Angle of attack, p.1
Angle of Attack, page 1
Highest Praise for Leo J. Maloney and his thrillers
For Duty and Honor
“Leo Maloney has a real winner with For Duty and Honor—Gritty and intense, it draws you immediately into the action and doesn’t let go.”
—Marc Cameron
Arch Enemy
“Utterly compelling! This novel will grab you from the beginning and simply not let go. And Dan Morgan is one of the best heroes to come along in ages.”
—Jeffery Deaver
Twelve Hours
“Fine writing and real insider knowledge make this a must.”
—Lee Child
Black Skies
“Smart, savvy, and told with the pace and nuance that only a former spook could bring to the page, Black Skies is a tour de force novel of twenty-first-century espionage and a great geopolitical thriller. Maloney is the new master of the modern spy game, and this is first-rate storytelling.”
—Mark Sullivan
“Black Skies is rough, tough, and entertaining. Leo J. Maloney has written a ripping story.”
—Meg Gardiner
Silent Assassin
“Leo Maloney has done it again. Real life often overshadows fiction and Silent Assassin is both: a terrifyingly thrilling story of a man on a clandestine mission to save us all from a madman hell bent on murder, written by a man who knows that world all too well.”
—Michele McPhee
“From the bloody, ripped-from-the-headlines opening sequence, Silent Assassin grabs you and doesn’t let go. Silent Assassin has everything a thriller reader wants—nasty villains, twists and turns, and a hero—Cobra—who just plain kicks ass.”
—Ben Coes
“Dan Morgan, a former black-ops agent, is called out of retirement and back into a secretive world of politics and deceit to stop a madman.”
—The Stoneham Independent
Termination Orders
“Leo J. Maloney is the new voice to be reckoned with. Termination Orders rings with the authenticity that can only come from an insider. This is one outstanding thriller!”
—John Gilstrap
“Taut, tense, and terrifying! You’ll cross your fingers it’s fiction—in this high-powered, action-packed thriller, Leo Maloney proves he clearly knows his stuff.”
—Hank Phillippi Ryan
“A new must-read action thriller that features a double-crossing CIA and Congress, vengeful foreign agents, a corporate drug ring, the Taliban, and narco-terrorists… a you-are-there account of torture, assassination, and double-agents, where ‘nothing is as it seems.’”
—Jon Renaud
“Leo J. Maloney is a real-life Jason Bourne.”
—Josh Zwylen, Wicked Local Stoneham
“A masterly blend of Black Ops intrigue, cleverly interwoven with imaginative sequences of fiction. The reader must guess which accounts are real and which are merely storytelling.”
—Chris Treece, The Chris Treece Show
“A deep-ops story presented in an epic style that takes fact mixed with a bit of fiction to create a spy thriller that takes the reader deep into secret spy missions.”
—Cy Hilterman, Best Sellers World
“For fans of spy thrillers seeking a bit of realism mixed into their novels, Termination Orders will prove to be an excellent and recommended pick.”
—Midwest Book Reviews
Books by Leo J. Maloney
The Dan Morgan Thriller Series
TERMINATION ORDERS
SILENT ASSASSIN
BLACK SKIES
TWELVE HOURS*
ARCH ENEMY
FOR DUTY AND HONOR*
ROGUE COMMANDER
DARK TERRITORY*
THREAT LEVEL ALPHA
WAR OF SHADOWS
DEEP COVER
THE MORGAN FILES**
The Alex Morgan Thriller Series
ANGLE OF ATTACK
HARD TARGET
*e-novellas
** compilation
Angle of Attack
An Alex Morgan Thriller
Leo J. Maloney
LYRICAL UNDERGROUND
Kensington Publishing Corp.
www.kensingtonbooks.com
Contents
Highest Praise for Leo J. Maloney and his thrillers
Books by Leo J. Maloney
Angle of Attack
Contents
Copyright
Dedication
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
Epilogue
Hard Target
Chapter 1
About the Author
Copyright
To the extent that the image or images on the cover of this book depict a person or persons, such person or persons are merely models, and are not intended to portray any character or characters featured in the book.
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.
LYRICAL UNDERGROUND BOOKS are published by
Kensington Publishing Corp.
119 West 40th Street
New York, NY 10018
Copyright © 2021 by Leo J. Maloney
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.
All Kensington titles, imprints, and distributed lines are available at special quantity discounts for bulk purchases for sales promotion, premiums, fund-raising, educational, or institutional use.
