by Terry Keys
“They are trying to take out Wolfe!” I yelled.
More shots smashed into the Expedition. I ducked down behind one of the open doors and fired back several rounds at the approaching vehicles.
I’d spent enough time around guns that, after a few shots, making out the caliber was second nature. These men were firing AK-47s, and they were of the fully automatic variety, which were illegal in the United States. Fully automatic AK-47s were capable of emptying one hundred rounds per minute. Most of the criminals I’d come across weren’t overly concerned with gun laws.
Luckily, the young guns I’d brought with me had towed along their SWAT-issued M4s. The M4 could also fire about one hundred practical rounds a minute.
Both cars kept approaching, seemingly unfazed by our return fire. The cars swerved back and forth and continued to fire at us. They’d gotten fifteen yards away when both cars suddenly lost control and crashed in opposite directions, one car running into a fire hydrant while the other hit a light pole.
I rushed to the car on our side of the street, looking for signs of life. My weapon was raised, and I was ready to fire. I got ten feet from the car when I detected movement from inside. The car was on its side, and the man who was still alive was wearing a vest.
I sprinted back up the street, hoping I hadn’t gotten too close. As I reached the curb, the car exploded behind me. Shards of glass flew into my back, and the aftershock sent me tumbling to the ground.
“Get away from that car!” I yelled at the two officers across the street. Within seconds, the other car exploded too. My desperate plea had come too late. Both officers lay motionless. Grant, who had remained near the Expedition to monitor Wolfe, had taken a round to the leg.
I ran over to check their vitals but it was too late. They were both gone.
Within minutes, other officers were on the scene and Grant was off to the hospital. It looked like one of us needed that ambulance after all.
Special Agent Stagg and Captain Park, who’d helped me interrogate Rael a few days earlier, had finally arrived on site. Marty Wolfe was to be taken to an undisclosed location. A U.S.A. black site, no doubt. I’d heard all about black sites where prisoners that the US wanted to remain off the books were taken but I’d never actually been to one. I didn’t get the chance to interrogate Rael first when we brought him in. But this time would be different. The first crack at Wolfe would be all mine.
Chapter 61
We drove for almost two hours. Captain Park piloted our truck and Stagg rode shotgun. I rode in the middle section and Wolfe, both handcuffed and leg shackled, sat in the back.
“Where the hell y’all taking me? We passed up a bunch of police stations already . . . had to.”
No one responded.
“I know you assholes can hear me.”
I turned around. “Unless you’re looking to add a gag to your getup, I’d shut the hell up.”
Stagg finally spoke up. “Personally, Porter, I don’t even respond to traitors.”
“Screw you, you piece of shit. What, you think you’re better than me?” Wolfe said.
“I am better than you. You’re a no-good traitor. Turn your back on your country to help them?” Stagg snarled.
Wolfe laughed. “You don’t know shit about me, punk.”
“Punk? There’s the pot calling the kettle black.”
“Like I said, you don’t know shit about me. But in true Christian American fashion, you’ve judged me.”
“Judging your actions, pal. You’re right; I don’t know you. But I know what you did. I know you helped kill a lot of innocent people.”
“You just spew your ignorance. I’m used to it.”
“Well, you care to tell me how helping those monsters blow up the president don’t qualify your no-good ass for being a traitor?” Stagg yelled.
Wolfe laughed.
“You find that funny?” Park added.
“Like I said, you assholes don’t know shit about me.”
“Wolfe, we know you helped God’s Warriors assassinate President Wilson. And we know you took a lot of money to deliver her,” I said. “From where we stand—”
“From where you stand, I’m a traitor? Worst kind of human being there is, right? A man who turns on his flag?”
“Pretty much. So, see? You ain’t as dumb as you been pretending to be,” Stagg said.
