Even the busily-inventive Ghaith thought this made sense, because it was probably true. He was tempted to let go of his prisoner, who seemed to have more or less recovered from the blow to his throat. But two of the young policemen were massaging their triggers, like lovers unsure of love. He decided to keep his shield, for the time being.
"How do we know there are Office 8 men out there?" one of the more jittery cops asked.
"Go upstairs and look out the front window. Look for the turds in black suits marking time in their cars. But you’d better hurry up. I don’t think they’ve surrounded the block, yet. Is there a door out back? You’d better use it while you can."
"But where can we go? They know where we live. They could shoot us for abandoning our post!"
"And I could have killed all four of you by now. Or you can squeeze off a lucky shot, kill me, and buy yourselves maybe ten more minutes of life." The man Ghaith held shifted. He pressed the barrel of the Tariq into his spine. It would take one only of them to move against him and the rest would follow. "Where’s the asshole?"
The eyes of the man on the right tilted ever so slightly towards a door near the front of the house.
"What’s that, a bedroom?"
They wouldn’t answer him. Ghaith sensed that they were slipping away, that their fear of him was not nearly so strong as fear for their families if they were declared traitors. The impasse could not last much longer.
Beyond the chance of getting killed, there was another good reason why Ghaith was reluctant to shoot it out with these boys. Telling Abdul Rahman about Uday had been a drastic mistake. If Ghaith survived his encounter with the guards, Abdul Rahman was now unlikely to let him walk away from Palestine Street. But even if his former corporal was wavering, was able to subdue his fears, Ghaith still felt the need for some kind of leverage. And that leverage was standing right in front of him.
Decoys.
Quickly, he pushed away his prisoner and lay Omar’s pistol on the chair next to him. He spread out his arms.
"All right, shoot. Then you can die an honorable death trying to defend the Palestinian shithole. And if—"
The man Ghaith had nearly killed swung around and drove a fist at his head. He was still unsteady and Ghaith easily ducked aside.
"Nice try, Karim," Ghaith smiled.
"Wait!" the middle cop shouted as Karim wound himself up for another blow. He turned to one of the men holding a Kalashnikov. "Go upstairs and take a look outside."
The cop nodded and bounded up the stairs.
"If you’re lying, we’ll kill you right here," said the cop who had taken charge.
"I’ll kill you, anyway," said Karim, retrieving the pistol he had dropped when Ghaith punched him. "Right here."
Once again, Ghaith smiled. At the moment, it was the only weapon at his disposal. That, and rude logic:
"Now, when you chaps take off, scatter like the wind. I’ll be frank, I didn’t see any of those Office 8 boys go around back, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t there now, especially since we’ve been wasting so much time chit-chatting. When you get home, gather your families together and head for the Jordanian Embassy in the Al Andalus District. Tell them you have news about Abu Nidal and they’ll let you straight in. King Hussein didn’t think much of him and his son sentenced him to death for murdering a Jordanian diplomat, so they’ll be pleased to hear that the sentence has finally been carried out."
"He’s not dead, yet," Karim said, glancing at the bedroom door.
"It’s only a matter of minutes," said Ghaith.
There was a tumbling of footsteps and the guard who had gone for a look appeared at the bottom of the stairs, his face stretched by horror. He nodded.
"There," said Ghaith. "Go now! And may God be with you."
Three of them shot out the back. Karim remained, his gun raised.
All Ghaith could do was wait.
Outside, Abdul Rahman was growing increasingly nervous. The colonel had walked into the house nearly ten minutes ago. He had stolen Omar's gun. Abdul Raham had expected gunfire to break out immediately. But there had been only silence. He got on his radio and belatedly ordered his men to begin circling behind the house. Several minutes later he got a report.
"I talked with one of the neighbors," said an Office 8 agent over the radio.
"You idiot! You're not supposed to—"
"He said three cops ran out the back about five minutes ago. Then a fourth one ran out just before we got here."
This was totally unexpected. Had Colonel Ibrahim's reputation preceded him, terrifying the young policemen into thinking only of escape? But that wasn't possible. Ghaith had no reputation. He was an unknown operator, one of Saddam Hussein's true secret weapons.
