by Brad Thor
CHAPTER 46
TEXAS
Mike Strieber had always enjoyed getting his hands dirty and being connected to the earth. He liked watching things grow and wanted his children to understand that food didn’t magically appear at the grocery store. In addition to all the other things he’d done in his life, he’d always wanted to give farming a try. So, after finding the right location, he had purchased his own farm.
Being a pilot with his own plane meant that he could fly from San Antonio to the farm whenever he wanted. It was his private refuge, and he chose not to talk about it much. It had great water and encompassed a couple hundred acres. There were horses for his wife, Angela, a pool for the kids, and of course a shooting range. Other than that, he hadn’t done much to the property. It wasn’t supposed to be a Four Seasons. It was supposed to represent a simpler time in his life.
The moment Harvath saw it he loved it. But it wasn’t because it was so remote. It was because of whom Mike had hired to work and run the farm.
The three young Marines were all veterans and each had seen combat in Afghanistan and Iraq. They were standing with Mrs. Strieber alongside a white Suburban and a blue Ford Super Duty pickup as Mike touched the aircraft down on the dirt strip and taxied over to them. Each had been wounded, but there was no self-pity in them at all.
When Harvath stepped out of the plane, Angela gave him a big hug. They hadn’t seen each other in almost two years. She was easily Mike’s better half, and Harvath reminded him of it every chance he got. She was younger, funnier, and much better looking. More importantly, she had a heart as big as Mike’s, if not bigger.
After finishing her hello, she turned and introduced Harvath to the three Marines—Matt, Jason, and Ryan; all from Texas. Matt had been shot behind his left ear by a sniper while on combat patrol near Ramadi, Iraq. Jason and Ryan had both been maimed in separate IED attacks in Helmand Province, Afghanistan. Jason lost his left arm and Ryan both legs beneath the knee. Even in civilian clothes, though, they still looked like Marines and stood proud and tall.
The men took turns shaking hands with Harvath, but their attention was immediately drawn to the other passengers coming out of the aircraft. One would have thought that three men working a farm in the middle of nowhere might have been captivated by an attractive young woman like Nina Jensen, but they appeared more preoccupied by Nicholas and his two enormous dogs.
Angela reached out, punched the nearest man in the shoulder as a lesson to the others, and with a smile asked, “Didn’t anyone ever teach you that it’s impolite to stare?”
“Sorry, ma’am,” the men said almost in unison.
Ever the hospitable Texas lady, Angela walked up to Nina, introduced herself, and then met Nicholas before he reached the bottom of the air stairs and extended her hand. “Welcome to Five Star Farm,” she said. “I’m Mike’s wife. Angela.”
He had no idea if she had done it intentionally or not, but he liked the fact that she had made her introduction before he had fully descended the stairway. In this fashion, she wasn’t looking down at him, nor was he looking up at her. They met practically eye to eye. “I’m Nicholas,” he replied, shaking her hand. “I’m pleased to meet you.”
“Did y’all have a good flight?”
“It was very comfortable, thank you. You have a lovely plane. I’ve never flown in a Pilatus before. It’s like a private jet inside.”
Angela Strieber placed her index finger against her lips and quickly shushed him. “We don’t use those two words around here.”
“Private jet? Why not?”
“Because I’d like him to retire some day. I can’t afford for him to catch the jet bug.”
Nicholas nodded knowingly. “You’re a smart woman. There are a lot of men out there who identify themselves by having the sleekest, most expensive thing on the tarmac. But from the little I’ve seen of your husband, I don’t think he’s that type.”
Mrs. Strieber winked at him and said, “No man is immune. Trust me.”
Nicholas smiled and stepped down. Joining Nina, he was introduced to the three vets, who then walked over and helped Harvath and Mike unload the plane and transfer everything into the Super Duty. Angela showed Nicholas and Nina to the Suburban, and once the dogs were inside, headed off to the ranch house, where they would all rally.
