This was his destination. If he were laying a trap, he’d want the high ground. At the very least it was the ideal observation post. As a sniper perch, it was serviceable.
Jack checked his watch: eight forty-five.
He scanned the office building with his NVG, left to right and bottom to top. In his monochrome view the walls appeared gray; the window openings were charcoal rectangles. He saw no shadows, no movement. He picked up a rock and hurled it over the bulldozer. As the rock thunked against the nearest trailer’s roof, Jack watched the building. Again, he saw no movement. Twice more he repeated the process with the same result, then once more but this time pelting the side of the building itself. Nothing.
Either Möller’s men were not set up in there, or they were too disciplined to overtly react to Jack’s stone-throwing. Either way, it was time to move.
Jack slipped back to the fence and turned left, using the low-hanging tree branches to cover his movement. When he reached the building, he paused to look and listen, then continued to the corner of the fence. He looked right; through the foliage he could just make out Effrem’s shadowed form sitting in the Audi’s driver’s seat.
“I’m at your nine o’clock.”
Effrem’s head turned. In the NVG glow Effrem’s eyes narrowed and darted. “Yeah, I don’t see you. Nothing to report. All quiet. Maybe we’ve got it wrong.”
A small part of Jack hoped Effrem was right. Getting into a firefight on foreign soil was something best avoided. Trading bullets with bad guys in a major city was downright stupid. The cacophony coming from Optimolwerke would obscure the sounds of gunfire but that was little comfort. You never fight the war you want, Jack knew. You fight the war you have.
“We’ll find out soon enough,” Jack replied. “I’m going in.”
He drew his HK, stepped out from under the trees, raised the gun, and stalked forward. He was facing the hollow portion of the structure’s L-shape, most of which was crowded with wheelbarrows, cement mixers, and sawhorse tables. With both his gun and his eyes alternating between the windows above and the ground ahead Jack picked his way through the maze to a broad archway he assumed would eventually be the lobby entrance. He ducked right, pressed himself against the inner wall. The sounds of Optimolwerke’s revelers and pumping music faded slightly. He looked around.
Though the building’s exterior was nearly finished, the interior had a long way to go. The lobby was a slab of rough concrete crisscrossed with power cables and pneumatic hoses. The interior beams were exposed along with the water pipes and electrical conduits. Half-finished ducting snaked above Jack’s head. Directly ahead lay an open elevator shaft and on either side of this a pair of stairwells leading upward.
Effrem radioed, “Jack, I see something.”
Jack cupped his hand around the headset microphone. “What and where?”
“Light, just a flicker. Second floor — no, third floor, my side.”
To my left and above, Jack thought. Instinctively he pointed the NVG that way. He answered Effrem, “Roger. Don’t make me ask next time.”
They’d gone over this: The more radio silence Jack maintained, the better his chances. Effrem’s reports needed to be concise but thorough.
“Yeah, sorry,” he said.
“I’m moving up to the second floor.”
Effrem replied “Roger” with a double click.
Jack headed to the left-hand stairwell and started upward. At the first landing he stopped, leaned forward, peeked up, saw nothing, and kept going until he reached the second floor. Here there was an opening for a door, but no door. Jack stepped forward with his HK at relaxed high-ready, until he could see left through the opening.
Effrem called, “A car just pulled up to the gate. Two men getting out.”
Shit.
“Car’s pulling away… Oh, damn!” Effrem went silent for ten seconds then came back: “It turned onto Grafinger Strasse. I don’t think they saw me.”
“License plate?”
“Missed it, sorry. Okay, the guys are at the gate. It’s not locked, Jack, they’re just pulling the chain.”
That tended to confirm Effrem’s report of seeing light on the third floor. Möller’s men were already here, and now more were arriving. Either that or these newcomers were construction-site security guards and someone had forgotten to padlock the gate.
“I’m looking for weapons,” Effrem whispered. “I can’t tell. Okay, they’re through the gate, heading your way… Lost sight of them.”
Jack double-clicked.
He took another step forward, peeked right, and saw nothing.
From somewhere above came the crackle of a portable radio, then in German: “Ja… dritten Etage.” Yes, third floor.
Jack heard the scuff of shoes on the stairs. He looked over the handrail and saw a pair of men trotting up the stairs. Each was carrying a compact assault weapon — a FAMAS bullpup or one of its variants. These men weren’t security guards. Jack stepped through the door, then sidestepped four paces down the wall and raised the HK to shoulder height. He took a breath, let it out. Slowed his breathing.
Let both of them get through the door first, he told himself.
The footsteps reached the landing, then started up the next flight of stairs.
The party’s on the third floor.
Jack counted to five, then paced forward, peeked around the corner in time to see the men turning onto the next landing. Moving on flat feet, Jack stepped out and followed. He reached the landing and leaned sideways over the railing in time to see the two men disappearing through the doorway. He started up the stairs.
He was two steps from the third-floor landing when Effrem’s voice came over the headset: “Jack, you there?”
Jack froze and gave the radio a double click.
“I miscounted. The light I saw was on the fourth floor. It just started moving again. I’m so sorry—”
Fourth floor. Men above me.
He spun left, brought the HK up. A darkened figure was pacing down the steps. The man saw Jack, muttered, “Scheisse,” and jerked his rifle up. Jack shot him twice in the chest, dropping him. The already limp body slid down the steps and landed in a heap at Jack’s feet. The report of Jack’s HK sounded like a phone book being whacked with a wooden mallet.
“Was ist das?” a voice whispered.
Where? Behind me.
He turned, saw a man stepping through the doorway, a second man on his heels. Jack fired once, stepped forward, fired again, then charged forward and bulldozed the man backward into the second man, who instinctively reached out to grab his collapsing partner. As he did so Jack shot him in the forehead. Tangled together, the two men crumpled. One of their rifles clattered to the concrete floor.
Jack turned again, checked the up and down stairways.
Both were clear.
He stepped through the door, looked right, then left. He checked the faces of the two downed men. Neither was Stephan Möller. He sidestepped the bodies and crouched behind a garbage can. His heart was pounding. He could taste acid in his mouth. He switched the HK to his left hand and wiped his sweaty right palm on his pant leg.