FIFTEEN.

    Rapp sat awkwardly over a laptop, his muscular arms contorted so he could peck at the keys. He stopped reading the profile on the screen and looked out the porthole of the Agency's Gulfstream V long-range jet. As far as the eye could see was an endless stretch of blue water. The plane was outfitted with a VIP package: plush leather seats, a couch, galley, head, bedroom and a secure communications system that allowed the team to stay in touch with Washington without fear of being intercepted.

    Rapp didn't know how she'd pulled it off, but she had. Kennedy had convinced the President to give his approval to the operation, or turn a blind eye. Either way it didn't much matter to Rapp. He caught himself. That wasn't entirely true. He did care. It was infinitely better if the President turned a blind eye to the goings-on of the Orion Team and their dark operations.

    As far as the American people were concerned, Rapp honestly felt that the vast majority didn't want to know what he was up to. America had been attacked. The country was at war, and war was ugly. They didn't want to see the gruesome details of how it was fought. They didn't start the war but they sure as hell didn't want to lose it. They wanted someone like Mitch Rapp to take care of the dirty work. The chief problem lay, as always, with the politicians.

    They would use any issue to gain the upper hand on an opponent.

    Scandal is what they were in constant search of, so consequently the fewer people who knew at the White House, the better his chances of staying under the Washington radar.

    If President Hayes wanted to insulate himself politically, so be it.

    From an operational standpoint it was a far more desirable situation. If the President didn't want to be associated with the op it would ensure that he wouldn't be discussing it with any of his advisors, and the probability of another leak would be reduced.

    From the standpoint of morale it was a less palatable situation, however. Not that morale mattered much to Rapp. He didn't need his hand held, he didn't need to be pumped up, no pre-game speeches were required.

    Early in his career as a counterterrorism operative he'd once heard a Special Forces officer give his men a talk before launching a hostage rescue. The officer assembled his team and simply said, "If you need a pep talk right now, you're in the wrong line of work. We all know why we're here, so let's load up and get this done." No one said a word; no one needed to.

    That scene had stayed with Rapp all these years. He was only twenty-three at the time. Twelve of the calmest, coolest bad asses he'd ever met climbed onto two Black Hawk helicopters and went out and performed their jobs to absolute perfection. It was one of the most beautiful things he'd ever seen.

    Despite his natural preference for operational security, Rapp couldn't help but feel disappointed in the President. He'd thought better of the man. Rapp was starting to wonder if Robert Hayes was losing his determination in the battle against terrorism. Up until now, Hayes's commitment had been unwavering. Why he'd now decided to get gun-shy was a mystery.

    When Rapp had gone into the Oval Office this morning he'd honestly thought the President wouldn't need more than two seconds to sign on. When Rapp got back to Washington he'd make it a point to talk to Kennedy about the President. If anyone knew what was going on it would be her.

    Kennedy was an amazing woman. Even after the President had given him the cold shoulder, he knew Kennedy would succeed. Her powers of persuasion were so total that Rapp liked to joke if she got tired of running the CIA she could go to work for the D.C. police talking jumpers off the ledge. Her ability to navigate her way through Washington 's political maze was amazing.

    With all this fresh on his mind Rapp had put the wheels in motion the moment he left the White House. His first call had been to the SEAL Demolition and Salvage Corporation, out of Baltimore, where he spoke to an individual who he'd worked with many times before. Since they were talking on an unsecured line the conversation had been brief and cryptic, but enough information was passed along that the man on the other end could begin to assemble his team and prepare to leave on very short notice.

    The rest of the drive back to Langley was spent talking to his new bride. In her mind, the day they got married was the day her husband was to retire from field operations. And Rapp, at least, when they got engaged, thought so too.

    The problem was, between the engagement and the wedding, he'd been forced to sit through an endless succession of meetings where little was accomplished. He was quick to come to the realization that retiring from the field might not be as easy as he thought. Simply holding down an office job was never going to cut it. He knew it and she knew it, but they were both in agreement that the really dangerous operations were out of the picture.

    Rapp saw himself taking a very active role in planning operations.

    He might not be the man pulling the trigger anymore, but he sure as hell wasn't going to sit in his cushy office in Virginia doling out orders from thousands of miles away. There was a reason why military commanders favored the opinions of on-site commanders, and that was why Rapp would be running this op in person. There was nothing arrogant about it, but the truth was there was no one he trusted more to get it done right.

    Anna, always the inquisitive reporter, asked a solid minute's worth of questions. Each one came from a different angle and each one was met with the standard, "You know I can't answer that." There was one question, however, that he could answer. Anna wanted to know if it would be dangerous. Mitch laughed and told her, "No," and to his way of thinking, at least, it was the truth.

    There was little doubt, however, that if Anna knew what he had planned, she would disagree with him vehemently. Setting her opinion aside, in Rapp's brutally lethal world, this op didn't score too high on the danger list, and depending on how the final pieces were put into play, the op might actually present no direct threat to him whatsoever.

    Something told him he wasn't being totally honest with himself, but at present he wasn't willing to explore it much further. Right now he had the calm sense of clarity he always felt before a mission. Like any predator, he was comfortable with only brief periods of inaction.

    He never felt more alive than when he was moving forward with a plan. His intellect came to life, he saw things with a heightened sense of awareness. Possibilities opened up before his mind, with paths to take, and options to choose from while the entire time he subconsciously calculated the odds for success and set the information aside.

    There was something else, though. Something he'd never discussed with anyone, not even Kennedy. When he stripped everything away and forced himself to be brutally honest, he was left with the undeniable fact that he enjoyed killing men like General Moro.