Mrs. Strieber already had a pot of coffee going and pointed people to the cabinet where the mugs were stashed as everyone filed into her kitchen. Nicholas and Nina saw to the dogs and then offered to help with breakfast, but Angela politely declined and encouraged them to sit down with the others at the kitchen table. With fresh biscuits in the oven, she set to work on bacon, sausage gravy, and fried eggs.
As the aromas of the country breakfast filled the room, Mike set his coffee cup down, took a seat, and called everyone to order. He and Harvath had held an in-depth discussion on the flight in, and the first order of business was operational security. Mike explained that there was to be no communication with the outside world until further notice. The vets were given a simple cover story to e-mail or text to friends and family explaining why they’d be off-line for the next few days. Once the messages had been sent, Mike respectfully asked the men to let him hang on to their phones. While he trusted them implicitly, they had no idea what they were up against. Harvath had explained it to him on the flight in, and frankly it scared the hell out of him. Better safe than sorry.
He also requested that they retrieve their laptops from the bunkhouse and drop them off after breakfast. None of the men argued. They understood operational security. For all intents and purposes, Mike was their commanding officer. They would do as he asked. Harvath could tell by looking at them that they found the possibility of impending danger more than a little exciting.
Once the operational security details had been hashed out, Mike assigned guard shifts. Angela was given one, as was his son, who was driving up from San Antonio. The younger daughter could pull a trigger, but she was too young to stand guard by herself. Mike and Angela’s elder daughter could have held her own, but she was still away at school.
Though Nicholas admirably volunteered, Harvath told him he wanted him to continue to focus on Caroline’s flash drive and anything else he could draw from it. As for Nina, she didn’t have much experience with firearms and therefore didn’t qualify. Angela Strieber told her not to worry. There’d be plenty for her to do.
Mike then explained that he would be flying Harvath to another location and would step into the shift rotation as soon as he got back.
Mrs. Strieber laid out breakfast and the group ate heartily. When it was over, she got Nina and Nicholas installed in the house, while the vets went to work on shoring up the perimeter and Mike led Harvath to one of his pole barns.
Bolted to the concrete pad inside was an Armag Arms Vault. It looked like a shipping container made of high-grade steel that had been painted desert tan. Mike removed a set of keys from his pocket, unlocked the door, and turned on the lights, revealing a mini armory.
Weapon racks held an array of long guns, pistols, sub guns, and Taser devices. There were suppressors, a host of weapons optics, knives, binoculars, radios, helmets, plate carriers, tactical vests, and of course Strieber flashlights. Stacked in ammo cans were hundreds of thousands of rounds in varying calibers.
Harvath took it all in and then looked at his friend. “What? No RPGs?”
Mike shook his head. “Just like a SEAL. All you ever want to do is blow shit up.”
While that was true for some, Harvath was of the school that each specific job required a specific tool. The only problem was that you often didn’t know what the perfect tool was until you were in the thick of it, and by then it was too late to go back and get what you needed. The key was choosing something that worked well in as many situations as possible.
“You haven’t seen this yet,” Mike said as he waved Harvath into the vault. “I just bought it.”
He picked up a large briefcase and laid it on the armorer’s table. �
��This is the new takedown rifle from LaRue Tactical,” he said as he opened it up. Packed neatly inside were the component pieces of one of LaRue’s high-end long guns. “Watch this.”
Harvath watched as Mike rapidly assembled the rifle, spun on a high-end suppressor, and mounted a large scope in less than sixty seconds.
“It doesn’t have to be rezeroed. You just put it together and it’ll drive a tack at over seven hundred yards. Ain’t that something?”
“What caliber is it? .308?” Harvath asked.
Strieber nodded. “And it breaks down just as quick. It allows you to get in, get it on, and get the hell out before anyone knows you’ve been there.”
It was something indeed. “Can I borrow that?”
Strieber waved his arm and gestured at the entire vault. “You can take whatever you want.”
