"I trust you bring our cause good news, Mahir, coming in such unwise haste."
Mahir swallowed hard, drawing in gasping breaths as unblinking dark eyes peered into his. Unsteady, he touched one hand to his forehead and swayed.
"Yes, yes! It is good, sir," he hurried on, clearly desperate to get this interview over with. "It is how you were shown in your vision, sir. The man has arrived."
Ra'id Asim Ibn Hassan Sharif al-Mawsil settled back into his chair with a grin. Interesting. It appeared the old harlot was telling the truth. When Allah commanded him to slit her lying throat, he hesitated at first, aware of the laws forbidding him to shed her blood. When she begged him to spare her daughter's life, however, his fury was complete. The little priestess would bring an Infidel straight to the temple and destroy his plans. Yet, the Hosts of Paradise whispered he needed the bitch to cleanse the holy seat of Islam from the stain of unrighteousness. She knew how to find the temple. She could lead him there. At the temple in Nineveh, he would find the means to purge these Infidels from the face of the Earth and return it to the righteous.
Excitement twisted in his veins and his groin tightened with images of how he would make her beg for her life, same as the old harlot had. He would take his time with her though -- make her suffer for her crimes, her refusal to accept the grace of Allah. He gave her the choice and she ignored his attempt to spare her. Now, she would pay. His visions were clear. He was destined to be the scourge which removed the unfaithful from this land.
"Of course it is. I was given a vision from Allah, blessed be His name." Dark, writhing hate climbed through him. "We must rid this land of the infidels who feed so ravenously on the hearts of good men."
He picked up a hunting knife from the desk, its blade crusted with dried blood. Eyes closed, he savored the memory of slitting the old slut's throat. Syria was cleansed. The whores were all dead. All but one. The self-righteous little bitch got away from him here and robbed him of victory in Lebanon as well. He smiled cruelly as voices whispered along the edges of his mind. Allah, blessed be His name, sent His angels to guide Ra'id to victory. He had the perfect bait now. "Set a trap for the American. She will not be able to stay away long."
One of the men near him stirred. "Sir...the Black Widow, what should we do with her?"
Ra'id waved away his concern. The Brotherhood of Spiders was of little concern to him. They served a purpose and so he used them, but they were Infidels, and they too would feel his wrath when the time came. After all, they insulted him. They sent a woman to do a man's work. "Leave her be. She is still of use to us for now. I will deal with her when the time comes."
Dutifully, the men departed, leaving Ra'id alone in the room. Settling back, he toyed with the knife, a smug smile on his face. His father raised him to see the truth of these heathen women and Allah called him to purge the land of them. The little Sumerian bitch was his key to the power to destroy them all.
The light in the room flickered and Ra'id's head jerked up. His heart sped as he recognized the event. This was exactly how Allah's messenger always came to him. When he was a child, lost and missing his heathen mother, Allah sent His messenger to save Ra'id.
"Son of woman born. Servant of the One whose name is Blessed."
The words echoed in his head and ears simultaneously and Ra'id immediately slid from his seat to his knees, prostrating himself with his forehead to the floor in a sign of reverence. "I am listening."
"You let yourself be distracted from your task, son of woman born."
The displeasure in that deep, quiet voice made Ra'id tremble. Allah was merciful, but His servants were not. This one came to smite the unbelieving and the wicked, and had no tolerance for human failure. This, he learned early and he was loathe to fail Allah's messenger again.
"The women... They were Infidels, Abd-er-Rahman. They had to be destroyed."
"The tablets, son of woman born. You must retrieve the tablets in order to destroy these heathens. Only the tablets gain you entrance to their unholy temple where you will unleash the wrath of the Most Blessed."
With that declaration, the room plunged into darkness and the silence overwhelmed him. Ra'id huddled on the floor, shivering in cold fear. The threat behind the angel's words was clear. Find the tablets and finish his task, or the wrath visited on him would far outweigh any vengeance dealt to the heathen women.
Stumbling to his feet as the lights came back on, Ra'id slumped back into his seat and reached for the phone on his desk. He had an arrangement with the Black Widow. He had found the items she required. She better have secured his tablets, or she'd learn what wrath truly was.
