“What was wrong with the backgammon thing?”
“You wanted the truth. Are you saying you can’t handle the truth?”
Hawke smiled for a moment, pleased to see they hadn’t destroyed her sense of humor, but his face quickly dropped back into a frown when he remembered what she had said about Saqqal and Jawad. “Bacteriology?”
“This has to be something to do with weaponization, Joe.”
“Yeah… and here I was thinking we were busy enough trying to catch Kruger, rescue Ryan and save the Lost Treasure of the Incas. Now we have a couple of psychos with a bioweapon fixation on our hands.”
“Yup.”
“What else have you got on Saqqal?”
“Not a whole lot, but enough to grease the wheels. In his younger days he was in the Syrian Army where he rose through the ranks with some efficiency until becoming a highly respected general, but that’s where things went wrong. No one knows why but he left the army and ended up joining Hezbollah where his talents were put to use serving as a strategist and field commander in its military arm.”
“Don’t stop now,” he said sarcastically. “I can hardly contain myself.”
“He went back into Syria a few years ago with his Hezbollah troops where he fought to defend Assad against the rebels, but then returned to Lebanon when he was wounded in the arm. It was then he hooked up with Bashir Jawad and a beautiful relationship was born.”
“Certainly sounds like it. What about this Jawad toerag?”
“He’s easy — he has a very public profile from his work at the university. A little older than Saqqal and zero military experience. Educated in Lebanon and France with post-doctoral work in the US, he’s worked in the field of bacteriology for decades and is considered a world authority on the subject.”
“And for some reason these two clowns are hanging around with Dirk Kruger and they’re all searching for the Lost City of the Incas.” He blew out a long breath and tried to gather his thoughts. “Gotta say Alex, none of this is filling me with confidence.”
“There’s more.”
“Oh, happiness.”
“I was reviewing the hotel’s external CCTV and the three of these guys left together in a hired Jeep an hour or so ago, and they were joined by two other men.”
“Who?”
“Can’t help with the driver — he was already in the car when it pulled up at the hotel, but the other guy got out and they spoke for a moment. “His name’s Ross Chastain, an American hired gun from Alabama. Former Delta soldier who was kicked out for insubordination and is now way past his prime. He was involved with FARC via a drugs-running operation bringing coke into the US but he left them too.”
“Kicked out of the Deltas, eh?” Hawke said, thinking aloud. “Maybe that explains why he turned, but why did he leave FARC?”
“Chastain and his men disagreed with the main movers and shakers at FARC headquarters when they declared their unilateral ceasefire back in 2015 and that’s when he broke off and formed the Colombian Guerilla Force, or the CGF. So now he’s all wrapped up with a FARC splinter group and it looks like he’s hiring his men out to Saqqal and Kruger,” Alex said. “These guys have trafficked coke to fund their terrorism since they started, and they use camps like this to train their men. They also have a good sideline in high-level kidnappings and ransoms.”
“Is he what Americans call a douchebag?”
“Yup,” Alex said. “Nailed it.”
“Thanks. I have to say that this is not filling my day with sunshine and bluebirds.”
“Mine either, but that’s all I have. I wish I could help you more, but between my injuries and the whole Dad Thing it’s impossible.”
Only Alex Reeve could refer to her father’s impending Presidency of the United States as the Dad Thing. Hawke knew in his heart she would have to stay in DC not only while she recovered from the attack on Elysium, but longer if she couldn’t persuade her father that she could be safe from threats away from Secret Service protection, and that was going to be a tall order after Elysium. If she could be reached in that way on an isolated and heavily defended island then Jack Brooke was going to have a tough time letting her go anywhere else.
“And how is your dad?”
“Busier than usual, that's for sure. He keeps making jokes that the Electoral College is going to put Peterson in the White House instead of him and he can go back to Idaho, but it’s just nerves.”
“And how about you?” he asked, his voice quieter now. He expected an evasive response from her, as was her way, and that was exactly what he got.
“Just sitting in hospital hacking crap for you.”
“I meant when you’re out of hospital?”
A long pause. He heard the sound of a car horn outside her window and then a nurse said something to her before there was the sound of a door closing.
“Shit, I don’t know, Joe! Everything’s happening so fast. We were a team and then we got attacked and our base was smashed up, and now my Dad’s the President-Elect and I’m in DC. What do you want me to say?”
“I’m sorry.”
“Forget about it… listen — at first I wanted to tell Dad and his shadows to go screw themselves and that I had my own life to lead… that I was coming back to you guys, but now I think maybe this is a chance for us to build a bridge to each other, you know? Maybe the only chance.”
“I understand.”
“Listen, I’ll look into these assholes more later.”
“Thanks. We need to concentrate on the connection between them.” he said, rubbing his temples. “Why are they working together?”
“That is for you to work out, Joe. We all have our problems. I have to decide whether to have chicken or beef for dinner tonight.”
“A tough choice?”
“Not really. They both taste like plastic.”
After he disconnected he waited in silence for a few moments, unsure how to break the news to the rest of the team. As far as they were concerned, they were hunting Dirk Kruger, a corrupt archaeologist and part-time treasure hunter, with a view to stopping him getting to the Lost City. Now things had changed. A few simple words from Alex Reeve in Washington DC had changed the game completely. Why the hell would Dirk Kruger be associating with a Syrian terrorist rebel and a world-renowned expert in bacteria? He rubbed the back of his neck for a few seconds and sighed before getting up from his seat and walking to the others.
“And?” Lexi looked up expectantly.
“And we’re in more shit than we thought,” he said frankly.
“When were we ever in less shit than we thought?” Lea said.
“This is true…” Reaper said with a sympathetic nod of his head. “Always much more shit than you think… in life, I mean.”
Scarlet yawned. “Spit it out, darling, and while you’re at it, why not turn that frown upside down?” She punctuated the flippant comment by cracking the lid off a bottle of beer. He watched the low cabin lights of the jet illuminate the tiny cloud of condensed water vapor as it escaped from the neck of the bottle.
“Our South African friend has hooked up with a Syrian rebel of unknown affiliation and a bacteriologist.”
“Shit,” Scarlet said, pulling the beer away from her mouth before she had even taken a sip. “You’d better keep that shagging frown exactly where it is and tell me where I can get one.”
“Quite, and I think this just about quadruples the pressure on us finding them before they get to whatever the hell they’re looking for.”
Reaper nodded and exhaled sharply. “Oui.”