by Brad Taylor
Nassir looked up, and Haider held a finger in the air, saying, “He can do it.”
“Okay. I’ll send you the instructions. Make sure he doesn’t screw it up like your other friend. I don’t mind if he kills himself, but only after the meeting.”
Haider started to respond, then realized his father had hung up.
Khalid said, “Well, any news about Ahmed?”
Haider shook his head, hoping Khalid couldn’t see through the lie, knowing he would break down and do something potentially insane. He was caught between the fear of failing his father and Khalid’s actions, which would most certainly cause that failure. “No, but there’s other news. Our contact from the Islamic State is arriving in Crete tomorrow night. We need to pass him his travel documents there.”
Khalid said, “Who is this man? Why are we helping him? Keeping it secret is unlike you. This never happened in Afghanistan.”
Haider said, “I’m sorry, but my father insisted. I’ll tell you soon, but not now. Not until I’ve met Secretary Billings.”
Khalid snorted, and Nassir said, “Have the man come here.”
Haider drew himself up and said, “He’s going to Crete on a refugee boat, acting as one of them. He can’t redirect the boat. It’s done.” He pulled out a key from his pocket and said, “Nassir, I need you to get the documents, then go to the capital, Heraklion. I’ll send you the specifics over email when I get them.”
“How am I going to get to Crete?”
Haider smiled. “My father has a yacht lined up. It’s an overnight trip to Heraklion. You should enjoy it.”
Nassir smiled, until Khalid said, “Like Ahmed?”
Haider started to respond, then thought better of it. He said, “Go.”
He watched Nassir disappear, passing by another man Haider recognized. It was Nikos Andreas, a black-market thug working with one of the Greek crime families in Athens, and was the man who’d provided the forged documents.
Haider waved, then stood up and stuck out his hand, saying, “Nikos, how are you?”
Nikos sat down, ignoring the gesture. “I’m not sure. You have the money?”
Haider withdrew his hand and followed suit. He held out another key and said, “Same box. Same bank. All of the money you asked for.”
Nikos took the key, looking it over as if for something hidden, and said, “You told me the identification was for refugees. For people fleeing the chaos in Libya and Syria. Is this still true?”
Haider felt a bead of sweat on his neck, cool in the night air. “Yes, of course.”
Nikos smiled and said, “Then why is there an American watching this meeting?”
23
Down the slope of the sprawling tavern, at a table tucked behind a tree, Guy George picked at his own meal, going from elation to confusion upon the arrival of the fourth man. Up the hill above him, among tourists eating their mussels and musing about the Acropolis, had sat the final three faces on his target package, all together. Absolute proof he was correct about the conspiracy of his brother’s death, and justification for the killing he’d done in Key West.
He’d learned the location of just one face from the target package—Haider al-Attiya—and had to apply significant pressure to the man in the Key West restroom to get it. It hadn’t been easy, and he hated himself for the action, both because of what he’d done and the fact that a small part of him enjoyed it.
He’d seen enough horrific debasement of humanity in the search for “truth” during combat to know what he’d done had the chance of being nothing but sadistic satisfaction, the man telling him whatever he thought would stop the pain.
The carnage he’d inflicted still ripped through his psyche, a permanent scar. He wasn’t a pipe-swinger like the men in foreign countries he’d seen use the techniques. Once, now long past, he’d been the soldier who broke up such things. Prevented his cause from being tainted with the very offal the enemy used.
Now he was that enemy.
When the man’s essence had fled his carcass, a part of Guy’s mind knew he’d crossed over, stepping past an invisible line that separated the righteous from the despicable. He’d shoved that part to the rear, listening to his brother’s Pandora station and telling himself he was in the right. But deep down not believing it.
