Back Blast: A Gray Man Novel Read online

  Carmichael said, “I’m not after a confession. I know you were not aware that Violator was here. What I need from you is action.”

  “Sounds exciting,” Kaz said with a smile that appeared more than a little sarcastic.

  Carmichael didn’t hide the fact he was losing patience with the flip attitude of the other man. “I don’t have time to play. We both know exactly what’s at stake here.”

  “As far as I can tell the only thing at stake with the arrival of Violator”—Kaz paused; his mouth morphed into a smile—“is you, Denny. Surely you realize that he is here for you.”

  “Whatever his intentions, I plan on terminating him. In the city. I will have other tools at my disposal for this, but I need you and your people involved, as well.”

  Kaz shook his head. “Out of the question. The leadership of my nation has me quite busy at the moment. Nothing that would interest you, I can assure you of that, but I’m not in a position to retask my assets to your needs at this time.”

  Denny loomed a little closer. “You and I have had a good working relationship. You give me some space for my people in the Middle East. I give you space for your people here in D.C. I want that relationship to continue.”

  “As you said, it is a good relationship. Why on earth would it not continue?”

  “If the Gentry situation isn’t handled quickly and quietly, I’ll be the one taking the fall, and I will fall hard. You think the next man in my position is going to allow the same arrangement with Saudi Arabia that I’ve allowed?” Denny leaned closer. “No . . . fucking . . . way. You’ll be expelled; your cell here doesn’t have dip immunity, so they will be rounded up and tossed into prison, if not tossed into an unmarked grave.”

  Kaz said, “Threats of death and destruction? Really, Denny? Those who complain about you . . . and excuse me for saying so, but there are many . . . all say the same thing. That you don’t possess the nuance for intelligence work. I defend you, you know. But opening the conversation with an overt threat to our long-standing agreement is exactly the boorishness that others accuse you of.”

  Denny said nothing, waiting the other man out.

  Kaz calmed. “Look, dear friend. You are correct. Our mutual relationship is good for everyone. When our countries are friends, things are good. When you and I are friends, things are great.”

  “Then help me.”

  “What is it you want?”

  “I want you looking for him. You and your team.”

  Kaz blew out a sigh. “Who else do you have hunting him?”

  “Agency and military assets. But I need more. I need your best men.”

  “Sounds like a crowded playing field. That makes it dangerous for my men.”

  “I can keep you aware of other entities involved in the hunt. You can vector your assets away from American assets when necessary.” Carmichael then asked, “How many men do you have working in D.C.?”

  “Apologies, but that is something I would rather not say.”

  “Ten,” Carmichael said. “You have ten. I want them all on this. If you want to bring others in, I can facilitate that.”

  Kaz seemed reluctant, but after a few moments he acquiesced. “Professional trust and good manners are two things I don’t seek in this line of work. But you and I, Denny, we have shared interests. I will help you in this, provided you return the favor to me somehow.”

  Carmichael had been expecting this. “You help us find Violator and you have my word you will have more latitude in the District. You won’t be off the leash, but I will let a little slack out of the leash so you can sniff around the yard a little more.”

  Kaz nodded.

  Carmichael then said, “I am sure you realize Gentry can’t be taken alive.”

  Kaz reached out and patted Carmichael on the arm. “If we get to him first, he won’t be.” Kaz stood, extended a hand. “Let us work together to finally put an end to this difficult affair.”

  “Excellent. You and I will deal directly. I’ll let you know what I know, as soon as I know it.”

  Kaz stood and reached for his suit coat. Slipping it on, he said, “I do have some advice in the short term.”

  “What advice?”

  “Get off the streets. If Gentry is within ten miles of you right now, you are in peril driving yourself around.”

  “My relationship with you is unsanctioned, Kaz. I can’t just roll with a detail into the Saudi Embassy.”

  “Then let’s pretend it’s the old days. In Lebanon. Or in Sana’a. Or in Tunisia. You and I can play the role of young field operatives. Dead drops and coded messages.”

