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Dead Eye

Author: Mark Greaney

Publisher: Berkley Books

ISBN: 9780425269053

Year Published: 2013

With Court Gentry also known as the Gray Man still on the run from US authorities, including a number of "handlers" whom he has burned, the CIA hires one of its most covert private operations, Townsend Government Services, to find and kill him. They turn to the one man who is just as skilled as Gray Man in order to do the job for them, a man code-named Dead Eye, which is also the title of the fourth thriller in this series by Mark Greaney.

Gentry has no idea why the CIA has issued a shoot-on-sight order on him. He just knows that he needs to keep running and make himself invisible to stay alive. In order to finance his travels, he takes on selected assignments to assassinate only those men and women who deserve it, based on his own moral code. 

When Townsend gets word that Gray Man has just killed a Russian mobster, they immediately send Russ Whitlock, who’s Dead Eye, and a team of eight specialists to intercept Gentry as he flees Russia. Whitlock is a graduate of the same ultra-secret Autonomous Asset Program that trained and once controlled Gentry. But now, Whitlock is a free agent who has been ordered to terminate Gentry.

Dead Eye manages to find Gentry quickly enough, but instead of pulling the trigger himself, in an ironic twist, he helps the Gray Man escape the Townsend team sent to kill him by shooting at them. In the shootout, Whitlock sustains a gunshot wound in the waist.

Initially, Gentry is grateful for Whitlock's assistance, but remains suspicious. And he should be, as Dead Eye has other plans lined up for the Gray Man. He knows how his target thinks, how he moves, and how he kills. And he knows the best way to do the job is to make Gentry run for his life and after using the Gray Man for his own sinister purpose, then kills him off.

Dead Eye is an action-packed thriller, racing along at break-neck speed throughout northeast Europe. The premise of Whitlock's plans for Gentry is a little flimsy and unrealistic - after all, these are two loners or singletons in the CIA world who prefer to work on their own and are suspicious of any unrequested assistance, no matter how well-intended it may be. But this relatively minor plot flaw is readily overlooked as one man chases the other from country to country, leaving a trail of bodies in both their wakes.

The inclusion of a beautiful female Mossad agent in the hunt provides some additional excitement and uncertainty to the mix.

Ruth Ettinger, senior targeting officer in the Collection Department of the Mossad, is assigned to track and kill the Gray Man after receiving intel that the assassin has accepted an assignment to kill the Prime Minister of Israel. But after reading the Gray Man’s dossiers from Mossad as well as those given by CIA, she is conflicted by the difference in the profiling of the assassin. As Gentry has his moral standard to only kill those who deserve to be killed and the PM of Israel is not one of them. Ettinger’s suspicion soon leads her to seek Gentry out for a face-to-face meeting. Soon an unexpected circumstance throws both of them together and when Gentry denies that he is after her PM, Ettingeer decides to help him clear his name with the CIA.

Unfortunately, something goes very wrong with the plan but eventually, Gentry manages to save the PM’s life and in the process, Mossad helps him enter the United States again.

Dead Eye is an entertaining thriller, one that will have new readers to the series seeking out the first book to see how it all started.