by Ben Coes
The smooth bullet-shaped nose of the train swept down the tracks. The train pushed the falling snow into violent swirls of white as it came sliding in front of the platform and halted.
“I know it’s not a joke,” said Tacoma.
Tacoma looked around and then opened his parka. A compact MP7A1 was strapped inside. An M1911 was also visible, its muzzle extended by a long, thin silencer. A combat blade was sheathed just below. He quickly shut the jacket.
“Just don’t kill the woman,” said Dewey. “Or me.”
Dewey moved down the platform to the back of the train, meandering toward Katie along the way.
“Nice coat,” said Dewey quietly.
As he walked by, Katie handed him what looked like a pack of gum.
“Don’t distract me,” said Katie in a businesslike manner. “You think I want to be in France right now, in a blizzard, hunting for VEVAK agents? Just find her and we get off at the next stop, hopefully before the Iranians start shooting.”
“All I said was ‘nice coat,’” said Dewey. “It looks good.”
“My God,” she whispered. “You were in jail for like an hour. You’re acting like you were there for a decade. I do not look good. I bought this shit in Bermuda on the way to the airport.”
“Okay, whatever.”
Dewey kept ambling to the rear of the platform. He was the last person to climb aboard and barely got inside before the doors shut. A loud beep sounded, and the train started moving. He was in the last car.
Dewey waited for passengers to take their seats and then moved slowly down the aisle, slightly stooped over, walking stick in one hand, the other hand on the seat backs for stability.
Dewey had spent months learning surveillance and discovery: How to look for someone who knows he’s being looked for without being seen or noticed. How to spot unusual behavior. Inconsistencies vs. aberrations and how to differentiate between the two, inconsistencies indicating possible intentional concealment, aberrations simply part of the human condition. A man pretending to be old with a brand-new cane was an inconsistency. An actual man in need of a cane would have a worn one or, more likely, something like a walking stick, something to make the process of decline and aging personal, even enjoyable. Had Dewey been using a new cane, a metal one, for example, he could’ve been marked easily.
He scanned each row for the woman. A black man, a child, a group of teenagers off to ski—these didn’t have to be examined. Others did.
She wasn’t there.
Dewey moved through ten passenger cars. As he came to the car just behind the first-class car, he noted Tacoma seated near the back and Katie half a dozen rows in front of him.
When he reached the front, he looked through the passageway to the first-class car ahead, the car closest to the locomotive. A pair of uniformed policemen stood at the entrance to the car, preventing access to anyone who hadn’t paid the exorbitant price for a first-class ticket.
Dewey turned around and meandered back down the aisle. Halfway back, he saw the seat with the boot bag on it. The other seat was empty. Across the aisle, one row back, sat Beauxchamps. Dewey placed the bag in the overhead compartment and took off his backpack, putting it on the floor, then sat down. He removed the book and started reading. After a few minutes, he looked over to Beauxchamps, who was looking at his cell. Ever so subtly, Beauxchamps glanced forward—to the first-class car. His look revealed an important message: She was on board.
65
CHALON-SUR-SAÔNE, FRANCE
Fortuna, Mustafah, Hosni, and Jerome entered Chalon-sur-Saône’s train station through separate doors, pretending not to know each other.
Even though he wasn’t expecting an attack from his past, Andreas would be looking for everything. The greatest likelihood for success was blending in, then attacking with speed and brutality. The plan was to start looking two hours into the train ride. Even if someone suspected that a passenger was Andreas, they were to do nothing. Fortuna knew it was the only way. Andreas obviously understood not only how to blend in but also how to mark someone who didn’t. Andreas’s liability was his size. It was impossible to hide. Fortuna had two liabilities that posed risk of detection. One was his face. He had the same ability to make a room full of people turn to see his face. He was as handsome as a model.
