by David Lender
Tom surveyed the room. Styrofoam cups, sandwich wrappings and paper plates littered any horizontal surface, and a halfdozen laptop PCs were still plugged into the walls. Within the space of three hours they had reviewed all fifty-five dossiers, projecting faces and key facts on the wall from PC screens.
“I’m afraid I’ve lost track of the total count, old boy,” Nigel said.
“One hundred forty-six,” Tom said. “Including the related groups and bin Abdur.”
There would be thirty-two teams. All of those in Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Iraq, and Iran would be made up of local mercenaries. On the Continent the assassination teams would be a mixture of mercenaries, CIA, Mossad and British Secret Service. Tom watched Ira Land talking animatedly with a couple of the field agents and suspected that Ira might be in on some of the hits himself. They would also use mercenaries in the U.S. for the skinhead and paramilitary groups they had linked to or strongly suspected were sympathetic to the al-Mujari. CIA operatives would hit the more sophisticated targets, the underground al-Mujari cells.
“You okay, old boy?” Nigel asked, resting his hand on Tom’s arm. Tom didn’t respond. He was thinking about Sasha. Remembering his reaction when he’d seen her on the video screen with Youngblood. It looked like she’d gotten on to a good thing. Maybe settled into a real life. Maybe the two of them got away, got good and lost. Maybe he didn’t need to feel bad about her anymore.
“Tom, is it Sasha?” Nigel said. “I was talking to some of the lads about it. I heard she’s missing. You have to stop blaming yourself about all those years ago. She did a real service to all of us. Nobody else could have done it but her.”
Nigel’s words stabbed at Tom like his conscience. “We used her.”
“And she went into it willingly, as I’ve told you a hundred times. Did it for Yassar. You know that.” Nigel waved his hand in a circle in the air. “Almost a year as a trojan horse, that’s a lot of pressure, a lot of psychological trauma there, I agree. But she knew what she was doing. And if she hadn’t done it, Ibrahim would have helped Sheik bin Abdur kill Yassar, his own father. Bloody hell!”
Nigel didn’t ease Tom’s guilt. “We used her, we screwed up her life, and she spent the past twenty or so years running around doing God knows what as a result.” Maybe she really had found a life with Youngblood and Tom should leave her alone. “Maybe I shouldn’t try to find her, just let her fade into the woodwork again.”
Nigel looked at him warily. “Tom, old boy. You know perfectly well that if they came this close to her, it won’t uhm, uhm, be long before they find her again. We, uhm, never dreamed they’d be organized enough to pull off coordinated global terrorism like they’ve just attempted. You don’t want them catching up with her, do you?”
“No,” Tom said. They all owed her. What would have happened if Prince Ibrahim had survived? Then where would they be? “There was a guy, mercenary called—among other things—Habib. Remember him? Used to be one of ours.”
“Of course. We used to call him the invisible man. Rather, uhm, an, an enigma.”
“What if we were to get somebody good, really good like this guy Habib, and put him on Sasha, kind of a bodyguard?” He looked at Nigel’s face. “I figure a man like that might do a lot better job than some of our own.”
“Oh,” Nigel said. Tom saw his face go slack. “We understand he’s already working for bin Abdur.”
My God, Tom thought. What if bin Abdur had the same idea? Find somebody really good and put him on her.
CHAPTER 47
SEPTEMBER, THIS YEAR. NEW YORK City. Daniel walked into FBI Headquarters.
“Where were you?” Tom said when he came out to meet him.
“Hiding out.”
“Why the hell didn’t you call me sooner?”
“At first I was afraid to. I couldn’t figure out how they knew we were at the hotel. I thought you might have a leak.”
Tom looked straight at Daniel with those piercing blue eyes. “I’m the only one who knew where you were.”
Daniel nodded. “I also drove up to Milford. Sasha and I agreed to meet up there if we got separated.”
“She’s there now?”
“No. I don’t know where she is. I was hoping you might. You know what happened?”
“Yeah, the aftermath at least. Two guys capped on the roof, .22 caliber bullets in both. Three more dead in the hotel room. One from a marble bookend, two from the same Uzi.”
