by Vince Flynn
Rapp swung the gun around on the other man, who was caught between the door and Hurley. He was never going to make it, so he stopped and put his hands up in the air.
“Shoot him,” Hurley ordered in a raspy voice.
Rapp squeezed the trigger and buried a bullet in the man’s forehead.
“Get me down … quick,” Hurley hissed.
“What about him?” Rapp asked, pointing the gun at Radih, who was showing signs of life.
“Get me down first.”
Rapp ripped through the last bit of tape while he ran over to the wall and untied the makeshift pulley. Hurley dropped the short distance to the floor, landing on his feet. He wavered for a second and then caught his balance.
“Give me that gun,” Hurley ordered, “and check the right thigh pocket of that second one you shot. He should have a knife.”
Rapp placed the gun in Hurley’s hands and went off to search for the knife.
Hurley walked over to Radih, whose arms were starting to flop around as if he was waking up from a deep sleep. Hurley stomped on his stomach, and the Palestinian’s eyes popped open. Hurley bent over and pressed the suppressor against Radih’s chest. Looking into his eyes, he said, “You should have killed me when you had the chance, you piece of shit.” Hurley pulled the trigger.
CHAPTER 65
TWO of the sedans pulled into the hangar and three more stopped just outside. All of the doors opened at roughly the same time and a dozen well-armed men fanned out, creating a barrier at the door, effectively sealing Ivanov off from his Spetsnaz escort.
Ivanov looked at the commander with extreme disappointment.
Mughniyah approached with a confident grin on his face. Four of his bodyguards trailed a few paces back. “Mikhail, welcome to Beirut.”
“I would hardly call this a welcome.”
“You will have to excuse all of this, but I am not in a good mood today.”
“And why is that?”
“Because I just found out that you have been scheming behind my back yet again.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You will notice that our Iraqi and Iranian friends are not here.”
“Why?” Sayyed asked, alarmed by the news.
“Because I found out that Mikhail had made a deal with them. Didn’t you, Mikhail?”
Ivanov tried to laugh the question away as if it was a harmless maneuver.
Mughniyah turned his attention back to Sayyed and said, “He set the ceiling at five million. The others were going to bow out and let him win.”
“What did you do with them?” Sayyed asked.
“For the moment they are my guests. I will decide if I am going to kill them later.”
Ivanov clasped his hands together and laughed. Mughniyah was proving to be much smarter than he had given him credit for. “You have outsmarted me, Imad. That does not happen very often. Would you like me to leave, or would you like to discuss business? Negotiate some terms, perhaps?”
“I will negotiate nothing with you. I am going to name a price and you are going to pay it.”
“Really?” Ivanov said. “And what if I decide I don’t like your price?”
“Then we will have a big problem.”
Ivanov nodded as if he found the game amusing.
“Before we get to that, though, I need you to return all of the money you took from our Swiss bank accounts.”
“Money that I took!” Ivanov’s eyes nearly bulged out of his head. “I did no such thing.”
“I think you did.”
“As a matter of fact I want my money back from you.”
“Your money?”
“Yes, my money.” Ivanov’s face was blazing red. “The money that you took. You don’t think I suspected you at once? You never liked Sharif. You did nothing but complain about his prices. You called him a rat and a traitor to the cause for charging his inflated prices.”
“I did not kill Sharif,” Mughniyah denied flatly.
“And why should I believe you?”
“Because I am a man of honor. Someone who fights for what he believes in … not a thief like you.”
“Honor! This is beautiful. You, of all people, speak of honor. Imad Mughniyah, the hijacker of civilian airliners, the kidnapper of professors, the man who shells entire neighborhoods filled with women and children. You speak of honor. That is laughable.” Ivanov literally spat the last word at his accuser.
Mughniyah reached for his gun, but the Spetsnaz commander beat him to the draw and pointed the barrel of his Markov pistol at the side of Mughniyah’s head. All of a sudden it appeared as if everyone had a gun. Slides were being racked and hammers cocked.
“Enough,” Sayyed shouted. “Your disdain for each other has blinded your judgment.”
“And you are a fool,” Mughniyah yelled.
Sayyed approached him, and in a voice loud enough for only Mughniyah to hear said, “And you are broke. How are you going to pay all of your men next week and the week after that? Get control of your hot temper and let me handle this.” Speaking to the group, he then said, “Everyone, lower your weapons.” He motioned with his hands and repeated himself two more times until finally all of the weapons were either holstered or pointed in a safe direction.
“I know that Imad did not steal the money, and I do not think that Mikhail did so either.”
“How can you know?” Mughniyah angrily asked.
“Tell me. Why would he come here today if he had stolen our money?”
While Mughniyah pondered that question, Shvets stepped forward. “I can assure you that my boss had nothing to do with the stolen funds. I visited Herr Dorfman’s boss in Hamburg last week. More than fifty million dollars was stolen. It appears we were not the only targets.” Shvets wanted to get out here with his life, so he quickly added, “We are following several leads, including one that the money was stolen by an organized crime element out of Prague.”
