"Oh, please," Ahmed said with dismay. "A honey trap? You cannot believe for one moment that that's going to work."
The corner of Bob's mouth quirked up. Patrick said nothing. He'd chosen his people, the best at what they did. Now all he could do was step back and let them go to work. Still, he was taut and tense as a violin string, vibrating at the lightest touch, the balls of his feet digging into the floor. Come on, he said silently, come on.
Inside the interrogation room, in the middle of mopping up Sadiq, Mary pretended to hear something in the hallway. "Oh, no! I have to go!" She bent down to look earnestly into Sadiq's eyes. "I'm so sorry about all this, Mr. Sadiq. They're so mean to you men, and it seems to go on forever. I'll get back when I can, I promise." She gave his shoulder another consoling pat and tiptoed out.
"My cue," Bob said, and left the room.
Barely had the door to the interrogation room closed behind Mary when Bob kicked it open again, his head pushed forward aggressively, his eyes full of contempt. He walked over to Sadiq and without preamble balled one hand into a fist and hit Sadiq in the face, hard enough to knock his chair over. The chair with Sadiq still handcuffed to it slid across the floor until Sadiq's head hit the wall with a thump clearly audible to the two men on the other side of the glass.
Bob walked across the room and kicked him in the ribs. He looked down at Sadiq and smiled.
Sadiq groaned and coughed up blood and phlegm. There might also have been a tooth, but from behind the mirror Patrick couldn't tell for sure.
"Plenty more where that came from, friend," Bob said to Sadiq. "Where's Isa?"
Sadiq groaned again and tried to curl into a fetal position.
Bob shrugged. "Okay by me. I can keep this up all night." It was ten a.m. but part of the disorientation process was to divorce the detainee from real time. "No one will stop me. You're here until I say you can go." He leaned down and said into Sadiq's ear, "And I can do anything I want to." He straightened and reached for his belt buckle.
Sadiq's eyes went wide and his body bowed, heaving and struggling so violently the chair scraped a foot across the floor, his wrists straining against the handcuffs.
Bob laughed. His hand went to his fly.
"Jesus," Ahmed said.
Talk, you little fucker, Patrick thought.
The door to the room opened and Mary, looking frightened but determined, poked her head inside. "Mr. Crenshaw?"
Bob snarled. "What the fuck do you want?"
Her voice trembling, Mary said faintly, "I'm sorry, but Mr. Casawba wants a word."
Bob stormed past her into the hallway, refastening his belt and shoving her into the wall with a loud thud as he passed. The door slammed shut behind him.
"Oh," she said in a hurt voice. She pulled away from the wall, hand to her injured shoulder, and crept across the room. "Oh, what did he do to you?"
"Please," Sadiq said, coughing again. "Please help me."
Mary looked on the verge of tears. "I don't know what I can do." She blinked rapidly and said with brave determination, "Let's get you back up." With much heaving and struggling, she managed to right Sadiq and his chair. More ineffectual dabbing with her shirttail at the blood on his mouth, pretty concern over the lost tooth, and all the while Sadiq was saying in desperation, "Please, I don't know anything, I don't know why I'm here, please help me, please, get me out of here!"
Mary did cry then, actual tears, Patrick could see them distinctly, sliding down her cheeks. She was one of those women who looked good in tears, too, her nose didn't run and her eyes didn't redden. She knelt at Sadiq's side, the end of the heavy tail of black hair almost touching the floor, and held one of his hands below the handcuff, patting it ineffectually. "I can't do anything," she said, swallowing a sob. "I'm just a clerk. Bob-" She shuddered and cast a hunted look over her shoulder. "He's the lead interrogator here. He can do anything." She looked back at Sadiq. "Anything," she repeated, her lower lip trembling.
Sadiq swallowed hard, his horrified gaze fixed on Mary's haunted face. Even to Patrick, this seemed the essence of melodrama, overkill in a major key, any self-respecting detainee would laugh Mary out of the room. Surely Sadiq would see this, would catch on to what they were doing, would reject their attempts with the contempt they deserved.
