The Emperor's Revenge (Oregon Files 11)

It took two more minutes for the virus to upload. When it was complete, she wiped the security token with a tissue and stuck it back in the briefcase but kept the laptop out.

“Now I’m going to tie you up,” she said. “Turn over so that you’re lying facedown, hands behind your back, face toward the drapes.”

“But I—”

“Do it!”

He did as instructed. With his face turned, he couldn’t see her.

She went to the sofa and picked up a throw pillow. This was going to be the hardest part, but she steeled herself. She walked over to the bed with the pistol up against the pillow, placed it against Blanc’s head, and pulled the trigger. The TV drowned out the muffled shot.

Blanc’s body went limp.

Ivana pulled the pillow away and appraised the small hole in the back of his head. There wasn’t even much blood.

She shrugged. That didn’t seem so hard after all.

She dressed quickly and wiped down every surface she had touched. Then she took Blanc’s wallet and laptop to make it look like a burglary gone wrong. By the time they connected Blanc with the bank theft to come, any leads would be ice-cold.

She mentally retraced her steps and confirmed that she had left nothing incriminating behind. With a satisfied nod, she headed to the door. Even though it hadn’t gone as she’d expected, it wasn’t a bad night’s work. She didn’t know a single soul who wouldn’t kill for thirty billion euros.

As she walked out of the apartment, she could hear the BBC announcer going to a special bulletin. The computer system of France’s largest bank just went down.

TWENTY-SEVEN

FRANKFURT

Sirkal lay on a hill on the outskirts of the city, a .50 caliber Barrett sniper rifle firm against his shoulder. O’Connor was prone next to him, observing Frankfurt’s biggest electrical substation through binoculars. Between them was a map of the substation, with twenty-five high-voltage transformers highlighted.

The brightly lit facility was situated in the middle of a farming region split by an autobahn, where headlights sped by in the distance. No one was within a mile of their hiding spot on the edge of a forested park.

The substation was monitored remotely, so nobody currently occupied the twelve-acre property surrounded by chain-link fences topped with barbed wire. Security cameras had a good view of the facility itself, but none of them were pointed outside the fence.

O’Connor snapped gum as he surveyed the target, a habit that had helped him quit smoking. The sound irked Sirkal, but it didn’t pose a threat in their isolated position. The Irishman was a good operative and a trusted partner in a fight, but he could be a pain in the butt.

“What idiots,” O’Connor said with another snap. “Not a soul around and lit up like a roman candle. They might as well have painted a bull’s-eye on it.”

“Their vulnerability is our advantage. ‘He who is prudent and lies in wait for an enemy who is not, will be victorious.’”

“Do you always have to sound like a Buddhist monk with those sayings?”

“That’s Sun Tzu, from The Art of War. You should read it sometime. And I’m a Hindu.” While that was technically true, he didn’t follow the teachings of the Hindu scriptures any more than O’Connor adhered to the tenets of Catholicism.

They’d already received confirmation from Ivana that her portion of the operation was complete. The banking system was in a panic because of the new breach. Steps were being taken to secure data that had previously seemed protected. Now it was time to set in motion the other part of the plan.

The idea for this mission actually came from a little-known attack on an electrical substation outside of San Jose, California, in 2013. Unknown assailants pumped more than two hundred rounds into a key Silicon Valley power hub. Because the substation was unmanned, it seemed at first to be nothing more than an equipment malfunction on the remote maintenance screens, and it took authorities nineteen minutes to respond. By the time the police arrived, the attackers had disappeared without a trace, leaving no clues as to their identities or motivation. The bill for the damage totaled over fifteen million dollars.

Seeing how easy it had been to take out an entire unguarded substation in the United States, Sirkal thought the same kind of attack would work in Europe. He had been an electrical engineer in college before gaining his mercenary experience in the Indian Army, so his expertise was critical for planning Operation Dynamo. After a careful study of the European Continental Synchronous Power Grid, he had pinpointed this one in Frankfurt as the prime target. He and O’Connor had scouted out the location over a month ago, picking this very spot for its unobstructed view of the facility.

As part of the reconnaissance for the mission, they had set off some fireworks in the area and timed how long it took the Polizei to respond. The Germans had done much better than the Americans, arriving at the remote spot in only eight minutes.

“Ready on the timer?” Sirkal said.

“Ready. Do you have the first transformer lined up?”

Sirkal looked through the scope and placed the crosshairs on the word Siemens stenciled on the side of the transformer. That would put the shot right through the tank of the transformer’s oil-filled cooling system.

“Got it.” He had the progression of targets memorized.