There were two main direct action ground asset components of JSOC — the navy men of DEVGRU, otherwise known as SEAL Team 6, and the army men of the unit that for decades was commonly known as Delta Force. The unit members even used that name in open sources from time to time, but their classified designation had been changed.
It was thought by the brass at JSOC that their operations and abilities had been compromised in the past few years due to an unprecedented spate of books, movies, articles, and interviews about and by Joint Special Operations personnel, so when they were given their new name, the name itself was codeword-classified.
The army boys of JSOC were happy to leave center stage to the Hollywood-loving navy SEALs.
JSOC had been on the Gentry hunt for years, but not this crew, because Gentry had been outside of the United States. These twelve operators worked inside the USA by special arrangement with the Department of Homeland Security.
The twelve men in the hangar at Joint Base Andrews were tip of the spear of the military on domestic operations, so it only stood to reason they would get the call-up for this mission. Their brass had been contacted late the evening before by the CIA and told of the in extremis mission to eliminate a rogue CIA man gone mad in D.C., and a short time later these men rushed to their headquarters inside the wire at Fort Bragg, geared up, and boarded the waiting army transport jet.
Ninety minutes after that they were on the ground at Andrews, and now they unpacked and assembled equipment, loaded it into three nondescript Chevy Suburban SUVs, and headed to a safe house in the Capitol Hill section of D.C.
The dozen men in street clothes didn’t know much about the reasons behind the hunt, other than the facts that Violator was ex-Agency, he’d gone off reservation, and he had killed a bunch of his colleagues. The guys figured that was more than awkward and ugly enough to put you on a presidential kill list, so they didn’t see the need to know more than that.
The leader of this unit was a forty-three-year-old lieutenant colonel with the code name Dakota. Soon after he and his men arrived at their safe house, Jordan Mayes, Suzanne Brewer, and the security detail traveling with Mayes arrived at the front door. Mayes, Brewer, and Dakota met for a briefing in the living room while the rest of the JSOC team prepped and tested their hi-tech communications equipment in the dining room.
Dakota took notes on a pad and asked relevant questions of the CIA officials, and together they went down a list of surveillance assets at their disposal. They then discussed Violator’s known associates and the other CIA brass who would need to have their homes watched in case their target tried to make contact with them.
When Brewer indicated the briefing was complete, Dakota looked across the table to the two Agency execs. He said, “We’ve done lethal ops in the U.S. before. Rare, but it’s happened. Know this. If we go in, collateral damage will be limited or nonexistent. Any other means you might use — local PD, federal SWAT, even CIA shooters, whatever assets you have available to you — they aren’t going to be as precise as my men and myself. We have experience in doing this sort of thing quickly, cleanly, and quietly.”
Mayes said, “Believe me, you are our first choice. Gentry has already committed two murders in the city. We are concerned that local police might run up on him before we do, but we will move you and your men to any sightings or possible sightings as soon as possible.”
Dakota stood, shook hands politely with the two CIA execs, and then said, “Very good. You get us to him, and we’ll put him down. For now we’ll kit up and hit the streets. Let’s stay in touch.”
11
Denny Carmichael climbed aboard a Bell JetRanger that was already spinning up in the parking lot at the CIA’s McLean campus.
DeRenzi was with him, for this leg of the movement, anyway. He threw an understandable fit when Carmichael told him he would run a surveillance detection route and then continue on to a meeting alone, but it wasn’t DeRenzi’s job to tell Director Carmichael what he could and couldn’t do, so the close protection officer just made sure the director of National Clandestine Service was wearing his .45 caliber HK semiautomatic pistol in his shoulder holster like he normally did. CIA officers virtually never carried firearms, but Denny had always been a different sort of animal from every other CIA officer around, and he often strapped a sidearm during movements, even in the States.
The JetRanger landed at Washington Executive Airport in Prince Georges County just fifteen minutes after it took off, and there Denny left DeRenzi in the helo and climbed into a beige Toyota Highlander that another CIA employee had positioned in the parking lot with the keys under the mat. He drove out of the airport grounds and into late-morning traffic, heading north on the 210 back towards D.C. He kept his eyes in his rearview and he turned east on I-95, and only after he was sure there was no one on his tail did he get off the freeway and head back west. He took the Woodrow Wilson Bridge over the Potomac into Alexandria, Virginia, and there he spent twenty minutes driving through the narrow streets of the Old Town section on a surveillance detection route.
After fifty minutes in the vehicle he parked on King Street and continued his SDR on foot. He meandered through the neighborhood for thirty minutes, wandering into gift shops and antique stores, heading down side streets and then back up again on the other side. At twelve fifteen he stepped into a sandwich shop and ordered a pastrami on rye. Eating his lunch at a counter by the window, he kept his eyes out on the street, all the while searching for anyone who might be following him.
His trained eyes saw nothing out of the ordinary, so at twelve thirty he threw the remainder of his sandwich away, headed north on King Street, and then ducked into the courtyard in front of the Kimpton Lorien Hotel.
Once in the lobby he walked straight to the counter and asked for a suite for one night with an early check-in. He used a credit card from a cover identity he kept ready and the woman behind the counter gave him the card key to his fourth-floor suite. He stepped around to the bank of elevators behind the check-in desk, and while he did so a distinguished-looking man stepped out of the men’s room and walked over to the elevator bank to wait alongside him.
The two men stood in silence as the car delivered them to the fourth floor. There Denny walked down the hall to his suite, and the other man followed. No words were exchanged.
They entered the suite together and Denny shut the door.
The man who shadowed him in was in his early fifties, lean and handsome in his gray pinstripe suit. Olive-skinned and delicately featured, he had a kind, gentle bearing about him, in sharp contrast to the stern manner of Denny Carmichael.
Only when the door was shut behind the two men did the olive-complected man offer a handshake to the American.
He spoke perfect English with only a slight accent. “Nice to see you, Denny.”
“Hello, Kaz.”
Carmichael turned away, took a cell phone — sized device out of his pocket, and turned it on. He headed to the center of the room and placed it on a coffee table. It was a radio frequency signal jammer, designed to block the transmissions given off by eavesdropping devices.
While he did this Kaz took off his suit coat and hung it over a chair, and then he moved to the sofa. There he sat calmly and watched Denny adjust the instrument.
Kaz was not his name, but Denny had called him this for fifteen years, because Kaz was easier to say than Murquin al-Kazaz. He was now chief of station here in the United States for Riasat Al-Istikhbarat Al-Amah, the intelligence agency of Saudi Arabia, but the two had known each other since back when Kaz was a lowly operative in Saudi intel.