The First Order

by Jeff Abbott

  “The knife wound that appears to be missing,” Sam said, “is a cut throat.” Sam removed an RSID—a rapid stain identification—blood detection kit from the Pelican. He clipped off a bit of the fabric of the canvas, using a disposable scalpel from the kit, and applied the reagent to it. He stood and measured the canvas with his eye. Then he looked again at the screen of the smartphone, backed up the video. Stared again.

  “What is it?” Allen asked.

  “This canvas was on the floor in the video. It must have been over the plastic.” He moved to the opposite corner of the canvas and repeated the RSID blood test. “It’ll tell me in ten minutes if this is human blood,” he said.

  “Is there much doubt?” Allen asked.

  “Yes,” Sam said. “There is.” He sank to his knees by the grave, his face grimed with dirt. “He’s not here.”

  Seaforth glanced at Allen. “We have body bags in the copter. Would you please have the men bring two? We’ll bag them and then go. I don’t think we should stay much longer.”

  Allen stepped away and spoke into his mike. Two dead bodies, but clearly…one that was expected to be here wasn’t.

  They collected the bodies, zipping them into thick cadaver bags with fabric handles on the sides. Sam sealed them with tamper-resistant zipper pulls that would maintain a chain of custody. The grave, empty, looked forlorn. He looked at the RSID blood test results. One sample confirmed human blood; the other sample said it was not human blood. One man had bled on that canvas; another had bled fake blood.

  Zalmay was dead, and Sam’s brother wasn’t here.

  The execution video—at least Danny’s part—was a fake. Why did the extremists kill Zalmay, but not Danny? Why make the world think Danny Capra was dead?

  The soldiers were carrying the bodies toward the copter, Allen and Sam and Seaforth following, when the thud sounded behind them.

  Allen turned and saw it: an RPG-7 grenade, skidding across the dirt toward them. But it didn’t explode.

  The soldiers reacted as one, those not carrying the body bags raising their weapons and firing, calling out to each other, laying down suppressive rounds. Sam could see the militants, above the landing zone, trying to work their way down the jagged rocks above the village. They retreated as the Americans responded with force. The man holding the grenade launcher retreated behind a shelf of stone. The others were armed with old Kalashnikovs, sputtering and roaring.

  The men carrying the two body bags ran, drawing weapons, covered by the rest of the squadron. Allen started to shove Sam and Seaforth—they were civilians, after all—toward the chopper, covering them. Sam drew his Glock 9 millimeter.

  “Run, just run!” Allen ordered.

  The squad, Seaforth, and Sam clambered aboard the MI-8T. The copter lifted up from the dusty ground.

  “Missile!” the crew chief yelled and Sam saw flares streaming out from below the helicopter in case it wasn’t another RPG but a laser-guided weapon. But the flares would do nothing to protect against a rocket-propelled grenade. The copter veered violently in evasion, throwing Sam into Seaforth. The body bags, unsecured, slid hard along the floor. The silence was intense: no one screaming, every man bracing himself for the impact.

  And then crowding into Sam’s thoughts, his son’s smiling face. He closed his eyes.

  The evasion worked: the copter climbed hard, aimed west, and steadied. Allen took command, making sure every man was uninjured and had his gear. The copter appeared undamaged, but it would have to be thoroughly checked on arrival.

  “Just mountain punks,” Allen said to Sam and Seaforth. “They like to shoot at anything.” He sounded far calmer than he felt. “They know this isn’t a military copter. Our job is to get you back safely, and these bodies. Otherwise we might have stayed a bit longer, made some new friends.”

  Sam nodded and he and Seaforth secured the body bags. Sam kept his hand in his pocket. He had one more job to do.

  The boy watched the flares dissipate, the American copter speeding away. His uncle gathered the men. One was hurt, a bullet through the shoulder, but he would survive. They marched back to their own village in silence. At home the boy told his aunt of their adventure. She glanced at her husband.

  “We ran them off!” the boy said with glee.

  “They dug up bodies? Why?” the aunt asked.

  “Maybe their people,” the boy said.

  “Maybe,” his uncle said. He turned to the aunt. “Bring me the box in the cupboard. At the top.”