  Carmichael wiped his eyes under his glasses. He was already fighting sleep deprivation, and he expected no real rest until Gentry was located and terminated. “Don’t be dramatic, Kaz. I’ll use the secure mobile, it’s on my person at all times. Keep yours with you.”

  The Saudi shrugged. Feigning disappointment. “Very well.”

  The men left separately, Carmichael first. He’d have one of his people drop by the hotel in the evening and spend the night, then check out in the morning using the hotel services screen on the television so he did not have to go to the reception desk and do it in person.

  The automated world of travel made some things easier for spies.

  12

  Carmichael returned to the Highlander parked on King Street, then he began a new SDR that would lead him, eventually, to the helicopter and DeRenzi at the airport. He’d be back at Langley by three p.m., and only then would he and Mayes both breathe a long sigh of relief.

  As he drove he thought of the unprecedented challenge before him: find one man in a metropolitan area of six million. Killing the Gray Man had been a top priority for the past five years, and still he had failed to accomplish it. In those same years he had directed human intelligence assets all over the globe, assassinated high-value targets in remote locations, successfully executed major intelligence operations against world powers, thwarted terrorist attacks on the homeland, and even had a hand in winning a regional war in Africa.

  But Courtland fucking Gentry somehow managed to remain alive. He’d been a hard target for a long time, but now Carmichael was certain Gentry had miscalculated. Whatever it was he thought he would accomplish here, there would be no escape from the United States.

  Not with Kaz and his men involved.

  Carmichael had allowed Kaz to run a small team of operatives in D.C. for three years now. Carmichael had even helped Kaz steer clear of FBI counterintelligence schemes designed to identify and arrest foreign operatives in the U.S., alerting his Saudi colleague to sting operations. And no one knew. Not the FBI, not the director of the CIA, not even Jordan Mayes. Mayes was aware his boss had a good working relationship with the director of Saudi intelligence in the U.S., but he had no idea of the quid pro quo that existed between the two men.

  It was entirely against the law, an unsanctioned relationship, but Carmichael wasn’t interested in rules; he was interested in results.

  In return for this, Kaz fed Carmichael intelligence of the quantity and quality no American intelligence chief had ever been given by an Arab nation. Kaz had personally passed Denny al Qaeda bank account numbers in Dubai, names and addresses of high-value targets, recorded intercepts of suspected ISIS officers working in Iraq, and many other items the CIA would have no access to otherwise, but an intrepid Saudi could obtain through his connections in the Islamist world.

  Kaz’s intelligence had not decimated the jihadists, not by any stretch of the imagination. AQ always seemed to find new avenues for funding, and ISIS found new men to put into leadership positions. But Denny was more than satisfied with the product he was getting from Kaz. That he had to keep the close affiliation under wraps was unfortunate, but Denny knew he would never in a million years receive authorization to allow foreign operatives to work freely in the USA. The c
losed minds of the FBI and the political minds of the White House would be horrified if they knew.

  Denny understood the intel business; you had to pay to play. And he also understood what Kaz wanted. Kaz wasn’t here in the U.S. running ops against the U.S. No, he was working against his country’s enemies. Economic intelligence against other oil-producing states. Political intelligence against those of Saudi Arabia’s Middle Eastern neighbors who swam in the waters of the United Nations, the American media, and D.C.-based think tanks.

  Denny had known Kaz a long time, and although he couldn’t say he trusted the man—Saudi Arabia was always looking out for the interests of Saudi Arabia, after all—Denny felt like he understood the man’s motivations. Kaz wasn’t running around America with a team of assassins knocking off congressmen. Allowing the Saudi intel chief some latitude to pursue his nation’s objectives in the United States was, as far as Denny Carmichael was concerned, a fair price to pay for what he was getting in return.

