“They have the US and UK ambassadors, so fire with discipline,” he said. “I have the lead.”
He charged down the concrete steps into the basement. After a quick scan, he spied the entrance to the tunnels—a hatch-style door swung ajar on its hinges. He sidled up next to the edge of the frame and glanced inside.
“Clear.”
He stepped through the hatch and into the tunnel. Scanning over his rifle, he cleared both directions then advanced five paces in a low crouch. He drifted left until he hugged the wall and paused for his team to join him. He chopped a hand forward, and they moved in unison—he and Mendez on the left wall, and Smith, Grimes, and the HRT operator on the right. They moved swiftly and silently for fifteen meters, then the tunnel began to curve to the right. Pools of shadow between the emergency blue lighting seemed to be getting bigger as they went. As he approached the end of the bend, Dempsey raised a closed hand over his head and took a knee.
Fifteen meters ahead, the tunnel split—one corridor continuing straight, and the other diverging to the right. This deep underground, their radios and mobile phones would be of little use. That meant no guidance from Jarvis and Hansen in the mobile TOC. He looked at Smith and shook his head.
Through clenched teeth, Dempsey said the four words every team leader dreads most. “Time to split up.”
As he read the paint-stenciled letters for the left tunnel, he mumbled the words, “FDR Drive, East River access.” He glanced right. “UN Consolidation Tower, Midtown Tunnel.”
“Whatcha think, John?” Smith said.
Dempsey closed his eyes and listened, hoping to hear footsteps or voices echoing in one of the tunnels, but all he could hear was the whir of the ventilation fans and the buzz of the emergency lighting fixtures.
When in doubt, go right, Kate always used to joke.
He opened his eyes.
“Smith and Mendez, take the left tunnel,” Dempsey said. Turning to the HRT operator and Grimes, he said, “You two come with me.”
“Rendezvous back here?” Smith asked.
Dempsey shook his head. “If you hear gunfire but you ain’t in the fight, then you’re in the wrong tunnel.”
“Roger that,” Mendez said with a smirk.
“Move out,” Dempsey said, and advanced into the right tunnel. He hugged the left wall, Grimes took the right wall, and the HRT operator walked the middle, lagging a few paces to form a V.
Ten meters in.
Twenty.
At twenty-five meters, the tunnel doglegged, obscuring his line of sight. He paused at the corner and looked at Grimes. Ready?
She nodded.
They crept around the bend and spied the three missing ambassadors with their backs pressed against the wall. A single terrorist holding an AK-47 paced in front of them. The jihadist was looking off to his right, down the tunnel. Suddenly, the Iranian ambassador sprang forward and grabbed the stock and barrel of the terrorist’s rifle.
What the fuck is he doing?
The two men wrestled over the weapon, but then the terrorist seemed to give up and practically handed the weapon to Masoud Modiri.
Dempsey advanced in a tactical crouch, keeping a red dot on the Iranian ambassador’s forehead as he closed the gap. “FBI—drop the weapon!” he hollered.
Both the terrorist and Modiri whirled toward him, shock on their faces. Modiri looked confused and looked back at the terrorist, then back at the team as they surged down the corridor. Through his holographic sight, Dempsey watched Modiri point the machine gun at the terrorist and squeeze the trigger.
The roar of the AK-47 discharging in the tunnel was deafening. The left side of the young jihadist’s face evaporated in a cloud of blood and bone. The terrorist bellowed a dissonant, gurgling scream as he pitched backward against the wall. With a violent spasm, he slid to the ground, leaving a wide trail of blood and something else on the wall behind him, and ending in a lifeless pile at Modiri’s feet.
The team moved in on the three ambassadors.
“Drop the weapon, Modiri,” Dempsey called out, his voice cool and collected. Grimes continued down the right wall, closing off the tunnel to encircle the group.
Modiri looked at him, his face a twisted mask of confusion and fear.
“What are you doing?” Ambassador Long shouted, moving between Dempsey and Modiri. “He’s with us. He just saved us.”