  She did and he opened it. A satellite phone, with instructions that had been left for him, a preprogrammed number to call, with an offer of money. The uncle put the phone in its charger and let it power up, and then he dialed the one number in it.

  In case anyone ever came to the village of ghosts, there was a man who wanted to know.

  The ride back to Bagram was quiet. Sam returned from the back of the helicopter, where he had excused himself to have a moment to gather his thoughts. He handed Seaforth a smartphone with a scuffed protective case. “Is this yours, Bob? I found it on the floor back there. You must have lost it during the evasion attempt.”

  “Oh, thanks,” Seaforth said. In the chaos he hadn’t noticed he didn’t have the phone in his pocket. He tucked it back into his jacket. Sam sank onto the seat next to him and clutched the Pelican backpack close to his chest, as if overwhelmed in thought.

  “Sam,” Seaforth whispered. “Your brother…”

  “My brother is alive,” Sam said. “The question is why? What did the Brothers of the Mountain hope to gain from faking his death? They needed the world to think he was dead.” They? Or Danny? The question stabbed at his heart.

  “Then they had a use for him.”

  Sam said nothing. The bullet marks in the wall. The latex shreds that looked like skin, the blood that maybe wasn’t blood, the clipped hair left behind on the floor. The elaborate heads straight from a special effects studio. A hard drive taken, without its laptop. A box of DVDs, proven to be blank, abandoned in a place that barely had electricity. But there had been a shipping label on the box. Mirjan Shah. It was a thread. The truth was hidden in these impossible clues. Forensics tests would tell him more.

  “If he’s alive, he let you think he was dead.” Seaforth could not imagine putting his family through that kind of hell.

  “Maybe he had a good reason,” Sam said.

  “I cannot imagine what that would be.”

  “I think one is Zalmay,” Sam said. “The other one… The clothing tag on the shirt is written in Russian. Why was a Russian here?”

  “Another captive? We’ll search the records, but I don’t recall Russians being taken at the time Zalmay and Danny were. The Russians stayed out of Afghanistan at that point. Maybe they were old clothes. Prisoners don’t get to choose what to wear.”

  “It’s odd his captors had Danny talk, isn’t it?” Sam said.

  “Why?”

  “Well, Zalmay was of Afghan descent. His family had fled Afghanistan, and then he’d returned with the conquering Americans. A traitor, right? A symbol they could have used. Yet they gagged him.” Sam stared at his feet. “You would think their ire, their hatred, would be at him. Not Danny.”

  Seaforth said, “A lot can happen in those weeks of captivity.”

  “I once spoke to a former CIA ops chief who claimed my brother’s execution wasn’t what it seemed to be. He said, and these are his exact words, ‘Your brother. In Afghanistan. Wasn’t a bunch of Taliban hash smugglers that killed him. It was a Nine Suns job. Initiation…’”

  “Nine Suns doesn’t exist anymore. It fell apart.” Nine Suns had once been a dangerous syndicate of top criminal bosses around the world, working together when needed for common purpose against law enforcement, the people behind the destruction of Sam’s life in the CIA, who had kidnapped his family and framed him for treason. Sam had—eventually—rescued his infant son from them and exacted a devastating revenge. “And that man was trying to cut a deal with you. H
e’d have told you any lie to get your cooperation.”

  Sam glanced at him and Seaforth said, “Yeah, I know about what you went through with certain rogue elements in the agency. I’m sorry.”

  “If you’re sorry, then help me, Bob. I want to talk to the analyst who was responsible for intelligence in this area during the time Danny and Zalmay were taken.”

  “She’s retired now. The Magpie—that was her nickname. Margaret Granger. She lives in New York now. I’ll ask her to meet with you. But what she shares with you, Sam…it remains confidential.”

  “Of course. Thank you.”

  “We’ll send the remains to my labs in New York; we’ll put a rush on them. I’ll escort the evidence there myself.” Bob Seaforth was the Eastern European chief for Special Projects, the shadowy division of the agency that Sam had once worked for. “I assume you’ll come with me?”

  “I’ll follow you in a day or so. I’m going to Budapest and then New York.”

