The Assassin

by Andrew Britton

  He wrapped his left arm around the throat of his hostage and jammed the muzzle into his lower back, then crouched behind the German, trying to make himself as small a target as possible. He could feel something burning in his left side and knew he was hit; the guard’s single round had found its target. It was a sickening realization; until he looked, he had no way of knowing how bad the wound actually was. It could be a scratch, or it could be life-threatening. The pain had not yet realized its full potential, but that would change in a matter of seconds.

  The guard near the door was still shouting commands in his native language. He was clearly out of control; his eyes were like blue saucers, wide and irrational. The gun was moving all over the place; obviously, he did not have a shot from that angle, but was desperately trying to find one. Kealey had time here, but only a little. Naomi needed his help; that much was clear, but until he got past these two guards, he could not do a thing for her. He only hoped that she had the good sense to stall.

  Raising his head by a tiny fraction, he spoke quietly into the ear of his hostage. “What’s your name?”

  “My…?”

  “Your name,” Kealey hissed, adding a menacing edge to his tone.

  “Klein. My name is Gunter Klein. Please, I have a daughter in Bonn….”

  “Relax, Gunter.” He winced; the pain was getting worse. If it was only a flesh wound, it was a bad one. “I want you to tell your friend to drop his weapon. Do it now.”

  He knew the man near the door spoke English; it was an unwritten rule for embassy postings in Washington. But Kealey also knew the instruction would carry more weight if it came from his own countryman. Klein, clearly terrified, stumbled over the few necessary words. The man at the door replied with a short verbal barrage, but didn’t release the gun.

  “He won’t do it. He says you’ll kill us both.”

  “I won’t….” Kealey swore under his breath and made a decision. There was no convincing them, and this was taking too long. The bite in his side was nearly intolerable, and he could feel something warm running over his hip; it wouldn’t be long before the wound started to slow him down. Fuck it.

  He straightened and pushed Klein aside, exposing his body for the briefest of moments. Then he leveled his weapon and squeezed the trigger.

  The bullet tore into the guard’s right arm, just above the elbow, shattering bone. He screamed and the gun jumped out of his hand, clattering across the ceramic tile. A split second later, Kealey stepped to the left and slammed a fist into Klein’s face, sending him staggering into a nearby desk. A chair flipped over, and papers scattered across the floor. The other guard was reaching down for his gun with his good arm, his left hand wrapping around the grip. Crossing the few feet between them, Kealey kicked it out of his hand at the last possible second. Then he administered two judicious blows to the face. The man fell back to the floor and stopped moving.

  Kealey looked back at Gunter Klein. He was clearly unconscious, his body immobile. Kealey quickly retrieved their weapons, as well as their radios. They would have already made the call, but should they wake before he was clear of the building, there was no point in giving them the opportunity to provide more information. Nor did he want to catch a bullet in the back on his way out.

  He ejected the magazines on both of the weapons and shucked the rounds out of the chambers. Then he pulled the batteries out of one of the radios. The second radio he put in his pocket, along with the batteries, rounds, and the spare magazines, both of which could be used with his own Beretta. He left the guns and the spare radio, now useless, on one of the desks, then moved toward the door, shooting a quick glance at the guards. Neither had moved. Only when he was out in the hall did he remember the backpack; he could have simply dumped all of the gear inside and saved himself some time, but that couldn’t be helped now.

  He kept moving forward, jogging toward the stairwell. Soon he was out of the building, making his way through the darkened grounds, heading north. Again he heard a wail in the distance, but this time the sirens were drawing closer, and there were many more of them. It was just as he feared: the chancery guards had made the call before confronting him. He couldn’t help but wonder how they had learned he was in the building, but he knew it was no longer important. All that mattered now was getting back to Naomi.

  Behind him, an alarm started to sound, lights coming up in the chancery. At the same time, hidden security lamps flickered up from the grass; it was as if the earth itself was conspiring against him.

