by Tom Clancy
She was just a watcher. There were other RGB men here in the area, and they had used her for intelligence about the activities in the dim sum restaurant, but she had never seen her contact face-to-face, nor did she know a thing about the mission.
She had been working on this job for the past several days. Once each day she would get a call from her contact, and she would go to the address listed, either a restaurant or a laundromat or a food court or a parking lot or, in this evening’s case, an empty and unlocked but obviously lived-in apartment on Mott Street in Chinatown.
She would then keep an eye out for anything out of the ordinary around her. By her second day she recognized the one constant to each scene was the white man with the dark hair. She was not told his name, but when she pointed him out she was directed to keep watch for anyone else interested in him.
And now that she’d been at this for five days, she finally had success.
The Hispanic man she had identified tonight had not done anything wrong. He had not gotten too close to his subject, nor had he acted in any way different from any other random passerby on the street—any of the three times she had seen him.
That was what compromised him. The old lady had a memory like a trap. Three mornings earlier on 3rd Avenue the short, dark-haired man in his forties had been walking with another man, deep in conversation and with a cup of coffee in his hands. They were across the street and some seventy-five yards from where Edward Riley was having coffee with a contact at a Starbucks. The Korean lady had been stationed in a Hallmark shop, looking out the window and simply noting passersby.
Two days later, in the mid-afternoon, a construction worker in denim pants and a T-shirt sat on a residential stoop in Chelsea, a block and a half from where Riley and one of his agents had gone into a brownstone.
The Korean woman had been browsing in a luggage store on the corner, she’d been far from the construction worker, but she thought he might have been the suited Hispanic from two days earlier. If she’d had binoculars she could have made the connection with certainty, but her cover was more important to her than his cover, so she let it go.
But tonight she saw the same man again, running in the dark, dressed like he was just out for a jog. He was either a businessman–construction worker–jogger, or he was a member of the opposition.
She doubted seriously he was working alone, but she’d not managed to identify any confederates.
She neither knew nor cared about the reasons he was following Edward Riley, no more than she knew or cared about what Edward Riley was up to. But her grown son and daughter lived in North Korea, and her occasional work here in New York for RGB always brought good news from them. The last time she worked an operation here in the city for North Korean intelligence her son sent a letter a few months later telling her he had received a new bicycle and his sister a new radio. They did not know the reason why, but they thanked the Dae Wonsu and professed their everlasting love and affection for him.
The elderly Korean Manhattanite was pleased her work here in America brought her family happiness back home, even if she would have loved to be able to have them come here to live with her.
—
The three Campus operators continued their coordinated leapfrogging movements through Chinatown, and it was still something of a ballet, but by now the complexity of the choreography had increased because the black SUV had turned up again, this time shadowing the woman on Canal Street. Marleni Allende continued walking unaware, her beige raincoat contrasting with the T-shirts of many of the other pedestrians here shopping for cheap knockoff goods in the rows of sidewalk stalls. Behind her, carefully tracking her, the Ford Escape moved normally through traffic, turning onto perpendicular streets and then pulling back onto Canal moments later.
Caruso still had the eye; he was one hundred feet directly behind the target, which meant at times he was moving right along with the black Ford. He spoke softly, but his earbud picked up his words with no problem. “This is starting to feel like that deal in Vietnam. I count four in the Ford. They aren’t closing on her, but there are a lot of civilians around here.”
—
Sam had pushed ahead through traffic, and now he raced to the nearest subway stop on Canal. During Allende’s meeting in the restaurant, he’d called Clark and asked for information on the woman. Clark read aloud everything the Campus analysts had given him, and from this Sam knew she lived alone in an apartment in Midtown.
She wasn’t walking home, that was for sure. Unless the Chilean woman hailed a taxi, it was a fair bet she was going to go down into the subway.
He knew there was no way in hell he’d find a place to park to go on foot, but at least he’d be able to identify any threats on the woman when she passed by.
—
Dom had no concerns the UN woman was going to see him; she walked with her head down and her shoulders rolled forward. If she started to look back over her shoulder, Dom had the training to recognize the telltale body movements that would come before her eyes actually put her in position to compromise him.
But the men in the Ford were a concern. They were alternately behind him, next to him, and facing him as they went up one street and down the other, and he assumed whoever these guys were, they had the training to be on the lookout for countersurveillance.
So Dom stopped now and then to look at cheap T-shirts and tacky wallets for sale in the stalls, and he just made occasional spot checks on Allende to confirm the other team on her tail hadn’t yet closed distance on her.
As he walked he saw the Ford Escape leave the tail completely and move up the street. He called it out to his teammates, and they all surmised the Escape was heading to the subway station as well.
Sam asked over the net, “What are we doing, guys?”
Clark had been monitoring the progression of the tail. “You two have to call it. I’m not there and Ding doesn’t have the eye. Dom, I don’t want you guys in the subway if I can avoid it, but if you think this woman is in peril, I’ll approve you going down and watching over her. Dom? Sam? Talk to me.”
