All that changed when he had been offered a chance to do what he did best for a client for whom money appeared to be no object – his friend had hinted that it was the government and that the budget was virtually limitless, but said he couldn’t discuss his work with anyone because it was beyond top secret. Ben had agreed, and after signing a sheaf of official documents, he had been taken to work on a device that he had only heard rumors about – a suitcase bomb from Russia that the government had been trying to get operational again.
It had taken many months in a sequestered location, but he had finally been able to develop a new arming and timing system that incorporated the obsolete one and solved the problem of the power supply and battery, in return for which he had been paid a small fortune, after being again reminded of the dire consequences if he breathed a word to anyone. He had crafted a second system for the other device, and warned his hosts that both were extremely delicate – there were limits to what he could achieve without a specialized factory to harden the gizmo and make it shockproof.
One million dollars had been transferred into an offshore account with his name on it, and he’d been cautioned not to alter his life lest he attract undesirable attention – the nation’s enemies were everywhere, and he was now a valued asset. Ben had done his best to control his impulsive nature, but in the end had lost the battle, and bought the car, leased a penthouse in a desirable area of town, and set out to have some fun, for the first time he could remember.
It turned out that money was just the thing that had been missing from his life, and he was soon living the existence he’d always dreamed of, enjoying the fruits of his labor. Rachel was the latest in a string of dalliances, although she had captivated him as few others had, and he’d become increasingly enchanted with her as they’d spent more time together.
Ben slid behind the wheel and cranked over the powerful German engine, pausing to enjoy the throbbing engineering marvel that was his to control. He put the little car into gear and swung into traffic, unaware of the SUV fifty yards behind him that had also pulled from the curb, maintaining a discreet distance as it tailed him back to his condo – where another team would take up the watch, having wired it with hidden microphones and cameras while he’d been out on the town, and had tapped the phone and data lines.
~ ~ ~
“Hey, how are you?” Jet asked, happy to hear Matt’s voice after hours in the planning meeting.
“Good. Just getting up. Slept in. How are things on your end?” he inquired.
“Don’t ask. How about you?”
“No drama here. Just another mundane day. Going to hit the bank, tote around ten million in stolen diamonds, and maybe do lunch. The usual.”
“That’s about what I figured.”
“And you? Have you saved the world yet?”
“No, but I did get to talk to Hannah a few minutes ago. She says she’s bored.”
“What does she do all day?”
“She has our housekeeper waiting on her hand and foot. Goes to the park and plays with a bunch of other kids. Watches cartoons. Does projects Magdalena comes up with. Today they’re making a collage from magazines.”
“Why don’t you have her doing college prep courses or something more challenging?” Matt asked.
“She’s two and a half,” Jet said.
“Hmm. That’s right. But it’s never too young to start. Can’t you get her a job on a construction site, or welding, where she’ll learn a skill?”
“I think in Uruguay you can’t put them to work in the steel mills until they’re three.”
“What a backwards country. Not like Thailand. They’re driving cabs by the time they’re three here.”
“I know. I still remember how they drive.”
Jet and Matt chatted easily, the give and take playful, and when she signed off she felt better than she had all day. The connection with her daughter had been reaffirmed, and she could almost see Matt’s wry grin as he wisecracked with her.
She set the phone on the side table and turned off her bedside lamp, trying to get comfortable in the lonely bed, and found herself staring at the ceiling, as she had the prior night, her mind worrying over all the things that could go wrong, and already had. Two hours later she was still awake, and she resigned herself to another long night, the tension from anticipation of the pending operation buzzing in her brain like a hive of angry bees, wishing she was back in Uruguay with Hannah, Matt by her side.
Soon, she thought to herself. She just needed to get through this, and then things would return to normal.
Whatever that meant.
At two thirty a.m. she finally drifted off, her breathing soft, the few hours of rest she would get a meager preparation for the ordeal that was to come.
Chapter 19
Jet watched the skyline of Nice, France drift up to meet her as the Falcon 20 business jet the Mossad had chartered descended toward the airport. She would clear French immigration and then immediately make her way to the commercial passenger terminal, where she was booked on a commercial plane bound for Tunis and then Benghazi, departing in two hours.
Her newly minted Italian passport was waved through with hardly a glance by the immigration official at the private terminal, and soon she was waiting to board the flight, which was only half full, mainly with businessmen.
The trip was smooth, the time on the ground in Tunis minimal, and Jet took the opportunity to call Hannah again, knowing that the time was rapidly approaching when she might not be able to touch base with her for days. Once she was in the thick of the mission, she’d be devoting all her focus to the job. As Jet assured her daughter that she loved her, a wave of despair washed over her, the possibility that it was the final chance she’d ever have to talk to her at the forefront of her thoughts.