Harvath wanted to take one of everything, but he couldn’t. He’d have to choose carefully. He was going into very hostile territory alone. There’d be no resupply, support, no nothing. The last thing he needed was to look back and wish he had chosen one piece of equipment over another. But no matter how carefully he planned, he knew that Mr. Murphy, of Murphy’s Law, was always destined to show up. The only thing you could count on when planning an op was to expect the unexpected.
Harvath let his operating environment be his guide. He chose equipment that was easily concealable and that he was the most familiar with. Laying everything he wanted on the armorer’s table, he then returned half to the racks, packed the rest of it into his Camelbak, along with lots of extra ammunition.
“That’s all you want?” said Strieber. “You’re sure? I can probably scare up a bigger ruck for you.”
He shook his head. “I’m good.”
“Okay, then. I’ll lock up here and get the plane fueled and ready. Angela or one of the guys can drive you out to the strip. How about we say forty-five minutes?”
“Thanks, Mike. I’ll see you out there,” replied Harvath as he picked up the briefcase with the takedown rifle in it and shouldered his pack.
Back at the farmhouse, he took a few minutes to strategize with Nicholas and debrief. He wanted to check the dating site for any word from the Old Man, but he didn’t dare, not from the Strieber’s farm. Nicholas agreed. They both suspected that Skype was how Harvath had been pinpointed in Spain. While Nicholas believed that ATS had gotten the Skype account through covert means, Harvath had a deeper fear.
His fear was that someone had grabbed Reed Carlton and had tortured all of the communication protocols out of him. That person or persons could be sitting on the dating site right now just waiting for him to show up. Which brought him to how a kill team had been able to find Three Peaks Ranch.
Nicholas had been very careful in his use of the Internet while there, but ATS was so sophisticated, there simply was no telling how they’d been discovered. They needed to assume that anything they did over the Net could and would expose them. They agreed that Nicholas would continue to study Caroline’s flash drive and all its data off-line, but that anything beyond that was off-limits, including Strieber’s landline phone. Nina and Nicholas had to completely cut themselves off from the outside world. Any contact, and even then only in an emergency, would be done through Mike.
“It’s been a long time since I felt this powerless,” Nicholas confided in his friend.
“You’re not powerless,” Harvath replied. “You’re going to stay on Caroline’s data. We need to know what these people are planning so we can stop it. The answer has got to be on that drive somewhere. Find it.”
He pointed at Nicholas’s tiny .45 and added, “Keep that loaded, keep it with you, and keep your head on a swivel. Got it?”
The little man smiled. “Got it.”
They didn’t say anything else to each other. Instead, Nicholas stepped forward and did something he had never done before. He motioned for Harvath to bend down, and then he gave him a hug. He had an awful feeling he was never going to see his friend again.
CHAPTER 47
NORTH CAROLINA
Flying into North Carolina was going to end up being either a very good or a very bad idea.
When Mike came in to see customers at Fort Bragg, he always landed at the Moore County Airport. The people there were friendly, the staff didn’t ask a lot of questions, and there was no tower. It was the perfect general aviation setup to have resting in the shadow of America’s primary counterterrorist unit.
The First Special Forces Operational Detachment—Delta, also known as Delta Force, Combat Applications Group (CAG), or simply the Unit to its members, was headquartered in a remote section of Bragg behind high security fences and rows upon rows of razor wire. There, “behind the fence,” as people referred to it, no expense was spared on training the world’s most elite warriors.
These operators excelled in a wide array of clandestine operations including hostage rescue, counterterrorism, and counterinsurgency, as well as strikes inside hostile, off-limits, or politically sensitive areas. It was because of these operators that Harvath worried that coming to North Carolina could end up being a deadly idea. If Colonel Chuck Bremmer was tasking active military personnel for his kill teams, they might have something to do with the Unit.