Special book excerpts or customized printings can also be created to fit specific needs. For details, write or phone the office of the Kensington Sales Manager: Kensington Publishing Corp., 119 West 40th Street, New York, NY 10018. Attn. Sales Department. Phone: 1-800-221-2647.
Lyrical Underground and Lyrical Underground logo Reg. US Pat. & TM Off.
First Electronic Edition: January 2021
ISBN-13: 978-1-5161-1007-0 (ebook)
ISBN-10: 1-5161-1007-2 (ebook)
First Print Edition: January 2021
ISBN-13: 978-1-5161-1008-7
ISBN-10: 1-5161-1008-0
Printed in the United States of America
Dedication
This book is dedicated to all the veterans who have sacrificed so much to serve our great country, and to all the first responders and medical staff who have served so courageously during the novel coronavirus pandemic. Thank you for all you did and do.
Chapter 1
Alex Morgan pulled the long, loose gray tunic over her baggy gray slacks and shapeless gray top. She put the hijab on last, as Lily Randall did the same. They were wearing the more conservative headscarves that covered everything but their faces.
Lily examined Alex, tucking some of her wayward brown hair under the hijab. Strictly speaking, the extra care wasn’t necessary. They were already dressed more traditionally than most Iranian women, who were getting increasingly more daring with their colorful hijabs that covered less and less of their hair.
Alex wished those women well, but there was no doubt that they attracted attention. The last thing she and Lily wanted to do was attract attention. Things were tense enough on the streets of Tehran as it was.
“How about me?” Lily asked.
“Perfect,” Alex said. She wasn’t surprised to see not a hair showing from under Lily’s headscarf.
Her friend and fellow agent had dyed her usual blond locks brown, just in case anyone saw under the scarf. Even that wouldn’t be catastrophic, but it would attract more attention than they wanted—which was zero attention.
Alex checked the mirror. She wasn’t wearing a trace of makeup and though she usually wore very little, she felt surprisingly barefaced and vulnerable without it.
Lily, on the other hand, was wearing subtle makeup to flatten her cheekbones and create dark patches under her eyes. Even with that effort to appear less attractive, Lily was still beautiful.
“Any doubts?” Lily asked in her light London accent. Several years older than Alex herself, Lily was British and had served for years in MI6 before joining Zeta Division.
“They’re overrated,” Lily said with smile. “The shoes you have to wear are ridiculous, the wigs are uncomfortable, and nobody ever tells you that those places reek.”
“To be fair, these shoes aren’t too bad,” Alex said. They were wearing track shoes that were reasonably comfortable. She also appreciated that the loose clothing meant they’d be able to move and fight, if they had to. That clearly wasn’t the intention of whoever designed this clothing for women, but it was a nice perk.
“First rule of undercover work,” Lily said, “it’s never what you expect.”
That was true, Alex thought. Her first undercover mission had been nothing like she had expected.
“I’m sorry, Alex, that was thoughtless,” Lily said.
“Not at all,” Alex said. “The mission was a success.”
That was true. Zeta had prevented something awful and Alex had helped.
Yet there had been losses.
Losses were part of the job, Alex knew. You never get used to them, her father had explained. The day you do is the day you know you’ve been doing this too long.
“I want to watch it again,” Alex said. Lily checked her watch and opened the laptop. She pressed a button and the video started. It was a press conference at the University of Tehran, where a woman in a green headscarf approached the podium wearing a Western-style business suit.
Maryam Nasiri was an Iranian-American professor who had emigrated from Iran as a small child and was now an American citizen. She was also one of the only two women to win the Fields Medal in mathematics for her work on an algorithm that was so far over Alex’s head that her year of A.P. calculus hadn’t helped her understand even the Wikipedia entry on Nasiri’s work.
The mathematician had made the mistake of accepting an invitation from the University of Tehran for a reception in her honor. After that reception, her family had never heard from her again.
The university released a written public statement signed by Nasiri about her decision to stay on at the university and her excitement about finally being “home.”
After a great deal of international pressure, a single public appearance at a press conference was set up and had gone viral. In the video, Nasiri appeared sedated. Standing stiffly at the podium, she spoke in a flat tone. “Thank you all for coming. I want to make it very clear how excited I am to continue my work in the country of my birth. The University of Tehran is my new home and they have given me all the resources I need to continue my work. Thank you.”
Then she was ushered away. There had been no questions from the press at this “press conference.”
“Let’s go,” Lily said. “We don’t want to be late on our first day of work.”