Benghazi customs was more involved, the visa process taking an hour in spite of the Mossad’s reassurances that all had been taken care of, and for a time Jet was worried that something had gone badly wrong. Eventually a document was procured and she received her thirty day visa, but not before she had begun to wonder whether the incompetence was an omen of how the rest of the mission would go. These sorts of last-minute operations were the bane of every thinking operative’s existence, and Jet was more sensitive than most, having had a methodical, thorough case officer in David, who would have declined putting his assets on the line for something this tentative.
She took a taxi to the hotel, where a room had been reserved for her – at least that part of operation had gone according to plan. After unpacking, and donning an abaya, hijab, and niqab – the robe, head scarf, and veil favored by the devout in Libya – Jet activated the cell phone she’d been given and placed a call to the local operatives, who confirmed that they were in position on the small residential street. She told them that she’d be there shortly, then called the contact who would be providing equipment and logistical support and arranged to be picked up outside of the hotel, thirty yards down the block, in ten minutes.
A battered dark brown Renault sedan arrived five minutes late, driven by a paunchy local man in his mid-forties who introduced himself as Luther, sticking to code names. He pulled into traffic before reaching under his seat and withdrawing a SIG Sauer semi-automatic pistol, which he handed to Jet. She checked the magazine and slapped it back into place, then slid it under her robe, into the waist of her pants.
“No suppressor?”
“Sorry. I checked everywhere, but nothing.”
“What’s the situation here?”
“Still very dangerous. The new regime is trying to establish order, but there are roving groups of gunmen who call themselves militia, but in truth are insurgents opposed to the puppet government that was installed after Qaddafi died. It’s not a good situation, although things seem like they’ve calmed down some. The new government is trying to clamp down on them, but it’s easier said than done.”
“And the team at the location?”
“In place, but there’
s been no activity other than lights going on yesterday evening. So someone’s inside.”
“Or they have the lights on a timer.”
Luther didn’t respond, nor did she expect him to. His role was to provide her whatever she needed in terms of gear, not to act as a sounding board for the operational details.
“How about the F2000?” Jet asked, referring to the FN assault rifle she’d been told he could get.
“I’ll have it in an hour, along with several spare magazines.”
“And the night vision goggles?”
“I’m still working on that. Hopefully should have them by tonight. It’s far easier to get a bunch of Kalashnikovs or some grenades than the goggles – just not much call for them compared to ordnance, I guess. If you’d wanted some RPGs, I could have thrown a rock and hit ten of them. Welcome to Africa.”
The neighborhoods quickly deteriorated as they moved farther from the city center toward the target’s house in a district near the old Italian “freedom square,” and when they finally ground to a stop a block away, the area looked about as seedy as anything she’d expected – more a slum, reeking of disrepair and rot, than a residential zone. Half-built cinderblock dwellings lurked next to small walled compounds with iron bars on every ground floor window and door. A few starving dogs roamed the dirt road, nosing for sustenance as a small troupe of local urchins kicked an ancient soccer ball back and forth near a dilapidated corner market. An odor of decay and the stench of poorly functioning septic tanks permeated the air, and she was reminded of some of the worst areas in Yemen. The sense of danger seemed to be as much part of the local makeup as the graffiti adorning the dull gray walls.
“They’re in the Peugeot on the left,” Luther said. “The target is across the road sixty yards further along on the right – it’s got a dark brown border painted across the top of the wall. You have my number – call me if you need anything, and I’ll work on the night vision gear in the meantime.”
Jet nodded, adjusted her headdress, exited the vehicle and began walking slowly to the market. She bought some bottled water and a package of local crackers, and then carrying the plastic bag with her purchases, set out in the direction of the watchers.
When she shuffled past them, she was disheartened to note that they were as conspicuous as imaginable, right down to a set of binoculars around the neck of the man in the passenger seat. She made a mental note and continued along her way, ignoring them, and slowly approached the target house.
Jet immediately spotted the small security cameras mounted on the front, behind the ten-foot-high walls, on the first of the two buildings in the compound. She knew the layout from the satellite footage, but the cameras were a nuance that would only be picked up in person. The building next to the target was a half-completed construction, and a crew of workers was mixing mortar and running conduit, their battered pick-up truck parked in front, resembling more an abandoned vehicle than a functional conveyance. Her eyes roamed over the structure with precision as she moved past it, continuing her shambling gait until she turned the corner.
There was nothing particularly noteworthy about the house – just another in a long line of unremarkable dwellings. She carried on circling the block until she was on the opposite side of it from the target, and confirmed that the compound backed onto another walled house, also heavily fortified, as were all the homes in the neighborhood. Yet even with the situation of living in a de facto war zone, each home had a satellite dish for television reception. Apparently, some things took precedence over relocating somewhere safer – if there was such a place in Libya at the moment.
Random groups of loitering men stood, watching her go by, their gazes aimless, and she saw the telltale shape of a rifle leaning in one of the doorways. At least the presence of weaponry wouldn’t be out of place, she mused as she extracted her cell phone and called the director.