“I served five years in the United States army. My squad had been sent overseas for our third deployment. We were on a night mission, and our crew was taking heavy fire. One of my team members stepped on an IED. Killed him and two others and left me medically unfit for duty—hence, the limp. That was ten years ago, and since then I’ve done nothing but fight for help. I spend more time sending in receipts for treatments or trying to prove that I should get the help I deserve. Nobody cares about me. Nobody checks on me. Nobody is trying to help me. After I got discharged, I might as well have been dead. I learned real quick that once I could no longer fight, the Army didn’t care if I was even alive. But I’m the traitor? Show the world that you care about your war veterans.”
The three of us listened quietly to Wolfe’s story. Sadly, it was one I’d heard more than once.
“So what gave you the right to play God, determine who lives and who dies?” Stagg growled.
“No comment on the help or lack of help that I been receiving from your government? Of course not. Just change the subject. No one ever wants to talk about it. Just sweep it under the rug. I wouldn’t expect anything less at this point. I’ve seen firsthand how veterans are treated. Besides having the bum leg, I lost my wife and—”
“Save the rest of your little sob story, traitor,” Stagg said.
We pulled up to a nondescript building, and six armed men approached the truck. Everyone piled out, and two of the men grabbed Wolfe. One of the men smashed a black cloth on his face and another tied it down.
They dragged Wolfe inside the concrete building. One metal chair had been placed in the middle of the room. Wolfe was shoved onto it and then tied down.
“Mr. Wolfe, a lot of people have already died. Personally I don’t want to see anyone else die. And more importantly, I know you have information about the very men I’m hunting. The one thing I don’t have is time. You see, several countries are sending troops to our very shores. I don’t want to see another world war, Mr. Wolfe. I’m actually a very peaceful man. You can make this very, very easy on all of us and just tell me who these men are. You can also tell me where I can find them. I don’t know . . . maybe share some cell phone numbers,” Park said.
“You’re wasting your time, Park. This piece of shit ain’t talking. I’ve seen his type,” Stagg added.
“We at least have to give him the chance. That is the proper thing to do. So superstar, what’s it going to be?” Park asked.
I stood about fifteen feet away from the men and watched. I’d been involved in my share of these information coercion parties. And as much as I hated to admit it, they worked.
Park tapped Wolfe on the back, making him jump. “Given the two choices, one being the easy way and one being the hard way, tell me why in the hell a man would ever choose the hard way?”
Wolfe cleared his throat. “I’m a soldier. And if you don’t mind me saying so, you’d do the same damn thing. Do what you gotta do, and we’ll see which of us gives up first.”
Chapter 62
We’d been at it for an hour and still nothing. Wolfe was strapped down and immobilized, and we had been waterboarding him for a solid hour. I could tell it wasn’t Wolfe’s first time to deal with this. Waterboarding had become popular, because there weren’t many outward signs that a captive had been tortured.
Most of the civilized world agreed that torturing captives should be outlawed, but no one shunned the information received from it. Lots of valuable intel had been received over the years, thanks to such tactics.
“Lift him up,” Park said. “Listen, Marty. How aware are you of waterboarding’s side effects
?” You know this can cause brain damage, damage to your lungs. Hell, people have died from it too. But being a soldier and all, I’m sure you know that already.”
Wolfe tried to speak, but his words were unintelligible.
“What? Are you trying to tell us something?” Stagg asked leaning in closer.
“I ain’t . . . tellin’ you shit,” Wolfe finally said.
Stagg laughed. “What else do we have here?”
Two men brought in a box that was about the same size as a coffin. “Untie him and put him in it,” Park said.
I watched as the men untied Wolfe and hustled him over to the box. He fought them a little, but he was much too weak to put up much of a fight. The men slammed the box closed and nailed it shut. Four men picked up the box and placed it on a set of rollers.
They wheeled Wolfe into the next room, where the temperature had been set to minus-five degrees, and left him there. Every five minutes they checked to make sure Wolfe was still breathing. After twenty minutes, the men rolled the coffin back into the main room and took Wolfe out.
Wolfe’s breathing had no doubt slowed. He was out of the cuffs now, and he rubbed hard and fast on his arms.
