“We’re about two hundred yards away. Follow me,” he whispered, and then took off at a cautious jog in the direction of the target container. Solomon followed, trusting Joseph, who was the technology guru, to interpret the blip and get them to their destination.
Joseph stopped at a row of forty-foot containers stacked three high, and then shined his small flashlight beam on the identifying number of the bottom one and nodded to Solomon as he produced a pair of bolt cutters to cut the anti-tamper bolt. The hardened pin’s head snapped off with a soft crack. He eased it free, raised the handle, and swung the door open.
Inside were dozens of wooden crates containing air conditioning compressors and power transformers, as well as machinery and parts for maintenance of the cranes that dotted the city’s growing skyline. Joseph directed his beam on the boxes and then climbed inside, searching for the one that contained the device.
Halfway to the rear he stopped and smiled to himself. The red hand-written lettering for a five-ton compressor was exactly as he’d been promised – innocuous unless you were looking for it. Moments later he had pried the top off and slid it aside. He retrieved a flathead screwdriver and began dismantling the compressor casing. When he had it loose, he lifted the gray metal outer grills, placed them next to the crate, and unscrewed the inner top portion of the cooling fan. After a few more seconds he heaved the case out, his arm muscles bulging at its weight, and then set it next to the lid and switched his flashlight off.
Joseph grabbed the case handle and was moving from his position when the crate lid shifted and fell with a bang against the steel container wall, the noise like a fifty-five gallon drum smacking cement. He froze; and then a dog began barking. A big dog. Nearby.
He made it the rest of the way to the doors in a few long moments, and closed them as Solomon eyed the row of containers distrustfully. Joseph’s eyes met his, radiating a silent apology. He handed the case to Solomon and pulled a silenced pistol from his backpack.
“Get going back to the boat. I’ll slow whoever comes looking. Can you carry that?” he whispered, concerned about Solomon’s ability to maneuver with the heavy case, given his wound.
“I’ll manage,” he responded, as he gritted his teeth and hoisted the strap over his good arm. “Let’s split up. Make some noise and hopefully they’ll go after you.”
Joseph nodded. “I’ll be back at the boat in five minutes. If not, leave, and we’ll meet at the house. If you hear any sirens or anyone but me approaching, get the hell out. The device is more important than anything else.”
“I know. But it’s not going to do me a lot of good without you, so be careful.”
“Can you find your way back?”
“I think so. I’ll just keep going till I hit the water, then look for the dinghy. Now get out of here.”
Joseph chambered a round in the pistol and strode off to the next row. He took another look back at Solomon, then ducked around the corner and was gone.
A flashlight beam blinked in the distance, sweeping down the aisles formed by the stacked containers, and Solomon took that as his cue to get moving. He heard a clatter nearby – Joseph creating a diversion, hopefully drawing any pursuers away – and squinted in the darkness as he trotted toward the water. Another noise, this time further away, was followed by a shout, and he picked up his pace as he toted the bomb, the weight slowing him more than he liked.
He heard the sound of full-speed motion behind him, then a fur-covered form slammed into his back and he fell face forward. The case pounded against the concrete, bouncing twice before it skidded to a stop five yards away. Solomon was barely able to stop his fall with his hands; a stab of blinding pain shrieked from his good shoulder accompanied by a low growl as a large German shepherd sank its teeth into him. He rolled to the side and pushed the dog off, swinging his fist at its head, and landed a blow that seemed to do nothing but infuriate the animal, which then went for his legs. Solomon stifled a scream as the dog latched onto his left calf, and he kicked his free boot at the slavering beast, breaking its jaws loose with a grunt.
The dog was leaping for his throat as Solomon held his arms up to defend himself when a pop sounded from in the gloom, and the dog whined mid-air as a slug tore through its back. The stunned animal landed a foot from Solomon’s bleeding form – he rolled away and looked up to see Joseph sprinting from the shadows, silenced pistol in hand.
A light appeared behind Joseph and he spun and fired three times at the guard. The flashlight fell to the ground with a crash, followed by the wounded security man, his revolver clattering harmlessly at his side. As Solomon struggled to get to his feet, Joseph moved to help him, pulling him up while listening for any sounds of pursuit.
“Shit. The damned dog got me good,” Solomon hissed, limping as he made his way to the case, holding his shoulder where blood was streaming from the bite.
“Just move. I’ll take the bomb. Head for the water – it’s just past that next row, to the right. Go,” Joseph instructed, assessing Solomon’s condition and instantly making a judgment call.
Solomon didn’t argue, and staggered in the direction Joseph had indicated. Joseph waited, head cocked, anticipating more guards, but didn’t hear anything, and after a few moments he approached the battered case and lifted it, gun gripped tightly in one hand as he carried the deadly device in the other. He increased his speed to a jog, and was just rounding the corner when his eye caught a glimmer of light at the far end of the aisle – more guards, and not too far behind. His only hope was that they didn’t have more dogs, and that finding the wounded man would delay them long enough for him to make it to the boat and get clear of the area before they sounded a general alarm.
