Admittedly, there was thrill in danger: insertion into the country, the skill of getting into position without detection. It was a rush that he now realized he’d missed more than he had thought. The actual killing would be anticlimactic. Death from a distance was never as exciting as face-to-face. Still, for the pure pucker factor, it beat painting seascapes.
He returned to his former position: legs flat and wide apart, elbows resting comfortably to support his weapon. He inhaled deeply — once, twice — and centered the scope between Bugunda’s eyes before lowering it perhaps a millimeter. A shot in the middle of the forehead was desirable but it was unlikely the man would survive any head shot.
With the eye that wasn’t glued to the scope he watched the minute hand of his watch go straight up before he slipped off the safety and took two more deep breaths, and then a third, which he held as he gently increased pressure on the trigger.
So intent was he on holding his aim steady he either didn’t notice or didn’t hear the gunfire or the crack of a projectile splitting the air at ten times the speed of sound. His first real awareness came with the impact of the Heckler & Koch’s recoil and the scope’s circle of blood and brains splattering onto those standing next to his target.
He waited an extra second, watching the two men beside Moustaph drag him off the platform as though to protect him from another assassin’s bullet. As Jason dropped the rifle, his last glance toward the village took in mass confusion. Its inhabitants had either dropped to the ground or were staring stupidly at the corpse on the platform or generally getting in the way of those trying to flee. Men in uniforms were firing their weapons in every direction, including the sky. Those Jason assumed to be in command shouted orders at deaf ears as Moustaph was literally thrown into one of the jeeps, which disappeared in a cloud of red dust.
Leaving the rifle where it was, he slipped out from under his blanket and crawled as quickly as he could to the base of a flowering magic guarri tree — a bush, actually. Its fruit was often fermented into a potent liquor and its wood was said to have magic properties, two reasons it was never used to make charcoal. At the moment it would conceal Jason’s line of retreat. A rattle of automatic-rifle and machine-gun fire ripped through the grass like wind-driven rain, snipping leaves from the maize and flattening some of the millet as though by an invisible hand. He could only hope the ill-disciplined troops were firing in every direction. Still, a random bullet could kill just as easily as one carefully aimed. Ducking his head as though to present a smaller target, he stood. Keeping the guarri in line between him and the village as best he could, he moved swiftly away on a track he had predetermined with the GPS. Even as the random gunfire began to subside, it took willpower not to break into a run. The waving of the tall grass as he crashed through would not escape the notice of even the greenest troops.
The sound of gunfire had acted as a signal. Somewhere in front of him, Jason could hear rotor blades thumping the thick, humid air. From behind him there was the sound of engines.
Now Jason was in a field covered with only waist-high grass and about fifty yards across. Some sort of horned animal raised its head, spotted Jason, and fled, followed by two more of its kind.
Floating in the middle of the lake of dry grass was an old Boeing-Vertol CH-47A Chinook helicopter, the one seen on every evening’s newscast during the Vietnam War as it ferried men in and out of combat. The only difference was this one was painted black and without insignia. The payload of the Chinook had made it popular the world over for both civilian and military use. It would be as impossible to trace as the sniper’s rifle.
Jason waded through the swaying grass, the chopper’s twin rotors, one at each end, reminding him of a pair of dragonflies mating in flight. From his right, one of the jeeps he had seen in the village emerged from the tall grass, its fifty-caliber chattering at something behind it. A lump in the backseat was wrapped in flowing white robes.
They had Moustaph!
Someone in the Chinook saw it too, for a metal ramp appeared at the lip of the large cargo door halfway down the fuselage. The jeep bounced inside.
Jason was running now. With Moustaph on board, he had become dispensable. There was no need for anyone to take further risks to make the mission a success. The helicopter levitated a few inches. Once free of the earth, it began a slow counterclockwise rotation from the torque of its twin engines.
Jason was galloping at full speed, intent on reaching the chopper. Only a blur to his right caused him to turn his head in mid-stride to see the other jeep approaching. They had seen him and were turning at an angle that would put them between him and the departing Chinook.
His straining heart seemed to skip a beat as the chopper rose a little higher. He could see one of the crew members, indifferent to the approaching jeep’s machine-gun fire, standing in the doorway. Was he waving? The bastards! They were going to leave him!
No, wait. The man was signaling. He wanted Jason to stop? Jason suddenly understood. Not stop, but …
He threw himself forward onto the ground just as a finger of white smoke streaked to connect the Chinook’s doorway with the second jeep. There was a ball of fire as the vehicle disintegrated among flying parts both body and chassis and a thunder that rolled across the field like a storm.
Smoking debris was still falling like a gentle rain as Jason stood and brushed himself off before reaching out for the hand extended from the cargo door.
“Thanks!” he yelled, trying to be heard above the racket of the engines. “That was a little close!”
The crew member, his face half hidden by the visor to the helmet he wore, pointed to the still-smoking tube of the rocket launcher, smiled, pointed to his ears to indicate he couldn’t hear, and jerked a thumb at the rear of the aircraft.
There Moustaph was being helped none too gently out of the jeep, his hands cuffed behind him and his feet shackled. The crewman nodded and grinned, a smile that invited Jason’s. Stepping into the rear of the cavernous Chinook, he made sure that Moustaph was alive and in no immediate danger of anything more than the discomfort of being bound and a large, grape-colored bruise that was growing under one eye.
He stared at the terrorist whose return gaze was full of fury.
Jason smiled, remembering the old Arab proverb about revenge being a dish best served cold. Jason’s had been given over a decade to cool.
4
John Odet was certain that either his eyes were playing tricks or fate was. He shuffled the stack of photographs, wiped the magnifying glass off with a handkerchief, and started over again.
Same result.
John glanced around his diminutive office. Room enough for a nice, if small, faux wood desk, two modern club chairs, and a credenza with pictures of his family. At least his mother, father, and a couple of nieces and nephews. The director was big believer in family. Probably wouldn’t be a great idea to include pictures of John and Benny, though. Although the federal government prohibited discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation, it wasn’t smart to flaunt such things.