Page 116 of Spymaster

The cops Harvath had seen approaching back by the river had probably gone right to the island and were trying to figure out what had happened. The rest of the police force, though, was likely hearing from angry drivers who had called in about two black sedans that had caused damage to multiple vehicles.

The good news for Harvath and his team, though, was when the police ran the license plates, they would come back as GRU and nothing further would be done, no officers would be dispatched to investigate. Only later would they realize that the vehicles had been stolen. And by then, it would be too late for the Russians to do anything at all.

CHAPTER 69

They kept pushing west until Harvath, who had been glued to the rear window, watching to make sure they weren’t being followed, felt comfortable enough to give the okay to pull off the road.

Up ahead was a small, run-down truck stop and Sloane suggested they stop there. Harvath concurred.

Around the back was a pair of beat-up old Dumpsters and a crappy, out-of-service car wash. That was where they parked.

Getting out of the cars, they kept their eyes peeled for trouble as they stretched their legs.

“What the fuck were you thinking?” Chase demanded, as he approached Harvath.

“I had a bird in the hand,” he replied. “I wasn’t going to let him go.”

“A bird whose nest we had under observation,” stated Sloane.

“Sometimes birds don’t come back to their nests.”

Chase shook his head. So did Sloane. Staelin was unavailable for head shaking as he had walked over behind the car wash to take a leak.

“We’ve got Tretyakov,” Harvath declared. “That’s what matters.”

“The ends justify the means,” said Chase. “Is that what you’re telling me?”

“In this case? Absolutely. When you get a shot, you take a shot. It’s that simple.”

“You’re lucky we were there.”

“Iamlucky,” Harvath admitted, not afraid to say it. “Very lucky. But what the hell were you doing there in the first place?”

Chase was neither ashamed, nor embarrassed. “I thought you made a really bad call. So when you left the roof, I decided to follow you.”

“Bullshit. I would have known you were behind me.”

“Not if I was using the Force.”

Again with the Force, thought Harvath. But there was no arguing with the fact that Chase had indeed followed him, and that Harvath hadn’t even realized it. Perhaps his skills were much farther along than Harvath had been giving him credit for.

Even so, he wasn’t thrilled with Chase’s decision to abandon his post on the rooftop. Harvath had been the ultimate rule breaker, it was the foundation of who he was, but now that he had one foot in management and was responsible for people beneath him, he needed his orders to be followed without exception.Hypocrisy at its best, he realized.

“Next time I do something you think is dumb,” said Harvath, “don’t you do something dumber. Okay? In the meantime, thank you.”

Chase hadn’t been expecting a thank-you. “Seriously?”

“Seriously,” Harvath answered. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” he said, and then added, “You also need to thank Ashby and Staelin. They hauled ass to get there. We had no idea what you were up to, but we wanted to have your back in case something went down.”

Harvath thanked Ashby, and when Staelin reappeared, zipping his fly, he thanked him as well.

“You bet,” the Delta Force operative responded. “?‘Gunfight in Kaliningrad’ is going to make a killer band name.”

Harvath smiled. “Make sure to save me a T-shirt.”

Staelin nodded and, remembering he had something for him, reached into his vehicle and pulled out Harvath’s backpack. “Your phone and the other things they took from you are in there, too.”