Thriller (60 page)

when something caught his eye and caused him to back up. In

the middle of the kitchen floor was a trapdoor standing wide

open. After double-checking the SureFire flashlight mounted to

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his rifle, Harvath swept into the kitchen and made his way down

the stone steps beneath the trapdoor.

The steps led him into a low-ceilinged, rough-hewn corridor

illuminated by a string of bare bulbs. From what he could tell, a

generator somewhere at the end of the corridor was powering

the lights.

Harvath hated tunnels. They provided little cover and had a

rather undesirable propensity for funneling enemy fire right at you.

Hugging the wall, he made his way toward a fissure of some

sort at the end of the corridor. He was now well beyond the

grounds of the villa above and could smell saltwater from somewhere off in the distance.

He entered the fissure and had to crouch to make it through,

but when he emerged thirty-five meters later he found himself

in a brightly illuminated grotto with a narrow strip of sandy

beach. Upon it were parked two heavily armed, high-end Farallon DPVs, or Diver Propulsion Vehicles. The lingering doubts

Harvath had harbored about Papandreou’s innocence were beginning to melt away.

From the far end of the beach, a flash of sparks and a highpitched, grinding whine caught Harvath’s attention. A figure

dressed in black was using what appeared to be a circular saw to

carve into a metal canister propped between two large rocks. Harvath’s instinct was to call in what he was seeing to Washington,

but he had lost all radio contact the minute he had entered the

first subterranean passage.

A million questions raced through his mind, the answers to

which appeared to be on the beach.

Harvath found a narrow footpath and carefully picked his

way down, never once taking his eyes off the figure so intent

upon opening the metal canister wedged between the rocks.

When his feet hit the sand, Harvath moved forward as silently

as a shadow.

With sparks flying and the grinding of metal upon metal, the

black-clad figure never noticed Harvath’s approach. When the

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suppressor of Harvath’s SR25 was pressed up against the back of

the man’s wet suit, he let the saw fall to the ground.

Harvath told the man to turn around slowly, and when he did,

Harvath was rendered nearly speechless. “Ambassador Avery,” he

stated. “I don’t understand. I thought you were dead.”

An aura of shock was replaced by one of dignity and power

as the silver-haired ambassador replied, “Obviously I’m not. Who

the hell are you?”

“My name’s Harvath. I was tasked by the Pentagon to find your

killers.”

“The Pentagon? They couldn’t find their ass with both hands.

I suppose you’ve also been tasked with retrieving the device.”

There was something about looking into the eyes of a dead man

that caused Harvath to mentally pull back and play it dumb until

he could get a handle on what was going on. “The
device,
sir?”

“Don’t bullshit me,” commanded Avery. “That’s what this is all

about. Put your weapon down and give me a hand. We haven’t

got much time.”

“Where’s Papandreou?”

Avery was silent and so Harvath repeated, “Where is Papandreou, sir?”

“Somebody took him for a swim,” said the ambassador, motioning over his shoulder toward the water. “I don’t think he’s

coming back any time soon.”

Harvath looked to where the beach dropped off into the deep

water of the grotto. Several feet below the surface he could make

out the shape of a man wrapped multiple times in what looked

like heavy anchor chain. Pieces of the puzzle were starting to fall

into place.

“And Nomikos?” asked Harvath. “Let me guess. Someone was

just trying to help him clear the wax out of one of his ears.”

“Who cares? They were both 21 August. All that matters now

is that we get the device out of here ASAP.”

The hair on the back of Harvath’s neck was standing up. He

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didn’t like this. Steadying his SR25 on the center of the ambassador’s

chest, he ordered, “Get your hands up where I can see them.”

“What the hell are you doing?”

“Taking you into custody.”

“No, you’re not. I’ve got an assignment to complete. If you get

in my way and fuck this up, I’ll make sure you burn for it.”

“Just the way you did in Athens?”

The ambassador fell silent and the only sound that could be

heard throughout the grotto was the steady hum of the generator.

“I ought to put a bullet in you right here,” continued Harvath,

his mind rapidly cobbling together a picture of what must have

happened. “Good men on your detail died. And for what? Money?”

“Lots of money,” came a voice from behind. “Twenty-five million and counting.”

Harvath turned to see the head of the ambassador’s security

detail, the agent known as Point Guard. In his hands he carried

a fully automatic French FA-MAS with a heat shield over the barrel. The man was enormous—almost twice Harvath’s size and

was wearing an Infrared reduction suit.

Though he didn’t mean to, Harvath laughed.

“What’s so funny?” demanded Point Guard.

“I was just thinking of that old joke about the difference be tween a BMW and a porcupine, except in the case of you and the

ambassador, this time the pricks actually
were
on the outside.”

Point Guard stepped up to Harvath and wiped the smile off

his face with a butt stroke from the MAS across his jaw.

Harvath saw stars and fell to one knee.

“We’ve all gotta do what we’ve all gotta do,” said the ambassador as he stripped Harvath of his weapons and equipment and

tossed them into the water.

“And in your case,” added Point Guard as he kept him covered, “you’ve gotta join Mr. Papandreou for a little swim.”

Harvath spat a gob of blood from his mouth and said, “Probably not a good idea. I just ate before I got here.”

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“Very funny, wiseass.”

“Why don’t you tell me how long you’ve been working for 21

August.”

The ambassador smiled. “We don’t work for them. They work

for us. Our associate, Mr. Papandreou, screwed up very bad a

while back and we offered not to turn him in if he would be our

eyes and ears inside the organization.”

“Did the State Department or CIA know about this?”

“Of course not, Papandreou was too valuable an asset to be

shared.”

