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Synopsis
If the mission fails, it's World War III. Any questions?
Owen Taylor is about to be betrayed on his final covert mission. It will take everything he has to make it home alive, and to save the woman he loves.
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LIGHTNING-FAST STORIES BY JAMES PATTERSON
- Novels you can devour in a few hours
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- All original content from James Patterson
Release date: March 7, 2017
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Print pages: 160
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The End
James Patterson
Chapter 1
In a remote hangar at the Aviano NATO air base in northern Italy, I’m holding my government issue SIG Sauer P226 9mm pistol in my right hand, hammer pulled back, finger on the trigger, deciding when and how I should shoot the intelligence field officer standing before me.
Dunton is skinny, with thick brown hair, round wire-rimmed glasses, and a snippy attitude. He’s wearing a BDU, a Kevlar vest, and heavy boots.
He says, “I’m telling you, Taylor, I don’t care what the weather reports are saying for tonight, you and your buds are ‘go’ for this mission. The diplomats in Geneva are in a delicate position. Your successful op could tilt things to a satisfactory conclusion.”
I keep quiet. I’m sure he thinks I’m pondering his warning, but what I’m really pondering is the best place to shoot him. Dead center in the chest would break a couple of ribs and knock him flat on his ass, but a round to the center of that shiny forehead would get the job done in a final and spectacular fashion.
But killing him would mean lots of paperwork and embarrassing questions, and I have no time for that.
I say, “Dunton, you may have operational control, but I have tactical command of this op. It’s my job whether to say go, not yours. Or anybody in Geneva. Or Washington. Or Langley.”
Dunton says, “Deputy Director Hunley has expressly—”
“You say he’s a deputy,” I point out. “Does he get a nice five-pointed star to go along with it?”
I sense the other four members of my team standing behind me, giving me quiet support, and Dunton glares at me before stomping toward one of the hangar’s side doors. “I’m off to the weather office,” he shouts back. “You better be ready when I come back!”
I try to be helpful. “Don’t get lost.”
The door slams and my teammates chuckle for a moment and wander away, their current mission achieved. It’s still raining. I slowly draw the hammer down on my pistol and return it to my side holster, taking in the miserable weather. We’ll wait for the final weather report, and that will tell us if we can go out on this rainy night to kill somebody in another country we’ve never been to before.
My teammates—Borozan, Sher, Garcia, and Clayton—now keep to their own routines, talking or smoking or reading from battered paperbacks. I just wait, looking out at the rain coming down and hitting the windswept runway, not wanting to think, just waiting for that one last weather report so I can complete my final mission.
We’re all dressed nearly alike, with custom helmets, camouflaged BDUs, heavy boots, knee pads and elbow pads, body armor, MOLLE vests with flashlights, knives, survival packs, compass, encrypted handheld devices, and holstered pistols. Our assault packs and parachutes are carefully stored in the corner of the empty hangar. We each carry a modified Heckler & Koch HK416 rifle with a 10-inch barrel slung over our shoulders.
Occasionally air force personnel wander in and just as quickly wander out, knowing they shouldn’t be here, not wanting to be in the same area with who we are: stone-cold killers ready to do a job.
I pace some more, feeling the wind hitting my face from the Southern Carnic Alps. On my BDU, my name tag, TAYLOR, is easily removable with one swift tear of Velcro, which I’ll do once we illegally cross into Serbia. And that’s it for any kind of identification in case I get wounded, killed, or captured.
Oh, and who are we, my four teammates and I? I’m sure you’ve heard of Rangers, SEAL Team 6, Special Forces, Marine Recon, Delta Force, and other elite secret units. Well, we’re not any of them. For what use is an elite secret unit if its name is known to the outside world?
One of my crew comes up to me. It’s Clayton, who looks like the cliché surfer dude from California, which is pretty much the truth.
“What do you think, Gramps?”
I wince at my nickname, knowing if I were to complain about it, my guys would use it more. My fault. Last time around with these special operators, I let slip that I was on active duty during the first Persian Gulf War, back in 1991.
“Gonna be tight,” I say. “Dunton has his pressure, his boss Hunley has pressure, his boss’s boss has pressure, and it all comes down to us. You know the drill—shit rolls downhill.”
“Always nice to know we’re here to catch it.”
The door slams open and Dunton strides back in with a sheet of paper in one hand. Clayton says, “What do you think? I know he talks the talk, but is he really CIA? Or Defense Intelligence Agency? National Reconnaissance Office?”
“Probably NSA, son,” I say to Clayton. “No Such Agency.”
