“I . . . I . . . okay,” Al Falah then sputtered, speaking English for the first time. “I will tell you. I will tell you! Please . . .”
“That’s more like it,” Tailor said. He pushed the switch on his knife, and the blade disappeared back into the handle. I took my foot off of Al Falah’s chest and holstered my pistol. Tailor and I then grabbed the back of his chair, hoisted him up, and set our prisoner upright again.
“Your uncle,” Sarah said, sitting back down in her chair. “Ali bin Ahmed Al Falah. Tell me everything you know about him.” The young Arab took one last look around the room, lowered his head slightly, and began to talk. He had a lot to say.
Stepping onto the roof, I saw Sarah silhouetted against the lights of the city. She was standing by the wall that ran around the roof of the house, smoking a cigarette. Hearing me open the door, she turned around briefly and nodded. I returned the nod, and stood beside her.
Below us was the small villa that we used for a safe house. The house itself was big, with no less than six bedrooms, two and a half bathrooms, and a big common area downstairs. In addition to that, it had a huge basement. Basements were rare in homes in the Middle East. The safe house also had a tall wall around it. Next to the house was a large carport that held four vehicles. In front of the house was a sort of garden with a grove of tall palm trees and a mess of ferns at their bases.
“Are you okay?” I asked, looking out over the city. “I didn’t know you smoked.”
“I don’t,” she said, exhaling a puff of smoke. “I mean, I quit years ago. I bummed one off Tailor. I just . . . sometimes when I get stressed I have one. That’s all.”
“Oh, I see. What’s wrong?”
“I thought you were going to kill that guy.”
“Sarah.” I paused for a moment while I struggled to find the right words. “I did kill a man tonight. One of Al Falah’s bodyguards.”
“I know! I ordered you to. It’s just . . . I don’t know. I’m being stupid. I’ve never been part of an interrogation like that before.”
“I was a little surprised to see you here,” I said.
“I was surprised when they called me out. I guess the other Arabic speakers were busy. Walker was probably busy pulling somebody’s fingernails out. I was told that normally I wouldn’t leave the compound much. I’m not even supposed to know where all of the safe houses are!”
“You’ve never done an interrogation like that before, have you?” I asked.
“No. I suppose you’ve done a lot of them, right?”
“Not really,” I said truthfully. “I was mostly a trigger-puller. We had intel specialists do that kind of thing.”
“Tailor seemed like he was enjoying himself,” she said hesitantly.
“Well . . . Tailor is crazy. He’s always been like that.”
“How long have you known him?”
“Years now. Since we were in Africa together.”
“Do you really trust him?” Sarah asked, putting out her cigarette on the top of the wall and looking over at me.
“With my life,” I replied. “I don’t know if I’d trust him with anybody else’s, though.”
Sarah looked at me sideways, eyebrows raised. She then let out a sardonic chuckle. “You’re funny, Mike,” she said, calling me by my given name for the first time. We stood together, looking out over the lights of the city, for what seemed like a long time. Neither one of us said anything.
“You did fine, by the way,” I said at last.
“What?”
“In the interrogation,” I continued. “You really kept your cool in there. You really seemed like you knew your stuff.”
“I’ve been trained,” Sarah said, “by, um, our employers for Project Heartbreaker. I just didn’t know how intense it was going to be.”
“It gets easier. I mean, it sounds horrible, but you get used to it.”
“I hope so,” Sarah said. “We’re just getting started.”
“You hear something?” I asked.
“Oh, yeah.” She looked back over at me. “We’ve got a list of targets a mile long. Terrorists, financiers, support people, recruiting people, you name it.”
“You know all of the targets?” I asked incredulously.
“What? Oh, no. I just got a peek at it. It’s not just names, either. It’s places. Gatherings. Events. This is going to get ugly, Mike.”
“That’s what I figured,” I said. “So, what happens to our boy downstairs?”
“Hunter’s sending someone to come get him. I don’t know what they’re going to do with him now.”
“They’ll either make a deal with him in exchange for being a continuing source of information, or they’ll put a bullet in his brainpan and dump him in the ocean. Either way, sucks to be him.”
Sarah nodded. “His computer wasn’t even password protected, either. There’s a lot of information on there. Hunter was happy.”
“Heh . . . I’m glad. So, do you know what’s next?”
“His uncle. He’s the next target for you guys.”
“I figured. When?”
“Soon. Hunter said your chalk did so well that he’s giving you that mission next. We’ve got some more intel to gather, but that’s your next job. They’ll be sending me information to brief you soon.”
“Good.”
“Mike . . . I saw something else. You know, when I was digging around. They’re expecting heavy casualties for Dead Six. The operations they’re planning are high risk and are planned with minimum possible manpower.”
I sighed aloud, looking back out over the city. “Great.”
“You just be careful out there, okay?” she said quietly. She was staring at me intently. We held eye contact for a long time.
“I will,” I managed.
“What’s up?” Tailor said, strolling through the door onto the roof, lighting a cigarette as he went. He was unusually upbeat and had a stupid grin on his face. He paused when he realized Sarah and I were alone together. “Am I, uh, interrupting something?” he asked, cigarette in mouth.
“No, no,” Sarah said, stepping away from me. “I was just giving Valentine some info on what’s happening next.”
“We’re going after his uncle, right?” Tailor asked, referring to the captive in our basement.
“Sure are,” I answered.
The expression on Tailor’s face changed almost imperceptibly. My friend might not have been certifiably nuts, but he sure did enjoy this kind of thing a little too much. “Good.” He grinned.
Chapter 4:
Secondary Target
LORENZO
March 13
Falah had sounded nervous on the phone as he apologized for postponing our appointment due to family trouble. I played the concerned friend, even went so far as to offer my assistance, but he wouldn’t elaborate about what was wrong. It wasn’t until afterward that I got the word on the street that Falah’s favorite nephew had disappeared. The bodyguards provided by his uncle had been found shot to death, along with one of their new recruits. I’d only met the kid once. He’d struck me as another obnoxious rich kid, wannabe-terrorist asshole.
Nobody had any idea who’d taken him. It wouldn’t have surprised me if the senior Falah wasn’t waiting by the phone for the ransom call right now. There was a subset of the criminal underworld that specialized in kidnapping the kinds of targets whose parents wouldn’t involve the authorities. It was dangerous, but drug lords’ kids were especially lucrative. But I knew of most of the crews who did that kind of thing professionally, and I didn’t think any of them were operating around here.