Rapp glanced back at the slabs of meat hanging near the rear of the refrigerator. Finding an empty hook, he grabbed Marri with both hands and began driving him back. When they were less than three feet from the steel spike, he lifted the chef off his feet.
“Stop!”
Marri’s scream was loud enough that it would have been heard throughout the palace if they hadn’t been closed up in the refrigerator. Rapp didn’t stop, though. He accelerated. Marri’s back was only inches from the hook when Rapp pulled right and slammed him into a wall stained with dried blood.
The man was blubbering now and his legs wouldn’t support him. When he crumpled to the ground, Rapp went with him, grabbing the back of his hair and forcing him to meet his gaze. “Decision time, Obaid. I leave you here on a hook or you do exactly what I tell you.”
“I’ll . . .” he stammered.
“You’ll what?”
“I’ll do it.”
Rapp pulled the man to his feet and shoved him toward the door. Marri stumbled but Warch caught him. He straightened the man’s coat and wiped away the tears that had started to flow down his soft cheeks. “Stay calm, Chef. It’ll all be over in a few minutes.”
CHAPTER 61
RAPP kept his eyes locked on Obaid Marri.
The red marks on this throat and right cheek were still visible and he was sweating profusely, but those things were plausibly explained by the heatstroke story. If the kitchen crew had any curiosity about what happened in that refrigerator or why there was a security man standing watch over the kitchen, they didn’t show it.
Marri was working on a bowl of soup, carefully arranging sprigs of cilantro before tapping chili powder artistically over the top.
“Secretary of State Wicka,” he said to the server waiting obediently at the end of his worktable. The man took it and hurried toward the door. Despite actually being an ISI operative, he passed by without giving Rapp so much as a glance. Such was the power of Chef Obaid Marri to beat down anyone in his presence.
He continued to personally adorn the dishes of the most important guests, prioritizing them based on the complex protocols that politicians were so obsessed with. While Rapp spent his time being shot at in places without electricity or running water, the world’s elected officials filled their days worrying about who got the shiniest fork.
Jack Warch entered the kitchen and took up a position next to Rapp. “I’ve got nothing. I’m sorry, Mitch.”
The former Secret Service agent had been poring over building plans and manpower distribution charts to find an escape route for Rapp in case he had to take Taj out himself. The result wasn’t much of a surprise. Warch and the Pakistanis had specifically designed their security to be foolproof.
If Marri failed, Rapp’s best option would be to just stride into the room and put an unsilenced round into the back of Taj’s head. The panic would be immediate and he could use that. With luck—a lot of it—he might be able to disappear into the chaos and make it to the main gate.
Marri glanced at a list clipped to the shelf in front of him and froze. When he began moving again, it was to push up his left sleeve.
“This is it,” Rapp said quietly.
Warch brought his wrist to his mouth. “We have a report of a potential threat. Don’t make any overt moves, but stay alert.”
Warch went for the door to the dining room as Marri casually scratched his arm. It was an admirably practiced motion that brought the poison packet right over the bowl. Even anticipating the move, Rapp was barely able to track what was happening. A moment later, the garnish was in place and Marri was handing the bowl to a server.
“Ahmed Taj.”
The man took it with a curt nod and headed for the dining room. This time Rapp followed, taking up a position along the south wall where he would be behind Taj. President Chutani was standing next to Sunny Wicka, making a speech about friendship and cooperation. Warch had moved as close as was practical to the secretary of state and his eyes were silently taking in the positions of the guests, his men, and Pakistani security.
Chutani began acknowledging individual guests as the last of the soup bowls were delivered. Ahmed Taj looked on respectfully, reacting with appropriately enthusiastic nods and smiles as the president outlined his vision for Pakistan. The ISI director was good—of that there was no question. He exuded the same calm neutrality that Kennedy had mastered, but added to it a vague dullness that she could never pull off.
Finally, President Chutani sat down and, after a few cheerful words to Wicka, began eating. Rapp focused on Taj as the room was filled with the metallic clink of guests picking up their spoons. He had absolutely no idea what to expect. His best guess was that the ISI director would abandon his normal subtlety in favor of something spectacular. He’d picked a public venue full of Americans for a reason. This was about making a statement.
It started surprisingly innocuously. Taj coughed, wiping at his mouth and reaching for a glass of water. He brought it to his lips, but wasn’t able to swallow, struggling for a moment before spewing it across the table. The man next to him seemed to think that Taj was choking and slapped him on the back.
The scene seemed to slow down as Rapp moved a hand toward his weapon. Warch’s men were edging in Wicka’s direction while one of the ISI men doubling as a waiter started toward Taj. All conversations had gone quiet and everyone’s full attention was on the intelligence director. Faces at this point reflected concern but not fear. It was clear that he was breathing and everyone assumed he’d swallowed something wrong. That he would be fine in a moment.
