Next someone spoke in an Asian language. When he finished, a translator asked, “Where is he now?”
“He flew to Prague last night. I have our agents asking around at hotels for him, but there is no way to know if he is still there.”
“Which team is being sent to Prague?” someone asked.
“The Albanians. They are closest.”
“That’s hardly fair!” shouted a South African.
Lloyd, in silhouette, took off his glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose. “No offense to the Albanians, but I don’t think the first team he encounters will be the one that gets him.”
There was grumbling on the Albanian feed, but it was quickly extinguished with hisses.
“We will kill Gentry in the next two days, yes. But we will likely do it through attrition. Many of you may die.” He paused a beat, a halfhearted attempt to act like he gave a shit. “That said, we don’t know that the Albanians will get the first crack at him. He may well have moved west by the time your plane lands. If that is the case, if we do pick up his trail past Prague, we will put you back on your plane, and you will take up a new ambush point closer to the final destination. There is no clear advantage to being farthest east, I assure everyone.”
Lloyd sat up straighter in his chair. His silhouette appeared thin but athletic. “Let me finish by saying this. Do what it takes to get the job done. I could not possibly care less aboutcollateral damage. If you can’t stomach a few dead kids or dead pensioners or dead puppy dogs, then don’t get on my goddamn airplane. Your job is to kill Court Gentry. Do that, and you will make millions for your organization and garner the thanks of the Central Intelligence Agency. Fail, and you will most likely die by his hand. You would be well served to avoid worrying about anything else.
“Any questions?”
There were none.
“Then, gentlemen . . . game on.”
—
At four fifteen in the morning a LaurentGroup security officer from the firm’s massive truck farm in Brno, Czech Republic, showed Gentry’s photo to a sleepy hotel desk clerk at a narrow four-story inn in the Stare Mesto, the old town of Prague. The old man behind the hotel counter looked at the photo for a long time, said he could not be sure, but upon taking payment of five hundred crowns from the beady-eyed stranger, he changed his tone. He was certain the clean-shaven man in the picture and the bearded tourist in his attic room were one in the same.
The surveillance agent called Lloyd immediately. He was an employee of LaurentGroup, and Lloyd was under strict orders to keep company people away from any direct action, so Lloyd instructed him to go home.
“A team is on the way,” Lloyd said.
“If you need him dead, I’ll do it for one hundred thousand crowns.”
Lloyd chuckled into the phone. “No, you won’t.”
“Are you saying I can’t handle—”
“Yes. That’s exactly what I’m saying.”
“Fucking Americky prick.”
“I’m the fucking Americky prick who just saved your worthless Czech life. Go home. Forget. You will receive a bonus for your good work.”
“I hate Americans.”
Lloyd laughed out loud as the line went dead.
TEN
Gentry awoke at five in the morning. The bullet wound in his thigh stung and throbbed; it had been anything but a good night’s rest. He sat up slowly and painfully, leaned forward to stretch his lower back and ham-strings, stood, and tilted hard to each side. He wanted to spend the day moving. He had not yet decided on a destination, but he knew the sooner he left the hotel, the better.
After a quick trip to the bathroom to relieve himself and check the dressing on his leg, he dressed in the same clothing as the night before. He then looked out the window for signs of surveillance. Finding nothing amiss, he descended the stairs and left the building at twenty-five minutes past the hour.
He had created a mental to-do list for the day. One, go to his local cache here in Prague and retrieve a small handgun. He would not be doing any more flying; the plane trips of the last twenty-four hours were an anomaly in his life, because Court hated to be unarmed. He only boarded commercial aircraft as a last resort, had flown no more than a dozen times in the past four years. Now, as he walked unarmedthrough the darkened and deserted cobblestone streets of Prague, he felt naked. The only consolation to his martial needs was a small Spyderco folding knife in his waistband that he’d bought off a Kurdish policeman. It was better than nothing but inferior to any sort of firearm.
After hitting his cache he’d need to get out of town: pay cash for a cheap motorcycle and just buzz on out of Prague. Maybe spend a week or so moving from village to village in the Czech Republic or Slovakia. He hoped this would keep him safe until the Nigerian president left office and, hopefully, left him in peace.
No one could disappear more quickly or cleanly than the thirty-six-year-old American.
