by David Rich
“We’re planning on finding out about you and Bannion.”
“How do you contact Diyar?”
Cold water drenched me. Don’t shiver. Where was Dan? I needed him to tell me not to shiver. No, Dan did not give orders or advice. I needed an old story about the time he refused to shiver, no, refused to sweat, no, ignored the charges against him and eventually they disappeared, like this cold. But Dan was busy elsewhere. Tempting the devil. Reliably unreliable whenever you need him to be.
“Diyar is your partner. I heard you say this.”
“Bannion is your partner.”
“Diyar is a terrorist. You are a terrorist.”
I felt the tickle in an armpit and almost gave in to the shivering. The earth exploded and my body split, every inch spread out, fire covered me. Fire filled my lungs and gut. Freezing fire. The fire went out, but I still burned. More cold water and I was sure my skin was smoking and fizzing like a dying campfire.
“Did I ever tell you about my father?”
Fariz laughed. “Tell me about Diyar.”
“He’s dead. He’s having dinner with Diyar.”
The tickle again. The blast. My lungs came up my throat. My balls burst. I was in two dimensions, just a flat flash of lightning. More water. More sizzling. A door creaked open. A conference. A shadow moved in front of the light, and I shivered at last.
“Get out of the light,” I said. I sounded like an old man trying to read the small print. The figure moved, but the chill stayed. The hood came off. My arms went slack and I fell to the concrete floor. I kept my face to the light, though it blinded me. Someone put me in a chair. Feet shuffled. The door opened and closed.
Gill threw a towel. I was reluctant to rub hard, certain the flesh would peel off. As soon as I was done, I threw the towel at Gill and dove into him. I hit the concrete right after I hit him. There was no difference between the two. He lifted me back into the chair and threw a blanket over me. I took a look around the room. The floor was concrete and so were the walls. Above me was the hook I had been hanging from. Two fans were installed just below the ceiling on either side of the very heavy steel door. They swiveled enough to cover the room. There were no windows. Gill sat in a chair opposite me.
“Tell me where Diyar is and I can get you out of here.”
I understood then why Major Hensel could not find him. My bait caught the wrong fish. “You must be at the bottom of the CIA ladder to get a job guarding the King. Probably typecast you because of all the muscle.”
He did not answer. He did not move. “Tell me how you contact Diyar and you can leave here. We’ll send you home. Anywhere you want. We need Diyar.”
We had been set on parallel paths: assigned to the King. Maybe he knew Bannion beforehand from his Special Forces stint in Kirkuk. Maybe there had been Maya infatuation, too. He repeated his demand for Diyar.
“It was you tipping off Bannion from the start. The SUV that first night wasn’t following Maya. It was following me. Darrell White was your contact. He alerted you that an oilman with PKK contacts was in town. You’re the one who took his call and told Bannion I was coming.”
“I told you I did a lot for them.”
“Why kill Arun?”
“He attacked me.”
I laughed at the picture of that pouchy little old guy attacking Gill. His insecurity was grotesque, festering behind the stolid wall of silence. “What could you be getting from Bannion?” But that was a wasted question, I knew. Bannion had the chests full of fake emeralds and rubies waiting to be loaded onto anyone’s ship.
“Where is Diyar?”
“What does ‘DS’ stand for in DS Security?”
“Who cares? Where is Diyar?”
“What does the CIA get out of this? Why kill the Prime Minister?”
“Diyar. How do you contact Diyar?”
“I would have to know why.”
“Are you always bargaining?”
My turn to use the silent stare. I could have told him who I was and asked him to contact Major Hensel, but I told myself that wouldn’t work, that he would find out my identity but keep my whereabouts hidden. The truth was that I didn’t want him releasing me and pretending we were on the same side. I was never going to be on the same side as Gill. I did not want any orders to the contrary.
He stood and took the blanket from me.
Before he got to the door, I said, “Hey, Gill. You better kill me. You better kill me here. Because if I get out of here, you’re dead.”
