Near Dark (Scot Harvath #19)(19)

“Thank you for the vote of confidence,” he replied. Selecting a cigar for himself, he then placed the box on the small table between them and offered Harvath the cutter.

“You first,” his friend said.

After Nicholas had snipped his cigar, he tossed the cutter over to Harvath followed by the lighter.

The tips of their cigars glowed a bright orange as the men puffed away in the semidarkness of the porch and blew heavy clouds of smoke into the air.

Nodding toward the bourbon, the bottled water, and the ice, Nicholas intimated that it was time for Harvath to pour.

Once the drinks were made, they quietly clinked glasses and then settled back in their chairs. There was no toast. Neither wanted to break the silence that had settled over them. For the moment, they enjoyed not saying anything at all.

It could last only so long. Finally, it was Harvath who spoke. “Okay, what the hell is going on?”





CHAPTER 9


With the Old Man dead, Lydia Ryan dead, and Harvath not interested, the management of The Carlton Group had fallen upon Nicholas. Right after the murders, when Harvath had gone missing, he had proven himself more than worthy of the challenge. He had worked tirelessly to get him back. This new threat they were facing, though, frightened him even more—and he didn’t scare easily.

Exhaling a cloud of smoke, he asked, “Where do you want me to start?”

“Who was the assassin in Key West?”

“We don’t know, yet.”

“Is it the same person who killed Carl Pedersen?”

“We don’t know that either.”

“Chase said there may be more than one assassin. He also said we have intel the Norwegians don’t.”

Nicholas set his cigar in the ashtray and looked at his friend. “It’s only RUMINT. Nothing confirmed.”

Harvath was familiar with the term. RUMINT stood for Rumor Intelligence. He waited for Nicholas to fill him in, and when he didn’t, he cocked an eyebrow as if to say, spill it.

“Allegedly, someone, or some organization, took out a one-hundred-million-dollar contract on a single individual. At this point, it’s just whispers. Barely audible chatter on the Dark Web and in other remote places. We didn’t share it with the Norwegians because in our opinion it was too vague.”

“And you think the subject of this contract is me?” asked Harvath.

Nicholas nodded. “That’s my concern. That’s why we brought you here.”

“But why not one of our safe houses? Or one of the Agency’s?”

“Do you want the tactical or the practical answer first?”

“Tactical,” Harvath replied.

“One hundred million dollars can buy even the worst kind of person a lot of friends. It’s such a huge bounty, we didn’t know whom we could trust.”

“Even within our organization?”

“Somehow, an assassin picked up your trail and tracked you to Key West. Only a handful of us knew you were in Florida.”

“I had my cell phone. Used my credit cards now and then. I wasn’t exactly trying to disappear.”

“Nope,” said Nicholas. “But if there really is this kind of a contract out on you, we have to assume it’s only being shopped to the best.”

“More than one assassin, though? That’s not normally how this is done.”

“That’s part of the RUMINT as well. Supposedly, the contract was put out to a pool. Whoever closes it out first, gets the bounty. That’s why we came so hard and fast to get you.”

“So, out of an abundance of caution, you said no to our portfolio of safe houses, no to the CIA’s, but yes to Camp David?”

“That’s the practical side of this. I wanted one location with no additional movements. None of the ‘different bed every night’ scenarios like some sort of Mexican drug lord or Middle Eastern dictator. Place you and encase you. That’s the plan.

“What’s more, I didn’t want to be cooped up in some house, especially not with the dogs. Here, we’ve got two hundred of the most secure acres in the world. A squirrel can’t even get within one hundred feet of the perimeter without the Marines knowing about it.”

“Aren’t you afraid of one of them being bought off?”

“A, no, and B, by whom? No one knows we’re here except for McGee, who made the request, and President Porter, who gave his approval. I guarantee you, neither of them is going to be bought off.”

Nicholas was right about that. Bob McGee was the Director of the CIA and Lydia Ryan’s boss before she had moved over to The Carlton Group. Harvath trusted McGee. He also knew that the Marines who served at Camp David were not only exemplary, but also rigorously vetted.

“Plus,” Nicholas continued, “only if we were camped out at the NSA or the Situation Room back at the White House, could we access faster and more secure networks. This is the perfect bolt-hole.”

Harvath agreed. It made sense on several levels. Nodding, he steered the conversation back to his earlier questioning. “Let’s say the contract does exist and I’m the target. Who’s behind it? Who have I pissed off badly enough to put up one hundred million dollars to take me out?”

“Even at their most flush, bin Laden and al Qaeda wouldn’t have been able to come up with one hundred million, much less give it away. ISIS, though, is a different story.”