Ghaniyah got on the other side of the chest and on the count of three, they lifted it rather easily. They quickly loaded the chest, the old chair and a rocking chair into the truck. As the man tied it all down with rope, Ghaniyah knew this might be her last chance and quickly headed back inside.
“Hey!” the man called out.
On the top step, Ghaniyah turned back, her heart racing.
“If you’re thirsty, I have water in the truck.”
Ghaniyah gave a small smile. “I’ll just be a minute.”
Stepping back inside the old house, Ghaniyah knew that her evasive answer would lead the man to think she was in need of the bathroom. Instead, she quickly made her way to the kitchen. Fortunately, there was a small window that allowed her to keep an eye on the man. She opened a drawer and selected a five-inch sharp knife. Putting her foot on the kitchen counter, she hurriedly rolled down her calf-length stocking and placed the knife inside her stocking and the ankle-high boot, the sharp blade against her instep, the handle tight against her ankle. She put her foot on the floor, putting all her weight on the foot, testing it. Amazingly, she couldn’t feel the blade against her foot. She then pulled her stocking up, hiding any trace of the knife.
As she walked across the kitchen floor the handle painfully dug into her ankle. But it was a small price to pay for the little amount of security it provided.
Hopefully, she would never need it.
Chapter Sixteen
MP-5, The Green Zone, Baghdad, Iraq Saturday, April 15th 1:06 p.m.
“Nothing,” Peterson said, clicking through various screens on his computer. “Still off.”
“Damn,” Gonz muttered while sprawled in a nearby canvas director’s chair and eating an apple. It was quiet inside the Marco Polo 5 complex. Heisman paced nearby, a satellite cell phone glued to one ear.
“Think she knows that? That we’re trying to triangulate her cell?”
Gonz sighed. “Peterson, a couple hours ago I would’ve told you she’s our best shot at bringing down al Mudtaji and uncovering whatever he’s up to. I’d tell you we’ve got a local agent watching her, she’s not a pro, which means the chances of him getting burned are zilch. So to tell the truth, I don’t know shit.”
“Got it. Thanks,” Heisman said, disconnecting the call. He walked over to Gonz who had raised an eyebrow.
“Sent an Army captain and an interpreter to their idea of a county record office,” Heisman said, looking at a piece of paper in his hand. “The only record of a Ezzah Shukir close to the age range we want is a birth certificate from 1980.”
“Sounds about right,” Gonz said. “Birth place?”
“Basra.”
Gonz sat up, all attention now. “Siblings?”
Heisman shook his head. “Got the mother’s name, that’s all. A Faymen Shukir.” Heisman grinned at Gonz. “But guess what? This Ezzah Shukir? The address given at the time of her birth is just a couple miles from the aunt’s farmhouse. Another one of those coincidences you don’t like.”
“But the aunt, the one in the hospital, she’s from the father’s side of the family. Not the mother’s sister.”
“Doesn’t mean family didn’t live close by. How many times have we seen that?”
“True,” Gonz conceded.
“Something else of interest. She applied for a Jordanian passport in 1995.”
“And it was granted, we know that. So, what? She’s got dual citizenship?”
“Jordan’s cooperating and they’re chasing down all that stuff. Key is, if she was born there. Then there are two. One born in Basra, 1980 and the one born in Jordan.”
Gonz mulled this over for a moment. “You’re right. About the coincidences. That’s supposed to be a pretty rural area, right? Where the aunt lives? We got Ghaniyah’s aunt and maybe she and her mother, no mention of a father, living just a couple miles apart.” He bit off another piece of the apple. “My bet is on the Basra baby. She’s our Ghaniyah.”
“How does that work then?” Heisman asked. “She goes off to Jordan, gets recruited by al Qaeda?”
“Or falls in love.” Heisman shot him a skeptical look and Gonz said, “Wouldn’t be the first time.”
“Question is, is she in love now? In love with our pharmacy guy?”
“No way of knowing,” Gonz admitted.
“Handwriting sample came back negative by the way.”
“I saw that.”