Gill shrugged.
Two men in heavy coats entered; one held a bucket. The other one was Eddie, my pal from New Jersey, even more sheepish now. He met my eyes, asking me not to acknowledge him. I didn’t see why I should. His partner poured ice water over me and any big ideas I had. They didn’t stay to watch the show. Maybe they had other buckets to empty.
Don’t shiver. I could have sat in full lotus and lost myself, but those fans were the enemy, the source of all my problems, and they had to be dealt with before any meditating took place. Standing on the chair and yanking at the fan did nothing. Lifting the chair and smashing the fan worked. The cover flew off. Sparks flew when I smashed the spinning blade. It bent and stopped. The chair was wrecked, too. I stomped on it to separate the two parts. Holding on to the two back legs, I moved over to work on the second fan. The door creaked and opened. I swung the chairback right into Gill. That hurt him. He yelled, but he kept coming. Another man came in behind him.
I measured them for another swing. Gill just stood in the middle of the room, next to his chair, waiting for me to make a move. The second man tried to slip around behind me. Gill yelled at him, “Get out of here.” The man hesitated. Gill repeated it in Arabic. The man left. Gill slammed the heavy door with a flick of his wrist.
I circled left, holding the chair fragment by the legs, and jabbing at Gill. He did not reach or lunge. I moved toward the other broken section and stumbled over it on purpose. Gill stepped in to take advantage. I hopped to the right and swung the chair. The edge hit him in the neck. I swung again. He ducked and his fist hammered into the back of my left shoulder. The force drove me into the wall. I swung the chair again. He leaned back to avoid it, but I let go and it clipped him above the ear. I punched him in the middle of his face and felt his nose crunch. He deflected my next punch with his forearm and hit me in the gut and then the jaw. My head slammed against the wall. I stayed there wanting him to try again. If I could make him miss, he would break his hand on the concrete. But he hit me in the gut again and moved in close and grabbed me. I kneed him in the groin, but Gill kept his hold. He was stronger than any man I had ever fought and he was well trained, too. I was finished. He slammed my head against the wall again.
______
Gunshots woke me.
The shivering started. The chair remnants were gone. I was slumped against the wall. Blood marked the spot above me. Very little of it came off the back of my head onto my finger. I figured it was frozen. The shots were coming from some distant part of the building. I hopped around for about two minutes, but the insides of my head were bumping against the skull. Just as I was about to sit again, the door creaked open. Masked men carrying rifles rushed in.
On the way out, I saw Fariz slumped in a hallway with a bullet hole in his forehead. I did not see Gill. Or Eddie.
25
They clothed me and fed me and gave me aspirin. Giddy from the successful raid, they laughed while watching the TV, which repeatedly played the cameraman’s video of the King toppling over. That was followed by a news update featuring a photo of me. The announcer said I was wanted by the Asayish and might be working with the PKK. They turned off the TV and opened a computer and read the stories about me and my investment with the PKK. They got serious.
“Why did you claim to have given money to the PKK?”
“Aren’t you the PKK?”
But
they had no time for answers; they had questions. “Why did you search for Diyar? Are you an agent of the U.S. government? Do you want more soup? What kind of torture did they use? Do you have any money for us?” And more. I sat in a plush, comfy chair. Four sat in front of me and one behind. We were in the living room of a modest house. I told them I claimed to be in business with the PKK to gain leverage against the big oil companies who were making deals with Baghdad and the regional oil companies. I was trying to get attention.
“You got lots of attention.”
“Are you an agent of the American government?”
My silence made the questioner launch into a long anti-American tirade about illegal occupation and ending that occupation prematurely. “Your plot failed. The Prime Minister has not been assassinated. The shooter missed his mark.”
He sat back with satisfaction. The others did not seem to share his certainty that the U.S. was behind this.
“Have they caught the shooter?” I asked. They didn’t answer. “Is the man they caught one of yours?”