"All right, I want Team One to pursue..." Abdul Rahaman stopped and lowered the radio. For once, he thought he had insight into Ghaith's mind. He had somehow convinced the policemen to take off. The purpose was obvious. To scatter his agents. He lifted the radio. "That's all? Four men?"
"Four cops," said the Office 8 agent behind the house.
So Abu Nidal was still inside, too. "Don't move. Tell everyone to hold their position."
The agent acknowledged his orders. Getting out of the Audi, Abdul Rahman walked towards House Number 22. Omar Pachachi trotted up next to him. This was annoying, but there was nothing Abdul Rahman could do about it. He was sure Omar was a spy sent out by the man responsible for this entire setup. He couldn't say why his conviction was so firm. He only knew the same way the residents of al-Masbah had known that the convoy entering their neighborhood was packed with dangerous men not to be trifled with.
"What is he up to?" said Omar. "You think Abu Nidal got the drop on him? I don't care what they say about his cancer and hemorrhoids. He's still a dangerous fucker."
"The colonel's got your gun," Abdul Rahman said.
"Well, he's not going anywhere," Omar sniffed.
As they drew closer to the house, Abdul Rahman flicked his fingers left and right, guiding agents on the sidewalk, closing the ring around the Palestinian and the man who had saved his life on the Highway of Death. The burn scars on his face came alive, as though he was trapped all over again, this time never to escape. He tried not to think that he would have been a better man...in a better world.
He lifted his radio to his mouth. "Do you see anything out back?"
"Nothing." And then, a moment later, the voice said, "Wait..."
"What is it? What do you see?"
"I don't see anything. Can't you hear...?"
Abdul Rahman lifted his hand, ordering Omar to stop. In fact, the way he did it, it was more like a courteous suggestion.
"Listen..."
And then they heard. A low moan.
"What the hell—" Omar began.
A scream from the house cut him short. Abdul Rahman had avoided looking directly at Omar ever since the meeting at headquarters, but now he turned to face him. Omar was wide-eyed.
"Who was that?" Omar asked, turning his eyes back to the house. "Which room did it come from?"
Abdul Rahman shook his head. He had no idea.
There was another scream, and Abdul Rahmal envisioned Ghaith, bound to a chair by the now-departed policemen who were washing their hands of the business, being subjected to the kind of tortures for which Abu Nidal was famous. He could not allow this to continue. The colonel had to die, of that there was no doubt. But not in this vile way, at the hands of a Palestinian thug. There was still such a thing as honor, no matter how weakened by circumstances. He rushed forward.
And stopped when a scream that blistered his ears shocked him into stillness.
"He has to go, one way or another," said Omar, but his hard breathing discredited his indifference.
Abdul Rahman nodded angrily at the agents on the sidewalk, who had also been frozen in position by the scream. They edged ahead, trained killers experiencing uncertainty.
Everyone dropped to the ground when a shot rang out. After a half
minute, they raised their heads, only to duck once again when a second shot shocked the quiet neighborhood.
"Is he shooting at us?" Omar asked, his chin scraped by the pavement.
"Is everyone all right?" Abdul Rahmal called out.
Shouts of affirmation reassured him.
Abruptly, there were two more shots.
Another full minute passed before Abdul Rahmal lifted himself off the road and ran to a parked car for cover. Omar quickly followed.
"What's happening out back?" Abdul Rahmal spoke into his radio.
"We're all right," came the metallic answer. "We haven't seen anyone."
Abdul Rahmal was about to signal his men to move forward once more when the front door of House Number 22 swung open. A moment later Ghaith came out onto the stoup, covered with blood. An intense prayer pursed Abdul Rahmal's lips as he sprang ahead. A prayer for the man he had been ordered to kill, if he survived to this point.
Ghaith had already descended the steps by the time Abdul Rahmal burst through the white gate.
"Abu Karim!" he cried out, then hesitated. Ghaith wore an expression he had never seen on any man. A look of satisfaction such as someone might wear after talking to God. He turned to Omar. "We have to get him to the hospital!"
