skeptical. Even though Harvath had foiled their ambitions more than once, they would have known grabbing him on American soil like this would be an act of war. The reprisals they had already suffered for their prior bad actions would be nothing in comparison to what the U.S. would do in response to something like this.
The CIA Director felt certain that an undertaking this brazen, with such an incredible downside, had to have been carried out by a nonstate actor. It was the only thing that made sense.
Nevertheless, before the plane had even landed, he had pulled together a trusted team at Langley to comb through Harvath’s past assignments, all the way back to his SEAL days, to see if anything jumped out at them.
Accessing Harvath’s jobs for The Carlton Group was another matter. They had other clients besides the CIA. McGee was going to need somebody inside whom he could trust, someone with access to all of the files. There was only one person who filled that bill.
In any other situation, the request could have been made via a secure teleconference or an encrypted email. Today, though, it needed to be made in person. No one at The Carlton Group was yet aware of the murders. It was going to hit the entire organization hard, but no one harder than the man McGee was about to meet.
The man known in international intelligence circles as “The Troll,” The Carlton Group’s Chief Technology Officer, met the CIA Director at the elevator. Because of primordial dwarfism, he stood barely three feet tall.
With him were his ever-present guardians—Argos and Draco—a pair of white two-hundred-plus-pound Ovcharkas, also known as Caucasian Sheep Dogs. In the dangerous, cutthroat world he inhabited, the dogs were both a bulwark against attack and a reminder of the powerful enemies he had made.
Before joining The Carlton Group, the little man had enjoyed an extremely lucrative career trafficking in the purchase and sale of highly sensitive black-market intelligence. He was a hacker and IT specialist par excellence. What he lacked in physical stature he had more than made up for in brainpower and ambition. He was also a man of particular appetites whose predilections would put some of the world’s grandest bon vivants to shame.
His given name had been abandoned to a past fraught with heartache, pain, and abandonment. A quiet supporter of orphans and orphanages in far-flung corners of the world, he had taken for himself the name of the patron saint of children, so his small circle of friends and colleagues at The Carlton Group knew him as Nicholas.
When the CIA Director and his retinue stepped out of the elevator, the little man could read the expression on his face. Something very bad had happened.
McGee suggested they conduct their meeting in Lydia Ryan’s office, as it was more comfortable than the Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility, or SCIF, that Nicholas called his own.
Agreeing, the little man led the way.
When they arrived at Lydia’s office, McGee’s security detail did a quick sweep and then retreated into the hall.
“Take a seat,” Nicholas said, gesturing toward one of the long leather couches. “Can I get you something to drink?”
“Coffee,” McGee replied, as he scratched Argos and Draco behind the ears. He had gotten to know them quite well since Nicholas had joined the firm.
There was the sound of ice cubes being dropped into glasses, followed by bourbon being poured.
Putting the cork back in the bottle, Nicholas turned from the liquor cart and waddled over to the couch with two tumblers. “We’re out of coffee,” he said as he handed them over.
Once he had climbed up onto the couch, he took one for himself and asked, “Why do I get the feeling I’m going to need this?”
McGee had already decided he wasn’t going to pull any punches. “Lydia has been killed. So has Reed. And so has the Corpsman who was on duty.”
Nicholas was in shock. “When? How?” was all he could manage to say.
“As best we can tell, a few days ago. They were all shot inside the cottage in New Hampshire. Lara Cordero was there, too. She’s also dead.”
The blood drained from the little man’s face as he braced for what he was certain was coming next.
The CIA Director’s following sentence, though, surprised him. “There was no sign of Harvath.”
Emotion overcoming him, Nicholas fought it back and took a long sip of his bourbon. As he raised it to his small mouth, the large glass trembled in his hand.
McGee wasn’t good at