by Brad Thor
He hadn’t thought much about it at the time. Probably because he didn’t feel “different.” He figured everyone else felt the way that he did. The whole “It’s a dirty job, but somebody’s got to do it” thing.
But people did feel different. Not all of them, but enough. Not long ago, he remembered a colleague saying, “While most of us are trying to come up with a plan on how to get out, you’re trying to figure out how to stay in.”
It was true. He had no desire to get out. He believed in what he was doing. And though he loved the idea of having a family, he didn’t want to give up his career.
That was probably the biggest difference he saw between himself and guys who were looking to pull the rip cord. They had families. They wanted a life beyond slinging a weapon for a living. Those who stayed in usually did it because they needed the money or didn’t know what else to do. Harvath, though, wanted to have his cake and eat it too.
“Really bad idea, exhibits D, E, and F, coming up on our right,” said Morrison, as they passed three more men in a pickup truck with a .50 caliber machine gun mounted in its bed, known as a technical.
The Libya Liberation Front was a brutal, local Islamist militia that provided protection for Halim and his smuggling operations. Even more unpalatable for Harvath and his team, though, was the fact that the Libya Liberation Front was aligned with Ansar al-Sharia, the Al Qaeda–linked group behind the attacks on a U.S. diplomatic outpost and CIA annex in Benghazi.
They only numbered in the hundreds, but they had access to a ton of firepower. The last thing Harvath wanted was to tangle with them. It wouldn’t end well. Get in. Get the job done. Get out without being seen. That was his plan.
But as experience had taught him, things rarely went as planned. That was why McGee had made everything conditional on Harvath’s bringing the team.
Turning the corner, Haney piped up, cutting off Morrison and interrupting Harvath’s train of thought. “Approaching target,” he called out. “Three hundred meters. Left side.”
CHAPTER 12
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* * *
The Europeans had chosen not to project force into Libya. That was their choice, but as far as Harvath was concerned, it was a mistake.
Libya was in their backyard. The smugglers were pumping massive numbers of refugees into their countries. Hidden among those refugees were terrorists who were massacring their citizens.
It didn’t seem like a difficult calculus. Why have a military—complete with special operations units—if you weren’t willing to use it to take out threats to your nation? Fortunately, the United States didn’t feel that way.
From attacks on American tourists, embassies, and interests abroad, to attacks on its own homeland, the more terror was left to grow unchecked, the worse it was for everyone. Europe’s problems today would only grow to become America’s tomorrow.
U.S. President Paul Porter had laid down a marker. If America’s allies couldn’t, or wouldn’t, handle the metastasizing threats within their sphere of influence, the United States would.
He understood that, like his own FBI, European intelligence agencies were overwhelmed. Nevertheless, their reluctance to get more aggressive was concerning.
By clarifying his position, Porter was putting allies on notice that America would not sit idly by. In other words, if you see us operating in your neck of the woods, don’t be surprised and don’t say we didn’t warn you.
Harvath liked and admired many of the European teams he had worked with over the years. He understood that an overwhelming bureaucracy had hamstrung them. Nevertheless, their nations were in a fight for their lives. They needed to ask themselves some very difficult questions—and to do so quickly—beginning with who were they and what exactly were they prepared to do?
It was the same question their enemy had already asked, answered, and was acting upon.
If the Europeans had decided to go on the offensive in Libya, they would have started by focusing on the most accurate, most readily available intelligence. That was what Harvath had done, and the Italian Coast Guard had tapped into some of the best.
In addition to a satellite phone, most smugglers provided Italy-bound migrants with a GPS device. There were plenty, though, who didn’t.
Far too often, the Coast Guard’s Maritime Rescue Coordination Center in Rome received distress calls from terrified migrants who had no idea of their precise location, rendering a rescue next to impossible.
Even when a caller had access to GPS, the center still needed to verify their position. The slightest deviation from the caller’s actual location could mean the difference between life and death.
Fortunately, the Rescue Coordination Center had access to an outside verification source.
Abu Dhabi–based Thuraya was one of the largest satellite telecommunications companies in the world. Because of Thuraya’s excellent coverage of the Mediterranean, Libyan smugglers bought all of their satellite phones from them.
When the Italian Coast Guard received a migrant distress call, the first thing they did was contact Thuraya’s emergency 24/7 hotline. In turn, Thuraya would do a quick search and provide the phone’s GPS location.
That cooperation had helped save tens of thousands of lives. Sometimes, though, the Italian Coast Guard was unable to get to a sinking vessel quickly enough.
Such had been the case when the distress call from Mustapha Marzouk’s trawler had gone out six days ago. It too, the CIA had learned, had come from a Thuraya satellite phone.
Harvath, though, wasn’t interested in the phone’s position when the call had been made. He wanted to know who had purchased the phone in the first place.
While the CIA or their Italian counterparts could have requested the information from Thuraya, they doubted the Emirati company would comply. It was decided that the best, and quickest, way to access the data was to go take it.
Thuraya’s encrypted servers proved no match for the NSA, which soon delivered the information the CIA wanted.