Dempsey pushed the woman aside with his left forearm and stepped in front of her, placing himself between her and Modiri. Ambassador Cochran stayed pressed against the wall, his head jerking back and forth between Modiri and Dempsey, his mouth open and his hands over his head.
“Drop the weapon,” Dempsey ordered again. He held the targeting dot in the middle of Modiri’s face—the red light from the laser designator blinding the Iranian. Grimes had shifted farther on her arc to the left, clear from his field of fire. He saw her red dot on the side of the Iranian’s head. Modiri raised his arms in the air, but the AK-47 was still clutched in his right hand by the grip, index finger still on the trigger.
“I am the Iranian ambassador to the United Nations,” Modiri said, raising his chin in defiance and puffing out his chest. “Lower your weapons.”
“I know exactly who you are,” Dempsey said.
“What the hell are you guys doing?” the HRT operator said.
Dempsey ignored the FBI man. Modiri was stalling, and it set his nerves on fire. He tensed his right index finger, putting pressure on his trigger.
“If you don’t put the weapon—”
A muzzle flash behind Grimes and the deafening thunder of another AK-47 discharging in the tunnel drowned out his voice and sent the standoff straight to hell. To his horror, Grimes screamed and pitched forward. She hit the ground facedown. The US ambassador screamed and started running in the wrong direction. The British ambassador fainted and slid to the floor.
Events shifted into slow motion.
The HRT operator ducked and scrambled toward where Grimes lay on the ground.
Dempsey locked eyes with Modiri, who was still clutching the AK-47.
In that moment, time froze. Like a slide show in his mind, the smiling faces of his Tier One SEAL brothers flashed through his mind. Thiel manning the BBQ grill; Spaz and Pablo arguing about which superhero made the best operator; Gabe, Rousch, and Gator doing the chair dance at Zach’s bar mitzvah, Helo sucking on a beer . . . all gone. All gone, thanks to this man and his brother.
Modiri’s eyes went wide, and his lips curled with rage. “Alluhu Akbar!” he screamed, his face twisting in a homicidal fury. The Iranian brought the rifle to his shoulder but aimed at the US ambassador instead of Dempsey.
The round from Dempsey’s Sig516 hit Modiri just above the bridge of his nose, silencing the homicidal scream and splitting the top of the man’s head apart. Modiri stumbled backward, looking like someone who had just been hit in the forehead with an ax. Dempsey fired again as the body fell, the second bullet hitting the Iranian in the middle of the chest.
He was aware of a series of pops to his left as the HRT guy, crouching over Grimes, engaged the target retreating down the tunnel. He was aware of the whispered cries from Felicity Long: “He was going to shoot me. Why was he going to shoot me?” He was aware of these things, but his only concern now was Elizabeth Grimes. He flew to her side. He wouldn’t lose another teammate. Not today.
The tunnel was silent now.
“Clear,” the HRT guy said. “The shooter is down.”
Dempsey quickly scanned Grimes’s body and the ground around her for blood. No blood, but he did find a jagged hole in the back of her vest, just below her left shoulder blade. He hunched over to see her face. Her eyes were open, and her mouth was pulled back in a grimace.
“I’m gonna roll you onto your back,” he told her. As he did, she winced—a good sign.
“Wow, that fucking hurts,” she hissed. Dempsey stroked the hair out of her face, and she looked up at him and tried to smile. “Thanks for the tip about
wearing my SAPI plate,” she said, and then coughed. “Still hurts like a bitch, though.”
Dempsey flashed her smile. “Yeah, trust me, I know.”
Footsteps echoed in the tunnel behind him. Dempsey spun around, his Sig516 trained down the tunnel. In his ear he heard Smith’s voice. “One, this is Two. Coming to you.”
At the same time, Mendez hollered, “FBI. Don’t shoot!”
Dempsey lowered his weapon and looked over at the HRT guy, who was now standing and staring down at him.
“You shot the fucking Iranian ambassador,” the agent said, pale-faced with disbelief.
Smith fell in beside Dempsey, surveyed the scene and said, “No, you just shot the mastermind of the biggest terror plot since 9/11. HRT uncovered the plot, and you shot the leader and rescued the US and British ambassadors. You’re a hero, my friend.”
