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Chapters (96)
  1. Cover
  2. Berkley titles by David Ricciardi
  3. Dedication
  4. Epigraph
  5. CHARACTER LIST
  6. PROLOGUE
  7. ONE
  8. TWO
  9. THREE
  10. FOUR
  11. FIVE
  12. SIX
  13. SEVEN
  14. EIGHT
  15. NINE
  16. TEN
  17. ELEVEN
  18. TWELVE
  19. THIRTEEN
  20. FOURTEEN
  21. FIFTEEN
  22. SIXTEEN
  23. SEVENTEEN
  24. EIGHTEEN
  25. NINETEEN
  26. TWENTY
  27. TWENTY-ONE
  28. TWENTY-TWO
  29. TWENTY-THREE
  30. TWENTY-FOUR
  31. TWENTY-FIVE
  32. TWENTY-SIX
  33. TWENTY-SEVEN
  34. TWENTY-EIGHT
  35. TWENTY-NINE
  36. THIRTY
  37. THIRTY-ONE
  38. THIRTY-TWO
  39. THIRTY-THREE
  40. THIRTY-FOUR
  41. THIRTY-FIVE
  42. THIRTY-SIX
  43. THIRTY-SEVEN
  44. THIRTY-EIGHT
  45. THIRTY-NINE
  46. FORTY
  47. FORTY-ONE
  48. FORTY-TWO
  49. FORTY-THREE
  50. FORTY-FOUR
  51. FORTY-FIVE
  52. FORTY-SIX
  53. FORTY-SEVEN
  54. FORTY-EIGHT
  55. FORTY-NINE
  56. FIFTY
  57. FIFTY-ONE
  58. FIFTY-TWO
  59. FIFTY-THREE
  60. FIFTY-FOUR
  61. FIFTY-FIVE
  62. FIFTY-SIX
  63. FIFTY-SEVEN
  64. FIFTY-EIGHT
  65. FIFTY-NINE
  66. SIXTY
  67. SIXTY-ONE
  68. SIXTY-TWO
  69. SIXTY-THREE
  70. SIXTY-FOUR
  71. SIXTY-FIVE
  72. SIXTY-SIX
  73. SIXTY-SEVEN
  74. SIXTY-EIGHT
  75. SIXTY-NINE
  76. SEVENTY
  77. SEVENTY-ONE
  78. SEVENTY-TWO
  79. SEVENTY-THREE
  80. SEVENTY-FOUR
  81. SEVENTY-FIVE
  82. SEVENTY-SIX
  83. SEVENTY-SEVEN
  84. SEVENTY-EIGHT
  85. SEVENTY-NINE
  86. EIGHTY
  87. EIGHTY-ONE
  88. EIGHTY-TWO
  89. EIGHTY-THREE
  90. EIGHTY-FOUR
  91. EIGHTY-FIVE
  92. EIGHTY-SIX
  93. EIGHTY-SEVEN
  94. Children of Fallen Patriots Foundation
  95. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  96. What’s next onyour reading list?

Graves stared at the camera for a few seconds.

“Good,” he said eventually. “Maybe it’ll flush out our boy.”

The screen went dark.

TWENTY-TWO

PICKENS HAD THE machine gun on his lap again.

Dawn was still two hours away as Jake drove to the outskirts of Mogadishu. It was a dangerous neighborhood for two foreigners, made even more so by the nature of their work. A new IMSI catcher was on the center console, acting like radar to locate anyone around them who was using a cell phone. Jake killed the lights and turned off the pavement. The closest user was a quarter mile away.

The two CIA officers drove a hundred yards down a long dirt road and stopped. Jake opened the SUV’s trunk and he and Pickens hauled a mildly sedated Mahad fifty feet off the road into a flat area filled with nothing but scrub brush and litter. With Pickens holding the machine gun, Jake loosened the hood, removed the leg restraints, and told their prisoner that there had been a mix-up—that he wasn’t the man they were looking for.

Then they let him go.

While the Americans held no affinity for Mahad, detaining him too long would raise questions in the pirate community and potentially put the mission at risk. They needed to move on.

Pickens took the wheel. He’d spent his entire career as an Africa Center officer and eight years working the Somalia account—intentionally skipping rotations to other posts to build an absolutely airtight legend. Though his cover would degrade naturally over time—he couldn’t recruit sources if he didn’t occasionally risk exposure—he’d decided not to go to Greece. Being associated with a private jet widely believed to belong to American intelligence would be an unnecessary risk for a long-shot lead.

He drove Jake to the rear entrance of a nearby hotel, where he passed through the lobby and caught a cab to the general aviation section of the airport. Aden Adde International was the most heavily defended space in all of Mogadishu. Hundreds of federal and foreign troops guarded the terminal and the entire eleven-thousand-foot runway with armored vehicles, machine gun towers, and serpentine concrete barriers meant to prevent vehicle-borne IED attacks.

They were succeeded about 50 percent of the time.

Jake walked across the sandstone-colored ramp, already warm from the sun. He passed an old MD-88 from the United Nations and a newer Airbus 321 operated by Daallo Airlines. The Airbus had a hole blown in its skin where a laptop computer packed with homemade explosives had been detonated by a suicide bomber intent on bringing down the plane.

Fortunately, the suicide was the only successful part of the operation.

Farther down the tarmac was a gray McDonnell-Douglas 520 helicopter that was being rinsed with fresh water. The man working the pressure washer stopped what he was doing and watched as Jake approached the white Gulfstream G550.