Near Dark

by Brad Thor

  “Roger that,” said Harvath. “I see it. Our guest of honor has just pulled in, or a drug deal is getting ready to go down.”

  Moments later, another car pulled up, parked alongside, and it did actually look, via the drone, like a drug deal.

  When the cars departed a minute later, they were back to waiting for the Contessa.

  Then, Harvath noticed something. “Inbound. Lone figure. Northwest gate.”

  This time, things looked a bit more promising. While the Contessa could have driven to the park, it was within walking distance of her villa. That wasn’t enough to determine if it was her, but it was a start.

  The figure strode down the park path, not too fast, not too slow, and headed toward the dock.

  “This is her,” Harvath said, convinced.

  “Roger that,” Sølvi replied. “Any tail-gunners?” she asked, using a term sometimes applied to criminal accomplices who lagged behind, out of sight, waiting to strike if a job went south.

  “Negative,” said Harvath. “I don’t see anyone. It appears she’s on her own.”

  “What do you want me to do?”

  “Wait until she’s at the end of the dock and gives you the signal. Then you can come in.”

  “Roger that,” Sølvi said. “Standing by.”

  The figure walked down to the end of the dock, pulled out her cell phone, and turned the flashlight feature on and off three times.

  Harvath didn’t need to say anything. This was the part where Sølvi took over. Starting up the engines, she put the Riva in gear and headed in toward the shore.

  As she piloted the craft, she did everything via the night vision goggles, never activating the running lights, thereby denying an advantage to any ambush that might lie in wait.

  Pulling into the shore, there was enough ambient light that her night vision goggles were no longer necessary. She peeled them off and tucked them into the compartment next to her as she blinked her eyes, adjusting to the new situation.

  It took only a moment to see the lone figure at the end of the dock. Sølvi agreed with Harvath that this was most likely her, but until she had full confirmation, she wasn’t going to relax.

  They were operating off an old Italian Intelligence photo of Tatiana Montecalvo, from when she had worked at the Russian embassy in Rome. It had to have been twenty years old—if not older. There was no telling how much she had changed in the meantime, nor how much plastic surgery she may have had done.

  As Sølvi got closer to the pier, she could see that the woman had had a little work done, but nothing so dramatic that she was unrecognizable. She was older, a bit softer, and appeared more tired, but she was still Tatiana Montecalvo. This was their target.

  Sølvi swung the boat in and sidled it up against the pier the same way she had with Harvath earlier in the day. That was when the Contessa pulled her gun.

  “Shut the engines down,” she ordered, pointing a Beretta pistol at Sølvi.

  The NIS operative did as she had been commanded. Turning off the engines, she raised her hands.

  “Open the door to the cabin and turn on the lights down there,” the Contessa ordered, waving her Beretta.

  Once more, Sølvi did as she was instructed. Then, with the lights on and the door open, she stepped to the side so Montecalvo could take a look for herself.

  “It’s just me,” said the Norwegian. “Nobody else.”

  Withdrawing a powerful pocket flashlight, the Contessa flashed a burst of its high-intensity light into Sølvi’s face, ruining her sight and temporarily causing her to see spots.

  Tightening her grip on the weapon, Montecalvo demanded, “On your stomach. Now.”

  The Norwegian didn’t like taking orders from this woman, but she did as she had been told.

  As she lay facedown, the Contessa climbed aboard. She wanted to make sure the boat was safe before she got down to business. That meant making sure no one was hiding in back, or up front in the cabin.

  She took a moment to pat Sølvi down and check the seat pockets, cushions, and various cubbies. Confident as she could be that the woman wasn’t carrying a weapon, nor had one too close at hand, she backed away toward the cabin.

  There were three steps leading down into the luxurious below-deck space. The Contessa took them slowly, shifting her eyes back and forth from the cabin to the woman who was facedown outside.

  She checked the galley, the bathroom, and the sleeping area—none of which revealed any stowaways.

