Back Blast: A Gray Man Novel

by Mark Greaney

  All this information was divined from open sources by USCrypto staff, so it was completely legal, but the very existence of Spycatcher made Court sick to his stomach.

  The site could easily serve, and had probably already been used, as a tool by terrorists and other agents provocateur to allow them to physically target installations and personnel. But now USCrypto.org was an asset to Gentry, because he found himself in an adversarial relationship with his former employer.

  It occurred to him that, if he were still working for CIA, he would love to be assigned to target the founder and author of this website, because the head of USCrypto.org was certainly a danger to every man and woman who worked in the U.S. intelligence community. Court would think nothing of killing the founder, although Court had never killed for his country on U.S. soil.

  Court searched for the names of several people, and he found only one, because although USCrypto.org was good, Court’s old associates at CIA were among the blackest of the black. He jotted down the address, pulled out his phone, and recorded it all on a mapping application. He also looked up addresses for several clandestine government contractors. There he had more luck, and he noted these on a pad and in his phone.

  Quickly he ate a microwave enchilada and drank a bottle of water. As soon as he was done he took off his shirt, grabbed the hacksaw off of the little kitchen counter, and sat on the edge of his bed.

  Court slowly and carefully began sawing the cast off his right arm. Less than a month earlier he’d taken a handgun round straight into his forearm, snapping the ulna in two. His doctor’s orders were to leave the cast on for six weeks, and it had been less than four, but Court decided the time was right to free himself of this annoying burden. He’d have to be careful with it, of course; the broken bone and soft tissue had healed, more or less, but there was still some more growing together that needed to happen, and certain high-stress actions to his arm could quite easily reinjure it.

  But Court knew his body. It came from a lifetime of hurting it and watching it heal. He knew he could go without the cast as long as he was careful with the arm, and he also knew he was out of time.

  Each and every day he remained in the U.S. with the CIA’s shoot-on-sight sanction in effect he compounded the risk. He had to begin his operation now. He didn’t have time to nurse his wounds.

  As soon as Court had the cast off his arm, he put on several layers of his darkest clothing, loaded his pockets with gear, and headed back out into the night.

  He’d already had a busy day, but his real mission was only now about to begin.

  16

  Chris Travers ordered his fourth shot of Jameson at last call, then he polished off the last few gulps of his draft beer. He’d been drinking since before ten p.m., it was nearly one a.m. now, and he wanted one more for the road, or more precisely, one more for the six-block walk back to his apartment.

  This was Travers’s favorite pub and he was a regular here, but he drank alone now. A couple of mates had sat with him for the first round, but they had to push off because the next day was Monday and, after all, who really hung out sipping whiskey till closing time on a Sunday night?

  Chris Travers did, because he didn’t work a nine-to-five job. For large swaths of the year he was on the clock 24/7, and for other sizable chunks of the year he was in training and away from home. But for a few precious weeks here and there he was free from training, off from deployment, and on his own to do whatever the hell he wanted to do with his time.

  And this evening he was determined to take advantage of one of the all-too-rare respites.

  He held the whiskey up to the little light hanging over the bar of the Irish pub to appreciate the amber color, and while he did this he looked out the window into the night. By force of habit, he always kept an eye open. Even here, in the States.

  He was surprised to see trash blowing down 19th Street. There had been only the lightest breeze when Travers headed out to the pub hours earlier, so he’d not bothered to dress for warmth—he’d just thrown on a flannel shirt and khaki pants, and boat shoes with no socks. Suddenly he found himself regretting his rare moment of poor preparation.

  He’d not thought twice about making the six-block walk down here from his apartment to the Irish Whiskey, because Chris Travers had braved elements a hell of a lot more severe than a D.C. spring. His mind took him back to a mountain in Pakistan where he’d once spent three days in temperatures below zero; he’d handled that without a second thought. Granted, at the time he’d been under fire from Taliban snipers, so he had bigger fish to fry than catching a chill, but still, he told himself, tonight’s ten-minute hump back to his apartment would be no big deal.

  Travers had joined the army out of high school, served two years in straight-legged infantry and, with that, three tours of Iraq. He then earned his way into the Green Berets, spending three more years in 7th Special Forces Group. From there he left the military and went straight into the CIA, found his way to SAD Ground Branch, and, with his paramilitary unit, he had deployed all over the world for the past ten years.

  This had been a life well spent, but he had a long-term plan for his life ahead, too. He’d earned his private and commercial pilot’s licenses along the way and, he told himself, once he got too old or too beat-up for the shooting and scooting life, he’d stay with the Agency, flying spooks and techs all over the world as a pilot for Air Branch.

  But that was somewhere in the future. For now he was between deployments, spending his evening alone in a bar and thinking about all his mates who didn’t make it back home from Iraq, and from a dozen other shit holes of the world. He’d lost a lot of good friends, and he always dedicated his last drink of the night to them. Then he gave a silent wave to the bartender, a little wink to the waitress, whose attractiveness, like the wind outside, had increased dramatically in the time he’d been sitting on a bar stool drinking, and he headed out into the blustery night.

