True Faith and Allegiance

The heart attack was sudden, and it was massive. He’d not even managed to sit up. He just lurched there in the bed, let out a short gasp, then dropped back dead, his hands across his chest.

* * *

John Clark still could feel the effects of his two vodkas thirty minutes later, but as he looked at his watch, he doubted his effects were anything like what Sami bin Rashid was feeling right about now. Squirting the eyedropper of advanced neurotoxin into the vodka when the Saudi looked at the woman had taken speed, dexterity, and some luck, but nothing like the luck of having the Saudi step up to the bar when Clark assumed the man was sleeping.

The original plan had involved slipping into the Residence unseen and injecting him with a fast-acting heart-stopper, holding a hand over his mouth while he thrashed for several seconds.

That had been no one’s first choice, but it would have been preferable to losing him in Sydney.

To make this work Ding Chavez would have had to do the hit while Clark distracted the concierge and the bartender, and this looked like it would have been a tough op in the small and quiet confines of first class, so both Clark and Chavez were happy that bin Rashid made it easy, and the next eight hours of their flight could be spent in utter relaxation here in the opulence of first class.

Sure, an hour or so before landing there would be a shriek from the Residence, stress from the flight crew, and perhaps some delays in deplaning. But flying to Sydney meant there really was no place for the aircraft to divert to on the way, so no one on the flight would be terribly inconvenienced by Clark’s actions.

Except for Sami bin Rashid.

Clark looked away from his watch, confident the job was done, and he looked across the width of the darkened cabin and saw Ding checking his own watch. The two men made eye contact for a moment, Clark winked, and Ding smiled back, and then both men reclined their seats as far as they could and closed their eyes.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Mark Greaney has a degree in international relations and political science. He is the author of Commander in Chief and Full Force and Effect, and with Tom Clancy he coauthored Locked On, Threat Vector, and Command Authority. He has written five books in his own Gray Man series: The Gray Man, On Target, Ballistic, Dead Eye, and Back Blast. In his research for these novels, he traveled to fifteen countries, and trained alongside military and law enforcement in the use of firearms, battlefield medicine, and close-range combat tactics.

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