His second liability was the fact that he and his team were Arab. Airports, with the exception of Israel, didn’t profile. They didn’t cull out, the way Israel did, specific groups based on the color of their skin, their nationality. It was the greatest gift America and the West gave to terrorists. But Andreas would be different. There was no question that he profiled. Like a filter, Andreas would sift out the obvious nonpossibilities. Then he would cull through the remnants, looking for suspicious behavior—something as trivial as how a man’s pants fit, knowing that a pair that looked unnatural on someone probably was, that they’d been given them on the way to the airport or were concealing something.
The plan was simple. After settling aboard the train, Mustafah, Hosni, and Jerome would search for Andreas while Fortuna remained seated and out of the way. Fortuna had never met him, but he knew Andreas might recognize similarities between himself and his father or brother. The element of surprise was paramount.
Mustafah and Jerome carried snowboard bags. Each bag contained a snowboard, boots, and, in hidden pockets, weapons and ammo. Mustafah had an Uzi and a Glock 38. Jerome was carrying an MP7 and a Walther PPK.
Hosni had a large suitcase. Inside was clothing and, in a secret compartment, enough explosives to blow up the train, along with a Glock 38.
Fortuna had two bags. One was a smaller boot bag, which held a pair of ski boots stuffed with 8-gauge shotgun shells. A long, thin ski bag was strapped to his back. Inside was a pair of skis and Fortuna’s weapon of choice, a sawed-off pump-action Benelli 12-gauge shotgun.
All four men carried knives as well as concealed handguns.
They purchased tickets from separate windows, then moved to the platform to await the train’s arrival. Fortuna took a slight detour, heading into a bathroom, locking the door, and removing a ziplock bag filled with cocaine from his pocket. He took several fingertips’ worth and snorted it sloppily into both nostrils. He checked himself in the mirror, wiping his nose and getting rid of any traces of coke, then went to the platform just as the overnight Marseille train was coming into the station.
* * *
An hour into the train ride, Katie removed a small prescription bottle from her jacket pocket. Inside was a tiny silver object the size of a Tic Tac. She placed it in her ear, then tapped twice.
“Rob,” she whispered.
“Yeah,” said Tacoma. “You’re late.”
“Sorry. Can you hear me okay?”
“Yeah, loud and clear.”
“Is Dewey on COMMS?”
“No.”
Katie stood up and went to the restroom, bolting the door. She dialed the international switch for Special Operations Group, looking for Polk, Mack Perry, or anyone else monitoring the operation. It was Perry who picked up in one of the operating theaters. A former member of the Air Force’s 24th Special Tactics Squadron, referred to as 24th STS, Perry had been recruited to the CIA by Katie when she ran SOG.
“This is Perry.”
“It’s me,” she said.
“Are you on the train?”
“Yeah. I can’t talk. Lock me in, phone and watch, then I need something.”
“Hold on.”
Katie waited for the familiar beeps as Perry initiated a tracking protocol from Langley, based off her cell phone and watch, enabling Langley to track her in real time and impose her location on a digital map in the theater.
“Okay, we got you,” said Perry. “What do you need?”
“Do the trains have cameras inside?”
“No.”
“The train is packed,” said Katie. “We need to weed it down. Do we at least know how many there are?”
“Negative.”
“KUDS Force? VEVAK? It couldn’t be Hezbollah, could it?”
“We don’t know,” said Perry.
“Try scanning the manifests,” said Katie. “Arabic-sounding names.”
“I’ll try, but you’re in Europe. There are going to be plenty of Arabic-sounding names.”
“Just look for something.”
“I will. By the way, we have a chopper en route. It’s a Trauma Hawk, so we can use it for extraction or if anyone gets hurt.”
“When will it be in position?” said Katie.
“Belfort,” said Perry. “You’re coming into Chalon-sur-Saône, so you have another hour and a half or so until we’ll be in position to pull you out. The snowstorm is wreaking havoc.”
* * *
Dewey read quietly as the train moved north, occasionally leaning back and staring out the window. Snow was so thick it was hard to see more than a few feet. The white billows of snowflakes were illuminated by the train’s running lights. For a few moments, Dewey thought about what it must have been like to be going skiing this night with a family, traveling north, going away for a weekend or a week.