Dunton steps forward, thrusts the sheet into my hand. I glance at the map, seeing the weather report, the prediction for the next six hours. Iffy. It’s up to me, the team leader. My last op, and I’d like to make it a successful one. But the bad weather could force us down over the Adriatic Sea or into the Carpathian Mountains. I could kill myself and these guys with one second’s worth of decision.
Some last op. Even if I were to pull the plug, I’d be done, and these guys would be up to bat again at some later date. In other words, I’d finally be safe, and they wouldn’t.
Dunton says, “Well? Well?”
I crumple up the sheet of paper, toss it at his chest. “We go.”
Dunton smirks while I head over to our gear, and Clayton is behind me. He says quietly, “A question, Gramps?”
“Go ahead.”
“I saw you draw on Dunton before he left to get the last weather report. Were you really going to shoot him?”
I pick up my assault pack and parachute. “We’ll never know, will we?”
Clayton grins, which is a nice memory for me, because in three hours and eleven minutes, he’ll be dead.
Chapter 2
Time for one last briefing before we fly into harm’s way and get dropped out of a perfectly good helicopter in the process. We’ve trained and briefed so much we don’t need this final step, but them’s the rules. The room is small, bare, and fits its purpose. A series of photographs of a bearded man is on one whiteboard, and next to the photos is a detailed topo map of where we’re going to end up, if the army’s 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment—more commonly known as the Nightstalkers—doesn’t screw up and drop us off in Monaco or on the Riviera.
Which wouldn’t be that bad, all things considered.
I slap the center photo as my four guys settle into standard classroom chairs. “One last thought to bounce around in those thick skulls of yours. Our target for tonight. Darko Latos. Ever since the Balkan wars have heated up again, he’s been one of the leaders stirring the hate. He made his name back during the first Balkan wars when he ran a paramilitary unit of snipers in the hills above Sarajevo, shooting kids in the head.”
I touch the map next to the photo of Darko. “His house, more like a mansion, has two support buildings—here, and here—along with this adjacent warehouse. Just like the mock-ups we trained on back in North Carolina. Darko used to make his living the old-fashioned way, smuggling drugs and young Balkan sex slaves up to truck stops in Germany, France, and Belgium. Now he has the opportunity to go back to his first love, killing innocents, and we’re going in tonight to stop him. After our insertion, at 0200 hours, we’re to meet with an intelligence operative—code-named Alex—at this place, called Point Q. He’ll lead us to Darko’s compound. Any questions?”
My team is good, and they know bette. . .
In a remote hangar at the Aviano NATO air base in northern Italy, I’m holding my government issue SIG Sauer P226 9mm pistol in my right hand, hammer pulled back, finger on the trigger, deciding when and how I should shoot the intelligence field officer standing before me.
Dunton is skinny, with thick brown hair, round wire-rimmed glasses, and a snippy attitude. He’s wearing a BDU, a Kevlar vest, and heavy boots.
He says, “I’m telling you, Taylor, I don’t care what the weather reports are saying for tonight, you and your buds are ‘go’ for this mission. The diplomats in Geneva are in a delicate position. Your successful op could tilt things to a satisfactory conclusion.”
I keep quiet. I’m sure he thinks I’m pondering his warning, but what I’m really pondering is the best place to shoot him. Dead center in the chest would break a couple of ribs and knock him flat on his ass, but a round to the center of that shiny forehead would get the job done in a final and spectacular fashion.
But killing him would mean lots of paperwork and embarrassing questions, and I have no time for that.
I say, “Dunton, you may have operational control, but I have tactical command of this op. It’s my job whether to say go, not yours. Or anybody in Geneva. Or Washington. Or Langley.”
Dunton says, “Deputy Director Hunley has expressly—”
“You say he’s a deputy,” I point out. “Does he get a nice five-pointed star to go along with it?”
I sense the other four members of my team standing behind me, giving me quiet support, and Dunton glares at me before stomping toward one of the hangar’s side doors. “I’m off to the weather office,” he shouts back. “You better be ready when I come back!”
I try to be helpful. “Don’t get lost.”
The door slams and my teammates chuckle for a moment and wander away, their current mission achieved. It’s still raining. I slowly draw the hammer down on my pistol and return it to my side holster, taking in the miserable weather. We’ll wait for the final weather report, and that will tell us if we can go out on this rainy night to kill somebody in another country we’ve never been to before.
My teammates—Borozan, Sher, Garcia, and Clayton—now keep to their own routines, talking or smoking or reading from battered paperbacks. I just wait, looking out at the rain coming down and hitting the windswept runway, not wanting to think, just waiting for that one last weather report so I can complete my final mission.