The HRT operative stared at him, completely perplexed.
“And we were never here,” Dempsey added.
Smith slipped a USB memory stick into the agent’s right chest pocket. “Turn this over to Agent Hansen. Tell him that everything he needs to know about the plot is on here,” Smith said in a hushed voice.
“Who the hell are you guys?”
“No one,” Mendez said, and slapped the man on the back. The agent looked at him, realization spreading slowly across his face.
Dempsey looked up at Smith, grateful for his friend’s perfect timing.
“Rostami?” Smith asked.
Dempsey nodded down the tunnel. “Our HRT friend here said he bagged him, but we should probably confirm.”
“Agreed,” Smith said. He looked at Grimes. “You all right?”
“Yeah,” she said with a grimace. “You boys go. Mendez can keep me company till you get back.”
Dempsey stood. “You heard the lady.”
“Age before beauty,” Smith said, gesturing down the tunnel.
Together, Dempsey and Smith advanced down the tunnel, weapons at the ready. After a few meters, when he didn’t see a crumpled body sprawled on the ground, Dempsey’s heart rate picked up. He glanced at Smith.
“I don’t see a body,” Smith whispered.
Dempsey nodded.
They pushed on, and Dempsey felt like he had that night on the deck of the Darya-ye Noor. Same stillness. Same eerie “This was too easy” feeling.
He felt an ambush coming.
Five meters . . . seven meters . . . ten . . .
On the ground, two feet in front of him, he spied what looked like a small puddle of oil. He stopped next to it, knelt, and dipped his left index finger in the liquid. He held his finger up for inspection, and then rolled the liquid between his thumb and fingertip to check the viscosity.
Not oil.
In the dim blue aura of the tunnel’s emergency lighting system, blood looked black.
“Blood?” Smith asked.
Dempsey nodded and got back to his feet. Two feet away, he saw another drop, and then another. They followed the trail of blood until it suddenly stopped. Dempsey surveyed the tunnel walls for possible exits or alcoves, but found nothing.
“He must have stopped the bleeding,” Smith whispered.
“Too bad. I was hoping to find the bastard bled out.”
They pushed on until they reached another fork in the tunnel. This time the right fork was labeled UN CONSOLIDATION TOWER, and the left fork was labeled MIDTOWN TUNNEL.
“Split up?” Smith asked.
“No way. Not this time,” Dempsey said.
“Agreed.”
“When in doubt, go right?”
Smith rubbed his chin. “Construction on the Consolidation Tower isn’t even close to finished. My money says that tunnel dead-ends at a construction wall.”
Dempsey nodded. “Left it is.”
They took the left tunnel, and after a few meters the background noise began to increase in volume. As they advanced, the whir of ventilation fans became so loud that Dempsey lost the sound of his footsteps and breathing. Ahead, the passage ended at a steel door. He tightened his grip on his rifle and dropped into a tactical crouch for the approach.
At the door, Dempsey studied the doorjamb and the handle. The door opened “in.” He gestured for Smith to open and he would clear.
Smith nodded and mouthed a silent count—One, two, three—and pulled the handle.
Dempsey glided through the opening—clearing while sighting over with the barrel of his Sig. The next room was tiny—a closet, really, no bigger than six feet by six feet—and smelled of enamel paint and engine exhaust. Directly facing him was another door, the same configuration as the last, but this one was labeled DANGER—TUNNEL ACCESS.
Smith stepped up beside him. “Let’s do it again.”
Dempsey nodded and readied his weapon.
One, two, three . . .
Smith pulled the handle.
Dempsey took a step but immediately caught himself, nearly tumbling headfirst into the Midtown Tunnel. “Jesus Christ,” he bellowed.
Smith jerked him backward by the straps on his vest.
“Thanks, dude,” Dempsey said, gawking at the two-lane underground highway in front of them.
“Don’t mention it.”
The tunnel was empty, not a single vehicle in sight.
“What the fuck?” Dempsey said.
“This is the eastbound spur,” Smith said. “The NYPD must have shut down the entrance. Emergency protocol for any terrorist attack. Any cars already down here would have been oblivious to the closure and exited into Queens.”
