Use of Force

CHAPTER 59

Securing Naya in the bedroom, they dimmed the lights and got ready. Lovett had read the text on the bartender’s phone and knew that Ragusa would be there shortly.

Half an hour later, Harvath received a message from Staelin. “He just pulled up. Two bodyguards with him. Get ready.”

Harvath relayed the information to his team and everyone got into position.

Naya had informed Lovett that Ragusa always came upstairs alone. His men would either wait in the car, have a drink in the bar, or stand at the front door and chat with the bouncer until it was time to leave.

It sounded plausible, but all the same, Harvath didn’t trust her. Yet whether the mobster came to the door by himself or with his two goons didn’t matter. The team would be ready.

According to the bartender, Ragusa had his own key to her apartment. He expected her to be in bed, naked, and waiting for him when he arrived. So that’s where they had put her. And though Harvath was glad to have the cover of the loud music from downstairs, he hated not being able to judge how many people were headed toward them by noise from the staircase.

The seconds dragged into minutes.

Finally, Harvath’s phone vibrated again. “Goon One just sat down at the bar,” Staelin texted. “Goon Two is talking with the bouncer. Target is unaccompanied. All yours.”

Harvath passed it along. Moments later they heard Ragusa’s key in the lock.

They had no idea how many times the Mafioso had been to the apartment to see the young Nigerian bartender, but enough that he had a routine. And if he had a routine, especially one that involved leaving his security downstairs, he hadn’t arrived expecting trouble — anything but, in fact.

Ragusa had come expecting a good time with his mistress. After this visit, he was going to take his security very seriously. That was if Harvath let him live.

He had been racking his brain, trying to come up with a way so that there’d be no blowback for Lovett. But so far, he hadn’t been able to come up with anything.

Depending on what information they got out of the mobster, they might not be able to let him go. The last thing Harvath wanted was for him to report back to ISIS that he’d been interrogated by an American team. Even worse — that the team was interested in knowing the destination of a Tunisian chemistry student who had drowned while being smuggled across the Mediterranean Sea.

The only way to keep him quiet would be to kill him or ghost him to a black site facility like the Solarium back on Malta. Either way, once he went missing, Lovett was going to be on the short list of suspects. Her antiterror contact at the Carabinieri would be all over her.

That wasn’t Harvath’s problem, though. Working at the CIA meant you had to be willing to take risks. It wasn’t about covering your ass and hanging on for twenty years until you could collect a pension. The closer you got to the tip of America’s spear, the more dangerous things became. As far as Harvath was concerned, the only measure that mattered was whether you did everything within your power to achieve the mission you had been sent to perform.

Right now, everything revolved around Ragusa and his interrogation. How cooperative or uncooperative he was, and what kind of information they got out of him, would dictate what they would do next.

As he watched the knob turn, Harvath’s whole body tensed. He couldn’t wait to get his hands on Ragusa.

The only other group he hated as much as terrorists were mobsters. This was one interrogation he was going to take extreme pleasure in.

The door began to open, and as it did, he could feel Ragusa on the other side. A thick, menacing energy radiated from him.

Harvath was so preoccupied with it that he almost didn’t notice how slowly the Mafioso was opening the door. Had he sensed Harvath as well?

His question was answered as soon as he saw the muzzle of the man’s pistol.

Sliding his foot forward, so that Ragusa couldn’t slam the door into his face, Harvath grabbed the barrel of the weapon and yelled, “Gun!” as he wrenched the weapon sideways out of his grasp.

Barton leapt from where he had been hiding, grabbed Ragusa by his jacket, and wrestled him into the apartment. The two men landed in a tangled pile on the floor.

Though he was taller and much heavier, the Mafioso was no match for the younger and stronger SEAL. A fan of mixed martial arts, Barton liked nothing more than going to the ground. In no time flat, he had Ragusa in a submission hold, and, demoralized, the man gave up.

Getting him to his feet, they marched him into the kitchen where they duct-taped him to a chair.

Harvath had already unloaded the man’s Beretta pistol and had placed it on top of the refrigerator. Emptying his pockets, he placed his keys, wallet, cash, and cell phone on the counter.

Pulling up a chair, he swung a leg over and sat on it backward. He rested his arms on the back of the chair as he studied Ragusa. Anger simmered all over the Sicilian’s face.

As soon as Harvath asked him if he spoke English, the Mafioso began cursing at him in Italian.

Spittle collected in the corners of his mouth. He went on and on, no doubt unpacking everything he was going to do to his captors once this was all over. Harvath let him get it out of his system.

Then, giving him one last chance to admit whether he spoke English, he called in Lovett.