The Joe Brennan Spy Thrillers

by Sam Powers

  It felt wrong. It was public, but it was enclosed, boxed in. A source who wanted anonymity – would there be risk in such a place, in being seen there? Maybe not.

  But it felt wrong. He was anxious, watching the people as they passed, wary of anything out of place; a young mother with a stroller, kids holding hands to avoid getting lost, a senior couple heading the other way; a single tourist, guidebook in his college-aged hand looking like he’d seen too much in one day.

  The source had given him a first meeting option that was obviously out of the question; the second option had seemed more reasonable; but perhaps that had been the point.

  Brennan hadn’t survived in the business by ignoring his instincts. He turned back and began walking the corridor towards the stairs. The mother with the stroller tracked him, eyes flitting sideways as he passed; she seemed out of place as well, too interested in him, her expression oddly neutral; ahead, the senior couple had stopped by the fish tanks but were both looking up, as if intent on his position, his situation. He wasn’t being paranoid, Brennan told himself. Each of the handful of people around him felt like they were going through motions.

  It was a setup. The whole thing, the whole scene. He was sure of it.

  He began to sprint, and the mother with the stroller turned quickly, her hand dipping in and out of the carriage, the machine pistol appearing in a smooth arc as she fired, rounds cutting into the walls, dust kicking up as Brennan tried to keep his head down. He ducked behind a board advertising the penguins’ feeding times and drew the Glock from the back of his waistband, but before he could fire back, a chunk of the board disappeared, showering him with chips of wood. He looked back quickly; both of the seniors were twenty yards away towards the front of the building, with silenced pistols drawn, trying to catch him in a cross-fire.

  A handful of other patrons screamed and ran, momentarily cutting off the older couples’ view, and Brennan quickly moved to a narrow space between the two fish tanks, which offered cover on both sides as long as he could stay low. He leaned around the corner to his left; the “mom” was levelling the machine pistol in his direction but Brennan was quicker, the Glock readied and his aim true, both shots hitting her center mass; then he ducked back into cover. She tumbled to the ground after another half step, convulsing from an arterial rupture, a punctured lung filling with blood.

  The ‘elderly woman’ tried to flank him by crossing the corridor to a small area of fake palm trees, her speed of movement betraying the grey wig, while her husband laid down suppressing fire. But Brennan had just enough angle from behind the corner of the right-hand tank to hit her before she got there. He unloaded five shots in quick succession, catching her in the legs and ankles. The woman screamed and went down, her gun sent sliding across the marble.

  Brennan heard a slight shuffle of shoe on concrete from behind him and instinctively dodged sideways, the blade of a butterfly knife slashing past his face in a short, sharp arc, the tip a quarter-inch from his throat, a foot coming up quickly to kick the Glock from his hand.

  He dropped into a defensive posture then jabbed upwards with an open-hand punch, blocking the attacker’s arm away from him. The ‘confused tourist’ had almost managed to sneak up on him, but now the man’s left kidney was exposed and Brennan hit it hard, with a hook, the attacker arching his back in spasmodic pain. Brennan kicked hard, sideways, the arch of his boot striking the side of the man’s knee, dislocating it. The phony tourist screamed in agony and went down to one knee, but still managed to wildly swing the knife in his right hand; Brennan caught the arm and turned the man around, like dancing with a rag doll, just as the elderly assassin fired three more shots, the impromptu human shield taking each bullet in the back.

  Brennan dropped him to the floor and sprinted towards the old man, who was trying frantically to get another magazine into place. As Brennan leaped into a flying sidekick, the old man dropped the weapon in favor of throwing up a cross-armed block, deflecting the kick’s force. Brennan landed and rolled into a crouched position facing his adversary. The man was genuinely old, he realized absently. The old man began to go into a defensive martial arts crouch, but then staggered sideways slightly… then to his left, then backwards, as if he’d had too much to drink and could suddenly barely stand. Then he spread his feet wide, leaning back with one hand to his chin as if taking a deep drink of something.

  His ‘Drunken Man’ form was impeccable, Brennan noted, a sign of expertise in Choi Le Fut Kung Fu. The old man came out of the backward lean by lurching forward then flipping head-over-side in a cartwheel of kicks. Brennan instinctively set his feet wide and shuffled backwards out of the way. He threw a series of rapid punches, but the old man swayed backwards again, his back seemingly made of rubber as he arched it to avoid the blows. The old man did a single back flip so that he was in a balanced position again then took a quarter-turn before lurching sideways, a series of strikes catching Brennan in the side of the head and sending him reeling.

  He shook off the blows, but the old man rolled sideways again and came up with the pistol. He squeezed off a shot but was a split-second too late as Brennan closed the distance and slapped the gun to one side; the elderly assassin was left open, and Brennan drove the side of his hand into the man’s throat. The old man collapsed to his knees, clutching for air, and Brennan threw two more quick punches, knocking him out.

