American Assassin

Chapter 49
RAPP rocked the clutch of the little silver Renault Clio and closed the gap between himself and the next car waiting to get through the checkpoint to Beirut proper. It was his third checkpoint since the Syrian border. The little 1.2-liter engine was about as big as the one on his dad's old John Deere riding mower. If he had to run from the authorities it would be a very short chase. He'd been in line now for about fifteen minutes, inching his way forward a few feet at a time. The car didn't have any air-conditioning so he had the windows rolled down.

Rapp slapped his hands on the steering wheel to the beat of some atrocious techno music that he'd picked up at the airport. The title of the album was Euro Trash, and he agreed. He would have preferred a little U2, or maybe some Bob Seger, but the idea here was to make them think he was French, not some American assassin on safari. Third in line now, he leaned out the window to get a better look at the teenager holding the AK-47 assault rifle. Rapp had no idea which faction he belonged to, but the kid seemed calm enough. The first checkpoints were manned by the Syrian army, and then as he neared the city the militias were in charge.

He'd found a pay phone at a gas station along the way and called in to check on things. The automated voice told him his room was ready and gave him the address and the location. Rapp wrote it down, memorized it while on the road, then crumpled it up and threw it out the window. The file told him to expect four checkpoints, counting the border. Each one would cost him between five and twenty dollars. So far whoever had put it together was right on the mark.

The line snaked ahead and Rapp yawned. It was finally catching up with him.

After sinking a hollow-tipped parabellum into Ismael's head, Rapp had steadily retreated, keeping his gun leveled at the woman, who was temporarily frozen with shock. Rapp wasn't going to shoot her and wasn't worried that she would shoot him. He kept his weapon raised to conceal his face and to deter her from looking too closely at him. People in general did not like to look down the barrel of a loaded gun. When the woman finally glanced down at the man who had threatened her life only moments before, Rapp turned and ran.

He didn't turn the corner because he did not want to head back down the street where Ismael had just fired the Uzi. Half the block was likely to be looking out their windows, and a few of them would be on the phone with the police. So he ran straight, at an all-out sprint, for two blocks, the gun at his side. Then he took a hard right turn and stopped. His breathing was heavy but under control. He holstered the pistol while he looked for a place to reverse his jacket. Twenty feet ahead on his right there was a stoop that would offer some concealment. Rapp ducked into the shadows, tore off his overcoat, and turned it inside out. He tossed the clear black-rimmed glasses to the ground and mussed up his slicked-back hair before emerging from the shadows wearing a khaki trenchcoat. He headed back to the corner he'd just rounded. The distinctly European police klaxon could be heard screeching in the distance.

Rapp calmly crossed the street, looking to his left. He could just barely make out the woman. She had been joined by three or four people. Rapp acted as if he didn't notice. After he cleared the intersection he picked up the pace, but not so much as to draw attention. He looked like a man out for a brisk walk. The Rhone was now only a block and a half in front of him. With each step the sirens grew in force, but Rapp wasn't worried. They would go to the body first and then they would check the damage caused by the Libyan's Uzi and then they would begin to look for a suspect.

Rapp reached the river, which at this point was fairly wide. He turned right and after looking up and down the block to make sure no one was watching, he casually slid his left hand between the folds of his jacket and grabbed the Beretta he'd used to kill Ismael. Rapp waited until he was in the shadows between two street lights and then drew the gun. He flipped it casually a good twenty feet into the ice-cold water and kept moving. A block after that, he disposed of the second gun, then had to make his first big decision. Just on the other side of the river, one mile away, was Geneva International Airport. If he hustled, he might be able to catch the last flight out to Paris.

Airports made him nervous, though. There were always cameras and police, and if you were going to get on a plane you had to buy a ticket and show a passport, and that left a trail. His legends were to be cultivated and protected, not used for convenience' sake. So he turned back for the rental car and rehearsed what he would tell the police if they stopped him. Fortunately, the story was never needed. Police were flooding the area, but they were still headed to the crime scene. On his way back he didn't see a single police car heading out to look for suspects. When he climbed behind the wheel of the rental car he checked his stopwatch. Four minutes and thirty-seven seconds had elapsed since he'd taken refuge behind the mailbox. Not bad.

Once behind the wheel he had a lot of options. The primary plan was to cross the border into France and then drive to Lyon, but he was too pumped-up, and with the border crossing so close, they might be looking for a man of his general description. Again, there was no longer any hard evidence that could tie him to Ismael's death, but why push it?

