Vince Flynn - The Third Option

«Who's Harry?»

«He's my neighbor. Don't worry about him. He's eighty-one and as deaf as a door. Now, listen. These two guys standing post are dead. We don't have time to dick around with them. We don't have cuffs, and we don't have enough people to cover our asses. When I give the word, I want you to pop your man in the head. You got any problems with that?»

Hackett was unfazed by the question. It would not the first time he had taken a man's life. He didn't blink or show the slightest sign of tension. He uttered his simple one-word reply. «No.»

«Good.» Rapp slapped his arm. «Get moving.»

Hackett moved silently into the darkness. Rapp spoke to Stroble over the radio. «Dan, get him moving.» He waited a second and said, «Marcus, I want continuous updates once he's inside the house.»

CONAN O'BRIEN WAS on the tube. Jeff Duser stretched his arms above his head and let out a long yawn. He hadn't had enough sleep as of late. Too much work and no play: When he brought his hands down, he said, «Where the fuck is Polk?» The other man sitting at Rapp's kitchen table didn't bother to answer his boss's question. Duser stood and looked out the window onto the back deck. One of his men was pacing back and forth trying to stay warm. Looking around the kitchen, he said, «I can't believe this guy doesn’t even have a bag of chips around here.»

The man at the table looked up from his game of solitaire. «Maybe he's healthy.»

«What in the fuck is that supposed to mean?» snarled Duser.

The man shrugged his shoulders. «Chips are full of bad stuff.»

«Pedro, I've been eating chips my whole life. I'm thirty five years old, and I've got a washboard stomach.»

«Yeah, but what do your arteries look like?»

«My arteries are fine.» Duser wasn't in the mood for one of Pedro's health lectures. He walked to the front of the house and checked the porch. His man was out there, but there was no sign of Polk. Mumbling to himself, Duser asked, «How long does it take to get coffee and sandwiches?»

Turning, he looked up the stairs and thought about the fine-looking piece of ass who was sleeping in one of the rooms. Duser thought about what the Professor had said to him about the girl. It didn't make any sense, but he didn't know if it was worth the risk of pissing the man off. He had paid them a lot of money in the last few months, and Duser was sure there would be more to come.

Duser's cell phone rang, and he grabbed it from the case on his hip. «Hello.»

«It's me. How is everything?»

«Fine. We're just waiting for Polk to get back with some coffee and food.»

«How long has he been gone?»

Duser noticed the concern in the Professor's voice. «Don't worry. It's late. I'm sure he had to drive farther than we thought.»

«Is he carrying a phone?»

«Yes.»

«Well, call him on it.»

«Don't worry, I'll handle it.»

«How's the girl?»

«She's fine. She's upstairs asleep.» A pair of headlights cut through the front windows. «Hold on a second. I think Polk is back.»

RAPP AND COLEMAN watched through the bushes as the car came down the driveway. It stopped in front of the other sedan, front bumper to front bumper. As soon as the headlights were doused, Rapp and Coleman moved. They stayed in a crouch and picked their way through the narrow path, stopping just short of Rapp's side yard. Each dropping to a knee, they watched their Trojan horse p the tray of coffee and bag of sandwiches and walk between the two sedans. A voice from the porch asked, «Where the hell have you been?»

«I got hung up. They had to brew a fresh pot of coffee.» Dumond's voice came over their headsets. «We have one person on the front porch. Make that two. Another guy just came out.»

Rapp whispered into his mike, «Let me know the second they start to enter the house.»

«They're going in right now.»

Rapp and Coleman dropped to their bellies and crawled across the grass, keeping the sedan that was closest to the garage between them and the front porch. They stopped near the trunk of the car and waited. They could now hear the audio from inside the house. «Where’s the girl?»

«Upstairs asleep. What the fuck took you so long?»

Dumond's voice came over the line. «We have two inside. One’s standing near our man in the kitchen. His gun is holstered, but he’s holding something in his hand. The second is at the kitchen table.»

Rapp whispered, «Hackett, are you ready?»

«Roger.»

«Wait for my word.» Rapp looked at Coleman and nodded. Coleman gave him a thumbs up. Rapp sprang from behind the car and began sprinting across the driveway toward the front porch. The man was standing with his back toward the door facing the street. Rapp was coming at him from the man's right side. He had his Beretta in his left hand and leveled it at the man's head. The entire scene unfolded slow motion for Rapp. As the man started to move, Rapp said, «Take him.»

The man sensed movement and started to turn toward Rapp. He had a machine pistol slung over his shoulder with the hand on the grip. He started to reach for the weapon with his other hand as his eyes made contact with Rapp. Rapp fired his weapon twice. Two bullets spat from the end of the silencer. The first bullet struck the sentry in the right eye and tore through his head. The second one hit him in the cheekbone an inch bellow the first shot. The sentry's body was propelled backward, sending him over the railing and into a bush.

«Tango one down.» Rapp reached the porch just seconds later and put his hand on the doorknob. Coleman was there a step behind him. Over their headsets, Hackett's voce said, «Tango two down.»

Rapp looked up to see Stroble coming across the lawn, and then he heard from inside the house, «What in the hell’s that?» Rapp knew the noise they had just heard was the body of their comrade falling outside on the wood deck. Into his lip mike, he said, «Marcus, tell Dave to get down.» He didn't do it out of concern for the man's life. It was a matter of practicality. He wanted him out of his field of fire. Rapp twisted the knob and shoved the front door. He was in the house, moving to his left toward the kitchen, his gun extended. There would be no shouts or warnings. Rapp wasn't a cop, he was a trained assassin. As he entered the kitchen, Dumond was saying something over the radio, but Rapp didn't register it. All of his senses were focused on a man holding a cell phone in one hand and drawing his gun with the other.

Jeff Duser heard the noise outside and instinctively reached for his gun. A second later, he thought he heard the front door opening. He turned to look and grabbed for his Glock. As he was pulling the weapon from his holster, a dark-featured man came around the comer with a gun in his hand. Duser freed his weapon from the holster and frantically tried to bring it to bear on the stranger. As he did so, he muttered, «Who the fuck are you?»

Rapp fired once and kept moving. The bullet hit exactly where he intended it to – dead center, right between the man's eyebrows. As he crossed the kitchen, he kept his gun aimed at the second man, who was standing by the back door. The guy made no effort to reach for his weapon as Rapp closed on him. He slowly brought his hands up. Rapp brought a finger to his lips and gestured with his gun for him to lie down on the floor. Rapp turned to Coleman and said, «Take care of him. I'm going upstairs.»

PETER CAMERON WAS sitting in the living room of his Georgetown apartment, eyes wide, clutching his digital phone to his ear. Something was wrong. He had been talking to Duser. Everything seemed fine, and then there were Duser's first words of alarm, followed just a few seconds later by Duser saying, «Who the fuck are you?» Then came the loud crash that Cameron guessed was the phone on the other end dropping to the floor. Cameron squeezed his phone tightly as he strained to listen to what was going on.