  He was gasping for air, the pain like a hacksaw blade digging into his side. He ignored it and ran harder.

  “You know, I don’t think this is legal. You can’t hold me unless you have a reason.”

  “Actually, I can,” Lowe replied in a bored tone. He had tried to ingratiate himself, but the woman had yet to respond to his mild flirtations, and he was beginning to lose interest. “Listen, ma’am, you should have just answered my questions. We could have saved ourselves a lot of trouble.”

  “I did answer your questions, and I answered them truthfully. I don’t understand the need for this.”

  “And I don’t understand why you’re still waiting for a tow truck at this hour of the morning. What time did you place the call again?”

  Naomi took a deep, stalling breath and looked down at her hands. It was becoming more and more difficult to evade the officer’s inquiries. He had climbed back into the car a few minutes earlier, and he’d been peppering her with questions ever since.

  “Officer Lowe, I already explained this to you. My engine started to make this strange noise on I-95, so I got off to look for a hotel. I thought I’d just find a mechanic in the morning. But then I got turned around and ended up here, which is when the engine died completely. So I called for a tow truck, and that’s when you showed up. You knocked on my window a second later… literally.” She allowed a note of indignation to creep into her voice. “If anything in there constitutes a crime, I’d like to know what it is.”

  “No,” he replied patiently, “nothing you’ve done is a crime. But I do find it interesting that you decided to take an eight-hour trip starting so late in the day. More to the point, you left Richmond without ID or the registration to your car. Most people remember those kinds of things.”

  “It was stupid, I know. But it doesn’t really matter, does it? It’s not like I can go anywhere. Once the tow truck shows up, I’ll catch a taxi to a hotel. Believe me, Officer, the first thing I’ll do is call my boyfriend and get him to send me my license. Or maybe I’ll have him drive up and give it to me. Either way, this problem is easily solved.”

  “You’d think so,” Lowe said, shifting his weight in his seat. “But I’m afraid I can’t leave you here, Ms. Brown.”

  Naomi did not react; after debating the risks, she’d decided it was better to give him a false name rather than nothing at all.

  “I’ve already called my sergeant,” Lowe continued. “As soon as he gets down here, he’s going to have a little talk with you, but either way, you’re going to have to stay in the city tonight. You’re welcome to use the phone at the station… Maybe your boyfriend can overnight your license, as you suggested. With a little bit of luck, you’ll be on your way to Baltimore first thing tomorrow morning.”

  Naomi felt a stab of panic, her throat constricting. She quickly looked out the window to hide her reaction. It was what she had feared all along. He must have made the call when he was out of the car. In doing so, he had sealed her fate; there was absolutely no way she could get out of this.

  Commanding herself to relax, she tried to think of anything she might have missed. There had to be a solution. As her mind raced to find one, the radio sputtered to life.

  “All units in PSA 205, this is D.C. 10-95 reported at the German Embassy on Reservoir Road. Shots fired, repeat, shots fired. All available units respond.”

  Naomi froze, aware of the intense silence that followed the call. She couldn’t bring herself to face him, but she
knew exactly what the officer had to be thinking; she was parked right next to the embassy, and she had refused to let him search her vehicle. It wouldn’t take a genius to connect the dots.

  Lowe grabbed for the radio. “2054, D.C. I’m still in the area. I, uh, may have a subject of interest with respect to that call—”

  He was cut off by a sudden flurry of activity outside the car. Their heads snapped forward simultaneously as lights exploded on the other side of the black-iron fence. At the same time, a distant alarm began to scream. It was piercingly loud, even inside the cruiser. Neither of them really had time to react; a few seconds later, a dark figure crossed the fence in the distance and began jogging in their direction.

