Chapter 58
A s the men entered the elevator and the doors closed, Harvath noticed a nervousness about them. One was tapping his foot, while another was tapping his left index finger against his thigh.
Without saying goodbye, he disconnected his call with Nicholas, slipped his phone into his back pocket, and placed both hands, as casually as he could, on his hips.
He watched the men who kept looking at their sergeant, as if waiting for some kind of command. Then he noticed their hands inching toward their sidearms.
As the sergeant pulled his pistol, he yelled, “Now!”
Harvath came out with his dagger, which he used to stab the officer next to him in the neck. At the same time, he drew his Glock with his right hand and shot the officer standing directly in front of him.
The sergeant got off three rounds, all of which appeared to have bounced off Fuller’s plate carrier.
Wallace put a bullet into the sergeant’s head and then two rounds into the remaining officer, who had been standing just next to him. The entire altercation had gone down in less than four seconds.
As the elevator chimed and they arrived at the lower level, they had their weapons up and at the ready—not knowing what would be waiting for them.
When the doors opened, there was a smattering of bystanders, who had likely heard the shots and gathered to see what was going on, but nothing immediately threatening.
Pulling the elevator’s stop button and triggering the alarm, Harvath stepped out, followed by Wallace. Fuller, however, didn’t move.
Turning around to see what the holdup was, Harvath could see blood running from under Fuller’s arm and down the side of his plate carrier.
“I think I’ve been shot,” the big man admitted, shallow of breath.
Together Harvath and Wallace helped him from the elevator and sat him down in a nearby chair. As Harvath radioed Gaines to tell him what had happened, one of the bystanders ran to get a medical kit.
“Uniformed Secret Service?” Gaines asked. “Are you positive?”
“Come down here and check for yourself,” he replied angrily. “You’ve still got a fucking leak, Russ. If you don’t find it and plug it, I will.”
“I’m working on it.”
“How far out are the paramedics for Fuller?”
“They’re already on their way to you.”
“Good,” said Harvath. “Now all I need are those three Iron Tree assholes I’m looking for.”
“We just got a report that one of them was spotted on your level. I’m texting a schematic with a pin to your phone now.”
When the text came through, Harvath checked it and replied, “Got it. On my way.”
The bystander had returned with the medical kit, and Wallace, who had helped remove Fuller’s plate carrier, was already applying a pressure bandage.
“You going to be okay?” Harvath asked.
“He’ll be fine,” Wallace responded. “Go.”
That was all Harvath needed to hear. Getting his bearings, he charged off toward where a security guard believed he had seen a man who matched the photo of one of their suspects.
As he moved, he dictated texts to both S?lvi and Carolan. He wanted them to know what was happening down below and to be cautious around any Secret Service personnel they saw.
When he got close to the portion of the lower level where the “cages” were kept, he took one last look at the schematic and then slid his phone back into his pocket.
He thought about relaying an update to Gaines over the radio but decided against it.
If the man wanted to track him via the CCTV system, that was fine.
Other than that, he didn’t want to directly contribute any information to the Secret Service pipeline.
Someone had already tried to have him killed.
He didn’t intend to give them another opportunity.
Up ahead he saw one of the convention center’s private security guards. She was a short, middle-aged Asian woman with glasses who looked like she took her job very seriously.
Walking up to her, Harvath held up his phone with the three pictures on it. She pointed to the man in the middle.
“Where’d you see him?” he asked.
“Four aisles down,” she replied. “Third cage on the left.”
“Is he alone?”
The woman shrugged. “I didn’t want to get too close.”
Thanking her, Harvath asked that she not let anyone else pass until he got back. She gave him a nod, crossed her arms, and stepped into the middle of the hall to physically block the way of anyone who might come along.
Judging by the size of most of the union workers he’d already seen, she wasn’t going to scare any of them. But by the same token, she had a pretty good don’t-fuck-with-me-fellas attitude that might actually prevail.
Leaving her to “guard” his six, Harvath took out his Glock and headed toward the cages.
The unending rows of metal storage units reminded him of the Indiana Jones movie where the Ark of the Covenant is hidden away in a massive government facility.
When he neared the fourth aisle, he came to a stop and listened for several moments. He didn’t hear anything.
Even though the cages were made from heavy-gauge wire mesh and therefore technically see-through, the one he was standing next to was so crammed with rolls of carpets and construction materials, he couldn’t use it to steal a glimpse down the aisle.
To do that, he was going to have to expose himself and pop his head out around the corner of the cage.
As soon as he did, he saw not just one but two of the men he was looking for. He figured the third one was inside the open cage.
“Hands up!” he yelled, drawing down on them. “Don’t even fucking twitch.”
Both of the heavily tattooed men spun to face him, with the result that the man in the cage was completely hidden from view.
“Hands!” Harvath shouted again.
Man number one complied but man number two didn’t, which was the only green light Harvath needed.
He shot man number one in his left thigh, dropping him to the ground. It revealed that man number two, standing slightly behind him, had just pulled a pistol.
Harvath shot man number two—twice in the chest and once in the head, dropping him to the floor next to his neo-Nazi buddy.
The only question was, had the third man gone for coffee, or was he actually in the cage? Harvath figured he was close.
“Step out of the cage!” Harvath ordered. “Do it now!”
His instructions were answered with a series of shotgun blasts.