Daniel felt shock, blood rising to his face. “Two dead on the roof?” His stomach started rolling over. Tom had rattled it off like it was nothing. He felt sick. His thoughts raced back to the hotel, going to the courtyard, finding no one…Finally: “I didn’t know about the two guys on the roof.” He felt renewed terror in the aftermath of killing the two men in the apartment, then fear for Sasha’s safety.
Tom said, “Then I guess Sasha did the guys on the roof. That means she probably got away.”
Hearing it was like oxygen to Daniel.
“You talk to Yassar?” Tom said.
“I couldn’t get through.”
Tom looked at the floor, thinking.
“What?” Daniel asked.
“I can’t get him either. They said he’s on his way here.”
“Maybe he’s coming for her.”
“Or after her.”
Daniel felt an escalating fear. “What the hell are you talking about? She says he’s like her father.”
Tom looked grave. “She did a job for us once.”
“I know about Yassar’s son.”
Tom’s blue eyes were cold, unblinking. “Then nothing he does should surprise you.”
Daniel felt a twist deep in his stomach.
Tom went on, “With all this shit going on I’ve never had time to ask you how you and Sasha got involved.”
Daniel felt his face color. “She was sent to see if the terrorists were working through my clients. And probably to check me out for Yassar, before he hired me.” He averted his eyes, his face now burning, humiliated.
“You sure about her?” Tom asked. “Sure she’s told you everything?’
Daniel raised his head, certain. “Yes.”
“Okay,” Tom said, looking unconvinced. “We better get started trying to find her. I’ll see if we have any leads. We’re still covering your apartment and weekend house. Where’s your cell phone?”
“Smashed in the hotel.”
“We’ll get you a new one, same number. May take a few hours with all I’ve got going on. She may try to contact you.”
Daniel felt his tension and disorientation scrambling his thinking. It didn’t make sense, Yassar double-crossing Sasha. He told himself that it was just Tom’s job to be a professional paranoid. Unless he knew something he wasn’t saying. Then he had to struggle to ignore the queasy sensation he felt.
Tom said he was in the middle of a sensitive operation and needed to get back to it. He parked Daniel in a conference room. Daniel couldn’t tell if he was just sleep deprived, or whether the worry, anguish and confusion twisting in his mind over Sasha were real. Yassar plotting revenge against her? Chapters of her past he still didn’t know about? Sasha lying in a ditch someplace? Tom aware of things about her he wouldn’t—or couldn’t—tell him? Maybe he shouldn’t have come back from Milford. Now he wasn’t so sure Tom could help.
Daniel leaned forward in his chair and rested his forehead on the conference room table. Despair took hold. He put his hands over his head, wished he could fall asleep, just black out and wake up with his mind clear. A moment later when he tried to lift his head he felt he had no strength to do so, then thought he might simply slide to the floor and collapse, a blob of raw emotion.
He didn’t know how long he sat like that, but when he focused again he was thinking about what Sasha must be doing at that moment. Probably waiting for him someplace in Milford, keeping her wits about her, planning how they’d get to safety. He thought about the Mercedes coupe. He’d parked it at the Grand Union in Milfo
rd so she would see it, know he was alive.
He sat up in the chair. Snap out of it. He stood up and started pacing. What still gnawed at him was how the terrorists could have guessed they’d be at that little-known hotel. If Tom hadn’t told anyone, it just didn’t make sense. Sasha and he had taken three different taxis, two subways, and a bus to make certain they weren’t followed. The only people who knew Daniel used to stay there were colleagues from work, years ago. Then it hit him: Kovarik. Kovarik was one of the only people who might guess Daniel would go to Barton Manor if he wanted to get lost. When they were still friends together at Goldman, Daniel told Kovarik where he went for those “lost” weekends in case an emergency arose at the office. He had to track the bastard down; he was obviously still feeding information to the terrorists.
