Brad Thor - Full Black

Holding his keys in his hand, he moved past the rows of cars pretending he was looking for his.

“The first of the vehicles just entered the airport,” said Nicholas.

“Understood,” Harvath replied as he kept walking.

“Did you notice anything off about any of the vehicles?”

“Negative. Why?”

“One of the guys in the TOC thinks that the cab that just pulled in is riding too low.”

Harvath had been so preoccupied with Sarhan and the men coming out of his house that he hadn’t paid nearly enough attention to the vehicles. “Nobody got out,” he said into his earbud’s microphone.

“Excuse me?” replied Nicholas.

“The van driver. The taxicab drivers. Even the driver of the Town Car. None of them got out when they picked the men up at Sarhan’s.”

“So?”

“So it doesn’t make sense,” said Harvath. “Why didn’t they get out and help with the bags?”

“Maybe they were told not to.”

“Why?”

Nicholas thought a moment. “Because they don’t want anyone else handling the bags?”

“Bingo.”

“I just got another IM from the guy in TOC. He really doesn’t like that first vehicle. He says it reminds him of VBIEDs he saw in Iraq.”

Harvath had seen his share of vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices as well. “Watch where it goes, and tell him to look at the other vehicles. I want to know if he thinks the same thing.”

“What are you thinking?” Nicholas asked.

“I’m thinking those guys with the bags go in, explosions happen, and when survivors rush out of the terminals, if those four vehicles are VBIEDs, the survivors get taken out in a secondary attack that’s even worse than the first.”

“What should we tell DHS?”

It was the right question, but not the one Harvath wanted to have to answer. If they told DHS that they now believed they had four teams of suicide bombers being dropped off by vehicles loaded with explosives, it was game over. They wouldn’t wait to see what happened. They’d shut the entire airport down. If Harvath was right, DHS would succeed in saving countless lives. If he was wrong, Sarhan and his men, who could very well be controllers of other cells scattered across the country, would know they had been blown and all those potential leads would evaporate.

The FBI would get involved, but even if they used CIA interrogators, they’d never be able to lean on Sarhan and his men hard enough to get any actionable intelligence out of them. And once the FBI was involved, they’d see to it that the men were afforded every single protection under the law. Nobody would be putting bags over their heads and transporting them to Iceland or one of the other black sites. Caught on American soil, they’d be handled under criminal court rules and proceedings-that is, if the FBI could come up with enough to even hold them.

It wasn’t that Harvath didn’t respect the Bureau, he did. It was just better that they didn’t get mixed up in this. It was also better, at least at this moment, that DHS not be given any encouragement to pull the trigger prematurely. “Don’t tell them anything,” he said.

“And if those are VBIEDs?” asked Nicholas.

Harvath could now make out the silhouette of someone standing in the northeast corner. Ducking into a row of parked cars, he crouched and adjusted the side mirror of the vehicle he was leaning against. “Contact,” he said quietly into his microphone.

“What’s he doing?” asked Nicholas.

Watching in a sideview mirror through multiple layers of autoglass, Harvath had a pretty lousy view. “He’s leaning against the concrete half-wall with a laptop open.”

“What’s he doing on the laptop?”

“I think it’s a ruse. He’s trying to look busy while he watches his teams arrive at the airport.”

“Now what?” asked Nicholas.

Harvath knew that the only way anyone was going to get any answers out of Tariq Sarhan, especially quick ones, was if he was asking the questions. The problem was, how the hell would he interrogate him in the middle of a parking garage?

Two vehicles away from Sarhan was a brand-new, white Cadillac Escalade. Harvath described it, gave Nicholas the license number, and said, “How long?”

“Give me three minutes,” he replied.

Harvath looked at his watch. “You’ve got two. Make it happen.”

Ninety seconds later, Nicholas said, “The OnStar folks are very sorry to hear you’ve lost your keys, Mr. Chaffee. Let me know when you want it opened.”

“Stand by,” said Harvath, as he stepped out from the row of parked cars. Holding the key fob for the vehicle he’d parked downstairs, he proceeded forward.

Sarhan had a pad, pen, and a few papers set up next to his laptop. If anyone had wondered what he was up to, he could have argued that he had just dropped someone off and was filing a quick sales report or was trying to be productive while waiting to pick someone up. What none of them would suspect was that from this vantage point, he was taking advantage of a perfect view of all the traffic coming into the airport.

“Unlock it now,” said Harvath as he closed within fifteen feet of Sarhan.

The lights on the Escalade flashed and the locks thumped as they popped up. The Egyptian turned, looked at Harvath briefly, and went back to what he was doing.

Harvath ignored him. Walking around to the driver’s side, he opened the door and climbed in. Had there been space enough to maneuver, there was nothing he would have rather done than to drive the Escalade right into Sarhan and pin him against the concrete wall. It would have saved him a lot of time.

He listened as Nicholas updated him that the first vehicle had dropped its passengers at the Tom Bradley International Terminal and that two more were also just pulling in. It was time to crash Sarhan’s party.

Grabbing the latch, Harvath popped the Escalade’s hood and stepped out of the car. As he raised the hood, he looked around to see if anyone other than Sarhan was in the immediate area. Satisfied the coast was momentarily clear, he fiddled with the vehicle’s engine and cursed. The Egyptian glanced at him again and then went back to what he was doing. The fact that the Escalade had likely been there before Sarhan arrived ruled Harvath out as a threat to him. There was no way anyone could have known he would set up there.

Harvath stepped away from the truck and closed the distance with the Egyptian so rapidly that he didn’t realize what was happening until Harvath was almost on top of him.

Pulling his Taser out of his pocket, Harvath hit the trigger and watched as the expression on Sarhan’s face went from surprise to shock to agony-all in a matter of a few seconds. The man’s muscles seized and he fell forward.

Harvath worked quickly. After zip-tying Sarhan’s hands behind his back, he gathered up his belongings and dragged him back to the Escalade. The rear windows were tinted and that’s where Harvath had decided to conduct his interrogation.

Shoving the Egyptian inside, Harvath climbed in behind and told Nicholas to remote-start the vehicle.

He buckled Sarhan into his seat belt, zip-tied his ankles, and then took the seat next to him. When the vehicle started, Harvath reached for the rear seat audio controls and dialed in a local funk radio station. The Escalade was well insulated. In fact, it was built like a bank vault, but Harvath turned up the volume of “Too Hot to Stop” by the Bar-Kays just in case the Egyptian began to scream.

Sarhan didn’t, not at first. He also didn’t demand to know who Harvath was and what he was doing to him. The first thing he did was spit in Harvath’s face. That was all Harvath needed. Sarhan was guilty.