  Alarms were sounding and he could hear footsteps running up stairs. He looked for a quick exit point; there was a washroom to his left, and he ran inside, the door swinging shut hard behind him. There was a window, high on the wall above the sinks and small, but big enough to get through. He clambered up onto the back of the sink; his ear was ringing from the senior assassin’s punches. Brennan pushed the window open and leaned out quickly to look for foot traffic, the sound of the city instantly taking over. It led out onto the end of a metal platform that ran part of the way around the outside of the building, leading to several service entrances on the rear of the building, and then a second metal set of stairs down to ground level.

  As he took the stairs two at a time, police sirens buzzed by in the street ahead, behind the walls separating the aquarium from the mall and restaurants. He found a spot where the concrete turned to a lower mesh fence and climbed it quickly, dropping to the sidewalk on the other side and walking away. A few minutes later, as police began to clean up the carnage at the aquarium, he was flagging a cab from outside a nearby hotel.

  Faisal Mohammed had been behind his desk for nearly an hour, waiting for the line to blink. Finally, the call came through.

  “Yes?”

  “The operation was unsuccessful, sir, and the contractors have failed to complete the terms of the agreement arranged by the American.”

  “I see.”

  “Would you like me to arrange other contractors…”

  “No. No, that won’t be necessary for now.”

  “Very good, sir.” The line went dead.

  He dialed Khalidi. “Sir?”

  “What is it, Faisal?”

  “The issue with the American agent, Joe Brennan, was not resolved. He is intent on getting answers with respect to the African incident…”

  “I thought we had control over his movements.”

  “We have control of his handler, technically,” Faisal said. “But he informs us that Brennan was commissioned ‘below board’, which is to say…”

  “I know what ‘below board’ means, Faisal,” Khalidi said, fatigued. “Can we have our contact recall him to America? If we cannot eliminate the problem, perhaps it is best to at least get him out of our hair – or, perhaps, have him stationed somewhere out of the way until things are calmer.”

  “I can certainly put that to our contact, sir,” Faisal said. “He may not be receptive but…”

  “Remind him of how much he is being paid. Remind him of our expectations, and that he can always be replaced if he does not meet them.”

  “Yes, your highness.”

&nb
sp; “And if he cannot manage it, remind him that we still need a solution to Mr. Brennan. Tell him to bring force to bear.”

  JUNE 6, 2016, WASHINGTON, D.C.

  The President threw the copy of the magazine story back onto the long wooden table that sat in the middle of the National Security Council’s executive meeting room. “I need answers, gentlemen,” he said. “How much of this is true and how much of it is just fanciful reporter bullshit?”

  They’d all read Alex Malone’s work; everyone inside the Beltway had been discussing her series for more than a week. The consensus seemed to be that the ACF, at the least, was acting criminally. That meant extended opportunities to investigate, multiple opportunities for Fawkes to be uncovered.

  “Mr. President, if I may…” Mark Fitzpatrick said, drawing everyone’s attention. “The intel on Khalidi’s company funding an African insurgency is correct. The handful of other incidents to which she has referred are, as far as I can tell, also legitimate.”

  At the other end of the table, David Fenton-Wright kept his opinion to himself. But everyone around the table was aware of how badly the President’s popularity had slid in the prior year. If he wanted to help Younger, the agency man thought, he could best do it by staying off the stump, not dragging his successor down with him. Fenton-Wright considered himself apolitical; but he reserved a special dislike for the commander-in-chief, whom he saw as weak.

  “Could this get any worse?” the President asked.

  “Well sir, it’s already worse in that the board members appear to have used military force to settle political scores, as well,” said Fitzpatrick. “The incident Ms. Malone’s story mentioned in Harbin, China has been confirmed by our allies in the region.”

  “And how are they dealing with this?”

  “They’re … not, Mr. President,” Fitzpatrick said hesitatingly.

  “I don’t follow.”

  “They’re ignoring the story. China and Japan have often treated American domestic reporting with a large grain of salt, and Khalidi’s home nation, Jordan, offers him great deference due to his lineage. Possibly, the powerful father of Fung’s wife has intervened on his behalf; it’s difficult to say at this point.”

  The President considered the implications. At least, he assumed, he would be out of office by the time the other powers began to pay attention to the ACF and, by extension, to Lord Abbott’s double life.

  “There is another facet to this we need to explore,” Fitzpatrick said. “It’s possible that the sniper who started all of this was going after ACF board members because of its off-the-books behavior; the shooter might even have been employed by a country.”

  “So if we take down the sniper, it may lead us back to a diplomatic mess with… who, the Nigerians?” the defense secretary asked. “Christ, what a shitstorm…”

  “Where does that investigation stand, David?” the President asked

  Fenton-Wright saw his opportunity. “If we’re going to distance ourselves from the ACF and Fawkes, Mr. President, I would suggest at this point that the unofficial and unsanctioned investigation into the shootings be terminated and the asset withdrawn. Really, if we don’t have a horse in this race, we should get out. It’s quiet right now, and the less attention we draw the better.” It was exactly what Faisal wanted, and it solved the problem of Brennan’s ongoing efforts to tie the missing nuke to Khalidi, Fenton-Wright thought.

  The President sat quietly for a moment and thought about all of the ramifications. Fawkes had been in place long before he took office, had never become active again until the sniper. Could he use that as an excuse, in posterity, were the agent to be uncovered? Probably. Would leaving a man over there to snoop around potentially lead to more questions being posed than were answered? Also likely.