—
Sam watched the Ford stop at the entrance to the subway. Two Asian men climbed out of the back and hurried down the stairs.
Before Dom had a chance to respond to Clark’s query, Sam said, “I’ve got two potential North Korean FAMs descending into the Canal Street station. Both wearing light-colored button-downs under black business suits.”
FAMs meant the same thing to all four men on the net. “Fighting-aged males.” They could be spooks, military, or any other bad actor. Of course, they could also be insurance salesmen, on their way home from work.
But Clark was betting against the latter. “Sam, you stay in the vehicle. Ding, you catch up to Dom.”
“He’s in view ahead of me,” Ding said. It was evident he was still jogging, keeping his cover going as well as closing the distance between himself and the surveillance target.
Clark finished with, “Ding and Dom, follow Allende tight. Go overt if you have to, let the DPRK assholes know you’re there, but keep her out of danger. No unnecessary risks. You will lose comms with Sam and I up here, so reestablish contact as soon as you’re able. Good luck.”
In front of Dom, the Chilean woman in the raincoat descended into the station, unaware men were watching her at this moment, and equally unaware others were waiting for her below.
34
Canal Street station was surprisingly quiet, even for ten-fifteen on a weeknight, but a light stream of foot traffic on the stairs headed toward the track. Marleni Allende walked along with the others, all but unaware of her surroundings because her mind was still on her worries.
She passed through the turnstile on her way to the northbound N train, her mind still unable to free itself of the stress of the past few days. She told herself she’d done the right thing, no amount of money would assuage the guil
t she would feel for the rest of her life if she succumbed to corruption. She considered herself a good Catholic, and though here in New York she had made many mistakes, finding herself unable to resist running up her credit cards and blowing through her life savings, she at least had the backbone to know that accepting a bribe from shadowy men obviously working for the interests of an evil regime was no way to dig herself out of her troubles.
She wasn’t paying attention at first, so she didn’t notice when, directly in front of her, two young Asian men walked on the platform against the flow of pedestrians heading toward the train. And she became only obliquely aware of them a moment later and took a step to the right because she sensed them in her path and approaching her direction.
When she noticed the two men adjusting their gait to move again in her path, now just fifteen feet away, she looked up. Both men eyed her without reservation and they kept moving toward her.
She slowed her walk in surprise. She didn’t have the training to be instantly fearful, but she thought they were perhaps walking up to her to say something.
At eight feet she sensed rather than saw both men reach inside their jackets.
As her eyes began moving down to see what they were retrieving from inside their coats, her heart lurched in her chest.
Oh, God! They are police and they know.
Just then she felt hands touch her from behind, grasping her at her elbows, and two men formed at her sides and began leading her gently but surely along the platform diagonally, out of the path of the men in front of her.
As she looked up at them, certain she was under arrest, one of them, smiling, spoke in a friendly voice.
“¿Marleni?” he said. “¡No lo creo! ¿Como te vas, amiga?” Marleni? I can’t believe it! How are you doing, friend?
She glanced up and saw the Asian men standing on the platform, their hands still in their coats. Confusion on their faces. The men leading her to the subway didn’t seem to notice them.
“¿Todo bien, chica?” the smaller of the two said. He was on her left, and he continued to guide her toward the track’s edge. He acted like he knew her, and was happy to see her, but it was clearly an act.
“¿Quién es usted?” she asked. Who are you? The man on her right was a little taller, just as dark but bearded, and he shielded her from the two Asian men who were now behind her. A few more people came forward on the platform as the train came to a stop.
The Latino with his hand on her back—from his accent, Marleni had identified him as Mexican—spoke softly now, still in Spanish. “Get on the train with us. It’s okay, we’re friends.”
She did as she was told, not because she understood or trusted him, but only because there were two of them and they moved her forward with gentle but unmistakable force.
—
When the doors closed, Chavez turned around to look for the two North Koreans, but he couldn’t see through the crowd of people leaving the train and heading for the exit. He thought it possible they had boarded another car, but he hoped the sudden appearance of him and Dom gave them enough pause to slow them down.
Chavez helped the woman to a seat; she was compliant but scared.
He said, “Ms. Allende. I don’t want to alarm you, I am a friend.”
“Who are you?” She clutched her bag. Ding was a forty-seven-year-old Hispanic male in warm-up pants and a gray sweatshirt. While he didn’t look threatening, his approach like this was jarring enough to make Allende wonder if perhaps she was about to be robbed.
“Those men have been following you since you met with Riley. We think it’s possible they were going to hurt you in some way. We can’t let that happen.”
“I don’t know any Riley.”
“He may have given you another name. I am talking about the man you met with at the restaurant on Mott Street twenty minutes ago.”
Allende’s face reddened. “I don’t know—”
“It doesn’t matter what is going on. We just want to make sure you are safe. Please let us escort you back someplace where we can talk.”