  From the moment Kealey crossed the fence and stepped into Foxhall Road, everything inside the car started to move much faster. Muttering something under his breath, Lowe reached for his gun, his left hand moving to open the door. It was clear he had made the connection between the call and what he was seeing. As his hand moved down to the right side of his belt, Naomi knew she had to do something, anything, to stop him from getting out of the car and drawing the weapon on Ryan. Without thinking, she reached over and grabbed Lowe’s right hand with both of hers just as the gun came out of the holster. Shocked by this unexpected assault, he shouted for her to stop and pulled his arm up violently, trying to break her grasp. Naomi held on desperately, even as her elbow smashed painfully against the dash in the struggle.

  She had picked a fight she couldn’t win; that much was immediately obvious. He was much stronger than her to begin with, and she didn’t have any leverage. To make matters worse, there were a number of obstacles in her way, including the radio and the dash-mounted laptop. Still, she held on with all her strength, struggling to keep his gun hand immobilized. Through the windshield, she saw Ryan running hard toward the cruiser, though something about his stride seemed a little bit off….

  Without warning, Naomi was blinded by a sudden flash of light. Momentarily stunned by the muzzle blast and the deafening noise, she released her grip and raised her hands instinctively. For a brief, terrifying instant, she thought she’d been shot in the face, but the pain never came. A split second later, the driver’s side door was yanked open. Lowe swung in his seat to counter this new threat as Kealey reached inside, grabbed him by the hair, and pulled him out of the car. Lowe was still screaming as his feet left the cruiser, firing his weapon without regard for his aim. One round missed Naomi’s right side by less than an inch, slamming into the passenger-side door; another whined past her ear and punched a hole in the roof. The next four drilled into the dash, the fifth exiting the windshield.

  As the sound of gunfire faded into the night, replaced by the scream of approaching sirens, Naomi thought she heard a pair of sharp, brutal blows. She couldn’t be sure; for the moment, she was completely disoriented, her ears ringing, her head thumping. She found herself wedged against the door, trying to make herself as small a target as possible. She couldn’t see what was happening, and she wondered why, before realizing that her eyes were still squeezed tightly shut. Just as she found the courage to open them, the passenger-side door was pulled open, and a familiar hand reached in for hers.

  Naomi could see he was hurt from the moment her feet touched the pavement. He was favoring his left side, and as she pulled him into the light, she could see that his face was drawn, pale, and shining with sweat. There was blood on his hands and a large wet stain on his shirt, barely discernable against the dark material.

  “Oh, God, what happened?” she asked anxiously. She moved to examine the wound, but Kealey waved her away.

  “Don’t worry about it. Are you hit?”

  She looked down and performed a quick visual check. She didn’t see any blood, and nothing seemed to hurt except for her elbow, which was still throbbing painfully. “No, I’m fine.”

  “Good.” Still holding his side, Kealey pointed toward the unconscious officer. “Take his radio.” The words were pinched off at the end; clearly, he was in considerable pain. “Get rid of it, and cuff his hands. He’ll have the keys in his pocket. Make sure you get them, too. Hurry.”

  She was already moving. Kneeling, she stripped off the officer’s shoulder mic, following the wires to the radio itself, which she pulled off the belt. Wrapping it all into an untidy ball, she tossed it into a bush near the sidewalk. Then she turned over the body, pulled the limp arms back to the rear, and snapped the cuffs into place. After a second of rummaging, she found the handcuff keys in a spare magazine pouch and slipped them into her pocket. “Done.”

  Kealey was leaning against the front of the cruiser. Wincing, he straightened and started toward the passenger side of the Taurus. “We have to move. The responding units will be here in less than a minute. You have the car keys?”

  “Got ’em.” She hesitated. “Ryan, you have to get to a hospital.”

  He shook his head in the negative. “I already checked it out. Trust me, it’s not as bad as it looks.”

  “But—”

  “Naomi, we don’t have time to argue. Get in the car.”

  She did as he asked. Starting the engine, she put the Taurus into drive, accelerated quickly, and swung a hard right onto Reservoir Road. As the screeching alarm started to fade, it all seemed to catch up with her. The adrenaline dissipated quickly enough, but even as her breathing returned to normal, her hands just wouldn’t stop shaking. As she struggled to regain control, she turned in her seat and said, “So where are we going?”

