Mack Bedford had spotted the man and his clothes distinctly, through binoculars on the far side of the Euphrates River, just before his friends were incinerated by a Diamondhead missile. In that split second, standing alone in his own living room, Mack realized that he, above all other men, knew that Henri Foche was the mastermind behind the most hated guided missile on earth. He, Mack, had seen him plainly, in sharp focus, standing with the Arab terrorists across the river. He’d been peering through the sights of the missile launcher, for Christ’s sake. Mack had watched those turbaned killers talking to Foche in the moments before the Diamondheads had ripped across the water and smashed into his tanks, burning his men alive. That was him, Foche, standing there, large as life, with a black Mercedes at his beck and call, and several Arab missile men hanging on his every word. Mack had watched him, with his own eyes. And he’d never forget that scarlet handkerchief, sharp beneath the desert sun.
The answers to a thousand questions posed by the reporters suddenly sprang into focus. Was Foche the owner of Montpellier Munitions? Of course he was. Had they made the Diamondhead and sold it to Iran? Of course they had. And were they still doing it? Given this morning’s shattering news bulletin? In Mack Bedford’s mind there was no doubt. Yes, they fucking well were. And who could he tell? Who would listen? No one was the answer to that. And into the mind of the former SEAL commander, there began creeping forward a thought that he had never in his most unlikely dreams considered possible.
Once more the images of his best friends stood starkly before him. The SEAL team gunner, Charlie O’Brien, who died in the tank with Billy-Ray Jackson; Chief Frank Brooks and Saul Meiers, who never had a chance when the second tank was hit. In his mind he could see only the searing blue chemical flames as they demolished the best people he had ever known. That unusual crackling sound as the heat devoured everything inside the cockpits and then melted the fuselage of the tanks. The Diamondhead was a weapon from the dark core of hell, a man-made, laboratory-honed missile that belonged to the black arts.
For a few moments he just stood staring at the face of the man who produced it—Henri Foche, who, in just a few short seconds, had become not just a politician who was somehow going to close down the local shipyard. He had become the most hated figure in Mack Bedford’s life, in the entire chronicle of Mack Bedford’s life.
He rolled up the magazine and stuffed it in his pocket. He paced back and forth across the room, checked to see the final score at Fenway Park, and then had one more look at the pictures of Henri Foche. This was the man he had somehow pledged to have assassinated on behalf of Harry Remson. He’d been doing his best for almost a week, but hitherto for no reason. Certainly not a personal one. Just Harry’s determination to save his shipyard. But now things had changed. Very drastically.
Again he put the magazine in his pocket, and he walked out to the hall table and picked up the car keys. Then he selected a small piece of paper from a notepad and scribbled ten numbers on it. He left the house and wondered whether he should drive, because the hours of the wolf were upon him. Carelessly, he dismissed the thought, and strode up to the garage, hauling open the door and firing up the Buick. He eased out of the garage, then hit the gas, swerving out of the drive, hurling gravel.
Upstairs, Anne was curled up on the bed with just a quilt over her. She was not asleep and heard the car start. Oh, my God, he’s left me. Oh, my God! She flung off the quilt, ran to the open window, and yelled through the screen, “Mack! Mack! Darling Mack! Please, please, don’t go!”
But she was not in time. She watched the car hurtle out of the drive and disappear. And she just stood there, repeating over and over, “Darling Mack, please don’t go, please don’t go. Don’t leave me. You can’t leave me. No one could ever love you like I do.” But no one was listening. She was used to that.
Mack sped through the quiet coastal road to the western end of the town, and was making about seventy-five miles an hour as he flashed past the gates of Remsons Shipbuilding. Still racing, he reached Harry’s drive and pulled in, almost sideswiping a stone lion that was supposed to be on guard at the gate. He glanced at his watch, just eleven o’clock. Harry might be in bed . . . but he’ll get up for this.
Mack pulled up outside the front door and without hesitating hit the front doorbell. Hard. There was no answer for at least two minutes, and then a light was switched on in the front hall and the door was pulled open.
Harry stood there in a very snazzy dressing gown, dark red velvet, with the golden crest of the shipyard on the breast pocket. “Jesus, Mack,” he said. “Do you know what the time is?”
“Of course I do. You don’t think I’d be knocking on your door at 2300 hours if it wasn’t important, do you?” Mack knew Harry loved to converse in the language of the bridge. “One hour before eight bells, right? End of the First Night Watch.”
Harry chuckled. “Come on in, buddy,” he said. “Let’s have a glass of Scotch whisky.”
They walked to Harry’s study, and the shipyard boss poured them each a double shot from a crystal decanter. He opened the fridge door below and selected a bottle of club soda, from which he topped off each glass. “Your good health,” he said.
“And yours,” replied Mack.
“And now perhaps you’ll tell me what’s so important you need to be here at six bells? Before the watch change!”
Both men chuckled. They’d been going through this routine since Mack first joined the navy.