“The surveillance team is a joke. They couldn’t be more obvious if they’d painted the car bright red and mounted antennas on the top.”
The director ignored her opening salvo. “I’ll have two seasoned operatives there in a few more hours. By nightfall. They’ll be under your orders and can help you with whatever you plan to do.”
“That’s nice, but I prefer to work alone, as I’ve made abundantly clear.”
“Yes, but on this one, I’m afraid your preferences need to take a back seat. These are experienced field agents. Just deploy them as you see fit.”
Jet decided not to fight with him – she’d keep the new arrivals out of trouble and do the ingress herself, exactly as she intended, regardless of what the director wanted. It was her ass, not his, and she wasn’t feeling especially cooperative after seeing what had been dispatched for surveillance.
“You’re the boss. I also don’t have any of the gear I need to take the house. Promises, but nothing besides a pistol. Needless to say, that’s not boosting my confidence, either.”
“I’ll make a call.”
“Please do that. I’m going to continue making rounds here to size up the situation, but I think I already know how I want to do this. If your equipment boy can come up with the necessary weapons, I could go in late tonight. I see no reason to wait, do you?” Normally she would be on site for a few days to watch the house herself, but given that nobody had entered or left, she wasn’t sure that would do any good beyond wasting time nobody had.
“No, not given the urgency. I’d say minutes count.”
“That’s what I thought. Hopefully, the surveillance team hasn’t tipped the targets off, although it’s too late to do anything about that now. Still, I’m going to have them move farther from the house, and get a van so they aren’t in plain view of any passers-by – not that there are a lot of people out for a stroll. As it is, though, this is pure amateur night. I can’t believe these are active field assets.”
“They were doing different kind of work in Tripoli. More administrative espionage. Data, developing a network, that sort of thing.”
“Great. So I have file clerks playing at being spies.”
“Look, that area of the world isn’t exactly our normal stomping grounds. With the latest escalation of armed attacks, many of the embassies have pulled their staff out. There are at least two dozen terrorist entities actively working in the country. It’s suicide for anyone to stay in position for any length of time.”
“That’s not really going to matter if we don’t find the nuke, is it?”
The director didn’t respond to her observation, silently conceding the point. “Just do the best you can. A simple home invasion should be pretty routine for someone of your skills. Do what you have to do and then report back. I’ll make some calls about the gear. Is there anything else?”
“If it’s of any interest, I have a bad feeling about all of this.”
“Fine. But the house still needs to be taken. If you’re not going to do it, I’ll have my two agents do so when they arrive. They’re qualified.”
“If you have someone who can pull this off, why am I here?” she fired back.
“Because just like you, I have a bad feeling, and I need the best I can get. I’m not delusional – I know the odds of the nuke being in there are slim. But we need to know for sure, and I want to narrow my odds of a screw-up.”
Jet took a deep breath, forcing her annoyance away. “I’ll do it. But nothing about this mission so far is even remotely positive. We’ve got substandard operatives, we’ve got almost nonexistent logistical support, and so far a near-zero on equipment. This all needs to turn around, and now, or it’s doomed for failure.”
“I understand. I’ll make the calls. The operatives should be there soon – they’ll contact you when they’re in the vicinity.”
Jet hung up and scanned the street, and then her eyes found the back of the building that was under construction. The crew would be finished for the day in another half hour or so, at which point, hopefully, the building would be vacated for the night.
&n
bsp; That would be her launching point.
She just hoped that she would have at least a slim element of surprise. At the rate things were going, she wasn’t hopeful. Still, she had a job to do, and one way or another, by the following morning they would know whether they’d found the nuke, or whether the entire exercise had been in vain.
An outcome she was becoming increasingly convinced was most likely.
Chapter 20
Bangkok, Thailand
The late morning traffic was still a snarl downtown – a constant state of affairs for a city that had woefully inadequate street planning and an ever-growing number of cars. An endless procession of daredevil motor scooters, their engines buzzing like a agitated hornets, darted in and out of the stalled cars, narrowly avoiding collisions as their operators jockeyed for openings.
Matt took in the entire crazy ritual with a smile. At least some things were constant, and Bangkok’s insane traffic was one of them. The contrapuntal cacophony of horns accompanied his footsteps as he edged into the column of vehicles and then made his way to the other side of the street, jaywalking with a cheerful carelessness mirrored by dozens of other pedestrians on their way to whatever destinations called to them.
He rounded a corner, and the bank towered in front of him, one of countless new chrome and glass buildings that had sprung into being over the last twenty years as Bangkok had gone on a tear, its nearly non-stop construction adding to the congestion from thousands of workers now having to commute to the myriad monoliths that dotted the skyline. Matt checked the time – he wouldn’t need all the slack he’d cut for himself, but with Thailand, you never knew what would happen next, and sometimes a routine errand like visiting his safe-deposit box could unexpectedly take hours instead of minutes.
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