Day of Reckoning (19 page)

There was a quiet threat there in his old friend’s eyes, but Harry just nodded. “I can live with that.”

“Good,” Han replied, turning away after a long moment. “Because I’m not sure I can…”

7:56 P.M.

The Tactical Operations Center

West Virginia

Getting a tight perimeter in place was always a challenge—toss in the darkness, the blinding snow, the vagaries of the West Virginian mountains, and it was turning into a full-fledged nightmare.

Caruso dug a gloved hand from the depths of his pocket and reached out, opening the door of the mobile trailer that served as the HRT’s Tactical Operations Center, or TOC, in the community parlance. The trailer was parked crossways on the narrow road, in itself forming an effective roadblock against anyone who sought egress from the mountain.

Marika was already inside, working over the computers with one of the members of the support team.

“Do we have the perimeter in place?”

She looked up. “Take it easy, Vic—just because you’re good at groping about in the darkness doesn’t mean we all are. We just got satellite support fifteen minutes ago—Petersen nearly went over a cliff before she saw it was there. Thank God for technology.”

Leah Petersen was the HRT’s lead sniper. “Where’s Jicha?”

“In the back with Russ—running over the plan one last time. We send him in within fifteen minutes.”

Caruso nodded. William Russell Cole was a living legend among hostage negotiators, a small-framed, gentle man in his early sixties.
In thirty-odd years with the Bureau, he’d never worn a gun.

Spend five minutes with him—you’d feel like you had a new best friend. That’s why he was so good at what he did.

He found the two men near the back of the trailer. “We’ll have two snipers here…and here,” Jicha was saying, drawing his finger across the touchscreen of the computer. “They’ll be in position to cover you as you walk up to the cabin, but, you know our ROE.”

The negotiator smiled, patting Jicha on the arm. “It’s not a problem, Klaus. Never has been. If I do my job right, your boys can go home without firing their weapons. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to suit up.”

“Don’t underestimate him, Russ,” Jicha warned as the negotiator turned away.

“Nichols?” Caruso could see a shadowed look there in Russ’s eyes as he asked the question. “Don’t worry, Klaus. I won’t.”

8:12 P.M.

Washington, D.C.

Waiting—that was the biggest part of the spy business. Just waiting. It didn’t do wonders for one’s blood pressure—or waistline.

Thomas tapped his hand idly against the passenger window of the Malibu, waiting. He needed a drink.

He glanced over at Tex in the driver’s seat, wondering if he should wake him. The big man had the seat all the way back, his lanky form stretched out, his hands folded over his chest. He was a Marine, after all. Never stand when you can sit…never sit when you can lie down…never lie down when you can sleep—because you never know when you’ll have another chance.

“You think Carter will come through for us?”

Tex’s right eye came open, a single black orb staring over at Thomas. The news that the FBI had located Harry had come as a shock to them both. As usual, the Texan was dealing with it better.

“Going back into Langley at this hour is going to raise some eyebrows—but if anyone is known for odd hours, it’s Ron.” Carter hadn’t known anything more than the basics, but he’d promised to get back on Langley’s servers and find out where the Bureau was staging.

As if on cue, it was at that moment that Tex’s cellphone chose to ring. “Yes? Yeah, I’ve got a pen—go ahead and give me the coordinates.”

Flicking the dome light on, the Texan cradled the phone against his shoulder as he scrawled a series of latitude and longitude coordinates on the back of his hand. He listened for another moment, then tucked the phone back in his pocket.

Thomas waited as Tex put the Malibu into drive, heading south. “Where’s the FBI raid going down?”

“West Virginia. Got a long drive ahead of us.”

8:15 P.M.

The CHRYSALIS cabin

West Virginia

Harry was in the bedroom when Carol found him, tucking the Colt .45 into a paddle holster at his hip. Preparing for war. His AK-47 was clutched in his left hand, a pair of spare magazines in a pouch on his belt.

He didn’t turn around, simply gestured toward a ballistic vest lying there on the bedspread. “I need you to put that on under your shirt.”

“Where do you want me?” she asked, peeling off her jacket as she entered the room. She dropped it on the bed and picked up the vest, holding it up against herself.

“You can change in there,” he said, indicating the direction of the bathroom with a curt nod. It was almost as if his previous display of emotion had embarrassed him.

The vest had been designed for a woman, Carol realized, tracing the outline of the built-in bra cups. Han’s wife?

Closing the door behind her, she stripped out of her blouse and pulled the vest on over her head. It was more than a little loose, but the 6-point strapping system offered enough adjustability to make it work. Just enough.

When she re-opened the door, Harry was still there, checking his weapons one final time. “That’s not what I meant,” she began, buttoning her blouse over the vest. “Where do you want me when the assault hits?”

“In the bunker. Stay in the back, near the helicopter if you want to. Just keep your head down.”

“That’s it?” she heard herself ask. “These men killed my father and you just want me to keep my head down?”

He looked up, meeting her gaze for the first time since she’d entered the room. “You’re missing the point. If anything happens to you, they succeed.” Those ice-blue eyes blazed with a flash of intensity as he added, “And I fail.”

Carol took her jacket off the bed and started to push past him toward the door, but his hand closed around her wrist. “I need to hear you say it,” he warned, his grip firm but not painful.
Not yet.

She felt her breath catch as she stared back into his eyes, unyielding. And in that moment, she knew. If it was necessary to save her life, he wouldn’t hesitate to snap her wrist like a straw. “Say it…”

Surrender was the only option and she realized it. Didn’t make the words come any easier.