“Which means, he may be telling the truth. He didn’t write the note in Quizby’s mouth. Which leaves us with Abdul al-Jarrah, a.k.a., Sharif, to be the note writer since he speaks English, too. Only he used the pharmacy stationery to rat out Adnan.”
Gonz nodded. “All’s fair in love and war.”
“Great analysis,” Heisman scoffed. He studied the paper in his hand for a moment, then asked, “You buying that al Mudtaji’s illiterate?”
“No evidence either way, really.”
“Our pharmacist friend said he tested him. Had two bottles. One marked ACE inhibitor, the other a diuretic. He asked al Mudtaji for the ACE. He got the diuretic. He also claims he tested him again just to be sure. Both times al Mudtaji had a 50-50 chance of getting it right, both times he blows it.”
“That’s his story. No way to confirm or deny.” Gonz tore off another bite of the apple and spoke while he chewed, “But, you have to wonder, if you’re a terrorist, you’re planning something big, we don’t know what, you’re constantly on the run, is it a factor?”
“What do you mean?” Heisman asked. “Being illiterate?”
“Think about it. He’s totally dependent upon voice communications, either on the phone or in person. He can’t take a chance communicating by e-mail or leaving hidden messages in chat rooms because then someone has to do it for him. Even if he’s handed a written note, he has to have someone he trusts, someone valuable to him, who can read it to him.”
“Someone high up in the brain trust,” Heisman said, continuing the line of reasoning.
“Someone that could want to be the top dog himself.”
“What are you suggesting?” Heisman asked in surprise. “A coup?”
“Why not? Can happen in any dictatorship. And I guarantee you, terrorist organizations are pure dictatorships.” Gonz turned to Peterson. “You can post a message on al Mudtaji’s website, right?”
“Someone translates, sure.”
Gonz looked at Heisman with an impish grin.
Basra, Iraq Saturday, April 15th 1:42 p.m.
McKay couldn’t believe her luck. Or rather, her lack of luck. “This isn’t good.”
“How do you want to play it?” the man calling himself Richard asked as he slowly drove the small sedan toward the ranch house.
“I don’t know,” McKay muttered. Two bright yellow trucks were parked close to the well. The doors of each truck were marked with “City of Basra” emblems in both Arabic and English.
“That’s where the water came from,” Richard said rather than asked. “You know what’s wrong with it?”
McKay hesitated. The man seemed to be legitimate. When he had picked her up at the bazaar, she had been surprised to learn that he knew her real name and spoke English surprisingly well. On their ride to the aunt’s house, he had lamented that Ghaniyah had given him the slip, explaining that he had been watching for her outside the front entrance of her hotel. However, once he had realized that she must’ve given him the slip, it was too late. He complained that he should’ve been allowed to have another man watch the rear exit of the hotel.
“Poison?” Richard asked.
“I imagine,” McKay said, keeping her answer vague. The man might be in Gonz’s loop, but she couldn’t be sure how large that loop was. “Tests haven’t been confirmed yet. At least, I haven’t heard.”
“So, how do we play it?”
“Let’s stick close to the truth. I’m a concerned doctor. Wanted to be sure there wasn’t anyone else out here sick.”
Richard nodded, putting the car in
park. The three Basra city employees watched them as they got out.
“I’ll need to get inside the house,” McKay quietly told Richard as they approached the city workers.
The man who seemed to be boss asked something in Arabic and Richard answered. The discussion seemed to go forever in McKay’s mind as Richard and the city official went back and forth. Finally Richard said to her, “They’re going to block off the well, so no one can use it until it’s been tested.”
McKay nodded. As a doctor, she was glad to hear it. Who knew who might stumble upon these few homes and want a drink of water? She turned to Richard. “Tell them that the woman who lives here, her niece hasn’t been to the hospital for a couple days. We want to be sure she isn’t here and possibly sick, too.”
Richard quickly explained in his native tongue. A moment later the man nodded his head. Richard said something in reply, then with his hand at McKay’s back, propelled her toward the front steps of the aunt’s house.
