by Desiree Holt
He had to give her that. She wore faded jeans, a rodeo T-shirt and a rodeo ball cap set atop a wig of curly black hair. Even he wouldn’t recognize her, except that he’d memorized every inch of her body so well that no disguise would trick him.
Slade had reminded him that the terrorists had also gotten a look at him during the boat discussion, so they’d outfitted Marc with a rodeo T-shirt and a straw cowboy hat.
He swallowed a sigh.
“Fine. But you aren’t leaving my side for a second. Got that?”
“I’m sure she does.” Slade grinned at her. “She’s pretty damn savvy, the way she kept her shit together at the lake.”
Nikki gave him a tiny grin. “Thank you. Just as long as I don’t have to do it too often.”
“Okay.” Slade slapped his hand on the roof of Marc’s cart. “I’ll get Trey and Beau over to the coliseum and check in with the others. Hofler and Trainor and their crew will be checking every possible place these nuts could pick to place a pipe bomb, then checking it again. Hofler says he believes they’ll do the deed tomorrow. He’s got experience with this stuff, so I won’t argue with him. You two take off now. You’ve got your route and your stuff. And be sure you hydrate yourselves, too.”
“You got it.”
They’d needed a reason for Marc and Nikki to be riding around everywhere for however many days it took for this thing to go down. Trainor was actually the one who’d come up with the idea of taking pictures for a magazine that would showcase the rodeo. The chairman of the board was only too glad to sign off on it after they filled him in on what was happening. No way did he want his pride and joy, a historic, multi-million-dollar event, disrupted by terrorists.
Marc drove them once around the rodeo grounds to make sure he was familiarized with every inch of it. In Delta, because his life always depended on it, he’d learned to absorb information quickly. Then they started on their ‘assignment’, stopping at vendors and exhibits so Nikki could snap photos, even as she managed to sneak shots of the crowd. In case she missed the people they were looking for, they could check the pictures.
“What if this whole thing is a mistake?” she asked, when they stopped for a moment. “What if this isn’t their target after all and we’re wasting time and resources?”
“Anything is possible,” Marc agreed. “But JSOC would have checked out the rumor before they passed it on to our team.”
He’d worried about the effect of this whole thing on her, but she was one hundred percent focused on her job. She was also damn good with the little digital camera someone had gotten for her, as well as charming and joking with the people whose pictures she took.
Periodically he would find a shady spot to park in that still gave them a wide view of the outdoor area. They could take a few moments to scan the crowd and see if they got lucky and spotted anyone. Whoever these guys were, Marc was convinced—as were the others—that they’d scope out the place today and try to blend in with all the other rodeo-goers. That meant there was a good chance they could spot them at one of the outdoor vendors or activities.
By noon they had covered a good section of the grounds, familiarizing themselves in greater detail than the day before. Getting people used to seeing them so they didn’t look out of place. That was the key. To not set off any alarms while they scoped things out.
It was straight up noon when Marc pulled the cart into the shade of an overhang and stopped. He reached into the back seat of the cart and lifted the small cooler he’d packed that morning.
“Food and water,” he said. “And a few minutes’ rest.”
Nikki uncapped her water bottle and took a long drink. “This is like finding the proverbial needle in a haystack.”
“That it is. And while the sketches you helped with are great, they aren’t the same as real photos, so we’re having to pick faces out of the crowd that we hope look like these.”
She sighed. “I wish I could have done better.”
Marc took her hand in his, lifted it to his mouth and pressed a kiss to her knuckles.
“You did great, Nikki. Better than ninety-nine percent of people. You remembered things that most folks wouldn’t even have noticed. So don’t sell yourself short.”
“Well, I hope they do what we need them to. The more I look at the crowds packing in here, the more frightened I get at the damage these men can do.”
“I think we all feel that way,” he told her. “Some of the stuff we see overseas in the sandbox could give you nightmares for years.”
