All Out War Read online

  Dedication

  To all those who’ve risen in defense of America, past, present, and future.

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Act I 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

  Act II 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

  Act III 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

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  Chapter 77

  Chapter 78

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Also by Sean Parnell

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Prologue

  Four Months Prior

  Sol-Iletsk, Russia

  Major Mikhail Petrov stood at the window, smoking a cigarette and watching the snow collect on the triple strands of razor wire that stretched around the perimeter. At thirty-nine, Petrov was the youngest warden in the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service. He was also the most corrupt, which made him the perfect man to run Black Dolphin prison.

  Located a rifle shot from the Kazakhstan border, Black Dolphin was an isolated, austere fortress on the steppes. A place where an escapee could run in any direction and his lungs would freeze before he saw another face.

  It was the last place any of the bureaucrats from the Penitentiary Service would ever choose to visit, which was exactly why Petrov had chosen the assignment.

  A knock at the door drew him from his reverie. Petrov checked the time on the Jaeger-LeCoultre strapped to his wrist and crushed the cigarette into the marble ashtray on his desk. The Jaeger cost two million rubles, more than a year’s salary, and while he rarely took it off, today was not the day to flaunt his success. He replaced the watch with the Russian-made Raketa, grabbed his gray greatcoat and peaked uniform hat from the hook by the door, and stepped into the hall.

  “My instructions were followed?” Petrov asked his aide, Captain Ruslan Girkin.

  “There will be no problems today,” Girkin assured him, taking his boss’s greatcoat.

  “Good,” Petrov said.

  They walked down a hallway lined with faded pictures of past wardens until they stopped at the main entrance.

  “And prisoner thirty-seven?” Petrov asked, stepping into the greatcoat.

  Girkin flashed him a feral smile. “I spoke with him personally,” he said, displaying a pair of freshly scabbed knuckles as proof. “He will not be an issue.”

  Petrov pulled his cap over his head and stepped outside. The cold air blazed his face and numbed his ears, but even with the howling wind he could hear the thump, thump, thump of an approaching helicopter. The Kazan Ansat came in at treetop level and hovered over the pad. The downdraft kicked up the fallen snow, obscuring the helo in a white curtain as it settled on its skids.

  Petrov ducked his head against the blowing clouds. A tall Arab, dressed in black, stepped out of the blasting mist. Petrov locked on the man’s face, and a hint of annoyance crept into Petrov’s eyes.

  He’d used every asset at his disposal to find out more about the man, but it wasn’t until he reached out to an old friend at Russian Intelligence, paid the fifteen thousand euros the man asked for, that he’d finally made headway.

  According the FSB databases, the man’s name was Gabriel and he was from Saudi Arabia.

  A glint of metal from Gabriel’s wrist turned his attention to the silver handcuff that secured a leather attaché case.

  You, Mikhail, are about to be a very rich man, Petrov thought.

  “Welcome to Black Dolphin. I hope your—”

  “The pilot will wait for exactly thirty minutes,” Gabriel answered in flawless Russian. “Not a moment more. Do you have what I requested?”

  “Yes, of course,” Petrov said, taking the morning’s report from a pocket and handing it over.

  Gabriel checked the date and nodded. “Take me to him,” he ordered.

  Three floors below, Aleksandr Zakayev—prisoner thirty-seven—sat in his cell, head bowed, throwing his torso in a long shadow cast by the bare bulb hanging from the ceiling. The cell was a gray cube of concrete walls and floors. The only color came from the green bucket in the corner that smelled of piss and shit.

  Girkin had come last night, using the squeak of the food cart to mask his approach. In the pit you had ten seconds from the moment the metal slit hinged open to grab your food or the guards would snatch it back. Zakayev had gotten to his feet when he heard the cart stop outside his cell. But instead of the metal tray with its meager portion of food, this time he was offered a flashbang.

  The flash and subsequent concussion sent Zakayev to the floor. When he looked up, Girkin was standing at the door. The nozzle of the fire hose was pointed at his chest.

  “Time for your bath, little dog,” Girkin cackled.

  A blast of icy well water pummeled Zakayev in the side, pushing him across the floor and pinning him to the wall. The cold sucked the air from his lungs.

  When the water stopped, Zakayev caught his breath and then vomited. Feeling wretched, he tried to get to his knees, but Girkin kicked him in the stomach.

  “We have a guest tomorrow,” Girkin said, grabbing Zakayev by the hair. “And . . . you . . . will . . . behave.” Girkin punctuated each word with a fist to the face. Delivered to four quadrants, like a diseased prayer.

  Before Zakayev passed out, he made a promise to himself. No matter who came through that door tomorrow, he was going to kill Girkin.

