Takedown

Harvath looked at the JTTF duty officer and exclaimed, “What do you mean, you don’t have him?”

“We don’t have him,” the young man blasted back. Like many others, he was not dealing well with the stress of the terrorist attacks.

“Maybe he’s already been processed,” offered Herrington, trying to prevent the situation from escalating into an all-out, interagency pissing match. “Did you check with the Federal House of Detention on West Street?”

“What am I, new?” replied the duty officer. “Of course I checked. They haven’t heard of him either.”

Harvath was about to come unglued. They had covered the entire two-and-a-half-mile distance to the JTTF headquarters at the FBI field office in lower Manhattan on foot, and now some rookie was telling him that not only did they not have Sayed Jamal, but that nobody had ever heard of him. “I want you to find Mike Jaffe right now.”

“Who?” said the duty officer.

“What do you have, sand in your ears? Mike Jaffe. I transferred the prisoner in question to him and a team of agents from this office this morning.”

The young man was tired of having his valuable time wasted by some DHS knuckle-dragger. “You’ve got your agencies screwed up, Agent Harvath. None of our guys were involved in a prisoner transfer this morning, and we don’t have anyone in this office-JTTF, FBI, or otherwise-named Mike Jaffe.”

It was like banging his head against a brick wall. Harvath’s blood was beginning to boil and he was getting very near his breaking point. He needed to go over this kid’s head and was about to do so, when Bob thanked the duty officer for his help, grabbed Harvath’s arm, and steered him out of the JTTF and into the stairwell.

“What’s the matter with you?” demanded Harvath.

“Shut up,” replied Herrington.

“The hell I will. I’ve got to find Sayed Jamal, and your getting in my way like that isn’t going to-”

“They don’t have him.”

“Or so says the dumb ass at the front desk. Sometimes you’ve gotta go higher up the food chain to get answers.”

“Well, you are going higher up the food chain, all right, because Mike Jaffe doesn’t work for the Joint Terrorism Task Force,” Herrington replied. “He’s with DIA.”

“The Defense Intelligence Agency?”

Bob nodded his head. “I met him in Afghanistan back in 2001. My unit was assigned to a very high-speed task force going after the top of the al-Qaeda leadership.”

“And Mike Jaffe was a part of that task force?” asked Harvath.

“He was in charge of it.”

“So why the hell would he pose as a JTTF agent?”

“We had a saying that both the Lord and the DIA work in mysterious ways. Obviously, he had a very personal interest in your prisoner.”

“A little too personal,” said Harvath as he began walking down the stairs.

“Where are you going?”

“To make a phone call. Then I’m going to find Mike Jaffe if I have to turn this entire city inside out.”

Twenty

It was the tapping at his window that caused Tim Fiore to snap back into consciousness. His reflexes kicked in, and in a flash he had his SIG Sauer drawn and pointed dead-on at the threat.

“Mister, the bridge is going to collapse. You’ve gotta get the hell out of here,” a stranger yelled from the other side of the glass.

Fiore’s head hurt like hell. It felt like someone had smacked him with a lead pipe. For a moment he didn’t know where he was. Then slowly it started coming back to him. “On the ground!” he yelled at the man. “On the fucking ground-now!”

Terrified, the Good Samaritan fled for his life.

Though he was a seasoned Secret Service agent, nothing could have prepared Fiore for what he saw when he turned and looked over his shoulder.

The entire back half of the armored vehicle they’d been traveling in was gone; evaporated. It had taken the sliding gun drawers beneath the cargo area, along with the third row of seats, where Agents Grossi and Swartley had been sitting.

An enormous piece of twisted metal that looked like a pitchfork had pierced the second row of seats, impaling both of Amanda Rutledge’s friends. Amanda was unconscious, but Tim didn’t see any wounds. He reached for her and felt for a pulse; it was weak, but at least she was alive. For how much longer, though, he couldn’t tell.

Fiore looked over at his partner, whose chin was slumped against her chest.

“Marcy?” he said as he felt for her pulse. “Marcy, can you hear me?”

There was no response.

Twisting out of his seatbelt, Fiore kicked his door open and began yelling into his radio. “This is Echo One. We’ve been hit. I repeat, Echo One has been hit. All units respond. Over.”