William Dietz - Hitman - Enemy Within

Fifteen minutes later Agent 47 entered the Ville Nouvelle. From there it was a short walk to the Al-Fulani mansion, where 47 made his way to the main gate, and waved Abadati’s ID card as he passed the guardhouse. The operative waited for what seemed like an inevitable challenge, but the gate guard had seen what he expected to see. Which was the eternally dependable Waleed Abadati, showing up early for work.

Now that he had successfully penetrated the outermost layer of Al-Fulani’s security, a single swipe of Abadati’s key card opened the basement door. That provided 47 with access to the locker room where staff stored their personal belongings, and ultimately the subsurface corridor that would take the assassin to his real objective-a stairway that led from the basement up to Al-Fulani’s study. The passageway, which was intended to function as an emergency escape route should the mansion come under attack, was to see on the diagrams downloaded from The Agency.

Which meant the assassin should be able to enter Al-Fulani’s private office, overpower the businessman, inject him with Sodium Pentothal, and ask two extremely important questions: Who had penetrated The Agency—and who were they working for? It would be awkward, since time would be limited, but with Marla running Al-Fulani’s personal security detail, 47 had given up all hope of spiriting the Moroccan away. Ever since the incident with the fuel truck her precautions had been extremely thorough.

Since Abadati was habitually early for work, Agent 47 had a full thirty minutes to enjoy before anyone would question his whereabouts, and perhaps another fifteen minutes before a search began. With that in mind, he entered the employee lounge, gave thanks for the fact that it was empty, and proceeded out into the hallway. An elderly janitor was swabbing the floor, but he didn’t bother to look up as the uniformed guard passed and slipped around a corner.

Agent 47 knew where the hidden door was supposed to be, but when he arrived there, it was to discover a wall covered with panels of gold fabric. After a quick scan to ensure he wasn’t being observed, 47 began to push and prod at the panel where the door was supposed to be.

There was no response at first, and the agent had begun to worry when he heard a click followed by a whir as the door swiveled open. That released a rush of air laden with the faint odor of incense. He stepped through the portal, and was about to turn and close the door when a sensor took care of that task for him. Pleased with his progress so far, Agent 47 paused to remove his shoes before climbing a flight of narrow wooden stairs to the floor above.

Ali bin Ahmed bin Saleh Al-Fulani was seated behind his desk, with his back to three arched windows, as Marla stood in front of him.

“There’s no doubt about it,” the Puissance Treize agent said earnestly. “The Otero brothers were sent to kill you. Not one of the other VIPs who occupied the stage.”

“Yet they failed because this Agent 47 person managed to stop them,” the businessman mused. “Why would he want to do that?”

Six intricately carved Moorish screens served to partition off the east end of the office. Beyond them, in the alcove where Al-Fulani took his naps, one of the richly polished antique doors that decorated the back wall opened on silent hinges as Agent 47 entered the room. The assassin’s feet were silent as he padded over to the screens and peered through one of them onto the scene that lay beyond.

Damn it! Al-Fulani was present, all right, but so was Marla, and the clock was ticking. Still, there was always the possibility that she would leave, so it made sense for the operative to wait.

“There’s no way to know for sure,” Marla replied gravely. “But it’s my opinion that he wants to capture you, perhaps to interrogate you. And that would be difficult if you were dead.”

“Yes,” the Moroccan agreed bleakly. “It would. But I have news for you. Good news. We’re about to leave Fez, which will make your job much easier!”

Marla wasn’t sure whether leaving Fez would make her job easier, but she could hope. So she forced a smile.

“Really?” she responded. “Where are we going? Somewhere cool, I hope.”

“No, I’m sorry,” Al-Fulani answered sympathetically. “It’s pretty warm in N’Djamena this time of year. But the desert in Chad has its own kind of beauty—and Agent 47 will have no idea where I am.”

Having said that, the Moroccan businessman rose and circled the desk.

“Come, my dear,” Al-Fulani said playfully, as he offered his arm. “My limousine awaits!”

“But I don’t have the appropriate clothes!” Marla objected.

“Ah, but you will,” Al-Fulani assured her soothingly. “We’ll stop by your apartment on the way to the airport.”

There were other things to worry about, including her team’s readiness for such a journey, but Marla knew her sponsor well, and he wouldn’t want to wait, so she’d have to make arrangements on the fly.

The twosome were gone a few seconds later, which left 47 with no choice but to retrace his steps, and escape the mansion as quickly as he could. Fortunately the stir caused by Al-Fulani’s sudden departure was such that the assassin was able to exit the basement undetected, and make his way to the south side of the property where Abadati was normally stationed. What could have been a tricky moment was eased by the fact that the other guard was tired, and eager to go home. He said something in Arabic, then laughed at his own joke, as he turned to leave.

The assassin waited for a full minute before he slipped out through the very gate he was supposed to guard, and faded into the foot traffic beyond.

He had been forced to abandon the Jammer identity in the wake of the truck explosion. His new base of operations, which consisted of a room in a seedy hotel, was about a mile away.

The real Waleed Abadati called in shortly after 47’s departure, which triggered a full-scale search of the property. But having found nothing amiss, the way in which Abadati had been waylaid was ascribed to thieves, and the hapless guard was ordered to pay for both the uniform and the stolen weapon.

It was a significant setback that meant the car would have to wait. But Abadati was a good man, a righteous man, who knew that Allah promised those with patience a reward without measure.

A reward that, with the passage of time, would eventually be his.

EAST OF N’DJAMENA, CHAD

There was no direct air service to the city of N’Djamena—not from Fez—so unlike Al-Fulani, who had a private plane to call upon, Agent 47 had been forced to travel via a number of commercial connections, thereby losing quite a bit of time in the process. But thanks to some assistance from The Agency, a driver and a vehicle were there waiting when he landed.

And now, some six spine-jarring hours later, the operative and his paid companions were closing in on the spot where Al-Fulani and his party had probably spent the previous night. Would the Moroccan still be there? That seemed unlikely, but 47 hoped to confirm that he was on the right trail. Especially since the desert was a big place, and The Agency’s spy sats had lost Al-Fulani’s convoy during a dust storm.

The sub-Saharan landscape was divided between the bright, almost searing blue of the sky and the khaki colored landscape that lay sprawled below. The growl of the Unimog’s engine dropped a full octave as Pierre Gazeau shifted down, released the clutch, and guided the truck up the sand-drifted track toward the next rise.

The Libyan freelancer had thick black hair, a hooked nose, and a three-day growth of beard. He wore wraparound sunglasses, a sleeveless khaki shirt, and a pair of matching slacks. Black hair crawled down his arms and darkly tanned legs to a pair of beat-up desert boots. Though born in Tripoli to an ex-legionnaire and a Tuareg mother, Gazeau had been educated in France, and spoke English with only a slight accent.