Zero Zero Read online

  Z E R O Z E R O

  (AN AGENT ZERO SPY THRILLER—BOOK 11)

  J A C K M A R S

  Jack Mars

  Jack Mars is the USA Today bestselling author of the LUKE STONE thriller series, which includes seven books. He is also the author of the new FORGING OF LUKE STONE prequel series, comprising six books; and of the AGENT ZERO spy thriller series, comprising twelve books.

  Jack loves to hear from you, so please feel free to visit www.Jackmarsauthor.com to join the email list, receive a free book, receive free giveaways, connect on Facebook and Twitter, and stay in touch!

  Copyright © 2021 by Jack Mars. All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior permission of the author. This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictionally. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Jacket image Copyright oOhyperblaster, used under license from Shutterstock.com.

  BOOKS BY JACK MARS

  LUKE STONE THRILLER SERIES

  ANY MEANS NECESSARY (Book #1)

  OATH OF OFFICE (Book #2)

  SITUATION ROOM (Book #3)

  OPPOSE ANY FOE (Book #4)

  PRESIDENT ELECT (Book #5)

  OUR SACRED HONOR (Book #6)

  HOUSE DIVIDED (Book #7)

  FORGING OF LUKE STONE PREQUEL SERIES

  PRIMARY TARGET (Book #1)

  PRIMARY COMMAND (Book #2)

  PRIMARY THREAT (Book #3)

  PRIMARY GLORY (Book #4)

  PRIMARY VALOR (Book #5)

  PRIMARY DUTY (Book #6)

  AN AGENT ZERO SPY THRILLER SERIES

  AGENT ZERO (Book #1)

  TARGET ZERO (Book #2)

  HUNTING ZERO (Book #3)

  TRAPPING ZERO (Book #4)

  FILE ZERO (Book #5)

  RECALL ZERO (Book #6)

  ASSASSIN ZERO (Book #7)

  DECOY ZERO (Book #8)

  CHASING ZERO (Book #9)

  VENGEANCE ZERO (Book #10)

  ZERO ZERO (Book #11)

  ABSOLUTE ZERO (Book #12)

  Agent Zero - Book 10 Summary

  A minor terrorist group with few resources, looking to make their mark in the most impactful way possible, kidnaps a former president and holds him for ransom while placing the blame on Iran. Relations deteriorate rapidly as the US prepares for the possibility of an act of war. But Agent Zero faces his own personal battle: when he is targeted for assassination and Maria ends up the victim instead, it sends him into a downward spiral, his only course of action vengeance against those responsible.

  Agent Zero: With a new treatment plan for his neurological condition and a recent wedding to Maria Johansson, life seemed to be as good as it could get—until the second day of their honeymoon, when an assassin vying for Zero killed Maria instead. His mind muddled and hell-bent on vengeance, Zero tore a path halfway across the world before his daughter Maya confronted him and talked him down. Upon return to the US, Zero figured out where the former president William McMahon was being held and rescued him from Iranian captors, but in doing so allowed the assassin Stefan Krauss to slip away.

  Maya Lawson: After completing the CIA’s “junior agent” program, Maya was sent on her first op with new partner Trent Coleman, only to find that they had been recruited into SRM, also known as the “dark agent” program, to carry out strategic assassinations. Maya refused, and found herself face-to-face with John Watson, the man who murdered her mother. In exchange for his life, Watson offered vital information on the whereabouts of her father, who Maya found in Greece and brought home to the US. After Zero was taken into custody Maya located Mischa and saved her from near-death at the hands of Stefan Krauss, who narrowly escaped.

  Sara Lawson: Despite her vigilantism against male abusers, Maria’s murder leaves Sara feeling helpless and ineffective. With her dad, Maya, and Mischa all absent, Sara drove alone to Florida, where she murdered one of her own former abusers, a drug dealer, before returning home. She told no one of her whereabouts, or the growing darkness within her.

  Mischa Johansson: The thirteen-year-old former spy was conflicted after Maria’s death and reconciled the only way she knew how: by seeking out Maria’s murderer and confronting him herself. A standoff with Krauss that was meant for Agent Zero almost saw her killed, had it not been for Maya’s intervention. But Zero vowed that he was not yet done with Stefan Krauss, and Mischa—now legally his daughter—offered her help to find and kill him.

  Stefan Krauss: The assassin who was supposed to eliminate Agent Zero was dismayed at Maria’s act of sacrifice, and by his own bizarre honor code let Zero live to get his revenge. But Krauss instead found himself faced by Mischa Johansson, who shared information about a wealthy puppeteer and war profiteer who was pulling Krauss’s strings behind the scenes. After a bloody fight, Krauss escaped with his life, vowing not only to see through his promise to kill Zero, but to follow up on Mischa’s claims.

