The First Commandment (31 page)

Though Harvath was traveling on his German passport as Hans Brauner and could go anywhere in the world he wanted, he had been marked a traitor, which made him a man without a country, and what was worse, he had absolutely no idea where he should be going.

In Roussard’s twisted countdown, the Bucket of Blood might have been meant for the final two plagues, but Harvath doubted it. He had a very bad feeling there was still one attack to go, and that it would represent the plague in which the waters were turned to blood.

Harvath tried to run through all of the people he knew who lived on or near water. He had grown up in California, spent a significant amount of time in the Navy, and lived on the East Coast for the last several years; the list was long. It was so long, in fact, that Harvath couldn’t keep track of all the names inside his head and had to find a pen and paper to write them all down.

It was a hopeless task. There was no telling where Roussard was going to strike next. The U. S. Ski Team facility in Park City and the Bucket of Blood in Virginia Beach were almost as random as Carolyn Leonard, Kate Palmer, Emily Hawkins, and his dog. They were all significant to him, but they were not people or places he would ever have anticipated being attacked.

After the jet had made its descent into Houston ’s Intercontinental Airport and Harvath had made his way through passport control and customs, he proceeded to the private aviation business center.

The first thing he did, after building his layers of proxy servers, was to plug in his ear bud and make hospital calls. Finney’s security teams were still in place and Harvath spoke with their captains. Ron Parker had updated each of them on the failed attack in Virginia Beach.

As a precaution, the team watching Harvath’s mother had her moved to another room, which didn’t face the street. From a car bomb perspective, Tracy was already protected.

Harvath spoke with her father, who told him that they had run additional tests and the results weren’t good. The new EEG suggested further decreased brain activity, and they had been attempting to wean her off the ventilator without any luck. Tracy was still not able to breathe on her own. There was a double downside to that, as not only could she not breathe on her own, but as long as she was on a ventilator there was still no way to conduct a full MRI to look for the exact cause of her coma and the true extent of the damage.

There was a tone of fatalism in Bill Hastings’s voice that Harvath didn’t like. “This is not what Tracy would have wanted,” he said. “All these tubes and wires. The ventilator. Remember Terri Schiavo?” Bill asked. “We had talked about her once, and Tracy told us she would never want to live like that.”

Bill and Barbara Hastings were Tracy’s parents and her next of kin, so that gave them the power to make medical decisions on Tracy’s behalf, but it sounded as if they were considering throwing in the towel.

As long as Tracy was alive, there was still hope that she might pull through, and Harvath told them so.

Bill Hastings was not as optimistic. “If you’d spoken to the doctors, Scot. The neurologists. If you’d heard what they had to say, you might feel differently.”

The man didn’t have to say it. Harvath knew he and his wife were seriously considering removing their daughter from life support. He asked them not to do anything until he could come back and be there. It seemed like a reasonable request. Though he and Tracy hadn’t been together long, their relationship was intensely close and committed.

The elder Hastings ’s response took Harvath completely off-guard. “Scot, you’re a good man. We know you cared for Tracy, but Barbara and I feel this is a family decision.”

Cared?
They were talking about her as if she were already dead. Immediately, Harvath knew what he had to do. He’d find a way to get into the hospital without being apprehended. He had to. He had to be with Tracy and more important, he needed to speak with Tracy ’s father, man-to-man.

Harvath was ready to alert his pilots to file a flight plan for D. C. when an email appeared in his gmail account that changed everything.

Claudia had found a judge with a real thing against terrorists who used Swiss bank accounts to fund their actions. The judge moved quickly, granting Claudia everything she asked for.

Attached to the email was a transaction history for the Wegelin amp; Company account. Harvath scanned through it, paying close attention to activity that had taken place subsequent to the night Adara Nidal was supposedly killed. One of the first things he noticed was a series of payments to something called the Dei Glicini e Ulivella in Florence.

Harvath did a Google search and discovered that Dei Glicini e Ulivella was an exclusive private hospital. It had an elite plastic surgery team billed as “one of the best” in Europe. Among their many specialties was the treatment of severe burn victims, including reconstructive surgery, rehabilitation, and recuperation.

He didn’t know how she had done it, but Adara Nidal had somehow survived. She had not only managed to get away from the scene of the explosion, but she had also managed to get to someone inside the Italian law enforcement apparatus to sign off on one of the charred corpses from the scene as being hers. It was an elaborate vanishing act, but she had done it. Harvath didn’t want to believe it, but the proof was right in front of his face, and he had learned a long time ago not to underestimate any of the terrorists he went up against.

Skipping ahead to the most recent transactions, he came to something even more troubling. Shortly before each of the attacks, money had been transferred to a nearby bank. Harvath scanned the list and ticked off the dates and locations of all the attacks so far-Bank of America in Washington, D. C.; California Bank amp; Trust in San Diego; Wells Fargo Bank in Salt Lake City, Utah; Washington Mutual Bank in McLean, Virginia; Chase Bank in Hillsboro, Virginia; First Coastal Bank in Virginia Beach, Virginia; and finally, U. S. Bank in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin.

