The Prince of Risk

82

Supervisory Special Agent Bill Barnes, head of intelligence for the FBI’s New York counterterrorism division, former leader of its SWAT team, crouched at the foot of the driveway. Twelve men dressed in assault gear, faces blackened with night grease, stood in an arc around him, the rain sluicing off their helmets like so many waterfalls.

“Normally this would be Jimmy Malloy’s slot,” said Barnes. “We all know what happened to him. I’m taking his position and it’s an honor. Okay, then, it’s a long run up to the house. We’re exposed the entire way, but the weather is on our side. If we skirt the tree line, no one will see us until we’re already on top of them. We break into two teams. I’ll take my guys through the front. The rest of you take the back. We go in hot. Whoever is inside, they are not nice guys. Shoot first, ask questions later. These are the animals that took out Jimmy, Terry, and Jason. Take them down hard. If you can, try to leave one or two alive so we can ask them what they have planned. I want the place cleared inside of thirty seconds.”

Barnes extended a gloved hand. Twelve others covered it. “Fidelity. Bravery. Integrity.”

He broke formation, put on his helmet, and started up the drive. He jogged along a grass berm that bordered the driveway and ran alongside the forest. He glanced over his shoulder. His men were shadows. He rounded a bend and the home came into view. It was an old, rambling, one-story place with a shingled roof and two chimneys. Lights burned in the front window. He had the floor plan etched into his memory. Four bedrooms, three baths, living room, den, library, and kitchen. A 4,200-square-foot maze with low ceilings and two back doors. He couldn’t have picked a worse house.

Barnes gripped his pistol tightly. The rain had picked up in the last minute and the grass was soft and slick. He kept his eye on the front door. The probe team sent three hours earlier had scanned the residence with an infrared heat detector and come up with ten separate heat blooms. Jan McVeigh had relayed Alex’s view that the mercenaries had decamped long before. Maybe. Maybe not. Something was creating the heat blooms. Either someone was growing pot with heat lamps or there were ten bad guys inside.

Barnes raised a fist. Behind him, his men halted. The front door stood 50 feet away across an expanse of lawn. No protection there. They had no choice but to run, a difficult task when you were wearing 35 pounds of body armor and equipment. New York’s FBI office did not possess an armored vehicle to plow down the front door. He and his men would have to do things the old-fashioned way. They would have to put their lives on the line.

Barnes directed two fingers at the house. His men sprinted across the lawn, lining up in single file at the front door. Barnes hit the side of the house, breathing hard. He wiped the rain out of his eyes and gave the signal to go.

A man ran ahead and broke open the door with a battering ram. Barnes was breacher, which meant that he was first man in. He turned on his pistol’s laser sight and flashlight and stormed into the house, tossing in a flashbang to say hello.

The stun grenade exploded. He heard the second team come through the back door. Another grenade. His men ran past him, securing each room. Cries of “Clear!” sounded through the house.

Barnes’s boot knocked something over. It was a tin bucket. He bent to pick it up but pulled his hand away when he noted that it was glowing with heat. Next to the bucket was a Sterno can-a solid-fuel canister used to heat food. It was apparent that the bucket had been placed atop the Sterno can for hours. Hence the glow. Hence the heat blooms. He ran through the house and found nine similar setups.

Barnes returned to the front door. The smoke was clearing now, and he switched on the lights. There were no bad guys. The FBI had been played. It was then that he saw the black wire stretched against the wall. He followed it toward the door, where it lay on the ground, snapped in two by his own careless feet.

“Out! Out! Out!” he shouted. “The place is booby-trapped.”

He stood by the door, counting his men as they ran past. The last man brushed by.

Barnes turned to leave.

He never made it.

Twenty-nine seconds after he had entered the house, a 10-pound charge of C4 plastic explosive wrapped in a bed sheet filled with cutlery, candelabra, and cooking ware and hidden in the dresser 2 feet away detonated.

Supervisory Special Agent Bill Barnes was vaporized.

Miraculously, no other member of the SWAT team was seriously injured.