Then he remembered the package. He reached in his pocket and removed a small, thin green-and-white box that said TRIDENT on the side. He opened it up and pulled out the earbud, sticking it in his ear, then tapping twice.
“Hey, guys,” he whispered. “You hear me okay?”
“Yes,” said Katie.
“I hear you,” said Tacoma.
“She’s in the first-class car,” said Dewey, “which unfortunately has a couple of gunmen guarding it.”
“When do you want to get her?” said Tacoma.
“The sooner the better,” said Dewey. “I doubt Paria beat us getting on board, so let’s get her off before those nutjobs show up and spoil the party. Ideally, we grab her and get out of here with no loss of life.”
“A chopper is en route,” Katie said quietly. “We’ll be able to extract once we get to Belfort. That’s an hour and a half, maybe two hours from now.”
As the train pulled into the next station, Dewey scanned the crowds of people waiting to get on. The platform was more crowded, and a large sign on the side of the station announced CHALON-SUR-SAÔNE.
As the train stopped, his eyes fell on a young man with short black hair. He was wearing a green ski jacket with white stripes down the arms. A bulky snowboard bag was slung over his back. The man was tall, with dark skin: Arab. There was no reason to consider the man in any way. Dewey was on the train to find the woman, and that was all. His main concern was DGSI, and thus far he hadn’t seen any signs of law enforcement other than the two officers guarding the first-class car. Yet something about the Arab in the green jacket triggered an instinct inside Dewey. He felt a chill in the back of his head that spread down his spine.
* * *
Fortuna looked down the Chalon-sur-Saône platform. He made eye contact with each man. Fortuna was closest to the rear of the train. Hosni was waiting at the next car. Mustafah was in front of him a car forward, followed by Jerome.
As the doors opened, Fortuna stepped inside, quickly scanning for anyone who might be looking at him. But there was no one, just some teenagers grabbing a cigarette in the small area at the end of the car. Fortuna walked down the aisle until he found an open window seat. He put his ski bag in the overhead compartment and looked at the passenger in the aisle seat, a pretty blond woman.
“Pardon, mademoiselle,” he said politely. “Est-ce-que c’est pris?”
She looked up at Fortuna, unhappy that she had to give up the empty seat, but then as she took him in with her eyes, a smile appeared on her lips.
“S’il vous plaît,” she said, standing up and stepping into the aisle to let him by. “Sit down. It’s not taken.”
* * *
The new group of passengers flooded onto the train. A family of four settled into empty seats near Dewey, the father taking the seat next to him. They were French. The man nodded politely to Dewey as he sat down. Dewey smiled back, nodding warmly, saying nothing as his eyes continued to scan the front of the car, where he knew the man in the green jacket would be entering.
Dewey watched him move down the aisle, his jacket reflecting in the glass, allowing Dewey to follow his movements without looking away from the window. He sat down a few rows in front of Dewey, across the aisle, stowing his bag overhead, along with his jacket.
Dewey needed to figure out a way to get into the first-class car, but now his mind started to drift, watching the young man as he got comfortable. He stuck earbuds in his ears, then plugged them into his cell phone. He didn’t look back once, not even to check out his immediate vicinity. Instead, he tilted his seat back as far as it would go and shut his eyes.
Dewey slouched back into his seat, lodging his head in the corner near the window. He crossed his arms and shut his eyes most of the way, keeping them just the slightest bit open, remaining alert. An hour passed, along with a few more stops, and Dewey continued to study the Arab, who napped, woke up, and went to the café car one car back, returning with a bottle of water, which he drank as he read a magazine.
You’re being paranoid.
But who could blame him? Every law enforcement official in France wanted him captured. More than a handful wanted him dead. Thanks to the INTERPOL alert, DGSI had alerted every country in Europe, and they, too, would be looking. Dewey finally picked up the book again, opening to a random page. At some point, the young Arab stood up and walked toward the front of the car. He knocked on the bathroom door and entered.