“Harry, you understood my reluctance to continue with our highly illegal project this morning? And you said all I needed to do was provide you with the telephone number of a competent assassin who would carry out your wishes and take out Henri Foche?”
Harry nodded, and Mack handed him the piece of paper on which were written the ten numbers. Harry stared at the 207 area code. “Jesus,” he said. “This is a local Maine number.”
“It’s closer than that,” said Mack. “It’s mine.”
CHAPTER 7
Harry Remson did not know whether to stand up and cheer or reach for his blood-pressure pills. Men have won the Olympic 200 meters with heart rates slower than Harry’s was at this particular moment. He tried to remain calm, considered, and businesslike. He took a long pull on his Scotch and soda. “Mack,” he eventually said evenly, “are you saying what I think you’re saying?”
“I believe so, Harry. I’ve fired Raul, who I don’t trust one inch, and I’m volunteering to undertake the contract myself, for the same money.”
Harry stood up and walked across the room to refresh his dwindling drink. He lifted up the decanter, but before he poured, he said quietly, “It’s Tommy, isn’t it, Mack? You’ll do it for Tommy.”
“Mostly,” replied the former SEAL commander.
“That’s good,” said Harry. “Anyone can be a hired killer. But it takes a real man to put his life on the line for his little boy.”
“I guess you know the situation, about Switzerland and everything?”
“I do. I was talking to your dad yesterday. They want a million, right? To do the operation—the bone marrow?”
“That’s their price. Fixed. No extras, and a room for Anne for up to six months if necessary. One million U.S. dollars.”
“Mack, they just got it. If you’ll take this on, I’m coming up with the first million right away. I’ll have it wired from the account in France, direct to the clinic. Book their tickets.”
“And what if I fail?”
“The money’s a nonreturnable deposit. But I know you won’t fail.” Mack smiled. “You do?”
“Sure I do. As far as I’m concerned, Henri Foche is living on borrowed time.” Harry Remson looked as if the weight of the world had been lifted from his shoulders, as if the sudden recruitment of this battlefield commander had solved his every problem. “Mack,” he said, “remember one thing. Until this moment I had no one who could be trusted to carry out the project. I know you had leads, but they were full of dangers and suspicions. And you were
right to be concerned—these Marseille villains could just as easily have bolted with the greenbacks and done nothing.”
“I just didn’t trust them, Harry.”
“The difference is, I trust you. I know you will undertake this venture as if you were still a SEAL. I know you will plan carefully, and then carry it out. For the first time I feel my money is going to buy me something of value. Guaranteed.”
“Harry,” said Mack, “I can’t guarantee my success.”
“I don’t want you to guarantee success. But to me your handshake is better than a thousand contracts. You are a United States Naval officer, a gentleman, and a lifelong friend. I know, without you saying it, you will give it everything . . . for yourself, for Anne, for me, for the town—and above all for Tommy.”
“On that,” replied Mack, “you do have my guarantee.”
“Knowing you, you’ve already thought about how this is going to work—the time frame, expenses, and so forth.”
“I’ve been thinking about it for a week now. Not for myself, for Raul. But the same basic rules apply.”
“Go on.”
“He was to be paid two million dollars for the project. There was no mention of expenses. So I assume whatever they were came out of his share of the money. In my case, the money for Tommy, I thank you from the bottom of my heart. My expenses will come out of the second million, same as Raul. But I’m poorer, so I’ll need a substantial advance against the second payment.”
“Okay,” said Harry. “Where do we stand?”
“I will need two hundred thousand dollars, maybe ten thousand in U.S. currency, the rest in euros and British pounds. I intend to enter France via southern Ireland and England. And I have some quite serious purchases to make.”
“Such as?”
“A sniper rifle that I will need to be made especially for me. Plus some rather expensive underwater equipment.”
“What’s that for?”
“Foche has major financial interests in shipbuilding. That magazine says he has made most of his important speeches to workers in that industry. That’s where I may nail him, in a shipyard, and my only way of escape will be the water.”
For the first time, Harry Remson felt the project shifting gears, like a blurred photograph, suddenly becoming clear, jumping into the realm of stark, hard-focused reality. The assassin, the bullet, the victim, the blood, the headlines.
“Holy shit!” said the shipyard owner. He took another quiet gulp of his Scotch and soda. He looked at Mack and thought he could see a difference in the man. This was no longer the cheerful young guy who’d made it big in the military yet was always ready to offer the hand of friendship. This was a deadly serious professional. And a professional killer at that, the way all U.S. Navy SEALs are ultimately professional killers. If the American government did not want them for that, then there was no purpose in their existence. They were men trained specifically to carry out that which no one else would even dream about.
Here he was, Mack Bedford, outlining the precise nuts and bolts of the operation, the absolute anatomy of an assassination. And Harry was financing it, making it possible. For a split second he wondered whether he ought to turn tail and run, but then he thought about the family business and the men he must cast out onto the cold streets of midwinter Dartford. No, he wouldn’t fail them. He must not fail them.