    At first he had been embarrassed by these feelings, uncomfortable with the knowledge that he took pleasure in something so brutal. But with time and maturity he had grown comfortable with the knowledge that he was killing men who had made a conscious choice to do harm. Moro was a traitor of his own volition, and when you plowed through all the political horse shit, the Anderson family had been minding their own business, breaking no laws, when they were snatched from their seaside resort. They were noncombatants in a war that had nothing to do with them.

    Moro had decided to climb into bed with the enemy and because of him the Andersons were still held hostage and two U.S. commandos were now dead. Rapp knew that just planning this operation wouldn't be enough. He wanted to be there. He wanted to see the look on the general's face when he knew it was over. He wanted to reach out and tear the man's throat out with his bare hands.

    Rapp's thoughts of blood lust were interrupted by a presence hovering over his shoulder. Reaching up he closed his laptop and turned to see who it was.

    Special Agent Skip McMahon of the FBI placed one of his forearms on the top of the seat next to Rapp and frowned.

    A bit of a fashion throwback, McMahon had on a short-sleeve, white dress shirt with a striped tie. In a deep gravelly voice he asked, "What are you up to, Secret Agent Man?"

    Rapp smiled. McMahon was one of the few people he knew who had absolutely no problem giving him shit.

    "Just a little homework."

    McMahon took a seat across from him, letting his tired, beat-up body slump into the leather chair.

    "Homework, huh?" he said in a skeptical voice. McMahon studied Rapp with his probing eyes. In his more than thirty years with the Bureau, McMahon had hunted bank robbers, kidnappers, killers, serial killers, terrorists, cyber punks spies, several federal judges and a few politicians to boot. He was a tenacious no-nonsense lawman who the Bureau often called on when they needed results. He was loved by the few people who truly understood him, and hated by the army of bureaucrats in dark suits who were more concerned with protocol than results.

    But even the pension gang at the FBI had a grudging respect for McMahon. In a place where 99.9 percent of the employees had never discharged their weapon in the line of duty, McMahon had done so on more occasions than he cared to count. He wasn't a lawyer or an accountant, he was an old-fashioned law enforcement officer.

    "So who's General Moro?" asked McMahon, his eyes staying locked on Rapp.

    Rapp didn't answer at first. He cursed himself silently for allowing McMahon to read his computer screen and then he tried to figure out how much he should say. McMahon had been brought along to conduct surveillance on Ambassador Cox, and when Rapp gave him the word, he was to arrest the Ambassador and escort him back to the United States.

    The President had personally asked for McMahon at the urging of CIA director Kennedy. Kennedy and McMahon had a relationship that went beyond work. How far beyond, Rapp had never been comfortable in asking, but McMahon was ideal for the job. He had a reputation as someone who could turn a blind eye to certain things if need be.

    Rapp figured McMahon could find out who the general was with one phone call, so he told him the truth.

    "He's with the Philippine army."

    "No shit," McMahon said, feigning surprise.

    "I don't know if I ever could have figured that one out." McMahon scratched one of his hairy forearms and asked, "So what's your interest in the man? Is he friend or foe?"

    Rapp smiled.

    "Tread lightly, Skip."

    "Or what… I might step in dog shit?" McMahon's face contorted into an annoyed grimace.

    "Come on, Mitch, I step in dog shit for a living, and don't give me any of that need-to-know crap. I know plenty about you and"-McMahon leaned forward, pointing over his shoulder with his thumb-"I also know a fair amount about Blondie sitting up there. I don't know who the other guys are, but I can take an awfully damn good educated guess that they're pretty handy with a gun and they probably know all that kung fu shit they teach you guys.

    So"-McMahon leaned in even closer-"why don't we just cut to the chase and save each other a lot of time and effort."

    Rapp shook his head with amusement. The "Blondie" Skip was referring to was Scott Coleman, the former commander of SEAL Team 6.

    Coleman, retired from the navy, now ran an outfit called SEAL Demolition and Salvage Corporation. They did a fair amount of legitimate work training local police departments from Baltimore down to Norfolk on scuba techniques and underwater salvage, but unofficially they also worked from time to time as freelance operatives for the CIA.

    McMahon and Coleman had crossed paths several years back during a very high-profile murder investigation. The case had never been brought to trial, but both Rapp and McMahon knew the truth about the events that surrounded the sensational murders. Scott Coleman had been a major player in that drama.

    McMahon had been chosen to come along for the very reason that he could be trusted. He wasn't some hotshot Fed who would try to burn the CIA so he could advance his career. McMahon understood that they were all on the same team. Nonetheless, Rapp wasn't all that comfortable with sharing highly classified information.

    "Skip, believe me when I tell you, you don't want to dig too deep on this one."

    McMahon's frown turned into a scowl.

    "Mitch?" His tone left no doubt that he wasn't buying the tired old line.

    "I don't need bodyguards, and you sure as hell don't need bodyguards. I should be able to handle arresting the Ambassador all on my own, so there's only one reason I can think of why you'd bring these four boy scouts halfway around the world."

    Rapp slid his laptop off to the side and reluctantly made a decision.

    "You familiar with the Anderson kidnapping?"

    "Yep." McMahon paused for a moment and then his eyes got real tight. He'd been briefed by Kennedy herself about why the Ambassador was being arrested. He knew about the leak, the two dead navy SEALs and the failed hostage rescue. It didn't take him long to realize that General Moro was involved in this, and probably not in a good way.

    "Is Moro a man we can trust?"

    Rapp shook his head.

    McMahon nodded slowly.

    "I see."

    "Any more questions?"

    The big FBI agent had a cheerful glint in his eye. Slipping out of his chair he patted Rapp on the shoulder and said, "No. I think I can fill in the blanks, but for Christ's sake, be careful."

    Smiling, Rapp said, "Always."