Back Blast

47

The rain battered the tiny window high on the wall of Court’s basement apartment. He lay awake in the closet, his bandaged ribs bare and his backpack under his head as a pillow.

His new Glock 17 pistol, now with the suppressor screwed on to the end of the barrel, lay by his side.

He hadn’t left this apartment since he arrived home just before six the afternoon before; it was nearly three a.m. now, and he hadn’t slept one damn minute of the past nine hours. He’d not accomplished much since watching the news and changing his bandages other than eating a dinner of bland collard greens and black beans, then washing it all down with tepid tap water and a pair of bottled beers.

After that, he vegetated, watching TV for hours.

The first half of his viewing was for purely operational purposes. He watched the major networks as they ran reports about the “terrorist massacre” in Dupont Circle. The faces of the reporters talking were different, but only a little. Their reports, on the other hand, seemed almost word for word the same.

After he couldn’t take any more regurgitated information or uninformed conjecture, he switched off the news and began flipping through the entertainment channels. There wasn’t much on that interested him, other than a comedy on basic cable about a group of guys who woke up with hangovers after a bachelor party in Las Vegas. Apparently this was the first film of a trilogy, but Court had never heard of it, and he wondered if watching all three would have increased his enjoyment. But despite the banality of it all and notwithstanding everything that had happened to him this week, Court caught himself laughing out loud at the absurd dilemma of the protagonists to the point his gunshot wound throbbed in protest at his enjoyment.

After the movie was over he turned off the TV, crawled into his closet, and assumed the awkward sleeping position he’d adopted since arriving here in the Mayberrys’ basement. Like every night, he popped the Walker’s Game Ear in his right ear, and immediately he could hear new sounds in the quiet neighborhood. A barking dog, the soft rumbling of a passing car, one of the Mayberrys leaving the kitchen above and walking up the staircase to their second-floor bedroom.

Now he lay here, fighting for sleep, moody and unable to find a way to shake it off. It grew from his utter frustration in his lack of forward momentum after the Ohlhauser meeting and the chaos that ensued from it. It was as if the wind had been pulled from his sails. He had no idea where to go next, and now he needed to find the momentum to regroup, to reacquire a target, and to reboot his operation.

He told himself he needed to work on his next move, which sounded good until he hit a wall the moment he tried to think. His original plan here in the D.C. area had been to talk to three men to get all the information he needed to determine his next course of action. Indeed, he had spoken with Chris Travers and Matt Hanley, but Leland Babbitt had been killed before he could interrogate him. And although Ohlhauser hadn’t been on his radar at the beginning of this op he’d managed to talk to him before he, too, had been killed.

But now what? Court thought back to his conversations with the three men, trying to pull out some actionable nugget that he hadn’t noticed before. Something that had eluded him.

Shit, thought Court. He was a shooter and a spy. He wasn’t an analyst or an investigator. He wanted a mission, not a fucking puzzle.

Then it hit him. A way to reanalyze the problem. He asked himself, what one thing did all the men agree on? What was the continuum between all parties?

He knew the answer as soon as he posed the question.

Fucking BACK BLAST.

This was understandable, Court reasoned, because Denny had told everyone it was an op gone bad. It had been his justification to hand down the shoot on sight. Now, in the middle of the night, with nothing else to do and nowhere else to turn, he told himself he had no choice but to try to reach back into his memory banks somehow and to replay every minuscule aspect of this one op out of dozens in his time with the Goon Squad, and hundreds in his life as an operator.

The normal routine with the Goon Squad after a mission was to perform an immediate hot wash, an after-action review where all elements involved discussed the good, bad, and ugly. They did it while memories were still fresh. But BACK BLAST had been different because Court had worked alone, without a net, much as he had in the early part of his career, when he’d been a member of the Autonomous Asset Program.

After Trieste there had been no hot wash, no after-action review, literally no mention of the event ever again.

This made details very fuzzy after more than half a decade, but as Court lay in his long, narrow closet, his head next to his ersatz escape hatch to the basement proper and his booted feet pressed up against the wall, he committed himself fully to this endeavor.

He forced himself to do his best to remember an operation that took place a half dozen years ago.