“I’m so torn,” she told hm. “I’m so proud that you’re out there doing your best to protect people and get the bad guys. At the same time, though, I hate that you have to be there, putting yourself in danger.”
“Someone’s gotta do it, darlin’.” He cupped her chin and turned her head so she faced him. “I’m proud to be doing this and I promise I’m more careful than I am crossing the streets here. Okay?”
She hesitated for a moment, long enough for him to wonder what was going through her mind. But then she nodded and even smiled.
“Okay. And we’d better get back to work.”
Marc packed the trash back into the cooler and pulled out into the crowd again. He was focused on identifying the terrorists, but one tiny part of his mind still wondered what was bothering Nikki. Whatever it was, he’d fix it before he had to leave again. He’d found the woman who made him whole once more and gave his life meaning unlike anything he’d ever known. He’d do whatever was necessary to make it work.
* * * *
Rafiq dropped them off just before the gate officially opened.
“You can ease yourselves into the crowd. Do not all go on together, but make your way to the spot I marked and go from there. There is safety and disguise in numbers.”
The three of them—Jamal, Kasim and Salman—blended into the crowd waiting to enter, passed through security with no trouble and met at the designated spot. Even though Jamal had studied the huge maps and diagrams of the event grounds, he still could not help marveling at the size of it as well as the numbers of people in attendance.
“Be sure to note the heavy presence of the rodeo security force,” Salman reminded them. “Lucky for us, as Rafiq explained, they wear their uniforms, so they are easy to identify. You have your programs?”
Rafiq had told them each to purchase a program as they entered. That way they could look like regular attendees checking locations as they walked around. Kasim had a ballpoint pen with him to mark off the spots that Salman said were optimum for bomb placement. And Jamal took pictures with the cell phone he’d been given, forcing himself to adopt the posture of any of the thousands of eventgoers doing the same thing.
“It is best to place them in this area where all the food vendors and exhibits are located,” he told them. “The vests should be detonated in the Freeman Coliseum and one of the expo halls. We will look at both of them and decide which one would give you the best effect.”
They stopped shortly after noon, to buy bottled water and something called noodle buckets with chicken. They sat at a bench behind a tree to eat.
“Who are those people riding around in that cart?” Kasim asked, pointing to a golf cart carrying a man and a woman.
“It looks like they are rodeo employees,” Salman said. “When they were taking pictures at one of the vendors, I walked over to listen to what they were saying. It seems they are taking pictures for a magazine the rodeo is putting together. Why?” He gave Kasim a sharp look. “Do you recognize either of them?”
Kasim shook his head. “No. I just want to make sure they aren’t taking pictures of the crowd.”
“Don’t worry. I won’t let them anywhere near you. Even though tomorrow is your last day on earth, it would not do to have your picture show up someplace. Any of our pictures. Who knows what could lead back to Rafiq and me and the others?”
Jamal squinted at the cart as it passed them heading toward the carnival. A thread of unease wriggled through
him, but he didn’t know why. Neither of the two people looked familiar to him. How would anyone know to search them out here, anyway? He did not remember if any of them had mentioned the rodeo when the nurse had been in their cottage.
By mid-afternoon, they had covered the necessary portions of the event grounds and marked where the bombs were to be located. Jamal was ready to get out of this crowd of infidels and back to the place where they were staying. Perhaps he could persuade Rafiq to have someone take them to say goodbye to Malik. If not, he would just keep him in his mind. He had already accepted the fact that Malik would not survive this. Then he would say his evening prayers, memorize the map and prepare for tomorrow.
Allah be with me.
Chapter Sixteen
At seven in the morning, Marc’s cell phone rang. He groaned as he rolled over, not wanting to separate himself from the warm, naked body of the woman next to him. He grabbed the phone and punched Accept.
“Yeah?” he growled.
“It’s Hofler. Bring your lady and get your asses down to the sheriff’s office. Meeting in the conference room in one hour.”
