It wasn’t a question.
They nodded agreement. “We don’t have to like it,” Drake said.
Monroe sighed. “No, young man, you don’t. Any more than I do. But that’s life.”
“How long will we be stuck here?” Spencer asked.
“No more than twenty-four hours. We still have to conclude the operation, so you’re the guests of the taxpayers until tomorrow, at which point the murder charges will be dropped and your passports returned. Then you’re free to go. Anywhere but Kashmir. Cross that off your map for the duration. Oh, and in case you get any bright ideas of giving your information to someone else so they can hunt down the treasure, that will be treated as treason on your part, so don’t even think about it.”
“You made that quite clear,” Drake said.
The general nodded, his message received loud and clear. “Then we’re done.”
Monroe departed, leaving them fuming. The head of the security detail came in and stood at the door. “The general would like me to show you to your bunks. There are showers, and the mess is open round the clock if you’re hungry.”
Drake stood and looked at Allie. “It’ll have to be a long shower to wash the stink of this whole thing off me,” he said.
The officer’s face didn’t change. “We have unlimited soap and water. This way, please.”
Chapter 59
General Monroe returned to the bank of monitors and studied the images as a younger man wearing a headset adjusted a joystick. The screen in front of him displayed a bluish glowing outline of a two-story home inside a walled area, with a number of vehicles parked in the front drive.
“Heat signatures show the vehicles have been there for a while,” the younger man said.
“Very good, Sergeant. How long until we’re in position?”
“We’re ready now.”
Monroe looked at the wall clock. “I’ll need to call the Pakistanis and alert them, but I don’t want to give them time to leak anything.”
“Understood, General.”
Monroe lifted a landline handset and pressed a speed-dial button on the base. The number blinked green on the phone’s tiny screen, and then a voice answered in English. Monroe identified himself and asked to speak to the duty officer. Thirty seconds later, another man was on the line.
“Good evening, General Monroe. What can we do for you tonight?”
“We have an operation in progress that will require clearance,” Monroe answered in a tone that indicated he wasn’t asking for permission.
“An operation? Where?”
“Rawalpindi.”
“I see. And what is the nature of the clearance you require?”
“Surgical remote strike using a Reaper drone with Hellfire missiles.”
“Is the area residential?”
“Yes, but the target is far enough away from any other buildings that there shouldn’t be any collateral damage. If you like, you can blame it on a gas tank blowing. We are not planning on issuing a statement.”
“I’ll have to check on this. What is the address?”
“I’d prefer to obtain clearance without disclosing that.”
“I’m sorry, General, but you know that’s not how it’s done.”
“It is this time.”
“Then I’m afraid we can’t offer clearance.”
Monroe bit his tongue and debated giving the duty officer the address, and then seemed to arrive at a decision. “You know what one of my favorite expressions is?” he asked softly.
“I’m sorry, General. I’m not reading you.”
“It’s a good one. The saying is ‘It’s better to ask for forgiveness than permission.’ What do you think of that, young man?”
“General, there are established protocols we must follow. Agreed to by both our countries.”
“Yes, well, I’m afraid the target has no address. We only have coordinates,” Monroe said. The sergeant watched Monroe from his position in front of the screens without expression.
“What are the coordinates?”
Monroe read off the longitude and latitude. “How long will this take?” he demanded when he was through.
“Let me check with my superiors.”
“Get them out of bed, call a meeting, however you want to do it, but get me my clearance, because I’m not going to wait forever.”
“I urge you to follow the protocol.”
“You have five minutes, and then I’m going in.” Monroe hung up, knowing that he’d take the heat for the exchange, but not particularly caring. He felt old, every year a dead weight, and if this was his last operation before being put out to pasture as a scapegoat for a necessary strike, so be it. Let the diplomats tussle and pull hair and jockey for advantage — he was a warrior who lived by a code of honor, too much of which had already been sacrificed to get them to this delicate point.
He flashed back to the look of disgust on the young woman’s face at his collaboration with the slaver. A woman who could have been his daughter — or truthfully, more like an older version of his granddaughter. He’d tried to explain the delicacy, the inefficiency of using a blunt instrument like morality in a situation requiring considerable nuance and ethical elasticity — that it wasn’t a question of right or wrong, black or white, but only infinite shades of gray on a spectrum he hadn’t invented — but her glare had burned through him with the accusatory damnation of the righteous.
Monroe tried to remember when he’d been that young, when he’d been able to afford moral certainty, before he’d learned the hard way that everything in life was about compromises, little adjustments made for the common good, even if they were repugnant in the short term. He couldn’t. It had been too long ago, too much water beneath that bridge, and all he could recall were his duty and his obligations.
“General? Is everything all right, sir?” the sergeant asked, looking at Monroe with a worried expression.
Monroe’s eyes focused on the screen, and he checked the time again. “Any signs of life?”
“Negative, sir.”
“Then maybe we got lucky on this one. He’s definitely in there?”
“Affirmative. We tracked a cell call two hours ago. There’s no doubt, even—” The sergeant stopped talking as he watched the screen and quickly switched the image to infrared. “Sir, we have movement. Two men just exited the front door. There. Looks like they’re making for that vehicle.”
“Blow them to hell, Sergeant. And send the house with them for company.”
“Yes, sir.”
The sergeant made a minor adjustment, and the glowing crosshairs zeroed on the SUV the two heat signatures were moving to. When they reached it, he depressed a button on his console. “Bird one is away,” he reported, and then moved the crosshairs to the left wing of the house and pressed another. “Bird two is away.” He shifted the marker to the right wing, repeated the steps, and then zeroed on the center. “All birds in flight. Time to impact — six seconds.”
He switched back to night vision, and after a pause, the SUV dissolved in a blinding flash, followed almost instantly by the detonations that masked the house behind clouds of smoke and fire. Neither man said a word until the worst of the smoke had cleared and they could see that the dwelling was completely destroyed.