by Brad Thor
“Do you have him on any of the cameras?”
“Negative,” replied Nicholas. “Not at present.”
“Roger that,” said Harvath as he approached the parking stall with the blue Nissan. Checking the plate, he relayed the numbers back to Nicholas.
“That’s it.”
Harvath slipped his hand into his pocket and withdrew what looked like a threaded screw. It was a tool a spook buddy of his had designed and had given away to his friends in the community as a Christmas present. Foreign intelligence agents overseas had long been known to drive nails or screws into the tires of Americans they suspected of conducting espionage. Harvath’s buddy had seen it happen on more than one occasion and had decided to take the tactic to the next level. Employing a pal who was a machinist, he had him fabricate a screw with a hollow shaft and a small opening at the top and the bottom. In essence, it was an inch-long spike that relieved a tire of its air very quickly.
He eyeballed the interior of the vehicle, scanning for any sign of what Sarhan might be up to. “Did he have any bags with him?” he asked.
“Negative,” Nicholas replied. “Just what looked like a zippered case for a small laptop or an iPad maybe.”
“Keep looking for him.”
Choosing the tire he wanted, Harvath leaned over, jabbed in the screw, and kept walking.
If Sarhan hadn’t come to catch a flight or to switch vehicles, there was only one other reason, based on what Harvath had seen, for the man to be here. LAX had to be the target.
Four two-man teams had left Sarhan’s house and, via intricate SDRs, had taken great pains to make sure they weren’t being followed. Despite leaving before Sarhan, he had beaten them to the airport. Any doubt about what was about to happen was fading from Harvath’s mind.
Sarhan was the cell controller. He had picked the parking garage at Terminal One as an overwatch position. From the northeast corner of the garage, he could watch as all four teams drove past.
The fact that the men were traveling in pairs also made sense now. It was an insurance policy. Each was there to keep the other committed to the operation. With a two-man team, cowardice could be minimized, if not completely eradicated. If one of the men chickened out, the other would take care of the situation. It was a growing trend in terrorist operations.
Sarhan was there to make sure everything went off as planned. Very likely, he had been instructed to film as much of the carnage as possible so that it could be fed to Al Jazeera, which, in turn, would joyfully broadcast it to the Muslim world. Harvath, though, was determined that none of that was going to happen.
Holding his keys in his hand, he moved past the rows of cars pretending he was looking for his.
“The first of the vehicles just entered the airport,” said Nicholas.
“Understood,” Harvath replied as he kept walking.
“Did you notice anything off about any of the vehicles?”
“Negative. Why?”
“One of the guys in the TOC thinks that the cab that just pulled in is riding too low.”
Harvath had been so preoccupied with Sarhan and the men coming out of his house that he hadn’t paid nearly enough attention to the vehicles. “Nobody got out,” he said into his earbud’s microphone.
“Excuse me?” replied Nicholas.
“The van driver. The taxicab drivers. Even the driver of the Town Car. None of them got out when they picked the men up at Sarhan’s.”
“So?”
“So it doesn’t make sense,” said Harvath. “Why didn’t they get out and help with the bags?”
“Maybe they were told not to.”
“Why?”
Nicholas thought a moment. “Because they don’t want anyone else handling the bags?”
“Bingo.”
“I just got another IM from the guy in TOC. He really doesn’t like that first vehicle. He says it reminds him of VBIEDs he saw in Iraq.”
Harvath had seen his share of vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices as well. “Watch where it goes, and tell him to look at the other vehicles. I want to know if he thinks the same thing.”
“What are you thinking?” Nicholas asked.
“I’m thinking those guys with the bags go in, explosions happen, and when survivors rush out of the terminals, if those four vehicles are VBIEDs, the survivors get taken out in a secondary attack that’s even worse than the first.”
“What should we tell DHS?”
