The Invisible

lifted his voice to get the attention of everyone present. Strangely enough, he found success where the president had not, and once it was quiet enough, he said,

“The word is coming in from air traffic control at Bagram. Eagles 1 and 2 report they are still ten minutes out.”

The room fell silent for a moment; everyone present, even the most junior aides, understood what that meant. In the end, it took an army colonel standing frozen with a phone to her ear, not 3 feet from the grim-faced secretary of defense, to voice what everyone in the room was thinking. “Christ,” she murmured. “They’re not going to get there in time.”

Harper silently agreed as he stared at the heat signatures moving into the field. He had never felt more impotent. There was nothing he could do but watch as disaster loomed. He could only pray that the separate signatures would not converge, but even as he thought it, he knew that they would. The only question now was how the men on the ground would handle the unexpected change in plan. Shaheed was sure he had heard the American go down, but he wasn’t taking any chances. He waited for a moment, listening, but he couldn’t hear anything over the falling rain, the tanks in the distance, and the outraged screams of the Algerian at the top of the hill. Cursing the man’s stupidity—the general should never have brought him into this— Shaheed slapped a fresh magazine into his weapon and began moving forward slowly, each step planned and deliberate. He swept the ground with his eyes, searching for a lump that might represent the doctor’s body. He kept his right hand around the grip of his rifle as he used his left to brush aside the damp, waist-high grass. As his eyes started to acclimate to the dark, he picked up a few things he hadn’t seen before. There was a pine tree approximately 10 meters to his right, and to his left, nearly within reach of his arm, there was a small, low-lying shrub.

And beneath the shrub, he could see something that looked like a rock, or maybe a log. Shaheed hesitated. He was almost certain the American had fallen farther to the right, close to the pine, but as he stared at the dark shape beneath the vegetation, he could have sworn he saw it move. . . .

As the guard was firing his last barrage at the fleeing man, Kealey had taken advantage of the noise to adjust his stance. He’d planted his left hand in the damp soil and brought his right leg under him, wedging his foot against a large, partially buried rock. If he had to use it, the rock would serve as a starting block of sorts. It was all he could do without revealing his position, but it would give him a chance to move quickly and decisively if the guard stumbled over him. Right now, things were not looking too good. He knew he had to call in and tell Harper what had happened—the situation had changed drastically, and the helicopters might be forced to turn back—but it just wasn’t possible, and he could see the other operatives in his mind’s eye, swearing under their breath, wondering if they should take the shot.

Don’t do it, Kealey thought, hoping they could somehow hear his silent, urgent plea.Don’t fire. Just let him go. He doesn’t know I’m here. Just let him walk on by. . . . It wasn’t going to happen; Kealey sensed as much in the last crucial seconds. As the guard drifted past the juniper, he seemed to hesitate. With his head turned to the left, Kealey could see the outline of the man’s head, and he could tell from the profile that the guard was looking in his direction. Then he turned, took a few steps forward, and reached down with his left hand, his splayed fingers moving directly for Kealey’s left shoulder. . . . When he saw the contact coming, Kealey’s mind shut down, and his body took over. Operating on pure instinct, he launched himself up and batted the rifle aside with his left hand, pushing the muzzle away from his body. At the same time, he whipped the knife around in a short, controlled arc, plunging the blade deep into the guard’s neck, directly beneath the hinge of his jaw.

Even in the dark, Kealey could see the man’s reaction. His head jerked back and to the right, partly from the impact and partly in an effort to pull away from the knife. Blood and spit sprayed out of his mouth as the tip of the blade delved into his opposite cheek. His face tightened into a grimace, and his mouth fell open, his partially severed tongue protruding between bloodied teeth. He was obviously trying to scream, but all that came out was a wet, guttural hiss. He dropped the rifle and lifted his hands to grip Kealey’s right arm. It was a completely instinctive reaction, but there was nothing he could do; the damage was already done, and the wound was fatal. The guard just didn’t know it yet.