But Yaqub Sadiq was a novice terrorist, barely a year out of his middle-class cradle. Ahmed was right, Isa was operating outside al Qaeda and thus had no access to the culling process of the organization's usual thorough and ruthless recruiting practices. He'd been reduced to finding his own people, which, Patrick suddenly realized, must mean that he was in a hurry. Why?
He looked through the glass at the handcuffed man, hovered over by the waif with the ponytail. This was not the usual experienced, hard-shelled detainee. Yaqub Sadiq had been abducted and drugged and had woken up handcuffed to a chair in an anonymous room with no idea of where he was or what day it was. His captors had not identified themselves but Sadiq had to know they were American and Isa's sworn enemies. If not American, then they were at the very least American allies and at the very worst contract interrogators in friendly states with no constitutional guarantees of due process and no qualms about torture. They'd withheld food and water until his stomach was one big growl and his tongue was swollen in his mouth, and they'd refused him access to a toilet so that he was forced to sit in his own piss and shit.
From the intel gleaned in Germany Patrick had seen photos of Rashid Nurzai, a very fierce-looking gentleman who looked ready to compete in the shot put in the next Olympics. He was surprised that Nurzai had only made an anonymous call, if he had. From that photograph Patrick would have expected Nurzai to take more direct action in a matter involving his wife. Patrick would have run from that himself.
The intel still coming in from ongoing interrogations in Toronto confirmed that initial impression. Sadiq's new wife, in a tearful accounting of their life together, stressed his loving nature. So did all the other women with whom he'd had significant encounters over the past six months. His boss spoke highly of him at work, his neighbors praised his friendliness and willingness to pitch in on communal chores. A few of them were a little snide about the parade of women in and out of the apartment and it would have been only a matter of time before his wife got to hear of it, but on the whole a good report was given by most of the people who knew him. They were certainly to a man and a woman shocked to hear that he was a terrorist-in-waiting.
But not a career terrorist. He'd never been arrested before, never been interrogated before. An amateur, in fact, with the barest veneer of trade-craft and no detectable inclination toward fanaticism. Patrick frowned through the glass at Sadiq, now sobbing with his face buried in Mary's breast, a Mary who winked at them over Sadiq's head. Next to him, Bob chuckled. "This isn't going to take much longer."
Patrick was inclined to agree with him. Sadiq was an amateur, a terrorist of opportunity even, joining Isa as a way out of personal difficulties at home, with a natural inclination toward women curbed by a Muslim upbringing, and then sprung on an unsuspecting Western world. He was just settling into his new lifestyle when they had kidnapped him.
On the other hand, he had been apprehended at Pearson International, waiting to board a flight to Mexico City. No one among his Toronto acquaintances, including his wife, had been aware of his travel plans. This argued either dedication to duty or fear of Isa. Probably the latter.
"Come on," he said, out loud this time, "come on, you little bastard, give it up."
"Relax, Patrick-"
"Don't tell me to relax," he snapped. "That little fucker's the only lead we've got to a man who is responsible for the deaths of hundreds if not thousands of people all over the goddamn Asian continent! A terrorist who is now walking around the United States like it's his own backyard! How many Americans stirring half-and-half into their morning coffee or taking the bus to work or running their kids to school right now, right this minute somewhere in Dallas or Atlanta or San Francisco, h
ow many is this little prick's boss planning on killing? Don't tell me to relax, Ahmed. I'll relax when that monster is dead on the ground in front of me and not before."
Surprised, Ahmed maintained a prudent silence. Patrick Chisum, the king of calm, was not known for outbursts of any kind. For a moment there, he had sounded a little bit like Harold Kallendorf.
Meanwhile, Mary was mopping the tears from Sadiq's face, and holding her scrap of lacy handkerchief-where on earth had she come up with that?-so he could blow his nose. "I wish I could help you," she said, her breath catching. "But I can't, I just can't."
She pushed him back in his chair and looked up earnestly into his face. "He'll hurt me," she said, her voice breaking. She squeezed out another tear. Her head drooped. "He's done it before. He can do anything. Anything." Her voice broke again on the word.