Somehow, while they were watching the video, Lily had executed a physical transformation. The more senior agent usually carried herself with the confidence of an extraordinarily beautiful woman who was also one of the most deadly agents at Zeta. She seemed to occupy a unique space between a catwalk model and an MMA fighter—and carried herself accordingly.
Now Lily’s face had sunk into a dull frown. Her shoulders hunched over; her whole body loosened.
Alex did her best to imitate the stance, and the two agents walked out the apartment door. As they left, a woman a wearing a heavy, black hijab barked something at them. She was sitting behind a counter at what looked like the front desk in a small hotel.
This was a residence hotel of sorts, but the woman wasn’t a front desk clerk. She was more like a housemother, a chaperone for the working women who lived there.
Lily replied in Persian. The rough older woman waved them on, averting her eyes.
“How did you do that?” Alex asked when they were outside.
“I added a little Kurdish accent,” the agent replied.
That made sense—the Kurds were not exactly a favored minority in Iran. Plus, many were from a territory close to Iraq, which also didn’t endear them to the locals. Alex had seen anti-Kurdish feelings firsthand on a recent Zeta mission in Turkey.
“I’ll have to remember to do that,” Alex said. “Once I learn Persian.”
Alex wouldn’t need to speak the local language for this mission—the rescue of one Maryam Nasiri from the mathematics department at the University of Tehran, where she and Lily were now part of the crew of cleaning women.
The university was, at best, a low-security environment. A small detail of soldiers guarded the mathematician, but after two months, reports were that they were lax in their approach to the job.
As a mission, this would be the equivalent of a “smash and grab.” With any luck, Alex and Lily would have their charge out of the country before nightfall.
The streets of Tehran were bustling, and the air was warm—78 degrees, normal for spring. If it weren’t for the covered women, Alex would have thought she was walking the tree-lined streets of any large European city. It was jam-packed with standstill, honking traffic—more than she would have thought even for a city of ten million people.
The cars were mostly European, Peugeot Citroëns and other smallish models with a few more expensive German vehicles. Alex didn’t see a single American car on the road; no surprise really, given how the regime felt about America.
There were a fair number of motorcycles, but nothing impressive. Alex noticed smallish Hondas and Italian Benellis. She also glimpsed a few of the locally produced new Saipa electric motorbikes.
It took Alex a moment to figure out what else was missing on the streets of Tehran besides American cars. There wasn’t a single sidewalk vendor. She knew that the Iranian authorities didn’t approve of them and assumed the city was having one of its periodic crackdowns.
After only a few blocks, Alex was sweating under her heavy hijab.
“You okay?” Lily asked.
“I guess,” Alex said. “This thing itches, and it’s hot.”
“Just like the wigs at the underground nightclubs,” Lily said. “They’re itchy as hell.”
That made Alex smile and they lumbered on, eyes downcast.
And to be fair, the hijab Alex wore as part of her cleaning crew uniform was heavier than many of the ones she saw on the street, where at least half the young women were wearing nearly Western-style clothes and colorful headscarves that showed a fair amount of their hair.
They were all being watched by the green uniformed “Morality Police.” This branch of law enforcement was charged with making sure that the population conformed to public morality at all times. Theoretically, men could attract the attention of the Morality Police if their beards were too long or they wore short-sleeved shirts, but as a practical matter, the police reserved their scrutiny for women whose clothing or headscarves were insufficiently “modest.”
Women were taking more chances than usual today. It was Wednesday—or White Wednesday—the day that rebellious Iranian women wore white to protest the compulsory wearing of the hijab.
Alex applauded their efforts, but given the number of Morality Police on the streets, she didn’t think the day would end well for the women who bent the rules too far. Already, the agents had witnessed more than one heated argument between women and these special police.
The Iranian government’s official statements always referred to the mission of the Morality Police as “guidance.” Of course, if that were true, Alex wondered why these guidance officers were armed.
The agents approached the university’s main entrance, on the south side of the campus. The entryway was formed by four twisted concrete arches that were almost like modern art. The academic buildings were surprisingly modern and would not have been out of place in any major European—or even American—city.
Just to the right of the gate Alex could see a crowd forming around a woman wearing a white headscarf and shouting at two of the green-uniformed Morality Police officers. The men were flanked by two female colleagues wearing full black robes. The robed women were shouting back at the woman in white.
Alex could see the problem. The white-clad woman was wearing what would have passed for moderate makeup in the West but was very out of place in Tehran. Also, she wore her white headscarf toward the back of her head, showing fully half of her hair.
