The first six of those twenty bullets hit the pretty blonde flight attendant in the back. A seventh entered Robichaud’s right shoulder, and the remaining thirteen lost themselves in the ceiling of the aircraft. As Robichaud was thrown back by the impact, he saw Hassan stand up and take the pin out of an M67 fragmentation hand grenade while Fadl inserted a fresh clip into his Uzi.
The other passengers on the airplane began to scream and tried to take cover in any way possible. Unable to use his right arm, Robichaud used his left hand to cross-draw his pistol. But by the time he was ready to fire, Fadl was once again spraying the first-class cabin with 9mm Parabellum bullets. Robichaud, now on his knees using one of the front galley walls as partial concealment, was hit one more time in the chest as he fired his first shot. Consequently, his round went high, but his second shot, fired less than half a second later, hit its target between the eyes. Fadl collapsed on the elderly man cowering in the next seat.
Coughing up blood, Robichaud saw that Hassan was about to throw his grenade into the rear of the plane. With a one-handed left grip, he fired two more rounds into the back of Hassan’s skull. In slow motion, Robichaud saw the grenade slip from the dead terrorist’s hand and fall in between two seats before rolling toward a crying mother and her young son.
Fuck!
Knowing he was fatally wounded, Robichaud willed himself to get up but couldn’t muster the force. The excruciating pain in his chest prevented him to yell a warning. Only a gurgle and a fresh spray of blood came out of his mouth. Using his good arm, he tried to alert the passengers of the impending disaster, but chaos and panic had overtaken them. Everybody was running toward the exit, oblivious to the grenade lying only a few meters away. With his eyes fixed on the grenade, Robichaud used all of his remaining strength to crawl toward it. But in doing so, he felt the passengers running over him, stomping him with their feet.
Robichaud died from his wounds less than one second before the M67 exploded.
A LONG GRAY LINE pits the International Market Stabilization Institute – a privately funded organization operating outside official channels to protect North America’s financial interests – against two foes at the same time. One could decimate the American stock market and throw the entire world economy into a tailspin. The other is a piece of unfinished business from their last operation that could be even more destructive. Their ability to act in the face of confounding choices will have an effect on the future for years to come.
Featuring Mike and Lisa Walton – the husband-and-wife team of operatives who led the charge in THE THIN BLACK LINE – A LONG GRAY LINE is a thriller so packed with action and tension that it contains enough excitement for stories four times its size.
Here’s an excerpt:
CHAPTER 1
Miami, Florida
Mike Walton’s knees buckled under him, and the three Coronas and the two glasses of Sauvignon Blanc he had ingested weren’t the reason why.
“Say that again?” he said into the receiver.
“We have a lead on your father,” Charles Mapother repeated from his office in New York.
Mapother was the director of the International Market Stabilization Institute, a privately funded organization operating outside official channels but sometimes in concert with the needs of the United States government.
“Where is he?”
“Somewhere inside Syria. That’s all we know for now.”
“I’ll jump on the next—,” started Mike before Mapother interrupted him.
“No you won’t. What you’ll do is stay right where you are and enjoy some time off with your wife. I’ll call you as soon as we have something more substantial.”
Mike sighed. Mapother’s right. There wasn’t much he could do until they had more intelligence. Ray Powell, his father, the former Canadian ambassador to Algeria, had been kidnapped by the Sheik three years ago. Mike closed his fist as he remembered the grief the Sheik had forced his mother to endure for more than two years. By sending her pictures of her tortured husband, the Sheik had gotten into her head and had made her life miserable. Since the kidnapping, the Sheik’s network had gained wide notoriety within the terror community. Known to be merciless, the Sheik had been able to climb the terror ladder to the point that he was now—one of the top three most wanted men on the planet.
The good news was that Mike was now convinced his father was still alive. They had proof. Being totally honest, spending another couple of days in Miami could really do him some good. The last operation hadn’t been an easy one and they had lost a colleague.
And a damn good one at that.
There was no doubt in Mike’s mind that Jasmine Carson’s death would come back to haunt him at night, just like his two-year-old daughter Melissa did.
That’s not fair. She isn’t haunting me. She’s visiting my dreams.
Melissa, his mother and his wife’s parents had been killed in a terrorist attack orchestrated by the Sheik at the Ottawa train station last year. The unborn child his wife Lisa had been carrying in her belly for eight months had also been stolen from them. An IMSI team led by Mike had conducted a raid on the Sheik’s mobile headquarters —a large Azimut yacht— two weeks ago in Benalmádena, Spain. Thinking they had cornered the terrorist mastermind, they had launched a pre-emptive strike against the yacht. Even though they had failed at killing or capturing the Sheik, Mike’s team had delivered a devastating blow to his terror network by killing his right-hand man, Omar Al-Nashwan, as well as Mohammad Alavi, the man responsible for the assassination of the Canadian environment minister. Searching the yacht for additional intel, the IMSI team had successfully retrieved a ton of information pertinent to the Sheik’s upcoming terror attacks. Charles Mapother had quickly shared the newly acquired intelligence with the Director of National Intelligence, Richard Phillips, President Muller’s close friend and one of the only federal officials to know exactly what the IMSI actually was. Mike knew Mapother had kept some of the good stuff for himself, though, and wouldn’t be surprised if he’d hear from his boss soon regarding a follow-up operation.
