Path of the Assassin (6 page)

At precisely 5:29
A.M.
Prince Khalil of the Saudi royal family climbed into the small elevator with his two bodyguards and descended to the spa. He enjoyed his visits to Paris and especially the Ritz, where his every whim was catered to. Like many wealthy Arabs from the desert, he had developed an obsession with swimming. It was the one thing he did religiously every morning. He loved the Ritz’s swimming pool with its underwater speakers. In fact, he had been toying with the idea of having some installed in his pool at home.

When the elevator opened onto the spa level, the manager was already waiting for the royal party. The spa would not open for regular guests for another hour. Having the pool all to himself was a Ritz perk that the prince distinctly enjoyed. One of the bodyguards handed the manager a Moby CD and the tuxedoed man quickly rushed off to prep the underwater sound system. The royal party proceeded on through the men’s changing area and trod through the cold-water footbath before arriving poolside.

The prince was helped out of his plush Ritz bathrobe while he removed his matching slippers. Everything was neatly folded and placed on a nearby chaise lounge. The prince wore a blue Speedo bathing suit, and tinted goggles dangled from around his neck. He swung his arms back and forth to get the blood flowing and then raised the goggles and placed them over his eyes. After several squat thrusts, he moved to the edge of the pool. The manager reappeared and gave the bodyguards a discreet nod, indicating that the prince’s music was playing, before disappearing back upstairs to his office.

Track number one on the Moby CD was
“Honey,
” although the
“Bodyrock”
track might have been more appropriate for what happened when Prince Khalil hit the water. Within seconds he began bleeding from his eyes, his nose, ears, and rectum. At first his bodyguards thought that the prince had cut himself diving into the pool, but they quickly realized it was much more serious. The Prince’s blood fanned out through the water like hundreds of crimson ribbons as he began to violently writhe beneath the surface.

Immediately, the royal bodyguards jumped into the pool to save their charge. Though they were fully clothed, the toxin worked its evil magic just as quickly, and soon the largest swimming pool in Paris was tinted bloodred, with three dead bodies floating in it.

Later that morning, the hotel’s general manager received a letter containing an explanation of how to properly disinfect the pool and an apology for any inconvenience loss of the pool facilities may have caused hotel guests. It was signed, “The Hand of God.”

When Scot awoke to sunlight streaming through a nearby window, the first thing he noticed was that he was no longer flexi-cuffed. There was an IV in his left arm, but other than that, he could move freely. He was lying down and had been covered with a blanket. A figure hovered at the foot of his bed.

“What the hell is going on? Where am I?” he asked as the figure began to take the shape of a middle-aged man in a dark, pin-striped suit.

“You were oversedated and have been out for quite some time,” said the man. “I believe we owe you an apology, Agent Harvath.”

“This has gone far beyond an apology. You can get in line behind Morrell and I’ll deal with you next. I want some answers, now. Who are you and where am I?” Scot said groggily as he struggled to sit upright. His head was pounding and he was none too happy about it.

Someone had been standing in a corner of the room and that person now approached. Harvath recognized the voice immediately. It was his friend, the deputy director of the FBI, Gary Lawlor. “You’re outside Williamsburg, Virginia, at Camp Peary.”

“Gary? What the hell are you doing here? Better yet, what the hell am I doing here, and what have they done to me? My head feels like it’s been split open with a sledgehammer,” Scot said.

“I’m afraid we may have gotten our signals crossed,” answered the man in the pin-striped suit.

“I can guarantee you did,” said Scot. He noticed a pitcher on the bedside table. “Is that just plain water, or have you CIA guys put something funny in it?”

“No, it’s plain water,” said the man, who poured some into a plastic cup and handed it to Scot.

After draining the cup, he handed it back to the man for a refill and took another long swallow before he spoke. “There’d better be a damn good reason why your Harvey Point guys jumped me and brought me here to the farm.”

“I can’t fully address that issue. There are certain classified operations of the Central Intelligence Agency which I am not permitted to speak about.”

“What, that Camp Peary is the CIA’s spy school, better known as the Farm, or that Harvey Point, North Carolina, is where your hard-core paramilitary training goes on? Don’t bullshit me. My head hurts too much. I know Rick Morrell. I also know what goes on at Harvey Point.”

“Agent Harvath, I can’t talk about—”

“Fine, let’s back up. First, who are you?”

“My name is Frank Mraz. I’m deputy director of the CIA’s Directorate of Operations.”

“The DO, wonderful. Also known as the Clandestine Service.”

“We don’t really call it that anymore.”

“Different name, same game. Just like Delta Force is now called Combat Applications Group and SEAL Six is Dev Group. Like I said, different name, same game. Morrell and his boys are part of your paramilitary SAS branch—the Special Activities Staff, aren’t they?”