But there was something else about the Unit, which was why Harvath had decided to risk the trip. Never content to rest upon its laurels, and always exploring new ways to make itself better, deadlier, and more efficient, several years ago Delta had asked one of its most aggressive and forward thinking questions—Why not train and field female operatives?
It was an exceedingly good idea. Women attracted less attention in the field than men, and when they did, it was often of a completely different kind. They were welcomed in places men were not and could get away with things men could never dream of. A female operative who was prepared to kick in your door and shoot you in the head, or cuff you and stuff you in a trunk, was the last thing most of the bad guys ever expected.
With the approval of the Army’s Special Operations Command, under which Delta was chartered, a group of operatives agreed to become recruiters for the all-female team they were creating, the Athena Project.
The scouts were searching for intelligent, self-confident, polished women who could blend in and disappear into foreign cultures. They needed to be athletic and highly competitive. They needed to hate to lose, be mentally tough, and determined to win at all costs. Success needed to be part of their DNA. They also needed to be attractive.
People react to others differently based on how they look. If the female operatives were attractive, there was no end to what they could achieve. Men did things they shouldn’t do just to be near them, extending opportunities and even information that would never be offered to their male counterparts. In essence, the majority of men could often be counted on to underestimate and act stupidly around attractive women.
The Delta recruiters haunted high-end female athletic events, searching for potential candidates at triathlons, winter and summer X Games, universities, and U.S. Olympic training facilities. They also utilized a myriad of front companies. It was one of those very fronts that Harvath was there to visit.
After arranging to have the plane refueled, Mike Strieber borrowed the FBO’s courtesy car, a white Chevy Astro van, and he and Harvath drove into town.
“Pretty long way to fly for a manicure,” said Mike as Harvath removed the SIG-Sauer from the concealment pocket in his Camelbak and tucked it into the back of his jeans. “Angela’s never going to let me hear the end of this one.”
Harvath had decided on the detour about a half hour into their flight, and Mike had rerouted. He had no way to know if Riley Turner had been a target in Paris or if she’d simply been collateral damage in a hit focused solely on him. While the operators in the Athena Project had worked on assignments with the Carlton Group, they weren’t the Old Man’s employees. They were simply tasked to him on an as-needed basis. Their group was so classified Harvath didn’t have any contact i
nformation for any of them beyond e-mail addresses, which were locked away on his laptop in Virginia. This meant that he not only couldn’t let them know what had happened to Riley, but he also couldn’t warn them that they might be on the Black List as well.
The nail salon was in a strip mall not far from the center of Fayetteville. Owned by the wife of a retired Unit member, it was one of the first fronts Delta and the Athena Project started using when they began to broaden their search outside the ranks of the military. Not only did promising local candidates pass through the salon, it also gave the program a trusted location when it needed to quietly transact its affairs off-base. No one ever gave any of the women entering or leaving the salon a second thought. Even better, it was open seven days a week.
Harvath showed Strieber where to park and told him what to keep his eyes peeled for. Pulling one of Mike’s baseball caps down over his forehead, he climbed out of the van, crossed the lot, and walked into the salon.
The place was packed. All of the stations were full, as were all the chairs in the waiting area. Dan McGreevy and his wife looked to be doing very well.
“Hi. Do you have an appointment?” the cashier asked.
“Actually, I’m here to see Dan. Is he in?”
The girl picked up the phone and pressed a button for an extension. “Whom should I say is here?”
“Tell him a mutual friend from overseas suggested I pop in and see him when I got to town.”
The young lady seemed to know enough about what McGreevy did or had done in his past to be satisfied with that response. It wasn’t unusual for operators to suggest to other operators to look up a friend if they ever made it to their town. Harvath probably wasn’t the first person to have ever dropped in at the salon and to have floated a cryptic introduction to the receptionist.
Though he couldn’t see them, he knew the shop would have security cameras, and he did his best to make sure none of them were picking up on his face. He turned his back to the young lady and leaning against the counter, pretended to be looking out the plate-glass window of the waiting area.
