Foreign Influence_A Thriller Read online

  Navy SEAL turned covert operative Scot Harvath is called to action in Brad Thor’s hot new thriller, his next “must read for our times” (James Rollins).

  Buried within the black ops budgets of the Department of Defense, a newly created spy agency reports only to a secret panel of military insiders. Its job is to target America’s enemies—both foreign and domestic—under a charter of three simple words: Find, Fix, and Finish.

  When a bombing in Rome kills a group of American college students, the evidence points to a dangerous colleague from Harvath’s past. Tasked with leveraging this relationship to lure the man out of hiding, Harvarth must destroy him. But what if it is the wrong man?

  In Chicago a young woman is struck by a taxi in a hit-and-run, and the family’s attorney uncovers a shocking connection to the Rome bombing. Harvath must link together the disparate violence, and race to prevent one of the most audacious and unthinkable acts of war in the history of mankind.

  FOREIGN INFLUENCE

  “Quite possibly the next coming of Robert Ludlum.”

  —Chicago Tribune, on The Last Patriot

  ATRIA BOOKS

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  THE SOURCE FOR READING GROUPS

  Also by Brad Thor

  The Lions of Lucerne

  Path of the Assassin

  State of the Union

  Blowback

  Takedown

  The First Commandment

  The Last Patriot

  The Apostle

  Foreign Influence

  The Athena Project

  Full Black

  Black List

  From The Lions of Lucerne to Foreign Influence, Brad Thor’s Scot Harvath series delivers “high voltage entertainment reminiscent of Robert Ludlum” (Library Journal). While keeping readers riveted with heart-pounding suspense, the #1 New York Times bestselling author is also “changing the scope of the espionage novel in today’s world” (Tampa Tribune).

  Praise for

  FOREIGN INFLUENCE

  Named One of the Best Political Thrillers of 2010 by Suspense Magazine

  “Frightening, illuminating, and entertaining. … If you’re not hyperventilating once you’ve reached the last page, then you weren’t paying attention.”

  —Bookreporter.com

  “Intrigue, adventure, and adrenaline-rushing action. …”

  —New American Truth

  “Pulse-pounding.”

  —International Thriller Writers, Inc.

  THE APOSTLE

  “Blasts off like a guided missile and never slows down. … Brad Thor rocks!”

  —Tess Gerritsen, New York Times bestselling author of Ice Cold

  “An out-of-the-ballpark homerun. You won’t want to put it down.”

  —Blackwater Tactical Weekly

  “Powerful and convincing. … A breathtaking, edge-of-your-seat experience.”

  —National Terror Alert.com

  Foreign Influence is also available from Simon & Schuster Audio

  More acclaim for Brad Thor’s bestsellers featuring Scot Harvath, “the perfect all-American hero for the post—September 11th world (Nelson DeMille)

  THE LAST PATRIOT

  “A thriller to die for.”

  —Glenn Beck

  “As close to a perfect thriller as you’ll ever find. … Brilliantly plotted and ingeniously conceived.”

  —Providence Journal-Bulletin (RI)

  “Wow, this guy can write.”

  —The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

  THE FIRST COMMANDMENT

  “An intelligent, sizzling adventure full of international intrigue.”

  —Wilmington Morning Star (NC)

  “An adrenaline-charged thriller. … Brad Thor knows how to excite the senses.”

  —Steve Berry, New York Times bestselling author of The Emperor’s Tomb

  TAKEDOWN

  “[Like] the TV show 24 and other high-octane thrillers, Takedown is crisp and cinematic, with … gun-blazing, gut-busting action.”

  —The Tennessean

  “Enthralling. … A smart, explosive work that details events about to happen outside your front door.”

  —Bookreporter.com

  “Exciting … frightening. … [A] masterpiece.”

  —Midwest Book Review

  BLOWBACK

  One of NPR’s top 100 “Killer Thrillers” of all time!

  “Haunting, high-voltage. … One of the best thriller writers in the business.”

  —Ottawa Citizen

  “An incredible international thriller. … Riveting and superior.”

  —Brunei Press Syndicate

  STATE OF THE UNION

  “Frighteningly real.”

  —Ottawa Citizen

  “[A] blistering, testosterone-fueled espionage thriller.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  PATH OF THE ASSASSIN

  “Brad Thor is as current as tomorrow’s headlines.”