Once at the water’s edge he ran as fast as his legs would carry him with the additional weight to contend with, and made it to the boat as Solomon was tying a piece of cord around his leg to staunch the blood pulsing from the shredded flesh.
Joseph slipped the pistol into his backpack and swung himself over the rail, clutching the side of the ladder with an iron grip, and lowered himself to the waiting tender. Voices were now audible from the container area. He placed the case in the bow, untied the line from the ladder, and pushed off.
“Move to the rear. I need to sit on the middle bench to row,” he instructed, and Solomon inched to a position next to the outboard. Joseph dipped the oars into the water and spun the little craft around, then pulled with all his might for the inky water beyond the large cargo ships.
Two lights raced along the waterfront as the remaining guards hunted for the intruders, but by the time they made it to the ladder the dinghy was already on the far side of a five-hundred-foot-long cargo ship, whose rusting hull neatly concealed the boat as it continued its journey to the far side of the harbor.
Joseph waited until they were nearly at the port mouth before he started the engine and gave the motor as much throttle as it could take, and soon they were skimming along the calm sea toward the lights of the hotel near where they’d left the car.
Once ashore, they wasted no time hauling the case to the vehicle and placing it in the trunk.
“Damn. It looks like it was hit by a truck,” Solomon said. “I’m sorry. The dog…”
“What’s done is done. I’ll check it when we get back to the house. Let me go deal with the boat. I’ll be right back,” Joseph replied. He closed the trunk lid and returned to the tender at the water’s edge, stabbing the blade of his folding combat knife into the inflatable hull with a hiss. He watched it deflate for a few seconds, then pushed it away from the shore with his foot. Hopefully it would sink out of sight – not that it would matter as of morning tomorrow.
He returned to the car and got behind the wheel, then turned to consider Solomon. “You look like shit. I’d say the dog almost won that round.”
“I don’t disagree.”
“How’s the shoulder?”
“I’ll live. I may need a doctor for my leg. We’ll see when I get to the house. Mayb
e we can stitch it – hopefully it didn’t get an artery. Hurts like a bitch, though.”
The boat burbled air into the water behind them as it drifted, sinking slowly, the motor and fuel tank too heavy for it to stay afloat. Joseph muttered noncommittally and then backed out of the lot, traversing the dark asphalt in silence before he hit the lights as they rolled toward the seafront road that would take them to their safe house, his mind already on the possible ramifications of a damaged bomb only a scant few hours before it was scheduled for detonation.
Chapter 30
The French-flagged Citation business jet touched down on the runway in Nicosia, Cyprus, and after refueling and taking on three passengers, hurtled down the runway and into the starry sky. Jet watched the glowing lights of the island disappear beneath her before pulling down her window shade and closing her eyes, hoping to get a couple of hours of rest before arriving in Qatar in the wee hours of the morning.
The Mossad contacts in the capital had scrambled when the director contacted them and told them he needed to get some operatives in, and the money that had been required in order to get the immigration officials to turn a blind eye had been jaw-dropping; but then again, nobody was in a bargaining mood. Security had never been higher, in anticipation of the arrival of the heads of state for the Arab League meeting, and even with her Italian passport and the fake papers of the other two specialists, getting visas on a few hours notice had been nothing short of Herculean.
In the end, cash had won out, and the flight had been cleared for arrival at four a.m., with visas good for a week awaiting Jet and her two companions – the Mossad’s top field operatives, now that her team was history. Jet had read the men’s limited dossiers she’d been allowed to peruse, and had been heartened – while they didn’t have nearly the qualifications of the members of her old group, they’d both been involved in enough successful operations to warrant confidence.
The planning session had dragged on endlessly, and as the hour had grown later, the attendees had agreed that they would get Jet onto the ground as the satellites were being repositioned, and pass on any intelligence that came in after to her in the field. As it was, until she touched down, the Mossad presence in Qatar was limited to intelligence gathering moles and a station head who would get them whatever equipment they needed. They couldn’t chance bringing anything in on the plane, especially given the heightened security surrounding the conference.
Jet was frustrated by the lack of hard data they had to work with; other than knowing the bomb would be detonated at ten-thirty, they had practically nothing to go on. A contact in the government offices had secured a comfortable retirement by agreeing to provide a back door for the Mossad’s hackers to get into the immigration database and scour it for the errant operative’s entry records. The members of The Council had been taken into custody and were being interrogated, probably brutally, but as of right now, no new information had been forthcoming. Jet’s only hope was that one of the security committee knew more than they had let on, and that the combination of extreme torture and drugs would yield something they could use. The director had made it abundantly clear that he wasn’t concerned about whether any of them lived past sunrise, so the interrogation teams had carte blanche, and Jet’s experience told her that they were using every means at their disposal.