Omar, staring at the gore covering Ghaith, began to agree. The man was almost dead already. Why not condone a trip to the hospital, if only for appearance sake?
Ghaith snapped out of a trance and lowered a piercing gaze on his former corporal. "You don't think this is my blood, do you?"
Abdul Rahmal and Omar stared at him, astonished by Ghaith's venomous sauciness. The colonel was not injured in the least.
"You don't expect me to interrogate a man in these primitive conditions, with no proper equipment, without getting a little blood on me, do you?"
Omar glanced over at Abdul Rahmal, trying to recoup his wits.
"What's wrong with the pair of you?" Ghaith demanded. "You've seen blood before. Now get inside so you can start preparing your report. No, not you, Abdul Rahmal. I want you to drive me back to my office. I have spare clothes there. I can't very well go home like this."
Abdul Rahmal's burnt face emphasized his stupefaction. "But what—?"
"Abu Nidal, killer of men and women and children, torturer of men and women and children, the scourge of Islam who killed far more Muslims than Jews or Westerners, has seen the error of his ways and shot himself." Ghaith's devil-face abruptly softened into a grin. "In fact, he was so filled with self-loathing that he shot himself four times."
He waited for them to respond. "Well?"
Abdul Rahmal looked nervously at Omar, whose eyes remained wide. Finally, the spy gave a slight nod. "Yes. Drive him back."
"Good," said Ghaith. "Oh, Omar, here's your gun. Thanks for the loan. I used it to scare off the guards. I wouldn't execute them, if I were you. They're young and inexperienced. Just give them a good beating. And if the mess inside bothers you, rest assured...Abu Nidal did not suffer long enough."
On the way to SSO headquarters, Abu Rahmal tried to ignore the stench of blood and the awful stains Ghaith was leaving on the seat of his Audi.
"They won’t let you get away with this," he said tensely.
"Mmmm? What, the ANO?"
"Them. And others. The Boss’s son will—"
"Choke on his own shit," Ghaith said blithely.
And, in a way, that was exactly what happened. Ghaith survived the next eight months. In the interval between August and March, he even performed more vital services to the government. But his death sentence was firmly, if secretly, confirmed.
And then the invasion came and Ghaith was saved by the American Army…the same army that destroyed his family.
CHAPTER ONE
Richmond – January 2007
How could it stink so badly?
Ari Ciminon had once been known as Abu Karim Ghaith Ibrahim to his family and comrades, Haji by American troops who employed him as a translator, Malak Ta'us among the Kurds (borrowing from their Yazidi minority, though the Yazidis themselves, great devil worshipers, thought 'The Peacock Angel' had redeemed himself with seven jars of tears), 'Alejandro Perez – Alias' in Interpol Red Notices, 'Jules Maboule – Alias' at the Direction Régionale de Police Judiciaire de Paris….
But he had never been known as a cook. True, collard greens were not particularly aromatic, but he never thought they could smell this badly.
The gentle knock on his front door could not have been more inopportune. A genteel visitor would be repulsed by the smell and conclude Ari was a pig. A less than genteel visitor might try to kill him.
The tameness of the knocking lent credence to gentility. It might even be his handler, Deputy Karen Sylvester (aka ‘Deputy Sandra’) of the U.S. Marshals Service, although such nicety was probably not listed among her keynote abilities. It might also, of course, be an 800 pound gorilla pretending to be a child.
He lowered the burner to simmer and leaned down to remove the bottom access panel of the stove. It was in the air duct tubing under the Jenn-Air that he had discovered a cache of cocaine that had helped him unravel the mystery of who had murdered the previous owner of the house and his family. The actual discoverer of the hiding place was a tabby cat who was now upstairs sleeping on Ari’s mattress—or so he had been when Ari last saw him.