Chapter Two
Matthew Raleigh paced restlessly in the confines of the safe house's planning room. If there was one thing guaranteed to drive him crazy, it was confinement -- even self-imposed confinement.
"You keep pacing like that, and you'll wear a hole clear through the world, lad," Peter Talladay observed from where he lounged against the wall, rolling a coin over his knuckles.
Matt stopped, rubbing the back of his neck in an attempt to relieve the tension. "I can't believe we have to wait," he complained in frustration. "I don't like waiting."
"Sometimes," Talladay drawled in his Irish brogue, "waitin's the only part worth doing."
"I know that!" Matt resumed pacing in an effort to stave off the feeling of walls closing in around him, bringing with them the phantom smells of another life. A life he buried decades ago.
Talladay sat forward, the coin forgotten in his hand as his gray eyes tracked Matt's movement. "You thinkin' of Somalia again?"
Matt shook his head. He wished his thoughts were so easy to live with. His memories of Somalia were bad, but he could bear them. Most times, he was able to block those memories out. However, for some reason, ever since he landed in Sidon, all Matt could think about was Rachel Murray. A memory of three terrifying days in Hell, when he learned that, sometimes, the worst torture a person could do was to do nothing at all. Ever since he saw the secretive light in Star's eyes as the older man departed yesterday, the memory of Rachel was intent on strangling him.
"I'm wondering about Star." He shot Peter an assessing glance. Star set up their safe house and guided them there. He was interested in Peter's impressions. "Was he what you expected?"
Talladay frowned and shrugged as he resumed his absent coin rolling. He cast a glance toward the other room where the rest of the team was. "I'll admit he's a wee bit different from any spy I've ever known. But this is the Middle East, Matt. It's a different world. Everything works different here. You should know that." His gaze narrowed on his commander. "Is there some other reason you're questionin' this?"
Matt's mind flashed over one memory in particular -- a woman in white, with eyes like a stormy sky. She was memorable in herself, in this region where women hid themselves in head-to-toe veils of black. However, oddly enough, the look in her eyes was what haunted him -- a shocked look of disbelief and fear mingled together. As if she knew something he didn't.
"There was a woman on the docks..."
Talladay's gaze sharpened. "You think she's a spy for Al-Mawsil?"
"No." Matt shook his head. He couldn't imagine she was a spy. She'd been even more conspicuous than Star's vehicle. "But there was something about her...as if I know her from somewhere."
Curiosity bloomed in the Irishman's gray eyes. "Do you?"
"Never seen her before in my life." At Talladay's skeptical look, a quick grin tugged Matt's lips. He knew his reputation as a lady-killer was legend among his mercenaries. The reputation wasn't completely unearned, but it ceased to matter long time ago. "Trust me, Pete, I'd know. She wasn't the kind of woman a man forgets. I haven't been able to get her eyes out of my mind since I saw her."
Talladay cocked one dark eyebrow at him. "So, who do you think she is then?"
Matt shrugged. "I'm more concerned about how she seemed to know who I was."
That brought a frown to Talladay's face. "Ho
w do you figure?"
"She looked straight at me and seemed surprised and worried that I was leaving with Star." Matt paced a few more steps and stopped, heaving a sigh. "Damn. I wish I knew who she was."
Which only served to make him more restless. Whoever she was, Matt had an eerie feeling he hadn't seen the last of her. Somehow, she was going to turn his world inside out.
"Hey, Matt." Blake Wilmington, a former Delta Force operative who was now a member of Project Prometheus, poked his blond head through the door, his expression tense. "Incoming vehicle."
Matt's attention snapped around. No one was supposed to know where they were. No one except Star, that is. "Report."
"Dark sedan. Very obvious and quite an eyesore around here, if you ask me."
Matt's tension dissipated, and he grunted in a mixture of disgust and relief. "About time. It's our contact, Blake."
Behind him, he heard the rustle of movement before Peter joined him. "Star?"