Two of them answered at once, “He did not do it.”
“Has he been missing for some days? A week or more?”
Their faces gave the answer.
Bannion’s brilliance dazzled me. Magna cum laude from Dan U. He had fed the hounds a taste, then unleashed them. The King was out of the way. The PKK would be taking the official blame for the failed assassination. I still could not figure his goal. But every move made sense. Every move threw someone else off and solidified his own position. I wanted to get hold of him.
The man behind me said, “What is your relationship with John Bannion?”
I watched the faces of the others. The guy behind was the boss. His question almost made me laugh. I was Bannion’s fool, his protégé, maybe his executioner.
“You can have the money if it’s there,” I said. “I want Bannion.”
He asked, “Have you been inside the compound?” He was a thin, handsome man, about thirty-five, with messy, curly hair and light brown, very steady eyes.
They gave me a piece of paper and I drew the layout for them the best I could.
We piled into two trucks and stopped at another house that served as an armory. They loaded up with pistols and rifles. The leader handed me a SIG Sauer that might have been mine. They had grenades and a rocket launcher. I kept waiting for the pat on the back before the knife, but there was no fake friendliness and no shunning. The mood resembled preparation for a combat mission under a good commander: efficient, with minimal emotion or speculation. It did not surprise me that I felt so comfortable with them. The leader pulled me aside before we got back in the trucks.
“You can call me Rajan,” he said.
“Robert.”
He showed his skepticism. Maybe he was mimicking mine.
“You get Bannion. We get whatever is there.”
“I don’t guarantee any money.”
“I said whatever is there.”
“Why are you bringing me along for this?”
“If it goes wrong, I will negotiate to give you up to help the rest of us escape.” He smiled, but I don’t think he was joking. Maybe he was Diyar. Maybe he was nobody. There was no reason to ask.
______
The rocket blew out the front gate. No one returned fire and we moved into the courtyard, taking out as many surveillance cameras as we could find with rifle fire. Grenades for the office door and tear gas inside and up the staircase. Grenades into the building on the left. The rest of us went toward the residence at the rear. The door was unlocked. Rajan ordered one of his men to lead the way inside. He took three steps before the fire hit him. We backed out and tossed two grenades. I went in. I almost tripped over one goon groaning in the foyer from the shock of the blast. I smashed his head with the butt of my gun and moved forward. Rajan ordered one man to guard the entrance. Two of the PKK were taking fire as they worked their way upstairs. Two more worked cautiously down the hallway to the left.
Rajan joined me in the living room. I told him to expect at least eight goons. It was possible the house would be stocked with other DS Security men but they would have to be stacked on top of each other. The place was not huge.
A shot came from behind us. We hit the floor and turned. The goon I had hit was on his knees, firing unsteadily. Rajan shot him in the belly. We moved to both sides of the door to the dining room. I picked up a lamp from a side table and tossed it. No reaction. I thought I saw the flicker of a shadow. Rajan was about to go inside, but I signaled to wait. I stepped back from the wall and fired three shots through it. Rajan did the same on his side. Two goons fell. We stepped into the dining room, and Rajan put a bullet in each of their heads. Three down. There were at least two goons upstairs. That left three.
One of the PKK men joined us. The kitchen had two doors. Rajan and his man prepared to go in through the first one. I slipped past the first door and waited next to the second one. Rajan went in first, his man following close by. I stepped in. The goon was crouched behind the center island. I put my gun to the back of his head and ordered him to put down the weapon. He complied. I lifted him.
“Where’s Bannion?”
“I don’t know.”
I hit him across the jaw with the gun. He crashed back into the stove. I shot him in the knee. “Where is he?”
“I don’t know, man. We weren’t expecting the attack.”
We left him with the PKK man, and Rajan and I went to the study. The door was locked. Rajan shot out the keypad, but that did not work. He shot the lock. That did not work. The firing upstairs had stopped. I asked Rajan if he had a grenade. He shook his head and said, “Not for this room.”
