Han was out for nearly five hours every morning — a routine he varied just enough to keep it from being predictable.
It was probably senseless, but the morning patrol of his property was near the only thing keeping him sane.
He shook his head as he made his way up the low rise toward the ridge that overlooked the cabin. Then again, what sane man spends five hours of every day wandering through the woods with a loaded battle rifle?
Han reached the top of the ridge and looked west, his eyes opening wide in surprise.
It was a moment of pure, blinding instinct. He threw himself prone, his hands unslinging the SCAR and bringing it to bear.
There was an SUV sitting in his driveway, a blacked-out Ford Excursion. Low to the ground, probably armored.
The type of vehicle executive protection companies used. The type the government used.
He took a deep breath and steadied the gun, glassing the vehicle through the SCAR’s scope. Sixty yards. It was an easy shot.
“You think driving right up is a good idea?” Carol asked, looking through the front windshield of the Excursion at the hunting cabin.
They were the first words she had spoken since the gas station. Harry shook his head. “It’s not, but trying to sneak up on Sammy is a good way to get killed. That’s why I didn’t try to get here last night.”
“There’s something you’re not telling me.”
He sighed. “Yeah. Sammy’s last psych eval before leaving Langley diagnosed him with ‘acute workplace stress’.”
A mirthless chuckle escaped Harry’s lips. “That’s what PTSD is for a spy…workplace stress. It’s a cute way for the bureaucrats to shrug it off. So let me do the talking, if you will.”
He paused long enough to see her nod before he shoved open the door of the Excursion and stepped out into fresh-fallen snow.
The wind was blowing wild and raw through the leafless trees, and Harry reached down to zip up his jacket.
His fingers froze in place. There, dancing over the fabric of his shirt. The luminescent red dot of a laser.
Time itself seemed to slow down. The sound of Carol’s door shutting reached his ears, but it seemed distant and faraway. He felt preternaturally aware in this moment, sensing every breath. Every movement. The awareness of death.
His hand came up, moving slowly, deliberately. “Don’t move,” he ordered, looking back over his shoulder at Carol.
“What’s going on?”
“Just stay behind the vehicle and don’t move.” He took a half-step forward, his eyes scanning the ridgeline. Judging from the angle…
“That you, Sammy?” It sounded lame, but it was as good as anything.
No response. The laser dot remained focused on his chest, unwavering now.
With the same methodical motion, Harry pulled his jacket open, shrugging it off his shoulders. He tossed the jacket on the hood of the Excursion before reaching for his holstered Colt with his left hand.
The gun was of no use to him. Not now. He pulled it out with his fingertips and dropped it in the snow. Backed away.
A voice rang out over the mountaintop, strangely disembodied but familiar, despite the three years that had passed since the last time he’d heard it.
“That’s a good start.”
“We need to know what we will be dealing with on the inside,” Tarik announced, spinning the laptop around so that his small audience could see the images on-screen. “Pictures are one thing — but there is so little perspective, so little reality. We need dimensions, a sense of the space. Our timing has to be precise.”
Jamal al-Khalidi cleared his throat. “It is possible that I could get you the floor plans. I know a couple architectural students at Uof M — they may have access to the blueprints through their program.”
The shaikh turned that hypnotic gaze in his direction. “This is possible? Without alerting the authorities as to your interest in the building?”
The college student shrugged, a smile crossing his face. “Hey, this is America, man. Land of the free, home of the brave. And the foolish.”
Across the table, al-Fileestini’s eyes had never left the laptop. “It is as Jamal says,” he acknowledged, apparently deep in thought as he stroked his graying beard. “Certain freedoms of this apostate land work to our benefit, Insh’allah. However, there may be a shorter way.”
“And what would that be, father?” Tarik asked, turning toward the imam.
“As God has willed, one of our number has performed at this very building.” Al-Fileestini raised his hand, beckoning to a man standing by the door. “Call for Omar.”
Tarik’s eyebrows went up. “The negro?”
He’d felt colder winds. It had been colder in the mountains of the Hindu Kush. Intellectually, he knew that.
Still, he had never run around the Hindu Kush in his boxers. Harry crossed his arms over his bare chest, forcing himself to ignore the cold.
“Turn all the way around,” the voice ordered from its still-invisible perch somewhere up on the ridge.
“Satisfied, Sammy?” he asked, performing a less-than-graceful pirouette in the snow. His gaze slid over to where Carol stood a few feet away. Her jacket and the Kahr were laid on the hood of the Excursion, but that was as far as that had gone. So much for equal opportunity…
A figure materialized from sixty yards up the snowy ridge, the digital camouflage giving him the appearance of the Abominable Snowman as he stalked forward. He didn’t lower the SCAR.
“Better put your clothes back on, Nichols,” Han admonished, gesturing with the rifle. “Before you catch a cold.”
Harry held his gaze for a moment longer, staring down his old teammate. Then he reached for his pants.
“Nichols, you’re gettin’ old. Didn’t used to be that easy to get the drop on you.”
Harry looked up. “That goes double, Sammy. When did you start trusting women?”
“Oh, her?” Han asked with a wave of his hand, still keeping his distance. Five yards now. “Carol Chambers has many talents, but she’s not the threat you are.”
There was something in his voice. Harry shrugged on his shirt over his shoulders, looking from Sammy to Carol and back again. “I’m missing something here. You two have met?”
Carol started to respond, but Han cut her off. “Not exactly. Chatted a couple times, though. Haven’t we, Legion1337?”
American roads took some getting used to. Along with the fact that the American state police actually needed a reason to stop you.
Still, Korsakov was glad he wasn’t the one behind the wheel. Yuri, a short, muscular man from Leningrad — St. Petersburg, Korsakov corrected himself subconsciously — was driving.
“They’ve stopped moving,” Viktor announced from the backseat. “We can reach them in three hours. With good roads.”
“Assuming they stay there that long,” Korsakov mused. “What type of terrain surrounds them, Viktor?”
A pause. “I don’t know.” The boy sounded puzzled and Korsakov glanced into the rear-view.
“What’s wrong?”
Viktor leaned back, running his hand over the stubble of his beard as he glared at the screen of the laptop. “The software is phasing out when I try to pan — no visual on the site. Maybe mountains are doing it. Never seen this before.”
Korsakov shook his head. Mountains wouldn’t explain the phenomenon. A government installation might…