Target Omega

CHAPTER TWELVE

Garin drove his Jeep onto a gravel access road about a quarter mile east of Jefferson Davis Highway. A shallow, heavily wooded ravine separated the access road and the backyards of the houses in Gene Tanski’s development.

Garin parked in the tall, reedy grass on the side of the access road so that the Jeep wouldn’t be readily visible to passersby, although it appeared the road was rarely used. He headed cautiously down the side of the ravine and through the woods toward Tanski’s backyard; in brown cargo pants and a tan T-shirt, he could’ve blended better into his surroundings, but at least he didn’t stick out.

He held the SIG at his right side. Crossing a small creek at the bottom, Garin ascended the opposite side of the ravine and could hear the sound of a lawn mower somewhere over the crest. It was unclear whether the sound was coming from Tanski’s yard or that of one of his neighbors, but as Garin climbed closer to the top of the hill he allowed himself to hope that Tanski was still alive. He’d known Tanski longer than any of the other members of the team. They had been on numerous deployments together in some of the most hostile territories imaginable. A former Delta staff sergeant, Tanski was one of the toughest and most resourceful operators in the nation’s covert arsenal.

Once, on a mission in Yemen a little more than two years earlier, Garin had been momentarily stunned by an RPG that had exploded only a few feet away from his position. He was conscious, barely so, but immobile. The concussion from the same explosion had knocked Tanski off his feet and blown his M4 from his grasp. Tanski and Garin’s defensive position just inside a vacant storefront was charged by four screaming combatants who believed one or both of the pair to be either dead or disabled. As the combatants stood over Tanski and Garin, ready to administer a coup de grâce, Tanski pulled his combat knife from his boot and in one motion sliced the femoral artery of the assailant closest to him, and as the man fell in agony, Tanski pulled him on top of his body, using him as a human shield. He then took the man’s AK-47 and, with smooth precision, shot the remaining combatants dead before they had even processed what was happening. Garin had passed out shortly thereafter. When he regained consciousness moments later, the combatant with the severed thigh was also dead. Garin never asked Tanski whether the cause of death was bleeding or something else. There was little need.

Unsure of the exact boundaries of Tanski’s property, Garin headed in the direction the lawn mower sound was coming from. When he got within twenty feet of the top of the hill he knelt down and crawled slowly until he was only a foot or two from the crest. There, he paused and then looked behind him and to each side for signs of any other human presence. He was alone.

The noise from the mower was fading gradually as Garin, flat on his stomach, looked over the top of the hill. The property was about two hundred feet wide and bordered on either side by rows of towering pines.

Garin could see the back of a man on a riding mower heading toward the rear of the house about seventy yards away. The red cap he was wearing was pulled down low over his head, making it difficult for Garin to tell whether it was Tanski or someone else, but as the tractor began to turn around on the return pass, the man’s profile, dominated by a bulbous nose broken in countless bar fights, left no doubt it was the former Delta operator.

Garin rose from his stomach and got to his feet, relieved to see his friend unharmed.

Seeing Garin, a puzzled look came over Tanski’s face. What the hell was his boss doing coming up from the ravine with a weapon at his side, looking as if he had been doing some weekend recce? Hadn’t he just gotten enough of that crap in Pakistan? As it would for any operator with Tanski’s experience, the unexpected fired his synapses, prompting his eyes to dart about the vicinity.

Garin returned the SIG to his pocket holster and raised his hand to wave when he saw a strong gust of wind blow Tanski’s cap off his head. Tanski began to wobble drunkenly in his seat and then collapsed off the tractor, the pressure sensors in the seat automatically shutting the machine off and bringing it to a halt. Tanski’s cap lay several feet from his body. There was, however, not even the slightest breath of wind.

Garin dove to the ground, pulled out his pistol, and crawled quickly backward into the tree line at the top of the ravine. He should’ve been able to hear a rifle shot over the drone of the tractor and concluded that the sniper must have used a suppressor. Blood was now covering Tanski’s entire face and it was clear that the top of his head had been torn off. Garin scanned the surrounding area and listened for movement. By the direction in which Tanski’s cap was blown off, Garin estimated that the sniper was positioned somewhere to Garin’s left, the vector suggesting no more than eighty to one hundred yards away.

Garin resisted the temptation to run toward Tanski’s body. There was nothing he could do for him, and the sniper would be able to cut him down easily in the open field. Instead, he continued to listen for sounds of the assassin making his retreat — branches snapping, the crunch of leaves underfoot. He heard and saw no signs whatsoever of the gunman. Had the sniper seen Garin stand up a split second before shooting Tanski? Garin thought it unlikely. The sniper had probably had Tanski in his scope for several seconds before taking the shot and with his concentration on his target wouldn’t have seen Garin. Garin wondered, however, whether the sniper had noticed the confused expression on Tanski’s face just a moment before the shot. He should have, and if he was good, he wouldn’t dismiss it. If he was good, he would wait a moment. He would try to determine if Tanski had spotted something — a person, an animal — or if his target had just remembered a forgotten errand. He would wait until he was reasonably certain there was no one else in the vicinity before making his exit.

The sniper would be the first to move. He had no evidence that anyone was around, and he held the weapon that killed Tanski. When someone came looking for Tanski, they would come looking for him, too. So Garin kept his head down and waited for a moment. And listened.

It took less time than Garin expected. Within a few minutes his trained ear heard the barely perceptible sound of fabric against underbrush. He looked in the direction of the noise and saw movement approximately one hundred yards down the ravine. The sniper was good — he had moved an appreciable distance through dense woods making nary a sound. Garin crawled back behind the tree line and rose to his feet. He couldn’t get a clear visual on the sniper but detected a slight movement of branches and leaves. He momentarily raised his weapon in the direction of the movement but considered the noise the discharge would make reverberating through the ravine and stopped. Given the distance, and with all the trees and brush in the way, the odds of hitting the sniper with a pistol were poor. If he was going to alarm the neighbors and alert law enforcement with gunfire, he’d better make it worthwhile. He decided to pursue the sniper and see if he could get a clear shot.

Garin scrambled down the ravine toward the creek as fast as he could while making as little noise as possible. At the same time he kept his eyes trained in the direction where he’d seen movement and prepared to hit the ground if he saw a raised rifle or heard a shot.

A minute later Garin crossed the creek and paused to listen for movement. He saw and heard nothing. He climbed the other side of the ravine rapidly, once again feeling the sensation of being in a sniper’s sights. If the sniper had gotten near the crest, he might easily be able to pick Garin off.

He emerged from the ravine about sixty yards north of where he’d hidden the Jeep. As he turned toward the vehicle, he heard tires spinning on the gravel access road, as if someone was trying to leave in a hurry. Sprinting through the tall grass, he could see a cloud of dust billowing upward approximately one hundred yards south of the Jeep. Upon clearing the grass, he leveled his weapon at the receding car, the rear of which was completely concealed by a curtain of the chalky dust kicked up from the gravel.

Garin held his fire. He couldn’t shoot what he couldn’t see. For the moment, Tanski’s assassination would go unavenged.

And Garin’s predicament had worsened.