“Harry!” Han’s shout came from the front of the cabin. “Get your butt out here—we’ve got company.”

Silence. The only sound he could hear was the noise of the wind whipping around the mountainside. The cabin remained silent, no one answering his hail.

Russ fingered the bullhorn in his hands, debating how long he should wait before trying again. Over thirty years, he’d dealt with bank robbers, pyschotic parents, crackheads, and terrorists. He’d seen it all.

Yet the shiver that rippled through his body had nothing to do with the wind. Or the falling snow. Tonight was different.

He’d seen Nichols in action before—they’d worked together when Cole had been deployed to Islamabad as part of the Joint Terrorism Task Force in the fall of 2009.

Unpredictable. That was the CIA officer. Brilliant, ruthless—other adjectives that came immediately to mind. What had caused him to go rogue, Russ had no idea. One thing and only one thing he knew. Nichols would be playing to win.

A figure stood in the middle of the cabin’s driveaway, ankle-deep in snow, glowing in Harry’s night-vision. “What do you make of it?”

Harry looked back at his friend. “I recognize him,” he said finally. “It’s William Russell Cole. We worked together in Pakistan with the JTTF.”

Han’s face was drawn and white in the darkness. “What are you trying to tell me?”

“It’s not a trick—we’re up against the HRT.”

7:24 P.M. Central Time

Fargo, North Dakota

It was the night of the school Christmas party. She should have been there, but she didn’t feel like partying, particularly with her fellow teachers.

The glass of wine on the coffee table was half-empty, Bing Crosby’s voice on the radio in the kitchen crooning,
It’s the most wonderful time of the year
.

Yeah, right. She and Mary had gone to the Christmas party together last year, right before she left for Washington. She could still remember the sight of her pretty sister dancing in the arms of Nicholas, the phys-ed teacher. He’d been smitten.

Bing’s voice trailed off into the ether as the radio station broke for news. “…the parallel attacks in Virginia on the 13
th
and the widespread panic which has followed, President Roger Hancock has announced that he is leaving the G-20 summit to return to D.C. White House spokesman Dominic Reyes quoted the President in an exclusive with FOX News. ‘A leader’s place in time of crisis is in his nation’s capital’.”

Alicia smiled, reaching for the bottle of pinot noir in front of her. She’d already had two glasses, enough to necessitate coffee in the morning. But he was coming back to the States. That called for a celebration…

8:31 P.M. Eastern Time

The CHRYSALIS cabin

Fifteen minutes since the Bureau man had first appeared outside the cabin. They’d let him cool his heels for long enough.

With a nod to Han, Harry cranked the front window open. His hand grazed the packet of C-4 below the window sill. Disconnected, but it could still be detonated at a moment’s notice.

Time to open up a dialogue. “How’s it going, Russ?”

It was him. The older man drew his jacket tighter around his body, turning to face the voice. “I’ve had better nights, Harry, but let’s not talk about me. I’m here to listen to you, to find out what you need. I just want everyone to walk out of here—keep everybody safe.”

“I know, Russ,” the voice replied. “You’re a good man. You don’t want a tactical assault any more than I want to draw down on agents I’ve worked with for so many years.”

Calm. Nichols’ voice was almost dangerously calm. That was another thing he remembered about the CIA man.

“We can resolve this, Harry. Those security officers at Langley—that was reactive, a split-second decision—
and you didn’t kill them
. I know you feel alone, I know nerves can fray under pressure, but we can bring closure to this without anyone getting hurt.”

There was a laugh from the direction of the cabin. “Correction, Russ. I’m not workin’ this one alone. I’ve got a partner. So you can tell Leah to get her cross-hairs out of my face.”

The TOC

“Blast it!” Altmann exclaimed, listening to the exchange through her headphones. “How did he know?”

Vic shook his head. “It’s not that hard. He knows our protocols. He knows our people. Leah’s been the HRT’s top sniper for the better part of a decade.”

The woman sighed, looking over at Klaus Jicha. “Get Sgt. Petersen on comm. Tell her to stand by—but do not, repeat, do
not
take the shot.”

7:42 P.M. Central Time

The mosque

Dearborn, Michigan

It had taken them five weeks to make the basement of the mosque airtight. Another two to acquire the equipment needed and move it into place.

Jamal al-Khalidi smiled, slipping the gas mask over his head. This wasn’t like nukes. Most of the equipment he’d needed he had secured over the Internet. In times like these, eBay was your friend.

A pair of the shaikh’s Pakistanis entered the room through the hermetically sealed door, bearing a large container between them.

“Just set it down over there on the table,” Jamal instructed in English, switching to Arabic when they failed to comprehend. Didn’t everyone understand English these days?

Snapping gloves onto his hands, the University of Michigan chemistry student walked over, typing in the sequence of numbers of the container’s keypad. There was a buzz and the locks disengaged, allowing him to push open the lid.

He had known what to expect, but his breath still caught at the sight. Four large conical artillery shells lay within, inscribed in flowing Arabic script. He reached in, hefting one of the unwieldy munitions in both of his hands. Weighing in at eighty-four kilograms, the 180-mm shell had been designed to be fired out of the Soviet S-23 howitzer, exported to Quaddafi’s Libya.

And now, with the fall of the tyrant and the rise of the
Ikhwan
, he held it in his hands. Such power.

His fingers traced the script almost reverently, knowing that what filled the shell was not the ordinary mix of high explosive and shrapnel. Rather, what his chemistry professor would have referred to as pinacolyl methylphosphonoflouridate. Soman.

Nerve gas.