One Minute Out Page 32

  I start to speak again, to tell him I would be happy to fuck with the MdB on my own, if he just gives me the intel I require.

  But before I can tell him this, he says, “I’d like to help you, signore, truly. But there is one problem.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The Consortium . . . they serve a purpose. They help my firm with . . . how do you say it, securing some of our earnings.”

  Shit. The Consortium launders money for Alfonsi.

  “Apparently they are quite good at that part of the equation, too,” I remark.

  Ricci shrugs. “It’s a big business.”

  I am dead certain Ricci’s organization makes a lot of money from prostitution; he and his boss are probably just as bad as the men I’m after. But frankly, I’ve got a pretty full to-do list right now, so I’m not going to worry about that.

  I spend a lot of time with strange bedfellows when I work in the private sector. It’s pretty much my modus operandi.

  I need to convince him I’m not going to disrupt his organization’s money-laundering needs, so I say, “This has nothing to do with the Consortium. This has to do with Mala del Brenta. I figured your boss wouldn’t have any problem with my screwing around with them. You and your staff have plausible deniability. I was never here, and I certainly was never working for you.”

  He regards me a long time before asking, “Why do you want to know where the trade will happen?” When I don’t answer immediately, he smiles. “You want to rescue one of the girls, is that it?”

  That’s a good story, let’s go with that. I nod. “For her father. An old friend from my days working in Russia.”

  Ricci’s eyebrows rise again, and I can’t tell if he believes me. Finally he says, “If I give you the location of the sale, what will you do with it?”

  Holding intense eye contact, I reply, “My plan is to wait for my girl to be sold, then separated from the others. And then I’m going to get her back from the people who bought her. I am assuming security will be easier to manage once she’s moved.”

  “You will act in Venice, or once the girl is taken to her final destination?”

  “I will act at first opportunity. No matter where that is.”

  He takes this in for a minute. I know that telling him I would wait till they were out of the area before I start kicking ass would have earned me more favor, but I’m hoping he regards my comment as honesty, and he’ll offer up some brownie points to me for not insulting his intelligence.

  Giancarlo says, “So . . . though you may act here in the city, it will only be against the buyer, and only for the purposes of recovering your missing property.”

  Yeah, he just called the victims property. I’m in bed with a prick, but I knew that going in, and what choice do I have? He’s like Vukovic, and probably like all the others involved in human trafficking. The dehumanization of the women and girls is absolute, a necessity for the twisted minds who scout them, take them, smuggle them, and abuse them.

  And this motherfucker in the five-thousand-euro suit in front of me is no better.

  But I’m in character here. I say, “I’m not trying to make life more difficult here for anyone. I just want the property back.”

  He presses, “You can assure me there will be no disruption of the Consortium’s work itself here in Venice. You have no plans to target the organization, that is what you are saying.”

  He wants to help me, that much is evident.

  Without batting an eyelash, I say, “None whatsoever. I just want to bring a nice girl home to her father.”

  Ricci nods thoughtfully. “If I give you information, you must do a job for me. A difficult job.”

  And this is, of course, why he wants to help me.

  I ask, “Where is this job?”

  A pause. “America.”

  Shit. I don’t know the job, the target, the location, or the threat . . . and I certainly have my doubts about the morality. There’s no way in hell I’m killing some dude in the United States for the Italian mob.

  But I need a break here. I say, “The moment I have the girl back to her father, I will go to the States and do whatever you want me to do.”

  This is going well, and just as I think this I recognize that Ricci is suspicious of how well it is going. Finishing his coffee and putting the cup down, he says, “The story going around about you, as I’m sure you are aware, is that you double-crossed your masters in the CIA.”

  I reply flatly, “They started it.”

  He laughs, surprising me. “Maybe so. Maybe so. But you know my brotherhood is not like the CIA. I will find you if you double-cross me.”

  “As you’ve told me before.”

  “And as I will remind you again. You do not want me as an enemy. You do not want Luigi Alfonsi as an enemy. Is that clear?”

  I have every intention of double-crossing the man across the table, but I also happen to be a pretty good liar. “You can count on me, sir.”

  “Well, then.” Ricci sticks out a hand and I shake it. “I will give you information.”

  “Tell me about the market.”

  “It’s held by the Consortium for their best customers. Six times a year or so.” He nods. “And you are correct. It is tonight. It begins at midnight.”

  “The location?”

  “It’s in a building that adjoins the Casino of Venice. It’s invitation only, needless to say, and invitations are scarce and well checked.”

  “How much security will be there?”

  Ricci shrugs. “Mala del Brenta men, two dozen or so the last time I heard. The Consortium will have their own security.”

  That’s a lot of guns, but I imagine that’s not all of it. I assume security will be well beefed up after what I did in Bosnia and Croatia and out on the Adriatic Sea.

  It sounds like a no-go zone for me, and my heart sinks. His next words do nothing to assuage my frustration.

  “It will be incredibly difficult for one man to get inside the event. I can’t help you there.”