He burst through the door to find Tom. The woman at reception said Tom was in a meeting and couldn’t be disturbed. Daniel felt like someone was peeling the skin off his flesh as he strode back into the conference room. He started pacing again. Where would Kovarik go if he wanted to get lost? He remembered the pictures in Kovarik’s office. Kovarik proudly standing beside his Aston Martin. Kovarik’s Aston peeking out of the garage on Long Island City where he and Daniel used to keep them, where Kovarik still kept his. The image tingled in his brain. The garage.
Daniel ran to the reception desk. “I need to get a message to Tom Goddard.”
She gave him a bitchy look, “I told you he can’t be disturbed.”
Daniel wanted to throttle the woman. He grabbed a piece of paper and a pen from the desk, scrawled, “I’m going for Kovarik. 4250 12th St., Long Island city. Send backup. Daniel.” He handed it to her and said, “Get this to him now or take responsibility for what happens if you don’t.”
Ten minutes later, Daniel’s taxi pulled off the Queensboro Bridge and swung onto Queens Plaza South. It cruised down 12th Street and Daniel had the cabbie stop a few doors down from the garage. It looked much as it did the last time Daniel was here almost 10 years earlier. The windows were still blacked out with paint, the cinderblock exterior sported maroon, blue and white coats of paint peeling from it, and weeds and dried vegetation grew up through cracks in the concrete. Litter and dust were everywhere. Daniel walked down the side driveway to approach the bays in the back. As he turned the corner he got a shock: Kovarik walked straight into him, a suitcase in hand. “Ooof,” Daniel said as their chests collided. “Shit!” Kovarik yelled as he stepped back, then swung his suitcase into Daniel’s knee. Daniel saw stars and felt his leg go out from under him, landed on his back in the driveway. He rolled on his side to see Kovarik sprinting down the driveway toward 12th Street, moving fast, bad leg and all. Daniel was up in an instant, running after him full tilt, his knee smarting with every stride.
Daniel’s anger boiled in him as he ran. No way you get away. He thought he was gaining on Kovarik. His knee still hurt but it was loosening up. Yes, he was gaining on him. It would take only another few hundred yards to chase him down. They turned underneath the Queensboro Bridge onto Queens Plaza South. When Kovarik rounded the corner onto 10th Street he slipped and went down on the sidewalk. He got back up but it was all over in another 20 yards. Daniel grabbed him by the shoulders and slammed him against a light post. Daniel’s arms were trembling with rage as he spun Kovarik around, grabbed him by the shirt collar and pressed his back against the post. For a second he thought of hurling him in front of a car.
“You bastard,” Daniel said, panting, the taste of stomach acid in his throat.
Kovarik was giving him a tough-guy sneer. He wheezed, “What are you chasing me for? You’re the one who’s implicated, and I’ve tipped off the FBI. You’re gonna be disgraced and end your days in jail.” Daniel clamped his hands around Kovarik’s throat, started squeezing. He gritted his teeth and for a moment believed he could actually throttle him to death. Someone grabbed him from behind, pulled him off Kovarik.
“Take it easy.”
Daniel turned. It was Johnson, the FBI agent who’d led the team going to Kovarik’s office. Two other agents grabbed Kovarik, cuffed him and started moving him toward the street.
“We’ll take it from here, cowboy,” Johnson said.
Forty-five minutes later Daniel sat with Tom, Johnson and two other agents outside the interrogation room at FBI headquarters, watching Kovarik through the two-way mirror. The sound was tinny through the speakers, but Daniel could hear Kovarik whining like a schoolboy.
“He was a client. I did research on the industry for him.”
“Uh-huh.” The agent shook his head. “You’ll need to do better’n that.”
“I want to talk to my lawyer.”
The agent laughed. “You watch a lotta movies.” Daniel saw Kovarik’s eyes widen, his head droop. “Only when I’m done with you, and I’m not done with you yet. And if you don’t gimme what I want, nobody may ever even know you’re in here.”
Kovarik hung his head further still, staring at the table. The agent pushed a book of photographs in front of him.
“Again. Point out the guy.”
After an hour of it, Daniel got up and left. Nothing on Sasha from Kovarik, and nothing from Tom’s people. At least the excitement of chasing down Kovarik had taken his mind off her for a time. Now his stomach was churning with worry over her again. He was in a conference room when Tom walked in with a photograph. “Kovarik ID’d this guy. You ever seen him?” Daniel shook his head. “He goes by the name of Habib, at least most of the time. He was once one of ours. I think we might know how to get to him.”
