Counter Terror (A Jake Adams International Espionage Thriller Series Book 13)

by Trevor Scott

  When she saw motion at the peep hole, she smiled at the person behind the door.

  The door opened slowly and a sliver of light seeped through, along with a left eye.

  “If you are looking for Marco, he moved a month ago,” the woman said in Italian.

  “Tell Marco I’ll cut his balls off.” Alexandra knew she couldn’t bluff the approach, since the dying man had not given them that much. So she played drunken ex-girlfriend. “Are you his new whore?”

  “I told you that Marco has moved.”

  Alexandra pretended to almost throw up. Then she recovered and said, “That’s a lie, bitch. You’re cute. I’ll give that much. Does he try to take you up the ass? I think he might be secretly gay.”

  “I don’t know Marco,” she said. “I just get some of his mail.”

  “Seriously? Where did he move?”

  “I don’t know,” the woman said.

  By now the woman had opened the door a little more, showing that she had no security chain. With one swift move, Alexandra shoved her shoulder into the door, knocking the much smaller woman back a few feet. Before the woman could react, Alexandra had her gun out and pointed at the woman’s face.

  Closing the door and locking it behind her, Alexandra said, “You might want to take a seat.” She went from drunk to sober instantaneously.

  The woman was afraid, no doubt. She started to shift back to comply, but then with a sudden quickness, she rushed Alexandra and hit her in the stomach, knocking her back into the wall. Then the woman started to wail on Alexandra, striking her with both fists like a wild woman. But the blows were not doing much damage against Alexandra’s large frame. As the woman moved in quickly for another round, Alexandra shoved her right elbow up, contacting the woman’s chin hard and knocking the woman out instantly.

  Alexandra shook her head as the woman lay at her feet unconscious. She found her phone and texted Jake, saying she was at the woman’s apartment and he should come immediately.

  •

  Jake looked at his text and shook his head. What did that mean? Alexandra was more than capable of interrogating the woman.

  ‘Is everything all right?’ Jake texted.

  ‘Fine. She’s under the weather.’

  He knew what that meant. Alexandra had been forced to subdue the woman.

  He glanced at the bartender, who came over and asked if everything was going as planned.

  “Everything is perfect,” Jake said. “But your friend was not lying. She is not feeling well. However, why don’t you just come to our room when you get off work?”

  “That works for me,” the bartender said.

  Jake gave the man the room number. But not theirs.

  He paid for the drinks with cash and wandered out of the building. He quickly found the woman’s apartment and Alexandra met him at the door. Jake immediately saw the woman tied to a chair in the kitchen area, her head slumped to her left shoulder.

  “Jesus. Did you kill her?”

  “I barely hit her. She has a glass jaw.”

  “Did you find anything important here?”

  “I was busy tying her up.”

  Jake started searching the woman’s small apartment. During the search, he noticed that the woman started to wake from her slumber. Alexandra had done a good job tying and gagging the woman, so he continued to search. But, if the woman had half a brain, she would not have any evidence of her activity written down anywhere.

  While Jake checked for anything physical, Alexandra searched through the woman’s laptop computer and her cell phone. Most people forgot to clear their text entries or internet histories. Only those who had something to hide scrubbed those clean. But those were never really gone. The Agency could easily find every site she had ever visited online. Jake didn’t think they had time for that, though. He did have an idea that might work. He whispered his plan to Alexandra.

  Jake would speak only German and Alexandra would use only Russian. They would start with innocuous questions asking where she kept it—not being specific about what it might be. Then, when they got frustrated, they would try to piece some simple Italian together. When she was eventually turned over to the Italians, she would swear that a German man and a Russian woman had tortured her. But Jake didn’t think it would come to torture. This woman seemed to be a simple courier or intermediary. All they needed from her was her contact up the chain. First, though, they would get her to divulge the name they already knew—the name of the man Jake had shot at the Pompeii ruins that morning. By now, Jake guessed, she would have to know that this man was dead and out of commission. That’s why she really called in sick. He could tell that as soon as he stepped into her bedroom. She was packing. Ready to run.

