Off Reservation

by Bram Connolly

  She picked up the phone from the floor where Qasim had dropped it and made her way out the door. She closed it quietly, smiling to herself, and went down the hall back to her office.

  ‘Jesus, did that actually just happen?’ asked one of the intelligence staff under his breath.

  Fiona looked around the room at the intelligence staff. They all looked back at her with their mouths open in shock.

  ‘She just totally wasted one of our top informers in Afghanistan,’ said another analyst.

  ‘Right, so let’s have a few minutes’ break, gather ourselves a bit.’ Fiona was shaking. She looked at the door that her boss had just left through and slowly shook her head. She couldn’t believe how quickly Steph had burned a valuable contact in order to save a mission. If the station chief should ever return from sick leave – probably taken as a result of trying to rein Steph in this past year – she would be sure to inform him of what had just happened.

  ...

  Back in Kabul, Karen reported, ‘Target neutralised, sir. Battle damage assessment indicates complete destruction.’

  ‘Thanks, Karen, and top twenty on the JPEL – not a bad day’s work,’ said Brigadier Mark Smyth.

  ‘Yes, sir, great result all round.’

  ‘Should we get back to the bus now, sir?’ asked Jim.

  ‘The Reaper is empty now, Jim – that was its last hellfire. Plus, they lost contact with the bus for five minutes; there’s no telling if the objective is even on it anymore until we go through a whole ID match again.’

  ‘And in any case, all the other assets are on task,’ said Karen.

  ‘Yes, that’s enough for one day, I think. Thanks, guys, can you give me a few minutes alone now?’ Smyth lowered himself into his seat and turned off the large monitor with the remote control. He put his hand on the cupboard next to his chair, ready to open it as soon as they left. A quick shot of Irish whiskey would be just the recharge he needed.

  ‘Yes, sir.’ Karen nodded to Jim and they left the brigadier’s office.

  In the hallway Karen stopped and turned to face Jim.

  ‘God, that was intense. Can you believe that guy just popped up on the radar like that?’

  Jim shook his head. ‘I know, right? We’re going after one low-level guy and all of a sudden – boom, there’s Objective Citroen, right there for the taking.’

  ‘Massive boost for the boss.’ Karen smiled. ‘Let’s go get dinner. I’m starving.’

  Smyth sat quietly in his office looking at the blank TV screen. Moments before he had watched two lives wiped out on his command. Opening his notebook, he started to pen his thoughts on what had just occurred; no doubt it would come in handy one day.

  9

  AFGHAN–IRANIAN BORDER

  Faisal could see a group of Iranian border guards gathered by the boom gate as the Coaster approached. Not long from now, he would be in the city of Zabol. Faisal thought back to the instructions he had received from Hassan al-Britani.

  ‘In the centre of the city is a small tailor’s shop known as Stitch in Time Threads. This is where you are to meet Bahbak Khorasanhi, whose job it is to smuggle you into Turkey,’ the ISIS militant had said as he gave Faisal a single sheet of paper with the address of the tailor’s shop. ‘Destroy this once you have memorised it, Faisal. And I’m sure I don’t need to remind you not to carry a phone.’

  Faisal had ignored this; he had bought ten different SIM cards to go with his new phones. As long as he switched between SIM cards with his remaining phone he should have no trouble evading detection.

  As the vehicle came to a stop the guards gestured for the men to get off. The largest of the guards talked to the driver, who seemed to nod in Faisal’s direction.

  Faisal exited behind some of the others. He stayed silent as he went down the steps and produced his documents for the guards to inspect. The other three men behind him joked and laughed as they in turn stepped off.

  ‘Line up here, have your papers ready and put your bags at your feet.’ The commander of the Iranian guards was all business. He took Faisal’s passport and checked it, then looked back at Faisal suspiciously. ‘Not much travel over the last couple of years,’ he said.

  ‘No, there were things in Kandahar that held my attention,’ said Faisal. He could see the driver watching the exchange from the front of the bus.

  ‘Where are you heading to?’