“You think it’ll help us find Sasha?”
“I don’t think so. Like I said earlier, I think she got away. And she’s probably hiding out, waiting for you.”
It didn’t ease his mind. Tom had gotten him a new cell phone and she still hadn’t called. But he’d been thinking about what Sasha said about anticipating each other if they needed to run. It gave him an idea.
September, This Year. Buraida, Saudi Arabia. Assad stopped his Jeep on the desert just outside Buraida. It was good to be seeing action again—so infrequent since he’d become head of the Saudi Secret Police. The green outline of buildings shone in the distance through his night-vision binoculars. Quiet. Good. The advance team was indicating no security force visible. That meant they could neutralize the targets without taking out the entire building with handheld rockets.
Assad motioned to Mustafa, his driver, then nodded to Ishtar, his second, in the back seat. They drove the remaining mile with their headlights off. Mustafa parked the Jeep a hundred yards outside the town’s main street, and Assad and Ishtar started across the dirt. Assad could see the mosque in the distance and the shape of the building next door, but no lights through the windows.
The town was quiet, the wind picking up in the cool night air. Assad paused at the side street where it reached the center of town. As they approached, Assad could see five Arabs were seated outside the building. A half-dozen people walked the street. The advance team would be in place by now.
He pulled out his Ruger 9mm automatic, racked the slide and clunked the first shell into the chamber. Ishtar did the same.
They continued down the street, guns back beneath their parkas. Assad’s eyes darted from side to side looking for anything unusual. Still quiet. Good. Just stay that way. He was now at fifty yards. He inhaled deeply. The cool air felt good in his lungs.
At twenty-five yards he saw the shapes of the men in the street more clearly. Four of them walked to the door of the building next to the mosque. One lifted a steel bar and slammed it against the weather-beaten wood. The door disintegrated as much as it flew open and two of the other men pitched concussion grenades inside. Blinding flashes and muffled explosions reverberated inside the anteroom to Sheik bin Abdur’s chamber.
Assad saw the three men disappear inside, heard the crash of the steel against the inside door, then three more explosions. Assad entered the anteroom, smelling cordite and the dust that was sifting down
from the ceiling. Three men were coughing and groaning on the floor. His two men held automatics on them. Assad nodded to his team and turned toward the anteroom door. He heard three shots in the anteroom as he entered the Sheik’s chamber, where four other men lay facedown on the floor, begging for mercy.
Three of his team stood over them. Assad told his men to turn them over, one by one. The Sheik was not among them.
“Finish it,” he said. As he left the building he heard two shots, then two more. His Jeep was waiting. He climbed into the passenger seat and Ishtar jumped in the back.
Abdul and Waleed, and five others who do not really matter, Assad mused. But no bin Abdur. No wonder it was so easy.
CHAPTER 48
SEPTEMBER, THIS YEAR. NEW YORK City. Daniel was just leaving FBI Headquarters when his cell phone rang. It gave him a start, then a burst of joy. Sasha.
“Hello, Daniel.”
“Yassar. Where are you?” Tom’s words came back to him. Coming for her or after her? It still didn’t seem possible.
“In New York. Is Sasha with you?”
“No. We were attacked, got split up. But I think she’s safe.”
“Al-Mujari. Yes, she’s safe, for now.”
Daniel felt a rush of relief. His breathing was short, uneven. “Thank God,” he whispered.
“She’s emailed me, but she’s too cautious to call. I know how deep underground she can go. And she says she won’t come out without you.”
Daniel hesitated, then asked, “Yassar, why are you here?”
Yassar didn’t respond. Then, after clearing his throat, he said, “Why Daniel, what a strange question.” His tone sounded almost as if he were lecturing Daniel. He paused again. “The crisis is averted, but now Sasha is in danger and refuses to allow us to extract her. That is, without you.”
Daniel paused, thinking. He remembered Sasha’s words. Be intuitive.