IN THE face of the constant peppering fire, Jack calmed himself, closed his eyes, and imagined the terrain as a three-dimensional puzzle. The steep falloff to the right meant that Xhafa’s soldiers must be up in the trees in order to fire on them. They had the advantage of elevation, but it also meant that they were essentially immobile, unlike the men on the left, who seemed to be moving closer.
Then he understood: The trap wasn’t a classic pincers maneuver, but a herd-and-kill mission. The object for the contingent on their left was to force the enemy to retreat down the slope where they could be picked off by the snipers in the trees.
The firing from the left was louder now, proof that his theory was correct. Jack knew he had little time to act. But before he could do anything, he heard an infernal whooshing and, to his right, the shock wave from an explosion rolling him across the ground away from where Alli was hiding. A fireball rose into the night sky as the fired rocket detonated, and Jack, cursing under his breath, thought,
Then the night was lit up by another explosion, this one smaller, but much closer. Xhafa’s men must have tossed a grenade in counterattack.
Crawling on his stomach, Jack snaked his way to the clump of underbrush and told Alli to hold her ground.
“What? I can’t hear you.”
He read her lips because the ringing in his ears made voice communication impossible.
He gestured and pointed emphatically. “Stay put. I’m going to find Paull,” he mouthed.
Alli began to crawl out. “I’m going with you.” When he began to protest, she put her lips against his ear. “What if you get lost or, worse, pinned down and can’t get back here?”
After a moment’s hesitation, he gestured, and together they eeled their way along the rocky ground. The volleying gunfire assaulted them as their hearing came back. Xhafa’s men were trying their best to mow down the man who had fired the rocket at them.
Jack stopped them in the lee of a large boulder. He had caught a glimpse of movement just ahead and suspected they were near Paull’s position.
“Dennis is less than ten yards from here,” he said into Alli’s ear. “Stay put and I’ll be right back with him.” He gave her a tight smile. “From this distance I can’t get lost.” He handed her his assault rifle and took out a Sig Sauer. “Whatever you do, don’t fire your weapon. I don’t want them to know we’re here.”
She nodded, and, rounding the boulder, he slithered off. He found himself on a slight incline, which made the going tougher. On the other hand, there was plenty of cover to conceal his movement. Halfway there, a break in the firing caused him to freeze. For a moment, he wondered whether Paull had been killed. Then the firing began again and he pressed on.
Just ahead of him was the ridge beyond which, from his previous vantage point, he’d spotted Paull. Now, however, he could not see over the ridge; he was effectively blind to what was happening, a particularly dangerous position to be in. He scrambled up to the lip of the ridge and cautiously peered over. This was met with a volley of fire that almost took the top of his head off.
Ducking back down, he took a look around. To his left, the topography rose steeply, to his right, it fell off. He needed to go left in order to surmount the ridge, but a problem presented itself. There was far less cover in that direction. In fact, there were several spots made bald by small rock slides. They weren’t large. Nevertheless, they presented danger zones; crossing them would leave him totally unprotected.
Moving off to his left, he picked up a couple of rocks the size of his fist. As he came upon the first rockfall, he launched the first rock at a boulder off to his right. As it struck, he dived across the rocky ground, hearing a short volley of semiautomatic fire spang off the boulder.
He continued his climb past the far side of the rockfall. He could see the second. It was larger than the first, and flatter, which made it more dangerous still, like traversing a frozen lake with snipers in the surrounding trees.
This time, he threw the rock to his left, into the tops of the trees. As they shook and swayed, and more fire sprayed in that direction, he dashed across the open space. Just as he dived into the underbrush at the far side, a shot whizzed over his back. He rolled up onto the ridge and slid down the other side, all in one motion.
Silence now. Xhafa’s men knew where he had been a moment ago; it would not take them long to vector in new coordinates. His best option now was to move and keep moving. On elbows and knees, he snaked through the understory, grateful for the web of tree branches over his head. Once he got to Paull, he’d have to find another way back to where Alli waited; he’d been lucky, but the two of them couldn’t afford to expose themselves via the same path.
It was very quiet. No firing from either side, but there were also no bird sounds, which meant that Xhafa’s men were on the move, presumably heading toward where he had last been spotted; to assume otherwise was foolhardy. The silence made any movement more perilous. All he needed to do was crack a branch underfoot to bring the guerillas on the run.
A fitful breeze stirred the treetops, but the sky was entirely occluded by the branches. Darkness hung in the air like eternal twilight. There were no shadows. Jack brought his head up to get his bearings. From where he lay he could see where he’d spotted Dennis. It was possible that Paull had moved from there, but it was just as likely he’d hunkered down, waiting to make his break. Jack strongly suspected this was what Xhafa’s men were waiting for— the moment he showed himself their gunfire would tear him to ribbons. He had to get to his friend first.
Rolling across the ground in deep shade, he inched his way forward until he could get a better look at where Paull might be holed up. Just ahead was a trio of huge trees.
Jack moved slightly, and now he saw Paull, crouched in the center of the space between the trees. He’d hacked down some of the surrounding underbrush, building himself a makeshift camouflaged hidey-hole. Jack could see him because of his angle and ground-level perspective.
As he stole closer, Paull stirred.
“Dennis, it’s me,” Jack whispered.
Paull froze. “Jack?”
“I’ve come to get you out of here.”
There was a small silence. “I fucked up, Jack.”
“Don’t expect me to say I told you so.”
“Ha-ha,” Paull said without a hint of mirth.
Jack extended his left arm. “Let’s go. On your belly. I’ll cover you.”
As Paull began to creep out from his rough, trembling shelter Jack gave him a smile. “We’ll get out of this.”
At that moment, a hail of semiautomatic fire ripped through the silence. Paull shoved his face into the ground, but it wasn’t aimed at them. The firing was coming from behind them, where Alli was hidden.
GUNN EXITED his apartment building dressed in a navy blue chalk stripe high-end bespoke suit, John Lobb shoes, blue chambray shirt, and scarlet tie. He unlocked his BMW 5-series with the wireless opener, slid behind the wheel, and, after waiting for a break in the traffic, pulled out into the street. The break wasn’t quite large enough and he had to peel out with a squeal of tire rubber and an angry blast of the horn from a car behind him.
Several moments later, a tan Chevy sedan pulled out, tailing him. Gunn stopped at a gas station, fueled up, then drove until pulling into a 7-Eleven. He walked briskly inside as the tan Chevy pulled up across the street, its motor running.
Five or so minutes later, the Chevy’s driver noted him coming out, ducking into the car, and taking off. The driver put the Chevy in gear and dutifully followed.
Gunn stood at the back of the 7-Eleven in a spot out of sight of the rear wall-mounted convex security mirrors. After checking that his double’s identical scarlet tie was tied with a Windsor knot like his own and assuring himself that every other detail of the man’s haberdashery conformed to his profile, he had placed the keys to the BMW in the man’s hand.
“You know what to do.”
The man had nodded and, mimicking Gunn’s stride, departed.
Now Gunn looked at his watch and started counting off the seconds to himself. By the time he had reached