  Satisfied, she started up the stairs and told Sølvi to get up. As she stepped through the hatchway, about to explain that they could get under way, or discuss their business right there, she noticed water on the deck. Someone had gotten on the boat.

  But before she could raise her pistol, Harvath pressed his Sig Sauer against the side of her head and told her to drop it. She complied.

  “The flashlight too,” he ordered.

  Again, she did as he told her.

  Sølvi picked up the Beretta, released the magazine, ejected the round from the chamber and tossed all of it into the lake.

  Then retrieving her own weapon, she kept the Contessa covered while Harvath—who had been floating under the dock and had crept up onto the boat via its swim platform—went back for his gear.

  Everything was in a drybag stashed under the dock. He had been watching the drone footage through a waterproof phone pouch he had purchased, along with the drybag and a swimsuit, in town.

  Climbing back aboard the boat, he used his last set of restraints to zip-tie the Contessa’s hands behind her back. After a quick trip to the cabin to towel off and get dressed, he nodded to Sølvi that he was ready to go.

  Firing up the engines, she pushed the throttles forward and plotted a course for the center of the lake. All the while, Harvath kept an eye on the Contessa.

  Once they were far enough out, Sølvi put the engines in neutral and let the boat drift. Overhead, the drone was keeping watch. There were several other craft out and about, but nothing particularly close. As a result, they decided to keep their running lights off.

  Harvath looked at the Contessa. “Do you know who I am?”

  The woman nodded.

  “Then you know why I’m here.”

  “I know that someone really wants you dead, but I’m guessing that you don’t know who it is. That’s why you’re here. You’re hoping to extract information that can help you, which means you’ll be playing bad cop.” Then, looking at Sølvi, she said, “And that makes you the—”

  “Worse cop,” the Norwegian intelligence operative responded, cutting her off. “Let me explain how this is going to go. I’m not a fan of waterboarding or pulling out fingernails. I prefer a much more direct route.

  “I am going to ask you a series of questions. If you lie to me, I will shoot you in very painful, very specific parts of your body. If I even think you are lying, I will shoot you. If you hesitate, I will conclude that you’re about to lie, and I will shoot you. Have I made myself clear?”

  The Contessa had no idea how serious the threat was, but nodded, erring on the side of caution. “Is that what happened to Kovalyov?” she asked. “Did you shoot him? Is he dead?”

  Sølvi shook her head. “I shot his boss, repeatedly. Kovalyov was next. He decided to cooperate. We made a deal. And we’d like to make a deal with you. If you agree to—”

  “Not interested,” the Contessa broke in.

  “Either way, we are going to get the information we want out of you. You are choosing to make this much harder than it has to be.”

  “Go to hell,” the woman sneered.

  “You don’t even want to hear the offer?”

  “Not from you I don’t.”

  “Well, how about from him?” Harvath asked as he activated a video call on his app and held out his phone so she could see it.

  When the call connected, on the other side was Nicholas.

  The Contessa was already testy and angry, but once she recognized who it was, she became d
ownright aggressive.

  She let loose with a string of expletives in Russian, only a handful of which Harvath knew. The woman was so pissed off and spat words so fast at his phone that he couldn’t keep up.

  Nicholas, calm at the outset, also lost his cool—something Harvath had rarely ever seen. There was a lot of bad blood between these two. Buckets of it.

  The arguing, threats, and name-calling continued at a furious pace. Back and forth they went, their faces flushed, the veins in their necks bulging.

  It took quite some time, but eventually the Contessa’s outbursts began to slow, and she dialed back her tone. Nicholas also applied some self-restraint and became more measured. It wasn’t détente, but the temperature was definitely being turned down. They were now entering the critical phase of Harvath’s plan.

  Nicholas had been resistant at first. The Contessa had started this. She had been first to try to stick a knife in his back. He had simply dodged the blade and had inserted his own between her figurative shoulders. Theirs was a cutthroat business. The purchase and sale of black-market intelligence was incredibly dangerous. If you tried to take out a competitor and failed, you needed to be prepared for the consequences.