“Shit,” Dempsey said. “The motherfucker got away.”
Smith nodded. “Yeah. This was their end game. This was how Rostami was going to get the ambassadors out.”
A knot formed in Dempsey’s stomach. “I really wanted to put a bullet in that psychopath’s head,” he said. “For what he did to that poor girl in Frankfurt.”
Smith put a hand on Dempsey’s shoulder. “I know, bro. Me, too.”
“I’m gonna find that sonuvabitch,” Dempsey said.
“And I’m gonna help you,” said Smith, and let the door slam shut behind them.
CHAPTER 41
607 Horseshoe Drive
Williamsburg, Virginia
May 26, 2100 EDT
The buzz of his mobile phone vibrating on the table interrupted dinner.
Jarvis was dining alone, as usual, which meant there was no one to offend by checking it. The text message was from Ian Baldwin:
Urgent. Sent u e-mail on the high side. Call after you read—Ian
He stood, left his half-eaten plate of grilled salmon and vegetables on the table, and walked to his personal TOC in the basement. After satisfying the biometric security sensor, he pushed open the hidden panel door, stepped inside, and inhaled the cold, odorless air. The computer monitor on his desk showed a push notification of the waiting e-mail. He logged in to his secure high-side server and then minimized all the OPSEC briefs and security updates he had yet to read. He clicked on his e-mail login and tapped in his username and password.
At the top of his inbox, with a red exclamation point marking the message as time sensitive, was the e-mail from Ian. He scanned the text in three seconds.
He had expected this.
In the partitioned corner of his mind, his own cerebral, intracranial TOC, Jarvis had already made plans for this scenario. He felt nothing—not surprise, not anger, not rage, not even hatred. He had already battled these emotions when Ian first briefed him on the second burner phone during the flight from Frankfurt to Geneva. All he felt now was the compulsion to act.
Baldwin had dutifully copied Dempsey, Smith, and Quinton Thomas on the e-mail string. That was standard procedure for a message such as this—one containing sensitive information with safety and security implications for the team. Still, Baldwin’s rigorous adherence to protocol was incredibly inconvenient. Jarvis checked his watch and quickly calculated his head start:
Geographical proximity to the target: + twelv
e minutes
Preparation: + seven minutes
Tactical planning: + thirty minutes
Group consensus and debate handicap: + eleven minutes
Inebriation handicap: +/– ten minutes
The “Dempsey Factor” offset: – ten minutes
TOTAL ESTIMATED HEAD START: forty to sixty minutes
Jarvis closed the e-mail without responding. For urgent messages, the system would generate a time stamp and an automated reply to the sender with notification that the message had been read.
He expected calls from both Smith and Baldwin any minute, but he would let them go straight to voice mail. He tapped a code in a small dialog box in the upper-left corner of his center computer screen, and a flat, black glass biometric reader hissed open beside his keyboard. He scanned his thumbprint. A pop-up window opened on his screen.
ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT TO ENABLE SYSTEM LOCKDOWN?
He clicked “Yes.”
Every monitor in his TOC went dark.
From his pocket, he retrieved a stainless-steel Kershaw tactical knife. A flick of his thumb and the talonlike blade arced open. With his right index finger, he probed the skin along his left side above his hip. Finding the lump he was looking for, he plunged the point of the blade into his flesh and gave the knife a twist. He withdrew the blade, and blood immediately mushroomed from the hole. Using his right thumb and forefinger, he milked the tissue until a bloody lump the size of a camera battery popped to the surface. He used the knife to cut it free from a scar-tissue tether and held it up for inspection in the light. Satisfied he’d gotten the right implant, he dropped the micro GPS tracker next to his tactical phone on the desk, where both items would remain for the next several hours—perhaps longer—until he returned. If he returned. He pressed a sterile dressing against the hole in his side and walked out of his personal TOC. He had chitosan-based wound dressing in the med-kit in his car. The stuff burned like hell, but it worked, and the chitosan polymer would stop the bleeding almost immediately for such a small wound. This was something he could take care of on the way.
Tier One (Tier One Series Book 1) Page 33