by Mark Terry
The shot zoomed back slightly until Aleem Tafir was seen from the waist up. In one hand he held what Derek thought was probably a remote control for a digital video camera. Aleem sat on the computer chair in his bedroom.
“Mother, I’m sorry for any pain my death may cause you.”
Tafir’s face went white.
“By the time you watch this, I will be with Allah, having struck a blow for all of Islam, in the name of the Prophet. Know that I love you always.”
CHAPTER 30
In Washington, D.C., Homeland Security Agent Jeff Ayers, leader of START Team Alpha, studied the storage unit facility from the darkened windows of a panel van. He didn’t have a terrific vantage point from where he watched through binoculars, but he had two men inside, ready to go.
Ayers and his team had been assigned Washington, D.C. The capital was already a high-security zone, so they had merely stepped up their investigations, focusing on the Pakistani calling himself Kalakar.
Within six hours a report had come in from the National Security Agency. Their ECHELON system, a highly sophisticated eavesdropping and computer network associated with the UKUSA Alliance, a loose affiliation among English-speaking Intelligence organizations—Canada, U.S., U.K., Australia, and New Zealand-—had sorted through a few billion e-mails and phone calls with the name Kalakar in them, and come up with three exchanges between a cell phone in Los Angeles that was no longer active and a cell phone in Washington, D.C. that belonged to Tim Safa.
Ayers had promptly set up a net around Safa, a college student at George Washington University. Digging into his finances, they quickly discovered he had rented a storage unit six months earlier.
What Ayers wanted to do was get into the storage unit and figure out what was in there.
Unfortunately, before his team could do so, their surveillance unit had indicated Safa was on the move, picking up two other men. They appeared to be heading toward the storage facility.
Ayers had raced to get in place by the storage center before Safa and his people arrived. Half his team was following Safa. The voice of Jim Zay crackled in his ear.
“Alpha, this is Zeta. Target is leaving Benning Road onto H Street, heading west.”
Into his microphone, Ayers said, “Zeta, this is Alpha. Benning onto H Street, heading west. Confirm. Describe the vehicle.”
They weren’t far away.
Zay’s voice: “Gray Dodge Ram pickup. D.C. plate: X78-LU7. Just passed H Street and Eleventh Street. Still proceeding west. Three subjects in vehicle.”
Into the microphone, Ayers said: “Copy, Zeta.”
Within minutes he spotted the pickup truck. It turned into the storage unit facility. Through binoculars, Ayers watched Safa punch numbers into a keypad. The gate rolled back and they drove in.
He radioed his team members already in the facility.
“Gamma, this is Alpha. They’re coming through the gate now.”
The voice of Tony Gallagher rang through his earpiece. “Affirmative. Gamma monitoring.”
“As soon as they open it,” Ayers said. “I want a report.”
“Affirmative. Stopping now.”
Ayers fired up the engine of the van and pulled into the storage facility. He’d had just enough recon time so he knew where their unit was. He pulled toward the end of the row at the back so when the timing was right he could block their potential exit in that direction with the van.
“Zeta here. We’ve got the front.”
Ayers said, “Affirmative. Gamma?”
“They’ve stopped. They’re waiting. Someone’s out—”
Ayers’s heart beat hard in his chest. Gamma reported: “They’ve pulled the truck into the garage. It’s a large unit.”
“Go!” Ayers shouted. “Now! Go!”
He stomped on the gas and pulled the panel van into the middle of the mouth of the alley. At the far end he saw that Jim Zay and Bill Hayen had pulled their Ford Taurus into the alley and were sprinting toward the storage unit, MP5s at the ready. From two corners Gallagher and La-Fontaine rushed toward the container. They were the closest.
Running, Ayers heard shouts and the sound of gunfire. Gallagher and LaFontaine dived to the pavement and returned fire.
And then the entire world erupted into flame.
CHAPTER 31
Derek settled in next to Sandra O’Reilly and slumped into the passenger seat. He rested his forearm over his eyes.
O’Reilly said, “You don’t look so hot.”
“Compared to how I feel, I look great.”
“Maybe you should take a break. I can drop you back at the Federal Building and—”
“No, just drive around a bit.”
They had left Shelly at the Tafir’s townhouse. Another FBI agent was on the way to take official statements and gather evidence—like the suicide video. In addition, Shelly indicated she wanted to get as much financial data on Aleem and his parents as she possibly could.
O’Reilly said, “There’s the Fox backlot.”
Derek opened his eyes long enough to look, but didn’t comment. He wasn’t feeling much like a tourist. After a moment he asked, “Do you have your original report? The one they pulled from the computers they got in Pakistan?”
“Sure. It’s in my briefcase.”
Looking over his shoulder, he reached back and snagged the briefcase. Dropping it on his lap, he opened it. On the inside of the lid was a photograph of two children in a clear plastic frame. He studied it for a moment. The daughter, in particular, resembled Sandy.
“Nice looking kids,” he said.
“Thank you.” Her jaw was tense and so was her voice.
“It must be hard, not living nearby.”
She said nothing. She pulled onto Santa Monica Boulevard and headed toward the ocean. Finally she said, “We all have to live with the decisions we make. And I’m not talking about this with you.”
“I’m not talking about this,” Derek reflected, and “I’m not talking about this with you” were two very different things.
He nodded and focused on rereading the report. When he looked up, they were in Santa Monica. Glancing out the window, he smiled at topiary shaped like dinosaurs. Santa Monica, in particular, seemed very “California” to him. Part of it was the palm trees, but the rest was the architecture and the attitude. It might be an old-fashioned California attitude, but it worked for him.
