Lethal Agent (Mitch Rapp #18)(23)

The Saudi did a respectable job of the drop-off and Rapp slipped the face mask off the top of his head and over his face. Coleman’s men spread out, looking a little less smooth than normal in the chem suits designed to protect them from biological threats. Rapp positioned himself at the right flank of the formation, searching the darkness for human shapes as the chopper started to climb.

The beat of rotors began to fade like they had in so many ops in the past, but then were drowned out by the deafening crash of an explosion. He instinctively threw himself to the ground and trained his M4 carbine on the source of the sound. The sky to the northeast was lit up, and he watched through his face mask as the helicopter broke apart and flaming chunks of it started to rain down on the desert.

Predictably, the shooting started a few seconds later.

A disciplined burst from a tango to the south landed a few feet to Rapp’s right and he rolled in the opposite direction, getting to his feet and sprinting toward the village, finally penetrating into the narrow streets as rounds pounded a stone wall to the east.

“Give me a sit rep!” he said over his throat mike.

Everyone sounded off as uninjured, reporting opposition east, north, and south. Rapp dropped behind a rock wall but it turned out to be a bad position when what seemed like a .50-caliber round pulverized a stone two feet from him. He flipped over the wall, sweat already starting to soak him in the poorly ventilated hazmat suit.

“Mitch!”

It took Rapp a moment to realize the shout hadn’t come over his earpiece and he followed it through an empty doorway to his right. Coleman was inside with his back to the wall next to a window opening, occasionally peeking over the blackened sill to make sure no one was moving in on them.

Rapp took a similar position next to the door, peering out as he called for an update from Coleman’s men.

“We’re just inside the southwest edge of the village and we’re in a position to cover each other,” Maslick said over the radio. “No one’s hit yet but we’re taking heavy fire from the south and we’re seeing sniper activity to the north. The low ground to the west looks clear. Can you reach us? We can cover you and then get out down the slope on our side.”

“Rocket!” Coleman shouted.

They both threw themselves to the ground, anticipating an impact on the heavy stone walls of the building. The projectile went wide, though, and instead exploded in a narrow street just to the east. Flame billowed through the windows and door but didn’t reach either one of them. The smoke was another story. Suddenly Rapp was thankful for the fogged face mask.

“If these assholes could shoot straight, this would kind of suck,” Coleman said, moving back to his position next to the window.

The former SEAL’s muffled words were intended as a joke, but it was a pretty good description of their situation. The problem was that from what Rapp had seen, their attackers could shoot. They’d hit the chopper. Fire discipline was good—with controlled bursts only when a viable target presented itself. And while they continued to miss, they seemed to always go just a little wide to the east.

They weren’t going for kills, he suddenly realized. They were driving his team west, trying to draw them into the low ground. And it was working. He already had three men on that side of the village, and both he and Coleman were in a position where the smoke and fire were encouraging them to re-form with them.

“Why didn’t they take the chopper out while we were on it?” Rapp shouted over the sound of gunfire starting to pound the walls around the window Coleman was beneath.

“Maybe we caught them by surprise.”

“You mean the force dug in around a burned-out village in the middle of nowhere?”

Coleman looked back at him through his face mask as chunks of shattered wood and rock rained down on him. “It does seem a little far-fetched.”

“But they forgot to put men to the west.”

“You’re thinking ambush? That they’re driving us there? Why? If they want us dead, why not just surround us and do it?”

The answer was pretty clear: Sayid Halabi. The son of a bitch was holding a grudge. He didn’t want to kill Rapp, he wanted to capture him. He wanted to throw him in a hole and spend the next five years working him over with a set of pliers and a blowtorch.

And if that was true, it was their ticket out of there.

“We’re going east,” Rapp said into his throat mike.

Not surprisingly, Joe Maslick’s voice came on the comm a moment later. “Did you mean west, Mitch? The heaviest fire is coming from the east and it’d leave us climbing toward shooters controlling the high ground.”

“You heard me. East. Come right up the middle of the main street on Scott’s orders. Leave your hazmat suits and face masks on. I repeat, biohazard protocols are still in effect. Understood?”

The response sounded hesitant but there was no question that Maslick, Wicker, and McGraw would follow his orders to the letter.

“What are you thinking?” Coleman said as Rapp slipped up next to him and took a quick look outside. The flames had managed to find fuel and the smoke was combining with the condensation on his face mask to make it hard to see.

“Halabi figured I’d come and he left men with orders to capture me. But they don’t know which one of us I am because of the suits.”

“So we’re going to charge a bunch of guys dug in above us because you think he ordered them not to kill you?”