“How?” I asked incredulously. I could hear the metal coming out of his earpieces from across the room. That mystery was going to go unanswered as Reaper suddenly pumped his fist in the air.
“Cracked it!”
Thank goodness. This was big, but I had faith that Reaper could do it. “Well, that’s a little anticlimactic,” I said. Carl grunted in agreement and popped open another beer. It wasn’t that you couldn’t get alcohol in Muslim countries; you just had to know where to look. “Me crashing a hundred-thousand Euro car was way cooler.”
Reaper yanked out the earpieces. “I’m in. I’ve got everything. His password protection was pathetic. I own you, punk-ass bitch! Ha!” he shouted like he had just won a multiplayer death match rather than broken into a terrorist financier’s personal files.
I approached and stood over Reaper’s shoulder. “Look for anything on Adar. We need his contact info. If it isn’t under Adar, look for the Butcher. It’s time for Al Falah to call his pet psycho home.”
I called the Fat Man at the number provided in the folder from Thailand. I’d already had Reaper take a shot at figuring out where it originated, but it was even more secure than my personal communications, bounced off of who knew how many satellites and scrambled in every way imaginable.
The Fat Man knew who it was before I even spoke. “Hello, Mr. Lorenzo. How goes it?”
“Phase One is complete. We’ve implemented Phase Two,” I said.
“I shall pass that on to our employer. We had heard that there had been a few complications.” His voice was without inflection. He wouldn’t even give me a clue if he had just woken up or if it was late at night. Nobody even knew what time zone Big Eddie was in. “Nothing you couldn’t handle, I assume.”
“Of course not.”
“By the way, some of our men attended your niece’s dance recital. Rachel, I believe her name was. Let’s see, she belongs to your brother, Robert. They recorded the recital for Big Eddie. He commented that she is very graceful and talented for such a young girl.”
“I told you. I’ll do the job,” I stated.
“Of course you will. Eddie just likes to keep track of his employees. It is what makes him such an effective leader. Keep up the good work.” Then he hung up. I carefully put my phone away before smashing my fist into the wall.
Chapter 6:
From Sea to Shining Sea
VALENTINE
Ash Shamal District
April 1
2005
“Xbox, this is Shafter,” Hudson said over the radio, breathing hard. “We’re in position.”
Tailor looked over at me. I nodded, and he spoke into his radio. “Copy that. Stand by. Control, Xbox, we’re standing by.”
“Xbox, Control,” Sarah said, sounding as calm and distant as ever. “Execute. Be careful,” she added, her voice softening just a bit.
I smiled to myself. “This is going to be a turkey shoot,” I said, observing our target building through binoculars one last time. “You think they’d have beefed up security after we snatched the Al Falah kid out here.”
“They did,” Tailor corrected. “Look. That guy right there, he’s got a rifle.”
“What is that, a G3?” I asked absentmindedly. “Look, another guy in the doorway. Looks like he’s got a sub-gun.”
“I think they’re wearing vests,” Tailor said. He patted the driver on the shoulder. “Let’s go. Shafter, Ginger, stand by to execute. When you hear shooting, enter and clear. Watch for friendlies—we’ll be coming in from the other side.”
Hudson acknowledged. Our driver, a guy from another chalk that everyone called Animal, flipped on the headlights and stomped on the gas. Our up-armored van roared down the narrow street toward the social club.
The little side street had several cars parked on either side. Tonight was the most popular night, and it seemed that the disappearance of Al Falah hadn’t deterred the enemy from using the place. The two armed clowns outside wouldn’t pose a problem. Our plan was laughably simple: take out the two armed guards outside, then enter and kill every son of a bitch in the place. Tailor and I would enter from the front, while Hudson and Wheeler would enter from the rear. The rear door led down into a basement, where we believed there might be a weapons cache. Animal was going to stay with the van. He was from Singer’s chalk; he’d been hurt and couldn’t run, but he could still drive.
The terrorist with the G3 rifle was meandering up the street, checking the parked cars when he was illuminated by our headlights. I saw him clearly; he was wearing black fatigues, a ski mask, a blue body-armor vest, and a chest rig for spare magazines. He looked pretty squared away, and our van’s windshield probably wouldn’t stop direct hits from a 7.62x51mm weapon.
That didn’t deter Animal. He swerved the van right at the terrorist. I braced myself. The man in the black fatigues dodged to the left. He wasn’t fast enough. Our heavy, armored van came to a stop with a crunch of twisting metal and shattering glass. The little Toyota sedan we hit crumpled and was pushed up onto the curb. The man in black was pinned between our van and the Toyota, his legs and hips crushed.
“Move, move!” Tailor shouted, pulling the van’s right-side door open. I shouldered the paratrooper SAW I was carrying and headed for the door. I heard two quick shots as Animal leaned out the window and blasted the pinned terrorist with his .45. I ignored it as I ripped off a short burst at the man guarding the door, my machine gun roaring loudly in the narrow alley. The 5.56 mm bullets punched through him, splattering blood on the wall behind. He was so surprised he hadn’t even gotten his weapon ready.
I came up to the door. Tailor was right behind me. Stepping over the body, I reached forward and yanked the door open just as a long rattle of automatic fire could be heard from behind the building. I held the door open, and Tailor tossed in a pyrotechnic distraction device. We would’ve used grenades, but we didn’t know where Hudson and Wheeler were. A couple seconds later the device detonated, blasting the room with a head-splitting concussion.
Tailor and I stormed inside, weapons at the ready. The doorway dog-legged around into a main room. We rounded the corner. The social club was in chaos. Men were running in every direction, shouting and screaming in Arabic. Billiards tables lined one wall, and couches lined the other. The air stank of smoke from cigarettes, hookahs, and our flash-bang. Terrorist propaganda and Islamic flags were plastered all over the walls.
Men ran toward us, trying to get out of the building. They were either too confused and didn’t realize we were there, or thought we were their own armed guys. It didn’t really matter. I leveled my machine gun and squeezed the trigger.
It was a massacre. Tailor and I moved laterally across the main room, firing at anything that moved. A door burst open and a pair of men came running in, armed with assault rifles, but we cut them down before they even realized what was happening. The crowd of terrorist recruits turned, trying to escape down the stairs, tripping over overturned chairs, bodies, and each other as they fled. It didn’t do them any good.
“We’re in the basement,” Wheeler said over the radio. The men trying to flee out the back entrance were gunned down as they came upon Wheeler and Hudson.