  As he drove back over the Woodrow Wilson Bridge on his way to Prince Georges County airport, Denny allowed himself a moment of pride and satisfaction. He saw himself as the chess master, controlling the pieces on the board.

  The moment faded as he thought about Gentry. Not because Gentry was the problem at hand. No, he thought about Gentry now, because in the fifteen years Denny Carmichael had worked closely with Murquin al-Kazaz, there had only been one major misstep in the relationship. One time where intel from Kaz had led, for one reason or another, to an unmitigated intelligence disaster.

  That time was years earlier, and the end result of that intelligence failure was now running free on the streets of America, wholly unaware of what he did to bring the full force of the U.S. intelligence community down on him like so many missiles from the sky.

  —

  Murquin al-Kazaz sat quietly in the suite at the Kimpton Lorien for twenty minutes, using the time to send text messages and to clear other matters out of his inbox. Then he, too, left the suite, wiping the door latch with a handkerchief on his way out.

  He was picked up on Duke Street, two blocks from the hotel. He folded into the back of a Jaguar sedan, and then he was off to his office in the center of a small motorcade of unmarked Land Rovers and Escalades.

  Kaz stared out the window silently as they returned to the Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia, just across New Hampshire from the Watergate complex. His offices were there at the embassy, taking up a large portion of one wing of the building.

  Saudi Arabia had a robust intelligence apparatus here in D.C., for three main reasons. For starters, many young Saudis came to the U.S. to study, and here they learned English and the ways of America. Kaz therefore had a large selection of good intelligence officers to choose from to staff his stable in D.C.

  Secondly, Saudi Arabia had an incredible amount of money. Liquid funds. Easily accessible U.S. dollars. Good intelligence work did not rely on money alone, of course, but money was an effective lubricant to all manner of espionage. Kaz had a budget of millions with which to buy equipment, rent real estate, and bribe men and women in all social strata in the U.S.

  And the third reason Saudi Arabia’s intelligence service was so damn effective in the U.S. was because of the special relationship between CIA’s Clandestine Service Director Denny Carmichael and U.S. Station Chief for the Saudi General Intelligence Presidency Murquin al-Kazaz.

  The secret pact between the two men stipulated that Kaz could only use his operation here in the States to target other nations, not the U.S. itself. And Kaz was not allowed to work against any of the U.S.’s main allies. Both men understood this to mean Israel, because Denny could not very well have Kaz getting caught in the District, for example, conducting surveillance on the home of the Israeli ambassador.

  Denny’s understanding of their agreement was that Kaz and his men were free to do other types of collection. They might use long-distance listening devices against the Russian consulate to learn about oil pipeline deals, they could run collection operations on other Middle Eastern embassies to obtain information on diplomatic and military affairs important to the Saudi kingdom, and they might surveil foreign nationals dangerous to Saudi interests who were here in the District to visit think tanks or speak to aid groups or conduct protest rallies.

  Denny knew there was plenty for Kaz to do without conducting operations against Americans.

  Until now, that was.

  But despite Denny Carmichael’s understanding of the agreement, Murquin al-Kazaz had his own ideas about just what his men would do here in the U.S. He took advantage of the protective wing of America’s top spy, and he used Denny’s secret sanction to run lethal direct-action missions here in the United States. His men had killed an Israeli blogger, a prominent author who wrote books critical of U.S.-Saudi relations, and a German businessman in the defense sector who stood in the way of the Kingdom obtaining a lucrative contract for aircraft engines.

  All the murders had been passed off as muggings, car jackings, automobile accidents—and Denny had not suspected a thing. He never understood that his friend and partner Murquin al-Kazaz was actually more like a fox in a henhouse.

  And now Kaz was being asked by the most important man in American intelligence to devote all his energies to finding and killing a single American operative, inside the United States of America. At first blush it had nothing to do with Kaz’s overarching mission here in the States, but Kaz would do as Denny requested, because Denny Carmichael’s survival was in the interests of the kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

  13

  The three fraternity brothers were stone-cold sober, but that wasn’t the worst part. The worst part was that they were also wet, hungry, and pissed, and they hadn’t even killed anything yet.

