by Vince Flynn
Rapp looked away and grabbed his phone. After several rings a man answered.
“What’s up?”
“Where are you?” asked Rapp.
“Athens.”
“Get your ass to Cyprus, and I mean yesterday.”
“What’s wrong?”
“I don’t think we’re the only people looking for this guy.”
“I’m at the airport right now. I’ll see what’s available and get back to you.”
Rapp hit the end button and kept walking. He was trying to figure out his next move when it presented itself in the form of a mannequin perched in a storefront window near the end of the block. New clothes and a view of the two men across the street were exactly what he needed.
4
ZERMATT, SWITZERLAND
T he partygoers in the Alex Hotel were all in a good mood, and they should have been since not a single one of them had paid for a thing all weekend. This particular environmental conference was one of the hottest tickets on the annual circuit. One day of workshops and panels, and two days of skiing and debauchery at one of Europe’s finest ski resorts. A Grateful Dead cover band was on a tiny stage playing “Cumberland Blues” as the crowd of rhythmically challenged, Birkenstock wearing, patchouli oil–smelling, prematurely gray, Mother Earth lovers danced a herky-jerky dance that would have made any lover of the Motown Sound either cry or double over in laughter.
Mark Ross stood near the back of the room with a permanent smile on his face. He had attended the event five previous times as a U.S. senator and the attendees had always been nice to him, but now they treated him like royalty. He had been smart to embrace this issue years ago. If one was to rise to the top of the Democratic Party it was very important to have the proper credentials. No résumé builder was more vital than the role of compassionate environmentalist. These were the foot soldiers. The people who got out the vote. Who organized things from the grass roots with their e-mail blasts and blogs. He appreciated everything they’d done for him, and would hopefully do for him in the future. He was already thinking about his turn. Eight years wasn’t so long. There were limits though. He was now at the top of the political heap. One place from the pinnacle. He’d put in enough time with the unwashed. Now it was time to head off to Mount Olympus and bask in the adoration of the truly powerful.
The toughest invite of the entire weekend was for Joseph Speyer’s party at his mountainside villa. The Deadheads were not welcome. Speyer’s party was for the heavy hitters—European royalty; fashion icons from Paris, London, New York, and Milan; international financiers; media moguls; the occasional movie or rock star; hip politicians; and ultra-wealthy trust funders. In other words, the beautiful people who flew in on their private planes, partied hard, wrote big checks, and then flew on to the next big party, or one of several mansions they owned. Conservation to these people meant having their staff recycle their diet pop cans and designer plastic water bottles. Some of them went so far as to buy a small hybrid car, but the purchase was simply to drive to a friend’s house on the weekend. They still kept their limos, SUVs, luxury sedans, and sports cars.
For Ross, Speyer’s party was a must. It allowed him to tap into people with obscene money. People who could write million dollar soft-money checks, because that was how much money their bond portfolio had earned the previous week. Ross had been welcomed into this crowd from the get-go. He was tall, relatively handsome, and fit. But equally important was the fact that he’d built himself a small fortune on Wall Street, which endeared him to his fellow multimillionaires. The ultra wealthy had a much easier time writing checks to people who were already in the club. On some level they thought a fellow millionaire was less likely to abscond with the funds.
Ross shook a few more hands and turned for the door. The smell of cannabis was pungent. Michael Brown, the Secret Service agent in charge of his detail, stood a few steps away with a frown on his face. He fell into step with Ross as they left the room.
“What’s the matter, Michael?” Ross asked with a smile. “You’ve never been stoned?”
“I don’t do drugs, sir. Never have.”
“You don’t have to lie to me,” Ross said casually. “I’m not going to tell anyone.”
Five more agents fell in around them. The shortest was six feet one and the tallest was six feet six. They looked more like a basketball team than a security detail.
“I don’t lie, sir.” Brown’s eyes scanned the crowd in the lobby. “Just so you know, I’m going to have to put this in my report.”
“What, in your report?”
“The presence of marijuana.”
Ross looked at him sideways. “You can’t be serious?”
“It was pretty thick in there, sir, and we take drug tests. I have to write it up.”
Ross frowned. He could just see the press getting a hold of something like this.
“Don’t worry, sir. It’ll be internal. We’re good at keeping secrets.”
The Secret Service agents and the vice president–elect stepped through the front door and onto the sidewalk. Two more six-plus-foot agents were waiting for them. They were traveling light, which was the other reason for Agent Brown’s foul mood. Motorized vehicles were banned in the town of Zermatt. Brown wanted to get an exemption from the Swiss, but Ross wouldn’t let him. It was after all an environmental conference. Ross would ride the electric city busses just like everyone else.
This was both a logistical and security nightmare for the Secret Service. There was no bombproofing, let alone bulletproofing, electric vehicles. They simply didn’t have the horsepower to handle the extra weight, especially with some of the steep inclines they had to deal with. That meant Ross would be exposed to and from every venue all weekend long. In light of the attack on the motorcade, no one at the Secret Service liked this idea, but Ross held his ground.