Court Gentry didn’t mind commercial travel, not even in coach, because even a long-haul international flight over the Atlantic was far superior to any of the hundreds of trips he’d taken on Agency transport in his years with CIA. The majority of the time when he moved from one country to another it was in the ass end of a loud, cold cargo aircraft that smelled like jet fuel and BO. Even the Special Activities Division Air Branch Gulfstream that normally flew transport missions for the Golf Sierra unit was outfitted for function over form, and on the inside it looked nothing like what people assumed from its sleek and businesslike fuselage.

But tonight’s flight from Dulles to Milan was something special, because by the time the SAD logistics staff bought Court’s ticket coach was full, so he got to fly in business class.

And though he was the one man on his team who never bitched about the austere conditions that came with his work, Court really didn’t mind sitting in a soft and wide business-class seat, either.

It wasn’t lost on him at all that three days earlier he’d been lying on his belly inside a hot metal shipping container that had been left smashed on the banks of a levee somewhere on the outskirts of Mogadishu. With him had been Sierras Four and Five, and they had spent a day and a half waiting for the signal from Sierra Two that their target had been identified at the target location. Court’s body armor, hidden under the rags the locals wore, pressed into him, his ammunition digging into his stomach while he swatted flies and did his best to ignore Keith Morgan’s unceasing farts.

And now here he was days later, wearing a Tommy Hilfiger blazer and L.L.Bean khakis and sipping champagne from real glass barware while a drop-dead gorgeous English flight attendant went over his myriad options for dinner.

So much better than a Keith Morgan gas attack in all respects.

Sometimes Court’s cover for action was a hell of a lot better than his real life, so he took advantage of it on these few missions with the Goon Squad when he got to play dress up. He felt weird not working with the rest of his team on this, but he’d spent the first several years in CIA doing singleton ops, so it was no big trick for him to operate alone.

Over Nova Scotia he dined on salmon pomegranate with Turkish pilaf, and he washed it down with white burgundy. He’d rather have a glass of Redbreast Irish Whiskey or Knob Creek bourbon, or just a bottle of cold Pacífico beer, but his cover for action was a mild-mannered American businessman who would know that white wine paired nicely with salmon.

After his meal, while his Virgin flight flew over Greenland, he opened up his laptop and began scrolling through satellite and street maps of his target location.

The woman in the seat next to him was Italian; she never looked over at his computer to see the map of Trieste, but had she done so, Court would have just said he was in the consumer goods industry and heading to several Italian cities to meet with vendors.

He looked like an eager businessman getting a jump on his trip by committing locations to memory, but in fact he was concentrating on the maps so he could pick out his primary, secondary, and tertiary ingresses and egresses to the target area.

He worked till late in the night, then caught a few hours’ sleep before the end of the flight.

His plane landed in Milan before nine a.m., and Court breezed through customs using a CIA legend he’d been handed during the van ride over. With just his carry-on it was smooth sailing out of the airport, and he found himself in the train station less than an hour after touchdown.

The train from Milan to Trieste was six hours and passed first through Bologna. Court found his first-class compartment empty for nearly the entire ride, so he used part of his journey to continue working on memorizing the map of his destination city.

He arrived in Trieste just after four p.m. during a light February drizzle, and at a counter in the train station he rented a gray 2008 Peugeot four-door that looked like it would melt in nicely with the Italian traffic.

He found his safe house to be a one-bedroom apartment on the Via Valdirivo, just a few blocks from the port. The local station had prepped it for his arrival, apparently assuming he’d be spending some real time here. There was fresh milk in the fridge, along with meat and cheese wrapped in paper from the butcher. Court bypassed the niceties left by CIA station Italy, walked to the back bedroom, and saw a table, a bed, and a tall wooden armoire. He pushed the armoire away from the wall, just as he’d been briefed by Hightower the day before.

Behind the heavy piece of furniture he found a quality but nondescript briefcase. He brought it over to the bed, sat down, and opened it with a four-digit code — again, provided to him the day before.

Inside the case he discovered a small manila folder, which he placed to the side so he could see his equipment: a full-sized Beretta 92G semiautomatic pistol, an Advanced Armament silencer, three fifteen-round magazines, and a case of fifty rounds of expanding full metal jacket subsonic ammunition.

He was a fan of this brand and model of suppressor, but neither the gun nor the ammo were his top choices.

But they would do.