  Kealey looked down at his side and grimaced. The options were few. A hospital was clearly out; the police would be monitoring emergency-room activity, watching for someone to be admitted with a gunshot wound. At the same time, he knew he needed immediate medical attention. The truth was staring him right in the face. He had shot a man in the German chancery, and he had brutally assaulted a police officer. There was only one place to seek refuge, just one place beyond the reach of the D.C. Metro Police Department.

  “Langley,” he said through gritted teeth. “We’re going to Langley.”

  CHAPTER 33

  LONDON

  Mid-afternoon in the heart of the West End. The skies above were gray and fatigued, the sort of overcast weather that promised rain, but would never deliver. They were sitting outside the Embankment Café, which was surrounded by bright green grass, towering hedges, and trees wielding their colorful autumn leaves. Beyond the trees and a dirty brick wall, the River Thames curved on a gentle, slow-moving arc to the south, Waterloo Bridge to the east.

  Vanderveen had ordered a full English breakfast of eggs, bacon, chips, and beans, but Raseen had settled on black tea. As she sipped from the steaming cup, she kept shooting him little glances across the dingy plastic table. Vanderveen was guessing they were based partly on what had happened the night before and partly on how he looked now, which was considerably different. He had decided to switch passports shortly after they checked out of the hotel in Calais, which naturally meant a change in appearance. Now he was traveling as Russell Davies, a British national. The dark hair was gone, as were the beard and the tinted contacts. As with Tartus, he had returned to his natural state, although his blond hair and green eyes were much better suited to the streets of London than they were to a dusty Syrian souq.

  Raseen had changed her persona as well, but her features were much less malleable, and her various passports reflected this fact. Anything other than her original hair color would look highly unusual, only increasing her visibility in a crowd. As a result, she had wisely stayed close to her natural look in all the photographs that accompanied her forged documents. The French passport she was using now — which had passed Vanderveen’s careful inspection — bore the name Nina Sebbar.

  She had suggested they check out of the hotel the night before, but he had refused, knowing it would look more suspicious to leave in the middle of the night than it would to wait for morning. At the same time, he had not gotten much sleep, as part of him had been waiting for
the police to kick down the door. The raid had never come, but the restless night meant an early morning. They made the first ferry from Calais to Dover, endured the standard customs check on arrival, then caught a National Express bus to London. From Waterloo Station, it was a short taxi ride to the Embankment. They had arrived with an hour to spare, which was enough time to partake in a leisurely meal and watch for lingering eyes.

  Embankment Café at noon. A man will sit outside, gray suit, green paisley tie. He’ll be carrying a black attaché case and a copy of the Times. Follow him, and keep your distance.

  Vanderveen had no patience for these little games, but he had no choice but to play along. He needed what the controllers had to offer; namely, the specifics regarding Thomas Rühmann and his office in Berlin. The Austrian’s business relationship with the insurgency had started long before Vanderveen arrived on the scene. He had met Rühmann only once, and briefly at that. The purpose of the meeting was to describe the kind of weapon he needed for the attack in New York, and Rühmann had come through in spectacular form. Of course, circumstances had changed since then, and now, through little or no fault of his own, he had become a liability to the whole operation. The word had been sent up the line, sealing his fate.

  Time was the other factor here. For the moment, Vanderveen had no idea what Kealey was up to. He had to wait for the wheels to turn in Washington, which meant that he had to move faster than he might otherwise have liked. He had every intention of placing a second call to the States by the end of the day, but for now, there were other things to consider.

  Raseen lowered her cup to the table and leaned forward conspiratorially. “Russell, can we talk here?”

  Vanderveen cast a subtle glance around. Due to the weather, the tables on the terrace were nearly deserted. The closest patrons were four tables over, but judging by their advanced age, elevated voices, and blunt Estuary accents, they would not be able to understand — or even hear — a murmured conversation in French from the next table, let alone at a distance of 15 feet.