She looked up at Sadiq and shook his shoulder. "Tell him what he wants to know," she said urgently. "Tell him!"
"I don't know anything!" Sadiq said, his voice panicked.
She sat back on her heels. "Then I don't know what to say to you," she said sadly. "Unless…"
"Unless what?" When she didn't say anything, Sadiq said, bending forward as far as the cuffs would let him, "Tell me! Unless what?"
"There may be another way." She bit her lip. "I probably shouldn't tell you this, but…"
"What? Tell me what? Please, please help me!"
Mary looked over her shoulder at the closed door. "Is it true you're from Germany?"
"Yes, yes, I'm a German national! I want to contact my embassy!"
Mary looked uncertain. "I think they already have."
Sadiq looked confused. "What?"
"It's why Bob is so angry," she said, eyes huge wells of sympathy. "He might have to let you go before…" She made a vague, all-encompassing gesture, and they shuddered in unison. "You'd be sent back to… is it Düsseldorf? There's a man there, a Rashid Somebody?"
Sadiq froze, like a deer in the headlights. "Rashid Nurzai?"
"Yes!" Mary said excitedly. "That's him! He's vouched for you, says the government can release you into his custody to wait for the investigation. At least you'll be home. You'll be protected by the laws of your own nation." She sat back on her heels. "You can tell Bob you know that your embassy is looking for you. You can demand repatriation." She beamed at him. "He can't touch you once you're on your way home, and you're on your way home from the moment your embassy knows you're being detained."
He stared at her for a moment. Patrick held his breath. "Come on," he said, "come on, talk. Talk!"
Bob slammed back into the interrogation room-Patrick hadn't even noticed he had left the observation room-and snarled, yes, an actual baring of teeth, followed by the utterance of a loud, menacing growl that sounded like nothing so much as an infuriated and very hungry tiger. Sadiq actually cowered.
Mary leapt to her feet. "I-I was just-"
"Get out," Bob said.
Mary cast a scared glance at Sadiq and scurried out, giving Bob a wide berth.
Bob started toward Sadiq and Sadiq started to tremble. "Please-" he said, stammering. "Please, don't, I'll-"
"Shut the fuck up," Bob said, disgusted. "Jesus, if there's one thing I can't abide it's a sniveler. You're going home, asswipe." He unlocked the handcuffs and hauled Sadiq to his feet.
"Wait-" Sadiq said.
"What, you want to stay? You've had such a good time you want more? What are you, some kind of sicko?"
"No! I mean, wait! I mean-" Sadiq's feet scrabbled for purchase on the cement floor.
But Bob had him firmly in tow. "I can't see what a self-respecting freedom fighter like Isa saw in you anyway. What a waste of space. Still, there's someone back home who'll vouch for you, so you must be worth something to someone."
"Wait!"
"Oooh, nice little rent boy likes it rough, is that it?" Bob said, and gave Sadiq a shake, hard enough to rattle his teeth. He got him nose to nose and said, his voice a deep purr, "I'd love to have the schooling of you, pretty boy. Too bad."
He got Sadiq to the door and Sadiq, by a superhuman effort, managed to get his feet flat against the wall on either side of it. "Wait!" he said, almost screaming the words. "I'll talk! I'll tell you anything you want to know! Don't send me home! Please don't send me home! He'll kill me! He'll kill me!"
THE INTERROGATION HAD TAKEN LESS THAN TWO HOURS. SADIQ WAS even now babbling every detail, from his first meeting with Isa at the coffeehouse to packing his bag yesterday morning, into the interested microphones of three recording devices and two even more interested agents.
"How the hell did you know that would break him?" Patrick said. He and Ahmed were waiting for transportation to the Gitmo airfield.
Mary smiled. "Nurzai is an Afghan name. Afghans treat adultery as a capital crime, and the longer and more painful the death of those found guilty, the better. It was a calculated risk."
"But not that much of a risk," Bob said, looking very relaxed. "He's not what I'd call a pro."
"No kidding," Patrick said. "Well done."
"Wait until we see what we get," Ahmed said.
