Path Of The Assassin

“Agent Harvath, I know Ms. Cassidy possesses limited knowledge of your operation and your country’s overall involvement, but if you do not cooperate with us, you’ve seen that my brother is not above using her to loosen your tongue.”

“If you or your brother lay a hand on her, I guarantee it will be the last thing either of you ever do.”

“Idle threats, the last refuge of a beaten man,” said Adara, shaking her head.

“That wasn’t a threat. It was a promise, and it was anything but idle.”

Adara pushed herself back from the table and stood. “You do not frighten me, Agent Harvath.”

“I should.”

“Nevertheless, you do not. I will give you the rest of the night to think about what I have offered you. Either you choose to cooperate, or I will hand you both over to my brother in the morning and he will do things his way. The choice is entirely up to you. The guards will show you to your rooms.”

With that, Adara Nidal turned and left the dining room. The guards stepped forward and escorted Scot and Meg back to their rooms. Just as they reached their doors, Harvath turned to Meg one last time to tell her everything was going to be all right. This time, though, it was different. She knew by looking in his eyes that he didn’t really believe it.

49

When the guards locked Harvath back in his room, he knew he’d been blessed with the rarest of opportunities-a second chance. He went over the room again inch by inch, searching for anything he could use as a weapon. Out of frustration, he walked into the bathroom for the third time, and that’s when inspiration struck.

It took several hours of digging at the grout with his fingernails, but Harvath finally was able to loosen one of the large square tiles and then remove it from the wall. He scored the back of it as best he could by rubbing the tile continuously across one of the metal flanges used to bolt his bed to the floor. Once the tile was scored, he placed the guide cut over the edge of the bed frame and punched down on the tile with his blanket-wrapped fist.

The tile broke perfectly, leaving a jagged, sharp edge. Harvath worked the bottom of the tile against the metal flange a little longer, fashioning a makeshift handle, which he then wrapped tightly with strips of cloth torn from his sheets.

He took a moment to sit back on his mattress and admire his handiwork. It wasn’t pretty, but by prison-shiv standards, he had created quite a formidable weapon. Judging from the night sky outside his window, there were only a few more hours until daylight. Harvath didn’t even want to begin to imagine what morning and Hashim Nidal might have in store for them.

A loose plan had begun forming in his mind. He tried to quiet all of the competing thoughts whirling in his head and focus on how he was going to get them out of this. If anything happened to Meg Cassidy, he’d never be able to forgive himself. She had suffered more than enough already.

A loud explosion broke Harvath’s meditation and drew him across the room to the window. It was soon followed by another explosion and then another. They all sounded as if they were coming from the other side of the compound.

At first, Harvath wondered if the terrorists were doing some sort of oddball nighttime training, but discarded that idea when the lights dipped twice and then went out. The room was completely black, except for the faint glow of moonlight streaming in through the window. Harvath heard a commotion in the hallway and crossed from the window to that side of the room in three quick strides.

He pressed his ear up against the door and heard what sounded like retreating footsteps. He tried the handle of his door, but it was still locked from the outside. He couldn’t be sure if Morrell had arrived to rescue them, but something was definitely happening.

He kept his ear against the door for several more minutes, but heard nothing. The explosions continued outside, but at wider intervals. They seemed to be coming from different directions.

With his shiv at the ready, Harvath finalized his plan. It wasn’t the best one he’d ever conceived, but he figured trying it was a lot better than waiting for Hashim and his men to come take him down to the dungeon torture chamber that he knew in his bones this place possessed. If Morrell was somewhere outside, he’d need all the help he could get.

Scot began pounding on his door and calling out for the guard. He would keep the shiv hidden underneath his shirt until he could get close enough to one of the men and take him out. He would then try and take out the second guard and free Meg Cassidy. He calculated the odds and didn’t like them, but they were a whole lot better than the potential alternative. The bottom line was that Adara and Hashim Nidal were never going to let Harvath or Meg leave the compound alive.