  —Dan Brown

  “The action is relentless, the pacing sublime.”

  —Ottawa Citizen

  THE LIONS OF LUCERNE

  “Fast-paced, scarily authentic—I just couldn’t put it down.”

  —Vince Flynn

  “A hot read for a winter night. … Bottom line: Lions roars.”

  —People

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  ATRIA BOOKS

  A Division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  1230 Avenue of the Americas

  New York, NY 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2010 by Brad Thor

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information, address Atria Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.

  First Atria Books paperback edition June 2011

  ATRIA BOOKS and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  The Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau can bring authors to your live event. For more information or to book an event, contact the Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau at 1-866-248-3049 or visit our website at www.simonspeakers.com.

  Cover design by Jae Song

  ISBN 978-1-4165-8660-9

  ISBN 978-1-4165-8675-3 (ebook)

  For Mark and Ellen LaRue,

  two of the most dedicated patriots I know—

  Thank you for everything you do for our

  great nation.

  CONTENTS

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

>   Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  ‘Black List’ Excerpt

  Reader’s Companion

  About the Author

  About Emily Bestler Books

  About Atria Books

  Ask Atria

  He who does not punish evil commands it to be done.

  —Leonardo DaVinci

  PROLOGUE

  INNER MONGOLIA

  The strategic military outpost was such a closely guarded secret it didn’t even have a name, only a number—site 243.

  It sat in a rugged, windswept valley far away from cities and centers of industry. Its architecture was minimalist; a cross between a high-end refugee camp and a low-rent university. Tents, trailers, and a handful of cheap concrete buildings made up its “campus.” The only outward signs of modernity were the Pizza Hut, Burger King, and Subway mobile restaurant trailers which made up the outpost’s “food court.”

  It was just after three a.m. when the attack began. Lightweight Predator SRAW missile systems took out the fortified entry control point along with the watchtowers. Mortar rounds blanketed the campus, obliterating key infrastructure and force protection targets. When the heavily armed assault teams breached the perimeter, the outpost was in complete chaos.

  The well-trained soldiers tasked with 243’s security were no match for the men who now overran their positions.

  Dressed in black, with specialized night vision goggles and suppressed weapons, the professional combatants appeared only long enough to engage each soldier with an economy of surgically placed rounds before slipping back into the darkness, often before their victims’ lifeless bodies had even hit the ground.

  At the main concrete structure, a detachment from the assault team used a shaped charge to blow open the fortified door. As they rushed in, they heard the high-pitched whine followed by the thump of a limited EMP device being detonated. It was part of 243’s emergency protocol meant to destroy the facility’s data. The men in black, though, didn’t care. Their superiors already had a copy.

  With night vision goggles impervious to electromagnetic pulse, the men swept through the rest of the building, making sure they killed every occupant. From there, they moved on and cleared two more buildings while their teammates took care of the remaining tents, trailers, and concrete structures.

  Fifteen minutes later, three helicopters landed and the team was extracted. As they lifted off and disappeared back into the ink-black sky, not a single member of military outpost 243 had been left alive.

  LONDON

  A man in a blue linen blazer pushed away the hand of his subordinate. “I know how it works,” he said, placing the tiny bud into his ear and activating the video on the smart phone.

  His liver-spotted hands cradled the chrome device in his lap as he watched the scenes from Mongolia. It had been the most expensive and dangerous undertaking of his life. Though his club was actually a haven for members of the espionage community, he also sensed the presence of some of history’s greatest sociopolitical figures around him at this moment. Had he looked up to see the smiling ghosts of Lenin, Stalin, Marx, or Mao, he wouldn’t have been surprised. Great men who change the world shared a bond that transcended time, and he was on the verge of becoming just that, a great man who would change the world.

  Though they were alone in the club’s library, he kept his voice low. “We’re confident that all of their data was destroyed?”

  The subordinate nodded. “We have the only copy that remains.”

  “And the personnel?”

  “Everyone associated with the program has been terminated. The Chinese have gone berserk trying to figure out what happened. They have no idea who hit them.”

  “Excellent,” said the man in the linen blazer. “Let’s keep it that way. Now, what about our network?”

  “The network is fully intact and ready to go operational.”