The next time Taj spit something up, it wasn’t water. It was blood. He grabbed at his throat and tried to stand, knocking his chair to the floor and then tumbling backward over it. The guards went into motion, drawing their guns and sprinting toward President Chutani and Sunny Wicka. The panic started when Taj vomited a flood of dark fluid and security began shoving people and furniture out of the way in an effort to evacuate the guests of honor.
The attendees were going for whatever exit was closest—some rushing toward the kitchen, others following Chutani and Wicka as they were ushered toward the arch leading to the entry hall. Rapp fought against the momentum of the crowd, forcing his way toward Ahmed Taj.
A Pakistani guard reached the stricken man first, aiming his weapon at Rapp when he saw the CIA man closing in.
“I’m a medic!” Rapp shouted over the chaos around them.
Ironically, it was true. He had an advanced EMT certification and was very interested in Taj’s condition, though not for the reason most would suspect. The Pakistani lowered his gun and allowed Rapp to roll Taj onto his back.
Blood and tissue continued to flow from the ISI director’s mouth with each convulsion, but the force was subsiding as his muscles lost their ability to contract. The whites of his eyes had gone red with burst blood vessels and his gaze wandered blankly until it fell on the American hovering over him. Recognition was immediate and he suddenly gained the strength to shoot a hand out and grab Rapp’s shoulder.
“Relax, Director, you’re going to be fine,” Rapp said, pulling free of the man’s grip and pointing to the guard. “If you don’t get him to the hospital in the next half hour, there’s not going to be any point. Do you understand? There are emergency vehicles out front. Go!”
The guard gave him a short nod and began to lift Taj, mistaking the man’s thrashing for panic. In fact, he was trying to communicate who Rapp was, but with his throat eaten away all he could do was gag and struggle uselessly as he was dragged toward the door.
Rapp smiled and the expression made Taj fight even harder. The guard managed to maintain his grip but it didn’t matter. The ISI director would suffocate on his own blood before they made it to the front door.
The crowd shifted when the main exit became jammed with people and Rapp once again found himself being buffeted by the panicked guests. To his right, he spotted a freshman congresswoman who had stumbled and was unable to get ba
ck to her feet in the melee. He started toward her and made it to within a couple of yards when someone grabbed him from behind. He spun, prepared to deal with one of the Pakistani guards, but instead found himself face-to-face with a terrified Carl Ferris.
“Where do you think you’re going? Get me out of here, you idiot!”
Too much booze and the mayhem around them combined to lengthen the time it took Ferris to realize whom he was talking to. When he finally did, Rapp expected him to scurry away. Surprisingly, he did no such thing.
“What the hell are you doing here? No, don’t answer. Just keep your mouth shut and get me to my limousine!”
Clearly the young congresswoman on her knees didn’t concern him. And neither did the fact that he’d dedicated much of his life to destroying the CIA in general and Rapp in particular. Now that he was in danger, Ferris assumed that Rapp would do whatever was necessary to save him.
“Don’t just stand there like a—” Ferris was clipped from behind by a woman running in shoes that should have made running impossible. The senator grabbed the front of Rapp’s jacket, partially for balance but also to try to force him toward an exit.
They were next to an abandoned table and Rapp reached for it, retrieving a salad fork and jamming it into Ferris’s thigh. The politician let out an earsplitting scream and collapsed as Rapp went for the congresswoman. He put a hand beneath her arm and pulled her to her feet, supporting her weight as they joined the irresistible current of the fleeing crowd.
EPILOGUE
OUTSIDE OF BOWLING GREEN
KENTUCKY
U.S.A.
RAPP’S opponent was faster than anticipated and had a gift for using the terrain to his advantage. The sun was out for the first time in a week, filling the air with water vapor rising from the manicured grass. Rows of dew-covered tombstones created a glare that overpowered Rapp’s sunglasses and rendered shadows dangerously opaque. He angled left, but then thought better of it and instead slipped into the narrow space between two mausoleums.
There was a flicker of movement ahead and he picked up his pace, staying silent as he broke out into the open again. His target was just ahead, crouched behind a low hedge. Rapp abandoned all stealth and accelerated to a full sprint, coming around the south edge of the bush and grabbing his quarry by the back of the collar.
Mike Nash’s four-year-old son squirmed wildly as he was lifted off his feet, but the hand-me-down jacket was too tight for him to slip out of.
“The jig’s up, kid.”
Chuck had escaped ten minutes ago, disappearing in a rare moment when both his parents lost focus at the same time.
“I’m bored, Mitch!”
“Tough,” Rapp said, putting him back down. “Now march.”
Rapp followed, noting that Chuck glanced back every few moments to calculate the odds of another successful escape. To his credit, he recognized that he was beat and decided to play it cool until another opportunity presented itself.
