CROSSFIRE: Ex-CIA JON BRADLEY Thriller Series (TERROR BLOODLINE Book 1)

by Paul Rodricks

  He glanced at this wrist, “From the reports coming in, we can expect to wind up here latest by 6.00 PM. And, by early next week, we ought to have all the reports available, hopefully including that of the autopsies.”

  “The house must remain cordoned and sealed until the complete investigation and closure of the case,” posited Jonathan Bradley.

  Then turning to the Lieutenant, he said, “Detective Morris, could you please make it to the FBI’s Counterterrorism Office on Tuesday afternoon around 4.00 PM with whatever the latest developments in this case?”

  “Hopefully.” Morris said, then noticed Bradley’s right eyebrow shoot up.

  “Mr. Bradley, you know how the forensic people work. They can be frustrating at times,” Morris surmised bemusedly.

  “I think, in this case, they will be without any excuses not to cooperate with you, Lieutenant,” asserted Allan Banks, the Senior Special Agent.

  Bradley quickly understood Allan’s intent, and also the lieutenant’s point, both taking advantage of the fact that the debriefing was being recorded and later available for review.

  The debriefing had been going on for little over an hour, when Jonathan thought it was time to conclude.

  Understandably, they hadn’t much to report or talk about this early in the investigation.

  “It is now 8.35 AM. This preliminary debriefing ends now,” he declared as he switched off the recorder.

  ***

  The newspaper late-news and the national TV channels in the Breakfast News slot briefly mentioned about the shootout in Yonkers, the inner suburbs of the New York City, apparently between rival drug lords.

  Most news reports hinted at a fall-out among drug traffickers, fighting for control of their territories, further reporting the

  finding of four bodies, one of them being allegedly the body of the landlord who had rented out the premises to members of a drug gang. That both the NYPD and the FBI were observed to be investigating the crime scene.

  For more details of the gang-war shootout, the media awaited the Police Press Conference scheduled for 4.30 PM that day.

  ***

  As Jonathan Bradley drove away from the crime scene area, he wondered if he would find Samantha’s room-mate, Elaine, at their apartment.

  It’d soon be 9.00 AM, but it was a Saturday morning when there would be no classes to attend.

  If she had been out on a date the previous night, then either she’d be spending the night out someplace, or would have arrived home late night, the latter meaning that she’d be sleeping at home until mid-morning.

  Bradley decided that he would not telephone her now, but would drop by her apartment around 11.00 AM or so.

  He had been sending flowers to Samantha at her sister’s place through Elaine ever since she had refused to take his calls.

  However, there were encouraging signs now that Samantha was slowly getting over her trauma and he would have her back again.

  The next time, he decided to include a personal note with the flowers. He truly believed that it was only a matter of time. Soon, she would consent to meet him.

  For now, he was being kept busy with his intelligence work in the FBI. And, he had just suffered a setback in the Yonker Islamic-Jihadist terror plot case.

  Instead of extending cooperation, as was expected of them, the Israelis had pulled a fast one on them.

  He was not without suspicions about the CIA’s awareness of the whole episode. It was never beyond the formidable Agency to motivate anytime its hands–off policy in the affairs affecting its hidden-agenda, such as the Mossad’s escapade in Yonker on the American soil.

  His mind next shifted to the NYPD’s investigation into Samantha’s rape assailant. The last time, he had met with the lady detective, she had informed him that they had two suspects who needed to be interrogated thoroughly for evidence that would stand in court. That was a week ago.

  Almost four weeks had gone by and still the NYPD had not caught and indicted the alleged rapist.

  As any investigating officer would know the first twenty-four hour period of any crime is the most crucial period to find important clues or the offender. He was now losing patience with the NYPD.

  This morning, he has had his breakfast, if not his sleep. Why not drop by the detective’s office and learn more? Perhaps, he would convince her to accept his help in the investigation.

