apprehension and had even tried to smile at Harvath once or twice. He wasn’t in the mood and didn’t return the gesture.
His mind was on Riley and what had happened. The protocol he was following was correct, but it was maddeningly slow. He needed to make contact with Carlton. The Old Man would know immediately what their next move should be and he’d move heaven and earth to get to the bottom of the attack. Once he had all the puzzle pieces in place, he’d set Harvath loose to exact revenge.
A lot would have to happen between now and that moment, so he tried to think of something else. Unfortunately, he couldn’t get the image of Riley Turner out of his mind.
While he was lost in thought, the tobacconist noticed a car in the distance. “Eh,” the old man said, drawing Harvath’s attention to the vehicle.
Harvath recognized it right away and wondered who would be behind the wheel. He didn’t have to wonder long.
When the black Peugeot pulled up alongside them, Harvath saw the two Basque separatist operatives he had crossed paths with over the summer. They were both beefy men with thick necks. One had a sloping forehead and eyebrows as thick as Brillo pads. The other had a thin scar running down his right cheek.
Last summer, the men had been sent to make sure Harvath made it safely to a meeting deep in ETA territory. They weren’t supposed to be seen, but Harvath had picked up on them fifteen kilometers after leaving Bilbao. At a rest stop along the Autopista, he ambushed them and forced them to drive to a remote country road. After hog-tying the men, he dropped them in the trunk of the Peugeot and drove on to his meeting.
When they were cut loose and let out of the trunk in a tiny village called Ezkutatu, that was the last Harvath saw of them. Judging by the looks on their faces, they weren’t happy to see him again. He couldn’t care less. They were his ticket to where he needed to go.
Fishing the car keys out of his pocket, he tossed them to the tobacconist and walked over to the Peugeot. “Do I sit in back,” he asked Scarface, signaling with his hand, “or in the trunk?”
Neither of the men spoke English, but they understood when they were being insulted. They had little choice but to take it, since they had been told to go get Harvath and bring him back.
Eyebrows, who was driving, stared out the window and grunted in response. Harvath took that to mean that it was up to him and slid into the backseat, placing his pack next to him.
Closing the door, he leaned back and said, “Ready whenever you are, ladies.”
∗ ∗ ∗
The drive up and into the mountains was longer than he remembered. It was also quite beautiful. It reminded him of Switzerl
and. The only difference was stone buildings with red-tiled rooftops that took the place of chalets.
They passed oxen pulling wooden carts and meadows filled with sheep. Every once in a while, Harvath caught a glimpse of the stout, wild Pyrenean horses.
After winding their way through several towns and villages, they finally drove through Ezkutatu. Harvath remembered the squat buildings and the tall church steeple, all untouched by time. No sooner had they entered the village than they had already left it behind.
What followed next was a drive Harvath had only done once and in pitch-black night. He would have been hard pressed to do it again without some sort of guidance.
The road rose and fell, bent and switched back as it climbed higher into the mountains. Harvath could feel the pressure changing in his ears.
They drove farther still until they came upon a small gravel road bordered by high rock walls. Had Harvath been driving and blinked, he would have missed it.
They turned onto the road and about three hundred yards later came to a gate. Beyond it was a pasture filled with livestock being watched over by several Basque shepherd dogs. As the car came to a stop, two of the dogs ran toward the fence and began barking.
Two large men stepped from behind a formation of tall rocks and approached the car. Each was carrying what the Italians referred to as a lupara. Harvath was not familiar with the Basque word for the traditional, double-barreled shotgun that had been sawed off, with a rounded, pistol-style grip of checkered wood. The shortened barrels made it easier to conceal the weapon and also made it easier to handle in the woods and other close-quarters situations. Without any chokes in the cut-down barrels, the shotgun dispersed a wide pattern of shot that was particularly devastating at closer range.
One of the guards chatted with Eyebrows and Scarface, while the other silenced the dogs and swung the gate open wide enough for the vehicle to drive through. As the Peugeot rolled forward, Harvath saw the wooden guardhouse with its propane heater and additional manpower, all of them heavily armed and similarly attired in insulated down jackets and traditional black Basque berets.
Eyebrows and Scarface were the cousin and brother-in-law of the district ETA commander, and this was his ranch. But it wasn’t the district commander Harvath had come to see. It was another man, equally revered in the area, if not more so.
Eyebrows rolled to a stop in front of the stables and, grunting again, gestured with his chin toward the stairs. Harvath knew the drill.
Getting out of the car, he nodded at the two men and then watched as they drove off back toward the gate.
He stood for a moment and took in the view. The sun was dipping low on the horizon and the temperature, already considerably lower at this altitude, was beginning to drop. It was going to be a very cold night.
He climbed the stairs and opened the door to the small apartment above the stables. On the stove was the same traditional dish that had been left for him last time, Basque beans flavored with ham and chorizo. In the center of the kitchen atop an old wooden dining table there was a chipped glass and half a bottle of wine.
Though he’d spent less than four hours in the apartment last summer, the familiarity of it all helped to take the edge off of his tension. For the moment, he was safe.
Setting Riley’s backpack on the counter, he reached for the bottle and poured himself a glass of wine. The next step was going to be very dangerous. Before taking a sip, he offered up a silent prayer that the man he had come to see would be up to the task.
CHAPTER 9
TEXAS
There were very few people Nicholas would ever risk his life for, but Caroline Romero was one of them.