Court knew if Zack were here he’d bitch about the ammo, and maybe about the pistol, too, but Court was trained to see weapons as tools, nothing more. If the tool could accomplish the task, then it was the right tool for the job. He didn’t need to wield a specific weapon to make a personal statement — it was all about the job.

Also in the case were a night vision monocle and a pair of small but high-quality binoculars. Court shoved these in the pockets of his blazer, then he placed the gun on the table. He stripped, reassembled, and function-checked it, determining it to be in good condition.

After charging the magazines with ammo and loading the Beretta, he slid the gun into a small plastic hook device that would hold it inside his waistband.

And only when all this was done did he open the manila folder. Inside he found an eight-by-ten surveillance photo of a man wearing a white polo shirt, sitting at a café table. The man smiled into the camera, well aware he was being photographed.

This was the man he was sent to rescue.

The Israeli agent had a trim black beard and he appeared to be in his mid-forties, but his deep-set eyes and high forehead were conspicuous enough that Court felt sure he could recognize him even if he was clean-shaven.

The picture had been taken on the street, somewhere in Jerusalem, Court saw immediately, due to the fact that he could make out the Tower of David in the background.

He folded the picture in fourths, then tucked it into his back pocket.

He then stood from the bed, leaving the case right there, and he left the apartment. The meat and cheese and fresh cream sat untouched in the refrigerator.

Gentry wasn’t here for an Italian holiday.

Thirty minutes later he stood on the open fourth floor of an office building undergoing construction and he leaned into the late afternoon breeze coming off the Adriatic Sea. Through his binoculars he peered out over the Port of Trieste. Less than a quarter of a mile from shore, a small dry-goods hauler dropped anchor in placid water.

Court knew from his briefing the day before that the Casablancan Queen had left port in Nemrut Bay, Turkey, on Tuesday. On board, according to sources, were two al Qaeda operatives from Iraq, one of whom was actually a Mossad asset. They were here to meet five more AQ men from Pakistan, and then together open negotiations that AQ hoped would lead to a mutually beneficial weapons deal with Serbian gangsters. Court’s job was to tail these men to the Serb safe house, obtain positive ID on the agent, and then, at the earliest possible opportunity, he was to make entry on the safe house and rescue him.

Forty minutes after the Casablancan Queen anchored, a launch went out to the ship, then returned ashore to deposit two bearded men. They were too far away for Court to make a positive ID but he was confident, at least, that he was looking at two males with olive complexions. They each carried a large backpack and a second handheld duffel bag, and they moved with confidence and purpose.

Court watched them walk directly to a parking lot near the dock, where they were met by a Mercedes van driven by a Caucasian man. In the back were several more men who appeared to be Arabs.

He’d missed it at first because it had been slowed by a stoplight a block to the north, but now that it caught up with the Mercedes van, Court quickly realized the Renault SUV with at least four more Caucasian military-aged males inside was part of this group. It pulled alongside the Mercedes, words were exchanged, and then the Mercedes led the way out of the port.

Court climbed into his Peugeot and headed off after them, intent on tailing his objectives to their destination.

He followed the two vehicles easily to the neighborhood of Barcola, also on the Adriatic and just north of the port, where they drove straight up the driveway of a large, walled villa at the end of a cul-de-sac. Court continued on, finally turning onto a road that wound its way inland farther up a hill.

Shortly after nightfall Court knelt in dense trees on the hillside overlooking the property, again holding his binoculars to his eyes. It was dark now; the drizzle had stopped but there were no stars or moon visible under the thick canopy of clouds above, and Court was invisible to all but thermal equipment in the darkness due to his black jeans, black turtleneck, and black ski cap.

Below him in the large, walled villa, Court eyed the Serbian security men guarding the property. He counted eight men in total strolling around the large main building, either on a second-floor walkway or down at ground level, and two more at the front gatehouse, all carrying stubby submachine guns. It didn’t take him much time at all to determine these weren’t the most skilled or vigilant guards money could buy. Through a set of French doors to the back garden Court could see into the large living room of the main building, situated towards the center of the structure. A television was showing a soccer match on the large TV, and some of the men designated to guard the perimeters of this villa actually lagged for long periods at the French doors and back windows that gave them a view of the action on the screen.

Inside the villa Court saw several of the al Qaeda men sitting with more Serbians, all in front of the television. They spoke animatedly, clearly focused on the game, and Court doubted anyone was getting much work done on anything having to do with illegal weapons trafficking.

