guards who were stationed near the main entrance.
“We’re moving,” Lia told Rockman in the Art Room.
“We see. Situation is the same as it was,” he told her. “Just the two guards near the road. We haven’t seen anyone else.”
“That’s one of the things that bothers me,” she told him.
Karr gripped the handhold at the side of the Dauphin, waiting to jump off. Since the primary goal was to obtain information from the people here, the shotgun he gripped in his right hand was filled with nonlethal shells. Instead of buck-shot, shells were filled with a mixture of hard plastic balls and pellets filled with cayenne pepper, which would explode and send a disabling spray over whomever they hit. The modified Pancor Jackhammer could fire all ten of its rounds within a few seconds; Karr had two more of the canisterlike cassettes hanging off the tactical vest he wore over his body armor. His lower pants pockets held two stun grenades apiece. He also had an Uzi submachine gun, borrowed from the marshals, strapped between the two vests to use if things got very ugly, and a pair of pistols, one a .45 at his belt and the other a small Ruger strapped to his right calf. Two of the FBI agents behind him in the helicopter were also armed with nonlethal shotguns; the other two had standard assault rifles. Besides the guns and armor, Karr was wearing a lightweight set of night glasses so that he could see in the dark.
“We’re ready, Tommy,” said Art Koch, the head of the HRT team. He and his men had participated in several antiterror operations in the past, though never directly with Desk Three.
“Do it!” said Karr, leaping from the aircraft as it landed thirty yards from the largest of the three buildings on the property.
He got about ten yards before two men came around the side of the building holding rifles, Karr swung the Jackhammer level and fired three times. One of the men crumpled, screaming in agony; the other disappeared around the side.
“We are federal agents making an inspection for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms,” barked Lia’s voice through a loudspeaker projected from her helicopter. “We are serving a warrant under the U.S. Patriot Act. Anything you say can and will be used against you. Do not resist the officers. Do as you are instructed and no harm will come to you. Lay down your weapons and stand with your hands raised high in the air.”
The man Karr had shot howled, his eyes streaming with tears. Karr spun him down, then left him as one of the trailing FBI agents came up with his plastic handcuffs ready. He sprinted for the barn, some twenty yards away; when he got there Karr threw himself against the side of the building, caught his breath, then rolled around the comer, gun poised to fire.
There was no one there. He scanned the vegetation to the left, making sure the man hadn’t hidden himself there, then began crawling forward, looking for a spot ahead he might use for cover.
“Driveway is secure. Two men under arrest,” reported Team Five.
“Good,” Lia told them. “How are we doing on the buildings, Tommy?”
Karr didn’t answer. Rockman started to tell her something about the barn, but the head of the team tasked to take the building they called the Cottage reported that it had been secured; two prisoners had been taken. The transmission was so loud she couldn’t understand what Rockman said.
“All right, Cottage. Good. Hold on. Rockman, what are you telling me?”
“You have three individuals going toward the barn from the shed.”
“Did you hear that, Tommy?”
“I’m not only hearing it, I’m living it,” said Karr, huffing as he spoke.
He’ll be joking in his grave, Lia thought, picking up the microphone to repeat her warning speech.
Karr saw the three men Rockman had warned him about run down the slope toward the barn. When they got about thirty feet from him, he fired at the lead man. The shell popped him in the side and the man slid down, tripping both of his comrades like a scene from a slapstick comedy. But all three jumped right back up. Karr yelled at them to stop, then fired again, this time nailing the closest man in the head. A cloud of pepper spray descended on his as he fell to the ground. The others escaped unscathed: Karr’s next shot sailed to the side, missing by a good margin. Frustrated, he started to aim again when a barrage of gunfire sent him to the ground. The bullets missed, but he bashed his knee on a jagged rock so hard that he felt blood rush to his head.
“There! On the roof!” yelled one of the FBI agents.
A barrage of automatic rifle fire followed. By the time Karr got up, the gunman on the roof had tumbled to the ground, dead.
“You all right?” asked Koch, running up to him.
Karr growled. “Let’s get into the barn,” he told the FBI agent, ignoring his torn pants and bloody knee. “This is getting old.”
CHAPTER 110
Hernes Jackson sorted the yellow pads one more time, making sure not only that their pages were blank but that there were no impressions left on the underlying pages. He hated the idea of throwing out perfectly good paper; once he was sure there was no vestige of even a stray doodle, he would bequeath them to one of the investigators working on discovering the man or men behind Asad’s murder.
Asad’s death ended the Deep Black bugging and snatch operation known as Red Lion. While Desk Three was still trying to find out what Asad’s target had been, Jackson’s job in Detroit was over. Some of the members of the task force were staying on to investigate the murder, under the Department of Justice’s direction. A senior FBI agent had flown in that afternoon from Washington to take over. Jackson had written an eyes-only memo for him and then, following Rubens’ instructions, dismantled his temporary office. Dean would stay to work with the task force; Jackson was to return to Fort Meade.
Rather than staying overnight, Jackson had booked a late flight back to Baltimore. If he left tonight he would be home in time to honor his weekly Meals On Wheels commitment at lunchtime the next day.
Jackson took one last look around the small office, making sure he had everything. Then, briefcase in one hand and pads in the other, he left the office, walking down the hall and around the comer to the large room that many of the agents and detectives working on the murder were using as a workspace. Jackson looked around the tables and finally spotted Dallas Coombs, an FBI agent who had helped him coordinate the backup teams. The FBI agent was on the phone, so Jackson set the notepads down at the comer of the table he was using as a desk and left.
It had started to mist outside. Jackson tucked up his coat collar as he walked to the car.
“Say, Mr. Jackson. Ambassador?”
Jackson turned around and saw Coombs trotting toward him.
“Glad I caught you,” said the agent, winded from the short run.
“I hope you can use the pads of paper,” said Jackson.
“Oh, yeah, thanks. Listen — I have to check out some surveillance videos that the Detroit police think may have been Asad bin Fayser.”
“Bin
“Yeah, I’m sorry. Asad bin Taysr. I was wondering if you could help, because I haven’t seen anything except for those still photos, and I don’t even have them. I gave my set to the secretaries to get copied.”
“I’ve shredded mine, I’m afraid.”
“You think you could check the video for me? Otherwise I’m going to have to go over to the Justice Building and try and find someone to get me into the right office. The secretaries have gone home.”
“They left without making the copies?”
“This is Detroit,” said Coombs.
“I have a plane at midnight,” said Jackson. “And I was going to get something to eat.”