  ‘Imam Reza shrine.’ Faisal produced the envelope containing the forged letter and passed it to the guard, who opened it and perused the contents.

  ‘Hmm, I see.’ The guard raised his eyebrows and showed his commander, who was hovering next to him. The commander pushed the letter into Faisal’s chest and indicated for him to move to one side.

  ‘You three can stop joking around and produce your papers too!’

  The students stopped laughing and stood quietly as the guards took their documents. The first guard went over their papers while a second went through the bags at their feet. ‘Sir, look at this.’ The second guard stood up, holding the block of resin in his hands.

  ‘What?’ one of the students protested. ‘No! That’s not mine. You must have put it there.’

  ‘What did you just say?!’ The commander belted him across the face. ‘You come to the border with this poison and then you try to deny it!’

  The commander called for more guards and they streamed out of the concrete guard house to surround the men. The commander kicked the legs out from beneath the student and the other guards followed suit with his friends. The students lay in the dust while the guards went to work on them, kicking and punching them into submission.

  Faisal watched quietly as the young men were dragged away, along with their bags and Faisal’s drop phone. He smiled to himself.

  ‘What are you looking at?’ The commander eyed Faisal suspiciously.

  ‘At justice being served, I’d say,’ Faisal replied smoothly.

  ‘You’d best be on your way too,’ said the commander gruffly, clearly satisfied by Faisal’s response. ‘I’ve got some work to do.’ The commander turned his back and marched off towards the guard house.

  Faisal headed through the barrier towards the waiting taxis and walked up to the one at the head of the line.

  ‘Zabol, please.’

  10

  ABETONE, ITALY

  Stepping out of the Hotel Bellavista and into the cold, Matt pulled up the collar of his Arc’teryx jacket. A quick glance at his watch showed that it was seven am, although it could have just as well been two am given that the sun was yet to rise. An Italian winter could play tricks on the mind.

  Matt’s boots crunched along the frozen cobblestones as he walked slowly up the hill. About twenty metres ahead he could see a Transit van parked in front of one of the small shops that lined the ancient Italian street. Soft light from the dashboard was reflected on the faces of the two men inside. Both their heads were down, but as Matt approached he could see that their eyes were looking in his direction. That’s a rookie mistake, he thought. Not checking if the car lights could be completely blacked out while the heater was still on was the sign of an amateur as far as he was concerned.

  Matt patted the small Walther PPK in his pocket. Finding a decent gun in Italy without attracting the attention of the Mafia had proven to be a lot easier than he’d thought it would be. However, this firearm felt like a novelty item compared to the Heckler & Koch USP – Matt’s weapon of choice. How the hell did James Bond survive using this thing? Matt wondered.

  Approaching the car from the driver’s side, he turned the pistol in his left pocket to cover the two men while at the same time he slowly moved his right arm up, as if scratching his nose, so that it was clear of the proposed line of fire. He continued walking with the barrel trained on the driver’s side window. The weapon probably wasn’t going to be enough to kill anyone at this range, but it would provide enough of a shock to allow him to put some distance between himself and them should they be looking for trouble. The t
wo in the van gave him only a cursory glance as he passed, and then lost interest in the stranger walking towards them, going back to the paperwork required for their deliveries. Matt breathed a gentle sigh of relief.

  ‘Hanging on too tight,’ he whispered to himself.

  Matt continued on up the hill, past the Hotel Miramonti, once the summer residence of the famous composer Giacomo Puccini and a favourite spot of poets Byron and Shelley. He knew from the quick search for hotels he had conducted on the internet that behind the traditional wooden shutters and stone facade the rooms were chic and modern – probably not a bad description of Abetone in general.

  At the top of the hill were two stone pyramids signifying either side of the border between the provinces of Pistoia and Modena. Here the road turned in a dog’s leg, giving Matt a view out across the dark mountains and deep valleys below. The vista of snow-capped peaks was just becoming visible as dawn was breaking. Matt had to admit the jagged, frozen monsters in the distance were breathtaking.