The other problem was that Ross had sprung this trip on them at the last minute. That meant the advance team had arrived barely a day before the rest of the detail. A city bus was commandeered for the weekend, and two agents set about learning how to drive the large, low-powered vehicles. Brown arrived the next day to discover that his boys had crashed the bus. The narrow village streets were simply too difficult for amateurs to navigate. So now they had a civilian driving them, and no backup bus available as a decoy, nor a replacement should this one fail. The entire trip had degenerated into everything he’d been taught not to do. With Ross refusing to allow him to bring in one of the limos or Suburbans on standby in Milan, they were forced to adapt and settle for a less than ideal situation.
A perimeter had been formed around the yellow and green village bus. Black paper had been taped over the large windows along the back half. Brown escorted Ross onto the bus and walked him to the rear, where he sat him down between two black clad and heavily armed members of the Counter Assault Team. More agents piled on the bus and they started to roll. A light fluffy snow was falling as the bus hummed through the narrow streets. They didn’t have far to go. That was one good thing about Zermatt. The village was small. Speyer’s house was barely a mile away, most of it uphill. Two agents had been deployed in advance. Brown had wanted to send a team of six to sweep the house and wand the other guests as they arrived, but when Ross got wind of it he hit the roof. Ross chewed his ass out and Brown had to stand there and take it. He kept headquarters appraised of his every move and left a significant e-mail trail explaining that Ross had overruled him every step of the way. If something happened Brown wasn’t going to take the blame for it. He’d watched what they’d done to Rivera after the attack on the motorcade. She’d been put on administrative leave pending the completion of the investigation. Now she’d been cooling her heels for two and a half months. Even if they cleared her, there was no way she would get anywhere near the president’s detail.
With barely a hundred meters to the house the bus rounded a hairpin turn and stalled. The driver turned to Brown and in clear English said, “Too heavy. Too much weigh
t.”
“Wonderful.” Brown scowled and then mumbled to himself, “What a chicken shit operation.” He looked around at his fellow agents and said, “Everybody off accept Kendal and Fitz.” Brown was referring to the two men sandwiching Ross.
One by one eight agents piled off the bus and then slowly but steadily, the vehicle climbed the last steep incline. The agents who had disembarked dogged it up the hill double time without having to be ordered. The bus couldn’t go very fast so they kept pace, but when they got to the top they were all panting due to the thin mountain air. One of the two advance agents was waiting for them with a smile on his face. It vanished as soon as Brown stepped off the bus.
“What in the hell do you think is so funny?”
“Nothing, boss,” the man said sheepishly.
“What’s the situation in there?” Brown jerked his head toward the house.
“Eighty-three guests plus sixteen people from the caterer. No whack jobs.”
“Exits?”
“We’re piggybacking his security system. Everything is wired and covered.”
Brown stepped back onto the bus and said, “Sir, we’re ready.”
Ross stood and buttoned his tweed sport coat. He was wearing a gray and blue Nordic sweater underneath and some jeans. He exited the bus and proceeded to the front door, where it was opened for him by one of the host’s servants. The heavy wooden door swung in, and Ross was met by Speyer, who was waiting for him.
The banker was dressed in a red velvet smoking jacket, black pants, and a pair of black suede house slippers. He was every bit the stylish host, even here in the mountains.
“Mr. Vice President.” Speyer made a rolling motion with his right hand and then bowed at the waist. “It is an honor to have you as a guest at my humble abode.”
Ross laughed. “I’m still just Mark to you, Joseph. I won’t be sworn in for another week.”
“Oh…do not deprive me the joy of using such an exalted title.” The banker looked up at Ross and smiled.
“Stand up you imbecile, before I have you flogged.”
Speyer winked and said, “Promises, promises.”
“You look well.”
“And so do you. What can we get you to drink?”
“I would love a martini.”
“We will get you one, and then I would like to show you my new wine cellar. I think you will be most impressed.”
Ross started to follow the host and after a few steps could feel that someone was following him. He looked over his shoulder at Agent Brown and gave him a look that clearly told him to back off. “Wait by the front door. If I need you, I’ll scream.”
A bar was set up between the stone fireplace and the massive picture window that looked down on the village and out onto the most recognizable peak in the world. The Matterhorn. With the light snow falling the sheer face was all but obscured, but Ross knew it was there. He’d stood at this window just three months before and coveted the view.
The guests all gravitated toward him, extending their sincere congratulations. Many of them had helped finance the campaign. He was their horse, and they had backed him. Ross was well into his martini and Speyer was well into his second hilarious story, when Ross noticed a familiar face watching him from across the room. Ross became uncomfortable before he even knew it. His hands got sweaty and his throat tightened a bit. He avoided looking at the man directly. He expected him to be here, but not out in the open. Ross suddenly felt the need to dull his nerves a bit. He turned to the bartender and motioned for another martini. A little liquid courage was what he would need to get through the evening.