Seeing the men at the table above him brought vindication. A half step to redemption. He’d considered walking away right then, taking his digital photos and voice recordings with him. He could provide that to the Taskforce and turn them loose, but he knew he wouldn’t. He’d have to admit to killing the man in Key West, and that, without sanction, was murder. Regardless, he was sure the Taskforce would not respond. Policy trumped blood. He’d already witnessed that, and he would never be forgiven. He was, to use a phrase, a dead man walking, and he was comfortable with the thought. His brother deserved what he could do, and his sacrifice would be worth it.
But not before he killed the three at the table.
He’d watched one of the men leave, then checked the level of his homemade audio-capture device, using an Android app and a directional microphone plugged into the micro USB port of his phone, and saw that the noise pickup wasn’t nearly as strong as he’d wanted. When he’d returned his eyes to the table, he saw the fourth man arrive. A man he knew as Nikos.
Which was significant trouble.
In Key West, Guy had gleaned the one anchor point he needed—the Athenaeum InterContinental Hotel in Athens—and had immediately flown to Greece, successfully testing his new identity and credit cards. Before beginning surveillance on the hotel, he needed two things: technical equipment and weapons.
The tech stuff he’d managed to build off-the-shelf from a trip to a hobby store, a security boutique, and an electronics shop. It wasn’t Taskforce sleek, but he’d managed to develop a crude beacon, surreptitious camera, a beam-focused digital recorder, and various cell phone exploit tools. None of the devices was as powerful or compact as the state of the art he could have drawn from the Taskforce, but they’d get the job done, as the commercial sector grew ever closer to the surveillance world that was once an elite domain of governments.
The weapons, on the other hand, were a whole different kettle of fish. No way could he buy guns on the open market. He’d had to turn to a different source, and risk exposure by doing so.
He’d called a CIA case officer he knew was working in Greece. She was an old girlfriend of his roommate, Decoy, and she’d kept in touch with him after Decoy’s death, calling him for dinner whenever they were both in DC. She still didn’t know whom he worked for, only that it was beyond her classification level, but in her world, she knew better than to ask. What really mattered was that she was now posted to the US Embassy in Athens. And she trusted him, something he intended to leverage.
As much as the congressional intelligence committees wanted the CIA to deal solely with upstanding individuals, the work of intelligence necessitated stepping into the cesspool of humanity from time to time, and while the portfolio of the Athens station would include terrorism, it was focused more intently on the internal struggles of Greece. The euro crisis, political strife, and yes, organized crime.
They’d had lunch, he hinting he was operational and she beating around the bush about her own work. Eventually, he’d asked the favor, and using contacts she had, believing Guy was doing good for the United States, she’d set up a meeting with Nikos later that first night.
After a myriad of security precautions, both on his part and Nikos’s, he’d paid hard cash for a beat-up 6P9 pistol—a Russian weapon based on the Makarov, with an integral suppressor that could be broken down for travel—and a box of 9x18 ammunition. It would be enough to get him through the mission, but he wasn’t sure about the function of either, the weapon old and worn, the bluing rubbed clean in several spots, and the cardboard box of ammunition looking as if it had been moved from location to loc
ation for years without use.
After the transfer, they’d conducted their security dance and had parted ways, and he’d never expected to see Nikos again. But now he was here, meeting Guy’s targets. Which, from what he’d seen at last night’s meeting, meant Nikos had put the entire restaurant under surveillance at least an hour before. There was no way he didn’t know Guy was here. The only question was whether he thought Guy was a danger.
Guy knew the answer to that. Coincidence was a luxury neither believed in. If the roles were reversed, Guy would assume he was a threat, and would have actively prepared to neutralize that threat.
The biggest concern now was remaining anonymous from the other two men at the table. Guy had no idea why Nikos had arrived, and really didn’t care. Nikos didn’t know his name, but he did know what Guy looked like.
Before Nikos could point him out or do something else to expose him, he rose, shoving his equipment into a fanny pack, and throwing way more euros on the table than necessary. He slipped to the left, getting behind a tree and surveying quickly, regretting not bringing the pistol with him. He’d bought it purely for offensive action, and never thought he’d become the hunted.