This looked like some kind of fucking party.

Court focused on the match for a moment. He could not make out the names of the teams in the upper right corner of the screen, but from the uniforms and the players’ actions on the field, he realized Red Star Belgrade had just kicked off against Partizan Belgrade. This was the biggest soccer rivalry in Serbia, and though Court didn’t know which team these gangsters supported, he did know their focus would be on the match for the next two hours.

This would be the best window to make entry into this property without much chance of compromise.

But he wasn’t going anywhere till he made positive ID of his target. PID was vital before he began his ingress, because he needed to know where the hell he was going.

Court decided to change positions to see if he could get more intel about the layout of the villa and the disposition of those inside. He moved twenty yards to the south on the tree-covered hill and found another suitable hide. He pulled out his optics again and, almost immediately, he found what he was looking for. A man sat in an upstairs bedroom, wearing a button-down shirt and tan slacks. He sat on the bed with a pen in his mouth as he read through some paperwork in his hands, and occasionally made notes on the pages. Two prayer rugs were rolled up on the floor by the wall.

Through the nine-power magnification of his optics Court recognized the face of the Israeli agent almost instantly. The man wore a full beard now, as opposed to his trim beard in the Tower of David photograph, but Court was certain he had the right man.

Now that he knew his destination, he looked back across the property and did some mental accounting. Including the men patrolling the grounds, he had the location determined of a dozen bad Serbs, five bad AQ, and one good Israeli. He was missing one more Arab.

Court immediately wished the entire Goon Squad were here. If that were the case Hightower would just put Redus and Phelps up here to snipe while he, Gentry, Lynch, and Morgan hit the building, liquidating everyone except their precious cargo.

Whatever, he said to himself. For some reason the Mossad couldn’t know a thing about the help they were getting from the Americans tonight. Court stopped thinking about the what-ifs of the scenario before him, then he scanned the hillside with his night vision, looking for any sign of Israeli support operatives in the area.

Nope.

As Court did another head count, he couldn’t help but wonder where the last AQ operator was. He wasn’t downstairs watching the match, and up in the room with the two prayer rugs, Court had seen only one man.

Court did one more scan of the property with his night vision monocle, checking the outdoor walkway that circled the second floor of the villa, and he saw a pair of Serb guards standing close together, right above their comrades enjoying the match on the ground floor. These two men seemed to be more disciplined than their mates, because they were eyeing the side yard intently, their guns off their shoulders and in their hands.

To Court it looked like they might have heard or seen something that brought them up to the landing.

And then Court saw something that surprised him. On the terra-cotta tile roof of the villa, right above the two Serbs, his eyes picked up some movement in the dark.

Court lowered his binoculars quickly and then brought up his night vision monocle. Yes. Lying flat on the roof above the two Serbs, facedown and feet up towards the peak of the building, was a lone figure dressed in black.

Court squinted, trying to get better clarity. It seemed likely this might be the missing AQ operator, but it was difficult to tell. What was certain was the man on the roof just above the walkway was absolutely fixated on the two security men directly below him.

Court saw the glint of metal in the man’s left hand.

And then it hit him. Court hadn’t been the only one who realized the soccer match would be distracting the guards. An assassin wouldn’t wait for the middle of the night to act, not when nearly the entire security detail was focused on the television in the living room.

The hit man was here, now, and he was on his way to take down the Israeli agent.

A loud cheer erupted downstairs at the television, a dozen men celebrating some play made by one of the teams, and, while this was going on, Court watched as two flashes of light on the roof signaled the firing of two rounds from a suppressed pistol.

Court did not hear a sound from the gunfire, but he saw the two Serbs crumple to the walkway.

Quickly the man on the roof slid around, dropped down next to the two bodies, and started dragging one of them to a nearby open door. Court recognized that the man planned on hiding them from anyone below who stepped away from the French doors and looked up to the second floor.

He realized it would take him a minute or two to hide the bodies, but after that he’d have a straight shot along the empty walkway towards the Israeli asset sitting alone in the bedroom at the back of the villa.

And Court knew it was his job to protect the asset.

He threw his binos into his pack along with his night vision monocle, and then he stood and pushed through the trees, closing on the villa below him with reckless speed.