Deception Game (16 page)

By eight o’clock that evening, with the high straggling clouds tinged orange and long shadows stretching out across the garden outside, all was ready. Taking a sip from his fourth cup of coffee since arriving at the house, Drake called together his team to review the plan that he’d managed to hammer together.

‘All right, time’s not on our side, so I’ll get right down to it.’

On the table in front of him was a satellite image of Tripoli downloaded courtesy of Google Maps, for lack of a more sophisticated source of data. The image depicted a dense sprawl of urban streets and residential areas, laid out in a rough grid pattern that would be familiar to his American companions.

‘As best we can tell, Sowan beds down each night here.’ He indicated one particular building that had been circled in red pen. ‘It’s a walled compound in the Gargaresh district, on the west side of the city. Apparently it’s an affluent neighbourhood, so it’s popular with high-ranking government and military types.’

‘In short, one mistake and we’ll have half the Libyan army on our asses,’ Frost remarked.

Drake wasn’t about to argue with her less-than-optimistic appraisal of the situation. Likely there were a lot of security operatives in that district, there to protect the most vital elements of the government while they slept.

‘That’s why we’re going to do this right, first time. No fuck-ups, no mistakes,’ he said, giving her a hard look. She didn’t say anything further, so Drake turned his attention back to the map. ‘So, phase one – insertion. Considering the resources available and the target area we’re aiming for, an airborne drop is out of the question. There’s too much chance of being spotted, and if we miss our target we’d be caught in the centre of a busy city. Covert border crossings are out too because it would take too long to scout out a route, which leaves us with the sea.’

Referring to an expanded satellite map of the Libyan capital, Drake circled an area of rugged coastline some distance to the west of the city.

‘We expect heavy security around the commercial port and waterfront districts, but this stretch of coastline to the west should be quiet enough for us to get ashore undetected.’

‘Yeah, but get ashore in what, exactly?’ McKnight asked.

‘By Zodiac. Chandra has agreed to get us as far as Malta by plane. From there, it’s 190 nautical miles to Tripoli. A fast boat can cover that distance in under four hours. We leave at sunset, and we arrive in the early hours of the morning.’

Zodiacs had been used for decades by military and special-forces units for missions just like this. Difficult to spot at night, capable of transporting half a dozen men plus equipment, and able to outrun just about anything else on the water, they were ideal for covert insertions. Drake had ridden in the powerful, semi-inflatable craft plenty of times, and he knew that one outfitted with extra fuel canisters could easily make such a journey.

‘Okay, so once we’re ashore, what then?’ Frost asked.

‘The main coastal road is only a few hundred yards from the beach. We lay up there, wait for the vehicle that Dietrich’s contact will supply. That brings us to phase two – neutralizing security.’ He glanced up at his companion, indicating for him to carry on with the briefing. ‘Cole?’

‘If Sowan follows the typical pattern for high-level intelligence officials, he’ll have a security detail of between three and five men guarding his house – one coordinating, the others walking the perimeter,’ he explained. ‘There are also security cameras monitoring all approaches to the house, meaning nobody can get close without being seen.’

‘Could be inside too,’ Frost pointed out.

‘Unlikely.’

‘Why?’

Mason glanced at her. ‘It’s a secured compound, but it’s also his home. Would you really want someone watching while you take a dump in the middle of the night?’

She had no answer for that, leaving Mason free to continue. ‘Based on the blueprints we’ve seen, the security system is linked back to Libyan intelligence headquarters by shielded fibre-optic landlines, meaning even if we take out the guards on site, there’d be a second pair of eyes watching us.’

McKnight pursed her lips, staring at the printed plan of the house and its walled grounds. ‘So how do we get in?’

‘The fibre-optic network should work against us, but actually it’s our ticket in,’ Drake explained. ‘We know exactly where the cables are buried, which means we can access it. We dig one up, patch into their system, and use it to take control. A few minutes of looped camera footage should be enough to create the illusion that everything’s normal.’