  Jake walked over to the woman, who was now bright eyed and stretching against the lamp cord Alexandra had used to tie her. He grasped her shirt and ripped it from top to bottom, exposing her modest breasts in a pushup bra. First rule of interrogation? Treat the suspect like shit. Like they were just a piece of meat. He found a kitchen knife and came back to the woman, whose eyes were wide with fear. Moving the knife across the woman’s face near her eyes, Jake then slid the blade along her thin neck and across her collar bone. Her breathing increased, and Jake thought the woman might pass out with fear. Then Jake slid the blade under the center of the woman’s bra and cut the bra off, exposing her breasts. He slipped the blade across one erect nipple and then the other one. Okay, he thought, now she knew where he would start. She was ready.

  19

  Padua, Italy

  The train pulled into the station in early morning after traveling from Innsbruck. The sun was just rising over the Adriatic and Venice to the east.

  Derrick Konrad had just woken from a light sleep in his private sleeper car as the train came to a gentle stop at the Padua Central Train Station.

  Padua, or more appropriately Padova, was a major university city—where Galileo had once taught physics and developed the truth that the Earth revolved around the sun and not the other way around. A fact that the church called heresy and allowed them to imprison the brilliant scientist who had invented the telescope.

  Holgar rushed into the cabin and said, “We have to go.”

  “Why?”

  “Our man has his bag and is on the move off the train.”

  Konrad grabbed his bag and slung it over his shoulder. Then the two of them pushed out through the various passengers gawking out the windows at the terminal. The train, along with their tickets, was scheduled to terminate in Venice. So, not many were getting off. Which could be a problem. They would be noticed, Konrad realized.

  “Split up,” Konrad said to his young associate.

  Holgar nodded understanding.

  They were barely able to step off the train before it pulled away toward Venice. Konrad spotted their target ahead, making his way toward the front entrance of the station. He would take the lead first, while Holgar stayed back and observed both from a distance.

  Instead of picking up a taxi, the man they had followed from Geneva walked south toward the center of the city along Corso de Popolo. After a block, Konrad stepped into a building and let Holgar take the lead. They did this a couple of more times until they reached the bridge over the river and the road became Corso de Giuseppe Garibaldi. A block after the bridge, their subject crossed the street and entered a park which led to one of the city’s most famous churches, the Cappella degli Scrovegni. Konrad had been here once on a trip years ago in gymnasium school, where they had traveled to view important works of Renaissance art. His mind traveled back to those simpler days and how he didn’t at the time truly appreciate the beautiful frescos on the wall of the chapel by Giotto, painted around 1303. How did he remember that? Focus, Derrick.

  His subject made a direct approach to the chapel and went inside.

  Konrad got a call on his cell and he picked up but continued to walk. “Yeah.”

  “Do you want to go in there?” Holgar asked.

  G
lancing across the street, he saw his partner walking and tried not to look at Konrad.

  “No,” Konrad said. “I’ve been in there. There’s nowhere he can go.”

  “He could be meeting with someone.”

  Good point. But at this hour the chapel would not have many tourists checking out the frescos. So there was no way they could blend in.

  “Cross the road ahead and cover any possible retreat in that direction,” Konrad said. “He might just be an art lover. He could double back and pick up the next train to Venice. Many people do that.”

  “Will do. Is it impressive?”

  “It’s worth a look. It’s not the Sistine Chapel, but a close second.” What was this man up to, Konrad wondered. Then he stopped and turned without warning, a technique he had learned from an older man with INTERPOL. When he did so, a man about a block away nearly stopped, but then he started to walk again as if nothing had happened. Crap! “We’ve got a problem.”

  Ahead, Holgar was crossing the street, which gave him a reason to glance back toward Konrad. “What?”

  “A man about a block behind me. He’s tailing me?”