“Mike?”
His wife’s voice brought him back to the here and now. Lisa was looking at him, her curiosity apparent.
“It was Mapother,” Mike replied. “He has a lead on Dad’s whereabouts. He believes he’s in Syria.”
“When are we leaving?” Sanchez asked. His friend was standing next to Lisa. He drank the last of his wine. “I’m ready.”
“We aren’t going anywhere,” Mike said. “At least not yet. Mapother doesn’t have much information for us to work with at this point.”
“When then?” Lisa asked.
“He’ll let us know,” Mike replied, accepting the fact he might not have the chance to go after his father for a while.
“So that’s it?” Sanchez said. “That doesn’t sound like you, brother.”
“We have nothing to go on. Syria is such a mess that it won’t do us any good to head out there looking for him if we don’t have any clues of where he is.”
His phone chirped in his hand before his friend could add anything. It was Mapother. Again.
“Come back to New York, Mike,” the IMSI director said.
“What changed in the last thirty seconds?”
“As you know, our analysts have been combing over the data you retrieved from the laptop seized aboard the Sheik’s yacht.”
“And?”
“We’ve pinpointed the location to one of the Sheik’s associates.”
“Where?”
“He’s in Syria.”
Mike hung up and said to his wife, “Pack your bags, honey. We might head to Syria after all.”
CHAPTER 2
Split, Croatia
The Sheik had changed his appearance. His hair was now white and he had cut his beard in order to fit with the younger crowd frequenting Split’
s seafront promenade’s restaurant scene. Contact lenses gave him brown eyes and cotton wads inserted into his lower cheeks made his jaw appear more square.
The pressure his enemies had put him under did nothing to brighten his mood. Whoever had stormed his mobile headquarters in Spain and killed Mohammad Alavi and Omar Al-Nashwan hadn’t stopped there. His network attrition rate was getting out of control and most of his funds were gone. And in order to continue his operations, he needed money. Lots of it.
Luckily for him, the Russian government had proven itself to be a great ally. The Sheik congratulated himself for never going against Russia’s interests in the past and for keeping an open dialogue with the Kremlin. Since his recent setbacks, the Russian president had been quite accommodating when it came to financing the Sheik’s operations.
But he needed a win. Soon.
One that would put him back in the game. With ISIS latest successes, it was getting harder and harder to recruit competent men willing to join him. Mouin Bashi was a man he trusted. Bashi was a true believer and someone who hated the United States as much as he did, but more importantly, Bashi had the resources to implement the Sheik’s plan. A plan that, if successful, would stop dead in its track the economic growth the Europeans were now enjoying. Still, being twenty minutes late to a meeting wasn’t something the Sheik appreciated. Three months ago, he would have walked off and asked Al-Nashwan to deal with the miscreant brave enough to make him wait.
Was Bashi’s lateness a way to make him understand he had lost his status? That he wasn’t the big player he used to be? He clutched his fists, his short-temper threatening the calm demeanor he was showing to the outside world.
The Sheik was finishing his third cup of coffee when he spotted Bashi across the street. Bashi had supposedly sworn allegiance to ISIS but the Sheik knew this was a smoke screen. Bashi was his man inside ISIS, even if Bashi wasn’t aware of it. He had been the one to volunteer ISIS fighters to the Sheik.
“I’m so sorry for my tardiness, Sheik,” Bashi said in hush tones as he stood across the table. “I had to make sure I wasn’t followed.”
“Thank you, dear friend,” he replied, keeping his anger in check. “Please have a seat.”
Bashi pulled the chair and sat. He caught the attention of the waiter and ordered a double espresso.
“How’s Croatia treating you, Sheik?”
Never before had he set foot in Croatia but he had to admit that Split was a marvelous city. The café they were at was facing the Riva, Split’s seafront promenade that ran the length of the old town. The view across the harbor to the islands beyond were magnificent. The Sheik understood perfectly why the Roman Emperor Diocletian had chosen this spot to build his lavish retirement palace in AD295.
“How could one complain with such views?” the Sheik said.
“Very true, Sheik. That is very true.”
“You have news for me, I presume?”
The fact that whoever had ransacked his yacht and left with everything that was inside didn’t mean the Sheik was out of options. With the current Syrian refugee crisis, there was a wealth of opportunities just waiting to be seized.
“Zebar Selam has the plan,” Bashi replied. “He will dispatch his men and four days from now, you shall see the results. I’m wondering how Zagreb will respond once the Israeli embassy goes up in flames.”
The Sheik’s plan wasn’t a complicated one. With Hungary closing its borders to the Syrian refugees, tens of thousands were redirected through Croatia. Zagreb opened a transit camp in hopes of inserting some order into the chaos while providing food, water and medical attention to the refugees. Seeing this, elements within the Serbian government decided it would be a good idea to encourage all the refugees to continue to Croatia. It was felt this would remove the need to provide any type of assistance themselves. This decision accentuated the already tense relationship between Serbia and Croatia, and the acidic tone of exchanges between the two countries was something the Sheik wanted to exploit.
