Drone

Pearce dashed through the house to the kitchen area. According to the blueprints, the bunker’s air ducts were hidden behind the tiled walls of the villa, but an access door was located beneath the kitchen sink for duct inspections and repair. Pearce pulled on a gas mask, opened the access door, and snaked a long, thin plastic tube down into it, then he connected a small gas bottle from his utility belt to the line. After he emptied the bottle’s contents, he tossed the bottle aside and shut the access door.

After stripping off his mask, he jogged back to the bunker video monitor. Castillo paced furiously, a crazed, caged animal. Pearce held up his smartphone and recorded the monitor images. Castillo’s legs soon turned wobbly and he tripped, then stumbled, and finally fell to the floor, his eyes rolling into the back of his head. His arms and legs jerked wildly as his jaw clacked open and shut like a rapidly blinking eye. Seconds later, he was dead.

Satisfied, Pearce exited his phone’s camera function and pocketed it.

The last item on Pearce’s agenda was in the heavy rucksack he’d hauled up the hill. It contained a specially designed two-stage demolition device. He armed it and set the timer, then jogged back down to his boat.

When his boat and the two Spartans had sped out a couple of miles, he cut the engines and turned around just in time to watch the top of the island erupt with a deafening roar. A mushroom cloud of fire boiled up into the night sky, fueled by a canister of white phosphorus. It almost looked like a volcanic explosion. It lit the ocean surface for twenty miles in all directions. Pearce assumed that NORAD was going crazy right about now.

A gentle ocean breeze brushed against Pearce’s face. The phosphorus smelled a little like garlic. He fired up his engines and headed home.

24

Maiquetía, Venzuela

Sandwiched between the steeply rising mountains looming behind it and the vast Caribbean sea on its doorstep, the city of Maiquetía featured a deepwater port, an unlimited coastline, and the Simón Bolívar International Airport. There was also a secured compound that protected a safe house. Ulises Castillo had been its only guest for the last week. The last surviving Castillo was under the special protection of General Agostino Ribas, the defense minister of Venezuela.

Udi and Tamar were bored to tears. They had been floating off the coast of Maiquetía on a sixty-three-foot yacht for three days. Myers had forbidden Pearce to take out Ulises on Venezuelan soil so Udi and Tamar were reduced to babysitting.

The first day the Israelis arrived was the most exciting. They went onshore and planted spider drones equipped with microphones and pinhead-size cameras for data collection on Ulises, but they had been confined to the yacht at sea ever since. The boat was also equipped with long-range laser voice detection and video surveillance systems. They even had an RQ-11 Raven, a miniature unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) that could be launched by hand at a moment’s notice. But that was their only drone. They were too far away from friendly airstrips for ground-launched operations.

When General Ribas suddenly arrived at the safe house with an armed escort, Udi and Tamar scrambled into action. Ribas entered Ulises’s living quarters alone, leaving his two personal bodyguards outside the door.

Udi and Tamar tuned in to the conversation that was being recorded on video.

* * *

Ribas puffed thoughtfully on a fat cigar, clouding the small living room with blue smoke. The two men sat opposite each other on worn leather couches, separated by a glass coffee table.

“Your father and I have been friends for a long time. That is why he entrusted you to my care.” Ribas leaned forward and pointed his cigar at Ulises. “You know, I held you in my arms once when you were a small baby.”

“You and Papa ran Colombian cocaine together back in the ’80s,” Ulises said.

“Whores, too. We made good money.”

“Still do, from what he says.” Ulises smiled.

Ribas roared with laughter. “Just like your old man!” Ribas took a long, thoughtful drag on his cigar before stabbing out the butt in the ashtray on the table. “Look, I have some bad news.”

Ulises frowned. “My father?”

“Yes.”

“How?” Ulises demanded.

“It does not matter. I am truly sorry.”

“The Americans?”

“Yes, of course. Who else could it be? They are animals.” Ribas observed the ruthless young Castillo carefully.

Ulises stared at his enormous hands, emotionless. “It was inevitable, I suppose,” Ulises said. “The Americans are too powerful.”

“You are welcome to remain here, of course,” Ribas offered.

Ulises glanced back up, smiling. “I can’t kill Americans sitting here.”

Ribas laughed again. “Your father would be proud.”

“How soon can you get me back to Mexico?”

“How soon can you be ready?”

Ulises stood. “I’m ready now.”

Ribas stood as well. “I already have a helicopter waiting for you at the airport.”