In this case, al-Maliki was scheduled to leave for Paris at seven a.m., so to avoid the traffic moving in and out of the Green Zone, he booked an entire floor at the Babylon for himself and his aides. The summit was scheduled a month or so in advance. Al-Maliki’s plans to attend were public knowledge, so the bombers made a decision based on precedent, which obviously turned out to be right. They had plenty of time to set up an electrical malfunction, which al-Umari used to get them into the building.”
“How did they plant the devices?”
“They built them into the walls on long-delay timers. Ingenious, really. The IRA tried something similar in ’84. They failed as well, by the way, only their target was Margaret Thatcher and her entire cabinet.”
“What about the tape? Where was it found?”
“In a wall safe in the house. He didn’t do a good job of hiding it, to be honest. He might as well have left it on the kitchen table.”
Naomi thought about that for a second. “He didn’t feel the need to hide it, probably because it wasn’t supposed to exist in the first place. Al-Umari recorded it himself, right? For insurance?”
“It looks that way.”
“But you can’t identify the other voice.” The chief of station shook his head in the negative.
“What about the gate guards? Maybe one of them—”
“Not yet. Remember, this is a new development, Naomi. They only found the tape this morning, but it’s already in the works. The Iraqis will have a copy sometime tomorrow.”
“And the men who planted the bomb?”
“They’ve disappeared as well. One point of interest: the team leader was a German by the name of Erich Kohl. That comes from the gate guards, by the way; they didn’t do the security checks, but they did sign the workers in each morning. Kohl only showed up in the second week.
Interestingly enough, the German government doesn’t have a contractor by that name in the region, at least not in an official capacity.”
Naomi nodded and reached for her coffee, which was already growing cold. “So, Kohl might be the mystery man on the tape?”
“I’d say there’s a good chance. What I want you to do is bring it to our British friends and see if they can dig up a matching voiceprint on file. The conversation takes place in Arabic… Will that be a problem?”
She shook her head. “No, probably not. We can work around it.”
“Good. There’s a copy waiting for you in Operations.” Mills leaned back in his chair and studied her plaintively. “If you need me to get involved, that’s not a problem, but I’d prefer to handle it at our level. You can see the problem… We are not supposed to have this tape. I hope someone owes you a favor.”
Naomi smiled as she gathered her things. “Actually, sir, I think I have just the man in mind.”
CHAPTER 5
FALLUJAH
Mark Walland was on one knee in the dusty bed of the third Tacoma, which was turned around and facing north, back toward the train station. The other vehicles, parked about 30 meters away, had yet to pull the same maneuver. From his position, he could clearly see the two Iraqis standing guard, as well as the AK-47 rifles they held, which were vaguely pointed in the direction of the American visitors.
The scenario made him distinctly uneasy, even though he had performed similar tasks with Ryan Kealey on two other occasions in the past few days, and many times before that. The exchange of money for information and regional support was nothing new in the intelligence business, but Walland, despite his youth and limited experience, knew a few things about how effective the practice really was. A stack of American dollars could get you all kinds of promises, but it couldn’t reveal a man’s true nature, and the Arabs, at least the ones the Agency dealt with, were skilled dissemblers. Walland knew it was just a matter of time before one of their “clients”
decided that the money just wasn’t worth it.
He glanced at his watch, then lifted his left hand to adjust his ball cap. His right was wrapped around the grip of his M4 carbine. The weapon was specially modified, with a Rail Interface System that included a Visible Laser and a forward handgrip. Mounted to the upper receiver was an ACOG low-light, 4-power telescopic sight. Despite the rifle’s proven worth in combat, it didn’t offer Walland a great deal of comfort, as his intuition told him that the surrounding buildings were probably filled with armed insurgents. He was in a very dangerous place, and he knew it. Still, at least he had the advantage of a weapon at hand. Kealey’s position was much more precarious. At the moment, Kealey had nothing but a backpack full of cash and the word of a Sunni warlord.
The dark hallways seemed far more extensive than he would have guessed from the front of the building. From the search at the entrance, Kealey had passed into the custody of two more fighters, each of whom wore kaffiyehs to shield their identities. He walked between the two men, their feet shuffling forward on cracked tile. The dim light prevented him from seeing who else might have been lurking in the shadows, but it did give him the opportunity to carefully withdraw an object from the main compartment of his pack, which he slid into the waistband of his utility pants. He then pulled his T-shirt over the slight bulge. His escorts didn’t seem to notice the small movement.
A few more paces, and they stopped at a plain wooden door. One of the Iraqis ducked in first, then reemerged and gestured for Kealey to enter.
The room was spare and cramped, with a small window to the right. The hazy light that drifted through the dirty panes was enough to pull two men out of the shadows. The first was a guard armed with a battle-scarred AK-47. He stood in a corner, behind and to the left of his charge.
The second man sat in the middle of the room, his thick arms resting on a bare metal table. When their eyes met, he smiled and gestured at the chair opposite his own. Kealey took the seat, dropping the backpack onto the floor next to him. As he did so, he heard another guard settle into position behind him. The door closed a moment later, and it was just the four of them.
The man smiled once more at Kealey, but it was a gesture devoid of warmth. “You’ve come a long way. Would you like something to drink? Something to eat, perhaps?”
He knew that to refuse would be seen as an insult, and he didn’t want to set them on edge. At least not yet. “Just water.”
The order was given to the guard behind Kealey. Hearing the door open and close once again, he took advantage of the brief distraction to study his host.
As far as the U.S. intelligence community was concerned, Arshad Abdul Kassem was a blank page. Even his age could not be verified, though Kealey’s briefing officer in Baghdad had suggested that it probably fell somewhere between forty-five and fifty. This estimate was based on the fact that Kassem had served as a captain in the Republican Guard during the early years of the Iran-Iraq war, and then as a brigadier general in the months leading up to the second gulf war. When the Americans invaded in 2003, Kassem had made arrangements that resulted in the quiet surrender of his entire mechanized brigade outside Karbala. After several months in U.S.
custody, Kassem was offered an even quieter deal by the CIA.
With the fall of the Baath regime in 2003, the former officer had narrowly avoided sharing the fate of his party leader. At least, that was the official line of the U.S. government. In truth, his name had never appeared on a watch list, for the Agency had a use for men like Arshad Kassem, high-profile figures in the former regime, with all the right connections. It made Kealey sick to deal with people like this, men who had, in all probability, committed unspeakable crimes under Saddam. Unfortunately, it was hard to find clean hands in high places, especially in this part of the world.