  “Bring him in,” he told Fenton-Wright. “Let’s see if we can extricate ourselves from this mess.”

  32./

  JUNE 12, 2016, MONTPELLIER, FRANCE

  The apartment was hot; it was south-facing and just three small rooms, catching the brunt of the summer afternoon sun in the Languedoc-Roussillon region, adjacent to the Mediterranean.

  Brennan sat on the edge of the aging single-bed in the back room, where the shade was somewhat merciful, the thin mattress squeaking on decades-old springs whenever he got up or sat down. It was unseasonably warm out, even for the area. He had just a string undershirt and jeans on with running shoes, and the sweat beaded on his brow and jawline, as a cheap oscillating fan in the corner tried in vain to cool the surroundings.

  He flicked the old twenty-inch color television from channel to channel, pausing on each just for a few seconds, just absorbing the sights with the sound muted, without conscious thought process, allowing his mind to de-stress and unwind.

  Everything seemed to have gone south the moment Alex published her story, he thought. Up until that point he’d been making a plodding, dangerous sort of progress; but now Miskin was dead, Khalidi had run an effective duck-and-cover, Alex’s reporting seemed to have ground to a halt … and Brennan was on the run.

  He heard footsteps on the metal stairs up to the building’s second story. He got up and moved to the front window, by the door, pulling back the lacy white curtain. The first man was stocky, maybe five-eight, forty five years old, with curly black hair that was beginning to silver. His partner was younger, with a strong physique but not bulky, along with wispy brown hair and a goatee. He had a black tank top on and jeans while the older man favored a tight t-shirt and cargo shorts. The younger man was carrying a small athletic bag.

  They knocked on Brennan’s door and he let them in.

  “You Bernie?” the old man said in French.

  “Yeah.”

  “We’re supposed to say the missus sent us.”

  “Okay.” He closed the door behind them and they walked into the room. “You bring what was discussed?”

  “Yeah. But the piece was hard to find. It’s going to cost another five hundred.”

  Brennan paused for a second as he reached for the money clip in his back pocket. Was this guy just angling for an extra buck, or was it an exploratory request, a chance to see how flush he was? He took the clip out and watched their reactions. Both sets of eyes flitted momentarily to the thick money roll but betrayed no surprise or emotion.

  He peeled off three-and-a-half thousand euros in hundreds. The younger man leaned in to take the money but Brennan withdrew it quickly. ‘Ah… not before I see what you’ve brought me,” he said, nodding towards the athletic bag. The older man’s eyes had stayed on the money clip, even as he leaned down to unzip the bag. They dipped south and he looked into the bag, at the same time as Brennan. The pistol he’d asked for was lying on top. The curly-haired man looked at it, then at Brennan’s money, then at the gun again.

  And for just a split second, no one moved a muscle.

  Things had begun to unravel after the aquarium. Brennan had gone back to his hotel only to find it crawling with both police and federal agents. Disappearing into the downtown core, he’d managed to steal a cell phone from a careless tourist at a street café in order to call Myrna, from the relative quiet and security of an alleyway.

  She’d in turn told him that he was a wanted man, his face all over French television stations.

  “What the hell is going on?” she’d demanded. They didn’t use each other’s names; despite the public’s general ignorance of the techniques involved, both knew that signals intelligence gatherers could flag individuals from among millions with something as simple as a name, and that a network of countries circumvented rules on monitoring their own civilians by having partner nations do it for them. “They’ve got security footage of you shooting a helpless John Q.”

  “What?!?”

  “Old man, crown of white hair, brown suit, short, with a moustache.”

  The elderly assassin. “That was no ordinary senior,” he said. “But I didn’t do it. Whatever they’re showing, it’s doctored.”

  “It’
s a hell of a good job then. State has branded you rogue; and local yokels have been told you’re armed and dangerous. And my contacts over there have gone very quiet, which they generally only do to keep me from things I shouldn’t know.”

  “If it doesn’t go without saying, I need your help.”

  “Of course.”

  “Money. There’s a wire office near here; there’s a chance they won’t have cut me off yet from everything in the system, so I’m going to this place.” He gave her an address, four blocks off the actual location. “South from there, there are three more.” A cue for her to look up the actual locations of the three nearest money transfer offices. “As much as you can manage.” A cue to stay under the trace limit of $10,000, at which point any of the offices by law would have had to report a suspicious transaction.

  “The police found the man with two to the head,” she said, sounding momentarily unsure. “Are you certain…”

  “Yes! He disarmed me, we fought, I won. But there were no shots fired, at least not from my end. He was damn good, too, despite his age. If someone popped him, it was after I left.”

  “If this was Khalidi, he has some exceptional contacts in the agency,” Myrna said. “They had that bulletin out to the civil service and foreign agencies in about sixteen minutes, if the time stamp on your ‘security camera’ appearance is correct.”

  “Literally?”

  “Yeah. The tape shows you shooting the guy at eleven-thirty-six in the morning. The bulletin from State went out to all embassies at… Eleven-fifty-eight. So… twenty-two minutes.”