“Very well,” Sanchez answered.
CHAPTER 28
Antibes, France
The streets of Antibes, typically filled with wealthy vacationers in search of a good time, were uncharacteristically empty due to the cooler-than-usual temperature and light drizzle falling on the cobblestone streets. That made the job of Bernard LeBreton of the DCRI a lot more complicated, for conducting surveillance was much easier when he could hide in a large crowd. But LeBreton had been in the countersurveillance business for the last twenty-five years, and he was confident that his team would be able to do whatever was asked of them, crowds or no crowds.
The way they had received their directives for that evening’s job was quite irregular. The head of the DCRI had called LeBreton personally to request that his team drop everything it was working on in Cannes and travel the seven kilometers to Antibes right away. They were to monitor a gray Opel van that was in a parking lot beside the juncture where Général Maizière Boulevard changed into Amiral de Grasse Parkway. The director had indicated that two Arab males had exited the Opel and entered a house across the street.
At that point in the conversation, LeBreton could see no reason why the DCRI’s director had called him personally. After all, his team was used to doing that type of job. The severity of the situation became clear soon enough; however, when the director added that LeBreton and his team were to stay on station until the arrival of two troops from GIGN, France’s antiterrorism team.
From his position on the far side of the parking lot, LeBreton could clearly see the house that the suspects were said to have entered. But the curtains were closed, preventing him from seeing what was going on inside. LeBreton had three other DCRI men with him, and they were positioned in such a way that nobody could exit the house without being seen.
According to the mailboxes outside the front entrance, the white three-story house had been divided into three apartments. He sent one of his agents to verify all of the building’s entries and exits. The agent returned within minutes, confirming that the suspects were on the first floor and that the ground-floor apartment had only one entry—the front. The agent also believed that he’d seen evidence of a fire escape route leading to the roof of the building, likely accessible from the third-floor apartment.
LeBreton noted that the suspects might have access to the upper apartments, so they shouldn’t disregard other points of entry. Confident he could monitor all ins and outs of the building with his three men, LeBreton deployed his last man one block away with the order that he follow any suspect exiting the building.
LeBreton was just about to check in with the director of the DCRI when his agent posted at the rear of the building called him. “I’ve got movement at the rear. Someone is exiting the second-floor apartment. He’s wearing a white shirt, blue jeans, white sneakers, and a white baseball cap. Okay, he’s moving. He’s walking northbound on de la Tourraque.”
“Thanks, Regis. Pierre will take it from there,” answered LeBreton. “You copied that, Pierre?” he asked into his mouthpiece.
“Absolutely,” responded Pierre Levasseur, the agent he’d posted down the street. “I’ll be on foot.”
Just as LeBreton ended the call, his cell phone vibrated again. “LeBreton here.”
“This is Commandant Yves Bleriot of GIGN. We’ve arrived in the area and are on Cours Massena reviewing our assault plan. We should be ready to storm the building in about ten minutes. Will you be in position to give us a situation report before we move in?”
They’re going to storm the building? wondered LeBreton. He’d thought this was just a reconnaissance mission. “Affirmative,” he finally said. “We have eyes on the house.”
“Great. Don’t be alarmed if you see a man wearing a pair of blue jeans, black boots, and a bulletproof vest over a black T-shirt within our group,” Bleriot said, giving the description of Mike Walton. “He’ll be armed, and he’s a friendly. Please confirm?”
“I confirm. Man with blue jeans and black T-shirt is a friendly. I’ll pass it along,” replied Lebreton.
On his radio, he could hear Agent Levasseur announce that his target had approached Cours Massena, then crossed the street and turned around. It only took LeBreton a few seconds to understand that something was amiss.
“Commandant Bleriot!” yelled LeBreton into his cell phone.
The GIGN commander was taken aback by the sudden panicked voice.
“Break away from your position now!” yelled LeBreton.
Bleriot’s intuition told him not to second-guess the DCRI agent, and he quickly ordered his men to move out and regroup at their secondary rendezvous point located nearby at the intersection of the Boulevard d’Aguillon and Rue Vauban. Only when all his men were accounted for did he return to LeBreton.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
“I think we’ve been compromised.”
“What do you mean ‘compromised’?” the GIGN commander cut in.
“One of the suspected targets exited the house on foot. Unfortunately, he was headed in your direction. My man just informed me that he must have realized who you were, because he suddenly turned around. He’s now walking back toward the house.”
“Fuck. Is your man armed?”
“Of course he is.”
“I know you’re not in my chain of command, but your man has to stop the suspect from returning to the house or contacting whoever’s inside. And I mean by any means necessary.”
“You want me to kill him?”
“If you have to, yes,” answered Bleriot. “Listen, we’ve received information that these are the terrorists responsible for the attack at the Nice Gare Centrale earlier today.”
What the fuck? For the second time in as many minutes, LeBreton wondered why the hell he hadn’t been properly briefed.
“If we’re to have any hope of surprising them,” continued Bleriot, “you need to take that suspect out now. If not, we might get an unwanted welcoming committee.”
