side of the square, it was nothing but shacks—handmade driftwood, plywood, tin, and junk hammered together or tied together or, Court imagined with slight exaggeration, simply leaned together with a prayer to Allah and a hope for the best. The shacks stretched down a hill several blocks to the water’s edge and the causeway to the island of Old Suakin.
To the left of Court’s vantage point, the western side of the square, he saw the finest buildings Suakin had to offer. The hotel was there, the Suakin Palace. Court looked at the third floor and wondered if Sierra Five was watching. Gentry stood in pitch-blackness inside the bank, but he figured Spencer would have night vision gear of some sort. He raised his hand tentatively.
“Sierra Five to Sierra One,” the transmission came over the net a second later.
“Go for One,” Zack’s tinny voice responded.
“Sierra Six is in position.”
“Never a doubt in my mind,” said Hightower. Court lowered his hand. It felt odd to be watched, especially at a time like this. He continued scanning the rest of the buildings of the square. They were whitewashed limestone and coral, looking as old as Methuselah, Gentry thought, then he wondered if Methuselah was from around here.
He eyed the street from where the SLA trucks should come, assuming they’d come at all. If they did not, then Court assumed he’d leave all his gear here and just scoot on out the side door of the bank. The Sudanese would find a curious array of gadgets lying around the building where their president was set to come if there was a ruckus, but the CIA would not be positively implicated in any sort of attack or potential ambush. All of this gear was available outside of the USA, and all of this gear had been procured outside of the USA.
But the CIA local field office, Sudan Station, had assured everyone involved, in no uncertain terms, that their rebels would come through. Everyone involved had believed them, to the extent that Court’s source was discounted as unreliable for providing intel that said otherwise.
Fuck, thought Court. This is not how he operated his solo hits. Everything was so much simpler as a private contract killer.
THIRTY-THREE
The Gray Man had finished his work inside the bank by ten after six. He’d just returned to his perch on the second floor when a transmission from Zack came though. “Whiskey Sierra in position. Three is on a rooftop on the northwest corner of the square; Five is in the third-floor window of the Suakin Palace on the southwest corner. The remainder of us are together and mobile, three blocks northeast of the square. We are in a beige . . . break. . . . What the hell is this piece of shit? A beige Ford Econoline van. The SLA will hit from the west. They should be getting into position right about now. First one that sees or hears any sign of them, call it in.” A staccato pair of “Roger thats” from his men at the square followed the transmission.
Dawn began in the east ten minutes later. The town sloped from the square down to the water, so from his second-floor vantage point Court could see the distant sea glowing with morning light where it met the sky. Oryx would appear on the other side of the square in minutes, yet still no one had seen any sign of the SLA. They should at least have been somewhere staging to move, and the two Whiskey Sierra operators west of the square should have either heard or seen them by now.
But there was nothing.
Gentry saw what Zack meant when he said the town had an Old West feel. Looking out of the window at the dirt, the simple buildings, the hitching posts and water troughs, the donkey carts and wooden awnings, guns at the ready for a shoot-out, Court realized he could be in another world and another time.
Gentry sipped water in his high perch. He checked the layout of items in the pack on his back for the fourth time.
Tension built quickly in his stomach.
“One for Five,” Zack said in his mike.
“Go for Five, One,” replied Spencer, the muscular black team member who had been an Army Special Forces sergeant before moving into CIA black ops.
“Still nothing in your sector?”
“Don’t see anything over here by the hotel.”
“Three?”
“Not a peep to the northwest, boss.”
Hesitation from Hightower. Court wondered if he was about to abort the mission. “All right. Looks