Frost was starting to see where he was going with this. ‘Buying us time to get inside.’

‘Exactly,’ Drake agreed. ‘Once we have control, we shut down the cameras, then move in to take out the security operatives before they can raise the alarm. Signal jammers should be enough to disrupt their radios, giving us a window to take them down. After that, it’s a straight-up house assault. We move in, secure Sowan and get him of there with a minimum of fuss.’

‘So how do we get out of the country?’

‘That’s where Chandra comes in,’ Drake said, gesturing to the pilot who had been observing in silence thus far. He pointed to another area circled on the map. ‘There’s a small private airstrip about twenty miles out in the desert. He’ll meet us there.’

‘I’ll land in Tripoli at about the same time you make landfall, posing as a commercial cargo flight,’ Chandra explained, taking up the narrative. ‘I’ll need to refuel at that point anyway. Once you give me the code word
Tempest
via text message, I’ll take off and head east for the private airstrip. But keep in mind that I can’t land the bloody thing in pitch darkness, so you’ll need to find a way of turning on the runway lights. Assuming you do, I’ll land, pick you all up and we’ll be out of Libyan airspace before anyone is the wiser.’

‘It’s not perfect, but it’s what we’ve got,’ Drake concluded, glancing up at his companions. ‘Thoughts?’

This was a crucial moment in any operation, from the military to the Agency to this informal gathering. Everyone now had the chance to provide their insights, voice their objections or concerns about the plan, regardless of rank or any other consideration. At such a time, everyone involved was an equal, because they all had the same to lose. Drake had seen more than one operational plan torn to shreds or abandoned altogether because of problems that only came to light at this stage.

McKnight chewed her lip. ‘A lot of moving parts, Ryan,’ she warned. ‘Any one of them fails, and the whole op’s a bust.’

Drake nodded, his brow wrinkled in a frown. Single points of failure were the bane of operational planners, and there were all too many of them here. Normally they would have backups in place, additional resources they could call upon, but here there was nothing. Just Drake and his three teammates attempting a complex snatch-and-grab operation that a group twice as large and with far more resources would struggle to accomplish.

‘And we’re toast,’ Frost added, quite unnecessarily.

‘If you’ve got anything better, now’s the time,’ Mason prompted her.

For once, she said nothing.

‘Will you be able to do what we need from you?’ Drake asked her, wondering if her reluctance was due to a specific concern. ‘The fibre-optic lines, the cameras, the security systems. If there’s something you’re worried about, be honest.’

He expected nothing less than honesty from her, but it never hurt to reiterate it. The worst thing anyone could do at a time like this was make promises they couldn’t deliver on, for fear of being the naysayer of the group. If there was some insurmountable technical problem preventing them from going through with it, he’d rather know now.

The young woman mulled it over for a few moments. ‘If the system’s set up the way I think it is, then yeah, I can do it.’

Satisfied, Drake turned his eyes on McKnight. ‘Sam? The same goes for you.’

‘Can it work?’ McKnight asked, staring right back at Drake. ‘You know these kind of ops better than any of us, so no bullshit. Do you think we can pull this off, Ryan?’

‘It’s a gamble,’ he conceded. ‘There are a lot of ways this plan can go wrong, but in the end it’s not about the plan. The plan’s only as good as the team following it, and there’s nobody better at this than the people standing around me right now.’ He looked down at the map once more. ‘If anyone wants to pull out, then this goes no further. I won’t think less of you.’

Nobody said a word.

Drake let out a sigh and nodded. ‘All right, then. It’s a go.’

That wasn’t the end of it, of course. The ‘go’ decision might have been made, but there were still innumerable details to be pored over, countless minor problems and challenges to be resolved before the plan could be considered ready for action. The devil really was in the detail when it came to things like this, and there was simply no substitute for care and attention.

As the sun dipped below the horizon and darkness descended on the fields and woodlands outside, Drake and the others worked long into the night, testing and refining and searching for flaws they might have missed first time around.