After opening the front door, which was unlocked, McKay called out loudly, “Ghaniyah? Ghaniyah, you here?”
“What are we looking for?” Richard asked quietly.
McKay didn’t answer, going directly to the bedroom. Stepping inside, she suddenly stopped short. Every drawer of the dresser was pulled out, yet there were no clothes to be seen anywhere.
Richard joined her. “What?”
McKay shook her head. Finally she told him, “Ghaniyah said she was to go back to Baghdad with her aunt’s dresser.”
Richard walked over to the dresser. “Maybe her aunt’s clothes, clothes in the dresser, not the dresser itself.”
“No,” McKay insisted. “No, we’re missing it. Something’s wrong.” McKay carefully inspected each opened drawer, but like before, there was no hidden written message anywhere.
“What exactly did this woman say?” Richard asked.
McKay shrugged. “That was it. She was to come here to Basra, see how her aunt was doing and then take the dresser back to al Mudtaji.”
Richard thought for a moment. “She say this in English?”
“Well, I don’t speak Arabic.”
“Okay, but did she say it in Arabic first? Then someone translated it?”
“No,” McKay explained. “She wanted to talk to me and she’s fluent in English. Why, what are you thinking?”
“There a chest here? Trunk locker?”
“I don’t think so.”
Richard went back to the great room, McKay quickly following. “Sometimes words from Arabic to English and vice versa, they don’t translate exact,” Richard said. “In English, a dresser is a dresser. A footlocker is a footlocker. And a chest is a chest.”
“But not in Arabic?” McKay asked.
“No.” Surveying the floor, Richard immediately noticed the cleaner carpet spot near the far wall. “What was here?”
McKay thought hard. “A chair, I think. Pretty sad looking.”
Richard then noticed the four deep impression marks in the carpet nearby. He kneeled down, running his hand over the carpet. “This was it. Look.” McKay walked over, puzzled. He looked up at her. “This is about the right size for a footlocker type of chest.”
McKay shook her head. She couldn’t remember anything being there.
“Footprints from the chair are big. My guess? The big chair hid it. But there was a footlocker right here, I guarantee it.”
“And Ghaniyah’s now got it,” McKay said with dismay.
The Green Zone, Baghdad, Iraq Saturday, April 15th 1:56 p.m.
Adnan looked out the thick security glass window watching the activity three stories below. Two Americans, wearing T-shirts and shorts, stood on either side of the quiet street, tossing a Frisbee back and forth. Every once in a while a car or military truck would pass by. The two men didn’t let the vehicles disrupt their game, though. The Frisbee was usually arced directly over the passing cars, one time skimming just inches above the hood of a small Toyota, causing the startled driver to stomp on the brakes. A friendly wave from the Frisbee player and the car was on its way again.
Their casual game playing mesmerized Adnan. In the relative safety of the Green Zone, they could walk around nearly naked and play American games as they saw fit. A large Army truck slowly approached. The Frisbee player just below the window waited until the truck was close, then purposely tossed the Frisbee on the ground. A moment after it hit the pavement, the disc rose in the air toward the American on the other side. The man jumped in the air to catch it as the truck rumbled past.
Having seen enough, Adnan turned away. The room was small, holding a cot, a small desk and wood chair. To his left was a thick steel door with a small unbreakable glass window that allowed the Americans to look in on him. His back to the wall, he slowly sank to the floor, his mind still wondering if it could be true – Could Ghaniyah be a believer? Did she really believe in al Mudtaji’s call for jihad?
He tried to tell himself that the photos could be fakes. You could do anything with a computer these days. Maybe they had taken her picture when she had brought them the head, then overlaid her face on the real Jordanian woman that had been captured in the U.K. That was certainly possible. But then, she looked younger in the picture. Not a lot younger, but a few years younger which meant that the Americans were probably telling the truth about the photo.
