BATTLE READY
(written with General Tony Zinni, Ret., and Tony Koltz)
TOM CLANCY'S GHOST RECON
TOM CLANCY'S ENDWAR
TOM CLANCY'S SPLINTER CELL
SPLINTER CELL OPERATION BARRACUDA
CHECK M ATE
FALLOUT
CONVICTION
Created by Tom Clancy and Steve Pieczenik
TOM CLANCY'S OP-CENTER
OP-CENTER
MIRROR IMAGE
GAMES OF STATE
ACTS OF WAR
BALANCE OF POWER
STATE OF SIEGE
DIVIDE AND CONQUER
LINE OF CONTROL
MISSION OF HONOR
SEA OF FIRE
CALL TO TREASON
WAR OF EAGLES
TOM CLANCY'S NET FORCE
NET FORCE
HIDDEN AGENDAS
NIGHT MOVES
BREAKING POINT
POINT OF IMPACT
CYBER NATION
STATE OF WAR
CHANGING OF THE GUARD
SPRINGBOARD
THE ARCHIMEDES EFFECT
Created by Tom Clancy and Martin Greenberg
TOM CLANCY'S POWER PLAYS
POLITIKA
RUTHLESS.COM
SHADOW WATCH
BIO-STRIKE
COLD WAR
CUTTING EDGE
ZERO HOUR
WILD CARD
THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP
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TOM CLANCY'S SPLINTER CELL(r): CONVICTION
A Berkley Book / published by arrangement with Ubisoft, Ltd.
PRINTING HISTORY
Berkley premium edition / November 2009
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eISBN : 978-1-101-14955-3
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1
REIMS , FRANCE
SOconfident was the target in his invincibility that Sam Fisher had little trouble finding him, and even less in determining how to best take him down. Then again, as jobs went, Romain Doucet wasn't the toughest nut Fisher had ever cracked. Not even close, in fact. He did, however, rank high on Fisher's "Waste of Humanity" list.
As he had been for the last hour, Doucet was holding court, as it were, on the bleachers beside a basketball court off rue Voltaire, under the shadow of the Cathedral of Notre-Dame. Physically, the Frenchman was impressive: almost six and a half feet tall, 270 pounds, with a weight lifter's body. On the other hand, his powder blue gangsta-style tracksuit and gold chains were something less than magisterial.
Fisher, sipping coffee and reading his copy of L'hebdo du Vendredi, watched, trying to guess what topics someone like Doucet might be covering. Judging by the guffaws and gaping of his five compatriots, the man's proclamations involved whatever women happened to stroll by on the sidewalk. Fisher caught only a few snippets of conversation, but most of Doucet's comments seemed to be anatomical in nature. This was no surprise. In fact, it was Doucet's lack of impulse control that had brought him into Fisher's sights.
Romain Doucet fancied himself an up-and-coming Mafioso of sorts, though most of his crimes involved strong-arm robbery and burglary. But his crew was loyal and the residents of his neighborhood frightened, so Doucet never wanted for an alibi, and this, sadly, was the case in the recent rape of a local man's fifteen-year-old daughter. The police had investigated, of course, but with no forensic evidence, and eyewitnesses placing Doucet elsewhere at the time of the crime, the city prosecutor had been forced to drop the case. The girl's father refused to accept this, and word quickly spread that the father would be willing to pay for retribution. Reims was a relatively crime-free city, however; what few solicitors the father received had clearly been unequal to the task. For his part, Fisher had, over the last year, realized the mercenary business was one of feast or famine (too often the latter), so he had taken the job. Any other time and he would happily have done the job for free, simply because Doucet deserved it, but men of Fisher's ostensible vocation weren't known for their sentimentality, and he dared not show any now. Plus, the five thousand euros--almost seven thousand U.S. dollars--would cover his expenses for the next week or so, until he received his next payment from his German friend. What interested Fisher most, however, was one of Doucet's side businesses: identity theft. If one knew where to look, money was fairly easy to come by, but not so with passable identity documents. For what he had to accomplish over the next month, he'd need plenty of those.