It was the right question, but not the one Harvath wanted to have to answer. If they told DHS that they now believed they had four teams of suicide bombers being dropped off by vehicles loaded with explosives, it was game over. They wouldn’t wait to see what happened. They’d shut the entire airport down. If Harvath was right, DHS would succeed in saving countless lives. If he was wrong, Sarhan and his men, who could very well be controllers of other cells scattered across the country, would know they had been blown and all those potential leads would evaporate.
The FBI would get involved, but even if they used CIA interrogators, they’d never be able to lean on Sarhan and his men hard enough to get any actionable intelligence out of them. And once the FBI was involved, they’d see to it that the men were afforded every single protection under the law. Nobody would be putting bags over their heads and transporting them to Iceland or one of the other black sites. Caught on American soil, they’d be handled under criminal court rules and proceedings—that is, if the FBI could come up with enough to even hold them.
It wasn’t that Harvath didn’t respect the Bureau, he did. It was just better that they didn’t get mixed up in this. It was also better, at least at this moment, that DHS not be given any encouragement to pull the trigger prematurely. “Don’t tell them anything,” he said.
“And if those are VBIEDs?” asked Nicholas.
Harvath could now make out the silhouette of someone standing in the northeast corner. Ducking into a row of parked cars, he crouched and adjusted the side mirror of the vehicle he was leaning against. “Contact,” he said quietly into his microphone.
CHAPTER 53
“What’s he doing?” asked Nicholas.
Watching in a sideview mirror through multiple layers of autoglass, Harvath had a pretty lousy view. “He’s leaning against the concrete half-wall with a laptop open.”
“What’s he doing on the laptop?”
“I think it’s a ruse. He’s trying to look busy while he watches his teams arrive at the airport.”
“Now what?” asked Nicholas.
Harvath knew that the only way anyone was going to get any answers out of Tariq Sarhan, especially quick ones, was if he was asking the questions. The problem was, how the hell would he interrogate him in the middle of a parking garage?
Two vehicles away from Sarhan was a brand-new, white Cadillac Escalade. Harvath described it, gave Nicholas the license number, and said, “How long?”
“Give me three minutes,” he replied.
Harvath looked at his watch. “You’ve got two. Make it happen.”
Ninety seconds later, Nicholas said, “The OnStar folks are very sorry to hear you’ve lost your keys, Mr. Chaffee. Let me know when you want it opened.”
“Stand by,” said Harvath, as he stepped out from the row of parked cars. Holding the key fob for the vehicle he’d parked downstairs, he proceeded forward.
Sarhan had a pad, pen, and a few papers set up next to his laptop. If anyone had wondered what he was up to, he could have argued that he had just dropped someone off and was filing a quick sales report or was trying to be productive while waiting to pick someone up. What none of them would suspect was that from this vantage point, he was taking advantage of a perfect view of all the traffic coming into the airport.
“Unlock it now,” said Harvath as he closed within fifteen feet of Sarhan.
The lights on the Escalade flashed and the locks thumped as they popped up. The Egyptian turned, looked at Harvath briefly, and went back to what he was doing.
> Harvath ignored him. Walking around to the driver’s side, he opened the door and climbed in. Had there been space enough to maneuver, there was nothing he would have rather done than to drive the Escalade right into Sarhan and pin him against the concrete wall. It would have saved him a lot of time.
He listened as Nicholas updated him that the first vehicle had dropped its passengers at the Tom Bradley International Terminal and that two more were also just pulling in. It was time to crash Sarhan’s party.
Grabbing the latch, Harvath popped the Escalade’s hood and stepped out of the car. As he raised the hood, he looked around to see if anyone other than Sarhan was in the immediate area. Satisfied the coast was momentarily clear, he fiddled with the vehicle’s engine and cursed. The Egyptian glanced at him again and then went back to what he was doing. The fact that the Escalade had likely been there before Sarhan arrived ruled Harvath out as a threat to him. There was no way anyone could have known he would set up there.
Harvath stepped away from the truck and closed the distance with the Egyptian so rapidly that he didn’t realize what was happening until Harvath was almost on top of him.