  “Why Budapest?”

  “I have another lead there. I can keep working while you’re running tests. I can’t lose momentum on this.”

  Seaforth studied Sam. “You thought we might not find your brother’s body there, didn’t you? This isn’t a total surprise.”

  Sam said nothing.

  “We did you this favor, Sam, because we owed you and you brought us this new information. Exactly what kind of work are you doing now?”

  “I own some bars. I’m out of the spy game.”

  “But you got this village as the location. You found information. How?”

  “You don’t want to know. Truly.”

  “Hmmm.” Seaforth didn’t sound convinced. “But if your brother’s alive…” Seaforth’s voice was cold. “It might not be a happy family reunion. One wonders.”

  “Wonders what?”

  “What happened to Danny Capra here during his captivity. What he became. What they made him into. Why he wanted you, and the world, to think he was dead.”

  Sam had no answer; he stared out the window.

  When they landed, Allen told Sam he had to go file a report, since they had been fired upon. Seaforth told him he didn’t. There would be no report, not yet. After a moment Allen nodded and the squad headed back to their quarters. Allen stayed behind and offered Sam his hand. Sam shook it.

  “Whoever you’re looking for, Sam, I hope you find him. I can tell you can’t talk about it. But I wish you luck.”

  “Thanks. Where do you hail from, Sergeant?”

  “New York City. The Bronx.”

  “There’s a bar near Bryant Park, in Manhattan. The Last Minute. I own it. When you’re home you go there, ask for Bertrand, tell him Sam sent you. He’ll give you drinks on the house and if I’m there, and I often am, I’ll tell you the whole story. If I know it by then.”

  Allen nodded and walked toward the command post. Sam watched him go. And what story will you tell him? You have no idea how this will end—and you’re not even sure how it begins.

  4

  Long Island

  THE NEXT MORNING, Judge followed his two targets from JFK Airport to a small town on Long Island’s interior, quiet, moneyed. He would have liked more time to study them and their habits before striking, but Mrs. Claybourne had insisted he come back from Copenhagen early, before the Germans arrived, presumably to make this grandiose offer of the Morozov hit. And the money was good for dealing with these two targets. The two men stopped in front of a small German-themed bakery on the town’s main street. Judge watched them drive down the street; he didn’t follow. They turned onto the street that led toward the address Mrs. Claybourne had given him.

  He turned the opposite way on the street, in his mirror seeing the men walk into the house with their pastry box.

  He parked one street over, in front of a house under heavy renovation. The work crew was not on duty. That would not raise suspicion, a car close to a house where a contractor or a new owner might be visiting.

  He walked past the residence; it was a nice, large house and it made Judge wonder if the neighbors knew how the targets had paid for the hardwoods, the vaulted ceilings, the elaborate stone walkway.

  In the window he could see them talking, laughing, glad that their travel was over. One glancing over his shoulder, toward the back of the house, laughing again. Answering someone. Judge stepped back where he couldn’t be seen. Placed his earbud in his ear, dialed Mrs. Claybourne.

  “Problem?”

  “I think there’s another person in the target house. Aborting.”

  “Do not abort.”

  “It could be an innocent.”

  “There are no innocents in that house. Do not abort. There are three targets. You will be paid accordingly.”

  Why didn’t she warn him of this before? He felt anger well up in him and he pushed it down. Do the job.

  Inside the house he could hear loud chatting, gestures: they were talking European soccer.

  He slid a lock pick into the back door. Mrs. Claybourne had gotten him the house plans from an archived web page from when it had been sold months ago. There was a mudroom, then a laundry room, then the large, expansive den where the targets waited, and to the right was a big kitchen. He could smell coffee brewing. The other person, if there was one, was in the kitchen.

  He pulled a woolen mask from his pocket and lowered it over his face.

  The door opened. No alarm sounded. He slid the lock pick back into his pocket and pulled out his suppressor-capped gun. He went into the mudroom, tidy, scented of cleanser. Then the laundry room. It smelled of soap and mint. The washer rumbled. Laundry from their travels already being done.

  Laughter from the den, the murmur of television.

