by Tom Clancy
Rahmani took another deep breath, set down his teacup, then folded his arms across his chest, his black shirt and scarves pulling tighter across his neck. He studied them for a moment more, sending an icy pang into Samad’s gut, then cleared his throat and finally spoke again: “The Army has grown too unstable for us now. That much is clear. Khodai could have caused even more damage, and while I am grateful for the work your men did back in Islamabad, there are now many loose ends—particularly the agent our sniper spoke about at the hotel. We’re still looking for him. And now our new relationship with the Juárez Cartel in Mexico has been threatened because we were forced to kill their man. All of this means we must move more quickly.”
“I understand,” Samad said. “The CIA has recruited many operatives in the area. They pay well. It is hard for young men to resist. I have two men tracking one right now, a boy named Israr Rana. We believe he’s responsible for helping to expose the link.”
Rahmani nodded. “Some of us argue that patience will triumph. The Americans cannot and will not remain here forever, and when they leave, we will continue to train here, and we will bring Allah’s will to the people of Pakistan and Afghanistan. But I do not agree with sitting down and waiting for the storm to pass. The problem must be dealt with at its source. I’ve been working for the past five years on a project that will soon come to fruition. The infrastructure is in place. All I need now are the warriors to execute this plan.”
“We would be honored.”
“Samad, you will lead them. You will bring the jihad back to the United States—and you must use the contacts you’ve made with the Mexicans to do that. Do you understand?”
Although he nodded, Samad grew tense because he knew asking any favors of the Mexicans might both insult and incense them. Yet if he could somehow garner their support, his mission stood a far greater chance of success.
But how?
He would have to resort to hudaibiya—lying—as the Qur’an exhorted him to do when dealing with infidels.
“I must caution you and all of your men, Samad,” Rahmani went on. “Nearly one hundred of our fighters have already dedicated their lives to this plan. Some of them have already given their lives. There is much at stake here, and the consequences for failure are great, very great indeed.”
Samad could already feel the blade on his neck. “We all understand.”
Rahmani’s voice lifted as he quoted from the Qur’an: “Whoso fighteth in the way of Allah, be he slain or be he victorious, on him we shall bestow a vast reward.”
“Paradise awaits us,” Samad added with a vigorous nod. “And yet if we die and are martyred, only to be resurrected and martyred again, we will do it. This is why we love death.”
Rahmani narrowed his eyes even more. “This is why …Now, then, let’s eat, and I will discuss all of the details. The complexity and audacity of this mission will impress you, I’m sure. Within a few days, you will be on the road. And when the time comes, you will bring a message from Allah, the likes of which the Americans have never seen.”
“We won’t fail you,” said Samad.
Rahmani nodded slowly. “Do not fail Allah.”
Samad lowered his head. “We are his servants.”
Gandhara International Airport
Islamabad, Pakistan
Moore was en route to San Diego to meet with his new joint task force, and he was dreading the more than seventeen hours of travel time it would take to get there. As he sat at the gate, waiting for the first flight of his journey, he kept a wary eye on the travelers around him, mostly businesspeople, international journalists (he assumed), and a few families with small children, one of them decidedly British. Occasionally, he consulted his tablet computer, where all of his data was secured behind a double-encrypted password. Any attempt to access his computer without his thumbprint would summarily wipe the hard drive. He’d just pulled up some of the Agency’s most recent declassified reports on cartel activity along the border (he’d read the classified ones in a more private location). He was most interested in finding intel on Middle Eastern or Arabic links to that activity, but for the most part, the cases he reviewed were limited to warfare between rival cartels, most notably the Sinaloa and the Juárez cartels.
Mass graves had been turning up more frequently—some containing dozens of bodies. Beheadings and bodies hung from bridges were pointing to a rise in gruesome attacks by gangs of sicarios led by former Mexican Airborne Special Forces troopers. Government officials argued that the cartel wars illustrated the success of government policies, which were causing the drug traffickers to turn against one another. However, Moore had already concluded that the cartels had become so powerful that, in effect, they literally controlled some parts of the country and the violence was simply evidence of their gang law. Moore read one report written by a journalist who’d spent more than a year documenting cartel activity. In some of the more rural towns in the southeast portions of the country, the cartel was the only group the citizens could rely on to provide them with jobs and protection. This journalist published a half-dozen articles before he was shot seventeen times while waiting outside a shopping mall for his mother. Obviously the cartels did not like what he had to say.
Another report made a comparison between small towns in Mexico and those in Afghanistan. Moore had seen the Taliban engage in the same tactics and behavior as the cartels did. Both the Taliban and the drug cartels became much more trusted than the government and certainly more trusted than the foreign invaders. Both the Taliban and the cartels understood the power that drug trafficking brought them, and they used that power to enlist the aid of innocent civilians who were simply not supported or were even ignored by their government. For Moore, it was difficult to remain apolitical when you saw firsthand a government that was more corrupt than its enemies you were tasked with killing.