Of the 150 passengers on Mustapha Marzouk’s doomed fishing boat, only three had survived.
After they had been found, clinging to a piece of wreckage, and pulled from the water, they all identified Umar Ali Halim as the smuggler who had sent them out into the impending storm.
Halim’s hideous reputation was well known by Italian authorities. What wasn’t so well known was his location.
The migrants he smuggled knew nothing about Libya. He changed embarkation points daily. Often, his men ferried the migrants out to their boats, which were already waiting for them a mile or more offshore. None of them could identify where they had been held or where they had specifically departed from. That’s why Harvath had wanted to focus on the satellite phones.
The phone used in Mustapha Marzouk’s case had been part of a bulk purchase. The purchaser didn’t try to hide his location, nor did he bother to travel from Libya to the Emirates to pay cash and smuggle back the devices.
Instead, the purchaser sat eleven kilometers southwest of the highly dangerous port city of Zuwara, clicking on the satellite company’s Buy button and running everything through a PayPal account flush with cash.
The NSA had pinpointed his Internet usage as the same location the phones had been delivered to.
It was a hole-in-the-wall electronics shop advertising cell phones, digital cameras, and laptop computers.
“Pull over,” Harvath ordered.
Haney did as instructed.
They observed the store as Harvath gave their communications gear a final check, then, grabbing a black messenger bag, he opened the door and stepped out.
It was the kind of hot, dusty street he had seen countless times over countless deployments. Squat buildings made of concrete block sat side by side. Sun-bleached awnings hung over faded, hand-painted signs in Arabic. In the little shade they provided, stacks of cheap crap sat for sale. There was sand everywhere. The entire town looked one breeze away from being swallowed up by the desert.
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Whether it was the heat, or time for the midday Qailulah, few people were about. Even so, he didn’t want to draw attention to the shop by leaving a vehicle idling out front. “Find someplace close to park,” he said.
Glancing into his side mirror, Morrison replied, “Don’t be long. I don’t like this place.”
“Don’t worry,” Harvath stated, as he slid the door closed. “I don’t want to be here any longer than we have to.”
CHAPTER 13
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* * *
Entering the store, Harvath took it all in. It looked as if it had been a small grocery or maybe a pharmacy at some point.
The walls were lined with empty metal shelves. In the back sat an empty soda cooler alongside an old freezer chest covered with ice cream advertisements. The cracked linoleum floor had been designed to look like alternating tiles of blue and white marble.
The temperature inside wasn’t much better than out. An air-conditioning unit above the door in back sounded like it was ready to die. The place smelled like milk that had gone bad months ago.
What few electronics the store offered were laid out in a long glass display case up front. A lean, bearded man in his thirties sat behind it. He wore a green polo shirt and dirty jeans and was doing something on a computer.
He should have been surprised, or at the very least intrigued, to see a Westerner wander into his shop. But if he was either, he didn’t let on. In fact, he barely looked up from what he was doing.
“Ah-salaam-alaikum,” Harvath said, greeting the man as he walked up to the counter and set his messenger bag down on top of it.
He waited several moments, but the man remained focused on his computer and didn’t reply. Harvath rapped his knuckles on the display case and drew out the word “Marhaba?” in Arabic. Hello?
There was an edge to the clerk, a toughness. Harvath had picked up on it the minute he walked in. Former soldier? Militia member? Maybe he was just a local thug. Harvath couldn’t tell. But there was definitely something.
Shutting down his computer, he stood slowly and faced him. “Shen tebbee?” he demanded. What do you want? His upper left front tooth was black, dead.
“Nibi ma’loumat,” Harvath replied. I want information.
“Abie ‘illiktruniat, la ma’loumat.” I sell electronics, not information.
Harvath smiled. Sure you don’t.
“Shen tebbee?” the man repeated, gesturing angrily at the handful of cell phones, digital cameras, and laptops in his glass case.
Unzipping a pocket on his messenger bag, Harvath withdrew a sheet of paper and set it in front of the shopkeeper. On it were strings of numbers.
“Shu hadha?” the man asked. What is this?
“Thuraya satellite phones,” Harvath replied in English. Raising his finger, he pointed at him. “Your satellite phones.”
The man slid the paper back across the counter and said, “Ma bíhki Inglízi.” I don’t speak English.
Opening the main compartment of his messenger bag, Harvath withdrew two ten-thousand-dollar stacks of cash and set them on the counter. “Wáyn hu Umar Ali Halim?” Where is Umar Ali Halim?
Upon mention of the smuggler’s name, the shopkeeper’s icy demeanor turned to stone. But as it did, Harvath saw a brief flicker of something else slip across his face—fear.
“Ana mish mohtam,” he answered. Not interested.
Harvath withdrew two more stacks of cash and set them next to the others. “That’s forty thousand dollars, U.S.,” he said. “Araba’een-alf.” Forty thousand.
As the man eyeballed the money, Harvath repeated his question. “Wáyn hu Umar Ali Halim?”
When the man didn’t respond, Harvath added two more. “Sitteen-alf.” Sixty thousand.
There was still no response.
