Path of the Assassin by Brad Thor

From the Publisher

In The Lions of Lucerne, Agent Scot Harvath made a vow to personally kill or capture all those involved with the president's kidnapping. As he prepares to close out his list, he has one final question: Who ambushed the American Special Forces team, code name "Rapid Return," in Syria? Only Gerhard Miner (the Lions' leader), awaiting trial in a maximum sercurity facility in Switzerland, knows for sure. Before Harvath can get to him, Miner is assassinated and a bloody trail of clues point toward the world's most feared terrorist.

As this man prepares an ingenious assassination plot to ignite the dreaded Muslim Holy War against America and her allies, Harvath and his team known as "Operation Phantom," are in a desperate race against time to identify him and take him out before it's too late. Their only problem is...they have no idea what he looks like.

Left with no alternative, Harvath recruits and trains hijacking victim Meg Cassidy—the only person who can positively identify their quarry. In a dance with death that will take them spinning out of control through North Africa, Capri, Italy's Amalfi Coast and finally to Rome's Vatican City, Scot Harvath and Meg Cassidy must hammer into place the pieces of a maddening puzzle that will test not only their ultimate physical and mental limits, but also the growing bond they feel for each other.

Publishers Weekly

If Thor's second international thriller had any more testosterone, it would grow hair. This follow-up to The Lions of Lucerne is loaded with explosions, gunfights, car chases and hairbreadth escapes as Secret Service agent Scot Harvath battles religious extremists and incompetent CIA spooks to save the world from WWIII. The Hand of God, an apparent Israeli terrorist group, is blowing up mosques in Saudi Arabia, assassinating Arab leaders and hijacking airplanes, all in an effort to provoke the Arab world into war with Israel. Harvath tries to derail the terrorist plot and avenge the deaths of buddies killed in the first book. Aided by Meg Cassidy, a beautiful Chicago public relations expert, Harvath chases the terrorist leader and a silver-eyed assassin from Hong Kong through Europe to North Africa. However, since Cassidy is the only one alive who has seen the face of the terrorist leader, the assassin chases them, too, trying to kill Cassidy before she can point him out. The story is one bloody episode after another, with a touch of romance and colorful turf battles between the CIA, FBI, Delta Force and Harvath himself. Thor stacks the deck in favor of his hero-Harvath never makes a mistake, and his view of how counterterrorism operations should be conducted is invariably proven correct. To top it off, he boasts about his remarkable talents. With its infallible hero, fetching sidekick and wicked bad guys, this international shoot 'em up sticks close to formula, but the well-choreographed action and thrills will keep readers engrossed. Agent, Heidi Lange, Sanford J. Greenburger Associates. (Jan.) Forecast: Thor is the host of a PBS travel show, Traveling Lite. Cross-promotion with PBS, plus an eight-city tour, will give him an edge in this crowded genre. Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

Product Details

• ISBN: 0743436768
  
• ISBN-13: 9780743436762
• Format: Mass Market Paperback, 544pp
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster Adult Publishing Group
• Pub. Date: August 2003
• Sales Rank: 1,716

• Table of Contents
• Read an Excerpt
• Read a Sample Chapter

Table of Contents

Read an Excerpt

Chapter One

Dressed in the traditional robes of a Muslim pilgrim, a lone figure tore back the carpeting from beneath a window of the sumptuously appointed room and fastened the feet of a tripod firmly into the concrete floor with a commercial-grade bolt gun.

The equipment had been smuggled into Saudi Arabia's Dar Al Taqwa Inter-Continental Hotel via several large suitcases and a hard-shell golf club case. Arabs, even in Medina, loved their golf, after all, and no one had given any of the cases a second look.

Finally assembled and secured to its launching platform, the second-generation TOW 2 Short missile was something to behold. Though it retained the same three-foot ten-inch profile of the ones Israel had used during the 1973 Yom Kippur War, the effective range of the weapon had increased by almost a thousand yards, and was now the length of forty-one football fields -- more than enough to deliver today's deadly payload.