“I don’t know what this is all about. Really. I demand to be allowed to call my embassy immediately.”
Chavez said, “You aren’t safe in the subway. We can get you out at the next stop and meet friends at street level who can help us.”
Allende stood suddenly. Her confusion was subsiding quickly, and now she had acquired a sense of authority, even outrage. “I told you. I demand to speak to my embassy.”
The train slowed at the Prince Street station. Dominic moved for the door, his hand hovering at his waist, ready to draw his weapon if any North Korean operatives entered the car.
Ding said, “Okay. You can call whoever you want, but we’ve got to go up to the street, right?”
“I refuse to talk to—”
Dom spun away from the door, moved over to the Chilean UN official, and reached for his wallet. “Pay attention, lady.” He opened his wallet and displayed his Bureau credentials. “I’m FBI. You are coming with us.”
“I have diplomatic immunity.”
“And I don’t give a shit. You are not being arrested, you are being escorted to safety. You need to appreciate what is happening. We’re leaving right now.”
She started to move, but it took her too long.
At the stop a thick crowd of some fifteen people, the majority obviously tourists, were already boarding at the door nearest to Allende before she made it close enough to get off. An equal amount boarded at the door at the front of the car. By the time Chavez and Caruso had her moved through the group, the doors had closed again.
The train began moving.
Ding looked at Dom. “Stand her by the door and keep your head on a swivel. At the next stop we are moving.”
“Roger that.”
If not for the large group of straphangers standing in the middle of the car, Ding and Dom would have seen the two Asian men board from the door between their car and the car forward of them. But the men entered the car and began moving through the crowd, looking for their targets. When they did see the woman and her two mysterious protectors, they were only ten feet away, close to the rear side door. Instantly the North Korean operatives reached inside their coats to the small of their backs.
Caruso and Chavez saw the men right as the guns came out.
The North Koreans drew pistols, pushed a middle-aged woman and her grown daughter out of the way, and the guns rose in the middle of the group of stunned passengers.
The two Campus operatives went into their pants for their own weapons. Dom pulled a Smith & Wesson M&P Shield .40-caliber from inside his waistband under his shirt, and Chavez snatched a Glock 26 nine-millimeter from a Thunderwear holster. As Chavez drew, he stepped in front of Marleni Allende and shielded her with his body.
The North Koreans got the jump on the Americans, but the Americans executed their drawstrokes faster, so the race to get sights on targets was a four-way tie.
The screams and yells of thirty people came last of all.
Within one and a half seconds of the two teams seeing each other in the same train car, the four men had one another at gunpoint, each with two hands on his pistol in a combat grip. Their extended arms and gun barrels meant their muzzles were within eighteen inches of one another.
Men and women all around them dropped to the floor or recoiled out of the way in all directions, but the four professionals stood still as stones in the middle of the train car.
—
It was clear to Chavez these were North Koreans; he guessed they were members of their foreign intelligence service. He was surprised they were operating in the city with firearms, but, Chavez told himself, a gun was a decent tool for an assassin, so it stood to reason these guys were packing.
Caruso was on Chavez’s right, and as it happened, he had his gun on the man directly in front of Ch
avez, while Chavez himself was targeting the man just six feet in front of Caruso. The North Koreans had crossed their aim as well. The four weapons formed a near-perfect X that rocked and rolled with the rhythm of the moving train, and Chavez couldn’t help but think about the fact that he and the other three men would catch simultaneous point-blank rounds to the head if anybody on this train car so much as even sneezed.
He pictured what that would look like to the captive audience here. One extra-loud bang and four armed assholes dropping dead to the floor in a massive pool of blood.
That would be one hell of a vacation memory for all the tourists on the train.
No one said anything for the first few seconds, so Chavez took the role of master of ceremonies. “English? Either of you boys speak English?”
Sweat covered the brow of the man at the end of Chavez’s notch-and-post gunsight. Chavez didn’t look at the man in front of him, because that was Dom’s responsibility, and he knew Dom would have that guy covered.
Chavez’s man, dripping with sweat, had eyes that were wide and alert, but he did not seem panicked. He said, “I speak English.”
Chavez nodded. “That’s good.” He smiled a little, trying to bring even the slightest bit of calm to the scene. “This is a mess, huh?”
The North Korean didn’t reply.
Chavez continued, “I bet you and your partner want to go home tonight just like me and my partner. Am I right?”
The North Korean did speak now, but it was low and guttural and in Korean. He was talking to his partner, and while Chavez thought he might have just been translating for his partner’s benefit, it didn’t sound good at all.
The guns wavered a little as the train began a bumpy curve to the left, but still four muzzles were pointed at four faces, and four trigger fingers took up the slack in four triggers.
A female tourist in her thirties started to say something, but Caruso just hushed her without looking.
Chavez said, “Why don’t you two lower your weapons and you walk out of here at the next stop? We’ll let you do it. Matter of fact . . . we’d love for you to do it.”