Back Blast

1

The band started back up tentatively, but the revelers’ attention was firmly fixed on the dozen serious men in the driveway surrounding the host.

Carmichael’s eyes searched from left to right, locking on human forms, because everyone at the party was a threat now. A congressman from Nevada, a prosecutor from Virginia, a horse breeder from Kentucky, the co-owner of a fashion magazine on Fifth Avenue. Caterers, musicians, and an event organizer standing by the pool with his hands on his hips, gaping at the armed Neanderthals destroying the mood of this glorious spring garden social. Carmichael double-checked everyone’s faces as he neared the back door, and the men and women he did not recognize — there were just a few — he triple-checked. He knew Gentry’s appearance — he’d been thinking about it for years — but he also knew the man could disguise himself better than anyone he’d ever known.

When he was inside and completely surrounded by his detail, he stood there a moment breathing heavily. He remembered he was still holding the phone to his ear. He said, “We’re sure?”

Mayes replied in a clipped, efficient tone. “Israelis tracked him to a freighter that embarked from Lisbon eight days ago. It’s now anchored in the Chesapeake Bay, just west of Easton. He might be heading west into D.C., but if he goes east, that’s less than fifteen minutes from you by car. We’ve sent a Marine FAST team to hit the boat, but—”

“Gentry won’t be on it.”

“Not a chance. He would have slipped off the second he got near the shore. Have to clear it anyway. Might find some clues on board as to what his play is here in the States.”

“Where did the Israelis come across this intel?”

“Unknown. I have a conference call set up with Menachem Aurbach at Mossad. We’ll initiate it as soon as you get to Langley.”

Just then, Carmichael saw heads turn to the south. Seconds later he heard the thumping. He knew the sound. It was one of the Agency’s sleek new Eurocopters.

Jordan Mayes added, “Denny, sorry about the party. I know it was important to Eleanor.”

“Fuck this party. I want the Violator Working Group assembled in sixty mikes. Everyone.”

“Roger that.”

The landing of the helo and the exfiltration of the host of the garden party went down in a fashion just as obnoxious as Carmichael feared it might. He’d spend the rest of his life explaining this moment away to his wife’s friends, but the fallout wasn’t even on his radar now. As he boarded the aircraft, along with DeRenzi and three other bodyguards, his mind reverted into combat mode.

Carmichael had fought as a lieutenant in Vietnam, as a lieutenant colonel in Lebanon and Grenada, and as a CIA officer against the Russians in Afghanistan. He’d HALO jumped into Panama, jetted into the Balkans, dune buggied into Iraq, and helicoptered back into Afghanistan twenty years after his first visit. Denny knew combat, and he knew how to push everything extraneous out of his mind, leaving it solely committed to the utter simplicity of kill or be killed.

This was his mind-set now.

The helo took off towards the south, leaving the party behind as it rose over misty, rolling farmland. The pilot pushed the cyclic forward and then twisted the throttle to pick up speed in the cold air.

Carmichael ordered Mayes to hold the line, then he moved to a seat just behind the flight crew and put on a set of headphones. Pulling the microphone down over his lips, he tapped the pilot on his shoulder.

The man turned back to him. “Yes, sir?”

“You have countermeasures on board?”

The pilot seemed surprised by the question. He glanced to his copilot, then back to the windscreen in front of him. “Yes, sir. Chaff and flares.”

Denny said, “Be prepared to employ them. I want your head on a swivel.”

The copilot spoke up. Unsure. “We were rushed into this… uh… Anything you can tell us about what we’re up against would be helpful.”

Denny shrugged. He said, “The threat is an ex-asset, code name Violator. A former Agency paramilitary officer with one hell of a grudge.”

The pilot spun his head back around sixty degrees and stared through his visor at the much older man. “One guy? All this is about one guy?”

Denny’s leathery face turned even harder as he looked back into the pilot’s visor. “Son, do I look like I scare easily?”

“Not at all.”

“Well, this son of a bitch scares me to death. Turn around and fly this thing to Langley, and be ready for inbound missiles.”

“Sir,” he said with a slight nod, and then he focused fully on the flight.

Twenty seconds later Carmichael was back on the phone with his number two. “Get my family out of town. Have them taken to the ranch in Provo. If Violator is here for me I want them out of the way so I can do what I need to do.”

The helo began swaying to the left and right, not quite in jerking movements, but certainly nausea-inducing to those in back.

DeRenzi moved forward and sat down next to Carmichael. He had his own intercom-ready headset on. He tapped the pilot on his back, but the man did not turn around.

The security officer asked, “Why the hell are we flying like this?”

Carmichael answered for the pilot, who was fully occupied with his work. “We have to operate under the assumption that Gentry has a SAM, or at least an RPG. We’ll stay low to counter the SAM threat, but we need to fly like this over population centers to counter an RPG.”

DeRenzi then asked, “Why do you think Gentry has a SAM or an RPG?”

Carmichael looked out the window, focusing on the twinkling lights of the D.C. suburbs below him. “Because he’s the fucking Gray Man.”