At last, with the clocks rapidly approaching midnight, they could do no more and finally called a halt to their work, each of them mentally and physically exhausted from their efforts. Still, their reward was a plan of action which was about as complete and comprehensive as it could be, given the circumstances, and one that just might allow them to get what they needed without being killed in the process.

By the time the clock struck midnight, most of the group had drifted off to bed. But mindful of the need to safeguard the secrecy of their clandestine operation, Drake volunteered to take the first watch, partly because he knew his companions needed the rest more than he did, but mostly because he had too many things on his mind to surrender to sleep.

The success or failure of their plan rested on each and every one of them. If one failed in their designated task, all failed. And yet, for all that, he was still their leader. The ultimate responsibility rested with him. He was the one who had made this happen, not because he’d been ordered to do it, not because the mission had been handed to him via the Agency’s complex bureaucracy, but because he’d made the conscious decision to go ahead with it.

If one of his companions didn’t make it home, the blame rested solely on his shoulders.

Thus he found himself in the living room with a glass in hand, listening to the pop and hiss as a couple of small logs burned low in the open fire, the modest blaze helping to keep the room warm as the temperature fell outside. As it turned out, his mother hadn’t been much of a whisky drinker, but he’d found a bottle of vodka on the sideboard. One small glass – not enough to impair his judgement, but enough to take the edge off and perhaps allow him to get his head down for a few hours later.

He felt bad for helping himself to her drink, and even worse for commandeering her home as a makeshift base of operations, but he told himself it was only for one night. Anyway, temperamental and difficult his teammates might have been at times, but they each came from a military background and had likely been well disciplined at cleaning up after themselves. When his sister returned here, she would find the place exactly as she’d left it.

Drake took a sip of the vodka as he sat on the couch, idly spinning the antique globe that had so fascinated him as a child, watching countries and continents whirl past in the blink of an eye. A world of possibilities and adventure that had once stretched out before him, just waiting to be discovered.

How things changed, he thought as he took another drink. The potent liquor burned his throat on the way down, and carried on burning as it settled reluctantly on his stomach. The world had shrunk, and the adventure hadn’t turned out quite the way he’d hoped.

‘If you’re looking for Libya, you might be there a while,’ McKnight said from the doorway. ‘Doesn’t exist. Actually, neither do Tunisia, Iraq or Iran.’

Drake glanced around and smiled at her. Half the countries depicted on the antique globe had ceased to exist, or their borders had been radically altered. ‘Old map.’

‘Old memories, I think.’

He said nothing to that.

Crossing the room softly on bare feet, she sat down on the edge of the couch and nodded to the drink in his hand. ‘Be a shame to leave you drinking alone.’

Drake took the hint, and headed to the sideboard to pour her a glass. ‘Take it you couldn’t sleep either?’

‘Pretty much.’

‘I was always the same before a big operation,’ he said, splashing a measure into one of the crystal glasses. ‘Nervous, restless, wishing I could just get it over with. The waiting was the hardest part.’

‘And now?’ she asked, nodding in thanks as he handed her the glass.

He thought about it for a moment. ‘Not much has changed.’

McKnight smiled and took a drink, holding his gaze as she tipped the glass back.

‘It’s good,’ she remarked.

‘It should be. Knowing Freya, it probably came all the way from Moscow.’

‘Big drinker?’

Drake swirled the clear liquid around his glass before taking a gulp, grimacing a little as it went down. ‘Big traveller.’

McKnight eyed him curiously. She hadn’t missed his unhappy tone, and incorrectly assumed her question had stirred up the grief of his recent loss. ‘I’m sorry, Ryan. I didn’t mean to push.’

‘You didn’t,’ he assured her. ‘And don’t worry. I’m not about to put away a few more of these and break down in front of you. It wasn’t that kind of relationship.’

‘So what was it? If you don’t mind my asking.’

