But Court thought it was possible.
He knew Leland Babbitt ran a private military company here in D.C. They had been part of the chase and they had nearly gotten him in Stockholm and in Hamburg. In Brussels they had gotten so close Court now wore a bright red scar in the shape of a bullet hole on his right forearm.
Court wondered if Townsend was hunting him here in D.C., as well.
He found himself getting excited that Denny Carmichael might just walk up the narrow path any minute. If he did, Court would deal with whatever security force Denny had with him. This wouldn’t be easy, but the opportunity would be too good to pass up.
Then Court would find a way to get Denny back to his car, take him to his storage unit, and beat the truth out of him.
“Settle down, Gentry,” he said to himself. Bagging and zip-tying a nation’s chief spook wouldn’t be easy anywhere, not even in Paraguay or Namibia. Here in D.C. surely it would be virtually impossible.
Court forced himself to lower his sights a little. If Carmichael showed, Court would evaluate the situation. He doubted he could bag the man himself, so he’d just watch, listen in if he could, and wait for them to part ways. He’d stay on mission, following Babbitt back to his car and taking him at gunpoint as he climbed in.
Babbitt remained the target.
Court moved a little closer, then tucked himself into the foliage of the butterfly habitat and watched his target from behind and one hundred feet away. He placed the Walker’s Game Ear behind his right ear and turned the volume up.
19
While Leland Babbitt sat on a bench in an outdoor butterfly garden near the U.S. Capitol building staring at his watch and wondering when the hell Denny Carmichael would show up, Carmichael was five and a half miles to the west, sitting in his seventh-floor office at CIA, sipping coffee and reading his morning Violator Working Group report.
The report started on a down note. There had been a grand total of zero positive IDs of Gentry the day before. Facial recog had gotten quite a few possible sightings, and analysts in the Violator task force were evaluating these hits now, but Brewer said she’d looked at all the images and to her nothing appeared terribly promising.
That was the bad news. The good news was that the facial recognition software had been tweaked and retooled overnight, using some newer images of Gentry taken from security camera images out of Belgium, and the technicians felt confident they would, sooner or later, pick him out from the millions of human faces from thousands of video feeds in the D.C. metro area.
Still, Denny had his doubts the Violator operations center would get much out of facial recognition. No, Gentry was too good for that. He would mask himself a dozen different ways to spoof the software.
Next in the report Brewer wrote that JSOC operatives were up and running in the city, ready to be vectored to the right location as soon as there was more information to go on. Two men were also over watching the home of SAD director Matthew Hanley, in the hopes Gentry would show up to question—or to kill—his former boss.
The report also confirmed that thirty contracted assets were on station in the area watching known associates of Violator.
This wasn’t in the report, of course, but Carmichael also knew the Saudis would be deployed in the District. He hadn’t spoken with Kaz since he’d left him in the Kimpton in Alexandria the afternoon before, but Carmichael knew Kaz would waste no time getting his operation in gear.
Carmichael was confident one of the myriad elements involved in the hunt would locate Gentry soon, but he also suspected the action would really only start the second Gentry did something to expose himself to the hunters. He would make his play, contact a known associate or show himself at a CIA facility, and CIA would be ready.
And while Mayes sent JSOC and other assets, Denny would send the Saudis to cover any escape.
Court Gentry was going to die here in D.C., Carmichael felt certain. The only real worry was making sure it happened without either the media or the Department of Justice finding out about it.
Just then his intercom beeped. His secretary’s voice came over the speaker. “Sorry, sir, I know you asked not to be disturbed, but Department Director Hanley is here to see you.”
Carmichael put down the report and pushed the call button. “I didn’t see an appointment on the calendar.”
“No, sir. But he is insistent.”
Of course he is, Carmichael thought. “Prick,” he said aloud, then he pushed the talk button again. “Send him in.”