Page 82 of Rising Tiger

His brain could be restless, uncooperative, when he was on assignment and trying to process lots of information. He would have liked to have caught a little bit more than twenty minutes, but he was glad to have had it. Twenty minutes was better than nothing.

Grabbing the menu, he called down to room service and ordered dinner. He didn’t know when he was going to get a chance to eat again, and doing so now, at the hotel, meant he wouldn’t risk getting sick later by ordering something from a street vendor on the fly.

The food came up on a linen-covered cart, with polished silverware and hand-cut crystal glasses. Everything he had ordered was there—multiple, high-protein appetizers and fully cooked vegetables. Per his request, there was no bread, or butter, in sight.

In addition to a carafe of coffee, there were two large bottles of water. Turning on satellite news to catch up on what was happening at home, he sat down and tucked into his meal.

Back in Washington, it was the typical bullshit. The two parties were unable to work together. Those representatives willing to reach across the aisle and attempt compromise were labeled by the fringes in their parties as sellouts and even “traitors.”

Harvath hated the internet. He hated the political media complex even more. A bunch of loud-mouthed jackasses on the left and the right were getting rich by fomenting strife and convincing good Americans that their way of life was being destroyed by the other side.

The truth was that Americans had it better than any other people at any other time in history. The United States was at the peak of the mountain—lean too far left, too far right, forward or back, and we risked losing everything.

Instead of letting idiots on TV, radio, and the internet convince us that our good lives were terrible, we needed to be practicing gratitude. Only by recognizing how good we had it and being grateful for it would we ever hope to preserve it for the next generation. Frankly, there were days that the rampant stupidity in the United States made Harvath want to suck-start his Glock.

Lots of people were well-meaning, but they were lazy. They didn’t exert the basic duties of good citizenship. They believed anything and everything that flashed across their phone or computer screen. They believed that if they were in a group, or a feed, of like-minded people, all the information being pushed at them was true. They didn’t realize that the information spaces where you felt safest were where America’s enemies loved to seed their propaganda and disinformation.

Harvath loved his fellow countrymen and women but loathed the ones who couldn’t be bothered to fact-check what they were reading and hearing. Being a responsible steward of the American republic meant doing the hard work of being truthfully informed.

He was just finishing his meal when Vijay texted and told him he’d be downstairs to pick him up in a half hour.

CHAPTER 45

“That’s your plan?” Harvath asked as he slid a Sly and the Family Stone CD into the Jaguar’s player.

The evening air was heavy with humidity. Thunderstorms were in the forecast for later. Vijay had the top down and the AC cranked.

“I take it that you do not like it,” the ex-cop replied as they pulled out of the hotel’s driveway.

“It’s not that I don’t like it. It’s that I hate it.”

The man smiled. “It’s not the quality of the trap that matters. It’s the quality of the bait.”

“Which is complete and total bullshit,” said Harvath. “If we were dropping you into a snake pit, against just one snake, that’d be one thing. You’d at least be able to focus on the danger. But what you’re asking for is to be dropped into a pit filled with God knows how many snakes. It’s a horrible idea.”

“I told you. Aga Sayed is well insulated. This is how we get to him. Now, ask me how my Diwali went.”

“In all honesty, Vijay, I don’t care how your Diwali went. I want to iron out this stupid plan of yours. Even if you were still an active cop, which you aren’t, I wouldn’t want to go into this with anything less than a whole police station full of officers backing us up.”

“We’re going to be fine,” the man replied, tapping his steering wheel to the beat of the classic funk song “Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin).”

“You can say that a hundred more times, but it isn’t going to make it any more true. This is a suicide operation. Your plan is to walk into a nightclub owned by Sayed, staffed by people on his payroll, and walk out—arms around each other—like a couple of newlyweds. You’re nuts. It’s never going to happen.”

“To be clear,” the ex-cop clarified, “I don’t expect him to willingly walk out with me. That’s why I have a gun.”

“And if it doesn’t work?”

“That’s why you have a gun. The one I gave you.”

“Is there a Hindi word forlunatic? For a person absolutely around-the-bend crazy?” Harvath asked. “Because if there is, I’m going to start using it. Maybe that’ll get through to you.”

He laughed. “Chutiyais the word that comes the closest.”

“Laugh all you want, Chutiya. From the bouncers to any personal bodyguards, he could have ten or fifteen goons in there for us to contend with.”

“Then you’ll want the gift I have for you,” the ex-cop said, pointing at the glove box.

Harvath opened it and pulled out the extra pistol magazine that had been placed inside. “That’s it? One extra mag? And you waited until now to give it to me?”

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