  Nicholas, though, had largely left that world behind. He did still dabble, keeping his skills sharp and preying upon the most unscrupulous in their industry. But basically, he had retired. And while he despised Tatiana Montecalvo, Harvath was family and had asked him for a favor. A big one.

  They continued to speak in Russian, taking long pauses as each pondered what the other had said. There were a couple of flare-ups, but nothing close to what had transpired at the outset of the call.

  After a little while longer, the Contessa looked at Harvath and said, “We’re done. He wants to talk to you.”

  Turning the phone around, he inserted an earbud and walked to the swim platform, leaving Sølvi to keep an eye on their prisoner.

  “My God,” said Nicholas. “I hate that woman. Completely and totally. She is unintelligent, uncivilized, vindictive, and avaricious.”

  Harvath didn’t need to hear what Nicholas was going to say next. He already knew. It had worked.

  CHAPTER 42

  Returning to the dock, Harvath put out the bumpers and tied off the Riva. He then brought his drone in for a landing and packed everything up. Once they were ready, he and Sølvi unloaded the Contessa from the boat.

  Nicholas had warned them not to take their eyes off her, and they were heeding his advice. They had absolutely no reason to trust her. In fact, if anything, they had plenty of reasons to believe she might attempt to double-cross them.

  With Harvath hanging on to their prisoner, Sølvi retrieved the Jeep and drove down to the dock. After he and the Contessa climbed in, it was a quick drive to her villa.

  They parked out on the street, fully aware that they were in plain view of her security cameras and were being recorded. Harvath dropped his head so as not to reveal his face.

  “Don’t worry,” she offered. “I’ll erase all the footage once we get inside.”

  He’d have to see it to believe it. For the moment, he simply nodded as he took her arm and led her forward. A sweater had been draped over her hands secured behind her back so as not to reveal the restraints.

  Sølvi hung back a couple of feet, watching their six. She had her weapon drawn, but concealed—ready to engage if need be, but out of sight so as not to rouse any suspicion from any neighbors or passersby.

  Pulling the keys from the Contessa’s pocket, Harvath unlocked the heavy oak doors facing the street and they all stepped into a Moorish-style paved courtyard flanked by arched arcades and a splashing fountain in the center. From the second story, flower boxes overflowed with bright purple hibiscus and electric pink gardenias. Their scent filled the space. Nearby, an alarm panel had started beeping.

  The Contessa directed Harvath to it. Then, indicating that she wanted to be cut loose, said, “I need to enter the code.”

  “I’ll enter it,” he replied. Adding, “Don’t worry. You can change it after we’re gone.”

  She gave him the sequence of numbers.

  Before he plugged them in, he warned her that he had people watching for a response from her alarm company. If this was not a code that legitimately disarmed the alarm, but rather turned the alarm off while simultaneously sending a distress signal, there’d be hell to pay.

  He searched her face, looking for any sign of a tell as the beeping increased in intensity.

  “Is the code safe?” he demanded.

  “You’re running out of time. Yes,” she replied. “It’s safe.”

  He didn’t see anything that suggested she was lying, but to be absolutely sure, he would have needed more time—something he was all but out of.

  He decided to punch in the code. Instantly, the beeping stopped.

  “We’re in,” he said, over his earbud to Nicholas. “No dogs. No guards. Nothing so far.”

  Once his colleague had acknowledged the transmission, Harvath had everyone stop while he pulled out the drone and launched it from the courtyard. This way, if and when trouble did show up, they’d have eyes on it.

  Harvath relocked the oak doors and the Contessa directed her “guests” across the courtyard to an Arabesque entryway which gave way to the main portion of the villa. At a set of tall glass doors that looked to be hundreds of years old, Harvath found the corresponding key on her ring and opened them.

  Entering the house, the woman nodded toward another alarm panel that was beeping. “Same code, but backwards,” she said.