Rapp wasn't sure he could calm his nerves for the border crossing. The reality of what he'd just been through was setting in. There was no queasiness or feeling of nausea. He was simply pumped, the feeling very similar to the way he felt after scoring a game-winning goal, but better. He cranked the music and headed back for Zurich. Greta was on his mind, but there wouldn't be time. He'd have to grab the first flight to Paris or Istanbul and then on to Damascus.

He made it to Zurich just before four, parked in the rental car lot, and tried to grab a few hours of sleep before things opened at six. It didn't work, though, and he sat there with his seat reclined, playing it over and over in his head until he had analyzed every second of what had happened with Ismael. Each mistake was noted and alternatives explored, but as his old high-school coach liked to say, "A win is a win. It doesn't matter how ugly it is."

Strip it all down and that's what it was. Rapp won and Ismael lost. As the sun started to rise, Rapp looked out from the concrete parking structure and realized that one day he might be in Ismael's shoes. He'd pretty much spent the rest of the morning thinking of ways to prevent himself from ending up with a fate similar to that of the Libyan intelligence officer. From Zurich to Istanbul, and then Damascus, and all the way down this hot, dusty road to Beirut, he played a game of chess with himself. What should Ismael have done, and how should he have reacted if Ismael had done something different?

Exhaustion was finally catching up. Rapp let out a long yawn and then the kid motioned him forward. Rapp greeted the kid in French. He couldn't have been more than sixteen. Rapp smiled while he tapped out the techno beat and chomped on his gum.

"What is your purpose?" the kid asked with a lack of enthusiasm you'd expect from someone who was expected to stand in the sun all day sucking on emissions and asking the same question over and over.

"Business."

"What kind of business?"

"Software."

The kid shook his head. "What's that?"

"Computer stuff." Rapp reached over and picked up the flashy color brochure they'd ordered from a French company. He showed the kid, who was by now bored with their conversation.

"I like your music."

"Really?" Rapp said, surprised. "Are you here every day?"

The kid nodded.

Rapp looked over at the kid's dusty boom box and then reached over and ejected the tape. He slid it into the case and said, "I've been listening to it for a week straight. Knock yourself out. I'll pick it up when I drive back out in a few days."

The kid was excited and lowered his rifle. "Thanks ... for you ... half price today." He flashed Rapp five fingers.

Rapp paid him, smiled, slipped the little car back into gear, and drove away. It took him another twenty minutes to find the safe house. Based on the stories he'd heard from Hurley, he was surprised that during that time he didn't run into any more armed men. As per his training, he did a normal drive-by and barely glanced at the building. All he wanted to do was go to sleep, but it had been drilled into him that these were the precautions that would save his life, so he continued past and then circled back, checking the next block in each direction.

It was a five-story apartment building among four-, five-, and six-story apartment buildings. Rapp was too tired to care if it had any architectural characteristics beyond a front and back door. He parked the car, grabbed his bag, and entered the building. He didn't have a gun on him, at least not yet, so there was pretty much only one thing to do. Climb the stairs. If it was a trap, he'd have to throw his bag at them and lie down and take a nap. No one was waiting for him when he got to the fifth floor. There were three doors on the left and three on the right. They had the two on the right toward the back. Or so he thought. After checking above each door he came up empty, so he checked the ones across the hall and found two keys. That was when he remembered he was supposed to enter from the back of the building.

That snapped him out of it a bit. That and the lesson that he might be Ismael some day. He told himself to slow down and stop rushing things. He checked his watch. It was two-eleven in the afternoon. He hadn't slept in more than a day, and the day before that only a few hours. He opened the door and closed and locked it behind him. He could barely keep his eyes open, but he still dug out the doorstop and wedged it under the door. Not bothering to check the rest of the place, he went into the bedroom and opened the closet. There on the floor was a suitcase that looked a lot like the one from Istanbul. Rapp placed it on the bed, opened it, and found three Beretta 92Fs with silencers and extra magazines. It was the same suitcase.

Rapp loaded one of the guns and put the suitcase away. With his last bit of strength, he stripped down to his boxers and climbed under the covers of the twin bed. He shoved the pistol under the pillow and wondered who the person was who went from city to city dropping off their tools of the trade. Would he ever get the chance to meet this mystery man or woman? Probably not. As Hurley liked to say, they were on a need-to-know basis and there wasn't a lot they needed to know. Rapp began to drift off to sleep even though he knew that Hurley and Richards would probably be there in a minute. He figured any sleep was better than none.