Still, the human atrocities committed by both groups helped Moore keep it all in perspective.
He flipped quickly through some of the crime-scene photos of Mexican Federal Police lying in blood pools, some brutally gunned down, others with their throats slit. He paused to stare at two dozen immigrants who’d had their heads chopped off, their headless bodies piled up inside an old shed, the heads now missing and nowhere to be found. One sicario was crucified outside his house, the cross set on fire so that his father and other family members could watch him burn.
The cartels’ brutality knew no bounds, and Moore had a sneaking suspicion that his bosses had bigger plans for him than they’d originally suggested. Everyone’s worst nightmare was for this violence to find its way across the border. It was only a matter of time.
He checked his phone and stared at the three e-mails from Leslie Hollander. The first was a request to let her know when he’d be back in Kabul. The second was a question about whether or not he’d received her e-mail.
The third was a question about why he was ignoring her, and said that if he replied she’d set up another session in which she would, as she carefully put it, fuck him until he was walking bowlegged like a cowboy.
Leslie worked in the press office of the public-affairs department of the U.S. Embassy, first assigned to the embassy in Islamabad and then to the one in Kabul. She was twenty-seven years old, very lean, with dark hair and glasses. At first glance, Moore had dismissed her as an uptight geek whose virginity would remain intact until some pale-faced overweight accountant (the male version of her) came along and wrested it from her after a two-hour argument in which the process of sex was analyzed and discussed, the position agreed on, the act both clinical and upsetting to both.
But, dear God, once the glasses and the blouse came off, Ms. Hollander revealed the remarkable contradiction between her appearance and what really lurked in her heart. Moore was overwhelmed by their sexual escapades when he could escape to the city for a weekend and stay with her; however, he already knew the ending of this movie, and the screenwriter had run out of ideas: Guy tells girl job is too important and h
e must break off their relationship. Guy has to leave town for work, doesn’t know when he’ll return. This will never work out.
Interestingly enough, he’d explained all of that to her during their first dinner together, that he needed her as a source of information and that if anything came out of that, then they could explore the possibilities, but his career at the moment prevented any long-term or serious relationship.
“Okay,” she’d said.
Moore had nearly choked on his beer.
“Do you think I’m a slut?”
“No.”
“Well, I am.”
He’d smirked. “No, you just know how to manipulate men.”
“How am I doing?”
“Very well, but you don’t have to work so hard.”
“Hey, man, look where we are. Not one of the top ten places to have fun, right? Not the happiest place on earth. So it’s up to us. We bring the fun.”
It was that positive attitude on life coupled with her sense of humor that made her seem much more mature and utterly attractive to Moore. But the credits were rolling. The popcorn bag was empty. The lights were coming on, and their good thing was over. Should he just tell her that in an e-mail, the way he had at least two women before her? He wasn’t sure. He felt like he owed her more than that. Some of them were quick flings. And a brief note had been enough. He always took the blame. Always said it wasn’t fair to them. He’d go a year without a relationship, even resort to paying for sex because the efficiency and convenience were exactly what a man like him needed. And then, once in a while, a Leslie would come along and make him second-guess everything.
He dialed her at work and held his breath as the phone rang.
“Hey, stud,” she said. “No satellite service? You see, I’m trying to let you off here. Feed you an excuse …”
“I got your e-mails. Sorry I didn’t get back.”
“Where are you?”
“I’m in the airport, getting ready to get on a plane.”
“To where? The place you can’t tell me?”
“Leslie, they’re pulling me out of here. I really don’t know when I’ll be back.”
“Not funny.”
“I’m not kidding.”
Silence.
“Are you there?”
“Yeah,” she said. “So, uh, was this sudden? Did you know about it? We could’ve gotten together. You didn’t let me say good-bye.”
“You know I’ve been out of town. There wouldn’t have been any time. I’m sorry.”
“Well, this sucks.”
“I know.”
“Maybe I’ll just quit my job and follow you around.”
He almost smiled. “You’re not a stalker.”
“Really? I guess you’re right. So what am I supposed to do now?”
“We’ll stay in touch.”
A moment of awkward silence, just the hum from the connection. Moore’s shoulders drew together …and then it was more difficult to breathe.
He closed his eyes and heard her cry in his head: “Don’t leave me! Don’t leave me!”
“I think I was starting to fall in love with you,” she blurted out, her voice cracking.
“No, you weren’t. Look, we were just in it for the fun. You wanted it that way. And I told you this day would come. But you’re right. It sucks. Big-time.” He softened his tone. “I want to stay in touch. But it’s up to you. If it hurts too much, then okay, I respect that. You can do better than me, anyway. Get somebody younger, with fewer obligations.”
“Yeah, whatever. We played with fire and we got burned. But it felt so good along the way.”
“You know, I’m not sure I can do this again.”
“What do you mean?”
“Say good-bye, I guess.”
“No more relationships for you?”
“I don’t know.”
“Hey, remember how you told me I was helping you with the nightmares? When I told you the stories of when I was in college while you were trying to fall asleep?”