  “I see him. Are you sure?”

  “Yes. I’ll hold tight here and pretend to look at a map on my phone.” He clicked off the call and pulled up a map of his current location. Then he swiveled around to try to orient himself with the map, making the screen larger with his fingers.

  By now the man he thought was following him was almost upon him. Konrad had one more play. As the guy got closer, Konrad switched quickly back to his camera, firing off a series of shots, capturing the man. Then he went back to the map.

  The tail was now upon him. He was a man in his 50s who could have been Italian or someone from the Balkans. “Excuse me,” Konrad said in his best English. “Could you tell me where to find St. Anthony Basilica?”

  The tail hesitated, his eyes intense. “Non Capisco.”

  Now Konrad tried on a southern accent from America. “Crap on toast. I know that doggone sucker is somewhere hereabouts. Are you sure?”

  The man shrugged.

  Then, in broken Italian, Konrad asked, “I’m looking for La Basilica di Sant’Antonio di Padova?” He intentionally butchered the name of the city’s famous basilica.

  Now, the man looked at Konrad’s phone and lifted his chin with understanding. His tail spoke in Italian, explaining that the basilica wasn’t far from here. Then the man wandered down the street. But Konrad had gotten what he needed—a photo of the tail, and the fact that the man spoke Italian with a Slavic accent. What the hell was going on?

  His phone buzzed and he checked his incoming text. Holgar was looking for guidance. Konrad texted back, telling him to go to the far eastern side of the chapel park. He didn’t need an answer, though, since he could see Holgar move off toward that location. While he was on his phone, he checked on the series of photos he had taken of his tail—if the man was truly following him. He found the best image and texted it to his boss at INTERPOL, giving him the details of where he was and his status.

  Seconds later, just as his subject exited the chapel, he got a text back from INTERPOL saying ‘This man is from Serbia. He has a Red Notice on him for kidnapping, murder, and crimes against humanity. Bring him in.’

  Konrad thought he had recognized the man from somewhere. He texted back, ‘He is gone.’

  But the man wasn’t gone, he was still ahead walking slowly down the Corso de Giuseppe Garibaldi. It was a judgment call, and Konrad hoped he had made the right call. He had a feeling the subject he had followed from Geneva was more important than an old war criminal from the Balkan War. Besides, there was no way that this Serb was here by chance. He was involved. More importantly, Konrad was certain the man had burned him. He had obviously been at the Padua train station charged with following their subject to make sure he wasn’t being followed. Which he was. Maybe he should just make the arrest now. But which man? The one he suspected was planning a bombing in Europe? Or a man who had an INTERPOL Red Notice already on him, and was wanted by the International Court of Justice in The Hague?

  Konrad knew one thing for certain. He needed more assets.

  20

  Positano, Italy

  It didn’t take Jake and Alexandra long to get the entirety of what they thought the bartender knew about the part she played in the network planning to strike Italy. Jake had been right. Whoever was running the show was using a precise calculation for each member on each rung of the ladder. Nobody knew more than they needed to know to accomplish their mission.

  They ate a scant breakfast at the hotel, drinking a decent cappuccino. But they checked out by 0845 and drove down the hill toward the seafront to meet Italian Intelligence Officer Elisa Murici at the same café Jake and Alexandra had been to the day before, arriving at precisely 0900.

  Elisa was already sitting inside with a young man with long curly hair nearly to his shoulders. Jake thought the guy looked like a model for some high-end clothing line.

  Jake and Elisa kissed on both cheeks, but he only shook the young man’s hand, making sure to lay down a solid grip. Alexandra had still not gotten into the whole kiss greeting, despite their long stay in Italy. Her staunch German ancestry wouldn’t allow it, Jake guessed. But she was cordial with Elisa and her associate, a man named Vito Galati.

  They ordered cappuccinos all around and made small talk about the current weather until they came, all four with a different drawing in the foam. Vito was a talker, his English quite good. When they switched to Italian periodically, Vito seemed a bit confused.

