by Jack Hardin
“I don’t know, man. I swear. The job was posted online, and I grabbed it up. All I was supposed to do was get some images of her going about her day. I was supposed to upload them and then they would pay me in Bitcoin.”
Brad turned to Zoe. “There's a pair of handcuffs in my Jeep. Should be in the front cupholder.”
“Okay.” She hurried off as Brad frisked Raines.
“What’s your phone password?” Brad asked him. He recited it. Brad typed it in, and the home screen lit up. He navigated to the photo app and scrolled through the images. There were dozens of Zoe and three videos.
“You sonofabitch,” Brad said. “You messed with the wrong girl.”
Zoe returned with the handcuffs. Brad snapped one across Raines’s left wrist and then led him around to the open driver’s door, where he snapped the remaining cuff onto the door’s striker latch. He went around to the passenger side, crawled into the front, and after removing Raines’s revolver from the glove box, searched the vehicle for additional weapons. Finding nothing, he stepped out and called Homestead PD.
“The police will be here soon,” he said to Raines. “I promise you, I am going to be your worst nightmare.”
He walked Zoe back to her car and opened the door for her. “I’m going to call Roscoe and tell him what just went down. I want you to go stay with him and Amy. They have that extra bed. Just lay low over there until I tell you any different. No work, no school. Don’t even step out onto the porch. Do you understand?”
She nodded anxiously.
“Come here.” Brad wrapped her in a bear hug. “Everything is fine now. No one is going to hurt you.”
“Thanks, Brad. It means a lot.”
He peered over her shoulder into the car. “Are those French fries? You gonna eat those?”
Chapter Fourteen
Boomer turned out of the neighborhood and braked for a stoplight. “We can’t take Emmanuel back to the warehouse. There’s a safe house not far from here that we can use if we need to. But I’ll be honest with you, Savage. None of this is making a whole lot of sense. We’re still not even sure that this Recruit fella even took Kathleen. It fits his profile, but there’s nothing concrete to say it’s him.” The light turned, and he accelerated across the intersection.
Boomer was right. Granger had connected with an IT team at Langley, and together they were monitoring the gun forum, hoping to follow some digital breadcrumbs should The Recruit check the message. But that in itself was a shot in the dark.
I had been involved in investigations for over a decade. They had taken me all around the world, to a dozen countries and four continents. And it had to be this one, the most personal of all, that had me chasing my tail and crossing my fingers at every single step.
“I’m starving,” Boomer said. “You starving? Other than Teapot’s strapatsada I haven’t had a thing to eat all day.”
“I could go for a bite.”
“There’s this cool joint just north of the Parthenon. It’s Athens’ version of a hot dog stand. Except they’ve got these fried gyros that you can’t get anywhere else.”
“Fried gyros?”
“Trust me. It’s what you want.”
He turned hard at the next intersection, and we heard a thump from the trunk. Emmanuel cried out in pain. Boomer chuckled. “I love it when they do that.”
It was late afternoon by the time we turned downtown and rolled past the Parthenon. Sidewalks and shops were humming with tourists, most of them laden with fanny packs, cameras, and backpacks. Boomer pulled to the curb at Victoria Circle as traffic continued to roll by. “There isn’t much parking around here.” He pointed out my window. “See that little shack past the fountain, under the palms? That’s it. This street's one way, so I’ll have to go around a couple of times. I’ll meet you at the curb on the other side of the park, over by the statue of Athena.
He pulled out his wallet and handed me twenty euros. “And get me a Coke, too.”
“You’ve got it.”
I stepped out, and Boomer pulled back into traffic. The gyro stand had a line fifteen deep, and twenty minutes later, I was finally at the counter. The lady at the window scribbled my order, I paid her, gave her my name, and then stepped to the side to wait. A steady line of smoke drifted out of the shack’s vent pipe and was scattered by the breeze. The smell of fried lamb stirred my stomach and made my mouth water. If the gyros tasted half as good as they smelled, then Boomer had taken me to the right place.
The park was bustling. People of all nationalities were posing for pictures, eating on park benches, and passing through on their way to other attractions. Hearing my name called, I returned to the window, took the bag and two bottles of Coke, and started for the other side of the park. Just before I reached the curb, Boomer passed by and turned to make another revolution. I stepped beneath the shade of a sidewalk tree and waited.
A voice behind me said, “Beautiful day, is it not?”
As I turned to acknowledge the statement, strong hands grabbed me on either side. Before I could respond, an electrical current pulsed through my body, rendering my muscles temporarily paralyzed. The food fell to the concrete as my entire body lit up with internal fire.
The stun baton came off the center of my back, and I collapsed into the hands of the two men still on either side of me. Struggling was impossible, my body unable to respond to any command. They carried me to a waiting vehicle, and just before they shoved me inside, they jerked my gun from my waistband, dug out my phone, bound my hands with a zip tie, and forced a hood down over my face.
My feet were barely inside the car when the door slammed shut. I heard both men get in and the car rev into traffic. My heart was slamming inside my chest, my muscles screaming from the residual electrical shocks still pulsing through random muscle groups. I concentrated on my breathing and bit down on my bottom lip until the pain began to ebb.