  Now, he stirred as he heard voices in the hall and boots growing closer. They were coming again. Someone inserted a key into the ancient lock and the door creaked open.

  “Get on your feet, you swine,” Girkin ordered.

  Girkin entered the cell first, followed by two guards, Petrov, and a stranger in black. One was armed with an AK-47 and the second with a Caucasian ovcharka: a mountain dog bred to fight wolves. The dog i
nstantly sensed a fellow predator and lunged for Zakayev.

  The sudden yank caught its handler off guard, and he stumbled forward.

  “Get control of that animal,” Petrov ordered.

  The guard tugged on the ovcharka’s leash. “Heel, you bitch,” he commanded.

  Zakayev never moved. He kept his head down and waited.

  He knew every inch of the cell and exactly how many steps it took from where he was sitting to the door. Zakayev heard the whisper of wood scraping the metal ring. He knew Girkin had pulled out his baton, but still he did not move.

  He pictured the captain in his mind, counted the steps as he crossed from the door to where he sat on the floor. One, two, three.

  The footfalls stopped. Girkin was standing right above him.

  With a savage kick Zakayev drove his right heel into Girkin’s kneecap, snapping the joint backward with a wet pop. Before anyone could react, he sprang to his feet.

  Zakayev drove the web of his left hand into Girkin’s chin, grabbed the baton with his right. In a single, fluid movement he spun the falling captain around and pulled the baton tight against his throat.

  The ovcharka growled—a deep and ominous rumbling that was magnified by the cramped confines of the cell. Zakayev’s black eyes went to the dog.

  “Sidet!” he ordered.

  His voice was low and harsh, barely a whisper, but it snapped with the authority of a bullwhip. The large dog immediately stopped growling, took a half step back, and sat down.

  “Shoot him!” Petrov yelled to the guard, who raised his Kalashnikov and snicked it to fire.

  “No,” Gabriel said, slapping the barrel toward the floor. “He is of no use to me dead.”

  Silence fell over the cell, broken only by the pained wheeze coming from Girkin’s constricted throat.

  Zakayev eyed the tall Arab. Questions firing through his brain.

  Who is this man? Do I know him?

  He had a good memory for faces and after a moment of study Zakayev was sure that he had never seen the man before.

  Which left only one option.

  He wants something. He wants you to do something for him.

  “Who are you?” he demanded.

  “My name is Gabriel,” the man said, switching to Arabic.

  A Saudi, Zakayev thought. From Jeddah by the sound of his voice.

  “I am going to take something from my pocket,” Gabriel said calmly.

  “Easy,” Zakayev warned, tightening the choke hold on Girkin’s neck. It was funny how fragile a man’s windpipe really was.

  The man nodded and retrieved two photographs from his pocket. He held the first up so Zakayev could see it.

  “You know him, yes?” Gabriel asked.

  Memories from long ago came rushing to Zakayev.

  Hassan.

  “I knew him,” Zakayev replied, his Arabic rusty from lack of use. “His name was Hassan Sitta. But he is dead.”

  “Is that what they told you?” Gabriel asked, a hint of a sad smile forming. “They told you he was dead?”

  Something in the man’s eyes made him less sure about what he’d been told.

  What does it matter? Get to the point.

  “What do you want?” Zakayev demanded.

  “If Hassan is dead, then who is this?” Gabriel asked, moving the second picture in front of the first and holding it up with his left hand.

  The photograph showed a man standing on a street corner. It was Hassan, no doubt about it.

  “Look at the time stamp on the photo,” Gabriel said, pausing to pull the newspaper from his pocket. When he had it out he placed the photograph beneath the date and held them both up. “Now look at the date on the paper.”

  Zakayev followed his directions.

  According to the time stamp printed on the photo it was taken a month ago.

  It is a trick.

  Gabriel seemed to read his mind. “He is alive. The Americans have him in a secret prison. A place they call Cold Storage. I need you to get him out.”

  Zakayev’s attention slid from the Arab, covering the rest of the men in the room.

  He pulled the baton tighter into Girkin’s throat, a wild plan forming in his mind.

  You can kill them. Grab the rifle, maybe make it down the hall, over the fence.

  Gabriel had already guessed his thoughts. “Why expose yourself to death? There is another way. Come with me and see for yourself if I am lying. What do you have to lose?”

  It will get you out of here. Out of the cage.

  Zakayev’s eyes locked on Gabriel’s. “If you are lying to me . . . ,” he hissed.

  In his growing rage he visualized the spot in Girkin’s neck that he wanted to break. First things first. He jerked the baton up and back.

