He switched off the car alarm so that it wasn’t triggered by the movement of the ferry, then stepped out and went up to the café.

13

Ellie Flowers was sat toward the back of the Avianca A330 that was flying them from Washington to Bogotá. It was a quiet flight, and the rows behind and ahead of her were vacant. Ellie had her tablet on her lap and was reviewing the new intelligence from the DEA team that was running the operation in Medellín. The DEA was reporting that the walk-in who had offered information on the cartel in exchange for immunity and the five-million-dollar reward looked as if he might be legitimate. The man—they had given him the cryptonym of CHILD—had suggested that he could provide the coordinates of a jungle camp where El Centro’s decision makers could be found. It was that information that had sent Ellie to the airport. There had only been time to make a quick call to her brother to let him know that she would likely be out of contact for the next few weeks.

Five million bucks. It was one of the largest bounties the US had offered, but the stakes were high for anyone who was prepared to lay a claim to it. Fingering the cartel leadership responsible for the hit on Michael Cochrane would be a dangerous thing to do. The cartel had a long reach and a longer memory; anyone ratting to the gringos was accepting a life where he or she would always be looking over a shoulder. There had to be serious compensation for a risk as big as that.

Ellie had gone for a walk up and down the aisle on the pretext of stretching her legs, although the real reason was to try to identify the others who had been assigned to this operation with her. Men from two JSOC operational sabre squadrons—Blue and Black squadrons—had been deployed. Blue squadron was responsible for direct action and Black squadron for recon and surveillance. The latter were already in theatre while the former were travelling on a number of flights to avoid tipping off the Colombians that something was afoot. Ellie had seen a handful of potential suspects on her own flight: male, early to mid-thirties, relaxed, often grabbing sleep now in the anticipation that it would be harder to find later on. Others would be taking flights on Spirit, United, COPA and so on.