“And he used his friendship with Nomikos to steal the device?”

“Yes, but Nomikos was no angel. He was the chairman of 21

August.”

Harvath was stunned.

“Papandreou had suspected for quite some time that his cover

within the organization was blown,” continued Avery. “He knew

that they were going to come for him eventually. In fact, I suspect that was why Nomikos showed up here tonight. Looking

back on it, we probably should have done away with Papandreou

much sooner and gotten out of the country, but we had other

loose ends to tie up and hindsight is always twenty-twenty.”

“So you and Papandreou put this plan together yourselves?

The hit on your detail, your car?”

“We threw a couple of bodies in the car,” replied Point Guard,

“swapped out our dental records and then firebombed them so

only the bullets would survive to tell the tale.”

Harvath had to hand it to them. “And the entire trail led right

back to 21 August. You skated with the money
and
the device,

ready to start a new life anywhere you choose.”

“Precisely,” replied Point Guard.

“And the Jordanian buyer?”

“Will be meeting us in a hotel on Sicily in three days,” said

Avery, “so I’m sure you can appreciate that we need to get on with

our business.”

As Point Guard grabbed a length of anchor chain from a

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nearby pallet and began to approach, Harvath tried to stall for

more time. “So that’s it? Papandreou double-crosses Nomikos

and 21 August, after which you double-cross him, and your

country, then fake your deaths and make off to sell the device to

some character who is very likely to be an enemy of the United

States?”

“Well said,” replied the ambassador as he accepted Point

Guard’s assault rifle so the man could bind Harvath with the

heavy chain.

Harvath made a move to take Point Guard’s legs out from

under him and get control of his sidearm, but he wasn’t fast

enough. Point Guard dodged left and brought an elbow crashing down into Harvath’s temple, causing him once again to see

stars. As he fell to the ground, he felt clumps of sand between

his fingers made moist not from seawater but from the blood running from his mouth.

Point Guard worked quickly, wrapping the anchor chain

around Harvath’s wrists and ankles and then began half dragging,

half carrying him into the grotto’s saltwater pool. All Harvath

could think about was staying alive, but no matter how hard he

struggled he couldn’t get free.

As Harvath felt the bottom dropping away beneath the bigger man’s feet, he knew that any moment now he was going to

be let go.

Drowning seemed like one of the most ignoble deaths a SEAL

could face and yet that was exactly what was rushing headlong

to meet him.

Harvath summoned all of his strength and tried for one more

major contortion of his body. If nothing else, maybe he could get

a hold of the sick son of a bitch who was about to drown him

and take him down, too.

He counted to three and then as fast and as hard as he could

rolled his shoulders forward, his hands grasping for any item of

his killer’s clothing. As he did, there was a
snap
, followed by a

searing pain in his upper arm. Somewhere in the back of his

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mind, something told him he had just torn something very serious, but he didn’t care. All that mattered was staying alive.

Harvath tried again, struggling with all of his might to break

free, and then heard another
snap
. A second later, blood began

to drip into his eyes. As he looked up, he saw something bracing his killer’s throat and blood pouring out all over. It was only

a quick snapshot and before Harvath knew what had happened,

the powerful hands that had been dragging him deeper into the

water let go.

In an instant, the heavy chain pulled him to the bottom. It happened so quickly he had barely enough time to fill his lungs with

air. He tried desperately to locate the upward slope and inchworm his way back to the beach, but it was no use. The sand was

too soft—each time he moved he only dug himself in deeper.

His chest felt like it was pinned beneath a thousand tons of

concrete. Every fiber of his body was screaming for oxygen. His

vision was dimming at the edges and he knew it was only going

to be a few seconds before his mouth automatically opened in

one final, desperate attempt at life and his lungs sucked in a

hopeless quest for air.

Harvath prepared himself for the end and as he did, he felt

something strange bump his back. It felt distinctly like the nose

of a shark, which shouldn’t have come as any surprise since the

grotto most likely opened up onto the sea.

The bump came again, followed by another. Soon, he felt himself being pulled away. He strained to see the animal, but his vision was almost black and the water was filled with blood.

The great beast propelled him forward and he had the eerie

sensation of breaking the surface. Immediately, he was jolted by

a heavy impact followed by a searing pain in the same spot in

his upper arm where he had felt a similar pain moments ago. A

popping sound that reminded him of gunfire, but which he knew

were actually teeth snapping bone came next and Harvath told

himself it would all be over soon. Finally, there was quiet. Deep,

cold,
the end is finally here
quiet.

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It was at that moment that Harvath’s eyes shot open and he began

sucking in hot, greedy gasps of air. Thrashing in the shallow water,

he looked to his left and swung to his right, trying to find the shark.

“Easy,” said a voice from above as a pair of weathered hands

began unwinding the chain from around his wrists and ankles.

Harvath looked up and saw the face of Ben Metaxas. “Ben,

what the—”

“Careful, my friend, don’t move,” he said.

“Why? What’s going on?”

“I’m not as good a shot as Yannis, I’m afraid.”

Harvath didn’t understand. “What are you talking about?”

“Your arm,” said Ben.

Looking down at his arm, Harvath saw a long metal shaft and

realized what had pierced the throat of his killer—a speargun.

Harvath’s own wound was almost as serious. The spear had gone

straight through his left bicep and almost punctured his rib cage.

“It was very difficult pulling you out of the water.”

“But how did you get here?”

Ben held up his mask and swim fins. “There was another boat

offshore. We saw a man bringing out supplies from inside this

cave. When we couldn’t reach you on the radio, we decided to

take a look.”

Harvath remembered the ambassador. “The other man. What