He disconnected before Marc could reply.
“What is it?” Nikki murmured from beneath the covers.
“That was Hofler.” He repeated the short message. “I hope to hell it means he’s got something for us so we aren’t flying so blind.”
“I hope so, too. I’d like to get these men caught before they can blow anything up.”
“You and the rest of us, darlin’.” He kissed her cheek. “Come on. We’d better get ready. Hope he’s got some good pastries to feed us.”
Hofler and Vasquez were already in the conference room when he arrived, along with the rest of his Delta Team. Joe Trainor and Frank Novak were also just walking in.
“The others will be here in a moment,” Vasquez said. “Help yourself to coffee and a roll and have a seat down at this end of the table. Agent Hofler has some interesting and helpful news.”
Marc noticed then that a screen had been set up at one end of the room and Hofler had a computer open in front of him.
“Good,” Trainor said. “We could use some.”
“Amen,” Marc added.
“Then you’ll be happy to know we’ve had success with the photos you and Miss Alvarez took. Agents from both my office and DC flew in late yesterday and we spent a good part of the night looking through the photos you took. I had also sent them to DC so they could scan them and see if anyone matched up with photos in their database. “
“And?” Slade prompted.
“See for yourself.”
Hofler pressed a key on his computer and four pictures hit the screen at the same time. They all stared at them. Then four more pictures took their place and finally two shots. Next to him, Marc felt Nikki tense and she reached for his hand.
“It’s him,” she said in a low voice. “One of the men at the cottage.”
Vasquez turned his sharp eyes on her. “You know one of them, Miss Alvarez?”
She nodded. “From the cottage. Someone called him Jamal. That’s him in the brown T-shirt. I don’t know why I didn’t notice him yesterday.”
“You were snapping crowd pictures as fast as you could,” Marc reminded her. “He blended in so well. It was difficult to determine ethnicity in the crowd. If he had stood out in any way, you would have noticed him.”
“But we’ve got the pictures now,” Hofler reminded her. “And an identification, thanks to an undercover agent we’ve got in the camp in Niger. His name is Jamal Baqri. He’s the designated leader of the four-man team sent to Mexico for training then smuggled into this country. Our sources tell us today is their target date, so it’s a good thing we identified him.”
“But what about the other men?” Nikki asked. “I know one of them was injured. He may have died of infection if they didn’t get him to a doctor. Marc shot another one, but that still leaves the fourth one. I think his name is Kasim.”
“We couldn’t face match him,” Hofler answered. “But we did get lucky with another one.” He tapped a key on the computer and brought up two more pictures. “See the man in the black T-shirt with the very curly hair? His name is Salman Abidi. He’s part of a crew led by a man named Rafiq Pasha. We’ve had our eye on him for some time. Then he upped and disappeared. We were pretty sure he was still in San Antonio. When this whole thing came down the pike, we upped our search for him. Figured he’d squirreled himself away waiting for these guys to arrive from Mexico so they could get their plan in motion.”
“But…why did they need someone else to do this?” Nikki asked. “Couldn’t he just have done whatever this is himself?”
Hofler shook his head. “He’s not a doer. He’s a planner. He puts everything together and whoever is highest up on the ladder sends him the grunts to carry it out.”
“So they’re the ones who blow themselves up,” Slade guessed.
“Got it in one.” Hofler took a swallow of his coffee. “We’ve already got dogs at the event, stashed away in one of the cattle barns. What we need you to do, Miss Alvarez, is ride around there today with Marc, spot either of the men from the cottage and let us know what they’re doing.”
“Not an option,” Marc growled. “I’m not putting her in any more danger. Why can’t you just look for them on the camera feeds?”
“Because by the time we send out the word where they are, they could have moved to another spot.”
“But—”
Nikki put her hand on his arm. When he looked at her, he saw the fear in her eyes but also determination.
“I’m the only person who has seen them close up. You’ll be right with me. Nothing is going to happen to me. Okay?”
