Page 120 of One Minute Out

“Iden confirmed,” Travers said. “My iden is forty-six, Bravo, Sierra, nine, Kilo.”

“Roger, Zulu. Be advised, I have new targeting information for you. Target can be located in or around the Casino of Venice, in Carnareggio, two zero, four zero. Be advised that while we believe he is working alone, the area will likely be populated with third-party hostiles, forces from the Mala del Brenta crime organization.”

Travers scribbled this all down on a small pad. “Got it. Interrogative: where did we get this information?”

“That’s ‘need to know’ only, Zulu. Just treat the intel as credible.”

Need to know? Travers thought. Why wouldn’t the guys on the ground need to know where the hell the CIA was getting intricate location and disposition-of-forces intel?

He didn’t argue, but he did ask another question. “Do we know the time when the target should arrive at this poz?”

“Time, now, Zulu. Get there ASAP.”

“Roger that. We’re en route.”

Suzanne Brewer then said, “As per the DDO, the subject is to be taken alive. Is that clear?”

Travers sighed in disbelief now. Court Gentry was his friend, more or less. At the very least they had fought and bled alongside each other. Travers had been given the rules of engagement already, so he knew Gentry wasn’t hostile. Gentry was just being Gentry, doing his own thing, and the DDO wanted his ass dragged back to the East Coast so he could be put back in service.

Yeah, he might not want to go, and he would try to escape and evade. Gentry might even throw a fist or try out some of his whiz-bang judo shit. But neither side was going to pull guns on each other.

Court was a good man in the Ground Branch team leader’s book, despite what the Agency brassholes said about him from time to time. There was no way Travers or his team was going to kill him, and Brewer’s stressing of the rules of engagement just made him dislike the already dislikable woman even more.

But Travers was a good soldier. He kept his voice much more dispassionate than he felt as he replied, “Alive. Understood and wilco.”

He then transmitted on his interteam radio. “Listen up, Zulu. New target coordinates, one klick my poz on foot to the east. Everybody flex over there, and double-time it.”

THIRTY-SIX

Here I am, in yet another dark room, in yet another congested European city, looking out yet another dirty window in search of yet another group of assholes.

At times like these I can’t help but wonder if I should have gone to college.

I’ve been working at the packed restaurant and nightclub downstairs for the past two hours, carting ice to the bartenders, changing out kegs of beer, and schlepping cases of wine and liquor down two flights of stairs, then schlepping the empty bottles out to a loading dock in the back.

But at a quarter till midnight I slipped away from my assigned duties, picked an office door lock on the second floor, and found an overwatch position above the alleyway that looked directly out towards my objective.

I’m sitting in the dark, staring down on my target location, waiting for something to happen.

The Casino of Venice is in an ornate palace with a simple facade, tucked away in a tiny square surrounded by taller structures. Next door to it is a square building with a pair of large red wooden doors on the other side of a stone forecourt with an impressive iron gate. I see several people milling about inside the gate, all male, all dressed in fine suits. These don’t look like security, and they don’t look like Italian mafia to me.

So I’m guessing these shitheads are the buyers.

I’m assuming there are more inside, and I’m also assuming the women from Mostar have already been brought in, either via the passageways in front of me and off to my left or else through some sort of back entrance. The building does back up onto a small canal, so I know I may miss some of the comings and goings, but I also know beggars can’t be choosers, and this spot gives me a good chance of getting a look at some of the players.

I pull out my camera and begin taking pictures of the men I see, all the while scanning the buildings, windows, and alcoves within sight. I take it to be a one hundred percent chance that the Consortium will be on the lookout for me, and they’d be idiots not to put surveillance at the front entrance to tonight’s market. But despite my searching, I don’t see any threats except a couple of goons standing at the casino door.

Still, I know they are out here somewhere.

Close to me, hunting me.

I keep shooting images, but soon I hear a voice in the alleyway off to my left. I don’t move closer to the window to improve my angle so that I can get a visual on the noise, but instead I patiently wait for whoever is talking to come into view.

Finally a group of seven or eight men, all in business suits, walk together in a tight profile, casting one long shadow as they pass in front of a streetlamp. One of their number is talking loudly, in an animated fashion, as if he is on the phone. I can’t make out the words, but I can hear that he’s speaking English.

I focus on the middle of the cluster of men as they turn and begin down the alleyway towards the casino entrance. I see the top of a bald head, barely visible among the much taller men around.

I see a phone to his ear and realize he’s the one speaking.

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