  “What’s the matter?” Jake asked the young officer with AISI.

  “Your Italian is quite good,” Vito said. “It seems to be infused with local Calabrese.”

  “It should,” Elisa said. “That’s where Jake has been living for the last couple of years.”

  “The Calabrese are good people,” Vito said. “They will do anything for you.”

  “They are nice,” Jake said, “but don’t piss them off.”

  “Like the Malavita?” Vito asked.

  “Family in general,” Jake corrected. Then he considered not saying something, but he pushed forward anyway. He needed to make sure this guy knew that he knew who he was dealing with, and was not just some former CIA officer. “Not everyone can trace their heritage back to the Etruscans. But many in Calabria can at least go back to their Greek ancestry.”

  When Jake mentioned the Etruscans, Vito’s eyes widened. He said, “You have done your homework, Mister Adams. I’m afraid you have me at a disadvantage.”

  Jake doubted that, unless Elisa was keeping his background secret for a reason. He glanced at Elisa, who gave him a nearly imperceptible nod. So he gave the man a brief bio—Air Force officer, CIA, private security consultant. That was enough to impress the Italian.

  Vito tried to hold back a smile when he said, “Was the Air Force flying bi-planes back then?”

  “Yeah, and you were probably swimming around in your father’s balls when I was fighting the Communists,” Jake said, keeping things light with a smile of his own.

  “Boys,” Alexandra said, “I’m sure you all have enormous cocks.”

  “At least one of us,” Vito said. “I can’t vouch for my American friend.”

  The Italian didn’t know that Jake had also slept with his partner. Neither did Alexandra. Time to change the subject.

  “Do you want to know what happened in Pompeii?” Jake asked, and then took a long sip of his cappuccino.

  Elisa nodded.

  Vito shrugged.

  Jake explained, first backing up to their original operation in Rome, the second op in Rome, including the various shootings, the shift to Naples, and then finally their little adventure in Pompeii. For now he left out the bartender. Then he finished his cappuccino.

  “Interesting,” Elisa said. “But why are you here on the Amalfi?”

  “It’s a beautiful coast,” Jake said. “I’ve been meaning to take Alexandra
here for a while.”

  He could tell by Elisa’s expression that she wasn’t buying it. He forgot how good she was at ready people. But he guessed that she could read him better than most, considering the intimacy of their relationship.

  “What are we doing here, Jake?” Elisa asked.

  “You wanted to be read in on my activities,” Jake said. “I’m only doing this because we are friends. I’m not under any obligation to tell you anything.”

  Vito jumped in head first. “But I’m with AISI. You have been involved with a number of murders in Italy. That is my business.”

  Jake shifted forward in his chair toward the young man. “Murders? Justified self defense. Maybe if you did your damn job, the crime rate wouldn’t be so high in Italy.”

  “I can see the bulge under your left arm,” Vito said. “I believe you are not authorized to carry a concealed handgun in Italy.”

  The young man was partially correct. Jake had been given a special license to carry a handgun in Austria and Germany. However, with the open borders policy of the EU, those licenses extended to every country in the European Union. Also, he had a special two-year license to carry in Italy as a private security officer. His benefactor, the billionaire Carlos Gomez, had made that happen with little red tape.

  “When a man pulls a gun on me and tries to blow my head off,” Jake said, “I only have one thing on my side—and that’s my God-given right to self defense. We have a saying in America. It’s better to be judged by twelve than carried by six. I think that works in Italy as well.”

  Elisa finished her cappuccino and set her cup down onto the saucer with force. “Guys. We are all on the same side. Jake is authorized to carry a gun in Italy.” Then she turned to her young associate and said, “Wait for me outside.”

  This wasn’t a request, and the AISI officer shook his head as he rose, considering if he should protest. Instead, he stormed out the door and crossed the street, soaking in the morning sun as he gazed out at the sea.