"You're very cautious."
"Sadiq's a weak vessel," Ahmed said. "If I were Isa, I wouldn't have told him anything worth knowing."
If it wasn't anything Patrick in all his urgency to find and stop Isa wanted to hear, he knew deep down that it was true.
HUGH RINCON ECHOED AHMEd's WORDS WHEN PATRICK, BACK IN HIS office the next morning, called to fill him in. "It's one of the reasons you haven't been able to catch the bastard," Hugh said. "He's one of the few terrorists capable of keeping his own counsel. He really understands need to know. He lives by it. He survives by it."
"Yeah, well, anything, any detail we get from Sadiq, is more than we have now. Did you get anything off the bag Isa left at the hotel?"
"Negative. It was all Bayzani's stuff. Got some hairs, so you'll have a decent DNA sample when you need to ID the body."
"I like your optimism."
"He's in a hurry and he's making mistakes," Hugh said. "He's made two big juicy ones in the past year. All we have to do is catch him making his third."
16
MIAMI
Zahirah wasn't especially pretty, but she had an air of dignity that sat quaintly on her young shoulders and she was by no means unintelligent. He liked to think that she was what Adara would have become, if Adara had lived.
She smiled at him across the dinner table. He smiled back. Mrs. Man-sour pretended not to notice, handing round the bread and olives in a businesslike fashion. They served themselves heaping spoons of rice and lamb stew and began to eat.
He was a little preoccupied this evening. Yussuf had emailed from Mexico City, and had reported all his cell members present and accounted for.
Yaqub had yet to make contact.
He was at present a day late. Yussuf had written to one of Akil's email drops, saying that he had not heard from him, either. In one way, Akil was pleased that the two young men had not broken protocol by contacting each other. They'd grown up together, were childhood friends. As a matter of natural human reaction he would have thought one of them would have broken the rules at least once, in spite of the strict injunctions against it he had laid on them. In the alien worlds to which they had been exiled, they could have been expected, even forgiven for having reached out for contact with the one familiar face left to them.
Irritatingly, this had not proved the case.
So Yussuf claimed.
Akil wasn't entirely certain he believed Yussuf, but absent a face-to-face confrontation he couldn't be sure. The Internet had certainly proved an excellent administrative tool, but like every other tool, it had its drawbacks.
He himself was leaving for Mexico City the next day.
"You are very quiet this evening, Mr. Sadat," Zahirah said.
He looked up to see her eyes twinkling in an otherwise solemn face. They had long since become Zahirah and Daoud in private. He doubted very much
that they were putting anything over on her mother, but he went along with the subterfuge, refusing to admit to himself that he was enjoying it as much as she was.
They had grown inexplicably but undeniably closer over the past six months. Things had reached a head when she'd caught him checking his email when he should have been watching the movie with her and her mother. She'd accepted his explanation of finding the movie a bore but not wishing to spoil their enjoyment of the evening. They had agreed to tell her mother nothing, and this small deception had led to others. Before long, they were arranging expeditions of their own. They were all innocent enough, an art exhibit, a visit to a museum, a lecture at her university, but the fact that her mother knew nothing about them and did not accompany them as chaperone told its own tale.
At first he told himself it was only to distract her, but it wasn't long before he had to acknowledge the truth.
He'd never had a girlfriend before.
In spite of the judgment of his village council, in spite of the punishment inflicted on Adara for his supposed crime, he had never slept with Husn.
Husn kept house for the UNICEF representative in their small market town. As the only English speaker in the village, upon his return home he had been designated the local UNICEF contact. He and Husn had met for the first time at the Gilberts' home.
Looking back, it hadn't seemed that momentous an occasion, the event that would change all their lives so radically. Mrs. Gilbert had been teaching Husn English, and letting her spend an hour of each workday reading through the Englishwoman's collection of Mills & Boon romance novels, which increased her comprehension, if not her vocabulary. "Is love in the West really like this?" she had asked him shyly, holding out one of the books.
"I don't know," he had said, feathering the pages. "All I did was study. All I wanted was to complete my degree and get back home again."
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