Boomer hadn’t seen them take me; I knew that for certain. He had just turned around the south end of the park, and a cluster of trees, fountains, and monuments made it impossible to see from one end of the park to the other. Whatever this was, whatever these men had planned for me, I was on my own.
Soon after merging onto a motorway and picking up speed, I heard the crinkle of a paper bag and the soft crunch of what I could only imagine was a fried gyro.
“Is that my lunch?” I snapped. “Are you guys eating my lunch?”
The only reply was a happy, smacking sigh that comes after taking a swig of a cold soda. Soon enough, the familiar smell of fried lamb drifted through the hood.
We rode for over an hour, the hum of traffic gradually diminishing until the only sound was the low, consistent drone of the car’s engine and the whisper of its tires.
My mind raced through the possible scenarios. Had I gotten too close to the truth and didn’t even know it? If so, why hadn’t they taken Boomer too? Maybe they had. Maybe I was first, and they got him coming back around the park. Did they not get what they wanted from Kathleen and were trying me now? Or were they just taking me out of the city to get me out of the way and dispose of me?
There’s something unsettling about being forced into a car by unknown assailants and being driven to an unknown location. Considering the same scenario had played out with Kathleen, I didn’t have much hope of someone finding me anytime soon.
The car turned onto a bumpy road and slowed around several turns before accelerating up a steep hill and finally coming to a stop. The driver turned off the engine, and both men got out. My door opened, and someone grabbed my upper arm and yanked me out. The air was cooler out here, wherever here was, and the steady din of the city was missing. My throat went dry, and my heart sped up as my captors led me down a winding path and then up a series of outdoor steps. A door opened, and I was led into a building, floorboards creaking under our weight.
A second door opened, and I was shepherded into a room and forced to sit on a metal chair. The men left, slamming the door behind them.
The room was cool and musty. A window unit behind me issued a steady stream of cool air. The skin on my lower back was still burning from where they had stabbed me with the stun baton. The plastic tie bit deeply into the tendons of my wrists, and I flexed my fingers in an effort to keep some modicum of circulation flowing.
No one came. No voices from the other side of the door, no footsteps, or the strand of music from a faraway speaker. Just the sound of the air conditioner.
I did the only thing I could. I waited.
Chapter Fifteen
Helmand Province, Afghanistan
April 2012
Bahar Shakor felt a trickle of sweat roll down his temple and the side of his cheek before it ran off his chin and silently fell into his lap.
The American soldier pulled out the chair across the table and sat. Placing a hand on the table, he slowly tapped his index finger in a slow cadence. His icy blue eyes burned into Bahar’s. The young man looked away.
Bahar could feel the cold bore of his stare. He thought he might throw up. His worst nightmare had just realized itself. He hadn’t even completed his first task, and the Americans had caught him. And everyone knew that when the Americans caught you, they never let you go. “What do you want with me?” he blurted in English. “What am I doing here?”
The officer gave him a hard, thin-lipped smile. “Bahar Shakor,” he said slowly. “I am Captain Savage. You and I, we need to have a little chat.”
“I have nothing to say.”
“Maybe not. But I sure as hell do.” He placed a file folder on the table, flipped it open, and began to examine the contents. After several moments, he reached into the pocket of his pants and set something else on the table. It was the detonator Abdul had given him in the cafe.
“Bahar, do you want to tell me what you were doing with this?”
Bahar thought he might throw up. The temperature in the room suddenly felt much warmer, stuffier. He did not offer an answer.
“My squad picked you up in Kandahar with this little contraption in your pocket.” He picked it up, examined it for show, and then laid it on the table. “We also located a garbage can filled with explosives and ball bearings on the next corner. One of our patrols was set to roll by there in the next hour.”
Bahar set his jaw and looked down into his lap.
“My guys, they don’t take too well to triggermen. And I’ll tell you why, Bahar. It may not be for the reason you think. Because the only kind of men who hold something like this in their hands—and actually press the button—are cowards. And you, Bahar, are a coward.”
“I am no such thing!” Bahar belted out. “I am no coward!”
Captain Savage nodded. “So you do have a tongue. I’ll tell you what, we can debate the finer points of courage and valor another time. Right now, you should probably be thinking long and hard about your grandmother and your sister.”
Bahar felt like the American officer had just rammed his fist into his stomach.
“With you in here, they are going to have a rough go of it. What will they think when they realize the last man in their family is a terrorist?”
“They will praise me for it!”
“No, they won’t. At least, your grandmother won’t.”
“It was your soldiers who killed my father and my brother. If it were not for you Americans coming into my country, they would still be alive.”
“Bahar, I’m sorry about your father and your brother. I honestly am. But a group of Islamic radicals opened fire on our patrol in the market that day. The very radicals that you have now decided to work for. You can’t put their deaths fully on us.”
Bahar did not respond, only looked away again.
“Your file says you’re twenty-seven. That would make you and me the same age. It’s interesting, don’t you think? Here we are, two men the same age but sitting worlds apart across this table. I am a lover of freedom, and you are a lover of terror.”
