Page 95 of Edge of Honor

“I know it’s not as much fun as fishing or house-sitting, but I appreciate all your help.”

The ex–CIA director chuckled. “True, but hopefully it’ll make for a good story someday.”

Getting out of the car, Harvath had just closed the door when McGee rolled down the passenger-side window and said, “Word of advice. I read Hale’s file all the way through. You’ve been through a lot of scrapes but so has he. Be careful.”

“Copy that,” Harvath replied. “Keep an eye on Nicholas for me. He hasn’t been sleeping lately and could turn out to be an even bigger threat than Hale.”

Smiling, McGee pulled away as Harvath got into the Bronco and headed back to the house.

After parking in the driveway, he headed inside to check on Tyson. He found the Admiral right where he had left him. The President’s address was complete, and a cable news panel was discussing what little information there was to parse.

Harvath refilled the man’s mug full of coffee, checked to see if he needed anything else, and let him know he’d be back and forth getting things ready for their boat trip.

Grabbing a headlamp, he made multiple trips, carrying all his dive equipment down to the dock and loading everything aboardPier Pressure.

Once that task was complete, he walked over to the church, unlocked the door, and headed down into his gun room.

Wanting to make sure that Haney and McGee had every possible advantage should they come under attack again, he had left all of his weapons and equipment with them and was now starting from scratch.

As far as Harvath was concerned, gearing up for a water insertion was a completely different animal. What could get wet, would get wet. Anything else needed to be placed in a dry bag. And even then there was only so much he could physically swim with to shore. He began laying equipment on the center table piece by piece.

Removing a waterproof night-vision monocular from its case, he inserted fresh batteries and put it through the same testing process he hadrecently run his night-vision goggles through. Confident that it was in good working order, he found the flip-up head-mount assembly that went with it, which would allow him to wear it like a headlamp, and set both items on the table.

Next up was a little something the techs at Taser had been working on. Called theNeptune, it was a fully submersible, six-shot energy weapon. Grabbing a holster, an extended power magazine, and an additional six-shot cartridge, he added those to the table as well.

Along with it went one of his favorite fixed-blade knives—a Gerber LMF II Infantry with a rubberized handle, and a fully waterproof tactical light with multiple beams.

Everything else, including a suppressed Glock 19 and four spare magazines, a battle belt, a small blowout trauma kit, boots and BDUs, and an additional tourniquet went into his dry bag.

The Glock was coming along as a very last resort. As discussed with McGee, he wasn’t headed to the estate to harm anyone. It was the same reason he wasn’t bringing a rifle. His job was to be a ghost—get in and get out without any of the personnel knowing he had been there.

There was also the issue of getting off the estate if his primary means of exfiltrating failed. While he could get back in the water and swim downriver, he would need a way to transport Hale. His answer was an extremely small, inflatable dinghy. It came tightly rolled in its own compact dry sack and, via an adaptor, could be inflated from the air left in his SCUBA tank. It wasn’t exactly a process he’d want to attempt under fire, but if guns were blazing and he was rushing toward the Potomac, chances were pretty good that he would have already ditched Hale.

It wasn’t the worst backup plan he’d ever come up with. It also wasn’t the best. But it was a plan nonetheless, and considering how little they had to work with, it was better than nothing.

Going through all the gear two more times, he bagged everything and carried it upstairs.

Next on his list was to prep the small storage room off his gun room. As the room was all stone, he had to get clever with how he attached the heavy plastic sheeting. For the work lamps, he ran extension cords from the nearest outlet. And though it would have been nice tobe able to fully adjust the temperature in the space, that simply wasn’t an option. The church basement had never been intended to serve as a black site.

When all of his work was complete, he carried everything else down to the boat and then returned to the house to check on Admiral Tyson. He was still in the living room, watching TV and drinking coffee.

Retreating to his office, he hopped online and checked the latest data from the Chesapeake Bay Interpretive Buoy System. On a small pad, he noted the water temperature, the speed and direction of the current and the wind, the wave heights, and the time of the tides. Then, pulling out a nautical chart and laying it on his desk, he located the shoreline in front of the Willis estate and worked upriver to the point where he wanted Tyson to drop him.

Switching back to his computer, he pinpointed both sets of GPS coordinates and wrote them down. It was time to give the Admiral his pre-mission briefing.

He brought it all into the kitchen, laid it out on the table, and had the man come join him.

Coffee, and time away from the yacht club bar, seemed to have served Tyson well. The man was much improved—his eyes no longer glassy, his speech no longer slurred. He paid attention and asked a handful of good questions.

Once the briefing was over, Harvath went upstairs to get into his bathing suit and load the GPS data into his Garmin tactix watch, which was charging next to his bed.

After texting McGee to make sure he was en route, he grabbed a pair of flip-flops from his closet and returned to the kitchen, where he found the Admiral ready to go.

Together they made sure the house was all locked up, Harvath set his alarm, and they walked down to the dock.

OncePier Pressurewas fired up and Tyson gave him the command, Harvath cast off the lines. Helping ease the boat off his dock, he then hopped aboard and they began cruising up the Potomac.

The Admiral punched the coordinates for the drop-off point into his GPS while Harvath got into his wetsuit and readied all his gear.

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