We’re all dressed nearly alike, with custom helmets, camouflaged BDUs, heavy boots, knee pads and elbow pads, body armor, MOLLE vests with flashlights, knives, survival packs, compass, encrypted handheld devices, and holstered pistols. Our assault packs and parachutes are carefully stored in the corner of the empty hangar. We each carry a modified Heckler & Koch HK416 rifle with a 10-inch barrel slung over our shoulders.
Occasionally air force personnel wander in and just as quickly wander out, knowing they shouldn’t be here, not wanting to be in the same area with who we are: stone-cold killers ready to do a job.
I pace some more, feeling the wind hitting my face from the Southern Carnic Alps. On my BDU, my name tag, TAYLOR, is easily removable with one swift tear of Velcro, which I’ll do once we illegally cross into Serbia. And that’s it for any kind of identification in case I get wounded, killed, or captured.
Oh, and who are we, my four teammates and I? I’m sure you’ve heard of Rangers, SEAL Team 6, Special Forces, Marine Recon, Delta Force, and other elite secret units. Well, we’re not any of them. For what use is an elite secret unit if its name is known to the outside world?
One of my crew comes up to me. It’s Clayton, who looks like the cliché surfer dude from California, which is pretty much the truth.
“What do you think, Gramps?”
I wince at my nickname, knowing if I were to complain about it, my guys would use it more. My fault. Last time around with these special operators, I let slip that I was on active duty during the first Persian Gulf War, back in 1991.
“Gonna be tight,” I say. “Dunton has his pressure, his boss Hunley has pressure, his boss’s boss has pressure, and it all comes down to us. You know the drill—shit rolls downhill.”
“Always nice to know we’re here to catch it.”
The door slams open and Dunton strides back in with a sheet of paper in one hand. Clayton says, “What do you think? I know he talks the talk, but is he really CIA? Or Defense Intelligence Agency? National Reconnaissance Office?”
“Probably NSA, son,” I say to Clayton. “No Such Agency.”
Dunton steps forward, thrusts the sheet into my hand. I glance at the map, seeing the weather report, the prediction for the next six hours. Iffy. It’s up to me, the team leader. My last op, and I’d like to make it a successful one. But the bad weather could force us down over the Adriatic Sea or into the Carpathian Mountains. I could kill myself and these guys with one second’s worth of decision.
Some last op. Even if I were to pull the plug, I’d be done, and these guys would be up to bat again at some later date. In other words, I’d finally be safe, and they wouldn’t.
Dunton says, “Well? Well?”
I crumple up the sheet of paper, toss it at his chest. “We go.”
Dunton smirks while I head over to our gear, and Clayton is behind me. He says quietly, “A question, Gramps?”
“Go ahead.”
“I saw you draw on Dunton before he left to get the last weather report. Were you really going to shoot him?”
I pick up my assault pack and parachute. “We’ll never know, will we?”
Clayton grins, which is a nice memory for me, because in three hours and eleven minutes, he’ll be dead.
Chapter 2
Time for one last briefing before we fly into harm’s way and get dropped out of a perfectly good helicopter in the process. We’ve trained and briefed so much we don’t need this final step, but them’s the rules. The room is small, bare, and fits its purpose. A series of photographs of a bearded man is on one whiteboard, and next to the photos is a detailed topo map of where we’re going to end up, if the army’s 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment—more commonly known as the Nightstalkers—doesn’t screw up and drop us off in Monaco or on the Riviera.
Which wouldn’t be that bad, all things considered.
I slap the center photo as my four guys settle into standard classroom chairs. “One last thought to bounce around in those thick skulls of yours. Our target for tonight. Darko Latos. Ever since the Balkan wars have heated up again, he’s been one of the leaders stirring the hate. He made his name back during the first Balkan wars when he ran a paramilitary unit of snipers in the hills above Sarajevo, shooting kids in the head.”
I touch the map next to the photo of Darko. “His house, more like a mansion, has two support buildings—here, and here—along with this adjacent warehouse. Just like the mock-ups we trained on back in North Carolina. Darko used to make his living the old-fashioned way, smuggling drugs and young Balkan sex slaves up to truck stops in Germany, France, and Belgium. Now he has the opportunity to go back to his first love, killing innocents, and we’re going in tonight to stop him. After our insertion, at 0200 hours, we’re to meet with an intelligence operative—code-named Alex—at this place, called Point Q. He’ll lead us to Darko’s compound. Any questions?”
My team is good, and they know bette. . .
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