Putting the Glock in the tubing would have been impractical, since the fragile aluminum would tear from the weight. And yet, in spite of its slight dampness, he found the niche an ideal hiding place. The pistol’s ferritic nitrocarburizing protected the metal parts from corrosion, and leaving the screws out of the panel gave him reasonably quick access to the weapon. There was the risk, of course, that Deputy Sylvester would take it into her head to search the house for weapons and find the handgun. If she did the job properly, she would also uncover the assorted weapons in the gazebo facing the James River. But because CENTCOM found him to be such a valuable boy (and something of a hero, having saved American lives while acting as a translator in Iraq), he would, hopefully, be punished with nothing more than a slap on the wrist. Unless they traced the guns to something worse than possession of unlicensed firearms.
Knock-knock-knock.
The traditional three-knock pattern hinted at legitimacy. Naturally, this could be playacting, although the various authorities who had shown up on his doorstep had shown little variation from interminable banging and would see no need for discretion.
He took out the gun, closed the panel, and approached the door.
Here he was presented with one of the drawbacks of having no furniture: there was no temporary hiding place for a weapon near the door. Slipping the gun into his waistband, he peeked out through the sidelight. Unless the person was very short, there was no one on the stoup. It dawned on him that he should remove the large urn on the porch and the decorative mahonia bush that partly blocked his view.
Hoping the visitor had gone away, he began to move silently back to the kitchen.
Tap-tap-tap.
The visitor was losing resolution, the tap being a resignedly weak postscript to the knock. Ari would have left it at that, except he now had a good idea who it was and why she was here. Also, if she did not get an answer now, she would return later. He hurried into the kitchen, placed the gun on top of the refrigerator, and returned to the foyer.
"Diane," he greeted when he opened the door and saw the girl on his porch craning her head up to him. She was startled and a little dismayed. Her eyes widened, as if she had stumbled upon an oversized ogre.
"How do you know my name?" she asked warily.
"Mr. Nottoway told me. We saw you on the street one day while I was visiting him. You saw us, remember?"
"I was looking for Marmaduke."
Ari feigned ignorance by raising his eyebrows.
"My cat."
"Ah."
She risked lowering her eyes to see if the body attached to that menacing face looked just as ominous. She gave a little cough.<
br />
"Do you really live here?"
"Why, don’t I look like I live here?"
"You look like a homeless person who broke in. Are you a burglar?"
Offended, Ari’s scowl deepened. The girl’s amiable courtesy (‘homeless person’) was freighted with rudeness that would have been unthinkable in his homeland. The most flea-bitten Sadr City street urchin might filch your wallet, but he would never accuse you of looking like a vagrant. Diane, her rumba dress peeking out from under a wool coat, looked like someone from a good family, or at least a family with financial resources.
Suddenly, Diane’s hand went to her mouth and she laughed, "Mr. Snail, Mr. Snail!"
Hmmm…? Ari glanced down. To his intense mortification, he saw that his fly was undone. He had not felt well lately and his appearance had suffered. Also, it seemed, his sense of propriety. Growling, he turned away to zip up.
"Eeew, what’s that smell?" The girl pinched her nose theatrically.
"Can I help you, child? Are you lost?"
"I only live on the other side of Mr. Nottoway! How can I be lost?" Her face was super-charged with childish innocence, making her appear like one of the most wicked little girls Ari had ever seen. Not that he knew much about girls. All three of his children had been boys—for which, had he been so inclined, he would have praised Allah. The girl continued: "Mr. Nottoway says he thought he saw Marmaduke…my cat…hanging around your house. Has he come in here? I’ve heard of cats getting trapped in houses by accident. I’ve heard…well some people…like from far away…even eat them!"
"That is not a cat in my stew pot," Ari said irately, though he was not as put off by the idea as the girl obviously was. Sometimes you just had to eat what was available.
"Can I look around? Maybe you missed seeing him. He’s yellow, like a rose."
"Roses are not yellow," said Ari authoritatively.
"They can be. They even wrote a song about them."
Ari’s protest was brought up short by an awareness of ignorance. He had only taken red roses to his fiancé during his Western-style courtship (drawing the ire of his conservative prospective in-laws). There may have been yellow roses at the florist but he had been too blinded by love to notice. Or, perhaps, yellow roses only existed here, in America. It often seemed Americans had no time for anything else beyond being clever and inventive.
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