Ahead, the small knot of people surrounding Stan Hurley’s coffin came into view. Chuck ran toward his annoyed mother while Rapp aimed for Irene Kennedy, who was hanging back in a long black coat and a hat that shadowed her face.
A man with Stan Hurley’s past should have had a much bigger turnout but the guest list was complicated. Despite his profession, he’d outlived his siblings, and the ex-wives who were still alive wanted nothing to do with him. Two of his five children had showed, but the other three didn’t speak to him. Most of the surviving people he’d worked with over the years were either out of the country or understandably reluctant to publicly acknowledge their relationship. Flowers were -everywhere, though. Many sent by people who owed Hurley their lives.
Scott Coleman and his team were there, as were a scattering of retired CIA operatives. Two attractive foreign women Rapp didn’t recognize were most teary. The odd mix was rounded out by an elderly priest who had served with Hurley in Europe before attending seminary. He was keeping the Bible reading to a minimum, focusing on old war stories instead. While Hurley had been a fundamentally religious man, he’d made it clear that he had no interest in a heaven that would accept him.
It was hard for Rapp not to wonder if this was a preview of his own end. A week propped up in a freezer before being quietly planted. A handful of guests, a few mumbled toasts in dives scattered across the globe, and a collective sigh of relief from the enemies who had managed to stay one step ahead.
What would Anna have said? Probably that life and death were about choice, not destiny. That he had the ability to evolve.
But into what? There would never be another Anna, and he’d come to believe that was a good thing. She was the love of his life but that had put him in a terrifying position. He had worried constantly not only about her safety but about what she saw when she looked at him.
The coffin began to glide down on its hydraulic lift just as he came alongside Kennedy.
“I’m going to miss him,” she said.
It had been a long and complicated relationship for both of them. She’d known Hurley since she was a child and, in a way, he had, too. From their early days of trying to beat each other to death to the man frozen in a chair next to the steaks, it had never been normal. Or boring.
“I’m sorry, Irene. It was my op. My failure.”
The smile that spread across her face was uncharacteristically broad. “He’d have said that it was his op and you were just tagging along.”
“Yeah. I guess he would.”
“I was staying in touch with his doctors, Mitch. He wasn’t going to last much longer, and the death they described . . .” Her voice faded for a moment. “I’ve come to believe that it was better this way.”
Rapp just nodded. It was a scenario that had scared the hell out of him. Hurley would have never killed himself—survival was woven into every fiber of his being. And that would have left it to Rapp to slip into the hospital late one night as the shifts were changing. What would it have felt like to press a silencer to Hurley’s temple while the old cuss goaded him on?
“Are Rickman’s files safe?” Rapp asked as the coffin hit bottom and the funeral started to break up. Chuck was the first to take off, and this time Nash gave chase while the rest of his family dabbed at their eyes with a shared handkerchief. Coleman’s people drifted away, leaving only their boss to stare stoically down at the hole.
“President Chutani has started an internal investigation. We have a man in his administration who tells us the files were stored on a computer that Ahmed Taj kept in his office safe. Marcus is familiar with the encryption protocol he used and says that it’ll take the Pakistanis a minimum of thirty years to crack it. By then the information will only be interesting to historians.”
They didn’t speak again until they were the only mourners left, watched discreetly from the trees by the men charged with covering Hurley up.
“Senator Ferris was trampled during the panic caused by Taj’s poisoning,” Kennedy said. “Six cracked ribs, a broken wrist, and a puncture wound in his thigh. Last night he was transferred to Bethesda and he insists that you’re responsible. That you stabbed him with a steak knife. Is that true?”
“No.”
“You’re certain?”
“Positive. It was a fork.”
“He told the White House that you tried to kill him.”
“I don’t try to kill people, Irene. I either do it or I don’t.”
“That’s essentially what I said to President Alexander. And Chutani is extremely grateful for your intervention. According to him, the security footage was somehow corrupted. He also says that he has two men who will sign affidavits stating that Ferris was drunk and that you were nowhere near him when he fell.”
“Problem solved, then.”
“That was pushing the limits, Mitch. Even for you.”
“We needed to send a message to that piece of garbage. Consider it sent.”
“Fortunately for both of us, President Alexander privately
agrees. Having said that, he did mention that if you ever do anything like this again, he’s going to personally come to Langley and kick your ass.”
Rapp laughed and started toward his car. “Tell him any time.”
If you enjoyed THE SURVIVOR, be sure to read all of Mitch Rapp's daring exploits!
Term Limits
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* * *
Transfer of Power
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* * *
The Third Option
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* * *
Separation Of Power
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Executive Power
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Memorial Day
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Consent to Kill
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Act of Treason
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Protect and Defend
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Extreme Measures
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Pursuit of Honor
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American Assassin
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