“Once again, I can’t comment on any ongoing—”

“Jesus Christ, Frank,” Lawlor piped in. “We all know about Harvey Point. Agent Harvath is a former SEAL and an active Secret Service agent. Both the SEALs and Secret Service undergo training at Harvey Point. If we’re going to work together on this, let’s actually
work
together. Okay?”

“I am happy to be as cooperative as my position allows,” said Mraz.

“I’ll make it easy on you,” said Harvath. “Your SAS squad—”

“I have not confirmed that Mr. Morrell and his colleagues are Special Activities Staff, or that such a group even exists.”

Gary Lawlor rolled his eyes.

Harvath continued, “Hey, SAS, NFL, NBA…you can call them the fuckin’ Beach Boys for all I care, but they are under your command, and I’m sure they’ve each got a parking space at Harvey Point. You don’t have to confirm or deny. I know the score. I’m going to also bet that plane Morrell and company brought me back over the pond on is part of your Air Branch fleet, formerly known as Air America. Once again, different name, same game. I want to know why I got jumped in Jerusalem.”

“Would you believe it was a case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time?” asked Mraz.

“I wouldn’t patronize him, if I were you Frank,” said Lawlor.

“I’m not trying to be patronizing.”

“Then cut to the chase,” snapped Scot.

“Our sources indicate that Schoen has been trying to penetrate the Abu Nidal Organization.”

“Of course he has. He believes they’re behind the ambush of our Rapid Return operation.”

“He admitted that to you?”

“Sure, but I wasn’t too prepared to believe it. His theory, as well as his evidence has too many holes in it. If you really
want
to believe it, it makes sense, but if you look at it piece by piece, it just doesn’t hold together.”

“Well, we think it does. We’ve had him under surveillance and knew that he had been trying to hire some outside talent for a covert operation he’s working on. When we received word that he had possibly recruited a key Western intelligence operative and then you appeared out of the blue and spent several hours in his private offices, it was thought you might be in bed with him, and so you were picked up.”

“That’s it? That’s your justification for snatching me and pumping me full of God knows what? Why didn’t you just ask me what I was doing there?”

“Would you have told us?”

“Probably not, but it would have been the polite thing to do.”

“Polite or not, we did what we had to. In all fairness, it wasn’t until CIA director Vaile made some phone calls that we finally realized you were operating under direct orders from the president. And it wasn’t until Mr. Morrell had you on the plane that he recognized who you were.”

“Bullshit, he knew the minute he saw me in Jerusalem.”

“Be that as it may, he had his orders and he followed them.”

“Orders or not, he made this personal,” said Harvath, as even more anger crept into his voice.

“Whether or not that’s the case, is not germane to the ongoing crisis.”

“What are you talking about?”

“What do you know about an Israeli terrorist group calling itself the Hand of God?”

“Nothing much more than they have been behind two very high profile attacks against Arab targets recently,” answered Harvath.

“Three attacks.”

“
Three?
Since when?”

“It hasn’t been released to the press yet, but we got word early this morning from Paris that Prince Khalil of the Saudi royal family was killed while swimming at the Ritz hotel.”

“Killed how?”

“Somebody spiked the pool with a very deadly toxic chemical,” said Lawlor. “Soon after, the hotel manager received a note from the Hand of God claiming responsibility. We’re convinced they’re behind it.”

“What does this have to do with Schoen and what happened in Jerusalem?” asked Harvath.

“You’re aware that he had a son, correct?” offered Mraz.

“Yeah. He told me he was dead.”

“Well, what he probably didn’t tell you was that his son had followed in his footsteps. Against his father’s wishes, he joined the Mossad. A year later, he died entering an apartment rigged with explosives where a supposed terrorist was holed up. When his son was killed, Schoen’s hatred for the Arabs exploded. He began taking missions no one else wanted and was one of the Mossad’s most brutal interrogators.

“Fast-forward to our Rapid Return operation in Lebanon. Schoen is terribly disfigured, even more embittered, and decides to go underground. Shortly thereafter, the Hand of God attacks begin.”

“Wait a second,” said Harvath. “Are you telling me you think there is a connection between Schoen and the Hand of God? That’s one hell of a leap in logic.”

“Is it? Have you ever heard of a group called the Wrath of God, Agent Harvath?”

“Of course. They were a hit squad of Israeli assassins formed to avenge the killings at the Munich Olympics.”

“We prefer to call them an independent covert-action team, but you’re essentially correct. To carry out the mission,” continued Mraz, “the Mossad activated its thirty-six person assassination unit know as the ‘kidon.’ Funds were deposited into Swiss bank accounts for operatives to collect upon successful completion of their assignments. The unit was broken down into teams, which were highly compartmentalized. None of the teams knew about the existence of the others. The only thing they had in common was a shared point of contact, who was a senior Mossad agent.”

“Let me guess,” said Harvath. “Schoen?”