“You are a lover of power,” Bahar snapped. “You all talk about freedom but then destroy everyone else's.”
“You know what I think? I think that you, like everyone else on this planet, just want to live your life in peace. You want to raise your goats and laugh with friends and enjoy your family. But you haven’t known a lot of peace, have you, Bahar? First, it was the Russians, then the Taliban, and now us. I get it. Your entire life, all your country has known is some version of war. But do you want to tell me how radicalizing and blowing up a few convoys is going to get rid of us? It’s only going to step up our efforts.”
“At least some of us have decided to fight back.” Bahar hissed.
“Your father. Tell me about him.”
“My father? Why?”
“What kind of man was he?”
Bahar sighed sadly. “He was a good man. Hard working. That is all I will say.”
“Would he be proud of you? Or is it just the bloodthirsty sheik at your local mosque who is proud of you? You know, the old man who walks around in his long robes and poisons your mind with thoughts of violence while he himself sits back and does nothing?”
Bahar’s nostrils flared. “You know nothing.”
“I think I know more than you think I do.”
“What do you want with me? What am I doing here?”
“You’ve heard of Gitmo, haven’t you? I’m pretty sure everyone in this sandbox has heard of Gitmo.”
“Yes,” came the weak reply. “So you’re going to torture me?”
“No, that’s not my department. In your case, I’m the guy who gets the ball rolling, not the blood flowing.”
The door scraped open behind Bahar. A uniformed aid entered the room, went around the table, and whispered something in the captain’s ear. The captain nodded, thanked the aide, and then the aide left, the door slamming shut behind him.
“Well, Bahar, it looks like you’re about to get a second chance at life.”
“What do you mean?”
Captain Savage closed his file, folded his hands, and placed them on the table. “In a moment, someone else is going to come in here and speak with you. They’re going to put an offer in front of you. And Bahar, before you decline, I would think very hard about it. They’ll offer it once, and never again.” He stood up and came around the table. He placed a hand on Bahar’s shoulder. “Good luck, kid. I hope you can turn your life around for the better.”
When the door slammed shut again, Bahar’s entire body trembled. His head swam with a fear he had never experienced. It was all he could do to keep from throwing up.
Chapter Sixteen
I sat in the silence for over an hour, the air inside the hood growing increasingly stuffy. My mind continued to consider what kind of dilemma I was in. It was an effort in futility. The answers would play out in time, but I couldn’t help but wonder if this was the time I didn’t make it out alive.
Finally, after my hands turned numb and my entire body had grown stiff in the chair, a door opened and then shut. Footsteps scuffed across the floor. They stopped, and all I could hear was someone breathing quietly through their nose.
“Well, well. Is this not… humorous?”
The hood slipped off my head, and I winced from the glare of the overhead lights. I assessed the room as my eyes adjusted. No larger than ten square feet, bare white walls, and a folding chair in front of me. That was it.
My captor tossed the hood into the corner, moved over to the empty chair, and sat. He wore loose-fitting pants and a button-down shirt. I blinked as recognition washed over me. His hair was longer, slicked back in an oily shine. His beard was longer, too, and well groomed. In the intervening decade, his features had grown more rugged, and his eyes, no longer filled with fear and regret, were brimming with confidence.
“Captain Savage. It has been a long time.”
I nodded. “Bahar. It has been a long time.”
“So you do remember me.”
“Of course I remember you. You almost blew one of my squads to kingdom come.”<
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“Yes. That is true. How interesting life can be. It now looks as though the events of our lives have flipped. Now you are the captive, and I am the interrogator.”
“You look good, Bahar. I take it you took that deal?”
“Yes. I took the CIA’s deal.” He searched my face and held a contented smile. “I must say, I never thought we would meet again.”
“So… you’re The Recruit?”
“Guilty as charged.”
“You’ve come a long way. From what I hear, you’re a busy man these days.”
“That I am.”
“So, what am I doing here?”
“You seem to have spoken with Emmanuel Samaras. As I am sure you know, he left me a message on an internet forum. Imagine my surprise when I discovered that the number belongs to you. What was the purpose of that?”
“What was the purpose? Bahar, you kidnapped Kathleen Rose. I came to Greece to find her.”
His brow creased, his eyes narrowed. “I’m sorry?”
I sighed. “This is how we’re going to play this?”
“Play what, Captain Savage?”
“You kidnap me, bring me out here—wherever here is—and then act like you don’t know what I’m talking about? How does that help either one of us?”
Bahar spread his hands and tried to smile. “Perhaps we should start over. I am confused. And it appears that you are as well.”
“Okay. Let’s start over. Why am I here?”
“I have told you. You used Emmanuel Samaras to find me. You have succeeded, and I want to know what it is you want from me.”
I could feel the frustration building inside me. Either Bahar was playing it dumb or he really didn’t know what I wanted. If the latter, then he also didn’t know anything about Kathleen. I studied him closely as I said, “What do you know about Kathleen Rose?”
“Kathleen Rose? Nothing. I have not heard that name before today.”
“You didn’t kidnap her from the central market two days ago?”