  Looking across the frozen car park, he could see the lights were on in the Lupo Bianco cafe on the other side of the road and there were signs of life inside. He walked in a wide arc away from the cafe and across the car park so that he could get a better look through the windows and the entrance. This would give him more time to gain situational awareness as he made his approach to the doorway.

  There appeared to be six people inside: two staff as well as the two customers standing at the bar and two sitting by themselves at separate tables. The people standing were almost certain to be Italians enjoying their morning espresso, so Matt focused his attention on the tables. One of those seated looked at this distance to be an old man, so Matt discounted him. The other was a woman with her back to the entrance. This seemed strange to Matt. Why would someone sit in such a vulnerable position?

  He crossed the road and made for the door. While walking, he removed the PPK from his jacket and secured it inside the belt of his trousers. It nestled snugly in the small of his back, the cold steel against his skin making him shiver. As he stepped inside he was enveloped by warmth; there was a fire flickering in the fireplace and Roberta Flack’s ‘Killing Me Softly with His Song’ was playing softly. The whole setting was so calm and serene it made Matt nervous.

  He announced his arrival in the customary way, with a ‘Buongiorno’ addressed to the room in general.

  No one other than the waitress showed any interest in him as he took off his jacket and hung it on the back of a wooden chair.

  ‘Welcome, what can I get you?’ the waitress asked him in Italian as she approached the table. Matt guessed her to be in her early forties, but it was hard to tell because most of the women smoked heavily in Italy and he had always thought that this made them age faster. Still, she was pretty and slim, with tight permed hair.

  ‘Vorrei un cappuccino, grazie,’ Matt replied.

  As the waitress moved off Matt kept his peripheral vision focused on the woman sitting across the room with her back to him. She hadn’t moved an inch nor appeared to have registered his entrance. She just sat there staring into a mug of something.

  The cappuccino arrived.

  ‘Are you skiing today?’ the waitress asked casually.

  ‘Maybe later. I might make my way up to the rifugio at the top of the mountain for lunch. I hear that there is an amazing log fire and that the wine itself is worth the trip.’

  ‘Yes, it’s true.’ The waitress smiled at Matt. She stood there in silence for a moment, as if weighing him up. ‘Where are you from?’ she asked.

  ‘I’m up from Rome,’ Matt replied in fluent Italian. He took a sip of the cappuccino.

  ‘No, no, I don’t think you are. At least, you’re not Italian, are you? I mean your accent is good, but it’s not from here.’

  ‘What makes you say that?’ Matt asked quietly. He glanced around quickly to check on the positions of the other customers. Nothing had changed.

  ‘Your jacket,’ she said, pointing to the blue down-filled hoodie that Matt had placed on the chair. It’s Canadian, right? Arc’teryx? Well, no Italian gentleman would ever wear that. Those Scarpa boots, yes, of course, but the jacket, no. And who drinks cappuccinos?’ She laughed softly and walked back to the counter.

  Figures, Matt thought. When he was a boy it had been mandatory to learn either German or Italian at his school in Bendigo. He had excelled in Italian and had befriended an Italian boy at the school who had helped him learn to speak like a native. He had spent two winters and three more summers in Italy with his family over the years, too, not to mention the holidays he’d taken there while on leave from the army. It was on one of these holidays that he had met the beautiful Rachel. He’d felt sure he could pass himself off as Italian, only to be let down by his practical dress sense.

  Thinking about this, he looked down at the Suunto GPS watch on his wrist and let out an involuntary groan at another example of his own ineptness at blending in.

  ‘Hello, Matt.’

  He hadn’t noticed her entering the cafe. She must have been in the ladies’ room, he realised: the corridor leading to the restrooms was the only area he wasn’t able to cover from where he was sitting. She must have been waiting there for Matt to arrive.

  ‘Steph, how are you?’

  Matt watched her as she approached the table. She hadn’t changed from when he had last seen her two years ago. She still looked fit and wore her brown hair tied back in a single ponytail. While she was not unattractive, she certainly wasn’t Matt’s type.

