Path Of The Assassin

Harvath was quickly running out of answers. As the soldiers moved outside the villa to sweep the nearby shops, parked cars, restaurants, and other buildings, Harvath had a moment to talk with the summit’s chief of security, who had been guiding the soldiers through the different rooms inside. When Harvath showed him the map, the man’s eyes instantly widened.

“Where did you get this?” he demanded.

“Why? What do you see?”

“Those three letters followed by the numbers,” he replied, jabbing his finger at the upper-left-hand corner of the map. “And this blue line.”

“What is it?” asked Harvath as he stared at the map.

“That is a frequency designator for the helicopter transporting guests from the airport in Rome.”

“And the blue line is the flight pattern, correct?”

The man nodded his head and said, “You hold in your hand one of the most closely guarded secrets of this summit.”

“So if the helicopter is the target, it could be anybody they’re after.”

“No. Only the Palestinians are using the helicopter. The Israeli prime minister arrived in Rome with his people yesterday and is staying with the Israeli ambassador. As today is the Sabbath, he is not traveling. He arrives tomorrow by car. There is only one guest arriving in the helicopter and he arrives this evening-Ali Hasan, the chief Palestinian negotiator. We must change the flight pattern immediately.”

“Maybe not,” said Harvath.

“What are you saying?” asked the security chief. “We are trying to prevent a war here, not start one. The security of the summit participants is our highest priority.”

“How much time do we have until Ali Hasan is expected to arrive?”

The security chief looked at his watch and said, “Two hours.”

“Do you have a more detailed map of the area we can compare this one to?” asked Harvath as he pointed at the map Meg had taken from the catacombs.

The security chief shouted to one of his men, who quickly brought over a detailed map and laid it on the table in front of them. Harvath took a pencil and, using the straight edge of a clipboard, drew an identical line from Rome to Frascati, reproducing the flight pattern. “Just because we haven’t been able to find any explosive device at the villa or in the surrounding area doesn’t mean that the summit itself still isn’t the target. Your men need to keep looking. At the same time, I think we need to consider the very likely possibility that there is going to be an attack on the helicopter which will happen somewhere along this line.” Harvath retraced it with his pencil. “The question is, though, where?”

“It could happen anywhere during the flight,” replied the security chief.

“True, but there is a lot of air traffic around Rome. With only the frequency designator to go on, it would hard to get a visual lock on the target. If I was doing it, I would wait for the helicopter to get out here into the countryside, where it’s an easy mark.”

“Of course,” replied the man as he pointed to a section of the flight path. “This corridor along here has been set aside as restricted airspace.”

“So the only aircraft coming through there-”

“Is going to be the summit helicopter,” answered the security chief, finishing Harvath’s sentence.

“That narrows things down, but where along this line am I going to get the cleanest shot?” wondered Harvath aloud. “I would have spent a lot of time studying the area. I need a big open space, not a lot of trees. Something easy. I want to give myself plenty of time to be able to identify the helicopter and launch my attack. Where can I do that?”

The man surveyed the map for several moments and then, pulling out a red pen, circled the location he felt would be the most likely. “Here.”

“What’s that?” asked Harvath.

“The perfect place. They would be able to see the helicopter coming from almost two kilometers and would have plenty of time to prepare. The Fontana Candida vineyard.

68

The fact that there was a Buon Ricordo restaurant within driving distance of the vineyard was simply icing on the cake for Harvath. When Adara Nidal had tried to impress Scot and Meg with her worldliness and lull them into cooperating, little had she known that the dinner would come back to haunt her.

The crew of the Rapid Reaction Force helicopter had gotten in as close as they dared, dropping off their passengers on a small access road five miles away. The Frascati vineyards of the Fontana Candida estate were shrouded in an ever-deepening mist, and the night air had an unnerving chill as Harvath and Meg crept slowly over the rich volcanic soil and down perfectly manicured rows of vines. Once they had penetrated far enough into the vineyard and had covered the appropriate distance, they stopped. Harvath pulled up his sleeve and looked at his watch. It had taken almost the entire two hours to coordinate his plan and put it into effect. Now it was all just a waiting game.