“And I can promise you,” Ivanov added quickly, “that when we find these people, we will get our money back, and we will punish the people who took it.”
“Thank you,” Sayyed said. “Right now, we have something very important to negotiate. We have three Americans. John Cummins, who served four years in Moscow and the last four in Damascus, another relatively young man by the name of Robert Richards, and the infamous Bill Sherman.” Sayyed grabbed the file off the table and handed it to Ivanov, giving him a second to study the photo again. “Now, how much would your government be willing to pay for these three men?”
Ivanov unconsciously licked his lips. A prize like Stan Hurley would virtually guarantee him the directorship. Primakov was getting old and lacked the ruthless animal instinct that it took to run the SVR. He could control the interrogation and filter what information he passed on. The thought of keeping that asshole Hurley in the basement of one of his secure sites like some exotic animal was almost too much to take. He reminded himself that this was still a negotiation and his funds were not unlimited. “I am confident that my government would pay five million dollars for these three.”
“That is not enough,” Mughniyah complained before anyone had had a chance to absorb the offer.
Thus started the back and forth, with Ivanov coming up three million in his price. They were stuck there for a few minutes while Mughniyah kept saying that he would only accept an offer of sixteen million. Ivanov, as well as Sayyed, tried to explain to him that the issues of the stolen money and the value of the American spies had nothing to do with each other. Ivanov raised his offer to ten and was prepared to walk away when Mughniyah finally countered at fourteen. Thirty seconds later they had agreed on twelve, and everyone breathed a sigh of relief, no one more so than Sayyed.
They were only halfway done, though. Mughniyah wanted all the money in their possession before they would turn the men over, and Ivanov wasn’t going to release a red cent until he laid eyes on Stan Hurley.
Sayyed broke the stalemate by saying, “You need to
call Moscow, correct?”
“Yes.”
“Why don’t I retrieve the prisoners? They are not far from here. You can make the arrangements to have the money transfered, and when we get back we can complete the transaction.”
Ivanov, who wanted to get as far away from this horrible place and these horrible people as quickly as possible, leaped at the chance to expedite his departure. “That is a wonderful idea.” Turning to Shvets, he said, “Nikolai, go with Assef and bring the prisoners back here.”
The last thing Shvets wanted to do was leave the relative security of this hangar and drive into downtown Beirut. He considered asking if he could bring a few of the Spetsnaz with him, but he knew the request would be denied. As he followed Sayyed and his men to their car, he wondered how much longer he could continue to work for Ivanov.
CHAPTER 66
RAPP found the knife, dug it out of the man’s pants, and crossed the room. He took his gun back from Hurley and stuck it under his armpit while he cut the tape from Hurley’s wrists.
The tape peeled free and Hurley said, “Give me the gun.”
Rapp held out the knife. “Get your own.”
Hurley grumbled and took the knife.
“There are two guys in the hallway.” Rapp started dragging one of the bodies across the room and placed it by the wall with the door. “I’ll open the door, you try to sound like Radih. Yell for them to get in here and I’ll pop ’em.”
When the bodies were piled out of sight, Rapp placed his hand on the door handle. Hurley stood behind him. Rapp nodded and yanked the door open. Hurley muttered something about a mess and ordered the two guards to get in there. Unfortunately, only one appeared. Rapp shot him in the back of the head while pulling the door open farther and swinging his left arm around, searching for the second man. The tip of the suppressor ended up less than a foot from the man’s face. Rapp squeezed the trigger and shot him in the nose, pink mist exploding out into the hallway. Stepping over the body, he looked left and right. The hallway was empty.
Rapp dragged the guard into the room. Hurley was already stripping the first guard of his pants, shirt, and boots. Rapp did the same with the second guard and told Hurley to grab the man’s bandanna. When Rapp found the radio he asked Hurley, “Do you know where we are?”
“No.”
“I think I might. What about Bobby and Cummins?”
“Bobby should be here, but I think they took Cummins to the airport. They’re trying to auction off our asses.”
“We’ll get Bobby in a second, but I need to call Ridley first.” Rapp dialed in the right frequency and hit the transmit button. All he got was static.
“Bad reception down here,” Hurley told him. “We’ll have to get out of the basement.”
“All right…” Rapp looked around the room. “I assume Bobby is naked, too.”
“Yeah … Let’s grab him some clothes.”
Rapp scavenged up a set while Hurley collected two ammo pouches with eight extra AK-47 magazines. When they had everything, they tied the bandannas around their faces and Rapp checked the hallway. It was still empty, so they ducked out, closing the door behind them and locking it. The next door over was padlocked, so Rapp shot the lock off with his Beretta. Hurley opened the door and froze. There, dangling from the hook in the middle of the room, with a rope wrapped around his neck, was Richards.
“Motherfuckers,” was all Hurley could manage to say.
Rapp considered checking for a pulse, but Richards’s skin was chalk white. He’d been dead for hours. “Should we bring him with us?”
“No.” Hurley shook his head.
Rapp closed the door to Richards’s cell and told himself he would process it later. They ran down the back hallway, but when they got near the stairs they heard some voices. Hurley started making hand gestures, but Rapp waved him off, pulling him back away from the stairs.