A goon came into the other end of the hallway. I shot at him and he dived back. I doubted I killed him. We were trapped there. I signaled to Rajan that we would have to retreat up the hallway. We hugged the near wall and crept forward. After three steps the goon showed himself at the end of the hallway again. I shot. He ducked back. We did not hear the click of the door behind us.
A goon, the one named Neil Bess, knife in his right hand, leapt out at Rajan. Rajan managed to duck under the knife and turn toward Bess. But Bess hugged him and was pushing the knife at Rajan’s throat. My head swiveled back and forth like a puppet looking for a laugh. I did not have a good shot at Bess and I did not want to turn my back on the guy at the end of the hallway.
Bess was going to slit Rajan’s throat. I moved to them and slid my arm under Bess’s. I put my hip into him and levered him off Rajan. Rajan fell. I had control of Bess. I spun him around so his back was to the end of the hallway. His friend down there shot him in the back.
A PKK man came from behind and shot that goon.
Rajan took a long look at me. I wasn’t sure what it meant. “You are a very confident man,” he said. He kicked Bess aside and we entered the study.
The safe was open. Two body bags were inside. They were unzipped and newspapers spilled from them. I stood there like a drunk at the racetrack staring at discarded tickets, knowing it was useless to inquire. I dragged them out anyway and dumped them onto the floor. Five copies of the same paper from 2005 spread out. On the front page, a photo showed candidates for the Iraqi Parliament sitting unhappily at a long table. Bannion had stuffed the bags long ago. Not a single dollar bill fell out.
The safe did not interest Rajan. He went across the room to the closet. That door was locked, but he was not going to shoot out the lock. Two of his men came in. They reported that the premises were clear. Five dead and the man wounded in the knee. They looked at Bess. Six dead. I asked if Bannion was among the dead. Rajan had to describe Bannion to the men. They shook their heads. He asked them if they found “it.” They shook their heads. Another PKK man came in and said they had secured the offices. Rajan asked him about “it.” He shook his head.
Rajan asked one man to open the
closet door. The man carefully examined the lock. Satisfied, he took the butt of his pistol and knocked the doorknob off. He turned the lock with his fingers and opened the closet. “Everything is ours,” Rajan said and held his gaze on me until I nodded.
The computer server was inside. This was their goal, more valuable than money. It held the security details for hundreds of locations in the north of Iraq: electronic and human assets. Rajan took a long look at me to make sure I was not going to try to stop him taking the server. I had no orders to get involved in that and no intention of taking that initiative. I shook my head to let him know I was not interested.
Disgust soaked me. No Bannion, no Victor, no money. And no good next move. The men were rolling the server out of the closet. The wheels got stuck on the doorknob on the floor. One guy picked up the doorknob and tossed it into the safe against the back wall.
It made the wrong sound.
Everyone turned. I ducked and stepped into the safe and picked up the doorknob. I hurled it against the rear panel. The wrong sound: lively and thin when it should have been dead and solid. “Don’t lock me in,” I said. I pushed the back panel. It swung open.
Rajan ordered the others to take care of the server. He followed me down the stairs into a tunnel. The glare from the one lightbulb hanging midway through the tunnel obscured the other end. The walls were plasterboard. The floor was dirt. We moved slowly, weapons ready. I pressed lightly on the boards as we progressed. There were no side passages or cutouts. We reached a staircase and went up.
I pushed open the door at the top.
The room was bare, no windows and a tiled floor. An overhead light fixture was turned on. On the left, a door was partially open. I stood next to it. The room was dark. I caught a glimpse of a window and a chair. I pushed open the door, and before I walked in, a shot came through the window. A heavy load hit the floor.
“Close that door.” It was Bannion. I closed the door and rushed over to kick the gun from Bannion’s grip. He noticed Rajan behind me.
“I see you brought help, Mr. Hewitt. Good for you.”