  They’d begun this weekend with such high hopes, and Friday had been a blast. It was Jay’s twenty-second birthday and his father had arranged a memorable time for him and his two best friends. They left the Sig Ep house at Cleveland’s Case Western Reserve Friday afternoon and headed to the airport to climb aboard a Cessna Citation Mustang that was owned by Jay’s dad’s law firm. The three boys sipped rum and Cokes served to them by the jet’s leggy flight attendant while they flew to Greenbrier Valley Airport in Lewisburg, West Virginia. From the airport they were driven to the hunting lodge, and as soon as they checked in to their rooms they hit the bar and drank shots with a group of old-timers till late in the evening.

  Saturday morning they rolled out of their bunks, groggy and hungover, but riding on adrenaline. Dressed in their new camo, they shouldered their rented rifles and heavy packs and sauntered down to breakfast.

  The plan called for their guide to meet them in the lobby, and then they would discuss the strategy of their full-weekend wild boar hunting excursion over pancakes and bacon. The boys figured after that they would all climb onto four-wheelers, drive up into the mountains, and kill shit—maybe do a shot of Fireball or Jägermeister every time a hog went down.

  But when they met the guide in the lobby by the entrance to the breakfast room, he turned them away from the food and walked them directly out into the rainy morning. When Jay asked the gruff-looking, middle-aged, bearded man what the rush to get out of the lodge was all about, he just said they would be doing less four-wheeling and more “humping” to get to their hide site.

  The three boys got the impression humping meant something different to their guide than it did to them.

  The man then went through each of the frat boys’ gear and began pulling things out and throwing them in a pile on the gravel drive without a word. Out came the 12-pack of Natural Light, the bottles of Fireball, Jägermeister, and Pappy Van Winkle, then the M&M’s, fried pies, and even two bags of Cheetos.

  Jay’s dad was a high-profile attorney, Meat’s mom hosted a satellite radio show about Chicago politics, and Stuart’s dad had been deputy mayor of Cleveland, but all three boys were too intimidated by
the rough-looking guide to protest. They’d been warned at the lodge by the old-timers that the man was surly and taciturn, but along with these cons, they’d been promised he was also the best hunting guide in the state, so they just rolled with his gruffness.

  The bearded man all but pushed them into his huge pickup, although he did promise them food and coffee on the road. As soon as they left the lodge, however, it became clear their breakfast would consist of bagged military meals ready to eat and Folgers instant that they heated in a plastic bag with a chemical heater and then drank out of dirty tin cups.

  They drove for two hours with the guide barely speaking, then they slung their packs and rifles and began walking into the mountains.

  The guide led them off the trail after another hour and into impossibly dense forest.

  They walked, climbed, and stumbled through the woods all day, and they failed to drop a single wild boar. Stuart had fired twice and missed twice, Jay blasted an anthill that sort of looked like a boar from distance, and, although he expended a lot of ammunition, the only thing Meat had killed was three pouches of marbled pound cake and two helpings of beef stew out of the MRE stash in his pack.

  The guide was clearly disgusted with them all, but he had not even brought a rifle of his own, so as far as they were concerned he couldn’t prove he could have done any better.

  They made camp before last light and ate more MREs, and by then the Sig Ep frat brothers had begun complaining loudly. When they did, the guide gave them the evil eye and a gruff retort about how they looked like they needed the exercise more than they needed pork chops, and then he promised them better results on Sunday.

  But it was Sunday now, past two p.m., thirty hours after setting out, and the frat boys still hadn’t killed a damn thing. They sat in a hide on the side of a hill that looked down over broken ground divided by a winding creek. On the other side of the valley, some 250 yards away, sat another rocky hillside, thick with pines and brush that was lush and green in the wet spring.