Brad Thor - The First Commandment

The Troll’s face flushed with anger.

“That dog was an innocent, an absolute innocent!” growled the Troll angrily as he slid off the couch and walked to the bar to refill his glass.

Attributing his increasing loquaciousness to the alcohol, Harvath had no intention of stopping him.

“There’s a reason I haven’t been in touch with Philippe,” said the Troll as he refilled his glass. “He had always been a very disturbed young man.”

“How disturbed?” asked Harvath.

“Extremely,” he replied as he crossed back over to the couch and climbed up. “There even came a point where the Roussards refused to care for him any longer. Adara had to put him into a very expensive boarding school. But there his problems only got worse.”

“What kind of problems?”

“In the beginning, his behavior was marked by a lack of empathy or conscience. He had poor impulse control and exhibited an array of manipulative behaviors. A psychologist the Roussards consulted could not make a specific diagnosis. The boy exhibited both antisocial and narcissistic personality disorders-neither of which was good news.

“To paraphrase the renowned criminal psychiatrist Robert D. Hare, Philippe was a predator who used charm, manipulation, intimidation, and violence to control others and to satisfy his own selfish needs. Lacking in conscience and feeling for others, he cold-bloodedly took whatever he wanted and did whatever he pleased, violating social norms and expectations without the slightest sense of guilt or regret.”

Philippe sounded just like his mother, and Harvath wondered if such an abhorrent psychological condition could be inherited.

“The Roussards tried to medicate the boy,” continued the Troll, studying the bit of brandy in his snifter, “but he refused to take his pills. When he attacked their youngest daughter with a knife, the Roussards gave Adara an ultimatum.”

“Which was?”

“Either she show up within the next twenty-four hours to collect him, or they were going to put him on the next plane to Palestine.

“It was the first in a perceived series of abandonments that undoubtedly contributed to his already precarious mental condition. The boy had always been very conflicted about his Palestinian-Israeli parentage. The use of the plagues, and in reverse order, may be some twisted nod to his father’s Jewish heritage.”

Now that Harvath’s worst fears about the man stalking the people closest to him had been confirmed, he had to focus on how to stop him. “Do you have a way to contact him?”

The Troll shook his head and took another sip of his drink. “Philippe and I had an incident. We never spoke again after that.”

“What kind of incident? ”

“It’s not something I like to talk about.”

Harvath squinted over the sights of his pistol and began to apply pressure to the trigger. The Troll got the message.

“We had a disagreement. It was over something entirely inconsequential. Any normal person would have forgotten it and moved on, but Phillipe wasn’t normal, he was sick.

“He abducted me and held me hostage for two days, during which time I was subjected to torture. It was Adara who finally found me and came to my rescue. She nursed me back to health.”

“So why the hell would you want to show any loyalty to a man like that?” inquired Harvath.

“My loyalty wasn’t to him,” said the Troll, a sad smile playing out on his lips, “but to his mother.”

“I want to know something,” said Harvath. “I was there the night she died.”

“Yes.”

“Do you hold me responsible for what happened?”

The Troll was silent. “Does it really matter?” he finally asked.

“Yes, it does.”

“I don’t know who to blame. Hashim martyred himself and blew up the van, but he did it to save his sister from an ignoble fate at the hands of Schoen.”

“But what about me?” said Harvath.

“You were there. How could I not blame you?” asked the Troll. “I loved her and now she is gone. You were a part of that night, so yes, in part I do blame you.”

Harvath watched for any sign that the Troll was not telling him the truth. “Enough to want me dead?”

There was a long pause. Finally the man said, “At one point, I wanted you dead. I wanted everyone involved dead. But I realized that what happened was more of Adara’s making than anything else. She was the one ultimately responsible-she and her crazy brother, Hashim. The entire family was destined for tragedy.”

“Including Philippe?” probed Harvath.

The Troll’s eyes drifted toward the water. There was an odd sound coming from the bay. It sounded like a quickly moving watercraft rhythmically crashing against the waves. The only problem was the bay was perfectly calm. There were no waves tonight.

Harvath noticed it too and looked up just as a blacked-out Bell JetRanger helicopter came into view and began firing into the open living room.

The roar of the large helicopter hovering just above the water outside was eclipsed by the deafening thunder of heavy machine guns emptying themselves into the house.

Harvath grabbed the Troll by the back of his thick neck and forced him to the tile floor as all around them the walls, the furniture, and the fixtures were chewed to a pulp.

Shards of broken glass blanketed the ground, and a fire began in the kitchen. With its wooden construction and thatched roof, Harvath knew the place was going to go up faster than a box of kindling.

Drawing his pistol, he marked in his mind’s eye where the chopper had been hovering and readied himself to return fire. But the opportunity never came.

At a pause in the machine-gun rampage, Harvath popped up from the floor with his Beretta poised, only to see the skis of the helicopter as it disappeared overhead.

Despite the ringing in his ears, he could hear the helicopter as it flew over the roof and had a bad feeling about where it was headed-the landing pad.

The JetRanger could carry anywhere from five to seven passengers, which meant that there was no telling how many men were aboard. Harvath had already expended two rounds of ammunition and had only one spare clip remaining. He didn’t like the odds if they got into a protracted firefight. His only hope was to get the drop on whoever was aboard that helicopter.

When Harvath reached down to help the Troll off the floor, he was no longer there. Harvath spun to see the man running for the front door. Harvath caught him right at the reading nook. “We have to get out of here,” he shouted as he grabbed the dwarf by his collar.

“Not without the dogs!” he returned.

“There’s no time. We have to go now.”

“I won’t leave them!”

Harvath couldn’t believe the Troll would put his life on the line for his dogs. “Now,” he said as he spun him in the direction of the dining room and gave him a shove to get going.

Passing the couch, Harvath grabbed his dry bag and slung it over his shoulder.

At the dining-room table the Troll stopped again, this time for his laptop. Frantically, he began pulling the cables from its ports. Before Harvath could say anything, he stated, “We’ll want this. Trust me.”

Harvath didn’t argue. Grabbing the device by its handle, he jerked it off the table, stripping it from its remaining cables, which went whipping off in different directions.

With his other hand, Harvath took hold of the Troll’s arm and propelled him forward. They ran to the front of the structure, where the dining room and living room met. Beneath them was the glass floor. Many of its panes had been shattered. Others were pockmarked and splintered from the waves of machine-gun fire that had torn up the house.