by Vince Flynn
He had sat through countless interrogations and had never lost a single subject. Rickman’s methods, and those of his colleagues, were a bit more clinical, though. Before an interrogation started they met and put a script in place. What questions were to be asked and what methods they would use to inflict pain. Rickman was never one to get his hands dirty, of course. He didn’t even like his people getting their hands dirty. That was why he was such a big fan of electricity. It was nice and clean. No blood to mop up when everything was done. His team appreciated it as well, as they were the ones who had to clean up the room. It wasn’t as if you could grab a janitor and bring him to the secure detention facility to clean up the blood from a rough session that in the eyes of some of his fellow countrymen was blatantly illegal.
Rickman’s captors were obviously less concerned about the mess. The people in this part of the world were far more accepting of torture. In a sense, these animals had followed their version of a script. They had spared his feet and genitals and, for the most part, had slapped rather than punched him in the head. Most of the beating had been inflicted with a rubber hose and open palms, methods that were designed to elicit pain without causing life-threatening injury. At least that’s what he kept telling himself as each blow landed. Even during the height of the beating, Rickman had kept a careful inventory of where and how they were hitting him. Fortunately, they had restrained themselves from striking him in the head too many times. Other than a heart attack, the easiest way to lose a subject during interrogation was to create hemorrhaging in the brain.
Rickman tried his eyes again and got one of them partially open. The eyelid fluttered to life to reveal his dank surroundings. He was in a cellar of some sort with a dirt floor. White sheets were draped along the walls. His hosts had spray-painted the word Infidel in black across one of the sheets. They had made sure to follow their script while filming his beating and kept the word Infidel in the frame just behind him.
The place reeked of urine. That was the first thing Rickman thought of when they’d brought him here, and he was repulsed by it. He was a neat freak and the idea of being held captive in such a foul place gave him almost as much anxiety as the impending session. After the beating started, however, the smell quickly became the least of his problems. And now he cared even less, since he was pretty sure he’d added to the potpourri during his beating.
Rickman tried to lift his head, but it hurt too much, so he lay there and tried to take an inventory of his pain. Nearly every inch of his body was aching, but there were a few areas that stood out. Chief among them were his ribs. He was pretty sure a few of them were broken or at a bare minimum bruised. The majority of the session had been conducted with Rickman’s arms strung above his head to some contraption on the ceiling—his flanks exposed to the brutal blows. Even when they weren’t beating him, his shoulders screamed with pain as if they were going to be ripped from their sockets.
Rickman gathered the strength to roll from his side onto his back. He winced as shards of pain shot through his rib cage. Slowly he turned his head toward the door. The video camera was mounted on a tripod. The red light under the lens told him it was still recording. That was good. Record all of it, for all he cared. He heard movement and voices outside the door. Rickman tensed with the anticipation that the beating would begin again. The door opened, throwing more light into the room. The man turned off the camera and stood over Rickman. He was wearing a gray knee-length shirt with gray baggy trousers that the locals called Perahan Tunban. He squatted and held a bottle of water to Rickman’s swollen lips.
“It will go much easier if you tell them what they want to know. It doesn’t have to be like this.”
“I guess I’m into pain. What can I tell you?”
The man frowned and shook his head in a sad manner. After a long moment he fished a bottle of pills from his pocket and took off the cap. He tapped out two pills into the palm of his hand and then shoved them one by one into Rickman’s mouth. “These will help.”
Rickman tried to spit them out, but the man covered his mouth with his hand and said, “Don’t be a fool.”
A little bit of water and the pills slid right down. The man stood and walked back to the door. He opened it and waved another man in. The new man was carrying a small black bag.
It occurred to Rickman that he was a doctor. That was a good sign. His captors were taking this seriously. The man dropped to one knee next to Rickman and placed a stethoscope against his chest. After that he slapped on a blood pressure cuff and then dilated both eyes with a penlight. After no more than two minutes the doctor announced that he was strong enough to resume the interrogation.
The doctor left, two new men entered the room, masks pulled on to conceal their faces. The camera was turned back on and the man in the baggy gray pants nodded for the two men to continue. A rope ran through a pulley on the ceiling and was tied to Rickman’s wrists. The two men yanked on the rope and pulled Rickman into a standing position.
“This time you will answer my questions . . . yes.”
Rickman looked at the man through his one good eye and spat a glob of blood into his face. The beating commenced immediately. Strangely, the blows didn’t hurt as much this time. He told himself to stay strong. It wouldn’t be much longer. It couldn’t be, or he might die, and he doubted these men would want that. Discipline was paramount.
CHAPTER 12
KABUL, AFGHANISTAN
EVERYONE made mistakes. It was how you handled them that counted. Own up to them, make a few adjustments, and move on. At least that was the way Rapp had been taught. Anything short of that was counterproductive, self-serving, and typically dishonest. Rapp didn’t like having his time wasted under normal circumstances, but in a crisis like this it unnerved him when people couldn’t at least set aside their issues, grab a bucket of water, and help put the damn fire out. Act like Sickles and deny that a mistake had been made and that little pressure cooker inside Rapp’s head got so hot he became explosive.