  With a barely audible pop—the sound of a twig breaking—it was done, and then Girkin went limp. “That is your only warning.”

  “Of course,” Gabriel said. He produced a key, unlocked the cuff connecting the case to his wrist, and handed it to Petrov.

  “Shall we go?” he asked, motioning toward the door.

  Zakayev scooped the picture off the ground and followed him out. He kept a wary eye on the guards, not believing anything until he was free of their clutches. Just before stepping out of the cell, he took one final look at the room, saw every detail, from Girkin’s hooked body on the floor to the shit pot in the corner.

  No matter what happens. No matter what I have to do. They will never put me in another cage.

  Act I

  Chapter 1

  Present Day

  Rothrock State Forest, Pennsylvania

  The sun crept over the granite peaks and towering pines lining Rocky Ridge. Its heat was burning off the mist that blanketed the low ground, revealing a red dirt path.

  Eric Steele followed the trail down the mountainside, his footfalls impossibly quiet for a man of his size.

  At six foot two, he moved with a predatory grace, despite the weighted plate carrier on his chest. He kept his focus straight ahead, the muscles in his long legs working like pistons, propelling him down to the canyon where the day’s heat was already collecting.

  The trail flattened out until the air shimmered inside the narrow corridor. He pushed on, never breaking stride, despite the fact that each breath felt like he was on fire.

  Keep moving, he told himself.

  Then he passed through his personal death valley, reaching the trail that snaked up toward the opposite foothills. While others would take the opportunity to rest, Steele attacked the incline. Sweat poured down his face and over his arms as he beat the trail into submission.

  At the apex of the hill, he switched the rifle to his left hand and followed the trail down the other side and through a break in the tree line. The shade offered a reprieve from the sun but nothing else. Beneath the trees the air was thick, and Steele had to fight for each breath. He checked the stopwatch on his wrist, saw that he had a chance to break the record, and forced himself to speed up.

  Steele was an Alpha. A clandestine operative assigned to a unit known simply as “the Program.”

  The Program traced its lineage to World War II. A proud history that took America’s best soldiers and forged them into weapons.

  Weapons with a singular purpose.

  To protect America from enemies that the president of the United States couldn’t handle through either diplomacy or all out war.

  That is exactly what Steele had been doing six months ago, when he was sent to Algiers after a CIA convoy was ambushed on the road to Tunis. Every one of the CIA personnel was killed except for Ali Breul—a level-one asset, an Iranian scientist who had recently developed an untraceable portable nuclear weapon.

  The president wanted answers and sent Steele to Algiers to find them. But instead of the missing nuke, Steele found Nate West—his best friend and former mentor. A man who was reported to have died in a bombing.

  Steele tracked West from Algiers to Spain, praying that there was still
some good left in his old friend. But when West managed to smuggle the bomb into the United States, Steele had to make a choice between the man who had taught him everything and the country he loved.

  Steele had put West down with a knife to the chest but took a beating for his troubles. He was taken off active status for six months, and the only way back was to finish this course.

  Finally, he broke out of the trees and sprinted to the finish line, adjacent to a firing range.

  “Time,” a man with a stopwatch said as Steele crossed the line. “Twenty-five . . . and seven seconds. Not bad.”

  “Not bad?” Steele panted. He was pretty sure no one had ever beat that time.

  “I mean it was fast,” Demo said, his flip-flops smacking against his feet as he walked over, “but after six months off I was hoping for something, you know . . . more lively.”

  Demo was Steele’s “keeper,” a nonoperational asset who supported Eric on overseas operations. Built like a fireplug, with a perpetual tan that came from his Latin American roots, he was also Steele’s best friend.

  “Maybe you should give it a try—” Steele said.

  “The next phase,” Demo interrupted, holding up a clipboard and reading from the paper attached, “is the firearms proficiency portion. Any Alpha returning to duty after more than two months must be able to shoot. . . .”

  Broke the record and all he can say is “not bad.”

  Steele shook his head and walked over to the firing line, where Demo stood fiddling with a blue shot timer.

  “Frangibles are marked blue,” Demo said, handing him a pair of loaded magazines.

  Steele shoved the magazine with the blue tape into the holder on his belt and the second mag into the rifle.

  “You need a drink of water or anything?” Demo asked.

  “I’m good,” Steele replied, yanking the charging handle to the rear.

  “You sure?”

  “Yes, Mom.”

  Demo shrugged and fell back into his instructor role.

  “You will have three minutes to work the line. Tangos are the brown targets and friendlies are the white. Any marks on the white and you are an automatic no go. Any questions?”

  “Let’s do this,” Steele said.