"Yeah." Matt shoved a hand through his short-cropped hair as a scowl darkened his face. "And he better have the maps we need. I want to get the hell out of here before we're made."
Those words hung heavy in the air, pressing down on Matt as he moved into the next room where most of his twelve-man team was gathered. A moment later, a rap at the door drew all their attention and Matt nodded for Trevor Watkins, nearest the door, to open it. Trevor obeyed, his shoulders tensing as Star breezed into the room. The older man was oblivious to the tension hovering around them as he moved to the room's central table and began spreading out topographical maps of the region.
"You're late." Matt's words snapped like lightning in the room. He watched through narrowed eyes as Star froze, clearly pissed at being barked at. Too bad. Something about this guy bugged him and he wasn't about to cut the man any slack.
"I was not informed you were rude."
Hell, he wasn't falling into that trap. Prometheus wasn't here to placate CIA's assets. They were here to catch a terrorist and murderer. "Time is money. You're wasting it."
He wasn't blind. He caught the surprised glances that circled the room. His men all knew Matt Raleigh didn't give a rat's ass about money; that wasn't why he was here. They likely all wondered what was bugging him. He knew he did. His mind flashed again to the mystery woman on the docks, and the fear and dismay in her eyes when she saw Star's vehicle. Something about that look lay like a stone in his gut, and he couldn't help wondering what she knew that he didn't.
"Very well." Star's words were terse and clipped. Matt ignored him, moving closer to the table covered in maps. "I have been following Ra'id al-Mawsil's movements for some months."
"Learn anything interesting?" Peter laid his hands on the table, his gaze traveling between the maps and Star.
Star contemplated the maps, as if debating how much to tell them. "His obsession disturbs me."
"Obsession with what?" Trevor spoke up, surprising Matt. Not that the dark man -- another former Delta operative and one of Matt's closest friends -- didn't speak. He just wasn't usually interested in a target's motivations. Almost as if he was afraid any analysis might turn back on him. Now, lines of concern carved deeper than usual into his dark face, and his alert amber eyes reminded Matt of a wolf hunting prey.
"With this woman." Star pulled a surveillance photo from his briefcase, Matt's breath stalled in his lungs as he stepped forward and got a good look at the picture. It was her.
"Who is she?" The words emerged a croak. He caught Peter's speculative glance before the taller man's gaze dropped to the photograph.
"No one seems to know, but Ra'id and she have been spotted in similar locations more than once. Perhaps she is his contact with the arms deals. I have been unable to do more than snap a photograph or two of her."
He didn't like this. Matt stared down at the picture of a woman whose beauty punched him in the gut, and felt a stir of something he didn't want to feel. Interest. If she was a terrorist, she was dangerous to him in more ways than one, and if she wasn't, she was a distraction he couldn't afford. Either way, he had no reason to seek her out or learn more about her. Still, she drew him in ways he couldn't explain, and he couldn't stop the parade of images through his mind of bodies tangled in an embrace that melted stars. Damn it, who was she and why couldn't he get her out of his mind?
"Matt." Peter's warning mutter, followed by an elbow in the ribs, jolted him back to the present. He blinked, and cleared his throat.
"Any ideas where we can pick up al-Mawsil's trail?" He fixed his gaze on Star, determined to ignore the photograph.
The older man nodded and indicated the map on the table. One finger traced a circle around a canyon about five kilometers outside of Sidon. "He has been camped in this canyon for the past week. You should be able to find him there."
"Great." Matt winced at his own tone, knowing his men were aware of his tension. He could only hope he had the strength to see this through. For now, they needed a plan.
*****
Four hours later, Matt studied his surroundings from the passenger seat of a rickety, open-topped jeep as it sped through the dry savannah. Glancing briefly at the man driving, Dread clutched Matt's gut. Peter Talladay was a man he trusted to speak his mind, and usually wisely. His silence now bothered Matt. They both agreed Star seemed almost too capable, considering how limited he claimed his resources were. However, his smooth manner worried Matt more. His hand clenched in a fist. If only there was some way to be sure he could trust Star.
