Black List

CHAPTER 67

Before Harvath could turn and engage the shooters, he heard Rhodes over the radio say, “Guard down,” followed by another, “Guard down,” as the bodies dropped at his nine o’clock.

Rhodes was amazing. She obviously had his back, so he kept moving as quickly as he could.

When he finally arrived at the house, his lungs were on fire. He pulled up alongside, crouched out of view, and drew large breaths until he’d oxygenated his blood and steadied his heart rate. Throughout the entire process, he never moved the muzzle of his weapon, which was trained on the back door.

As soon as his pulse and breathing were steady, he prepared himself to enter the house.

According to Vignon, the security staff came and went through the kitchen, so the door was left unlocked. Sliding over to it now, Harvath gave the knob a slow twist, and found that it was indeed unlocked. Over his radio, he whispered, “Norseman making entry in three, two, one.”

Pulling the door open, he came into the kitchen low. There were two guards at the kitchen table and a third doing something at the sink. He double-tapped each of them and cursed under his breath when the man at the sink dropped the coffee mug he was holding and it shattered in the sink.

Had anyone else heard it? It had sounded earsplitting to him, and not just because his finely tuned senses were on high alert and he was allergic to making noise. It had been loud. Too loud. Damn it. Time to move.

Stepping to the far side of the room, he pulled even with a set of stairs that led up to where the bedrooms were. Vignon had laid out who normally stayed in what rooms, all of which were named after characters from literature. But before Harvath went upstairs, he wanted to clear downstairs.

Moving through the kitchen, he checked a small breakfast atrium and then scanned an adjacent butler’s pantry. Stepping into the formal dining room, he made a quick check before sweeping back into the kitchen and up the servants’ hall to the front of the house. As he did, he heard a noise from somewhere behind him.

Pressing himself up against the wall near the entrance to the dining room, he strained to discern what it was. He picked up the sound of footsteps. They were slow and methodical, cautious even. Based on the fact that there had been three guards in the kitchen, Harvath was willing to bet he was listening to the approach of a fourth, who must have been somewhere sneaking a cigarette or in one of the home’s bathrooms.

Allowing the weapon to hang from its sling, Harvath unsheathed a flat, skeletonized dagger and made ready.

When the figure appeared in the doorway, Harvath wrenched his pistol to the side and drove the dagger into his throat. He quickly thrust up toward the man’s right ear and tore through and back toward his left.

Easing the large man to the floor, he withdrew the dagger, wiped it, and slid it back in its sheath.

He transitioned back to his OBR and swept through a card room, a rather substantial library, and then the living room. There was no sign of life. At least there hadn’t been until he exited the opposite end of the living room where light spilled from an open doorway across the hall. Very carefully, Harvath made his way toward it.

Sweeping into a lavishly decorated study, with animal heads on the wall and a huge fireplace, Harvath found Craig Middleton. He was seated in a high-backed leather chair at an ornate partner’s desk. A pair of reading glasses were balanced on his nose as he studied a series of maps laid out in front of him. His shirtsleeves were rolled up and his jacket and tie lay across a nearby chair. In his right hand he held a rocks glass with what looked like scotch.

“Don’t move,” said Harvath as he entered the room.

Middleton looked up from his papers. A smile slowly unzipped across his craggy face. “Look at this. The mountain has finally come to Mohammed.”

“Don’t move includes not moving your mouth.”

Middleton rattled the ice in his glass, as if his right hand were trembling.

“Who else from the board is in the house?”

“How about a drink first?”

Harvath replied by firing two rounds into the top of the leather chair on either side of his head.

“Four,” Middleton replied. “Though I heard a car about an hour ago, so there could be a fifth. I’ve been a little bit busy.”

“I’ll bet you have. Get up. You’re coming with me.”