Park kneeled beside him. “You know I can end this at any moment. I tell them to stop and it’s over.”
Wolfe said nothing.
“One of you guys bring Mr. Wolfe a blanket.”
One of the men hurried off and came back a minute later with a wool blanket. Park gently laid it over Wolfe.
“I must admit, you’ve been one of the most resilient captives I’ve ever encountered. But I do have one question.” Park reached into his pocket and took out a photograph. “I’m wondering though . . .” he waved the picture in front of Wolfe’s face. “How much can she take?”
I moved closer. It was a picture of a little girl, presumably Wolfe’s daughter.
Tears immediately formed in Wolfe’s eyes. He threw the blanket off and slowly sat up.
“If anything happens to her, I swear on my life I will kill each and every one of you.”
Stagg and Park laughed. I didn’t. The little hairs on my neck stood up. Having daughters of my own, I understood where Wolfe was coming from. Whether he’d be able to carry it out or not was irrelevant. I could tell the man would die trying.
Park held the picture in front of Wolfe’s face again. “Last chance, war hero.”
“Okay, damn it. Okay. What do you want to know?”
Park slapped Wolfe on the cheek with the photograph. “I knew this would make you play nice. Not sure why it had to come down to this though, Marty.”
“What do you want to know?”
“I want to know everything. I want names, addresses, phone numbers. And don’t let me find out that you’re giving me bad info. I can still visit this pretty little girl.”
“And I can still cut your head off and feed it to your wife,” Wolfe growled back.
Finally I’d had enough of the back and forth. “Listen, Wolfe, no one is going to hurt your daughter,” I said, looking over at Park and Stagg. “Give us the info we need, and we can go from there.”
“What happens to me?”
“Well, despite your unfair medical treatment and your feelings of being abandoned, you’ve broken some laws here. And you’ve helped a murderous terrorist cell kill a lot of people. You’ll have to answer for those crimes, but I promise you two things. One, nothing will happen to your daughter; and two, if you help us I’ll see to it that you don’t get the death penalty.”
Chapter 63
Wolfe sat for a minute, staring at all of us and saying nothing.
“Okay. On my second tour of duty I came in contact with a man named Rokan Sheth. He approached me as a friend and asked for nothing from me. When I came back to the States, Rokan and I met for lunch a handful of times and had only friendly conversation. I was injured during my third tour, and that’s when my downward spiral began. I was discharged, but I couldn’t find work back home. My wife left me and took my daughter with her. I battled depression. I had no one and no help.”
“And when you came back Rokan Sheth showed up again?” I asked.
He nodded. “And then Rokan Sheth showed up. He gave me money. More importantly, he gave me someone to talk to when everyone else had turned their backs on me.”
“So fast forward to now,” Stagg said.
“One day he said he had a girl that he wanted me to introduce to a reporter. Told me her story and that was it.”
Stagg shook his head. “So you’re telling us you didn’t know what their plan for her was?”
“No. I never asked. He just said it was important for the movement.”
“And after they told you how much money they’d pay you, and I presume it’s a handsome sum, little bells and whistles didn’t start going off?” Park asked.
“No. Even if they would have—”
I put a hand up. “Doesn’t matter. It’s not what happened. So tell us the name of the mastermind here and where we can find him,” I said.
“Rokan told me the head guy’s name was El Printo. His second in command was a man named Abu Yallah. After Abu was a man named Hasan Goran. Those are the only names I know. They move around every few weeks to stay off the grid. They give money to the locals, who desperately need it, to buy their loyalty.”
This was the most intel we had on God’s Warriors to date. It again confirmed the use of torture and other extreme methods to get information from captives. It was a double-edged sword.
“Loyalty is a funny thing, Marty. I know you feel like we turned our backs on you after you returned from serving our country. But earlier tonight, the same guys who befriended you tried to kill you to keep you quiet,” I said.
Marty nodded. “And then my own countrymen tortured me and threatened to kill my adolescent daughter. Seems like I’m catching shit from all sides, huh?”
No one said a word.