But if the photo was real, what did that say about Ghaniyah? He knew in his heart that she wasn’t a jihadist. She hated al Mudtaji. She was locked in his terrorist cell against her own free will, just as he was now locked in this cell against his free will. But then, if it was true that Ghaniyah was no more a jihadist than he was, what about her arrest in England just a few years ago? Why hadn’t she told him about that? Was it because she had been with some lover? Or because she did believe in jihad?
His head spinning, he rested it against the cinder block wall, closing his eyes. Suddenly he heard some frantic shouts from somewhere outside his door, and he snapped his eyes open, staring at the door, waiting.
Then there was a horrific explosion.
Next thing he knew, he was curled up on the floor, in the fetal position. Something was on top of him, and it took him a minute to realize he was pinned underneath the desk. But he hadn’t moved. He was still underneath the window, which meant the desk had somehow been hurled across the room. Looking up, he could see the overhead light flicker for a moment, then go out.
He was suddenly aware of the pain that radiated from one shoulder and down his arm. He tried to see around the desk. See what had happened.
Then everything went black.
Chapter Seventeen
MP-5, The Green Zone, Baghdad, Iraq Saturday, April 15th 2:01 p.m.
The explosion was powerful enough and close enough to Marco Polo 5 that Gonz had instinctively taken cover near a desk. Watching the lights overhead flicker and the computers automatically power down, the screens going black as a safety precaution, Gonz had yelled, “Go to auxiliary! Go to auxiliary!”
Peterson had quickly cut all electrical power streaming into the MP-5 complex, switching over to a powerful diesel generator that had been installed for just such emergencies. A moment later all the computers had came back to life while the overhead lights operated at a prearranged 50% power level, still providing ample light, yet saving most of the juice for the computer and telephone systems.
“Find out what the hell happened!” Gonz told Peterson as he rushed outside. Sirens wailed from all directions, and he could see smoke rising from the Camp Ward building, just a hundred yards away.
“Shit!” Gonz heard from behind him. He looked over his shoulder to see Heisman panting for breath as he stood with his hands on his knees. Just a few minutes earlier, Heisman had left for the mess hall, a good distance away, for some food. Gonz knew he must have sprinted back to MP-5 as soon he heard the explosion. “Our guy’s in there!”
Peterson quickly emerged from the building and hurried over to Gonz. “Sir, Checkpoint 2 reports a FROG miss
ile. Unknown payload.”
Gonz nodded, watching the rising smoke as sirens screeched. So named by NATO, the FROG, or Free Rocket Over Ground missile, was an unguided Russian rocket that had been around since the mid-1950s. Saddam had bought numerous FROGs, using them in the Iran/Iraq war in the 1980s and in the Gulf War. Obviously, the Coalition Forces hadn’t rounded up all of them.
Gonz turned to Peterson. “Casualties?”
“Don’t know, sir.”
“Our guy’s in there!” Heisman repeated.
“We’re going over,” Gonz firmly told Peterson. “Get on the horn and tell whoever you can we got a priority one-four in there.” Peterson nodded, clearly frightened. “A one-four!” Gonz repeated, then took off down the street, running hard, Heisman right with him.
The Green Zone, Baghdad, Iraq Saturday, April 15th 2:09 p.m.
His head felt like someone had taken a sledgehammer to it. While still pinned underneath the desk, Adnan used his left hand to feel the back of his head. He could feel the warm liquid on his fingers and wasn’t surprised to see blood when be brought his hand back in front of his face. His right shoulder felt like it was on fire, with any movement of his arm sending stabbing pains down to his fingers. Ignoring the agonizing pain in both his head and shoulder, Adnan gripped the desk with his left hand, took a deep breath, then pushed hard, howling in pain as his right shoulder felt like a thousand knives were impaling him. The desk moved more easily than he anticipated as he slid out from under it, letting it crash down with bang.
Breathing hard, Adnan finally sat up. He looked at where he had lain and saw a substantial amount of blood on the floor. He knew he probably needed stitches, but he was more concerned about his arm. Looking up for the first time, he saw that the security door was ajar. It wouldn’t be long before someone came to find him.
Seven Days From Sunday (MP-5 CIA #1) Page 18
