Chapter 24
Morrell had wanted a big, open space with plenty of opportunity for a sniper to conduct overwatch and to be able to see who was coming. Harvath had wanted to minimize as much collateral damage as possible. In the end, they had agreed to compromise.
From top to bottom, proper tradecraft dictated every move they made. It started with putting themselves in the shoes of the dead operative from whom Harvath had taken the watch. If the man was truly in peril and needed to activate his distress beacon, where would he do it from?
If he had to call in the cavalry, it would mean that he was unable to return to his base of operations, which normally only happened in one of two circumstances.
Either local authorities were actively seeking him, and the dragnet was too tight to escape, or he was injured and unable to make it to any fallback locations.
After retrieving his cell phone and Harvath’s from the Faraday bag, Morrell thanked the two techs and then led Harvath to a secure conference room where they could talk.
“How wide should we draw the perimeter from Tommy’s?” the CIA man asked, booting up the encrypted laptop he had grabbed on his way in.
“Four klicks I would think. Maximum,” Harvath replied. “Any place you can find that might have medical supplies—a family doctor, a pharmacy, even an outpatient cosmetic surgery center. All that matters is that they’re closed for the night.”
“How about a vet’s office?”
“Only if they don’t board pets. If there’s animals on-site, they’re going to have overnight staff.”
Morrell nodded and kept looking. “How about a periodontist?” he eventually said, turning the laptop so Harvath could see the location on the map.
“That would work. Sutures. Bandages. Antibiotics and pain meds. They’d have all of it. What do the satellite and street views look like?”
Morrell spun the laptop back around, pulled up what Harvath was looking for, and then showed him.
The address corresponded to a drab four-story building on an equally drab commercial block. Scrolling up and down the street, there were no bars, nightclubs, or other late-night businesses visible.
Zooming back in on the building, Harvath pointed at the rooftop and said, “This is the place. We’ll do it here.”
If Tommy Sombat and the shootout at Teens were in fact connected to the bombings, then the beacon was a direct line into the network that had slaughtered Americans.
“What are we going to need?”
It was a question Harvath couldn’t fully answer. They had no idea who or what they were up against. His gut told him to bring everything. His brain went a step further.
If he had an injured operative calling for exfiltration, he’d want to gather intel and that would start with getting a drone overhead as soon as possible.
Before putting any personnel near the target, he’d want confirmation—or as close to it as he could get—that his operative was indeed the one requesting the exfil and was in legitimate distress.
Failing that, things began to get very complicated, which was exactly where Harvath found himself now.
If they were dealing with a Chinese intelligence unit, lulling them into a false sense of security was key.
The easier the job appeared, the smaller the footprint they’d likely employ.
Whereas a quick pickup of an injured teammate might only require a few men, the murkier the job, the more manpower they would dispatch.
Harvath wanted his adversary to send in the smallest number of people possible. That was part of why he was focusing on the roof. He also knew that for the emergency locator beacon to have the greatest chance of success, it needed to be deployed outside.
In real-life situations, a downed pilot or stranded adventurer would lash the watch to a pole of some sort that had been shoved into the ground.
Then, after removing the antennas and extending them in separate directions, the beacon would be activated, and they would simply cross their fingers and wait.
While not the best idea he had ever come up with, that was Harvath’s plan too. He was not only going to use the watch as bait, but he was also going to use himself. And that was where his hastily crafted plan began to fray at the seams.
If the Chinese did send a drone, which they’d be fools not to, he had to give them just enough bait to draw them the rest of the way in. They had to not just pick up the distress beacon, they’d need to see their man, alone, on the roof.
But while he’d passed for a handful of nationalities over his career, Chinese had never been one of them.
Shy of lying face down in a wig or wrapping his head in bandages, both of which would be unusually suspicious, he had yet to come up with a ruse strong enough to convince a potential rescue team that he was their missing operative.
He and Morrell were in the middle of brainstorming options when the CIA man’s cell phone vibrated.
Looking down at it, he recognized the caller ID and held up his index finger, asking Harvath to pause while he took the call.
“Hey, Davi. What do you have?”
He listened to his ex for several moments. Then, after a pause, as if he was considering something, he replied, “I can probably do you that favor. I’m going to need one in return though.”
Placing the phone against his chest, he looked at Harvath and said, “The Chinese guy you shot on the roof. You said you took a picture of him, right?”
Harvath unlocked his phone, pulled up the image, and held it out so Morrell could see it.
“I need you to find someone for me,” the CIA man said, returning to his call. “And I’m going to need you to do it with no questions asked.”