Whispering in his ear, Rapp said, “I have an idea.” Rapp handed him the two-way radio. “Try Ridley again. Tell him I think we’re at Martyrs’ Square. I’m gonna run down to the front of the building and see if I can start a little something.” Rapp started to move, but Hurley grabbed him.
“What are you talking about?”
“Just wait here. If I’m right, you’re gonna hear a shitload of gunfire in about a half minute. Then we’ll make our break.” Rapp pointed at the radio. “Just try to raise Ridley. I’ll be right back.”
Rapp tore off down the hallway, slowing when he was fifteen feet from the stairs at the front of the building. He stopped and listened for a moment, but heard nothing. Then there was the sound of a foot scraping along the floor and a faint voice. Rapp couldn’t tell if was coming from the first floor or farther up. He considered going back to Hurley. He could use his silenced Beretta to take out whoever was at the back of the building and then try to make a run for it. Fundamentally, though, there was a problem. They were on the wrong side of town and severely outgunned. They needed a diversion to get out of here.
“Full speed ahead,” he muttered to himself as he started up the stairs, his silenced pistol in his left hand and the AK-47 in the right. Midway up the steps he got his first glimpse of a small lobby off to the left, maybe fifteen by fifteen feet. Rapp counted two heads and then three. The main entrance was sandbagged, as were the windows on each side, although they’d left two holes in the sandbags to fire from—exactly what Rapp was looking for.
When he hit the landing he noticed two more men lying on the floor. One was standing, looking out one hole in the sandbags, watching the street, and two more were sitting in folding chairs, playing a board game. Rapp walked straight for the man who was on his feet. He kept his pace casual and started shaking his head as if he was going to tell them just how crappy things were downstairs. One of the men started bitching in Arabic. The best Rapp could figure was that the man was telling him he had another hour before he had to pull a watch in the toilet. Rapp laughed and then raised the suppressed Beretta. He had had eighteen shots to start with and was down to twelve.
The guy who was standing got it first, a nice little shot from ten feet right in the left eye. The two guys playing the board game—one got it in the back of the head and the other in his open mouth. Rapp never stopped moving. It was another nice thing Hurley had taught him. When you have the advantage, close with the enemy. He was no more than eight feet away when he shot the two nappers. The first one was clean, but with the second guy, he was off a bit on the first shot, so he had to fire one more to put him out of his misery.
Six shots left. Rapp glanced to his left. The hallway had been barricaded with scraps of broken office furniture. The stairs going up were empty. He walked over to the little one-by-one-foot hole in the sandbags and looked across the street. Sure enough, about two hundred feet away was a similar building. This had to be Martyrs’ Square. Rapp slung his AK-47 over his right shoulder, stuffed the Beretta in his waistband, and picked up the dead lookout’s AK-47. He gripped the rifle firmly, flipped the selector switch to full automatic, and sighted at the building across the street. He didn’t want to kill anyone over there, but he did want to make sure he got their attention, so he chose a position on the second floor and let it rip. The bullets shredded the afternoon calm, thudding into the sandbags across the street and then the building itself as it climbed. Rapp emptied the entire magazine and dropped the weapon.
Without hesitating, he moved to the peephole on the other side of the front door and took aim with the other AK-47. This time he sprayed the entire building down, firing in controlled bursts. Twenty or so rounds into the magazine the building across the street erupted in gunfire. Rapp hauled ass down the stairs as he heard bullets smacking into the building and gunfire being returned.
Hurley was standing at the other end, waiting for him. “What in hell did you just do?”
“I gave the big FU to Washington and got us a little diversion.” Rapp looked up the stairs. The men were gone. “Come on. Let’s get the hell out of here.�
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They climbed up the stairs, and when they reached the landing a heavyset guy in green fatigues came running down from the floor above and started ordering them to the upper floors to return fire. Hurley pointed out the back door with his rifle, and when the man looked in that direction, he deftly stuck a knife through his carotid artery. Blood came cascading out, pulsating through his fingers.
Hurley followed Rapp out the back door just as a sedan skidded to a stop between two piles of rubble. The two men in the front seat jumped out of the car, yelling and asking what was going on. Rapp couldn’t hear them over the gunfire, and since they weren’t pointing a gun at him he wasn’t in any rush to kill them. All he wanted was their car. Two more men exited the rear of the car, one Caucasian and the other Middle Eastern. Both looked vaguely familiar, which made Rapp think he’d seen them in some of the photos Ridley had shown him.
Hurley said, “Merry fucking Christmas,” and then shot the two men in front.
Rapp raised the Beretta and took aim at the fair-skinned guy on the left.
Hurley yelled, “Don’t kill the little Commie. Crack him over the head and stuff him in the trunk. I’ve got the other one.”
Rapp and Hurley rushed the two men, their weapons leveled.
Hurley swung the butt end of his rifle and cracked Sayyed across the temple. As the Syrian dropped to his knees, Hurley said, “Sayyed, old buddy. I can’t wait to play Twenty Questions with you.”