The Sheik smiled. Visions of chaos and mayhem had this effect on him. “Zagreb’s weak, my friend,” he explained. “They’ll only respond with some kind of economic measures. It’s the Israelis’ reactions I’m looking forward to.”
This was the plan after all. He would leak just enough information to ensure the investigating authorities would place the blame on the Syrian refugees. The Israelis would then go to its two closest allies —the Americans and the Canadians— and ask them to use their influence within the United Nations to close the borders within the European Union. The Sheik was confident that Berlin and Vienna would support the motion.
Especially Germany. With tensions developing between migrants and some German political activists, Berlin would be looking for any excuse to close its border without losing face.
“What if the Israelis don’t respond the way we expect?” Bashi asked.
“Then we activate the second group, Mouin,” the Sheik replied. “And if that doesn’t work, we’ll send another and another until they do exactly what we want them to.”
Terrorism became personal for Mike Walton on his last mission—a mission that resulted in triumph...and devastating tragedy. Now the stakes have been raised again.
Mike and his wife Lisa—both covert assets of the International Market Stabilization Institute, a privately funded organization operating outside official channels to protect North America’s financial interests—are sent to Russia after an attempt on their superior officer’s life. It is a mission fraught with peril and one that becomes exponentially more dangerous when their covers are blown within hours of setting foot in Moscow. Now, they are being hunted down by the Sheik, the terrorist mastermind behind the kidnapping of Mike’s father, Ray Powell, and to the treachery that turned Mike and Lisa’s lives upside down.
To make matters worse, there are clues that Biopreparat—the former Soviet Union biological warfare agency—has been resurrected and is about to launch a strike against the United States. This forces Mike and Lisa to make the most difficult choice of all. With Ray Powell’s life hanging in the balance, and the slightest mistake potentially igniting the next World War, nothing is what it seems.
And the line between friend and foe is blurring.
Here are the opening chapters:
PROLOGUE
Federal Correction Institution Otisville, New York
Louis Wall wasn’t a patient man, but he was curious. When the guard told him he had a visitor, he didn’t say a word. For the last ten years, no one had cared enough about him to visit, not even his only daughter. For that, he didn’t blame her; his stupid ex-wife brainwashed her into thinking he was dangerous. He should have killed the woman when he had the chance.
“You know the drill,” the guard said through the cell’s door. “Turn around.”
He obeyed and offered his wrists. Seconds later, he felt the cold steel of the handcuffs against his skin. As Wall exited his six-by-eight-foot prison cell, the guard dug his fingers into his bicep while pushing him in the back.
“What the fuck?”
“Shut the hell up and stop resisting,” the guard said. To get his point across, he delivered a powerful punch to Wall’s only kidney.
Wall winced in pain, but not a sound came out of his lips. He didn’t want to give the guard the pleasure of knowing he had hurt him. A few years ago, Wall would have fought back and cracked a skull or two, but with only a few weeks left to his twelve-year sentence for manslaughter and drug trafficking, it was better to take it like a man. Plus, he couldn’t help but wonder who his visitor was.
To his surprise, the guard didn’t lead him to the regular visitors’ room. Instead, he was escorted to an interview room where a man dressed in a three-piece suit was seated behind a steel table bolted to the floor. Laid open on the table was a yellow file to which Wall’s headshot was stapled. Another file folder, a green one, r
emained closed.
“Remove his handcuffs,” the man said.
The guard didn’t look happy but obeyed nonetheless.
“You can leave,” the man added.
Once the guard had closed the door, the man pointed to the single chair across the table. “Please.”
Wall remained standing. The man seated in front of him didn’t look dangerous. It was hard to say how tall he was. Five-and-a-half feet, he estimated. Maybe less. Dark skin. Slight built. Nothing like Wall’s own muscular six-foot-four-inch frame. But he did have an accent. Russian? It definitely sounded like that. He didn’t like Russians.
“What do you want?” Wall grunted.
The man slowly looked up from the file he was reading, his brown eyes locking into Wall’s.
“Louis Wall, forty-seven years of age, born in Dickson, Tennessee. Only child of Claire Dolan and Peter Wooley. Attended Dickson County High School before enrolling into the US Army-“
“Was my jaw supposed to drop?” Wall cut in. “That’s all public knowledge.”
The man simply continued without acknowledging Wall’s interruption. “You faced your first court martial before the end of basic training after assaulting your drill sergeant. After serving a month in a military prison, you were dishonorably discharged and spent the next two years living off the small inheritance you received after your father’s passing. You met Isabella, your first real girlfriend, at the local tavern on the night of your twenty-first birthday-”
“What do you want?” Wall said for the second time in less than sixty seconds.
“Please have a seat,” the man replied.
Wall shook his head from left to right, then crossed his arms, his biceps threatening to tear apart the fabric of his grey prison suit.
“I’m here to offer you a second chance.”
“At what?”
“Revenge, Louis. Revenge.”
A picture of his ex-wife hanging at the end of a rope appeared in his mind. “I’m listening.”
A Thick Crimson Line (Mike Walton Book 3) Page 30