  ***

  Jonathan Bradley was in the act of turning the car and heading towards the NYPD’s Detective Bureau office, when he overheard the dispatcher’s call on the police radio in his FBI car.

  He turned on the volume to listen more clearly. The 911 dispatcher was sending out a call to police patrol cars, reporting a homicide in downtown Manhattan.

  Bradley was momentarily stricken by the sudden awareness of the location. He knew the address only too well.

  The house belonged to his friend and mentor, the retired CIA Vietnam operative.

  Greatly disturbed in mind, he swung back his 2003 model Ford Crown Victoria, similar to the NYPD Police Interceptor, towards the Manhattan highway, praying and hoping against hope that there was somehow a mistake in reporting the homicide at his trusted counselor’s residence.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  2003

  Wādī l-Biqā‘, Beirut in Lebanon

  There was a strong ringing in both his ears. The faint sound of a voice with a foreign accent… increasing and decreasing in pitch… the words sounding distant and making no sense.

  He tried to open his eyes, but just couldn’t… he tried harder… harder… but they simply wouldn’t come unstuck.

  His head kept pounding, his whole body ached, his chest felt constricted and his lungs hurt with every small breath he managed to take.

  Someone was trying to move him, and coaxing him at the same time. He felt hands around his mid-trunk, and his reflexes prompted him to get to his feet.

  But the muscles in his legs from the waist down trembled with the knees failing to respond.

  His strenuous effort to stand roughened his senses and he could feel the acute throbbing in his right shoulder and stinging pain on the right side of his neck.

  For the first time since regaining half-consciousness, he could actually feel body- contact with another person, who was still continuing to coax him….

  After a while, the voice sounded familiar, becoming somewhat clearer.

  “… Mr. Peter… Mr. Peter… can you hear me?” It kept going on and on, until the voice registered in Bradley’s mind.

  He had shut his eyes tight with the effort to remember. Now he opened them and his blurred vision slowly returned to near-normal, when he saw and recognized who was standing above him.

  “Ja….meel?” his voice sounded choked with the hoarseness.

  “Al-Hamdulillāh. Thanks are to God.”

  There was a sign of pure relief on Jameel’s face. “Are you feeling better… can you try to walk a little distance from here…?”

  “I’ll… try… Where’re we…? What time is it…?”

  “Don’t talk. Save your strength. I will help you, Mr. Peter.”

  When his vision improved, Jonathan found himself sitting half-propped against the wreckage of a towering truck. He smelt the acrid odor of a burning car, his senses jolting his memory back to what had happened a while ago.

  Bradley clenched his teeth and closed his eyes tightly again. Then taking a deep breath, he made as strenuous an effort he could muster to slowly come to his feet, half-leaning for support on the truck’s body and helped by Jameel.

  He ignored the agony of pain shooting through his body, but his legs withstood his weight after a brief wobble.

  Jameel held him remain steady for a few moments, before he could test himself, leaning against Jameel, to take a small step and then two. Resting and feeling the blood circulate in his limbs. After a while, he felt weak, but knew that he could manage to walk some distance.

  “Good… you are doing fine. You are getting stronger,
Mr. Peter,” Jameel was cheerful whilst encouraging him.

  There were a whole lot of questions Jonathan wanted to ask Jameel.

  Jameel more or less sensed what the Ameriki sought to know. “I will explain later what happened. First, we must leave this place. It is dark and is possible to go without being seen. But let’s hope we don’t across path with any of the militants because that will mean trouble for you and for me also.”

  Bradley brought up his left hand. His reflexes responded normally though a bit sluggishly, but not cramped. The watch on

  his wrist was still working and its hands showed 10 minutes past 10.00 PM. He had lost all sense of time for over an hour.

  Moreover, he had lost his cellphone. That did not worry him. Actually, his mobile unit would have automatically locked and self-destructed itself if not timely reset.

  However, the cell’s GPS would have alerted his Control about his last position.

