Code of Conduct

by Brad Thor

  The danger and instability of the region were just two of the many problems Harvath saw with this situation. There was also a host of unanswered questions. No one even knew who had sent the video to CARE and worse still, no one could explain why the gunmen entering the clinic had been wearing biohazard suits.

  According to Beaman, Matumaini was a small family medicine clinic. They didn’t treat highly communicable illnesses. They didn’t have the capacity. The furthest they went was performing minor surgeries. If something exotic or unusual walked in their door, they knew to call for help.

  But as far as Beaman, or anyone at CARE knew, no such call had gone out.

  Harvath didn’t like it any of it. He hated loose ends. There were too many things stacked one upon another that didn’t make sense.

  Beaman was also running out of time. The longer it took to get a team over to Congo, the colder the trail would become. If something wasn’t done soon, they might never know what happened and who was responsible.

  Once again, a rush of unpleasant images moved across the screen of his mind’s eye. The scenes of families were the hardest to stomach. He had witnessed what monsters could do. He knew what monsters continued to do when not stopped. In this case, the monsters embodied an amplified evil. They had preyed not only on the sick and infirm, but also upon those who had helped to care for them.

  His mind then drifted to his trip to New England, but only as an afterthought. He had already decided what he was going to do. What he told himself he had to do. The Carlton Group didn’t have anyone else who could take on this kind of assignment with so little advance warning.

  If he didn’t agree to take charge, it wouldn’t get done. The State Department had passed, and Beaman was right, the FBI and CIA weren’t going to help him either. Harvath was CARE’s only hope.

  It would be an absolute ballbuster of an assignment, and he would have to figure out a lot of it on the fly, but he knew he could do it. Just like he knew he could convince Lara that he had no choice but to postpone their trip to New England. He would find leaves for her someplace else, someplace even better. It would all work out.

  And with his decision made, he had jumped in with both feet. Logistics, equipment, funds, support . . . it was chaos, but he relished the challenge because chaos was the arena in which he excelled. The Old Man had left him with one final directive. “Get in and get the hell out as fast as you can.”

  Within twenty-four hours, he was on the ground in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Twelve hours later, he had assembled his team and they were on their way north to the Matumaini Clinic.

  Exiting out of the video player, he took another look at his text message screen before returning the phone to his pocket and powering down the tiny Iridium cube he used to access the satellite network. He had texted Lara when he had touched down to let her know that he had arrived safely. She had not responded and Harvath tried to put it out of his mind. He needed to get his head in the game.

  If everything went according to plan, they would be in and out. At least that’s what he had told himself. He had also told himself that he’d be able to sway Lara about cancelling, or as he had put it, rescheduling their trip. That had not gone over well with her at all.

  But Scot Harvath had a bad habit of telling himself things he knew weren’t true.

  CHAPTER 2

  * * *

  Harvath’s security team was made up of four Brits—all former SAS members. They had been with a private contracting company in Kenya called Ridgeback. There was too much money and too much action in Congo, though, so they left to form their own venture.

  They called their four-man company Extremis. Harvath had never met any of them before, but they had come highly recommended. He had linked up with Patrick Asher and Mike Michaelson in Lubumbashi, where they loaded their gear onto the plane CARE had arranged for them.

  Asher, or “Ash” as his men referred to him, was the team leader. He was in his early forties and reminded Harvath in a way of the Old Man. He was cordial, but all business. No jokes, no small talk, just straight to the point. His graying hair and dark eyes gave him an added air of intensity.

  Michaelson, on the other hand, was different. Known by his teammates as “Mick,” he was a short, muscular man in his thirties with a shaved head, and a neck like a tree trunk. Everything amused him. Within the first ten minutes of their having met, he had slapped Harvath on the back at least three times.

  After loading their equipment, they flew north to Bunia, the provincial capital of Ituri. Waiting for them, were the other two members of the team, Simon Bruce and Evan “Eddie” Edwards.

  On the flight up, Mick had referred to Simon and Eddie as the “Brute Squad.” Meeting them, Harvath understood why.

  They were large men, both in their thirties, well over six feet tall and half a block wide. Unlike their clean-shaven compatriots from Lubumbashi, they sported facial hair. But not just any kind of facial hair.

  Simon had the biggest, reddest beard Harvath had ever seen. He looked like a lumberjack on steroids. Eddie sported a meticulous, jet-black Van Dyke that made him look like he had just stepped out of a Captain Morgan ad. Congo was already living up to its Wild, Wild West reputation.

  Accompanying Simon and Eddie was their fixer, a skinny, young Congolese man they had nicknamed “Jambo,” which meant hello in Swahili. Because his real name was practically impossible for anyone to pronounce and because of the manic enthusiasm with which he greeted people, the Jambo nickname had stuck.

  Two white Toyota Land Cruisers stood idling on the tarmac. One was outfitted for carrying passengers, the other for hauling cargo. Both had been tricked out with off-road packages that included lift kits, snorkels, winches, and mud tires.

  Like the fixer Ash had paid off in Lubumbashi, Jambo had made sure no Bunia airport personnel would interfere with them while they offloaded their gear into the vehicles.