Dewey got to his feet.
“I’m sorry,” said Dewey to the man next to him. “I left something in my bag.”
Dewey walked to the empty seat across the aisle and opened the overhead compartment. He searched with his hand, feeling for the zipper, then unzipped the snowboard bag. Inside, he felt a smooth snowboard, boots and, beneath the snowboard, a submachine gun. Dewey quickly zipped it back up and shut the compartment door.
He glanced back at Beauxchamps and almost imperceptibly shook his head. The meaning was clear: Dewey was not going for the woman yet.
Dewey walked to the front of the car, the walking stick in his left hand. As he got there, he put the stick on a shelf next to the ski rack. He stepped close to the door, glancing back, making sure no one was coming, and put his hand under his sweater and gripped the butt of his handgun. The lock on the bathroom door clicked. As the Arab started to slide the door open, Dewey stepped in the way and moved in, raising the silenced Colt .45 and training it on the Arab as he shut the door with his other hand. The Arab looked utterly shocked, but instead of fear, he seemed angry.
“On your knees,” Dewey said quietly. “Now.”
The Arab glanced behind Dewey, then looked at the window. But he didn’t move. Dewey remained still. Suddenly the Arab lurched forward, slashing his right arm through the air. Dewey blocked it with his left forearm and kicked viciously, striking him in the groin. He dropped to the ground, clutching his groin, heaving for air.
“Who are you?” said Dewey.
“No one,” groaned the Arab. “Mustafah. I’m a student at the Sorbonne. I’m meeting my girlfriend in Vienna.”
“Why the weapons?”
“What weapons?”
Dewey stepped forward and kicked him hard in the knee. He let out a pained yelp.
“If you want to live, answer my questions. Why the weapons?”
The train jerked slightly as brakes were applied. They were slowing down.
“I always carry something,” said Mustafah. “Are you fucking kidding? Watch the news sometimes. These fucking jihadis are everywhere. I’ll tell you right now, if I’m on a train or at a nightclub, I’m packing, and I’ll go out in a hail of bullets before I let one of these fucking towel-head nutjobs kill me.”
Dewey trained his gun on Mustafah, who remained prone on the floor. Dewey crouched and jabbed the end of the suppressor into Mustafah’s right eye.
“I woul
dn’t move if I were you,” he said.
The speakers crackled and a woman spoke: “Besançon, quatre minutes!”
They were coming into a station.
Dewey patted him down. He found a gun sheathed to his left calf, a knife tucked into a concealed holster at his waist, and another gun tied to a piece of string around his neck. He took all three weapons, stepped to the window, gun trained at all times on Mustafah, pulled the window open, and threw them out.
“That’s a lot of firepower for someone worried about a random attack,” said Dewey.
Mustafah looked up.
“Please,” he begged, becoming distraught, even emotional. “I’m just an amateur. I’m a fool. The only time I’ve even fired one of these is at the range. My father, he’s a successful lawyer. Please don’t kill me. Look.”
Mustafah held out his arm. On the wrist was a gold watch. “If I was a jihadi, would I have a Rolex?”
“Besançon, deux minutes!”
Dewey stared at the young Arab lying pathetically on the floor. He was lying. The concealed weapons proved it. Yet his explanation was believable. Was this man guilty simply because Dewey was on edge? Had his elevated sense of threat unwittingly sentenced an innocent man to die?
More important, killing him would create an unnecessary hassle. There would be blood, plus the need to dump his body out the window.
“Stand up,” said Dewey.
Mustafah slowly got to his feet just as the train slowed to a crawl. They were at the station.
“You’re getting off right now,” said Dewey. “The alternative is, I shoot you and throw your body out the window. I know you’re lying, but I don’t care. Stand up.”
Mustafah stared at Dewey. His eyes moved to the floor as he considered what to do. He nodded his head.
“I open the door. I step out first. You follow me. You take a left, then go straight out the door onto the platform.”
“It’s a blizzard,” he said, pointing at his T-shirt. “Can I get my jacket?”