  I’m desperately thinking about sewers, air ducts, rooftop access, and the like, and I’m thinking about stealing credentials and uniforms from employees of the venue. Hell, I’m even thinking about finding a way to steal or forge an invitation.

  None of it sounds promising, especially because I know the opposition will be checking all these avenues of approach to make sure some jackass isn’t trying to slip into their party tonight.

  But then Ricci brightens up. “There is a bar, it’s two blocks away. I can get you in there. If I remember correctly you’ll be able to see the building where the market is being held. You will be an employee, just for tonight. No one will bother you. Just do a little work, then run off and do what you need to do. You won’t be able to get close to the casino, but it’s along the route anyone leaving the building will take to get to the main street.”

  This probably looks to Ricci like a completely safe option for me to get some reconnaissance tonight, but I know what he doesn’t.

  The Consortium is looking for me, and they’ll be ready.

  Still, I don’t see any better opportunity for getting real eyes on and getting pictures of the buyers and sellers.

  I stand and extend a hand. “That sounds perfect, signore.”

  It’s not perfect, it’s not even close, but it’s as good as I’m going to get, and again, I have to look like I know what I’m doing.

  THIRTY-FIVE

  The pilot of the Dassault Falcon 50 lined its nose up between the runway end identifier lights beaming out of the dusk, checked his adherence to the glide path, and listened while his computer told him he was one thousand feet above the ground.

  The pilot worked for Air Branch, the CIA Special Activities Center’s air wing, and this meant he was one of the best fliers on Earth.

  Before qualifying
to fly the relatively sleek and advanced Falcon 50 he’d flown fat and slow Twin Otters off muddy and rocky jungle strips in Central America and Southeast Asia, so big, wide, and flat that runway 04 Right, dead ahead and a half mile out, was a piece of cake.

  In the cabin of the aircraft behind him the flight attendant strapped herself into the folding bulkhead seat, and then she rubbed her hands and wrists repeatedly.

  This was only Sharon’s third Agency flight since she’d been wounded in a tarmac shootout while on board a CIA Gulfstream a couple months earlier. Both her hands still ached where the bullet had smashed into them, but she’d passed her medical requirements a week and a half earlier and had been returned to duty.

  Facing aft, she was able to gaze upon the six men seated in the captain’s chairs. They were all in their thirties and forties; many wore longer hair and beards. They were quiet and soft-spoken and had been no trouble during the eight-and-a-half-hour flight from Reagan National in D.C.

  Sharon had been doing this long enough to recognize a Ground Branch unit when she saw one. These were CIA paramilitary operations officers, among the most highly trained fighters on planet Earth. Individually, they looked normal. They could be oil rig workers or construction workers or any other banal job that required manual labor. But together, to a practiced eye like Sharon’s, these were obviously American intelligence commandos.

  The Dassault touched down moments later at Aeroporto di Treviso, twenty miles northwest of the city of Venice, and then it taxied to a fixed-base operator on the southwestern side of the airport. Here the plane parked on the ramp, one hundred yards away from the doors to the FBO. The pilot and copilot shut it down while in the back the passengers readied their equipment.

  The arrival of the CIA flight had been arranged and approved by Italian officials, who were told these men were NATO forces and tied to the nearby U.S. air base at Aviano. There were no checks of customs or immigration, as this was a “black” flight, allowed by the Italians.

  Chris Travers stood in the low cabin and turned back to his team. At thirty-five years old, he was young to be running his own six-man Ground Branch unit, but he’d proven himself in the U.S. Army as a Special Forces officer, as a CIA para unit member, and then, finally, as a second-in-command on a Ground Branch team.

  After the death of his team leader and meritorious accolades for Travers’s actions during the event where the TL died, Travers himself was promoted to team leader.

  Ground Branch reported to the director of the Special Activities Center, who reported directly to the deputy director for operations, but things on tonight’s op were a little bit more streamlined than normal, because command authority of the entire operation was not located in Langley.

  Tonight command authority rested with the man sitting in the darkness in the back of the cabin. This figure said nothing while Travers gave final instructions to his crew, even though he himself had once run a team not unlike the one sitting in the cabin with him.

  Travers said, “Listen up. We have a sixteen-passenger van waiting to take us into the city. As I told you before, our mission this evening is the location and removal of a CIA asset, code named Violator. We have a general understanding of where he will be but no good timeline, so we’re heading there now, will remain clandestine, and will use nonlethal means to obtain his compliance with our commands.”

  One of the older men on the team muttered, “Yeah, right,” and others around him chuckled.

  Everyone on the team had been around the block enough to know the legend of Violator, aka the Gray Man, but only Chris and the man sitting in the back of the aircraft knew the former CIA employee personally.

  Travers addressed his doubtful subordinate directly. “Yeah, I hear you. We all know Violator is a badass, and if we can’t talk him into coming along with us, then this will get ugly. But that’s our op, so if you don’t like it, you can go fuck yourself.”