That didn’t mean, though, that he had thrown caution to the wind and gone rushing blindly to her aid. There were still precautions that he needed to take. First and foremost among them was selecting his base of operations.
Three Peaks Ranch spanned more than twenty thousand acres and belonged to a wealthy Texas family headed by Peter Knight. From cattle and aerospace to mining and biotechnology, Knight’s business interests spanned the globe, and Nicholas had facilitated multiple transactions for him over the years.
The ranch was the family’s primary retreat, maintained by a full-time staff. In addition to taking care of the Knights when they were in residence, the staff was expected to see to the needs of other guests who visited throughout the year. Before Nicholas showed up, they had had no idea what to expect. Mr. Knight had simply called and stated that a VIP guest was coming, that he’d be staying for an indeterminate length of time, and that the staff should see to any needs he had.
The man’s first request was waiting for him outside the guesthouse the next day: a black Yukon Denali that had been sourced from a leasing group in Brownsville catering to disabled drivers. It looked and functioned just like any other SUV, except that it also offered hand controls so that the driver could control the vehicle’s acceleration and breaking without touching the pedals. Per Nicholas’s instructions, the staff had tinted the windows and removed the rear seats in order to give the dogs as much room as possible.
Hopping into the front passenger seat with a Leatherman tool, he peeled back the headliner and snipped the wires that connected to the vehicle’s cell phone and onboard GPS/OnStar navigation system. After replacing the headliner, he then scoured the entire vehicle inside and out, making sure there were no other fleet management or tracking devices that might have been installed. It was a time-consuming exercise that required he get under the vehicle and use a step stool to poke around the engine compartment, but he had no intention of letting anyone follow his movements.
Once satisfied, Nicholas loaded the dogs inside and with the assistance of a booster seat he had brought along, took the Denali for a test drive to familiarize himself with the ranch.
The Knights had populated it with all sorts of wild and exotic game. If Nicholas hadn’t been awake for the entirety of his flight in, he could easily believe he’d been dropped onto a wildlife preserve in Africa. In the time it took him to drive across the game enclosure, he saw addax, oryx, kudu, impala, water buffalo, zebra, gazelle, and wildebeest. The dogs, their heads out the lowered windows, noticed them too.
Confident he could now handle the vehicle out on regularly trafficked roads, Nicholas eventually turned back to his guesthouse.
Sitting on the front steps was the Knights’ ranch manager, an attractive woman in her late thirties named Maggie Rose, who gave a friendly wave as Nicholas drove up.
Putting the car in park and turning off the ignition, Nicholas hopped out and then used the remote on the SUV’s key fob to open the rear tailgate and let his dogs jump down.
“How’s the truck working out?” she asked.
“It’s just fine, thank you,” he replied. Maggie had an easygoing way about her that he liked. Upon first seeing him, people often did a double take, but when she had met him at the plane last night to escort him to the guesthouse, she treated him just like any other guest. She had been professional, with just the right amount of Texas charm thrown in.
“I hope you don’t mind, but since you weren’t here I let myself in and put away the groceries you asked for.”
Nicholas did mind. He didn’t like the idea of anyone being in the guesthouse while he wasn’t there. Nevertheless, there wasn’t anything he could say. He was a guest, and he was sure she had done it only as a courtesy.
“Thank you,” he replied.
“You’re welcome,” said Maggie as she smiled at Argos and Draco. “I did a little research on your dogs last night. They’re an amazing breed.”
Nicholas smiled. “It’s the only type of dog I’ll ever own.”
“I bet they get expensive pretty quick in the eating department.”
“You can’t put a price on animals like these,” he said, patting each of them.
“May I?” asked Maggie as she approached.
Nicholas nodded and Maggie walked over to Argos and Draco. She held a hand o
ut to each of them to smell and then scratched them behind the ears. “You could probably make up half your food bill renting them out for pony rides at birthday parties.”
Nicholas smiled again.
Lowering her hands, Maggie took a step back. “If there’s anything else you need, just give me a buzz. My number is posted next to the phone in the kitchen.”
“I’ll do that,” he replied.
He watched her as she walked back to her truck and climbed inside. She honked the horn and gave him a wave and a warm smile as she drove off. Nicholas waved back.
Once she had gone, he mounted the stairs along with the dogs and let himself inside. The dogs needed to be fed, but he wanted to check his equipment first. While he didn’t have any reason to distrust Maggie, he didn’t have any reason to trust her either. She was a nice woman, but he’d had plenty of nice women try to slip knives between his ribs over the years.
He made his way to the master bedroom, where he looked the equipment over. All the cases were still locked and appeared to be just as he had left them.
Unpacking two of them, he set up his satellite uplink and connected his laptop. As everything was powering up and signals were being established, he fed and watered the dogs. By the time he was done, he was ready to go online.
Sitting at the dining room table, he navigated to the site Caroline Romero was using to communicate. He had left her a message alerting her that he had arrived in Texas. Now there was a message waiting for him in return. It read: Tonight. 8 pm. Casa De Palmas. McAllen. Parking garage. Top floor. Thank you for helping me.
Caroline’s previous appeal for help had contained such intimate information, things only the two of them could know, that he had no doubt that she was the author and that she was in very deep trouble.
Being the man he was, he wanted to rescue her immediately, sweep her into safety, but he needed to be careful. Telling her about the ranch and where he was staying was out of the question, at least for the moment. A lot of time had passed since they had last seen each other. A million things could have changed. Plus, he still had that twinge that something about this entire thing might not be right. Meeting in public was a much better option.