  Todd Strickland: An attempt to bring Zero home in Morocco led to a fight in which Zero bested the former Army Ranger, leaving them on bitter terms. After the deaths of Chip Foxworth and Maria Johansson, and the resignation of Alan Reidigger and Agent Zero, Strickland is the only remaining member of the Executive Operations Team.

  Mr. Bright: All that is known about the wealthy New York financier is that he was once the business partner of Mr. Shade, the incarcerated war profiteer who funded several of the terrorist operations that Zero personally shut down. Despite his lack of presence, Mr. Bright seems to have his hands in almost everything nefarious, including not only the plot to kidnap the former president, but also Stefan Krauss’s contract to kill Agent Zero.

  Contents

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CHAPTER THIRTY ONE

  CHAPTER THIRTY TWO

  CHAPTER THIRTY THREE

  CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR

  CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE

  CHAPTER THIRTY SIX

  CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN

  CHAPTER THIRTY EIGHT

  CHAPTER THIRTY NINE

  EPILOGUE

  Zero Zero:

  Atmospheric conditions that reduce ceiling and visibility to zero; the ejection of the occupant of an aircraft from a grounded stationary po
sition.

  PROLOGUE

  Too easy, Krauss thought. It had been too easy so far.

  Who is Mr. Bright to you? That’s what the girl had asked him, right before they had fought. Mischa Johansson, age thirteen, a slight girl short for her age, with blonde hair and a pink T-shirt, had nearly been the death of him.

  Stefan Krauss was a world-class assassin with thirty-seven professional hits notched in his belt, not including the many more who had gotten in the way or saw too much. Yet an unassuming preteen had almost gotten the best of him. Well—physically she had almost gotten the best of him. Mentally, she certainly had.

  Who is Mr. Bright to you?

  The Buchanan Building in Midtown Manhattan was surprisingly less secure than he’d assumed it would be. Still, Krauss took precautions. He dressed in his best, a Giorgio Armani slim-fit suit, a two-button Italian wool jacket with notched lapels, and a navy blue Ermenegildo Zegna necktie. His shoes, leather Giuseppe Zanotti loafers.

  Krauss was not all that particular about material possessions, but even he had to admit that if this was the day he died, at least his corpse would be an attractive one.

  The Buchanan Building had doormen and a lobby clerk with a required sign-in and ID check and three armed guards, but Krauss was able to gain access under the pretense of an appointment with a hedge fund manager on the fifth floor—which was not a lie, at least not entirely. The hedge fund manager had an appointment with a Belgian by the name of Simon Woulters.

  Krauss could not risk using his American alias, Patrick McIlhenney, again. After all, it was how the girl Mischa had found him in a hotel in Washington, D.C. It pained him slightly to bid adieu to a persona he enjoyed, in a manner he imagined was akin to American elitists getting a kick from mimicking southern yokels. The more he leaned into the stereotype, the more it seemed people bought the act.

  Oh well. At least the Belgian allowed him to use his native German accent, with only a slight adjustment to account for a Dutch influence.

  Who is Mr. Bright to you? Mr. Bright was no one to him. He hadn’t even heard the name until four days ago and his fight with Mischa Johansson.

  Mr. Bright, out of New York. The business partner of Mr. Shade. He funds the operations that paid you to kill Zero.

  The girl had more information than he did, which was concerning. Stefan Krauss had spent months tracking down the defunct terrorist cells that Mr. Shade had been bankrolling, relieving them of their funds in exchange for killing Agent Zero.

  Not only had he failed to kill Agent Zero, but now he’d learned that someone else had been pulling the strings the whole time. This Mr. Bright knew what Krauss was doing and fed the meter, as it were, kept Krauss believing that he’d done it all on his own.

  No, not on his own; Krauss had help from the Kiwi. A former smuggler from New Zealand who went by the name Dutchman. They’d met three years earlier in a bar in Jakarta. Dutchman had agreed to use his underworld network and extensive contacts in exchange for fifteen percent of Krauss’s take.

  It had never occurred to him before how strange it was that Dutchman was always able to come through, without fail.

  Stefan Krauss was a world-class assassin with a record of thirty-seven professional hits. Twenty-nine of those had been in the time he’d been working with Dutchman. Had they all been at the covert behest of this Mr. Bright? Had he really been behind Dutchman the entire time?

  “No one controls me,” Krauss murmured to himself in the elevator. “I control them.”

  The girl’s words rang in his ears: What I hear is a man who does not realize when someone is pulling his strings.

  The elevator, Krauss noted, only went up to floor twenty-six, despite there being forty-eight floors in this building. That likely meant that what he was after was above that.

  The Buchanan Building, he’d learned, was owned by a company called Sunshine Realty, a trite name. Mr. Bright might as well have been advertising.

  The Kiwi was dead now. Krauss had seen to that first. It was not a pleasant death, either. Krauss was not an enthusiast of torture; he preferred quick deaths, because it meant quick jobs. But he made an exception for Dutchman. To the New Zealander’s credit, he held out for as long as he could. He refused to talk, to admit Bright’s influence, for far longer than Krauss would have thought. It wasn’t until his eyelids had been removed that he sputtered out the name of the building that Bright operated from. By that point speaking was difficult for him, on account of so many missing teeth, but “Buchanan” eventually became clear.