  He stepped into the den. The first target had his back to the room, watching a recorded soccer match on the television. In the kitchen, a woman’s voice asked, in German, “Boys, do you want any more coffee?”

  And the two men both said, “Nein” as one, in bored voices, the way that brothers might, although Judge knew they were not brothers.

  The second target glanced over, saw Judge, and opened his mouth to speak.

  Judge fired, drilling a 9-millimeter bullet an inch behind the man’s ear, another through the neck. The other target had risen and turned, and Judge hit another sweet spot, the medulla oblongata. He fell before he could even scream.

  Six seconds, relatively quiet. The soccer game was punctuated by cheering for a goal.

  Silence from the kitchen. Caution made him position himself off the entrance to the kitchen, against the wall. He saw the gun first, as she headed through; she must have kept a weapon in the kitchen. Well, they were hired killers. Why not?

  He grabbed the gun—it was cold, as if it had been in the freezer—and yanked her forward, hammering a blow on the side of her head. She sprawled on the couch, whirling to face him. Eyes wide in shock, but not frozen with fear.

  “I’ll do the job,” she said in English. She repeated it, first in perfect Russian, and then in German.

  He froze.

  “I’ll do the job,” she repeated. “I’ll find others who are willing to tackle it.”

  He stared at her, not answering. He heard the ever-polite tones of Mrs. Claybourne: We approached another professional assassin. She and her team thoroughly studied the situation, but she could not see a way to it being done.

  This wasn’t just a hit. It was housekeeping.

  “The job?” he said. “Morozov.”

  “Yes. OK, look, I’ll do it. I’ll do it for half the price.”

  “I’m not in charge of negotiations,” he said. “What’s your name?”

  “Marianne.”

  He’d heard rumors of her. German killer for hire, known for training younger men and women as her backup team, then taking a cut of their earnings when they went solo for the first five years. She supposedly called her charges her “kids.” Never arrested. She was too good.

  “The job is difficult, but I’ll find a way,” s
he said. “I have all the research still on my laptop.”

  He glanced toward the laptop, on the coffee table, and she hurled herself toward one of the men. He didn’t hesitate; he shot her, once. She sprawled, her furious expression slackening. He checked her for a pulse—gone—then searched the man she’d reached toward. He had a Glock in his belt.

  This was what happened if you declined the world’s most dangerous job. You declined to live.

  He called Mrs. Claybourne back and touched his earpiece. “It’s done.” He removed his mask.

  “Three?”

  “Three.”

  “There’s a laptop there. Retrieve it for me,” she said.

  “I’ve decided I’ll take the big job.” He walked out of the back of the house with the laptop, jumped into the neighbor’s backyard, and went out onto the street toward his car.

  “I’ll tell Firebird that you’re a go,” she said. “Crack the laptop. There should be information there that’s useful to you.” She paused. “I hope you have a better imagination than Marianne and her team.”

  He hung up.

  I need to know who Firebird is, he thought. I need to be able to protect myself better than Marianne and her assistants. His hands were steady as he put them on the steering wheel to head back to Brooklyn.

  Back at the small apartment Mrs. Claybourne kept for him in Brooklyn, he turned on the news. There was no report yet of a triple homicide in Long Island. Marianne’s team probably did not socialize at all with the neighbors. The bodies might not be found for days. He left the news on. In case the story broke quickly, in case someone had seen him leaving in the morning quiet.

  He showered, came out and watched twenty more minutes of news that did not mention the killings, then crawled into bed and slept for a few hours.

  He awoke. The decision, now made, energized him. He could do this. He would.

  He opened up the stolen laptop. It was passworded. He powered up his own laptop, plugged in a flash drive loaded with a password cracker, and modified its parameters to include variants of German words. He slipped the flash drive into the stolen laptop’s port and let the cracking program begin to batter against its defenses. He made a late lunch, an omelet and hash browns and strong coffee. He finished eating and sat on the bed and began to think hard on the kernel of the idea he’d gotten when he’d left The Last Minute. Julius Caesar. Morozov. He closed his eyes. He sat in total silence. He felt no urge to talk or check his phone or surf the Internet or watch TV. His stillness was remarkable and frightening.