In response, he crouched down, carefully peeked around the corner, and unloaded his pistol in the shooter’s direction. He then ejected his spent mag, inserted a fresh one, and repeated the process.
There was a loud thud from inside the cage he was targeting. It could have easily been something inanimate, but it also could have been human. He decided to take a beat and wait it out. There were no other sounds.
“You, inside the cage, come out now!” he ordered.
Nothing happened.
“Inside the cage! Hands above your head. Come out now!”
Still nothing.
Addressing the man he had shot in the thigh, Harvath stated, “You, on the ground. Face down, hands behind your head. Do it now!”
As the man complied, Harvath added, “Interlace your fingers. Do it now!”
The man did what he had been told to do and, with one eye on him and another on the cage that had contained the man with the shotgun, Harvath stepped out of his position of concealment and moved cautiously down the aisle.
At the open cage, he saw the body of the man with the shotgun, perforated with multiple rounds from Harvath’s Glock.
Taking his shotgun away, he also put an additional round through the side of his head, just to be sure.
Jackass number two was lying, clearly dead, in the aisle from the shots to the chest and head.
Sliding the shotgun out of reach, he removed a pair of plastic restraints and secured the hands of number one behind his back.
Then, sitting him upright, he said, “Now you and I are going to have a talk.”
“Fuck you,” the man replied.
Harvath smiled. “You sound a lot like my friend Paul Jordan. I am going to make you a similar offer to the one I made him. If you cooperate, I won’t hurt you any further. If you make this difficult, though, I’m going to make this the most painful experience you’ve ever had.”
The man spat right at him, making his decision crystal clear.
“Option B,” Harvath replied, smiling even wider. “Just like Paul.”
Standing up, he walked into the cage and stepped over the body of the man who had been wielding the shotgun. It only took him a moment to find what he was looking for.
Exiting the cage with his Glock having been returned to its holster and a new set of tools in hand, he asked, “What are you planning and how do I stop it?”
“Fuck you,” the man repeated.
Taking the screwdriver from one of the toolboxes he’d found inside the cage, Harvath jammed it into the open wound in the man’s left thigh.
As he screamed in pain, Harvath repeated his question. And each time the man refused to answer, Harvath used the hammer he had found to drive the screwdriver even farther into the man’s leg. Soon enough, Harvath had his answer.
Racing toward the nearest stairwell, he ran up the stairs to the main level.
According to the guy he had just interrogated, Kennedy was in the exhibition hall.
And according to the last text he’d received from S?lvi, so was she, along with the Norwegian Prime Minister and all the other delegations.
This was where the attack was to happen.
Bursting into the crowded public area, he found Carolan and Fields already heading toward him, alerted by his text.
He gave them a description of what Kennedy was allegedly wearing and they all split up. They needed to find Kennedy and neutralize him before he could trigger the devices. Any attempt to pull the fire alarm or otherwise cause a migration toward the exits would only accelerate Kennedy’s plan.
With the help of the Iron Tree union members, multiple sarin gas dispersal devices had been hidden in the displays of various defense contractors at the NATO Summit.
All Kennedy had to do was walk by the specific booths, near enough to establish a low-level Bluetooth connection, and hit a button on his phone.
The needle would puncture the container and the sarin vapor would slowly begin to drift outward.
Taking out his phone, he called S?lvi. Set to “Do Not Disturb,” it instantly went to voicemail. Hanging up, he called right back, knowing that she had preapproved his calls to break through if he called a second time within three minutes.
“What’s going on?” she asked, getting right to business when she saw it was him and accepted the call.
“Where are you?”
S?lvi glanced overhead and read the aisle indicator aloud.
“The east exit is your closest way out. Start calmly moving the PM and the rest of the delegation that way now.”
“What should I tell Secret Service?”
“Don’t tell them anything,” Harvath replied. “We can’t trust them. Go. Now . I’ll meet you at the exit.”
S?lvi hung up the phone and then quietly informed her PST colleagues that there was a possible threat, but that they had to evacuate slowly so as not to create a panic and potentially trigger the attacker.
The Norwegian security team closed ranks around Prime Minister Stang, and once S?lvi had whispered in her ear, the woman nodded and was completely compliant.
As they prepared to move her to the exit, the Secret Service agents augmenting their team asked what was happening. A skilled intelligence operative, S?lvi knew that the bigger the lie the better, and told them that the Russians had just invaded Norway.
Before the Secret Service team could even process what they had heard, S?lvi and her colleagues were moving Stang toward the exit.
They had almost made it to the doors when an enormous plainclothes law enforcement officer stepped out of nowhere and yelled, “Kennedy! Get on the ground! It’s over!”
Another man, tall and slim, with a wispy beard and wearing a janitor’s uniform, pulled an FN P90 submachine gun from the supply cart he was pushing and began firing into the crowd.
With people screaming and running in all directions, S?lvi covered the Prime Minister’s body with her own and, unable to move her toward the exit, guided her backward, toward the nearest exhibition booth.
As she retreated, she saw Scot come racing past her, his Glock exploding in his hand.
Every round he fired into the janitor was joined by the rounds of two other shooters: the tall plainclothes law enforcement officer who had yelled “Kennedy! Get on the ground!” and another plainclothes officer, a Black woman who, despite running directly into the shooter’s line of fire, was absolutely fearless and an incredible markswoman as she pounded headshot after headshot into the man’s face.