Pulling his Taser out of his pocket, Harvath hit the trigger and watched as the expression on Sarhan’s face went from surprise to shock to agony—all in a matter of a few seconds. The man’s muscles seized and he fell forward.
Harvath worked quickly. After zip-tying Sarhan’s hands behind his back, he gathered up his belongings and dragged him back to the Escalade. The rear windows were tinted and that’s where Harvath had decided to conduct his interrogation.
Shoving the Egyptian inside, Harvath climbed in behind and told Nicholas to remote-start the vehicle.
He buckled Sarhan into his seat belt, zip-tied his ankles, and then took the seat next to him. When the vehicle started, Harvath reached for the rear seat audio controls and dialed in a local funk radio station. The Escalade was well insulated. In fact, it was built like a bank vault, but Harvath turned up the volume of “Too Hot to Stop” by the Bar-Kays just in case the Egyptian began to scream.
Sarhan didn’t, not at first. He also didn’t demand to know who Harvath was and what he was doing to him. The first thing he did was spit in Harvath’s face. That was all Harvath needed. Sarhan was guilty.
Harvath brought his elbow around and smashed the Egyptian’s nose. A gush of blood sprayed and Sarhan cried out. Harvath turned up the volume on the radio.
“We know everything, Tariq. All of it. I’m only going to give you one chance. How do we recall your men?”
“You can’t,” the man said with a smile.
Harvath gave him another burst from the Taser.
The Egyptian howled this time as the electricity coursed through his body.
“Tell me, Tariq. The pain only gets worse from here.”
“Fuck you,” he hissed.
Harvath raised the Taser to give him another jolt. The man’s body stiffened in anticipation. Harvath, though, had a better idea. Reaching back down, he depressed the rear cigarette lighter. He saw a flash of fear cut across Sarhan’s face. But as quickly as it had appeared, it was gone.
“The fourth vehicle has entered the airport,” Nicholas said. “Vehicles two and three have dropped off their passengers at Terminals Two and Four.”
“Roger that,” replied Harvath.
“I’m not afraid to die,” said Sarhan.
Harvath smiled. “I wish I was allowed to kill you. Unfortunately, I can’t.”
“You can’t do anything.”
“I wouldn’t go that far,” he said as the cigarette lighter popped.
“I have rights,” the Egyptian stated arrogantly.
“And if I was a policeman I might care. But today isn’t your lucky day. You see, I’m not a policeman. Technically, I don’t even exist. I promise, though, you’re never going to forget who I am.” Snatching out the glowing cigarette lighter, Harvath brought it close enough to Sarhan’s face to feel the heat radiating off it. “How do we recall your men?”
The Egyptian tried to spit at him again, but Harvath moved out of the way. The projectile of blood and saliva hit the window behind him and rolled down. Harvath was done playing games. Grabbing the man’s face in a vise grip, he drove the lighter right into the man’s upper lip.
Sarhan screamed bloody murder, but Harvath didn’t let go until the smoke stopped rising from the man’s seared lip. The smell of burnt flesh filled the SUV.
Dropping the lighter to the floor, he reached under his coat and drew his pistol. He then pulled the suppressor from his coat pocket and began spinning it onto the threaded barrel.
He didn’t even give Sarhan a moment to think. Placing the weapon against his knee, he pulled the trigger.
There was a crack as the weapon discharged, and Sarhan set off into a fresh chorus of screams and curses. Harvath brought his elbow up again and slammed it into the man’s jaw, causing the Egyptian to bite down on his own tongue.
Reed Carlton’s voice suddenly came over Harvath’s earbud. “All of the teams are now inside the terminals. What’s our play?”
Harvath snatched up Sarhan’s cell phone. It had been set to silent and he had received four text messages, each one saying the same thing: We are in line.
“Shit,” he said aloud as he raised his pistol and placed it right against Sarhan’s temple. “I’ve changed my mind. Tell me how to recall your men, or I am going to kill you.”