5
LIMASSOL, CYPRUS
R ather than fly into Limassol’s International Airport, Gazich took a more circuitous route. He flew first from Bucharest to Athens and then took the ferry to Rhodes, where he stopped for a few days before jumping another ferry to Cyprus. Immigration and passport control at the ports was virtually nonexistent. It had been more than ten weeks since he’d set foot on the island he called home. He had spent much of that time hopping from one country to the next and trying to remain as inconspicuous as possible. Before the bomb had exploded, he’d already decided to lay low and hide out in America for a week or two. That was his style. Where others rushed to get out of a country after a hit, he remained calm and waited for things to blow over.
Every step of the way he had been relaxed and deliberate. Run away from the scene of a crime and you attract attention. Stand and watch, lurk and loiter for a while and nobody notices. You blend in with all of the other gawkers who congregate to stand in awe of the carnage. Carnage was plentiful that Saturday afternoon in late October. At first Gazich had been unable to take in his handy work. The dust and debris cloud was massive. Fortunately, he had remembered to put in earplugs before the bomb went off. It had been more powerful than he’d expected and surely would have blown both his eardrums.
He had stayed pressed against the tree for ten seconds, his eyes closed and his T-shirt over his mouth and nose, holding his breath. When he opened his eyes a crack, day had been turned into night. With a cautious step Gazich left the protection of the tree, and started down the sidewalk. Even though he could barely see, he wanted to make it to the perimeter before the dust settled. He wanted to be standing amid the first group of onlookers. Slowly, the air cleared and the sky began to brighten. Debris was everywhere; broken glass, hunks of metal, bricks, and wood were strewn about the sidewalk. With the earplugs pulled out, he began to hear cries for help. He walked past those cries and made it to the bottom of the hill across the street from the Starbucks where he had been before the attack.
A man stopped him and asked if he was all right. Gazich still had his T-shirt over his mouth and nose. He nodded, coughed, and kept walking. A half a block later he reached the Safeway parking lot and stopped. This was his first chance to turn around and take in the destruction. The size of the crater surprised even him. It crossed both lanes of traffic and looked to be at least six feet deep. It was as if a meteor had come in at a shallow angle, slamming into the middle of Georgetown. It was hard to tell, due to the smoke and fire, but it looked like the apartment buildings across the street were no longer there. Most importantly, Gazich counted only one limousine. It was turned over on its back like some helpless turtle. Gazich guessed that the other limo had been close to incinerated.
As the crowd of onlookers grew, Gazich fell farther and farther back. With each move he was careful to shake more dust from his clothes. Emergency vehicles began to arrive within minutes and they just added to the chaos. When the pandemonium reached its peak, he simply crossed Wisconsin Avenue and walked four blocks to his parked car on T Street. Twenty minutes later he was merging onto Interstate 95 and on his way north.
He changed out of his clothes as he drove, not daring to pull into a rest stop. Too many cops patrolled those places. With the windows down and the cruise control set at the legal limit, he shook the dust from his hair and put on a new T-shirt and a pair of jeans. When he crossed the state line into Delaware, he finally relaxed a bit. The reports on the radio kept repeating the same information over and over, so he turned off the radio and drove in silence. A couple of hours later he ditched the car in Newark and took the train into Manhattan. He’d already booked a room at the Sheraton Hotel and Towers near Times Square—1,750 rooms, lots of tourists, and near complete anonymity. He’d arranged for two tickets to a show that night and he picked them up from the concierge before he headed up to his room. He didn’t want to go to the show. He would much rather go to one of the high end strip clubs and blow through a wad of cash, but he reasoned that if he was playing himself off as a tourist he should act like one.
When he got up to his room, he turned on the TV and any thought of going to the show, a strip club, or anywhere else for that fact, completely vanished. He could barely believe how quickly everything had gone from perfect to disastrous. He’d missed the target. The candidates were alive, and the wife and a whole l
ot of other people were dead. Gazich knew it had not been his fault. The man on the phone had told him they would be in the second limo. The limo that he incinerated. Would the person who hired him believe it when he told him he’d hit the car he’d been told to hit? Would they want him to try again? Gazich already knew what the answer to that would be. You only got one shot at something like this. Anything after that was a death wish.
Gazich barely slept that night, despite the fact that he’d put a serious dent in the minibar. As soon as the stores were open he found a T-Mobile kiosk and purchased a PDA with web browsing capabilities. He’d been paid a million dollars in advance and promised a million more upon completion of the assignment. In Gazich’s mind, the second million was still his. His employer had assured him that they had an impeccable source. Everything on his end had been done to perfection. This screwup was the source’s fault, and he was not about to take the blame for it.
Gazich logged onto the e-mail account using the password he’d been given and opened the draft menu where a message was waiting for him. It was pretty much what he had expected. They were blaming him for screwing up. As quick as his two hands could type, the assassin punched in his terse reply, placing the blame where it belonged. He finished by demanding the rest of his fee and then logged off. Over the next forty-eight hours they went back and forth, with things getting worse before they got remotely better. Both sides made threats and both were presumably in a position to follow through even though they had never met face-to-face. One side had the money and presumably could find the assets to retaliate while the other side had the talent and determination. In the end it was a standoff. This was a war that neither side wanted to fight.