As the pilots were filing their flight plan and readying the plane for takeoff, Harvath contacted Ron Parker and gave him instructions to overnight the items he’d left at Elk Mountain to the Abbey Resort in Fontana, Wisconsin.

After Parker took down the information, he asked Harvath how much longer Finney’s jet and its two pilots had to remain in Zurich. Finney had an important guest for whom he needed the plane and its crew.

Harvath told Parker to thank Finney again on his behalf and to assure him that he wouldn’t need it too much longer.

It had all been part of that second favor he’d asked Claudia for. When Kevin McCauliff had sent Harvath a follow-up email from outside the NGA with additional details he’d pulled about Wegelin amp; Company’s being the source of the money routed to Brazil, he’d included a warning. Though he couldn’t prove it, he had a sense that both his phone and his work computer were being monitored and suggested Harvath be on his guard.

From that email, Harvath had devised a plan of how to be in two places at once and how to make it work to his advantage.

His country club chat with Jim Vaile, the director of the Central Intelligence, notwithstanding, he had no illusions about what would happen to him the next time Morrell and his team caught up with him.

At best, they’d take him back into custody, and if that happened, Harvath knew Morrell’s men would see to it that he didn’t escape. And at worst, one of Morrell’s people would put a bullet in him.

Either would remove him from the game and give Roussard an open field to finish his rampage. Harvath couldn’t let that happen. As far as he could see, he was the only chance the people in his life had. The president was mired in gridlock and regardless of his promises to the contrary, wasn’t capable of stopping Roussard.

Morrell and his people were good, and Harvath was tired of looking over his shoulder for them. They needed to be drawn off-guard and taken out of play. That was why Harvath had gotten Tim Finney to send his empty jet to Zurich.

Harvath knew the FAA would be monitoring the jet’s flight plans. After Kevin McCauliff’s word of caution it seemed like the only way to go. If Morrell and his team knew about the Wegelin amp; Company account, and if they saw Finney’s jet heading for Zurich, it might be enough to make them believe Harvath was on it.

To make the bait even more attractive, Harvath had Claudia register him at a Zurich hotel under one of his DHS aliases, and the Troll established an electronic credit card trail around the city that would all but confirm his presence. While his professional aliases were in no way public knowledge, he was confident that Morrell and his people would be looking for him to pop on the grid with one of them. It was exactly what he would do in their place.

The idea was to lure Morrell and his team to the hotel where Claudia’s husband, Horst, and his tactical team would be waiting to take them into custody.

Claudia had assured him that under Switzerland ’s rigid antiterrorism laws, if any of Morrell’s men were carrying weapons of any kind, she could hold them for quite some time before actually filing any charges. The only hitch was that she had to catch them first.

CAMP PEARY, VIRGINIA

Rick Morrell didn’t like any of it. It had fallen right into his lap. It was too sloppy, especially for a guy like Harvath, and that’s why he decided to pull the plug.

Standing his team down, he put up with all their bullshit complaints as he had them unload the plane and stack their gear back in the two trucks they had used to drive out to the CIA’s private airstrip.

“I still don’t get it,” said Mike Raymond as they passed the final checkpoint and headed toward the highway. “It’s almost like you don’t want to catch this guy.”

“If that’s what you believe then you are just as stupid as Harvath thinks you are,” replied Morrell.

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about Harvath completely disappearing from the grid. Nobody sees him, nobody hears from him, and then suddenly,
whammo,
he pops back up.”

“Correction,” stated Raymond. “Suddenly he gets
in contact
with someone the NSA
already
has under surveillance. That’s how we got our lead.”

Morrell looked at his subordinate and realized he was going to have to connect the rest of the dots for him. “And it doesn’t bother you that McCauliff started back scrubbing all of his data trails and had the DOD do a pickup sweep on all his phone lines? He might not have known when he was talking to Harvath that someone was peeping on him, but he figured it out pretty fast.”

“You’re paranoid. Even if McCauliff did know about it, it didn’t change the nature of the intel he gave Harvath.”

“Meaning?” asked Morrell.

“Meaning Harvath has been off the grid because he went to ground. It wasn’t until he got something actionable that he popped back up.”

“And the fact that he popped back up using one of his known DHS aliases and a credit card doesn’t bother you?”

Mike Raymond shrugged his shoulders. “ Switzerland is fucking expensive. Show me one hotel that doesn’t expect you to present a credit card upon check-in.”

“How about a hostel?” offered Morrell. “Or a
Gästezimmer
in a private house? He could use a campground. He could even pick up some unwitting woman and shack up at her place. This is tradecraft 101.”

“Sure, maybe, but-”

“He knows we’re watching his buddy Finney’s aircraft,” said Morrell, plowing on, “yet he’d use it anyway to go to Zurich? I don’t buy it. It’s too good a trail.”

“So just like that you pull the plug?”

“Listen, Harvath’s problem has always been that he thinks he’s smarter than everyone else. You read his jacket yourself.”

“We all read his jacket, but what if Harvath set this all up because he knew you’d react this way.”

Morrell smiled. “He’s smart, but he’s not that smart.”

