Foreign Agent

CHAPTER 57

The first Wasp had come screaming in and had detonated with such a loud explosion that they hadn’t even known the second missile had been launched until it hit the second SUV with an eruption that sent an enormous fireball roiling up into the night sky.

“Now!” Harvath commanded back to northern Virginia.

Nicholas, who had hacked into the Damascus power grid, shut down the electricity in a ten-block radius. The entire neighborhood went dark.

Hitting the roof of the saltbox, Harvath gave the signal for the Hadids and their men to follow.

Charging the stairwell door, he racked his shotgun and placed it at a forty-five degree angle in, forty-five degrees down. Taking it off the safety, he looked at Thoman, who was his cover man.

When Thoman nodded, Harvath pressed the trigger and sent one of his heavy slugs flying into the area between the lock and the door frame. He then turned and mule-kicked the door. It didn’t budge.

Turning around, he racked the shotgun and went after the hinges.

The weapon thundered as he unleashed three more rounds.

This time when he kicked, the door exploded inward. Thoman peered down into the stairwell, his weapon raised, ready for any threat that might have been waiting on the other side. It was empty.

Harvath handed off the shotgun and transitioned to his rifle. Tapping Thoman, who moved out of the way, he took up the point position and led the team down into the building.

The stairwell glowed ghostly gray-white in their thermal-vision goggles. Harvath had no idea if the Russians had similar equipment or not. According to the team in the overwatch position, only Proskurov was seen getting out of a vehicle carrying anything — a bag of some sort over his shoulder and a small box. If the Spetsnaz team did have night-vision or thermal equipment, Harvath hoped that they had left it in their SUVs and it had all gone up in flames.

Stepping out onto the second floor, Harvath swept his AK from side to side.

All of the windows facing down into the courtyard had been blown out. Broken glass littered the Persian rugs. The fires from outside were burning so hot he could feel the heat on his face. Dust and smoke choked the air. The building would soon be completely engulfed.

Harvath signaled for his B team to take cover and hold their position. He then motioned for the Hadid brothers to follow him. Sidestepping the glass, they moved rapidly down the hallway.

They passed two bedrooms. Both were empty. Reaching the stairs that led to the ground floor, he made a decision and said, “Wait here.”

Before the Hadids could object, Harvath had disappeared down the stairs and into the thickening smoke.

When he reached the ground floor, he scanned the room. The thermal goggles allowed him to see through the smoke and dust. He could make out an overturned table, chairs, and a sofa. What he couldn’t see were any Russians.

Then he heard shots fired from outside. Within seconds, it was a full-on gunfight. Proskurov and his detail must have tried to make a run for the street.

Based on the position of the two Syrians outside, Harvath knew that the Russians would be pinned down. The Hadids’ men had excellent cover and concealment. They could rain lead down on the Russians all night without exposing themselves. But then something happened.

As soon as Harvath heard the explosion, he knew what it was. Someone had thrown a grenade. None of the Syrians outside were carrying any. It had to have been the Russians. Damn it. They weren’t coming back inside the building. They were going to make their escape on foot!

Harvath began shouting instructions over the radio as he raced out into the courtyard.

There were twisted pieces of flaming metal everywhere. Columns of charcoal-black smoke twisted up into the sky.

Rounds were still being fired, but it sounded like it was coming from only one weapon.

Pulling up short against the courtyard wall, Harvath dropped to one knee. Bringing his weapon up, he leaned out around the edge of the wall and took a quick look.

At the end of the drive, just inside the gates, was a lone male firing a short, fully automatic weapon. His attention was focused across the street, where the Hadids’ men had been.

From this distance, it looked like he was shooting a Bizon SMG — a 9mm submachine gun popular with Russian counterterrorism units.

He was laying down cover fire, helping Proskurov and the rest of the detail to escape. He should have kept an eye on his six o’clock.

Lining up his sights, Harvath took the shot and dropped him right at the gates. One down.

He heard a noise behind him and turned to see the Hadids rushing out of the building and into the courtyard.

“Where are the rest of your men?”

Thoman pointed up. “They’re using the rooftops.”

Mathan was carrying a thin laptop bag. “Where’d you find that?” Harvath asked.

“On the floor inside. I think it may be the bag Proskurov was carrying.”

Harvath nodded and looked at his watch. As soon as the Russians had realized they were under attack, one of them would have called for a quick response team from their embassy.

In a perfect world, they would have had ten minutes. The real world being what it was, Harvath figured they had less than five. And if the Syrian army hadn’t been activated yet, it would be soon.

Running for the gates, he drew even with the Spetsnaz soldier he had shot. He looked down. The man was still alive. That was a problem.

He had an earpiece in his ear, a microphone just inside his jacket, and he was babbling in Russian.

Applying pressure to his trigger, Harvath put two rounds into him, point-blank. End of problem.

Taking the man’s radio, he stepped up to the gates and looked out.

On the sidewalk, another Spetsnaz man was down in a huge pool of blood. He wasn’t moving. The Hadids’ men had managed to get one. Good for them.

“Which way did they go?” Harvath asked.

“Overwatch says they went left,” Mathan replied, chopping the air with his left hand.

Harvath held the radio up to his ear and listened. A quick response team, or QRT for short, was in fact inbound. They had just loaded up and were rolling out the Embassy gates. “Shest’ minuty,” a voice said. Six minutes.

When Harvath nodded, the Hadids leaned out of the gates and aimed their weapons in opposite directions to give him cover.

After making sure the Russian on the sidewalk was dead, he tore across the street and took cover between two badly damaged cars. Both of the Syrians assigned to cover the front of the saltbox had been blown to pieces.

Propping his weapon up on the hood of the parked car he was hiding behind, he waved Mathan over. Once he was safely across, his brother joined them. Then, they hauled ass as carefully as they could down the sidewalk.

They had almost reached the end of the block, when Thoman and Mathan in unison said, “Stop!”

One of their men was relaying something over the radio in rapid Arabic.

“We’ve got them,” Thoman replied.

“Where?” said Harvath.

“Apartment building on the corner.”

“Do your people have eyes on?”

Mathan nodded. “Ittak is the man who fired one of the Wasps and then came to provide backup. He followed the Russians.”

He was smart not to engage, thought Harvath. “Good, tell him to stay out of sight and just keep watching.”

Mathan relayed Harvath’s instructions as they kept moving.

Just before the intersection, they pulled up short and stopped at the rear of the building.

Harvath scanned the area through his thermals. He could make out the B team crouched behind the parapet on the roof across the street.

Pointing at them, he asked Thoman, “How’s their accuracy at that distance?”

The man raised his thumb, but turned it upside down. “They’re not snipers.”

“They might not have to be,” replied Harvath, who then pointed at the boulevard down at the corner and said, “Your man with the fifty-cal and his spotter—”

“Outha and Koshy.”

Harvath shook his head. “Whatever. The Russian Embassy has a team coming in. They’re going to pull up in front of that building any minute now to pick up their people. Your men need to be ready to take them out. Same thing if the army or police show up. Understood?”

Thoman nodded and immediately began radioing orders to his men.

Mathan looked at Harvath. “And us?”

Harvath glanced at the T-shirt under his jacket. “How good are you and your brother with pistols at close range?”