Behind him was a cut-stone staircase leading sharply down the hill, the drop to the steps about fifteen feet. To his front was the regular exit of the restaurant, leading straight by the target’s table.
Staircase it is.
He swiftly turned, strode to the stone wall that prevented drunkards from falling, and flipped over the side. He hung for a brief second, hearing a gasp from two pedestrians, then dropped.
He hammered the ground hard, one foot high, one low, rolling on his ankle. He glanced up and saw a couple, the woman with her mouth covered, and ignored them both. He skipped down the steps two at a time, seeing the flow of pedestrians on the street below.
Plaka, he knew, was an ancient neighborhood devoid of vehicles. An area made of twisting streets, tourist shops, and claustrophobic alleys, the only thing that penetrated the pedestrian throngs were minibikes and mopeds. He had to get to a taxi, and he needed to get out of Plaka to do so.
He glanced up the stairwell and saw two men appear, both with black leather jackets and beards. Not tourists. They began to follow.
Because of the way their own meeting had been arranged, Nikos had to assume he was official US government, but Guy had no idea how much weight that would carry.
He hit the road below and turned right, toward Syntagma Square and the coughing, congested streets of Athens.
24
Guy glanced back and saw the two rushing down the stairs, the shallow glow of the mercury lamps making them seem simian, their glide anything but innocent.
He darted into the crowd on the street, putting innocents between him and his predators. Walking quickly, he went through his options and decided that getting to Syntagma Square was his best alternative. They were pipe-swingers, no doubt, but they weren’t official muscle. They had to worry about the authorities just as he did, so wouldn’t attempt to harm him outright in the crowds. If he stuck to the main thoroughfares and stayed ahead of them, before they could present a threat, he could get out.
He wound down the hill, skipping past bars and restaurants, losing altitude and gaining confidence. He reached a T intersection, momentarily lost but knowing that downhill was safety. To his left he saw two policemen on BMW motorcycles, sitting on their saddles and smoking cigarettes, the deserted cobblestone road looking as if it had been built by Socrates. Just beyond them was an alley between apartments, which went sharply downhill.
Perfect. They wouldn’t do anything in the presence of the police, and might decide not even to follow him down the alley. He drew abreast, and one policeman sat upright. Guy felt a stab of adrenaline but kept his pace. The other turned toward him, talking into a radio. The first drew his weapon and shouted in Greek.
Jesus. They co-opted the police? How did they manage that?
He took off at a dead sprint, hearing the crack of a round just as he hit the narrow defilade leading downhill. He heard the motorcycles rev and knew he was in trouble. Not only from the motorcycles but from the radios the policemen held, and their knowledge of the terrain. And the fact that someone had called them to begin with.
He ran down the hill through the flickering moonlight and sparse vapor bulbs, realizing he’d channelized himself. He saw a splash of light on the cobblestones in front of him, his shadow in the middle, and knew the bikes were now behind him. He started looking for something to stop them. He saw nothing.
He reached another street and went right, running up the asphalt until another alley opened on the left, going straight downhill almost as steep as a staircase. He could see the lights of the main shopping area below and knew he was close to the endless traffic and taxicabs. Close to freedom.
He bounded down the narrow lane, moving so quickly that he could barely maintain his balance, seeing the flat ground of a street below, a market full of pedestrians beyond. He heard the motorcycles behind him, their headlights bouncing over him, and doubled his pace. He was within thirty meters of breaking into the crowds when three men appeared out of the moonlight, running up the alley straight at him.
Nothing remained but to fight.
They came at him as a pack, intent on preventing him from reaching the safety of the street, each dependent on the courage of the man to his left or right.
Guy had no such crutch.