“Understood. I’ll contact my man.”
“Thank you. We’re now en route to the house and will start our assault within the next three minutes.”
―
Mohammad Alavi cut short his walk for takeout food. He knew right away that the big Suburbans and the men dressed in black tactical gear he’d seen near Cours Massena were ominous. Their tinted windows and high-powered antennas were enough to send chills down his spine. One of the men, dressed in a pair of blue jeans and a black T-shirt, had actually looked him over. Probably GIGN, he thought as he turned as casually as possible back toward the safe house.
Could Abbud Raashid have betrayed them? Or had his men been followed from the airport?
Trying not to draw attention to himself, Alavi refrained from picking up his cell phone to warn those inside the house. Maybe he should have ordered them to ditch the Opel after the first strike against the Canadian minister at the Gare Centrale. They had allowed their arrogance to expose them. But it was too late to worry about that now.
After Alavi changed directions, he caught sight of a man across the street who seemed to be watching him. Although he avoided looking in that direction, he was sure his tail raised his hand toward his face. Probably talking into a radio, Alavi deduced. He cursed loudly in Arabic.
Suddenly, from the corner of his eye, he caught sight of the Suburbans departing. Years spent fighting the Americans and training young terror recruits had given Alavi a keen edge. He was quick to dissect a given situation and put two and two together. The shock troops had been warned that they’d been spotted, and that revelation had caused them to hasten their attack.
The time for caution had passed. He had to warn the others. He took out his cell phone and started dialing.
―
“Pierre, come in,” came LeBreton’s voice over the two-way radio.
“Levasseur here, go ahead,” said Pierre
Levasseur as he watched his target stride back in the direction from which he’d come. Levasseur hadn’t had time to conceal himself when the terror suspect he’d been following abruptly turned around. Instead he’d tried to act as natural as possible until the target had passed him.
“Has the target made any cell phone calls since he turned around?” asked LeBreton anxiously.
“Yeah,” answered the junior agent. “He’s making one right now.”
“Shit! Okay, listen up,” LeBreton said, launching into a stream of directives that caused Levasseur’s heart to leap into his throat.
Now aware that the man he was following was one of the terrorists involved in the Gare Centrale bombing, Levasseur took his MAS G1 pistol out of his shoulder holster. He held the weapon, which was in fact a Beretta 92F built under a French license, close to his right leg as he continued trailing the terrorist.
―
In full daylight, the advantage would have been against him. But at this hour, with no more than a few streetlamps shining and only a handful of pedestrians on the street, Mohammad Alavi knew he had the upper hand. Although the agent following him was good, Alavi was better. He took a sharp turn and hid under a secluded doorway. Then he waited.
The loud revolutions of the GIGN Suburban’s engines could be heard a few streets away as they raced to conduct their assault on the terrorists’ house. Alavi couldn’t help but smile at what he knew was going to happen next. His predictions were proved true when, a few seconds later, the cracking noise of an AK-47 broke through the otherwise silent darkness.
As if on cue, the agent who’d been following him passed just in front of Alavi’s hiding place. His attention was focused on the machine-gun fire a few blocks away. The agent didn’t even notice Alavi tucked away under the porch less than five feet to his left.
Alavi pumped blood into his hands as he readied himself for his attack.
―
Pierre Levasseur was not yet panicking, but a great sense of unease washed over him as he heard the sound of AK-47 fire. That wasn’t right. He knew that the GIGN’s FAMAS pistols didn’t make that sound. Had the terrorist he’d been following successfully warned his friends of the impending assault? And where the fuck was he, by the way? He’d had him in his sights not even twenty seconds before. Damn!
Levasseur was starting to regret not taking his shot when he was twenty meters away. The truth was that he didn’t think he’d be able to hit his target at that distance. What if he missed? What if the terrorist was armed and started returning fire? A gun battle in the streets wasn’t what they needed right now, no matter what LeBreton said. No, he’d decided it was better to shoot him at close range, just to make sure.
Shit! He knew he should have used the firing range more frequently.
Levasseur felt more than saw movement to his left. He barely had time to turn his head, let alone point his gun, before somebody was on him like a tiger.
―
Alavi was lightning fast. He placed his hands on the agent’s gun, pulling it toward him while forcing its barrel up and away from him. With his hands never leaving the weapon, Alavi swung his left leg around for momentum and simultaneously smashed his left elbow into the agent’s chin. The agent fell flat on his back on the sidewalk, and a dazed look slackened his face. He had been disarmed in less than two seconds. Alavi looked down at him and smiled, then shot him twice in the head. The sound of the MAS G1 was muffled by the AK-47 fire of his friends.
CHAPTER 29
Antibes, Frances
Allah is great,” exclaimed Ali Ghassan after speaking to his friend, the feared Mohammad Alavi, for the last time. He looked at the five men with whom he had eaten, slept, trained, and killed for the last few months. They all looked back at him expectantly.