There was a distinct possibility that Rapp might break the station chief’s jaw and Nash knew it. He also couldn’t blame him, but at this point it might or might not solve their problems. There were certain guys at Langley who were old-school and would be more than willing to take a beating if it saved them from being dragged back to Langley, but Sickles wasn’t one of them. He would love nothing more at this point than to claim victimhood, and Nash couldn’t allow that to happen.
Rapp stopped outside the secure door that led to the CIA’s suite of embassy offices. He looked at Nash and said, “Tell me again why you think we need him.”
“He knows these people. He’s worked with Rick for the last two years. He has to have some info we could use. We ship him back to Langley and he’s going to become significantly less cooperative.”
“I don’t give a shit. We ship him back to Langley and he’ll realize real quick I’m not the only one who’s pissed at him. His career is over unless he gets some religion real quick, and even then I’d stuff him in some cubicle.”
Before Nash could respond, Coleman approached and said, “Hubbard called. He talked to that veterinarian in J-Bad.”
“And?”
“The vet says he never put the dog down. Told Hub he couldn’t figure out what was wrong with it, so he referred Rick to another vet here in Kabul. Better animal hospital.”
“So was Hub wrong or misinformed?”
“I’m not sure I understand.”
“He told us the dog was put down by a vet in Jalalabad. Did Rick tell him that or did he just assume?”
“I don’t know.”
“Get him on the phone. I want to talk to him.” Rapp pivoted and faced Nash. “You’ve got about a minute to convince me. We need to be out there, not in here. We need to be kicking down the door of every scumbag we can find and maybe if we get a whiff that Iran is behind this, we need to return the favor.”
“I’m as pissed at him as you are. He broke our first rule. He forgot who he
works for. It’s not State . . . it’s us. But you said it yourself. The clock is ticking. This trail is going colder by the second and let’s face it . . . Rick’s got the brains, not the brawn. If he hasn’t already broken it won’t take much longer. We need Darren to give us everything now. Not two or three days from now when he’s back at Langley and Irene finally makes him see what a jackass he’s been.”
Rapp didn’t like it, but Nash was right. “Then put all the cards on the table and give him two clear choices: He either gets his shit together and remembers which team he plays for or he’s done. This is his last chance.”
Nash nodded and said, “I think you should be the one to deliver that message.”
Before Rapp could reply, Coleman handed him the phone. “Hub . . . did Rick tell you that he had Ajax put down by the vet down there in Jalalabad or did you just assume he did?” Rapp listened as Hubbard relayed his answer and then said, “Text me the info on the vet here in Kabul. I’m going to have a talk with him.” Rapp handed the phone back to Coleman and before he could return to the problem of Darren Sickles, Nash asked a question of his own.
“What was that all about?”
Rapp wasn’t about to go into his suspicions. Not until he had more information. “I’m just trying to run down a few leads. Darren is all yours. I need to get out of this building or I’m going to commit some serious violence.”
“Give me five minutes,” Nash begged, holding up the fingers on his right hand.
“No. I’m sick of talking. I need to get back out there.”
“A vet . . . what in the hell is he going to tell you?”
“Don’t worry about me. Focus on Darren and those other idiots. We’ve got more people coming in,” Rapp checked his watch, “about three hours from now. They need to hit the ground running and that means you have to put a game plan together for them.”
Nash’s face soured. “Who said I was the office manager?”
“It goes along with your fancy new title. You’re the senior man on the ground, so you get to stay here and babysit everyone while we go kick down some doors and knock a few heads.”
“This is bullshit.”
Rapp smiled. “You’re a national hero. We can’t afford to lose you.”
“More bullshit,” Nash barked. “You were there, too. In fact, you were the crazy son of a bitch who rushed those guys with nothing more than a pistol.”
“Shhhhh,” Rapp said with a finger over his mouth. “That’s classified information.” He laughed and then said to Coleman, “Get the boys saddled up.”
“You want to travel light or in force?”
“Light . . . just you, me, Joe, and Reavers. And none of that MRAP shit.” Rapp started to walk with Coleman at his side. “Find us an old beat-up sedan.”
Nash was genuinely conflicted as he watched Rapp and Coleman walk down the long hallway. It pained him to not be included in stuff like this. He had officially become a paper pusher and it killed him. It made his wife a great deal happier, and in light of the fact that he had four kids, one of whom was still in diapers, it was probably a good idea to hang up his spurs, but God, he missed it.
CHAPTER 13
THE assassin had killed eighty-seven of his fellow human beings. At least that was how many he had specifically tallied. There were likely a few more, bodyguards and such, who died later from injuries suffered at his hands. So he reasoned the number could be as high as one hundred, but the official tally stood at eighty-seven. Many of those kills he was proud of, nasty people who were creating pain and destruction in their lust for power or profit. There were also more than a few that he knew he’d answer to his maker for. Most of those came early in his career before he’d honed his skills and become more selective. Some were mistakes, and some were a simple lack of experience. He’d used his hands, wires, knives, and poison, but most often he used a gun or a rifle. There were a few regrettable times when he’d employed explosives, which were extremely effective, but unruly in the sense that the odds for collateral damage increased dramatically.