  More than three hours had passed since his last contact with him. This was enough time for his Control to have activated whatever the support system in place through the CIA’s local intelligence sources. That is, if the intentions were in the right place, he thought as his previous suspicions returned.

  “Jameel, do you have your cellphone intact? I seem to have lost mine?”

  “Sorry, Mr. Peter…”

  “Jameel, you can call me Peter, for God’s sake…”

  “OK. I like that name Boutros better, in Lebanese. I thought my cellphone would be safer inside the car’s glove compartment. Now I’m without my phone and the guns as well,” Jameel said dejectedly. “Pray that we don’t have a situation where we cannot defend ourselves.”

  Meantime, Bradley was shifting his weight from one leg to another, keeping the circulation going and maintaining his equilibrium.

  While doing so, he looked down at himself. His half-sleeve blue shirt was blood-stained and dirty, and his dark blue trousers were torn in a few places.

  Then, for the first time, he realized Jameel was in his undershirt, and that he wore the Keffiyeh wrapped across his forehead. It was wet and blood-stained; some of the blood had flowed down and dried on his face. His black jeans were soiled and spotted with burn holes.

  He remembered pulling Jameel away from inside the car after Jameel was hit and they abandoned the vehicle.

  The Lebanese man, apparently lucky, must have suffered some temporary concussion at least, when the slug nicked across his right brow.

  Yet he tried to appear cheerful and act normal. Jonathan Bradley would salute this man for his courage.

  “Boutros, now listen. We are presently in the Wadi Neita village of the Kasarnaba town in the Beqa’a valley.

  “We’ll walk down this place to the next village and stop at the first small house we come to. Let’s only hope the residents aren’t militants themselves or their sympathizers. The people here are generally simple farmers. I will go and ask for some help, or at least to use a phone to make a call to your people.” Jameel paused to look over Bradley.

  He then stepped aside to check to on the make-do cloth bandage tied across Bradley’s chest and right shoulder and another one around his neck.

  “You have taken a slug into your right shoulder and shrapnel into the left side of your neck. I have used the cloth from my shirt to temporarily stop the bleeding, but you will need a doctor soon.”

  Jon was mentally surmising the extent of his injuries.

  He knew from his knowledge and experience in working with and training informants in the use of the Dragunov sniper rifle, its effective range was 600-800 meters. The distance from where the sniper appeared to have fired at them was beyond that range.

  However, he would know later if it was truly a Dragunov rifle that the sniper had been using, only after the slug was retrieved from his shoulder.

  Despite being hit by the high velocity sniper’s bullet, it was probably a ricocheting slug, its force already spent before lodging itself into his right shoulder.

  It was not a deep penetration. Otherwise, his injuries would have been of life-threatening nature such as severe internal damage including broken bones and tissues, collapsed lungs and severed arteries.

  For now he felt that the bullet had caused no excessive structural or vascular damage. He was still able to move his right arm which meant that the brachial artery in the arm was not perforated.

  Similarly, the metal fragment lodged into the left side of the neck though bloody and painful had caused no damage to the deeper neck structures.

  Both his injuries though not immediately life-threatening were serious nonetheless. There had been a significant loss of blood and the wounds had to be medically treated sooner than later because of high contamination from the slug and fragment further infecting the wounds. Only then, he would ever know the real extent of his injuries.

  Already, Bradley was feeling feverish and normally incapacitated.

  “I understand that, Jameel. I can feel the hurt… but don’t worry, I shall manage. By the way, I owe you one, Jameel.”

  “No problem, Boutros, you are a valuable guest of my country, and as hosts, we take great care of our guests, you know that? “ Jameel smiled mischievously.

  There was enough natural light to find their way down the incline of the wreckage site, where they had sought refuge.

  They took the dirt tract, which led them to the street below. Jameel was walking a little ahead of Jon, making sure that the road was clear before continuing along the shadows.

  They soon arrived at the unpaved rural road and could see the lights showing from a few of the scattered houses.

