Gates of Hades by Gregg Loomis

animals and plants were equally likely to be poisonous.
    But no place had been as near to hell as the empty house on P Street in Georgetown, the home he and Laurin had shared. No encounter was as bad as being able to do nothing other than accept that she had been taken from him and there was nothing he could do about it. Getting even was out of the question; no life would equal hers. Still, he would gladly give years of his for just a chance at those responsible for her death.
    Then Mama had called.
    At first he had thought some prankster was playing a cruel joke. Then he remembered she was calling on a secure line, a phone that not only was unlisted but did not exist as far as any phone company knew.
    It was as if she were intentionally playing Mephistopheles to his Faust.
    The soft woman’s voice named the members of his last squad and the code name of their mission, information so classified that less than a dozen people knew it. Would he be willing to take a high-paying job that desperately needed doing but carried far too much risk for politicians, a job ignoring national boundaries to stamp out international terrorist organizations, those who were perfectly willing to kill the innocent to impose their politics or religion on others?
    Did a bear shit in the woods?
    Did he have qualms about killing extremists, no matter their sex or nationality?
    Did a shark ask questions before it fed?
    A week later, Jason handed in his resignation from the army and Delta Force amid the sounds of debris removal at the Pentagon. That night he was on a plane for Munich, from where he would travel to a small town just across the Austrian border to a place the leaders of three European cells of Hamas were meeting.
    Two days later he was on his way home, his rage at his loss partially slaked and his newly opened Swiss account over half a million dollars fatter.
    It took the Austrian officials over a week to conclude that they would never find all the body parts.
    Narcom had given Jason two things: wealth and revenge. There might be enough of the former in the world, but never the latter.
    So much for Memory Lane. He had a new job to do.

 
    Â 
C HAPTER T EN
    Hilton Hotel K Street, Washington
    That evening
    Dressed in a new sweater and slacks as well as a warm and moth-free coat, Jason had cruised the Kalorama District, an area of restored mansions bordering Dupont Circle known locally as Embassy Row. Despite a number of sudden and unsignaled turns that brought the blasts of angry horns, he was still not sure he was not being followed. There was simply too much traffic to be certain.
    Checking his watch for the third time in as many minutes, he was aware he was likely to be late for a rendezvous Jason considered useless at best. In typical CIA fashion, the phone number Mama had given him was answered only by the countersign, a time, and the bar of this Hilton as a meeting place. Simple courier delivery of the material Jason wanted would have served. The organization frequently reminded Jason of a group of kids playing at being spies, secrecy and stealth their own rewards. That love of the cloak-and-dagger mystique meant that if Jason were late, he’d miss his contact and have to go throughthe elaborate process of setting up another clandestine meeting.
    He pulled to the curb in front of one the embassies, this one flying a flag he didn’t recognize. As expected, a D.C. cop cruiser was behind him in less than a minute. In a world where alliances shifted like sands in a windstorm, the municipal government of the District made every effort to ensure that international antagonisms took only verbal form in its jurisdiction.
    One cop stood just outside the driver’s window of Jason’s rental car. Another was checking the license plate.
    The one beside the car made a motion to roll down the window. “You got a problem, mister?”
    Jason shrugged. “Lost, I’m afraid. Can you direct me to the Hilton?”
    The