Harvath upended his bag, dumped the remaining money on the counter, and pushed it toward him. “Maya-alf.” One hundred thousand.
Staring the man down, he demanded once more, “Wáyn hu Umar Ali Halim?”
The shopkeeper had had enough. “Barra nayiek,” he replied. Fuck off.
Pushing the money back, the shopkeeper pointed at the door and added, in English, “Now.”
So much for the language barrier, Harvath thought.
He was about to respond when Staelin’s voice came over his earpiece. “Boss, we’ve got a problem. Exhibits D, E, and F just pulled up outside your front door. Looks like they’re getting ready to come in.”
Damn it. That was the last thing he needed. The Libya Liberation Front was in Halim’s pocket. As soon as the shopkeeper opened his mouth, it’d be game over. There was only one thing Harvath could do.
Grabbing the man by his shirt, he pulled him forward and head-butted him as hard as he could.
Instantly, the shopkeeper’s knees buckled, and he crumpled to the floor. As he did, Harvath pulled a syringe of ketamine from his messenger bag and leapt over the counter.
Pulling the cap off the needle, he jabbed it into the man’s thigh and depressed the plunger.
Ketamine was created as a powerful battlefield anesthetic, but was best known as a horse tranquilizer. When injected into humans, it caused muscle paralysis in less than a minute. Too much of it, though, sent users into a hallucinatory state called the “K-hole.”
Stuffing the cash back into his messenger bag, Harvath removed a set of plastic restraints, flipped the shopkeeper onto his stomach, and flex-cuffed him.
“How much time do I have?” Harvath asked over his radio.
“All three are getting out of the truck. You’ve got maybe sixty seconds,” Staelin replied.
“Tell Gage and Barton to bring the SUV around back. I’m going to be coming out plus one.”
Rolling the shopkeeper back over, he grabbed him by the collar, slung his messenger bag, and dragged the man across the floor toward the rear exit.
Immediately, he realized the heavy security door was locked.
Harvath ran his hand along the top of the frame, hoping to find a key, but there was nothing there.
“Forty-five seconds,” said Staelin.
He patted the shopkeeper down and checked his pockets. Nothing. Where the hell was the key?
Staelin continued his countdown. “Thirty seconds.”
Maybe it was under the counter. Maybe it was inside the register. There wasn’t time to tear the store apart. Harvath needed to come up with a Plan B.
“Tell me exactly what you’re seeing,” he ordered, as he rapidly scanned the store.
“Three men with AK 47s. Mix of fatigues and street clothes. All three carrying sidearms in holsters.”
“Body armor?”
“Negative,” Staelin replied. “No radios either. One guy’s talking on a cell phone.
“Anyone else in the truck?”
“Negative. At your door in fifteen seconds.”
“Roger that. Zero comms,” he ordered, calling for radio silence.
Dragging the shopkeeper over to the ice cream freezer, he flipped up its lid. Instantly, he figured out where the terrible smell had been coming from. With the lid open, it was worse than spoiled milk. The inside of the chest smelled like death.
He could only imagine what it might have been used for during and even after the revolution. The bottom of it was covered with several inches of moldy, black sludge. Squatting, Harvath heaved the shopkeeper over his shoulder, dumped him inside, and closed the lid. There was only one place left for him to hide.
As he took cover, he removed a suppressed H&K VP Tactical pistol from his bag and did a press check to make sure a round was chambered.
Harvath didn’t know why the three men were about to enter the electronics shop and he didn’t care. The Libya Liberation Front members were bad actors.
He had no reservations about what he was about to do.
CHAPTER 14
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* * *
Harvath had positioned himself between the soda cooler and the wall. The interior of the cooler
was pitted with rust. One spot had been eaten away just enough to allow him to see the front door.
The first Libyan to enter the shop had a thick, jet-black beard. He carried his AK by its wooden pistol grip, letting it dangle at his side. The second man was tall and skinny, and held his weapon in both hands.
The third man, though, was the one Harvath was most interested in. He was the one talking on his cell phone. But because of the narrow doorway, his two comrades shielded him.
“Hello?” the first man called out in Arabic. “Anyone here?”
No one’s here, Harvath whispered to himself. We all went to Hooters for wings and dollar beers. Come back tomorrow.
When no one responded, the bearded man called out again.
The sputtering of the air-conditioning was the only reply.
Turn around and leave, Harvath whispered. Just turn around and leave.
None of the men moved.
Finally, the bearded man told the skinny militiaman to see if anyone was out back.
Bad decision, thought Harvath as he began applying pressure to his trigger. As soon as Skinny got two feet from the rear door, all he had to do was look to his left and Harvath would be in full view.
Skinny, though, never made it that close. Halfway across the floor, there was a noise.
Everyone in the shop heard it and everyone froze—including Harvath. He didn’t need to hear it again to know what it was—the shopkeeper. He had dosed him too hard and pushed him into the K-hole.
Because ketamine caused excessive drooling, sometimes even vomiting, Harvath couldn’t have risked gagging him or slapping a piece of tape over his mouth. He might have choked to death.
When the second moan sounded, Skinny made a beeline for the ice cream chest.