That wasn’t an easy question to answer, because as the past couple of days had demonstrated, he didn’t know half as much about his mother as he’d once thought. What he did know, or what he’d been told more times than he needed to hear, was that he’d been born just as her career as a freelance writer was taking off after years of toiling away in obscurity, her newfound success at last offering her the chance to travel the world in search of new stories.

It was no easy thing to do that with a newborn baby, and even less so to find the time to write about it. Just like that, all those opportunities for exploration and adventure and excitement had been suddenly pushed aside, replaced by the mundane slog of caring for a screaming, demanding, draining new life.

Neither she nor his father had ever said anything explicitly, of course, but Drake had always sensed the lingering resentment she felt towards him. It had been there in every exasperated look, every frustrated sigh, every longing glance at the antique globe now sitting just feet away from him. She’d always been a little less patient with him, a little less understanding, a little harder to please.

As if being born at the wrong time had been his fault.

It had been different with Jessica, of course – she had been a conscious decision. Perhaps resigned to the fact they’d started their family earlier than planned, his parents had made the best of a bad job and had their second child just a couple of years after him.

Getting it out of the way all at once, as his father had so aptly put it. That was certainly the way Drake had always been made to feel. Something to get out of the way as quickly as possible, to be tolerated and endured, and then eventually escaped from.

‘We...didn’t talk much,’ he said at last. ‘And I think that suited both of us just fine.’

‘But you must feel something, being here,’ she said quietly, reaching out and touching his hand. ‘Seeing all these reminders of her.’

‘I do,’ he admitted. ‘But it’s something I’ll deal with later, when we’ve done what we have to. Until then, I can’t let it in.’

He took another drink and looked away, staring into the flames in brooding silence, and for a time neither of them said anything more.

‘Just answer me one thing,’ she said quietly. ‘Is this worth it? Everything we’re doing, everything we’re risking. Tell me it’s worth it, Ryan.’

Drake glanced at the globe again, trying to recall the feeling of wonder it had once evoked in him. Instead, all he could see was his mother kneeling at the edge of a shallow pit, her hands bound behind her back, unable to resist as her killer levelled a weapon at her chest and pulled the trigger. Whatever his relationship with her had been, he knew that image would haunt his every waking moment.

Until he’d found the man responsible.

Drake looked at her then, his green eyes reflecting the glow of the fire. ‘To punish him for what he did, to take away everything he took from us, to make him suffer like we have. Yeah, it’s worth it,’ he said with utter conviction. ‘It’s worth all of it.’

The woman stared at him in silence, taken aback by the determination in his eyes, the sheer force of will behind his words. There was nothing she could say to that. Drake was a man set on his course, and nothing and nobody could stop him.

Nobody except her.

‘Get some sleep,’ he said quietly after a time. ‘Tomorrow’s going to be a long day, for all of us.’

She didn’t doubt it for a second.

Excusing herself from Drake's company some time later, McKnight crept outside, fished her cell phone from her pocket and typed in a number from memory, glancing over her shoulder once or twice to check no one was watching her.

Taking a breath, she paused for a moment as if debating with herself one last time, then hit the Call button. There was a click, then a faint buzz as the encrypted line was connected.

'What do you have for me, Samantha?' a familiar voice asked.

'It's on,' she said quietly. 'We leave for Libya tomorrow.'

'Excellent. And I can expect the operational details soon, right?'

McKnight's jaw tightened. She hated every moment of this. 'I'll send them to you when I can, but it's not easy. If they suspect me, it's over.'

Silence for a moment or two. 'Not losing your nerve, are you?'

'You brought me in to do a job. Let me do it, my way.'

She heard a faint chuckle of amusement on the other end. 'Well, the kitten has claws, I see. Just be careful where you point them, Samantha. Wouldn't want to see all your hard work be for nothing.' Marcus Cain let that threat hang in the air for a moment. 'Keep me updated. Out.'

With that, the line went dead.