“That was our brother Mohammad. We have been compromised, and he believes that an attack is imminent,” he announced. “Our final stand will not be tomorrow in Cannes as planned, but here, right now, together.”
His five brothers in faith exchanged uncertain glances. This wasn’t at all according to their plan. The Sheik had chosen Cannes, not Antibes, for their martyrdom. Cannes had a higher tourist density, and the bomb would have been more effective there. Antibes was only supposed to be their staging area.
“We have already accomplished a lot, dear friends,” Ghassan continued, motivating his men and assembling his AK as he spoke. “Allah smiled at us today when he allowed his great and faithful warrior Mohammad to escape. He will continue the fight for us. He will work with the Sheik to fulfill Allah’s will. Now we must make him proud.”
Ali Ghassan approached his friends and embraced them one after the other.
“Make sure that the device is activated, and be ready to use it as soon as their first man comes through the door. It will not create as much death and destruction as we had anticipated with our primary objective, but Allah will understand. How long will it take to make it ready?”
“Without Mohammad here? Maybe ten minutes,” came the answer from Karim Irfan, their junior bomb technician.
Ghassan snorted. “Make it five. The rest of us will hold on as long as we can to give you time. Complete your contingency tasks that brother Alavi assigned you, then take your positions. Go to a good death, my brothers. Allahu Akbar!”
The six men raised their fists and yelled in chorus, “Allahu Akbar!”
After he’d helped install the others in their positions, Ali Ghassan took up watch at one of the second-floor windows. His trusted AK-47 was in his hands, and three rocket-propelled grenades lay at his feet. He hadn’t been at the window for more than thirty seconds when he heard the GIGN truck engines barreling down the street. The attack was occurring just as Alavi had told him it would. He took aim at the GIGN convoy and, at a rate of six hundred rounds per minute, he emptied his first thirty-round magazine into the third Suburban.
―
Sitting in the passenger seat of the leading Suburban as they approached the terrorist refuge, Commandant Yves Bleriot was about to radio LeBreton when machine-gun fire suddenly opened up from above. Looking in his side view mirror, Bleriot saw the third Suburban in line swerve off course and crash into a building.
Merde! Any hope of a surprise attack was now officially blown.
His orders from the top of the gendarmerie chain of command had been clear. He had to go in and stop the threat. Enough French citizens had died that day. His brother, a high-ranking officer within the DGSE, had also advised him that an American would be joining them on the assault. Because his brother had insisted that nobody else at the gendarmerie was to learn an American was participating in the assault, Bleriot guessed the American was a member of the CIA. He turned around to look at the American and couldn’t help but notice how calm and focused he seemed amid all the chaos. That was for the best, because his initial plan was blown all to hell and he needed to be as composed as the American. As the four remaining Suburbans jerked to a stop, Bleriot steeled himself to deliver the most difficult directive of his life.
The outlook didn’t look good. He had no backup except for LeBreton’s noncombat troops, wherever the hell they were. He had no snipers and nobody on the roof yet. He had nothing except for a small group of assaulters bookending the main door and an unknown number of terrorists firing down on him. Ordering his men to storm the building under fire could become a death warrant for all of them.
―
Karim Irfan was working as fast as he could. He’d never expected that he would have to arm the device alone under such stressful conditions.
He knew that the GIGN troops could breach their defenses any second now, and it added urgency to the mission. He had so much to do in so little time. He tried to calm himself by pretending that his mentor and teacher, Mohammad Alavi, was standing next to him, telling him exactly what to do. Yes, this is just like at training camp, Irfan said to himself, trying to believe it.
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Training camp or not, he was determined to make his mentor proud of him.
―
Mike Walton followed Commandant Bleriot out of the lead Suburban and watched him wave his arm toward the safe house just as a rocket-propelled grenade landed in the street under the rear of the second Suburban. The explosion blew off the back end of the giant SUV, and Mike protected his head with his arms as he felt a heat wave go through him. When he reopened his eyes, he saw the GIGN commander lying on the ground next to him, a burning piece of metal embedded in his back. Mike knelt down and checked for a pulse. He was gone. Mike locked his MP5 into place and dragged Bleriot to safety while other members of the GIGN covered him. Calculating that the GIGN had already lost at least five men plus their commanding officer in the last thirty seconds, Mike joined the huddle of officers flanking the front door.
“We need to move in,” he yelled, “or we’ll be blown to pieces!”
“We’ve lost our two officers,” said one of the troopers. “We need to make contact with—”
Mike interrupted him, “No, you don’t. We need to break in now or we’ll all be slaughtered out in the open.”
The GIGN troops had been caught by surprise, but they should have already breached the front door. The whole operation was starting to be bogged down, and that wasn’t good. They were losing too many men too fast. Somebody needed to take charge.
“Where’s the shield?” Mike screamed over the noise of automatic fire. A few seconds later, one of the officers took up position with a type III ballistic shield. Though that type of shield was useless against armor-piercing automatic fire, it weighed only thirty-four pounds, making it easy to carry and a good option for their purposes.
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