Middleton smiled at him and leaned back in his chair. “I’d offer you a real nice position with us, but I know you wouldn’t take it. It’s a shame. We could use a man of your talents. The world is changing, quite rapidly, in fact. Guys like you are going to have to adapt or be crushed underfoot as our country progresses forward.”

Harvath put two rounds through the desk, barely missing each of Middleton’s knees. “I said get up.”

Middleton scooted himself back from the desk and took a long draught of his drink. “I hope wherever we’re going, there’s plenty of this.” Sitting the glass down on the desk, he smiled and added, “Are you a scotch fan, Mr. Harvath? I mean a fan of really, really good scotch. I’ve got a special bottle I have been saving for tomorrow.”

Harvath was about to tell him to shut up and step from behind the desk, when there was a pop and two barbed probes embedded themselves between his shoulder blades.

When the electricity ripped through his body, his muscles seized and he fell forward like an oak tree that had just been chopped down. He hit the floor face-first and blood gushed from his nose.

They rolled him on his back and stripped away his pistol and rifle. When his brain came back online and he was able to process what was going on, he was stunned to see Chuck Bremmer standing right next to Middleton, the Taser gripped in his right hand.

“It took all night,” he said with disdain, “but we knew you’d be here eventually.” With that, Bremmer pressed the Taser’s trigger again and held it down, giving Harvath an excruciatingly long shock.

When he stopped and Harvath had regained his faculties, Bremmer stepped forward and kicked him as hard as he could, right in the ribs. “That’s for using a sniper to target my fucking wife.” The kick was very painful but not as painful as the one that followed, which caught him under the chin and sent a searing lightning bolt right through his skull. “And that’s for targeting my daughter. My daughter! You son of a bitch.”

As Bremmer stepped back, Middleton looked down at Harvath. “You actually had old Chuck for a little bit. In the end, though, he figured it was worth one more try at getting rid of you. I’d say that was a pretty good gamble. Wouldn’t you?”

Harvath spit a glob of blood onto the Persian carpet he was lying on and worked his jaw side to side.

“Since you had Vignon and Schroeder, we figured it was pointless to try to stop you from accessing the estate. In fact, it was Chuck’s idea to let you walk on. If security caught you, perfect. If not, we figured this would work and it did. Now, to tie up all the loose ends.”

Harvath watched as Middleton gestured for the rifle. Bremmer checked to make sure there was a round chambered and then handed it to him.

He hefted it up and down a couple of times and then seated the stock at his shoulder. Stepping away from Harvath, he raised the weapon and pointed it at several of the animal heads mounted on the wall. Bremmer gloated with a smile that stretched from ear to ear.

But the smile vanished when Middleton aimed the weapon at him and pressed the trigger.

A spray of pink mist hung in the air like some sort of obscene halo as the round took out half the man’s head.

“Very nice,” said Middleton as he walked over and picked up the Taser. “Very nice indeed. Now, about the rest of those loose ends. I’d like to know where you’re keeping Kurt Schroeder as well as my security chief, Mr. Vignon.”

Harvath looked up, smiled, and shook his head. He was already gritting his teeth, aware of what was coming next.

Squeezing the trigger on the Taser, Middleton gave Harvath another burst of electricity.

Harvath’s body went as stiff as a board and then began to bend as his spine arched and his tensioned shoulders pushed him up off the floor.

When the effects of the Taser passed, Middleton repeated his question.

“Go fish,” Harvath replied.

The Director of ATS was visibly upset with that answer and sent Harvath back into agony with the device.

He pulled the trigger two more times just to prove how far he was prepared to go.

When Harvath’s eyes, which had rolled back into his head, came down and refocused, Middleton leaned over and pressed him one last time. “Listen to me, motherfucker. One last chance. After this, I’m going to the rifle and I’ll start by putting holes in your fucking knees. Where are my people? More importantly, where the fuck are Banks and Carlton?”

“Right here, asshole,” said a voice from the doorway.

Middleton spun as Reed Carlton pantomimed a kiss and two shots sped from his custom 1911.