“The one and only. He was quite ingenious, eliminating the rank structure and encouraging his men to be creative in their assassinations. He gave his operatives anything they needed to get the job done. And he didn’t just want to kill his targets; he wanted the terrorists to experience the same terror that the Israeli athletes and their families had faced. He wanted terrorists everywhere to know that if they even thought about committing attacks on Israel, there was no place in the world where they would be safe from reprisals.

“We know that the Wrath of God operation was covertly controlled by the Mossad, but that Schoen operated with total autonomy, completely outside the Israeli government. We think this might be what they’re doing again.”

“If ever called on the carpet, Schoen could claim sole responsibility and provide them with plausible deniability,” said Harvath.

“Exactly. Though the Israeli government denies any connection with the Hand of God, because of Schoen’s history, we decided to take a closer look at him. Our sources think that he might be in this more for himself than for Israel, and that’s dangerous.”

“So Schoen’s got several reasons to hate the Arabs. What’s this have to do with us?”

“Everything. First of all, if the Israeli government is behind the Hand of God attacks, which we believe they are, they are throwing the Mideast into serious peril. Terrorism on any level is inexcusable, but Israel appears to be taking it to new heights and we cannot have that, especially not now. Not with the resurgence of the FRC.”

“I find it hard to believe that Abu Nidal has magically come back to life. I thought we had independent confirmation of his death,” said Harvath.

“As far as our intelligence is concerned, he is very much dead.”

“So who’s running the show, then? He’s not giving orders from beyond the grave.”

“You’d be surprised. Apparently, Abu Nidal had a son.”

“A son? How the hell did we miss that?”

“I don’t know, but believe me, we’re looking into it.”

“So, the old man passed the baton to his son,” said Harvath as he reached for his cup to take another sip of water. “What’s the connection with the men who kidnapped the president?”

“From what I have seen in the recent reports you filed, you figured it out yourself. Gerhard Miner only had so many men working with him that he could trust. There was no way he could spare any of them to facilitate the explosion in Lebanon that killed the Rapid Return team. So, he contracted it out.”

“And you’re saying he contracted it out to Abu Nidal’s son, who is now the new leader of the old man’s Fatah Revolutionary Council?”

“Yes. His name is Hashim. It means—”

“‘Crusher of evil,’ I know. I’ve studied Arabic,” said Harvath as he fought to process all the information he was getting. “So, Hashim Nidal is rebuilding his father’s organization?”

“Unfortunately, that’s the way it looks. And, he appears to be committed to the same objectives as his father—”

“Destroying any peace negotiations or settlements between the Israelis and the Palestinians and wiping out the State of Israel.”

“Bingo,” said Mraz.

“Then put him on your most-likely-to-bleed list and let Morrell or somebody take him out. The father was bad enough; who knows how much worse the son will be.”

“We couldn’t agree more, but there’s a slight hiccup in this case.”

“There’s always something. What is it?”

“We have no idea what Hashim Nidal looks like. No one that we know of has ever seen him and lived to tell about it.”

“Surely there’s got to be somebody?”

“Zip. Not even a good description.”

“You can’t locate some of his own people and turn them?” asked Harvath.

“The old man had money stashed everywhere, and as far as we know, it’s all being watched. The son, though, has apparently been able to get his hands on money from somewhere, whether it’s his father’s or someone else’s. It’s been enough to fire the organization back up. And apparently he pays very well. No one’s risking their necks or their salaries to talk to us.”

Harvath leaned back on his pillow and had a faraway look in his eyes as he rubbed his stubbled chin. “Schoen and I have both come across Nidal’s son,” he said.

“You’ve seen his face? Both of you?”

“No, not really. What we each saw were eyes. Silver eyes. The assassin in Macau who got to Jamek before we could, the one who took out Gerhard Miner in Switzerland, and the man who attacked Schoen in Israel, the same one he saw after the ambush in Lebanon, were all the same guy. It has to be Hashim Nidal.”

“Or someone working for him,” said Mraz.

“Regardless, I’ll bet our last two Lions either had met with Nidal’s son face-to-face or had enough sensitive information on him that they had to be silenced permanently,” replied Harvath.

“That would make sense, as would the boldness of those assassinations. We’ve already tied the son to a string of deadly terrorist attacks on different continents over the last year and a half. They’ve all been very bloody, very high risk operations. They make what the father did look like child’s play. And what’s worse, we’ve discovered that he’s managed to align several different Islamic terrorist organizations under his umbrella. Our people are projecting that left unchecked, his group will grow to become the largest and best organized we’ve ever encountered. After they light up Israel, who do you think their next target will be?”

“Us,” said Harvath, his tone grave.

“Just like dominoes,” replied Mraz.

“But that’s ridiculous. They’ve got to know that as Israel’s biggest ally we’d come to their aid.”

“I’m sure they do know that. And I’m sure they’re counting on it. The minute we step into Israel, we’re going to see unprecedented acts of terrorism against the United States.”