“So who am I supposed to be loyal to again? Help me out here, Porter. Park? Stagg?” Marty leapt to his feet, and the other men in the room aimed their weapons at him.
“Relax, toy soldiers. Give me a piece of paper.”
Park handed Wolfe a pen and a piece of paper. Marty spent a few minutes writing something down.
He handed the paper over to Park. “Last I heard, this is where they were headed.”
My phone buzzed. It was a text from DeLuca.
“Found Paul. Sarin was used. Paul headed to emergency surgery. Keep you posted.”
My heart thudded heavily, and my eyes moistened. It was possible that Paul and I had spent our last minute on this earth together. I hadn’t even had a chance to say goodbye or to tell him how much his friendship meant to me. We always assume when we see someone that we’ll see them again somewhere down the road. That couldn’t be any further from the truth.
Chapter 64
I reached out to President Brown to get her up to speed and advised that we would be recommencing operation Blue Star in short order.
Captain Link with the U.S. Naval Special Warfare Division and Admiral Redder, commander of the Joint Special Operations Task Force had informed me that go-time would be 2300 hours.
The United States had boots on the ground about fifty miles south of where we believed Abu Yallah and Hasan Goran were operating.
I dialed the number Admiral Redder had provided me.
“Detective Porter here, sir.”
“Detective. Captain Link here. Are you able to log in to the video conferencing as well?”
“Yes sir, I’m in.”
“We’ve kicked around several options, and we don’t want another American put in harm’s way. I’ve ordered a drone strike that is set to launch in T-minus-ten minutes.”
A drone strike would effectively destroy God’s Warriors’ compound, but it would also destroy any valuable intel that might be retrieved. In this situation, with so much on the line, I would have to defer to their judgement.
“Let’s do it,” I said.
I listened in as the two men barked instructions to their various teams. Admiral Redder’s boots would do a recon mission within minutes of the strike to assess damage and confirm targets.
Thanks to Marty Wolfe’s intel, we’d been able to find pictures of Abu and Hasan, who were our main targets. Abu’s code name was Cherokee, and Hasan’s was Navajo. We’d also been able to recover dental records on both men which, after the drone strike, we would probably need to help identify their corpses.
I stared intently at the video of the compound. Nothing screamed or even suggested terrorists-at-work. There was no movement coming from the building. A few guards, halfway hiding their weapons, patrolled outside, and one patrolled the second floor roof of the building.
This was the first time I’d watched an impending drone strike in this way. These men were minutes away from being blown to smithereens and were oblivious.
Captain Link gave the order, and the drone was in the air. I couldn’t take my eyes off the compound and the men as they patrolled. Suddenly, the men on the ground ran toward the building’s entrance. Ten seconds later, the drone slammed into the compound, turning my computer monitor a fiery black and red. Why had the men suddenly sprinted inside? Had they received some kind of radio communication? Had they been tipped off?
Two minutes later, U.S. boots swarmed the compound. I watched as the men cleared the perimeter and then stormed the building.
Then a voice came in over the radio. “All targets have been eliminated, sir.”
“Cherokee and Navajo?”
“Confirmed. Both eliminated.”
“Ten-four. You’ve got five minutes, Commander. Grab what you can and get out.”
Watching the American military flex its muscle was breathtaking. In large part, we owed the mission’s success to Marty Wolfe, who’d filled in many of the holes we had. I’d be sure the judge in his case was made fully aware.
“Your intel proved rock-solid, Porter,” Admiral Redder said.
“Group effort, sir.”
I signed off and my mind wandered to El Printo. As expected, he hadn’t been at the compound, and, for now, he was a ghost. The war between democracy and radical Islam hadn’t ended with our drone strike. After news traveled to him, he’d no doubt focus his attention on the next plan that was probably already in motion. Would it be the bombing of a U.S. embassy? A shooter at a U.S. sporting event? Another bomb like the one used at the Boston Marathon a few years earlier? No one knew. The only thing we knew for sure was this: one day, when we least expected it, they would strike again.