  His apartment was on Florida, several blocks north, and it was directly into the wind, so he jammed his hands into his pockets, and leaned into it as he climbed the hill. There were next to no pedestrians out on a Sunday night, but he was careful to keep watch for movement on the sidewalk or on the street, ready to give a scrutinizing eye to anyone or anything that looked out of place.

  He wasn’t aware of any specific threats, but men like Travers had personal security and counter-surveillance techniques trained into their muscle memory.

  He saw nothing out of the ordinary.

  —

  Court Gentry was completely enshrouded in his hoodie and neck gaiter; only his eyes, forehead, and the bridge of his nose remained visible. His hands were stuffed in his pockets, and he kept his head low into the wind. He stood on the sidewalk, three doors down from Chris Travers’s apartment, and he waited for his target to appear, walking back from the pub.

  Once he saw the man in the distance make the turn onto Florida, he tucked himself into a little alley that ran south off the street, found the deepest and darkest place, well out of the wind, and waited with his hand on the pistol in his jacket pocket.

  He imagined Travers was probably a little drunk, but Court also knew the majority of the effects of the alcohol would disappear almost instantly when the adrenaline kicked in, so he knew he had to presume Travers would remain formidable.

  Court was also aware Travers would be hardwired with every counter-surveillance protocol and tactic known to man, and he would treat everyone he saw as a potential adversary. That said, Travers could not evaluate what he could not see, so Court waited here, just out of the sight line of his quarry.

  Court knew where Chris Travers lived because Court knew Chris Travers.

  Travers had been an SAD Ground Branch operations officer at the same time as Gentry. While they weren’t on the same task force, they had trained together from time to time and, to the extent Gentry got along with anyone, he h
ad gotten along well with Travers.

  The first time they met was in Court’s early days with the Goon Squad. Travers and some of his team were assigned to play the opposition force against Court’s Golf Sierra task force at a shoot house in Moyock, North Carolina. For two days Zack Hightower and his boys, all jocked up in combat gear, kicked in the doors of the shoot house and cleared rooms, opening fire on the other team, who were all dressed in robes or other Middle Eastern attire.

  They fired Simunitions at one another. Plastic bullets loaded with paint that left a splotch on the clothing and blistering welts on the skin.

  After the training the guys on both teams would go out to a local watering hole. For the most part the teams stayed to themselves, but Travers saddled up next to the bar alongside Court and complimented him on his skills. He asked questions of a tactical nature, bought Court a couple of drinks, and rolled his eyes when Court’s team leader, Zack Hightower, told Court to stop fraternizing with the enemy and sit with his Golf Sierra unit.

  The last time Gentry and Travers had run into each other had been at a funeral in D.C. Court barely knew the Ground Branch officer who’d been killed, but Zack Hightower had mandated all his team to go to the funeral because they were in town that week and few other SAD shooters were around to pay their respects.

  Travers had been there; he’d been best friends with the man who had died, and after the funeral he invited all the Ground Branch men in attendance to his place, just a few blocks away. It was a two-bedroom second-floor walk-up in a part of town where 700-square-foot apartments sold for north of a million dollars. When Hightower asked Travers if he’d taken to spying for the Chinese to pay his mortgage, Travers replied that his mom owned the building and he lived here for free, and due to the deal he was getting and the convenience of the location he wouldn’t think about moving as long as he was CIA.

  Court remembered the location, and although he didn’t know for sure if Travers was in town, as soon as he took up surveillance on the building tonight he saw the second-floor lights flip off and his old colleague step off the stoop and head south on foot.

  Court had remained a hundred yards back, keeping out of the streetlights, while he tracked the distant figure to an Irish pub on 19th Street. Confident he’d return home after a few drinks, Court retraced his steps and found an alley nearby with a place to sit and wait.

  He told himself it was Sunday night, and he doubted Travers would hang out at the bar till last call.

  He’d been wrong. Court was bored and freezing now, but not for much longer, so he shook his arms and stamped his feet to prepare himself for action.

  Travers had been a decent guy, Court remembered, but that was years ago, and in those intervening years Travers had no doubt been told that Gentry was both a rampaging murderer and an enemy of America. Court was here to talk to his old acquaintance, but he knew he had to take the other man down quick and hard. It didn’t have to get bloody, but Travers would make the ultimate determination of how rough things were going to go tonight.

  Now Travers passed along the sidewalk, moving abreast with the alleyway. Instinctively the man’s head turned to scan for threats in the dark, but it was already too late.

  Court stood there, face obscured, with his small pistol in his hands. In a tone that was measured perfectly to command attention without being loud enough to alert nearby apartment dwellers, Court said, “Hands on your head, Chris, or you die.”

  Travers stopped in his tracks, and his hands rose slowly. “What the fuck is this?”

  “I’m going to search you for weapons, then we are going up to your place.”

  “Who are you?”

  Court knew the man wouldn’t remember his voice, and there was no way Travers would recognize him from just his eyes in a darkened alley.

  “I’m only a threat if you make me a threat. I just want to have a little talk.”

  “You can’t talk without a gun?”

  “Of course I can. The gun is so you talk. Turn around and back up to me.”