The first reached him and swung a section of bicycle chain at his head. Guy caught the movement and ducked under, looping his arm over the man’s elbow and torquing his right leg behind the man’s knee. He swept his leg back and slammed him into the ground with his shoulder, hard enough to cause a dull thump from the skull. Not even registering the victory, he whipped backward with his left leg, catching the next assailant in the gut as he continued forward.
Guy heard the air leave the man’s lungs as he turned to the final target, but he was moving too slow. The attacker swung a wicked fish priest, a short club with the head encased in metal, hammering him in the shoulder. The steel hit the brachial nerve near his collarbone, rendering his left side momentarily useless. Guy dropped to his knees, a panic for survival flooding him as the second attacker recovered from the kick.
The men leapt at him, Guy seeing both flash in a strobe effect of the bouncing headlights from the oncoming bikes, like something from a seventies disco. The man with the club swung, and Guy rolled to the right, putting his back to the rough-hewn stone of the alley and hearing the metal strike rock, seeing it cast sparks. He protected his left and lashed out with his right, throwing a cross with his full weight behind it. The man’s head whipped sideways, slamming into the rock wall. He crumpled to the ground as the final man approached.
Guy saw the motorcycles gingerly bouncing down the narrow lane, getting closer, the lights bobbing as if they were on stalks. He said, “I got no beef with you. Let me go. Tell Nikos this is a mistake.”
The man drew up and Guy saw his size for the first time. Easily over six feet, with a wide girth and a bearded, acne-scarred face. In broken English, he pointed at the man with the fractured skull and said, “You missed the chance.”
Hands to his front, the motorcycles still approaching, Guy’s face curled into a death mask. “I don’t have time for this shit. Bring it, you fuck.”
The man did and, in the instant before he died, realized that size alone had nothing to do with the fight. He swung a bar-fight roundhouse, and Guy ducked under, pounding the man’s right kidney with two deep strikes as he rotated behind him. The man screamed and Guy grabbed his hair, jerking him off balance. The target flailed his arms and tumbled backward like a felled tree. Guy dropped to a knee, controlling the head as the body fell, and the target’s neck landed just above Guy’s kneecap. There was a crack, and the man was dead, his own weight having done the damage.
Guy let the man rol
l off his knee just as the first motorcycle reached him, the officer shouting from his bike but unable to engage with his weapon without losing control. Guy leapt down the alley, straight into the flea markets surrounding the Acropolis grounds.
Ignoring the stares from the myriad of tourists, he kept running until his lungs felt on fire, trying to remember the map he’d studied earlier. Trying to remember where Syntagma Square was, now that he was on level ground and free.
He stayed near Acropolis Park, cutting through musicians playing for euros and couples looking for romance, finally hitting the iron fence that surrounded the Acropolis itself. The sight brought him renewed courage, as he knew there were taxis at the entrance.
He saw the Acropolis Museum and realized he was close. Just a couple hundred meters to freedom. He cut into a path in the trees and picked up the pace, the fence to his right and the pedestrian street to his left. Ahead, he saw the circle for the entrance, people still milling about even at this hour. He saw the line of taxis and darted out of the trees just as two police motorcycles hit the circle from the city side, tires squealing as they hammered the brakes. They were followed by two more from his rear, the original hunters, who hit him with their lights.
He heard the shouts, the ones from the rear redirecting the new pair to his presence. With no other alternative, he turned into the park, running blindly, desperate to separate himself from the advantage of their motorcycles.
He heard the rev of engines behind him and felt the fear. The park was wide open, threaded with roads, and it was empty. He knew eventually he’d hit the same eight-foot iron fence and wouldn’t be able to get over it before they hit him. Even if he did, he would be in the Acropolis. He would be nothing more than a corralled animal, lashing out until he felt the spear.
He ran on, the motorcycles’ lights bouncing around him, his panic building. To his front, a hill of granite appeared. A giant, imposing knoll of stone with an iron staircase and some plaque that he wouldn’t read even if he could in the dark. All he knew was that it was a break from the motorcycles.