“Yeah.”
“Don’t forget that, okay?”
“Of course I won’t.”
“I hope you can sleep,” she said.
“I hope so, too.”
“I wish you would’ve told me what’s bothering you. Maybe I could’ve helped even more.”
“That’s okay. I’m feeling much better now. Thanks for that.”
“Thanks for the sex.”
He chuckled under his breath. “You make it sound so dirty.”
She breathed heavily into the phone and said, “It was.”
“You’re a crazy bitch.”
“You, too.”
He hesitated. “I’ll talk to you soon. Take care.” He closed his eyes and broke the connection. I’ll talk to you soon. He wouldn’t. She knew that.
Moore gritted his teeth. He should walk away from this gate and go back to her and haul her out of that job and quit his, and they could start a life together.
And in six months he’d be bored out of his mind.
And in eight months they’d be divorced and he’d be blaming her and hating himself all over again.
The boarding announcement came. Moore stood with the other passengers and started halfheartedly toward the agent accepting their tickets.
JORGE’S SHADOW
Casa de Rojas
Punta de Mita, Mexico
THE MORNING after the fund-raiser, Miguel took Sonia to the library before breakfast. He hadn’t intended to show her the room until after they’d eaten, but en route to the main kitchen they had passed by and she’d caught sight of several framed photographs on the wall and had asked if they could spend a few moments inside.
The stone fireplace with great arch and black-ash burl mantel, along with the floor-to-ceiling bookcases constructed of more exotic hardwoods, took her breath away. Rolling ladders and tracks stood on each side of the room, and Sonia mounted one to take in all one thousand square feet.
“Your father likes to read!” she cried, her gaze playing over the thousands of hardcover texts. No paperbacks. His father had insisted that all books in the library be hardcovers, many of them leather-bound.
“Knowledge is power, right?” he replied with a grin.
A small wet bar stood near the entrance, from where Jorge often served cognac produced by houses like Courvoisier, Delamain, Hardy, and Hennessy. Leather sofas and tiger-skin rugs imported from India formed an L-shaped seating area in the middle, with smaller islands of heavy leather recliners positioned around them. On several broad coffee tables sat magnifying glasses for reading and stacks of old Forbes magazines, dog-eared by his father. Beside them, the coasters stacked in their holders were inlaid with eighteen-karat gold.
Sonia climbed down from the ladder and returned to one of the photographs that had caught her eye.
“What was her name?”
“Sofía.”
“She’s beautiful.”
“She was,” he said with a slight tremor, imagining what her funeral was like, the one he’d not been allowed to attend because it would have been “too traumatic for him.” He wished his father was aware of the guilt he suffered because he was on an airplane while others were paying their last respects to his mother. He’d cried all the way to Switzerland.
The photograph of his mother had been taken on the beach in Punta de Mita, and, with an expanse of turquoise water sweeping out behind her, Miguel’s mother stood there in her black bikini, smiling broadly for the camera, looking like a glamorous movie star from another era.
“My father loved this picture.”
“And what about this one,” Sonia said, drifting over to a smaller photograph of father, mother, and baby wrapped in linen and silk. They stood before a sea of candles and stained glass and icons adorning the walls.
“That’s my baptism. And the one over there is my first Holy Communion. Then my confirmation later on.”
Sonia stared deeply at the pictures of his mother. “She lo
oks like …I don’t know …She just looks strong.”
“No one could tell my father what to do. No one but her. She was the boss. I don’t think I told you this, but one time we were in Cozumel on vacation, and she was snorkeling. We were looking at this sunken airplane, and she thought something bit her, and then we lost her and she almost drowned. We think she might’ve hit her head on some coral. My father went in after her, and he pulled her out and gave her mouth-to-mouth and she came around and spit up water, just like you see on TV.”
“Wow, that’s amazing. He saved her life.”
“When she told him that, he just said, ‘No, you saved mine.’”
“Your father is a romantic.”
“That’s true. He told me that night that if she had died, he didn’t know what we’d do. He told me he’d be lost. A few months later they found the cancer. It was like the trip was a premonition or something, like God was trying to prepare us for what would happen. But it didn’t work.”
“That’s just …I don’t know what to say …”
He smiled weakly. “Let’s go eat.”
They did, and their omelets with salsa, jack cheese, cumin, and garlic powder were prepared by his father’s private chef, Juan Carlos (aka J.C.), who’d said that Jorge had gone off to the beach for a run and a swim. Alexsi was at the pool, already into her third mimosa, according to J.C.
When they were finished eating, Miguel showed Sonia their workout facility, which she remarked was better equipped than most five-star hotels. He said his father was very dedicated to fitness and did two hours per day, five days per week, with a personal trainer.
“Only soccer for you?” she asked.
“Yeah. Those metal weights are heavy.”
She grinned, and they ventured on to the media room, with giant projection TV and seating for twenty-five.
“More like a movie theater,” she remarked.