Loyalty meant honoring the promises you made to other people — whether it was an oath of service or the rules of your relationship. But there was something more to it than that, especially when it came to relationships. It meant that you didn’t just think about yourself. You had to think about that other person. That’s what Decker had helped him realize. That was what his problem was.
He was successful because he pushed everything right to the razor’s edge. He liked pushing it to that edge. The harder the mission, the more he enjoyed it. It came partly from who he was and how he was raised. His father had taught him to push and keep pushing. It was the SEAL in him. When Harvath became a SEAL himself, they took him to a completely new level.
The only easy day was yesterday, Failure is not an option, and Never Quit were SEAL mottos that had become a part of him. They were so deeply burned into who he was that they impacted every decision he made.
But how could he look at a woman and say, As much as I love you, my job will always come first? Didn’t that mean failure when it came to that relationship? Was it selfish? Was it immature? Unfair?
But as frank and as honest as he thought he was being with himself, there was something else tapping at the back of his mind. This was not the time to be trying to get to the truth, but he was closer to it than he had ever felt before.
Jesus, he thought, this job is like a drug. It fought like crazy to keep you hooked. It also provided great moments of euphoria, along with some amazing moments of clarity.
Instead of slamming the iron door of his mind shut, as was his practice, he decided to leave it open and focus his mind elsewhere. Maybe the answer he was looking for would come, maybe it wouldn’t. As long as the job got done, that was what mattered for the moment.
The remaining items Harvath needed were not small, but with the help of a stack of currency, Jambo and his relatives had taken care of them in the blink of an eye. Mick had gone along with them to do the assessment and had given it his approval. With the final pieces in place, they were ready for their operation to go dynamic.
As Harvath powered up the jammer, Ash shook his head in disbelief.
“Bloody amazing technology,” he said. “I never would have thought to use it like this.”
“Any job’s easy if you’ve got the correct tool, right?”
“But you’re sawing boards with a hammer, mate. It’s brilliant.”
Harvath smiled and turned his attention back to the jammer. He had been right about Ash and his team. If the money was right, they were happy to be on board, especially with the action factor so high. Harvath had provided more excitement in the last couple of days than they had seen in the last couple of years. It had been a long time since they had played cowboys and Indians.
If the truth be told, they would have stuck with Harvath even if there was no money left to be made. What had happened at the clinic and to those villagers was horrific. It was an affront to their sense of honor. If they could help settle that score, they were one hundred percent on board and wouldn’t quit until every last person responsible had been brought to justice. It was about doing what was right. Like Harvath, they believed in standing up for those who couldn’t stand up for themselves.
With the jammer ready to go, Harvath hailed Nicholas and got ready for their first test. He would operate it remotely from the United States. When the time came, Harvath would need to be on the street, not up in the apartment pressing buttons.
“Okay,” he said. “Whenever you’re ready.”
“Roger that,” Nicholas said over his earpiece. “Stand by.”
Mick looked at the jammer and said, “It’s that accurate? You can focus on a single phone? It doesn’t simply shut down the entire block?”
“Let’s watch,” Harvath replied.
Several lights on the jammer changed colors as Nicholas manipulated its levels from back in the United States. There was a slight lag in what he could see from the camera feed, but not so much that it would make a difference.
There was an art to this and Harvath had been very specific about what he wanted. If he drove the black phone straight into the dirt, Hendrik might become suspicious. It was better that everyone in the house experience some signal drop at first. It was Congo after all. Shit happened.
The Brute Squad was the first to notice movement inside the house.
“I’ve got someone at the window,” Eddie said over the radio. “Second floor, northwest corner. Looks like he has his phone in his hand and is trying to find a better signal.”
“Make sure to keep taking pictures,” Harvath replied.
“Roger that.”
Cell phones had gone beyond being simple electronic devices. They had actually become part of people. Harvath was convinced that every time a person’s phone chimed, that a little blast of dopamine was released into the brain. It was like watching monkeys press on a bar for food. People were constantly looking at them, just in case a text or an email had come in. Take their phone away from them, even if only for a few moments, and they started to go into withdrawal.
“We’ve got movement in the courtyard,” Ash said.
Mick joined him at the window.
“Oh, look at this guy,” he laughed. “He’s spinning around like he’s got one foot nailed to the ground. Raise the phone higher you twat! That’s it. Up over your head. Now jump up and down on your left leg and see if that helps your signal, you tosser.”
Harvath smiled and asked in the room and over the radio, “Any sign of Hendrik yet?”
“We’ve got activity at the door on the west side,” Eddie replied.
“What do you see?”
“Stand by. Nothing yet.”
“Roger that,” Harvath replied. “Standing by.”
They all watched their respective areas of responsibility. Harvath was glued to the remote rooftop cameras.
“Okay, got him,” Eddie finally said. “It’s our guy. It’s Hendrik.”
“You’re positive?”
“Yes. It’s him.”
With that confirmation, Harvath instructed Nicholas to slowly bring the signal strength back up to normal.
“Cracking!” Mick exclaimed as he turned away from the window and flashed Harvath the thumbs-up. “Time to have fun?”
Harvath nodded. “Roger that. Time to have fun.”
CHAPTER 25
Asher knew his men better than Harvath, so once the plan was firmed up he decided who would take what role. With Jambo driving the van he had borrowed, Harvath and Asher would do the snatch. Mick would drive one of the Land Cruisers as a follow car, and Simon and Eddie would take sniper positions on two different rooftops. One of Jambo’s cousins would sit in LC2 with the engine running a block away, ready to pick up the Brute Squad once they had pulled back. If everything went well, the job would be over in fifteen minutes.
They all knew, though, that if something could go wrong, it would go wrong, so they developed a set of contingencies and after checking their weapons and equipment, sanitized the apartments. They wouldn’t be coming back. Mick would take the jammer with him in LC1 and run it off a converter. It was designed to be mobile, and Nicholas could still control it remotely from back in the United States.
Starting from several blocks over, they drove back and forth to the new safe house Jambo’s relatives had arranged. It was just outside of town and remote enough that no one would know they were there. They familiarized themselves with the roads — using a different route each time — until they felt they had everything as figured out as they could.