Sauvage looked at the woman a long time. Bianca smiled at him a little, and he looked away. “You shouldn’t be sorry. This isn’t your fault. It’s mine.”
Bianca checked the Mukhabarat officers on the other side of the room to ensure they couldn’t hear her. Then she said, “This European. Monsieur Drexler. He wants me dead, doesn’t he?”
Sauvage looked down at the floor. “Why would you think that?”
She didn’t answer him. “And since you just admitted he was the one who got you involved in this, I guess that means you want me dead, as well.”
Now Sauvage looked up to her. “No. Of course not. I haven’t wanted anything that’s happened in all this. I just wanted . . . I wanted money for a vacation house in Nice, for my kids’ university days.” He shrugged and sighed. “And a little more. A lot more, I guess. I was a fool, but I am not a murderer.”
“What is your first name?” she asked.
He looked at her again, nervously now. “Why does it matter?”
“Because I would like to know.”
“It’s Henri.”
“Perhaps, Henri, you and I can help each other.”
Sauvage looked away once more, out the window and towards the harbor. He stood up, ready to move farther away in the office. “Je suis désolé.” I’m sorry.
“Attendre!” Wait! “Listen to me. I see good in you, Henri. You are not like the others. I know you don’t want to have anything to do with this.”
Henri shifted on his feet now, kept looking out the window, but he did not walk away.
Bianca said, “You must ask yourself why you are here.”
“I am helping them get you to safety in Syria. Since I am a police officer, I have credentials they need in case—”
“Don’t be ridiculous. You must know they have you along for another reason, and when they are done with you, Drexler will kill you. Think about everything you know about what’s going on here. Why would men like Drexler and Malik allow a man with that knowledge to return home? Ever.”
Sauvage sat back down slowly. Soon he put his face in his hands.
Bianca said, “Non! You must remain strong. We must help each other if either of us is to survive.”
“How are we to survive?”
“That depends.”
“Depends on what?” Sauvage asked.
The Spanish woman looked him over a long time. “On whether you are brave enough to fight for your life.”
CHAPTER 68
Court Gentry wore a threadbare gray T-shirt with a black track jacket zipped over it, brown cotton pants, and tennis shoes. He’d gotten the clothes from FSA fighters here at the outpost in the hills, and with these clothes he looked just like most anyone else here, even though word had spread around the camp about the new visitor.
He donned a chest rig that carried his AK magazines, but no body armor. Few of the guys in the FSA had plates, so he’d opted to go without himself in case he was spotted by someone close enough to notice he wasn’t outfitted like the others.
He’d taken the dressing off his head; the fourteen stitches over his ear were holding, and the wound wasn’t visible through his hair without really looking for it.
He went through his gear one last time before departing. He had a large backpack full of equipment, food, and water on the ground next to him, a worn Beretta M9 pistol in good working condition, and an AK-47 with iron sights and a folding wire stock. He wore the pistol on his belt, and the AK lay on the ground next to his pack.
All this he considered extra equipment, because his main weapon for this mission lay cradled on a cushioned case in front of him. It was a McMillan TAC-50, a fifty-seven-inch rifle that fired the .50 caliber Browning machine-gun round.
Court didn’t know the TAC-50 at all, but he’d hit living targets in the field at over one mile distance with fifty-cal sniper rifles, and he’d spent the last half hour with the Terp and the FSA sniper who operated the gun to ask specific questions about the weapon and the scope attached to it so he’d know how to best employ it when the time came. He’d been given a laser range finder and notes on the ammunition, the air density in the region, and other relevant data that would make it possible for him to hit a one-to one-and-a-half-mile shot.
He zipped up the camel case, slid three ten-round box magazines into pouches on the outside of it, and slung it over his back on the right side, slinging his other pack over his left shoulder.
The AK he carried in his hand, and then he struggled forward to the pickup truck waiting for him at the edge of the camp.
Captain Robby Anderson met the American a few yards from the waiting vehicle, already loaded with the five Syrians. The vehicle would take the sniper, the Terp, and the two-man recoil-less rifle team to a spot in the desert a few miles from Palmyra, and then the Terp and the American would go on alone to the northwest, and the Carl Gustaf team would head due north. The technical driver and the machine gunner in the cab would return to base, while the four men on foot would spend the nighttime hours doing their best to remain undetected as they infiltrated the security cordon to get as close as possible to where their target was due to arrive the next day.
Court shook Anderson’s hand, and the younger man said, “Good luck, Slick. If this works, you’re gonna be famous.”
“If I become famous, a black helicopter is going to land right here and pick you up for a conversation.”
Robby nodded at this. “My lips are sealed. Same as the other guys. I just mean . . . if you actually do it, you will be making a hell of a difference around here.”
Court looked out over the hills and down to the desert in the distance. “Who knows?” He gave a nod to the other Green Berets standing near buildings higher on the hill, then turned to leave.
“Any chance you’ll tell me your name? I’d look you up back in the States. Maybe we could grab a beer.”
Court smiled. “Let’s keep this a one-night stand. Trust me, you won’t respect me in the morning, anyway.”
Court slapped the younger man on the shoulder good-naturedly, then began lumbering down the hill towards the pickups.
* * *
? ? ?
The stranger Robby called “Slick” had climbed into the technical, and the vehicle had just begun to roll out behind the others, when Danny walked up to Robby. Both men watched the FSA truck disappear around a bend in the hills.
Danny said, “I hate to state the obvious. But that dude is a dead man.”
Robby shrugged. “Yeah, probably. But can you think of a better way to go?”
“Got me there, Captain. You think he understands this is a suicide mission?”
“I think that man understands the odds, and understands what’s at stake. He figures his life is a worthy trade for a shot at taking down a monster.”
The two men turned and began walking along a switchback that climbed up the hill. They’d have to heighten their defenses for the next couple of days, because if the FSA technical was caught in the open and any survivors were taken, it was a good bet someone would come looking for their tiny outpost in the desert hills.
* * *
? ? ?
Court sat in the bed of the Toyota Hilux pickup with the Terp next to him. Both men had handheld radios with earpieces, and these had also been given to the Carl Gustaf crew and the driver of the vehicle. All four men spoke through the back window to the driver about their route as they picked their way across the rough ground. The Terp had a good map of Palmyra, so he and Court could make even more detailed plans about the ingress phase of their operation.