  This received a few chuckles, as well, including from the man who’d seemed to doubt the wisdom of taking on Violator in the first place.

  The team leader continued. “We know he’s worked with the Luigi Alfonsi family in the past. We are going to set up surveillance around the quarter where the Alfonsis are strongest, and if we get more specific location intel, I’ll flex you over to those areas as necessary. This might take some time, so be prepared for a long night.”

  The men hefted packs and filed out of the aircraft in silence. Travers was the last through the hatch, but as he neared the stairs he turned around and looked at the man in darkness in the back.

  “Hey. You coming?”

  Chris Travers saw the silhouette of the man as he reached for his bottle of Corona and took a slow sip. “Nah. You boys run along. I’m going to hang out here.”

  Travers shrugged. “Long flight not to get off the plane. Figured you’d want a chance at a little action.”

  The man chuckled softly, then said, “I might be seeing more action than you tonight, kid.”

  “Whatever.” Travers left the aircraft, then climbed into the van with his men.

  * * *

  • • •

  When he was gone, the man in the back of the cabin called up to the front. “Sharon?”

  The flight attendant stepped up as the man dialed a number on his phone. “Sir?”

  “I’m going to put you on the phone with someone. He’s going to give you some direction for this evening.”

  She cocked her head. “Yes, sir. Can I ask what this is about?”

  “Of course. He is going to tell you that you are to do whatever I tell you to do.”

  “I’m sorry, sir. I don’t know who you are, but I am pretty certain I don’t work for you.”

  “No, you don’t. But you do work for him.”

  He tapped a button, putting his sat phone on speaker, and then a voice said, “Miss Clarke. This is Matthew Hanley, DDO. I need you to listen very carefully.”

  The flight attendant sat down in a captain’s chair with wide eyes.

  “I’m listening, sir.”

  * * *

  • • •

  I sit in my rented flat on the Ruga Giuffa, watching the last of the day’s light fade through the dirty windows. I caught a few hours’ sleep and I ate in a restaurant down on the first floor of the building, careful to sit far in the back to avoid any detection from the street.

  But it’s eight forty-five p.m.; I’m back in the room and it will be full-on dark soon, which means it’s almost time for me to leave.

  Before I set out I call Talyssa, who should be on the ground in Amsterdam, en route to the home of black-hat hacker Maarten Meyer. She answers on the second ring, which I take as a promising sign.

  “Hello?”

  “It’s Harry. You made it there?”

  “I’m outside his house. I don’t think he’s home.”

  “That’s okay. You knew you might have to wait.”

  “I don’t know if I can do this.”

  “You can, and you can call me if you need help. Remember, you have your Europol credentials and a lot of information about his crimes and the investigation under way. Come at him hard, threatening even, but then show him a way through the door. You have to make him want to work with you so he doesn’t end up in prison.”

  “But . . . what if he says no? What if your plan doesn’t work?”

  This isn’t going to work, I tell myself. Then I tell Talyssa, “It’s going to work. Trust me.”

  After a moment she replies softly, and with no obvious confidence. “All right. I will call you when I have him.” Then she says, “While I’m doing this . . . what will you be doing?”

  “I’ll be doing what I do best.”

  “Which is?”

  “What do you think?”

  Talyssa heaves a long sigh. “You are going to try to catch someone and beat information out
of them.”

  “You know me too well.”

  I am worried about her, just like I was back in Dubrovnik when she had been rolled up by the Albanians. But now I can’t do anything to help her. She’s on her own.

  “Listen,” I say. “If it’s not working out, if you feel like you might be in any danger, then you need to just pull out of there. I can try later.”

  “Later all the girls will be gone.”

  “I know. I just don’t want you getting hurt.”

  She sniffs into the phone. “Thank you, Harry. You be careful, too.”

  Thirty minutes later I am out on the street, walking east through the artificial lights towards the Casino of Venice.

  I begin focusing my attention on my mission this evening. I need to be gray, to blend in with my surroundings, more so with each step as I near my target location.

  Talyssa can pull this off, I tell myself. I can pull this off, too.

  It’s an affirmation borne not out of real conviction but rather out of desperation.

  We have to pull this off.

  * * *

  • • •

  Ken Cage stepped out of the bathroom off the foyer of the Mala del Brenta safe house with a long, labored sniff, then he rubbed his eyes and nose.

  He grabbed his black suit coat off a leather wingback chair, slipped it on, looked to his bodyguard, and gave him an energetic nod.

  Cage knew Sean Hall would understand that this meant he was ready to leave for the auction.

  Hall immediately slipped on his own jacket, then radioed his team through his cuff mic. Within moments the six men appeared in the foyer and formed around their boss and their principal.

  Hall gave the men last-minute instructions, then radioed Jaco Verdoorn. He had no idea where the South African and his men were stationed outside, but he knew they would be trying to spot Gentry, if he was even in the area at all.

  Verdoorn acknowledged Hall’s message that the movement was beginning, but he gave the American lead protection agent no more information about his and his team’s dispersement around the route to the auction.