"You okay, Matt?" Talladay asked in his bluff Irish manner, his gaze sliding briefly to Matt's face. "You're a mite quiet for a man who's gettin' what he wants."
Matt shifted uncomfortably. Talladay, the mercenaries whispered, had the famed Irish Second Sight. While Matt didn't believe in such superstitions, even he had to admit that, sometimes, Peter was just a little too perceptive for comfort.
"It's Star. Do you think he's on the level, Pete? Something just doesn't seem right," he admitted in a mutter, his eyes scanning the low brush ahead. He hadn't felt this ill at ease since right before he landed in Somalia.
Talladay nodded. "He's a little too charmin' for my peace too, Matt, but he's a Spook. Man's made of whiskey and lies, and spies are more than human."
Matt's lips twitched involuntarily at his friend's quip. There was no one Matt would rather have at his back in a fight, but Peter's little Irish witticisms made him appear eccentric at times. He absently fingered the smooth metal barrel of his M-16 and frowned. They were all eccentric in some way. Why else would they chase around the world on fools' dreams of duty and honor? Too much war changed a man. It made him unable to see beyond the next battle. Matt had prayed, when he still believed there might be a God up there, that he wouldn't lose that little piece of humanity he had left. Then the SEALs dropped into Somalia, and every hope of peace or salvation was beaten from his heart. God was dead, and so was he. All he was looking for now was a grave.
A flash of white to his right yanked Matt from his thoughts. His heart hammered against his ribs and a prickle of awareness raced up the back of his neck. Someone was out there watching them. Scanning the low brush along the canyon top, he saw nothing. His frown deepened
"Something wrong, Matt?" Talladay asked quietly, his voice tinged with alert concern.
"Maybe nothing. Did you see anything just now?"
"Sorry, lad. I didn't see a thing."
Matt rubbed his face wearily. "Must've been a trick of the light."
The canyon Star marked on their map loomed ahead of them. Four jeeps cut their engines at Matt's signal and the mercenary team moved silently toward the basin on foot. Another prickle of awareness ran along Matt's scalp and his attention flew to the canyon wall as he flicked off his weapon's safety. Gesturing to Talladay, he pointed toward the sandstone ledge. Someone was watching them.
As Talladay passed the caution on, Matt moved toward the high sandstone walls, his gaze absorbing every detail. The basin was free of footprints except his
team's. No fire pit remnants, no tent peg holes and no tire tracks. Even the low brush was undisturbed. The eerie tingle at the base of his skull grew to a dreadful gnawing and his stomach knotted. Something was definitely not right here.
A loud click behind him stopped Matt in his tracks. He swung around, and fear rushed through him to see John Pelizone frozen in place. Everything seemed to slow as Matt's mouth opened to shout a warning. Then time ripped apart as a blast large enough to level a city block ripped through the canyon. Something heavy impacted Matt's chest, sending him flying backward. He smashed against the sandstone wall with a groan, unable to move. His stare fixed hazily on the canyon ridge as a vision from another world crested its top. He blinked once to clear the mirage to no effect. There, framed in sunlight, the wind blowing a loose cloak and dark strands of hair up around her like wings, stood his Angel of Death. In that instant, he knew his sins were being weighed against him. His reckoning had finally come. With a relieved sigh of surrender, Matt closed his eyes and let his world go dark.
Chapter Three
He was so very tired. He wished to rest, to give in to the siren's call beckoning him toward the great darkness. He could not rest, not yet. He had one more task to complete. He must hide his charge. He must secure the Star Blade.
On legs trembling with exhaustion, he stemmed the flow of life energy and blood from his shoulder wound as he stumbled toward the main room at the labyrinth's center. He could hear the Galla, Urasat, lumbering along behind him. He knew how to beat this monster, but it would require his life. He would leave it to his mother's servant to seal the labyrinth.
Wearily, he shed his armor as he went. Where he went from here, he would have no need of the worldly protections he had worn since leaving Aermórnosa's security nearly half a century ago.
"You cannot escape me, Son of Inanna. You will pay your Mother's debt." Urasat's voice hissed with the stench of the Underworld.
In Her Name Page 2