  Bradley occasionally rested and took support from Jameel to steady himself from falling. His shoulder and neck wounds were beginning to bleed. He felt the wetness when he touched them.

  They had been walking along the village road for about twenty minutes. Jon saw Jameel motion him to stop.

  Then, Jameel retreated towards Jonathan to whisper, “You stay in the shadows of the trees. There’s an intersection ahead, where the road divides into the left and right going towards the bigger farms and vineyards. Someone could be coming down this intersection. We are not going in that direction, but need to watch out.”

  Then pointing to a place in the opposite direction, “There is a single house there, quiet apart from the others. That would be more like our place to seek help.”

  “Give me a few moments, Jameel, to catch up with my strength. You can proceed and I will follow you a short distance behind. This way if trouble comes our way, we won’t both be taken by surprise.”

  Jameel had just disappeared from view, when Jonathan heard the sound of a car engine, and turned to look towards the intersection. He quickly moved deeper into the shadows.

  Minutes later, the vehicle drove past the place he was standing hidden, brightening the road up ahead. Its powerful headlamps caught a faltering figure in its wide-radius beam.

  For a moment, Bradley’s heart skipped a beat.

  CHAPTER NINE

  2003

  Wadi Neita in Kasarnaba,

  Beqa’a Valley

  But the driver did not slow down or stop the Jeep Wrangler. He merely kept on driving straight up the rural road, leaving a dusty trail behind him.

  The shadowy figure of Jameel turned in his direction, and beckoned him, calling out in Arabic, “Boutros, ta’al hini. Come this way, Peter.”

  After glancing towards left and right, Jon struggled to cross the road to the other side where Jameel waited for him.

  From the rural road, a narrow grass pathway led to the farm house surrounded by a natural fence made of shrubs and flower plants. The wooden gate to it was open, and the outside area was lit by a small electric bulb.

  Jameel would have to wake up the residents since the farmers went to bed early to rise up at dawn.

  They walked up to the front door verandah. Bradley stepped aside to lean by the side of the door, while Jameel started knocking, first lightly and then a bit harde
r.

  Somewhere inside a light came on, and they heard the sound of bare-feet approaching the door from inside and a half-asleep grumpy, guttural voice demanding, “Minoo…? Who is it?”

  "As-salaam aleykum. Peace be with

  you. “

  “Wa-aleykum as-salaam. Shoo ‘areed? What do you want?”

  “Ana Jameel Khalaf….’ and he went on speaking fast in Lebanese Arabic, Jonathan trying to catch up with him.

  Jameel was telling the man that he and a friend of his were hurt and needed help badly.

  The man was being cautious. He told Jameel that they should go to the hospital.

  Jameel replied that they did not have a car. The villager did not answer for a few moments.

  Jameel then, offered to pay the man… in dollars, he emphasized, glancing towards Jon for confirmation. The latter nodded.

  There was a momentary silence from inside and then they heard the bolts open and the short, sturdy figure of an elderly man with a weathered face, dressed in loose-fitting night clothes, emerge cautiously ontothe verandah.

  He first looked up at Jameel then shifted his gaze on Jonathan, at once wincing on noticing his disheveled state.

  “Minoo hada? Who’s he?” the farmer turned alert. “Min wayn huwa? Where is he from?”

  “Awwal min-el ʿajamiyah. Originally from Spain,“ Jameel misinformed him, knowing that Spain enjoyed a cultural relationship with the Islamic middle-east regions.

  Jameel went on to tell him that Bradley was a friend of his now visiting him and his family in Lebanon. They had come sight-seeing to the Kasarnaba town wadis famous for their vineyards, fruits and gardens, when they were caught in a sectarian firefight.

  The other members of the house had not awakened yet. The man appeared to be convinced, but remarked that he did not want any trouble from the militia or the Hezbollah extremists.

  He took them inside along a corridor of closed rooms on both sides until they came to a rest-area equipped with washbasins and chairs, opening into the backyard of the farm house.