  ‘I’m fine. As well as can be expected being here, I guess.’ Steph nodded towards the waitress who already knew what to get for her. Matt could see that the penny had dropped for the waitress too; it was obvious she knew Steph and now associated Matt’s appearance in this high alpine town with the American CIA agent.

  ‘Why here then, Steph?’ Matt gestured towards the window and the wider expanses of the Tuscan mountain range. ‘Why did you need me to come halfway around the world to meet you?’ Matt came straight out with it; he didn’t want to play games and knew only too well the capacity that CIA agents had for twisting a conversation.

  Taking a seat opposite Matt, Steph said, ‘See that mountain up there?’ She gestured out the window to the ridgeline that ran away from town and up into the clouds. The morning dawn now bathed the valley in warm light and the mountaintop was just visible through the fog. ‘That’s Monte Cimone, the highest mountain in the Apennines. It has a restricted US base at its peak.’

  Matt could just make out a few buildings and what looked like a small antenna farm on top of the ridgeline.

  ‘The locals think that the mountain is hollow and contains nuclear missiles.’ Steph laughed to herself and shook her head.

  ‘What does any of this have to do with Faisal Khan?’ Matt’s patience was already wearing thin. The last time he had seen Steph was before the enquiry into the botched suicide bombing in Kandahar, and that was only from a distance as she was whisked away. Steph’s abrupt disappearance had left Matt with many unanswered questions, especially about the death of his close friend, the Dutch intelligence officer Allie van Tanken. He had been determined to find the CIA agent, to have his questions answered, but she had become a ghost. Matt had been threatened with disciplinary action should he continue requesting that the Department of State investigate her involvement in Allie’s death, so, reluctantly, he had let the matter drop. But now here they were, face to face – and she had summoned him.

  ‘This is where I’m based now. They called it a promotion, but I think of it more as a sideways move to get me out of everyone’s way and as far from Washington as possible. I’m the station chief here – well, technically the deputy chief, but I’m the one who’s running the show. The site no longer contains ballistic missiles; I mean, it’s not the Cold War, right?’ She smiled. ‘It’s now a CIA listening post. As the highest point in central Italy, it’s perfect for looking into Europe.’

  ‘Yeah, whatever. Who gives a f
uck? Let’s talk about Allie, shall we?’ Matt took another sip of his coffee and looked out the window at a couple of skiers dressed in bright clothes who had just arrived in the car park. The cafe was starting to fill up now with ski patrol staff, emergency service workers and locals all looking for their morning espresso hit.

  ‘I killed her, Matt. What do you want me to say?’

  Matt looked back at her face; he thought he saw the briefest sign of regret flash across it, but it was gone before he could be sure.

  ‘So that’s it then, Steph? That’s all you have to say about it? No apology, no sorrow?’

  ‘It just is what it is, Matt. Move on. I have. Anyone would think you were in love with her.’

  Matt could feel the rage mounting in his chest; in the space of a week he had lost everything he had worked for and he wasn’t in the mood to be patronised. He moved his hand around to the small of his back and leaned across the table towards Steph, narrowing his eyes.

  ‘You had a team stalk me and then you lured me here. I suggest you tell me what the fuck is going on, Steph, before I do humanity a favour and put a bullet in that twisted little brain of yours. Trust me, I don’t feel like I have too much to lose right now and I’m not sure that you’ll be missed.’

  Steph took a sip of her coffee, her eyes never leaving Matt’s. She put the cup down ever so gently and then pushed it and the saucer out of her way.

  ‘Don’t be alarmed, Matt, but I’m taking out my Glock and I am going to put it right here on the table in front of me.’ She indicated where she intended to put it with a movement of her eyes and then she slowly withdrew her weapon from the front of her cargo pants. She slid it under her beanie on the table. She took a deep breath. ‘Anyway, are you sure that PPK even works, Matt? Have you test-fired it?’

  Matt did a double take at the question.

  ‘Oh, you seem surprised. You’re asking yourself, How could Steph know what weapon I have? Take a moment to think about it, genius; I control all the lowlife thugs within a hundred-mile radius.’