The knife was buried up to the hilt, and Kealey had to pull hard to extract it. The man automatically started to fall, and Kealey followed him down. He landed hard on his back, and Kealey was on top of him in an instant, ready to finish the job. As the man stared up at him, his face contorted with rage, pain, and fear, Kealey drew the knife firmly across his throat, severing the trachea, the carotid artery, and the connecting muscle tissue with one deep, powerful cut. Blood sprayed out of the wound immediately, splashing onto Kealey’s face, arms, and hands, but he repeated the process, then did it again, determined to extinguish the stubborn light in the other man’s eyes. Once he was sure the guard was dead, the strange ringing noise in his ears began to subside, and gradually, he picked up on the traffic coming over his earpiece.

“Ryan, are you there?” It was Owen, his tone controlled but urgent. “Goddamn it. What the fuck just happened? Where’s the hostage . . . ?”

“He’s down,” Kealey rasped. The short, one-sided fight had left him breathless, though the adrenaline was still pumping hard through his veins. He rolled off the dead guard, crawled the short distance to his hiding spot, and felt for his rifle. It was right where he’d left it, in the lowest branches of the juniper. “The hostage is dead, and so is the guard.”

“How the fuck did that happen?” Owen demanded. “Why did you . . .”

Kealey ignored the rest of the question as he planted his right knee in the sodden earth, lifting the rifle to his shoulder. Peering through the scope, he saw that the guards—all eight of them—were fanning out, preparing to enter the field. The figures were blurred for some reason, and Kealey realized he had blood in his eyes. Wiping it away with the back of his hand, he flicked it into the grass, then resumed watching. One of them had a portable radio up by his face; clearly, he was trying to raise the missing guard. There was no sign of Benazir Mengal—Kealey assumed he was still in the barn—but the Algerian was standing behind the cluster of armed men, screaming incessantly after them.

“The guards are coming in,” Massi said, almost as if he could read Kealey’s thoughts. The air force veteran sounded completely calm and in control. “Looks like we’re missing a few.”

“I count eight,” Kealey said. He thought back to the detailed notes that he had acquired from Fahim’s men. “Eight plus Saifi. Mengal’s in the barn . . . That leaves at least two unaccounted for.”

“So what the hell do we do?” Manik demanded. He sounded shaken, which didn’t surprise Kealey at all. While Massi was a hardened combat veteran, Manik was on the other end of the spectrum. He had undergone some kind of paramilitary training—otherwise, Harper wouldn’t have sent him—but he was easily the least experienced man in the group. Kealey was torn. A hostage was dead, and he had killed a guard, which dramatically limited their options. The op was blown regardless, but now he had a decision to make. Should he violate standing orders and go in after Fitzgerald, or should he wait and hope that the guard wasn’t found until the assault team arrived? That didn’t seem likely, as the assaulters were at least . . . He checked his watch and swore under his breath. They were at least eight minutes out. Part of him fantasized that he could already hear the sound of rotors chopping the damp, humid air, but he knew all too well how long eight minutes could seem in a combat situation.

A third option occurred to him: he could put the knife in the hostage’s hand. With any luck, the guards would buy into it, but Kealey dismissed the idea after a few seconds. They would never believe it. For one thing, the dead guard had suffered numerous wellplaced wounds. How would the hostage have been able to inflict those wounds if he was already fatally wounded himself? Besides, how would the hostage have gotten his hands on a knife like the one Kealey had used? Even if the guards bought into it, Mengal would see through the ruse. He would know right away that something wasn’t right, and he would either flee the farmhouse, with Fitzgerald in tow, or kill her on-site, then flee by himself.

And that was what it came down to; if they waited for the assault force, the secretary of state was either dead or gone. In Kealey’s mind, neither option was acceptable. They had to go in after her, and they had to do it before the dead guard was found. Once that happened, they would lose the element of surprise, and their odds of success would drop dramatically. Worse still, one of the Pave Lows was slated to set down in the field behind the house, and it wouldn’t help to have the enemy on top of them before the ramp even came down.

Once again, Aaron Massi seemed to read his mind. “We’ve got to go in,” the former combat controller said, his words cutting over the static. “They’re going to comb this field until they find him, and in the process, they’re bound to stumble over one of us. We’ve got to fire while they’re still grouped in the clear.”