  This was an incredible moment, the man thought as he plucked the bud from his ear.

  He removed the SIM card from the phone and handed the device back to the subordinate. “I want you to initiate stage one as soon as possible.”

  “So I have your permission to activate the network then?”

  “You do. And whatever happens, don’t lose sight of the bigger picture.”

  CHICAGO

  Alison Taylor hadn’t planned on going out drinking after work, but it was a gorgeous summer night, the sales presentation was pretty much complete, and everybody else in her department was going.

  It was supposed to be only one drink at RL, but as things often go, one drink led to another and then another. The party worked its way south hitting Pops, Shaw’s, the Roof bar atop the Wit Hotel, and finally some seedy dive bar just west of the Loop. Before any of them knew it, it was four a.m. and their presentation was in less than five hours.

  To counteract the heavy volume of alcohol they had consumed, someone had suggested the nearby 24/7 pharmacy for charcoal tablets and caffeinated beverages, but the idea was put on the back burner when they noticed that the tiny burger joint across the street was still serving. “There’s nothing like grease to absorb the alcohol molecules in your system,” one of them said.

  After cheeseburgers and fries, they conducted an unsuccessful search of the pharmacy for charcoal pills, loaded up on energy drinks, and then headed for the subway.

  Since two of the women lived in the suburbs, Alison invited them to stay at her apartment where they could borrow clothes and head into work with her in a few hours. The fact that one of the women was five inches shorter and the other seventy-five pounds heavier was lost on all of them in their drunken state.

  They spent the subway ride cursing the bright lights of the train compartment, downing Red Bull, and wondering how much sleep they could grab at Alison’s before having to leave for the office.

  At Division Street, they stumbled up the steps from the Blue Line platform and out onto the sidewalk where they began to head east. It was in the crosswalk at Milwaukee Avenue that the unthinkable happened.

  A taxicab came flying around the corner and slammed into Alison. Her friends watched in horror as she was tossed into the air and then landed, headfirst, fifteen feet away.

  All of it had happened so suddenly. Everyone was in shock. As the taxicab sped away into the night, neither of Alison’s friends had even gotten its number. The only thing they would be able to remember was the color of the vehicle, and that its driver appeared to be Middle Eastern.

  CHAPTER 1

  BASQUE PYRENEES

  SPAIN

  SIX DAYS LATER

  In a sixteenth-century farmhouse, a
dwarf known to intelligence agencies across the globe only as “The Troll” lay bleeding to death as his house burned down around him.

  He had made a very serious mistake, but it wasn’t until he had pulled his hands away from his throat and had seen the blood that he had realized just how serious. There was no excuse. He should have known better.

  The woman had been too attractive, too perfect, too much his type. She had described herself as an “erotic gourmand,” with predilections ranging from troilism to chrematistophilia. But it was her fetish for peculiar body shapes, particularly dwarfism—known as morphophilia—that had convinced him they were perfect for each other and that he had to have her.

  Precisely because she had seemed too good to be true, he had checked her out thoroughly. When satisfied that she was legitimate (and after having admonished the director of the Academy, as it was referred to, for not having brought her to his attention sooner), he arranged for her to be flown first class to Bilbao. There, he had a car meet her at the airport and take her to the train station where she traveled southeast into the Pyrenees. From the moment her feet touched the ground in Spain, he had had her watched. The nature of his business demanded that he be extremely cautious.

  She had been advised to bring nothing but her passport and the clothes on her back. He had requested her sizes in advance and assured the Academy that he would provide everything that she would need.

  When her train arrived in the sleepy mountain village, another car was waiting. The driver was professional and kept to himself as he made his way to the next transit point. Occasionally, though, the driver’s eyes wandered to the rearview mirror to steal glimpses of her incredible beauty.

  After dropping her off at a nondescript trailhead, the car retreated down the rutted, dirt road and disappeared. Two large men on horseback appeared from the thick forest of trees leading another horse behind them. They each carried knives in their boots and sawed-off shotguns in short, leather scabbards forward of their saddles.

  After checking the woman for weapons, they helped her atop her mount, and led her up into the mountains.

  The party rode for almost two hours and not much was said. The men had been instructed not to make small talk with their charge. Finally, they arrived at the farmhouse.