He turned again to face the assassin, Lt. Cdr. Mackenzie Bedford. “How long before you can leave?”
“Two weeks. I’ll need three expensively forged passports and three matching driver’s licenses, one American, one Irish, and one Swiss. I’ll need you to take care of that, but I can give you contacts, CIA freelance guys. Expensive but perfect documents.”
“Will they have time?”
“Sure. They’ll damn nearly finish them overnight if they have to. They’ve got plenty of blanks, for damn near any country in the world.”
“You’ll give me details of your other identities?”
“Tomorrow. Send ’em e-mail. They’ll come back by courier, five thousand dollars each.”
“Airline tickets?”
“Business class return, Boston to Dublin. Aer Lingus. Book in the same name as the new American passport. I’ll pay my own way to and from the local places. Cash.”
“Anything else?”
“Negative. I’ll take care of the rest.”
“Do I need to know how, where, and when?”
“Absolutely not. You will never know, and hopefully neither will anyone else.”
Harry Remson vacillated somewhere between blind admiration, outright shock, and general disbelief. This was actually happening. Standing before him was the man who would assassinate Henri Foche.
He tried to look at the man objectively, as if he had never known him. He saw a big and obviously very fit person. There’s something about guys like that. Military guys. Hard-trained, controlled diet, no excesses of alcohol. They radiate an understated power, toughness, as if they could instantly turn into Godzilla, which Mack Bedford most certainly could. The face was strong, with laugh lines around the deep gray-blue eyes, with no malice in their gaze. There was a steadiness in the expression. This was a man not easily thrown off his chosen course, and not easily intimidated. In Harry Remson’s opinion this was not the face of an assassin. It was the face of a born commander, a man whom other men would follow. Harry wondered how Mack would settle into his new role, operating beyond the law, seeking out his target with precision and ruthlessness.
On reflection, he considered there was no better man in all the world to save the shipyard. This was Harry’s lucky night, and right now he did not give a damn if it was midnight. He would not have given a damn if it had been 4:00 A.M. on Christmas, eight bells, that is, end of the Middle Watch.
He turned to Mack and offered his hand. “No contract, old buddy,” he said. “Just take me by the hand. That’s all we need.”
“One question, Harry,” said Mack. “What happens if I should be shot by French security forces, when I’m trying to get away? What happens to Anne and Tommy?”
“I will take care of everything. The second million belongs to Anne. Do you need an IOU in writing?”
“Negative.”
“Will we meet in my office tomorrow morning to finalize those passports?”
“Start of the Forenoon Watch—0800 hours.”
Harry Remson felt nothing short of a wave of elation sweeping over him. He was somehow in the middle of a military operation, so secretive, so highly classified, he felt darned near legal. Well, not quite that. But self-righteous, certain he was doing the correct thing.
They walked to the door together, and Harry let Mack out into the night. He watched the Buick slide noiselessly away, turning right, back toward town. He stood there for a few moments, shook his head, and said quietly, “Jesus Christ, what have we done?”
It was six o’clock in the French seaport of Marseille. Almost everyone in the area around the old port was somehow connected to the sea. Trawlers were still unloading cargoes of fish; others were gassing up in readiness to leave. The chefs on the yachts that lined several of the jetties were up and about, starting preparations for breakfast for both crew and guests.
One man, however, was not connected to the sea, and he was headed north along Quay des Belges, past the fish market, walking at a very steady pace, wearing an expression like a lovesick bloodhound. Raul Declerc was not happy. And the reason for this was simple: he had not heard from Mr. Morrison, the man, apparently, with the two million bucks. Raul Declerc had no idea what had happened to his seemingly reliable new client. The initial expense payment had gone off without a hitch in Geneva. But Morrison had now missed two calls, and there was an empty feeling in the stomach of Monsieur Declerc. He had a disquieting instinct that this particular feeling might shortly transfer itself to the Declerc wallet area.
He was mostly furious at himself. He should never have tried to grab an extra million dollars from a man like Morrison. Even th
e voice had betrayed a dangerous edge. In that split second, after he had suggested extra money, and reneged on his agreement, Raul knew he had gone too far. Morrison had come back at him like a striking cobra—You’re not getting it from me. The words had stayed with him. And now Morrison had vanished and taken his bloody two million with him. And he, Raul Declerc, had probably sent staff, helicopters, and God knows what else all over France for absolutely nothing. “Fuck it,” said Raul.
The worse part of all was he had no idea who this Morrison was, no idea whom he represented, no idea where he was calling from, except it was quite possibly somewhere on the planet Earth. “Fuck it,” said Raul again.
In his particular trade, assassination and killers for hire, there was often a spin-off for deals that went wrong. Priceless information. Details about a plan. But in this case, the level of information was so low, so devoid of anything even resembling a fact, he feared there would in the end be nothing. Nothing to sell, trade, or barter.
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