The Citation hit a patch of turbulence as it reached the coast of Lebanon, and the pilot climbed in an effort to find a smoother altitude. While it would have been faster to fly from Tel Aviv, a private jet arriving from Israel would have been a red flag for Qatar, and no matter how much money changed hands, everyone on board would have been held and interrogated. Cyprus, on the other hand, raised no eyebrows, and because the plane was French flagged there was no connection to Israel – Jet had flown in over an hour earlier on a Lear 35 that had deposited her in the private Nicosia arrival lounge with no questions asked, and spent her time on the ground online before the French charter had arrived to take her to her final destination.
The only thing she’d brought other than a robe and veil and a change of clothes was a notebook computer, and concealed within it, an earbud and the associated comm gear. Hopefully their contact on the ground would be able to supply them with whatever they needed, although at this point that was a question mark – they had no target, no strategy, just an imperative to get into position in Doha and pray for a break.
Two hours later they began to descend and Jet came back to full awareness, her effort to catnap having been more or less successful once the ride had calmed down. The pilot’s voice droned over the intercom and alerted them that they would be on the ground in fifteen minutes, and an uncomfortable silence settled over the cabin, the dull roar of the turbines the only sound as they banked on approach from over the Persian Gulf.
At the airport they were escorted through customs by a tall, dignified, sleepy-looking man in a military uniform who dispensed with immigration formalities by handing the clerk a sheaf of visas, freshly prepared by his office for the esteemed guests from Cyprus. Once their passports had been stamped, the officer said his goodbyes and departed, leaving them standing outside the private aircraft terminal staring at an empty access road.
Jet powered on her cell, and instantly her phone vibrated. She listened to the voice mail message and then hit redial, and was soon greeted by the director’s deep and distinctive voice.
“Our man will be there any minute. He’ll take you to a safe house and equip you, by which time I’m hoping we have something more. One of the interrogators phoned a few minutes ago to tell me that his subject knows more than he let on. Something about how the bomb entered the country. It may be nothing, or it may be critical. I’ll call you when I know the details,” he said.
“Fine. Right now we’re standing around outside the terminal, fully exposed, with our thumbs up our bottoms. Let’s hope your man here is just contending with traffic, because this isn’t getting off to a great start.”
Jet disconnected the call, both annoyed that their contact hadn’t seen fit to be more prompt, and hopeful that they were catching a break from the questioning. The two operatives who had joined her on the plane ride, Aaron and Eric, looked at her expectantly, and she gave them the update as a pair of headlights rounded the long curve that led to the terminal. A silver Honda minivan pulled to a stop at the curb and the driver rolled down the passenger window.
“Open the side door and get in. Toss your bags next to you. Sorry I’m late,” he said in Arabic. Jet gave him a black look and then slid into the passenger seat behind him. The others piled into the back, and soon they were rolling down the road, leaving the airport.
“What was so important that you left us waiting?” Jet asked.
The driver peered up at the rearview mirror and caught her glance. “The police had a checkpoint over by the port. They said there was a shooting. Didn’t really seem to know what they were looking for, but it clearly wasn’t one humble local on his way to work,” he explained, his tone calm and reasonable. Jet immediately felt remorse for her attitude and quiet cursing of the man. “I’m Isaac, by the way. We’ll be at the house in fifteen minutes, and then you can stretch out and check your gear. I wasn’t able to round up a lot on such short notice – pistols and a Kalashnikov.”
“What about ID?”
“As requested, I doctored up a few official identification cards making you members of the police force. They’ll get you in and out of situations where there isn’t a lot of scrutiny, but you’re dead in the water if someone radios it in.” Isaac glanced at the frowning faces of the group in the mirror. “How long will you be needing me?”
“All day,” Jet said, not wanting to share anything more with him. If the bomb went off, the less he knew, the better. Which at this point was a very real possibility.
“I got a couple of cars for you to use, too. The communiqué indicated I should give you every courtesy, and specified you would require weapons, identification and vehicles. Do you think you�
��ll need anything else?”
“How are you set for computer gear?” Aaron asked.
“Got a laptop and a workstation with two thirty-two inch monitors. State of the art.”
They saw the flashing lights of the roadblock in the distance, off to their right, and Isaac gave it a wide berth, choosing secondary streets until they arrived at the house – a modest affair in a working-class neighborhood on the southern end of town. He reached up and pressed a garage door remote, and the heavy iron plate gates swung open, enabling him to pull the van into the walled compound and then close them behind him, effectively sheltering the house from any view from the street.
It was five in the morning by the time they got settled, and Jet was anxious to get going. When her phone vibrated she almost jumped. She hurried to answer it, stepping into the kitchen for some privacy as the men joined Isaac at the computer.
“The bomb entered the country by cargo ship. The container was removed from the ship the day before yesterday. At least we now know how they got it in,” the director said, without preamble.
“Are they going to detonate it there?” she asked.
“Negative. Apparently, that came up during a cursory discussion of the planning. It’s too far away from the brunch location.”
“Well that narrows it down, doesn’t it? To something close to the target?”
“Not necessarily. They could be planning to detonate it in a plane, a drone, a nearby car…”
“Then we’re really no closer than we were.”
“Correct.”
“Is it possible it’s still in the container?”
JET V - Legacy Page 19