  As the team transferred everything over, Harvath handed Ash the car door magnets Beaman had provided. They proclaimed, in black and red letters on a white background, that the vehicles were on official humanitarian business from CARE International. They even included little red crosses.

  There were stickers as well that showed AK-47s with Xs through them, and these were placed in the vehicle windows as well. Once the gear was packed inside, tied down to the roof racks, and ready to roll, they left the airport and headed into the capital.

  Jambo had secured rooms for them at the best place in town, the two-star Bunia Hotel.

  To its credit, it had high walls, a secure gate, beer, and a pool table. By eastern Congo standards, it was the height of luxury. The kitchen even turned out halfway decent Chinese and Indian food, something Harvath hadn’t expected.

  Even though the hotel’s motor court was enclosed, Jambo had hired two of his relatives to spend the night with the vehicles.

  After checking in and moving the most sensitive of their gear to their rooms, the team reconvened in the lobby. Their first round of beers had just been served when the final member of the operation walked into the lobby.

  She was a tall blonde in a tight green T-shirt and even tighter gray REI hiking pants. A pair of Oakley sunglasses hung around her neck and dangled between her breasts. Her arms were buff and she sported a healthy tan. Freckles formed an imperfect bridge over a perfect nose. Her eyes, even in the half-light of the lobby, were a piercing gimlet-green.

  Unshouldering her pack, she had dropped it next to the pool table and introduced herself around to the team. Brash and unafraid, right from the jump.

  Before becoming a physician, Dr. Jessica Decker had been a war correspondent. She knew all too well what men were capable of doing to each other. Having seen enough suffering, particularly in Congo, she had decided she wanted to do more than just write about it. That’s why she left journalism and had gone into medical school.

  She
had been working with CARE for less than a year when she was asked to open the Matumaini Clinic on their behalf. She went on to carry out three subsequent missions there. She knew the area and its people better than anyone else.

  She was in the middle of opening one of CARE’s two new clinics—a facility outside Kinshasa—when everything was put on hold.

  Beaman had thought she could be helpful in the current situation and the Old Man had agreed. It had been two to one, and Harvath was overruled. Decker, Carlton had decided, wouldn’t only be coming along, but she could also be part of their cover.

  Not even Ash and his team knew the full extent of what was going on. As far as they knew, they had been hired to accompany a load of medical supplies and two members of CARE International to a clinic in the Ituri Province. It was dangerous territory and the middleman for CARE claimed they had been robbed twice before en route. CARE wanted to make sure that didn’t happen again.

  Ash had guaranteed that his team would do everything they could to make sure that didn’t happen. He felt relatively confident this would be a sure thing. Then Harvath had stepped off the plane in Lubumbashi.

  The American had “operator” written all over him. Ash could tell right away that there was more to this assignment than he and his team had been told. Quietly, he passed the word to each of his men to be on their guard. When the woman arrived, the complication factor escalated.

  She was incredibly attractive, too attractive for Congo—a rough place where people prized commodities above all else and would pay or do anything to get what they wanted. She didn’t belong here, yet she had walked in like she owned the place. Already she was playing with them.

  The shirt that showed off her chest, the tight pants that hugged her ass, the careful application of makeup—just enough to make it look like she wasn’t wearing any makeup at all—it all came together and spelled trouble. Ash was beginning to wonder if taking this assignment had been a mistake.

  Harvath didn’t know what to think of Jessica Decker either. The woman who entered the hotel was certainly not what he had expected. Beaman had forwarded a CARE newsletter to him with a bland photo taken in the field. It certainly hadn’t prepared him for what she looked like in real life. Not that it would have mattered, much. The fact that she was here was just a reminder that he didn’t have a say in the matter.

  After introducing herself around, she had walked over to the bar to order. Harvath fought the urge to watch her, and he watched the security team instead. Ash’s men looked like a pack of wild dogs ready to go to war over a pork chop.

  There weren’t a lot of western women in Congo and certainly not many, if any at all, who looked like Jessica Decker.

  If Harvath knew that, she had to too, which meant she knew exactly what she was doing. That was fine by him. Some SEALs were notorious for their extracurricular adventures overseas. Why should it be any different for a woman? He knew all too well how hard it could be to maintain a relationship when you spent so much time away from home.

  Whatever she did with her personal time was her business. As long as it didn’t become a distraction, Harvath planned to ignore the whole issue.

  They ate a good meal, played some more pool, and established a rendezvous time for the morning. Harvath was the first to excuse himself. He had several emails to respond to, and wanted to take a shower before turning in.

  He bought two bottles of Primus beer at the bar to go, said goodnight to everyone, and returned to his room.

  When Harvath walked into the motor court at four a.m. that Thursday morning, Ash and his men were already there loading and inspecting the vehicles. It was cool, only in the low 50s, and had rained heavily during the night. The dirt road outside the hotel had already turned to red mud.

  As Harvath placed his bag inside the Land Cruiser, designated as LC1, Dr. Decker appeared beside him. Reaching out, he accepted her pack and placed it inside as well. She smiled and thanking him added, “Is there any coffee anywhere?”