“Once she identifies them and where they are,” Hofler said, “the rest of us will take over.”
“I hope you’re including us in that,” Slade told him. “This is what we do for a living, dealing with these lunatics.”
“I’m counting on it. So. We have a camera at the main gate to see if we can spot them entering. We’ll try to follow them electronically after that but if we miss it, the next thing is to look for anyone wearing a backpack.”
“Then what?” Novak asked.
“One of you will track them,” Hofler explained. “If they conceal a package someplace, we’ve got the dogs to sniff for bombs. We may have to track them a little, gathering up what they’ve left, because when we drop the net on them we want to make sure they haven’t sent a signal to detonate the explosives.”
He paused to take another swallow of his coffee.
“The pattern is for them to strategically place pipe bombs around the area, then use cell phones to set them all off at the same time. Last time this happened, in Paris, while the bombs were still exploding the men who placed them opened their shirts to expose suicide vests and detonated them. If we stop him too soon he may just get to the main event right then, before we can clear people out of the way.”
“Oh, god.” Nikki squeezed Marc’s hand, hard.
“And you want me to bring my girl into that?” Marc wanted to snap someone’s head off.
“We just need her to help us with a positive identification. Like I said earlier, as soon as we see them enter the grounds we’ll start following them. We’ll have the dogs. As they place each bomb, we’ll be able to pick it up and put it in the special container. I promise you. We’ll have eyes on the main gate and the electronics will be all over everything.”
“If you have the electronics, why do you need Nikki?” He had a bad feeling about this. Getting her away from this was a priority for him, but it didn’t look like that was going to happen.”
“Marc, I told you. It’s fine. The cameras can’t cover everything at once. Let’s just do it and get it over with.”
* * * *
At the house in South San Antonio, everyone was up early for the big day. After morning prayers, they all had a breakfast of sweet rolls and coffee before preparing to leave for the rodeo.
Last thing, Jamal and Kasim donned the long-sleeved plaid shirts, rolling up the sleeves so they wouldn’t look quite so out of place. They would fit loosely over the suicide vests when they were finally able to slip them on.
Rafiq had insisted on going over the details with them one last time. Jamal was losing patience but realized it was important to lock everything down. They would have only one chance to get this right. Salman would go. Also, but like the day before, he would stand in line separately. They had decided the best place to rendezvous, after which Salman would take them to get the explosives.
Unlike opening day, beginning today the gates and some food vendors would open at eight o’clock, with attractions opening at ten. They had discussed several options and agreed that noon would be their zero hour. After placing the pipe bombs, Jamal and Kasim would make their way to their final targets, one of them to Freeman and the other to the expo hall. As soon as the pipe bombs began exploding, they would each find a spot where they could garner everyone’s attention, open their shirts to expose the vests and detonate them in simultaneous explosions.
“I will find the right spot to get their attention,” Jamal assured the others.
“As will I,” Kasim added.
“Good, good.” Rafiq studied both of them with a hard look. “No mistakes today.”
Jamal shook his head. “Will you trust us for this mission? We have trained for it for months. We will not fail, not you, not Allah.”
“Then we are all set. Let’s get into the van. I will be driving so Salman can move freely into the grounds.” He paused. “And I will find my way into the area where I will await your phone call.”
“Then let’s get going. Come on, now.”
They left through the back door, down the stairs and into the van. Then they headed for the rodeo grounds.
It was after eleven o’clock when they arrived. As they had the day before, they each entered the grounds separately, presenting their tickets and passing through security. Salman wandered off away from them, pretending interest in all the displays that were set up. Jamal and Kasim made their way slowly and separately to the truck Salman had shown them the day before, pausing to look at different exhibits and activities as they moved along. Dressed in the jeans and T-shirts they’d been given, they entered the big truck, found the false back and stuffed the bombs into knapsacks. Next they donned the vests and covered them with the plaid shirts, sleeves rolled up.