  Travers complied, clearly now aware that this man not only knew his name, but he also knew Travers had some training.

  Court pushed him up against the brick wall of the alleyway. While keeping his gun leveled at the man’s back, Court felt over the man’s waistband with his left hand. Finding nothing there, he checked Travers’s pockets. He had a mobile phone, which Court slipped into his own pocket, a billfold, which Court left alone, and a set of keys, which Court took from the pocket and placed in Travers’s left hand.

  Court then knelt quickly and grabbed at the man’s ankles. There was no ankle holster.

  “I’m not carrying,” Travers said.

  But Court wasn’t finished. He reached around to the front of the SAD operator’s body, grabbed the man’s belt buckle, feeling for a knife there, then he pulled Travers’s shirt out of his pants and swept his hand up the man’s chest.

  Hanging from a chain around Travers’s neck Court found a small blade in a sheath. He yanked the chain, breaking it free, and he threw it into the alley behind him.

  Travers grumbled, “That cost me three hundred bucks.”

  Court finished the frisk and stepped back. “Bullshit. You can get them for sixty on the Internet.”

  “Who are you?”

  “Move.”

  17

  Travers led the way to his building and up his stoop, used a key on his chain to unlock the door, then climbed the stairs and entered his own apartment with a second key.

  The space wasn’t large, less than a thousand square feet, and the living room was only twelve by fifteen. Court turned on the overhead, and Travers began moving towards the sofa.

  Court stopped him. “Not there. Sit on the mantel in front of the fireplace. Hands on your lap where I can see them.”

  Travers did as instructed. Court moved to the couch and, with his gun trained on the other man, yanked up the cushions.

  The handle of a sheathed bowie knife jutted out of the corner where the springs met the side of the sofa.

  Court pulled out the blade and tossed it on a side table. “You are just full of tricks, aren’t you?”

  “And you seem to know every one. Again, who the fuck are you?”

  Court sat down in a wicker chair next to the sofa, ten feet away from the man seated on the hearth. He then lowered his neck gaiter and took his hood and his cap off his head.

  “Sierra Six?”

  “We both know what’s about to happen.”

  Travers cocked his head. “Maybe you do, but I don’t have a fuckin’ clue.”

  “Sure you do. You’re going to act compliant, wait for me to let my guard down a little, say a bunch of shit about how we used to be buds, and you’re going to look for your opportunity. As soon as you see any chance, you’re going to take it.”

  “Why would I—”

  “Just know that I’m expecting it, and also know that as soon you fucking flinch, I’m putting three rounds through your heart.”

  Travers said, “I don’t know why you think I’m going to attack you, and I sure as fuck don’t know why you are pointing a gun at me.”

  “Because you’re SAD, and you have orders to kill me.”

  “Kill you? What the hell are you talking about? I haven’t heard your name in years.”

  Court was impressed. Travers did a good job selling his story.

  “Bullshit.”

  “I swear it, man.”

  To that Court just replied, “Moscow.”

  “Moscow? What about Moscow?”

  “Two years ago, a market a couple blocks away from where I was staying. I saw you with another dude, I didn’t know him, but he was a Ground Branch–looking motherfucker. I followed you back to your hotel, the Hilton Leningradskaya, then watched you leave with your partner and four other guys. A full six-man element. I
recognized Jenner. I figured him to be the team leader because he’s been around since forever.”

  Court could see the wheels turning in Travers’s brain, but to be fair, they turned fast. “Yeah. Okay, we were there. But it didn’t have anything to do with you. Another op. Code worded, so I can’t talk about it.” He paused. Faked a little chuckle. “I didn’t see you at all. That’s a hell of a coincidence, I’ll give you that.”

  “You’re full of shit. You guys were on my trail. You ran a full monty surveillance op outside the place I was renting. Bad luck for you that I saw you first and left town before you got set up.” Court smiled. “How long did you guys sit on the location before you realized I’d bugged out?”

  Travers said, “Man . . . you’re just paranoid. I’m not after—”

  “I know about the shoot on sight. I know Carmichael has JSOC and SAD hunting me all over the world. I know that’s what you were doing in Moscow. The longer you sit here and deny it, the more pissed off I get while pointing a gun at your face. Right now might be a good time to do things to minimize my anger.”

  Travers looked like he was going to keep up the ruse, but after a few seconds he deflated, his shoulders drooping. He gave a shrug and a nod. “You win, Gentry.” After another shrug he said, “If it makes you feel any better, I felt bad about it.”

  “That’s a huge comfort,” Court said, then added, “asshole.”

  “So? What are we doing? What do you want?”

  “I want to know why. Why is there a shoot on sight out on me?”

  Travers and Gentry made eye contact for several seconds, till Travers asked, “Why are you playing dumb?”

  “Because I am dumb. I have a guess, but I don’t know for sure. Tell me.”

  “You’re the enemy of the state, not me. Don’t ask me what you did.”

  “Come on. They told you why. What did they say?”

  Travers heaved his shoulders and closed his eyes. In frustration he said, “Dude, why’d you come back here? What the hell are you trying to accomplish?”