Black List Read Free

Which means you’d better get me something and get it to me soon. Do you understand me?”
    Schroeder nodded.
    “Don’t you fucking nod at me,” snapped Middleton. “Answer me.”
    “Yes, sir,” he piped up. “I understand.”
    His boss then raised his hand and pointed at the door. The pep talk was over.
    As Schroeder left the house and climbed back into his car, Middleton crossed over to the desk and picked up the handset of his encrypted telephone, known as an STE, short for Secure Terminal Equipment. Inserting a dummy NSA Crypto Card into the slot, he dialed.
    After two rings, the call was answered. “What’s the verdict?”
    “I think he’s lying,” Middleton stated.
    “What do you want me to do?”
    “Follow him.”
    “And if he is lying?” replied the voice.
    “Add him to the list.”

CHAPTER 2

    P ARIS
M ONDAY E VENING
    G un!” yelled Scot Harvath, launching himself into the apartment as a hail of bullets splintered the door frame around him.
    Knocking Riley Turner to the floor, he flipped onto his back and kicked the door shut.
    “Move! Move! Move!” he ordered as he struggled to get to his feet, but Riley didn’t stir.
    Looking down, Harvath saw blood and pieces of gray matter from where one of the bullets had torn through her head. He didn’t need to feel for her pulse. It would have been useless. She was dead. For a split second, everything stopped.
    But just as soon as it had stopped, his survival instinct kicked in, and right along with it, his training. The shock of seeing Riley dead was relegated to a far corner of his mind as he focused on the here and now. Running his hands along her body, he searched for a weapon but didn’t find one.
    Leaving his dead partner on the floor of the entry hall, he jumped up and ran for the living room. Everything now was about staying alive.
    All of the Carlton Group safe houses were set up in the same way.Rushing toward the two sleeper sofas, he yanked the cushions off the first one but immediately abandoned it when he saw the pullout mattress beneath. The next one was where the capabilities kit should be.
    Capabilities kits were Espionage 101. Though they could be tailored to fit specific assignments, in general they contained all of the hard-to-acquire items an operative might need in a foreign country: cash, sterile SIM cards, cell phones, lockpicking tools, a small trauma kit, tracking bugs, Tuff-Ties, a Taser, OC foggers, folding knife, multitool, an infrared and laser designator strobe, a compact firearm, suppressor, loaded magazines and extra ammunition, and a handful of other items.
    Removing the cushions of the other couch, Harvath tore out the faux panel beneath and exposed a long metal box. He punched in the code, a green light illuminated, and the box’s electronic lock released.
    As he threw open the lid, he didn’t need to hear the boots of the shooters staging outside in the hallway to know he didn’t have much time. Judging by the suppressors on their weapons, not to mention the fact that they had located the highly secretive safe house, they were professionals.
    Also, this wasn’t some Parisian ghetto where gunshots and violence might go ignored. Even suppressed weapons made a very distinct and audible sound. In all likelihood, neighbors had already called the police. The shooters would be under pressure to finish their job and get away from the building. Harvath had to work fast.
    His heart pumping and adrenaline coursing through his bloodstream, he snatched a .45-caliber Glock 21 pistol and spun the suppressor onto the weapon’s threaded barrel. After racking the slide, he shoved two additional magazines in his pocket and grabbed a couple of foggers.
    The only lights that had been on were in the living room and he quickly extinguished them. He needed every advantage he could get.
    Peering back into the darkened hallway, he could see Riley’s body still on the floor exactly where she had fallen. He punched the top of the fogger