He was good at killing. Too good, really, and that was what brought about his near downfall. You didn’t get good in this line of work from a lack of confidence, but you could definitely end up dead from an overabundance of belief in your abilities. After thirteen years in the business he learned that there were certain times when you needed to say no—sometimes for no reason other than the fact that you’d said yes too many times. The challenge to test your abilities and the money were incredible motivators, and he’d found himself competing to be the best. Increasingly, he needed to take the most difficult jobs, so he could prove to himself that he had no peer. It was stupid, really, as if there would one day be an awards ceremony for the greatest assassin of the last decade.
Eventually his ego and an extremely big payday put him on a collision course with mortality. That one job had changed everything. It had made him wiser. He was still confident, but he was also keenly aware of his weaknesses and the fact there were others out there who were every bit as talented as he was, and even a few who were better. The last and final piece was perhaps the most difficult to judge. By necessity, he never met his employers. He didn’t want them to know what he looked like, and if they had any brains they knew it was best not to reveal themselves to a world-class killer. This type of arrangement necessitated a middleman who was able to negotiate contracts and make sure that payments were made on time. He had used three such individuals over the years. The first two were dead—one of natural causes, the other from a bullet to the back of the head while he was taking a leisurely stroll through El Retiro Park in Madrid. The Spaniard, it turned out, didn’t fully embrace the confidential aspect of their work, and it didn’t help that he was stealing money from him.
His agent for the last two-plus years had been a Russian, and up until this point things had gone smoothly. This current contract was beginning to take on the stench of a job that he should have declined. Separate the most obvious problem, which was the target, and he was left with a bevy of red flags. Chief among them, his employer was showing himself to be a control freak. Just in the last few hours the anonymous employer had provided information that left him to wonder who he might be. It was natural to wonder such things in this line of work, but more often than not, there was a simple motivation. This one was beginning to feel different. The mystery man was feeding him with information that could be provided only by someone on the inside. In the assassin’s mind, that distinctly raised the possibility that he was being watched. The anonymous employer was now calling the shots at a level the assassin did not like. This employer was a puppet master who thought he needed to pull the assassin’s strings, as if the assassin was an amateur. After revealing that the target was none other than Mitch Rapp, a bellman delivered a large manila envelope that contained an address, a map, a key, and specific instructions on when and how he was to take the shot. The assassin was at first offended. He was the professional, after all. If this employer was so good at this, he should come and take the shot himself.
The assassin checked his ego, however, and for the moment was willing to explore what was increasingly feeling like a contract that fell outside his normal risk parameters. One voice inside his head, the one that was ruled by common sense, was telling him to go to the airport and leave the country immediately. If he was being watched, though, this could cause a problem. The other voice inside his head, the one that could sometimes get him to overextend himself, was telling him this was far too exciting to walk away from. For the moment, curiosity and the large payday got the best of him.
He retrieved his alias passport from the hotel safe with a matching credit card and cash as well as other worn forms of ID that any seasoned customs agent would expect to find in a fortyish man’s wallet. He donned a pair of cargo pants, hiking boots, field shirt, and light gray North Face vest. Into the left cargo pocket of his pants he slid a Kershaw Black Blur folding knife in the event that he needed to discreetly kill someone.
Next came what he considered his lifeline, should things go drastically bad. He laid his specially designed backpack down on the bed and went over his gear. Inside was an FNH 5.7 single-action, auto-loading pistol. He’d fired virtually every handgun known to man, and in the hands of a trained marksman there was no better pistol to carry into a gunfight, for three reasons: The first was the low recoil of the weapon, the second was the twenty-round magazine capacity, and the third was its unique 5.7x28mm round, which was capable of defeating all but the best body armor. The pistol had a short suppressor attached to the end and three extra magazines. The pack also contained two M84 stun grenades with timers, which he’d learned could come in very handy should he need a distraction to complete his job.
The backpack itself was the most impressive piece of equipment. It was made out of ballistic fabric and with the quick pull of a zipper and the yank of a handle he could pull half of the backpack over his head, where it would rest on his chest. With a few swift moves that took no longer than two seconds, the backpack became a bulletproof tactical vest with his pistol and his other much-needed tools readily available on his chest. He hooked a fanny pack around his waist. Inside was a second lens for his digital camera and a subcompact 9mm Beretta with a two-inch suppressor on the end.
The rest of his gear was thrown into a generic black carry-on bag. He was always careful about what he touched, so it didn’t take more than five minutes to wipe down the room. The hotel was filled with security cameras, and he wouldn’t be surprised if the embassy had real-time access to those cameras. There was absolutely no doubt that his image would be captured, and as much as he didn’t like it, there wasn’t a thing he could do to prevent it from happening.