The Egyptian looked at him and smiled before muttering a final, defiant “Fuck you.”
Harvath pulled the weapon back and then brought it crashing down into the side of his head. “Fuck you, too.”
“What do we tell DHS?”
Harvath was out of time. They couldn’t risk it any further. “Tell them to take them all down.”
“Roger that,” replied Carlton.
The Old Man’s voice was then replaced by Nicholas’s. “The Lincoln Town Car just pulled in one floor below you. Our man in the TOC says all of the vehicles are overloaded. He’s positive now that they’re VBIEDs.”
CHAPTER 54
Christie Jacobson wasn’t a big fan of flying. It wasn’t that she was afraid to fly, she just hated all of the hassles.
Her mother had worked as a TWA stewardess back in the glamour days of airline travel in the 1960s. She could still remember how elegant it was. You always got dressed up to fly. You even got dressed up just to go out to the airport to pick people up.
When she was a little girl, all of the stewardesses had looked to her like princesses or fashion models. They wore tiny hats, white gloves, and perfectly tailored uniforms. They even took your picture with a Polaroid camera and gave it to you as a souvenir. That’s how special airline travel was. Things certainly had changed.
Now, airline travel was like bus travel. No one dressed up, the service was lousy, and the entire air of elegance was gone.
Before Christie had changed positions within her company, the experience used to be a bit better. Up until last year, she’d been a very frequent flyer, which meant she was normally upgraded to first class and could check in at the premier counter. She didn’t have to stand in an insufferably long line like the one she was in now.
Glancing at her watch, she wondered if she was going to make her flight. There had to be at least sixty people in line in front of her, and only a handful of agents. Despite the automated check-in kiosks, everyone seemed to be having problems and needing help.
Christie looked behind her and saw that the line stretched past the retracta-belts and stanchions and into the terminal. There had to be several hundred travelers. She didn’t even want to think about what the security line was going to be like. That was the one thing she hated the most about flying. As a breast cancer survivor, she’d had more than enough radiation to last for two lifetimes. She despised the full-body scanners the TSA had introduced and how when she politely opted out of a scan, she had to be subjected to a full-body pat-down. If the scanners wouldn’t have stopped eithe
r the shoe bomber or the underwear bomber, she didn’t really see the point.
She liked to joke that the friendly skies would be a lot more friendly if everyone was required to fly naked. It was a cute joke; at least she thought so. During pat-downs, though, she’d been warned that joking wasn’t such a good idea.
She didn’t blame the TSA agents for the security measures. They didn’t make policy. They were there to carry it out, and Christie made it a point to thank them every time for working so hard to keep all travelers safe. Like it or not, life had changed because of 9/11.
Considering what had just happened in all those movie theaters across the country, she figured life was about to change again. Would there be pat-downs and screenings at the local multiplex now? Probably. Something would have to be done to demonstrate that America was serious about never letting such an attack happen again.
Christie had stayed up most of the night watching the news coverage in her hotel room. It was incredibly tragic, but she couldn’t turn it off. The entire nation was grieving. She’d felt very alone in her hotel as she watched and had called her husband. They’d turned to the same cable channel and had watched the coverage together, though they were thousands of miles apart. She was glad to be going home the next day.
She wanted to hug her husband and her children. She wanted to hold on to them for a long, long time. They were big moviegoers. They loved seeing films the weekend they came out, and as far as they were concerned, there was nothing like the experience of the big screen.
Their theater could have easily been targeted by the terrorists. That seemed to be the message of the attacks. No one was safe. Theaters in big towns and small towns alike had been struck.
And before the news had even confirmed it, she knew who had been behind the attacks. She knew it was al Qaeda. They had promised to return and they had. First it was the train stations in Chicago and now movie theaters. What was next? she wondered.
Was she even safe in the airport? She’d noticed the two Middle Eastern businessmen standing several people in front of her. Could they be terrorists? She supposed they could, but it just seemed so far-fetched. What were the odds she’d get into a line with two terrorists?