  Harvath entered the digits and as the panel fell silent, he took a look at the place. Nicholas obviously had his reasons for disliking her, but it certainly couldn’t have been because she lacked taste. Her home was quite stylish.

  The décor looked like a cross between Casablanca and Lawrence of Arabia. There were low-slung couches covered with pillows in an array of colors and fronted by ornate, hand-carved, antique tables. Sheer white muslin draperies were offset by potted palms. Large lanterns made of hammered metal hung at different heights from the ceiling. Somewhere, deeper in the villa, came the sound of another fountain.

  “My office is that way,” said the Contessa, pointing with her chin down a long hallway to the right.

  “In a minute,” said Harvath, as he unslung his pack and transitioned to his short-barrel rifle. “I’m going to take a look around first.”

  Montecalvo looked like she was about to say something, but Sølvi cut her off. Gesturing with her pistol to a nearby chair, she said, “Take a seat.” After which, she looked at Harvath and added, “Keep your eyes peeled for ninjas.”

  “Try not to shoot her while I’m gone,” he quipped back before turning and disappearing down the hall.

  The house, with all of its closets, nooks, crannies, and other potential hiding places, felt like it took forever to clear. Finally, after checking out the cellar, he returned to his Norwegian counterpart and gave her the all clear.

  “Now we can go to your office,” said Sølvi, gesturing with her pistol again.

  The Contessa stood up and led the way. Sølvi followed her and Harvath brought up the rear, constantly checking their six.

  He had already been inside the woman’s office and had swept it for weapons and other potential hazards. There had been another Beretta, like the one she had brought to the boat, mounted under her desk, as well as a “baby” Glock 26 in a lower drawer.

  On the off chance he had missed anything, he had rearranged her computer monitor, as well as her wireless mouse and keyboard, so that she’d have to work from the other side of the desk. If she had been contemplating something stupid, it would be a lot harder now.

  Dragging over a side chair, he set it in front of the desk and told her to sit down. He then handed Sølvi his rifle and had her watch the hallway while he cut the Contessa loose and relayed to Nicholas that they were ready to go.

  Back in the United States, the little man prepared to re
turn to Montecalvo her most prized piece of intelligence—one of the gems that he had stolen from her.

  Though Nicholas could have sold it for a fortune, he had kept it as an insurance policy. It was pure blackmail gold; an explosive Get Out of Jail Free card implicating some very powerful people in a serious scandal.

  And while it had been worth more to him sitting in his digital vault than he ever could have cashed it in for, he owed Harvath his life. It was time to play this card.

  To facilitate the exchange, they set up a virtual meeting on the Dark Web. There, they traded files and took time to authenticate what each had been sent.

  Each file contained a fail-safe; a sort of digital self-destruct feature. Only when both had agreed that the deal was satisfactory, could they exit the meeting with what the other party had given them.

  In exchange for the return of the prized piece of intelligence Nicholas had stolen from her, the Contessa had handed over what Harvath and Sølvi wanted—the file on the person who had purchased the information about Carl and Harvath. That was who they were looking for. That was their assassin. Harvath was certain of it.

  “What she sent looks good,” Nicholas said. “It will take me a little time to run it all down, but it appears authentic.”

  “Are you happy with what you received?” Harvath asked the Contessa.

  “Yes,” the woman replied.

  “Okay, we’re good on this end too,” he stated over his earbud.

  The next part of the puzzle, though, introduced a new problem—how to make sure that after they left, the Contessa didn’t tip off her client.

  Allegedly, she didn’t even know who the client was. She had never met him and the encrypted means of communication he used were constantly changing. Normally, he contacted her when he wanted something. That was what he had done in regard to Harvath. In return, she had put the blanket word out to her “collectors” that she was looking for anything they had on the American. Kovalyov, it turned out, had something very valuable. And he had been paid well for that information, in no small part because she had been paid extremely well.

  With each client, she had developed a unique follow-up protocol—a way she could alert them if anything else bubbled up that she thought they might find interesting. Because clients burned even encrypted email addresses after each transaction, she needed another way to ping them.