The missile's optical sighting unit was securely positioned in the adjoining hotel room, and its crosshairs were fixed upon its target. An infrared sensor would track the weapon's trajectory and progress, relaying any last-minute adjustments. At such close range though, there'd be no need for adjustments. It would be like shooting fish in a barrel.

The digital fuse was set for ten minutes into the night prayer session of the Prophet's Mosque, the second-holiest shrine in Islam. Friday was the most important day of worship in the Muslim faith, and the evening prayer sessions were always the most heavily attended. The timing of the attack insured maximum carnage. With a Do Not Disturb sign hung on the doors of both rooms, the terrorist would beresting comfortably on a first-class flight to Cairo by the time the missile launched. From Cairo, a clandestine transport network would round out the journey home just as today's events were being broadcast on the evening news.

As the digital fuse began its devastating countdown, the terrorist spray-painted a large hand cradling the Star of David on the wall.

For a moment, scenes of a happier time flashed through the terrorist's mind. A time before the hatred was so deeply entrenched. Two young lovers from different walks of life, two different sides of the struggle, walked together along a river in fall. Bells rang in the distance and they cherished the good fortune that had brought them together. Though each had been raised to hate the other, love had blossomed between them. But, there were influences at work greater than their love. It was those influences that would change their lives, and the world, forever.

The terrorist's eyes, normally silver in color, now flashed coal black with hate as the final letters were painted beneath the hand. It was a simple, yet chilling three-word message, "Terror For Terror."

Two hours later, a stream of worshippers hurried themselves along, late for the sunset prayer. As they entered the Prophet's Mosque, right leg first as custom dictated, each supplicated, saying, "I seek refuge with the Mighty Allah. I seek protection in His Generous Countenance and His Everlasting Authority....O Allah! Forgive my sins, and open the gates of Your mercy to me."

They fanned out deeper into the mosque, searching for empty spaces to kneel among the other thousands of worshippers. As was the custom, the women were directed into a separate area closed off by large panels of fabric, so as not to distract the men from their prayers. The younger children stayed with their mothers, while older sons, well behaved enough not to disrupt the service, were allowed to sit among the rows of adult men. Most of the families in the Prophet's Mosque were divided this way when a great rumbling erupted overhead and a massive double-detonating warhead crashed through the roof, exploding in a fiery hail of instant death.

By noon the next day, rescue workers were giving up any hope of finding victims alive beneath the wreckage of the Prophet's Mosque. As throngs of Medina's citizens gathered behind emergency-services barricades asking why, a broadcast fax went simultaneously to newspapers and news agencies around the globe. It read:

For decades, the Arab world has supported and encouraged terrorism against Israel. Publicly, terrorists are denounced, while privately they continue to be trained and financed by Arab nations. The nation of Israel will no longer tolerate acts of violence upon our soil, or against our people. Henceforward we will speak to the Arab world in the language they have given birth to, the language they have spat bitterly into our mouths, the only language they understand -- the language of terrorism.

As it says in Job -- "They that plow iniquity and sow mischief shall reap the same."

The fax was signed on behalf of an organization calling itself the Hand of God. Beneath the group's name was the same pictogram the Medina police found on the wall of room 611 of the Dar Al Taqwa Inter-Continental, a large hand holding the Star of David in its palm.

The operation had begun.

Copyright © 2003 by Brad Thor

Read a Sample Chapter

For decades, the Arab world has supported and encouraged terrorism against Israel. Publicly, terrorists are denounced, while privately they continue to be trained and financed by Arab nations. The nation of Israel will no longer tolerate acts of violence upon our soil, or against our people. Henceforward we will speak to the Arab world in the language they have given birth to, the language they have spat bitterly into our mouths, the only language they understand -- the language of terrorism.

Copyright © 2003 by Brad Thor