“That’s a shame. Good luck selling it.” Jet returned to her rental car and pulled away, frustrated that this was proving so difficult. She’d looked at three possible candidates, and all were garbage. Not that she particularly cared, but she couldn’t afford a vehicle to break down in the middle of an operation. She moved to the next on her list, five miles away.
The black Ford Explorer was owned by an older couple who seemed genuine and had no reservations with her taking it to a mechanic. After an hour inspecting all the basics and running a compression check, the mechanic she’d lined up gave her the thumbs-up, and she paid the couple in cash. She arranged to have the husband follow her to the rental yard so she could return her car, and paid for a taxi to take him home.
Her first hurdle had been surmounted, and she knew that the DMV system wouldn’t list the Ford as sold for days, by which point she’d be long gone.
She thought the next vehicle would be harder to acquire, but was pleasantly surprised when the first one she looked at proved to be exactly what she was looking for — a 201 °Coachmen Freelander RV with only eighteen thousand miles on it, owned by an old man who could hardly walk. The wife told her their sad story — about the dream trip they’d taken around the country before the husband endured his final battle with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma — and tearfully told her that they’d be willing to take a beating on it because they could use the money.
Jet paid them full price and asked if she could leave the vehicle sitting in their driveway until she could come and get it. They were overjoyed to do so, eyeing the stack of hundred dollar bills as though they’d just won the lottery.
As she pulled away, she tried calling Matt, but he didn’t answer, and she resolved to try him again in three hours, as agreed.
After a late lunch, she drove through both Briggs’ and Arthur’s neighborhoods, familiarizing herself with the layouts. Briggs lived outside the city limits in Arlington, Virginia, in an estate home near the river at the end of a cul-de-sac that backed onto the George Washington Memorial Parkway. She had studied the satellite images and confirmed her impression on the drive by. Relatively rural suburb for the well-heeled. Nice, but in keeping with a man who wasn’t living beyond his means.
Arthur’s townhouse was a different story. In the heart of Georgetown, a densely-populated, affluent section of Washington near the university, it would present some challenges. It was an older building that had been remodeled, she could see, and looked expensive. A security camera peeked from under the edge of the roof, another by the front door. It looked like the home had been built in the 1800s, but was immaculate. Easily worth ten million dollars these days. Unexpectedly opulent digs for a CIA career man.
She would need to look at the blueprints and the schematics, but it looked do-able for someone of her skills. Briggs’ house was child’s play.
Her final stop was a lavish nine-thousand-square-foot mansion near CIA headquarters, adjacent to Pimmit Bend Park — a faux Tudor home at the end of a long private drive. That one would require some additional research, but she was confident.
Matt’s sat phone continuously rang without response, and she spent the remainder of the day growing increasingly concerned. He didn’t strike her as the type to go dark for no reason, but there was nothing she could do but wait. Jet checked the blind e-mail account he’d had his contact send the blueprints to, and saw three large files sent from an anonymous remailer. She downloaded them to her laptop, opened them, and studied the floor plans and electrical diagrams with interest. As she had suspected, there were a number of weak areas, and she made mental notes as she pictured the layouts in three dimensions.
She tried the sat phone one last time after dinner but still got no response, and as she lay her head on the down pillow for the evening she had a sense of dread in the pit of her stomach.
Something was wrong.
She knew it.
Chapter 35
The following morning, Matt answered on the third ring.
“Where have you been? Is everything okay?” Jet demanded.
“No. There was an attack yesterday. We took heavy casualties.”
“Are you okay?”
“For now.”
His voice sounded odd. Tight.
“What happened?”
“Best I can tell the drug lord who provided the men sold me out. That’s the only possibility. They knew where the camp was.”
“Tribesmen?”
“Negative. American, by the looks of them. Four. All dead.”
Her thoughts raced at the implications. “All they understand is retribution. You know that. The drug lord has to go.”
“I know. I’m making plans to take him out tonight, before word gets back to him. But…I don’t know how to tell you this…”
“What? Tell me what?” she asked, her heart sinking.
“It’s Lawan. She was hit by a stray bullet. She didn’t make it. She’s dead.”
Jet couldn’t breathe. It felt like someone was standing on her chest, and Matt’s voice seemed to come from the end of a long tunnel. Then the sensation passed, and she gulped air. Her hand shook almost imperceptibly as she brushed away the beginnings of a tear.
“Those bastards. Saved from a nightmare only to be killed by…this had to be Arthur’s doing.” She fought back the rage, replacing it with a glacial calm. “Did she suffer?”
“No. I don’t think so.” The lie trembled over the line.
“Bury her and say a few words for me, will you, Matt? She deserves at least that.”
“I will. I’m sorry.”
“Just make sure you take care of yourself. You’ve used up all nine of your lives.” She paused. “What are you going to do?”
“Kill the warlord and then move the camp to one of my other sites.”
“All right. This cinches it. I’m going to go in tonight. This will be over soon.”
“Believe me. There’s nothing I want more. But I’ll believe it when I hear you confirm it, not before.”
An uncomfortable stillness hung between them.
“I’m going to get going. Good luck,” Matt said.
“Luck will have nothing to do with it,” Jet responded, then stabbed the cell off.
She brushed her arm against her eyes, blotting tears, and then overcome by fury again, hurled the phone at the wall. It exploded into fragments. Jet buried her head into the pillow and sobbed for Lawan, whose life was over before it began, her brutally short interlude marked by tragedy and abuse. Shuddering rocked her as she screamed her anger and frustration into the bed, and then she quieted, her body growing still as the emotional storm blew over.
She looked up at the mirror on the far wall, face distorted and eyes red, and vowed silently to avenge Lawan, even though it wouldn’t make anything better or bring her back. It didn’t matter.
They would pay.
Jet’s tires whirred beneath her as the anthracite mountain bike carved through the moist soil and dirty gray patches of snow that clung to the ground between the tall trees. Her breath steamed out of her mouth as she panted, having ridden two miles from where she’d left the Explorer. The moon peered through the patchwork of heavy clouds, pregnant with snow, as she glided like a silent wraith through the woods.
When she was a hundred yards from the house, she leaned the bike against a tree and adjusted her backpack, then trotted towards the hedges that ringed the palatial rear yard.