  The elevator doors opened on the fifth floor and Krauss stepped out, following a sign to the office of the hedge fund manager.

  “You must be Herr Woulters.” As Krauss stepped into the office, a man with hair plugs and a bleached smile hurried over to shake his hand. “Zane Thompson, pleasure to meet you. You can call me Zane. I prefer to keep it informal around here.” The man chuckled, as if he’d told a joke.

  “Simon, then,” said Krauss.

  “Please, Simon, have a seat.”

  The office was white and glass with black furniture. Krauss lowered himself into a leather chair.

  “Can I get you something to drink? Water, coffee, tea?”

  “No, thank you,” said Krauss. He crossed a leg, right over left.

  Zane’s bleached smile widened. “Those are sharp shoes, Simon. Say—you strike me as a scotch guy. I know it’s only eleven, but I won’t tell if you don’t.”

  Zane winked. Krauss feigned a smile of his own.

  “That would be agreeable.”

  “Terrific.” Zane zipped over to a minibar in the corner of the spacious office. Krauss noted through the window that he had a partial view of Central Park from here, just a sliver of green but probably enough to triple the cost of a similar office on the opposite side of the building.

  It felt strange, doing this in the daytime. But it was necessary, not only for his cover but because he assumed it would be unexpected.

  “So, Simon,” said Zane as he dropped a large cube of ice into a pair of rocks glasses. “Before we can begin, it seems that my office did not receive your financial records. Now, I’m fully prepared to admit that it could have been a clerical error on our end, for which I apologize. Would you be able to—”

  “Do you know a man who calls himself Mr. Bright?” Krauss interrupted as he rose slowly from the chair.

  Zane’s back was to him as he poured two fingers of scotch into the first glass. “Can’t say that I do. Should I?”

  “No,” Krauss told him, “I suppose not.” It just meant that if Zane was being honest, he was innocent in this. “I am sorry.”

  “For what?” Zane poured the second glass.

  It took only two long strides to reach him. The moment Zane set the bottle back down, Krauss cupped the man’s chin in one hand with the other flat on the back of his head and cleanly broke his neck.

  He lowered Zane to the floor. He took no pleasure in the act, yet it was a necessary expenditure if the people downstairs were to believe Simon Woulters was still in a meeting.

  Atop Zane’s black desk was a slender, sterling silver letter opener. Krauss put it in his sleeve and then hurried back to the elevator. He pressed the button for floor twenty-six.

  Anyone else might have thought that going into the Buchanan Building unarmed was foolhardy, but Krauss needed to ensure that he was not captured or worse before he reached his target. He could not risk being frisked, or metal detectors, or dogs—though none of those had happened, and he was again surprised by how much less secure the building was than he’d assumed it would be.

  Bright seemed to be the sort of man who did not think anyone would dare to come for him. A man who thought himself untouchable. A man who conflated wealth and power into authority. Krauss had met many such men before, and he had no issue teaching them their final lesson: when hands are tightening around your throat, wealth and power mean nothing.

  “No one controls me,” Krauss growled under his breath
, his shoulders tense as he drew nearer to his target. “I control them.”

  The doors opened on the twenty-sixth floor. Krauss stepped out into a corridor painted a light gray and softly lit by dim sconces in the walls, giving a silent, ambient glow. There were doors lining the hall, bearing numbers as if they were apartments, but there was no sound. No voices, no muffled televisions, nothing.

  The carpet beneath his Zanotti loafers was pristine, not a scuff or fiber out of place. The twenty-sixth floor, it seemed, was meant to look like apartments, but was likely nothing more than a buffer between the accessible floors below and whatever was above.

  He followed the hall as it wound left and right, leading near to the other side of the building before he spotted another pair of elevator doors, the ones he was certain would bring him up where he needed to be.

  Between the pair of doors was a plain metal chair, and seated upon that chair was a man with a suit and a thick neck.

  He stood when he saw Krauss, and he scowled.

  “Sir. You’re not permitted on this floor.”

  Krauss frowned. “Apologies,” he said, donning a British accent. He liked the British accent; it made everything sound polite and disarming. “I am trying to find a friend’s apartment. What floor am I on?”‘

  “Twenty-six,” the man told him. The scowl remained. “You need to go back downstairs, sir.”

  “Certainly.” Krauss gestured to the pair of steel doors. “Can I take that elevator?”

  “No, sir. Authorized personnel only.”

  He frowned. “I’m afraid I’m going to have to insist.”

  The guard’s hand moved to the interior of his jacket.

  Krauss sprang then, the fingertips of his right hand reaching for the man’s thick neck. The silver letter opener slid into his palm. The tip of it was in and then out of the guard’s throat in an instant.