Raymond shook his head. “Either way, it probably doesn’t make much difference. Even if he was in Zurich, he’s already got a head start on us. We could make the trip only to discover he’s already long gone.”

“That’s also one of the reasons I changed my mind.”

“But what if you’re wrong?”

“And Harvath really is in Zurich?” asked Morrell.

Raymond nodded.

“If Finney’s plane wasn’t a decoy and Harvath was dumb enough to use it, we can still track it. Let’s wait and see what happens.”

“What about the hotel Harvath supposedly registered at?”

“I’ve already got that covered.”

“Are you going to use an agency person from our embassy over there?” asked Raymond.

“No. The DCI was very clear. This needs to be kept absolutely quiet. I’ve got a friend; an ex-DOJ guy who retired and moved over to Copenhagen. He can go in and check things out for us.”

“You mean that book dealer? Malone?”

“Yeah, he owes me a favor. He can be in Zurich in a few hours,” replied Morrell.

“And you trust him?”

“Completely. He’s a smart guy. He knows what he’s doing.”

Raymond looked at Morrell. “And what if Malone calls and says Harvath really is in Zurich?”

Morrell scoffed. “We’ll jump off that bridge when we come to it. Personally, I think we’ve got a much better chance of Harvath turning up here in the States than we do overseas.”

“I hope you’re right.”

“Trust me,” replied Morrell. “When it comes to Harvath, I know exactly what I’m talking about.”

FONTANA, WISCONSIN

Known as the “ Hamptons of the Midwest,” Geneva Lake and the handful of resort towns and villages that surrounded its crystal-clear, spring-fed waters were a vacationer’s paradise. There was boating, sailing, swimming, hiking, fishing, shopping, and amazing golf.

Thirty-six holes plus lunch was what Harvath offered his pilots when he booked them into the Abbey Resort along with himself and asked if he could have use of their rental car in exchange.

The pilots were more than happy to comply. While they had an okay per diem, the sitting around and waiting for a client part of their jobs was normally the worst part. They didn’t always get to stay in a resort of the Abbey’s caliber and get thirty-six holes of golf and lunch to boot.

The arrangement worked out well for Harvath too. He didn’t want to let anyone know where he was, and if he used his real ID or credit cards, anyone who was looking for him would instantly know where he was. And as useful as the Hans Brauner alias was, it didn’t come with a driving permit.

Of course Harvath could have stolen a car, but in such a small community that was something he would have done only if he were desperate.

Meg’s wedding and reception were the day after tomorrow and were to be held at the Lake Geneva Country Club. The club, or LGCC as it was commonly called, sat on the southeastern shore of the lake. It was an idyllic setting for a wedding.

What Harvath couldn’t figure out, though, was how Roussard was going to spin the last plague and cause the waters to run red with blood. With the president in attendance, security was going to be beyond tight. In fact, no matter how badly Harvath wanted to go take a look at LGCC and the security the Secret Service had put in place, he knew it was pointless. He’d been a presidential advance team leader. The club would be locked up tighter than Fort Knox.

Even coming in via the water was out of the question. As boring a job as it was standing guard over a location in advance of a presidential visit, the local, state, and federal law enforcement officers who would be there right now would be taking their jobs very seriously. No one ever wanted to have something happen to the president, especially on their watch. Harvath knew that firsthand, and he knew it the hard way, because it had happened to him once.

The more Harvath had thought about it, the more targeting Meg’s wedding made sense. Roussard would get a lot of bang for his buck. Not only could he gain international fame and notoriety for the attack, but the killer could also harm additional people who were very significant to Harvath. There had to be something Harvath could do to stop him.

But first, he had to understand what his play was for Lake Geneva and Meg’s wedding. Did he have access to extra muscle? And just as important, as this was the final plague and seemed to involve the president as well, would his mother, Adara, show?

With payments recently made from her account in Switzerland to the private burn treatment hospital in Italy, Harvath doubted it. If Adara were up to it, she would have been the one hunting him, not her son. Harvath and Adara would have their final dance soon enough, but before that, he needed to stop Roussard once and for all.

The basic questions of
what, why, where, when,
and
how
ran through Harvath’s mind as he tried to fit the pieces together.

The
what
was the attack itself. The
why
was something Harvath had tried to understand but couldn’t, at least not one hundred percent. Adara Nidal wanted revenge for Harvath’s thwarting her plans to ignite a Muslim holy war with Israel, and she was using her son to exact that revenge. That was the best Harvath could make of it.

The
where
was the Lake Geneva Country Club and the
when
was sometime during Meg’s wedding or reception. Her nuptials were set to be one of the social events of the year. Her guest list undoubtedly read like a Who’s Who of Chicago elite. The wealthy, the beautiful, and the powerful would all be there. On top of that, both the mayor of Chicago and the president of the United States would be in attendance. If it was successful, Roussard’s attack would make headlines and be felt around the world.

Harvath had four out of five criteria for stopping Roussard’s attack figured out. He had the what, a good chunk of the why, as well as the where and when. All he needed now was to uncover the
how.