Squeezing his shoulders back, her savior cut off the blood supply to the man’s brain and within seconds, he passed out.
“Are you okay?” Harvath asked as he dropped Vottari to the ground and kicked his knife out of the way.
Lovett couldn’t speak, she could only nod.
“Toss me your underwear,” he said as he fished a set of flex-cuffs out of his pocket. “It’s right there to your left.”
It was a strange request, but she did as he asked.
Someone who has been choked out doesn’t stay out for long. It was only a matter of seconds.
Securing Vottari’s wrists behind his back, Harvath shoved Lovett’s underwear in his mouth and covered it with a piece of duct tape he had wrapped around the flashlight in his other pocket.
He then gestured toward the overturned furniture. “Unzip one of those throw pillows, pull out the stuffing, and bring me the cover.”
As she did that, Harvath removed his cell phone and sent another group text.
When she brought him the cover, he dialed a number and handed her his phone. “Tell Naldo where we are and that he needs to come get us right now.”
Lovett took the phone and relayed the instruction in Italian as Harvath put the cover over Vottari’s head as a makeshift hood.
Ninety seconds later, with all of his lights out, Naldo pulled up on the beach outside.
“Move, asshole,” Harvath ordered, yanking the hooded Vottari to his feet.
When the man tried to break free of his grasp and run, Harvath hit him in the kidney so hard, he was sure to be pissing blood for a week.
Dragging him to the back of the SUV, Naldo helped toss him into the cargo area. Harvath leapt in behind him, forced him to lie down, and then kept him pinned to the floor.
As soon as Naldo and Lovett were in, he said, “Okay, let’s go.”
The ROS operative put the vehicle in gear, stepped on the gas, and raced down the beach.
Pulling his phone back out, Harvath sent his final group text.
Within seconds of its being received, Harvath’s team began slipping out of the club.
Argento and his men stayed only long enough to make sure their American counterparts had gotten out without incident. Once that was confirmed, they too made their exit.
By the time any of La Formícula’s bodyguards were concerned enough to go looking for him, the teams that had snatched him were long gone.
CHAPTER 79
* * *
* * *
WASHINGTON, D.C.
Andrew Jordan pulled the MacBook Air out of his briefcase and pushed it across Paul Page’s dining room table.
“Ever heard of a thumb drive?” Page asked, accepting it.
“That’s what I said, but Susan Viscovich is spooked.”
“You used Viscovich to hack Carlton and Ryan?”
Jordan nodded. “She’s the best and I know you didn’t want to waste any time.”
“What did it cost us?”
“Don’t ask.”
Part of Page really didn’t want to know. A job like this must have been exorbitantly expensive. “Why the laptop, though?”
“She said it was for our safety,” Jordan replied. “She had to put out a contract for the hack. They scanned the files up and down for malware and didn’t find anything, but she’s paid to be suspicious. She wanted to make sure we were able to review all of the material on a computer stripped of any ability to connect with the Internet.”
“How’d she get the information onto the laptop?”
Jordan shook his head. “No clue. And to tell you the truth, I don’t really care.”
“So what did she come up with?”
“The personal email accounts for Reed Carlton and Lydia Ryan.”
Page was impressed. “That was quick.”
“Like I said, she’s the best. The emails go back quite a way, and there’s lots of them.”
“Did you also hire her for the rest of the surveillance?”
Jordan nodded. “That, though, didn’t go as well.”
“What do you mean?”
“Ryan wasn’t scheduled to have her place swept for another two weeks. The plan was to get in and get out before the CIA came through, but for some reason, she had them come in early. They found everything.”
Page was not happy. He was even less happy when Jordan added, “They found all the surveillance at Carlton’s too.”
“Son of a bitch,” he cursed. “Now they know we’re on to them.”
“They know someone is on to them. They don’t necessarily know who.”
Page looked at his partner. “The Deputy Director of the CIA and Reed fucking Carlton found out their homes were wired. You don’t think they’re going to move heaven and earth to get to the bottom of it?”
“Viscovich has assured me that absolutely none of the equipment she used can be traced back.”
“Well she wouldn’t be the best,” he replied, making air quotes with his fingers, “if it could. But I’m not worried about the equipment giving her away. I’m worried about whoever installed it. She does tons of fucking contract work for the Agency. If word gets out about this, her installers may start spilling what they know.”
“She has assured me that won’t happen.”
“Well that’s fucking great, Andrew. I’m glad you’re willing to gamble everything on a promise from Susan Viscovich.” Page paused and then added, “Are you fucking her?”
Jordan laughed, “Now that would be worth risking everything over.”
Page was pissed off and didn’t like his cavalier attitude. “She’s a weak link. You need to fix this.”
“Fix this?” Jordan said, with another laugh. “Fix it how?”
“Kill her.”
“You’re fucking crazy, you know that?”
“Kill her,” Page instructed, “and kill the installers.”
“Is that all?”
“You don’t seem to understand how serious this is.”
Jordan looked at him. “And you don’t seem to understand how insane you sound.”
“What exactly do you think is going to happen when Reed Carlton comes after us for this? Have you thought about that?”
“Frankly, Paul, he’s your obsession. Not mine. I was just trying to do you a favor. And apparently, no good deed goes unpunished.”
“We’re both going to get punished if we don’t get out in front of this.”
“I’m not killing anybody,” Jordan stated. “Full stop. Not going to happen.”
“That’s too bad,” said Page, as he removed the suppressed .22 Walther pistol mounted under his dining room table and fired into his partner’s left temple, killing him. “Now, I’m going to have to do all the work.”
CHAPTER 80
* * *
* * *
CALABRIA
When the teams arrived back at the safe house, Harvath’s VIP was already set up and waiting for him.
As the vehicles pulled into the courtyard, Dr. Vella stood in the doorway. In his hand was a very special black hood. He wanted to get it on their subject as quickly as possible.
Once Naldo had backed their SUV in, Harvath opened the hatch and waved Vella over. No one said a word. They operated in total silence.
Using his flashlight to blind Vottari so he couldn’t see where he was or what was going on, Harvath yanked the pillow covering off Vottari’s head and Vella replaced it with the hood he had brought from the Solarium in Malta.