Oath of Loyalty (Mitch Rapp #21)(26)

All the windows were barred—nothing fancy but not trivial to get through. Even with explosives it would be low percentage. Bars tended not to have enough surface area to absorb much force and the exterior walls they were set into were stone. The front and rear doors were the best bet for access, though also not trivial. Both were steel core with multiple dead bolts and reinforced hinges. An insufficiently powerful explosive would be more apt to jam them than open them.

“Unlock the front door,” Rapp said.

“Understood. Unlocking the front door. Okay, they look like they’re going to break the front windows. I think you can count on some fireworks, but you should be fine where you’re standing. The men in back are placing something that looks like a charge on the door.”

Rapp moved to a position behind the entryway staircase, giving him a view into the living room in one direction and the dining room in the other. He put his back against the wall, staying in the middle to give him maximum protection from any potential explosions.

“Get ready for the windows. The man at the door is reaching for the handle.”

The sound of shattering glass was followed by the creak of the front door opening. A moment later a blast from the back shook the house.

“The back door is gone and so is part of the wall. The front door is open and the front windows are broken. No one’s coming in the back yet. There’s a lot of smoke and some fire. Do you want me to turn on the sprinklers?”

“Not unless it gets out of control. Let’s limit their vision and ability to breathe as much as we can.”

“Understood. The men out back seem to be arguing about who’s going in first.”

That suggested they weren’t complete idiots. Once they got past the mudroom, they were going to find a smoke-filled hallway lined with locked doors and sealed off from the main house by another.

“The man I suspect is in charge is preparing to come through the front door, Mitch. Handgun only. His back is against the exterior wall to your left and he’s looking around the jamb. Okay. He’s in. Looking toward you and up the stairs. Turning right… He’s focused on the living room. Now!”

Rapp moved along the wall far enough to bring the man into view. A single round hit him in the left temple and splattered the wall with brain tissue, blood, and bone shards. Rapp retreated again.

“The man at the dining room window is shouting at the man at the living room window,” she said, though he could hear them from his position. Spanish.

“They don’t seem to know what to do. Two men entering the back while the other three stay outside. There’s still a lot of smoke but the fire seems to be going out on its own.”

“Roger that.”

Rapp started easing left, but then dropped to the tile floor when Claudia came on again.

“Grenade coming in through the living room window!”

The blast threw a heavy credenza across the room and he saw it shatter against the wall. Great if their target was the big-screen TV that had become the family’s Grand Theft Auto battlefield, but otherwise a waste of a perfectly good explosive. Again, he asked himself who these pricks were. If this was the best the Cooks could come up with, US spec ops had really gone to shit.

“It’s still hard for me to see clearly into the rear hallway, but the two men appear to have reached the door at the end. The two men out front are moving toward the still-open door. I think one has a grenade in his hand but no other explosive is visible. If you move now, you can just make it.”

He leapt to his feet and sprinted across the entryway, slamming the front door and then retreating to his former position. A grenade wouldn’t be enough to penetrate unless the blast could be concentrated. They might be able to use their vehicle for that purpose but, frankly, they didn’t seem that clever.

“Am I clear to go into the living room?”

“Yes. They’ve stopped along the wall. The door slamming seems to have surprised them.”

“Give me the exact position of the one closest to me,” he said as he moved forward. The sofa was smoldering to his left, but no open flames were visible.

“Maybe one meter to the east of the porch. The other one’s in a similar position on the west side. They’re facing each other with their shoulders maybe half a meter from the house. The men at the back look like they might be setting a charge on the door leading to the main part of the house. If it’s as powerful as the first one, they’ll have full access after it’s detonated.”

He didn’t respond, instead taking a position in front of the broken window. Because of the angle, it was impossible to see the men near the porch, but the closest would be less than ten feet away. He could hear them speaking unintelligibly as he slipped the gun through the bars. Aiming based on Claudia’s description, he emptied his magazine and then immediately ran for the dining room, slapping in a fresh one as he went.

“One hit! The man’s down, but I can’t tell how badly he’s injured. The other is backing along the wall, shooting toward the window you fired from. Two meters from the first dining room window, staying close to the wall. One meter, still focused on the living room window, not looking behind him.”

Rapp stayed near the back of the dining room, counting on the relative gloom and increasing haze from the burning couch to obscure him. His target came even with the window a moment later, still shooting at nothing, oblivious to everything else around him.