  “Coffee, coffee. Yes, yes,” said Jambo as he stepped out of the hotel with two large thermoses. “Breakfast too,” he stated, nodding toward a staffer following behind with a hot tray of eggs, rice, and cheese wrapped in naan bread, nuked in the microwave and then wrapped in foil for the ride. Harvath helped himself to two.

  After the vehicle inspections were complete and all the equipment loaded, Ash give the order to mount up. Once the gates were opened, they splashed out into the road and headed north.

  Of the hundred thousand miles of mapped roads in Congo, less than two percent were actually paved. Of those paved roads, only half were in good condition. In short, travelling anywhere in Congo was an incredible pain in the ass. That went double once you got outside any of its larger towns. The few grass airstrips that existed required constant maintenance, and almost all of those that had been carved from the jungles had been abandoned over the years. Missionaries came and left. Nature always reclaimed what was rightfully hers.

  In a poverty-stricken country of seventy million, with a landmass the size of the American Midwest, everyone was on the make. This was especially true in the lawless eastern part of Congo, where various rebel factions controlled almost everything. With the average wage about a dollar a day and an AK-47 selling for fifty dollars, locals got creative fast. That “creativity” only added to the stress of traversing Congo by car.

  Ash radioed the Brute Squad in the Land Cruiser behind them carrying Jambo and the cargo, “LC1 to LC2. Tollbooth coming up. Fifty meters. Everybody stay calm.”

  All it took was a log, a rope, or a long enough piece of chain and anyone could establish a “tollbooth” in this part of the country. They were normally staffed by rebel forces, crooked police, or legit military looking to augment their meager incomes. Some of the impromptu tollbooths were said to pull in $700,000 or more a year. It was a racket, to be sure, and the men who ran them ruled the roads with an iron fist.

  In order to make sure that no one assaulted these setups, or tried to blow through without paying, they hid ambush teams farther up the road. Depending on the terrain, sometimes the team was one hundred meters ahead; sometimes it was a couple of miles. It was the perfect insurance policy. You might make it past the tollbooth without paying, but you had no idea where the ambush team would be. Not only would the ambush team take your life, they would also use your corpse and that of your fellow passengers as an advertisement to others who might think they could avoid paying their fair share.

  Ash had briefed Harvath and Dr. Decker about his position on the tolls as they rolled out of Bunia. While he hated paying off thugs, a hundred dollars for two vehicles was just the cost of doing business in Congo.

  Despite the coffee and piss-poor roads, Jessica Decker had spent most of the ride sleeping on her rolled up fleece, pressed against the window. It was a skill likely developed from having experienced multiple war zones and learning to grab sleep whenever you could get it. The key was in knowing when to wake up. As the vehicles came to a stop, she did exactly that.

  “What’s going on?” she asked.

  “Toll,” Mick said from the front seat. “Don’t worry. Go back to sleep.”

  Ash mumbled something under his breath.

  “What is it?” Harvath asked.

  “Looks like Congolese regulars,” he said. “We’ll drop a few bills into the collection plate and be on our way.”

  As the men up front rolled down their windows, Harvath hoped they were right. But there was something about this setup, something he couldn’t put his finger on, that gave him a very bad feeling.

  CHAPTER 3

  * * *

  The first soldier who approached their Land Cruiser appeared nervous, distraught. He clutched his AK-47 in both hands. “Médecins?” he asked, gesturing with his weapon. Doctors? French was the official language of the Democratic Republic of Congo.

  “Oui,” Harvath answe
red from behind Asher. “Médecins.” His grade school had been run by an order of French nuns. Next to sports, French had been one of the few things he had excelled at.

  “Allez,” the soldier ordered, grabbing the handle and jerking open Harvath’s door. “Descendez.” Get out.

  “Everyone stays in the vehicles,” Asher commanded.

  “No,” the soldier said in broken English. “Doctor now.”

  Before anyone could react, Jessica Decker had opened her door and was stepping out.

  “Stop,” Harvath ordered her, but it was too late.

  “I’m the doctor,” Decker stated.

  The soldier looked back at Harvath. “Vous n’êtes pas le médecin?” You’re not the doctor?

  “Moi, je suis—”

  Decker interrupted Harvath. “I told you,” she said, as she grabbed a medical kit from her pack, “I’m the doctor.”

  The soldier slammed Harvath’s door shut and started walking around to the other side.

  “Dr. Decker, I want you back in this vehicle right now,” Ash instructed through Mick’s window.

  Ash and Mick were both wearing “bone phones,” earpieces connected to radios hidden under their shirts that transmitted speech through bone conduction technology. Eddie and Simon must have asked for a situation report because Harvath heard Mick say, “Figuring that out now. Stand by.”

  “Someone needs a doctor,” Decker stated with an air of haughtiness. “That’s what I do.”

  “And what I do is keep people safe,” Ash replied. “Whoever this someone is, they can wait five more minutes while we negotiate this. You’re not going anywhere.”

  “These are soldiers from the Congolese army.”

  “We don’t know that. Now get back in the vehicle.”

  Decker ignored him and walked forward.

  He was about to reiterate his order when he heard the door behind him open up and Harvath stepped out.