He said, “You notice that almost all of the information we got off the computers so far has been inaccurate?”
O’Reilly didn’t say anything for a long time. Derek bristled. “Look, if you don’t want to work with me, take me out to Malibu, and I’ll pick up the other bucar.”
She flashed him a sidelong look. “You can be a real dickhead, Derek.”
“Thank you. Coming from you—Jesus, like I give a shit. We either work together or we don’t, but this is bullshit the way we’re going right now. I’d rather work alone.”
“Now that sounds like the Derek I knew in Iraq.” She pulled the bucar into a parking lot near the Santa Monica Pier. “Let’s take a walk,” she said.
He climbed out after her. She led him onto the pier. She seemed distracted. Curious, he didn’t say anything. Finally, on the beach, she took off her shoes. “Come on.”
He took off his cheap Kmart shoes and socks and followed her. The sand felt good. Warm.
But he was puzzled. This was very un-Sandra-like. She walked down to the waterline and stopped above the waves, looking out at the Pacific Ocean. After a few seconds she said, “I met Rob here. Well, it was our first date. I knew him from school.”
“I didn’t know you were a California girl.”
She nodded, wrapped her arms around herself. “Born and bred. UCLA for undergrad. I was a physics major.”
Derek didn’t comment. He waited. She turned and set off down the beach. He paced alongside her.
She said, “You never talked about yourself in Iraq. Where did you grow up?”
“Eve
rywhere and nowhere.”
She waited. He sighed. “My parents were missionary doctors. I grew up all over the world. Even before Iraq, I got kicked out of a number of Third and Fourth World hellholes. Congo. Sierra Leone. West Africa. Parts of the Amazon. Sri Lanka.”
“You don’t strike me as being very religious.”
He laughed softly. She stopped walking and looked at him. “What’s so funny?”
“My ex-wife asked me once if my brother, David, was religious. He’s a physician with Doctors Without Borders. He’s in Congo. I told her no, David’s religion was medicine. She told me my religion was counter-terrorism.”
“Is it?”
Derek shrugged. He knew his marriage to Simona hadn’t survived his obsession with it.
She stood and contemplated him. He met her gaze without flinching. Finally she said, “I’m not really a counterterrorism expert, Derek. You know, that, right?”
He nodded.
“I’m a counterintelligence expert. But since nine eleven the CIA shifted away from CI to CT. I’m trying to find my place in this new world. That’s why I leapt at the chance to go to ODNI. I also think all the focus on CT is only going to lead us back to the need for CI.”
He thought she was right, but counterintelligence wasn’t his area of expertise. He believed that the long-term solution to preventing continued terrorist attacks was through intelligence and politics. History had proven this time and again, with the IRA, with Baader-Meinhof, with most successful counterterrorism efforts. Neither were his fortes, though. He didn’t have the patience for CI or the taste for politics.
He had spent years trying to educate politicians on ways to minimize terrorists, but intelligence gathering and political change were not as attractive to politicians as going to war against an enemy with no borders or rules of engagement.
She said, “The computer files said there were going to be attacks in five cities. They were focusing on election day. You know how nebulous intelligence can be. These files were very unspecific.”
“Election day is tomorrow. But so far we’ve had one explosion last night and two attacks the day before. Doesn’t that bother you?”
“It confirms that there is at least some truth to those files. Maybe Kalakar decided to accelerate the attacks because he knew we got the computer files.”
“Why not change them altogether? If they’re not targeted at polling stations on election day, why not activate them as soon as the raid went down?”
She turned to stare at him. “What are you getting at, Derek?”
“What I’m getting at is that I think these computer files the Bureau picked up in Pakistan are bullshit.”
“You can’t deny there have been attacks in three of the five locations indicated in those computer files.”
“But there’s no accuracy in the times. And the Chicago attack was just plain weird.”
“So a suicide bomber chickened out and decided that he was okay with killing himself but didn’t want to take a bunch of innocent people with him. That’s not unprecedented, Derek. There have been instances of suicide bombers who altered their original plans so fewer people died.”
Derek frowned. “It’s a—”
O’Reilly’s phone buzzed. Holding up her hand, she answered it. She listened intently, nodding, and said, “Yes. We’re still working. Okay. Yes.”
She clicked off. “There’s been a major explosion in Washington, D.C. START Alpha was tracking a potential bogie to a storage facility only a couple blocks from the White House. They got into a firefight and the bad guys set off their explosion. Alpha’s dead. All of them.”
Derek’s heart sank. “What type of explosion?”
“Looks like a truck full of ANFO. At least eight dead—the three terrorists and all five members of Alpha Team. It took out almost the entire facility.”
Derek’s brain raced. It was a day early, but that could just be because they were caught. The Dallas explosion was weird and might have been accidentally set off as well. The Chicago attack could have been a terrorist who panicked. And from everything they could tell, their own investigation had sparked the earlier attack here in Los Angeles.
“What do they want us to do?”
“They want us to report in to the Federal Building. And you’re supposed to contact Secretary Johnston.”
Derek thought about it. If everything in the computer records was somewhat accurate, their job was done. The local FBI and Homeland Security office could sort things out, follow-up on the Tafirs, collect whatever evidence they could from the cruise ship, bring Ibrahim Sheik Muhammad in for questioning, and follow up any loose ends. They would be focusing all their efforts on New York City, trying to prevent the last and final attack.
He held out his hand for the phone.
She handed it to him. He dialed Secretary Johnston’s direct number.
Johnston’s wood rasp voice said, “Derek? Where the hell have you been?”
“Long story. I’ll have to get a phone so I can stay in touch.”
“You’ve heard about the attack here in D.C.?”
“Yes sir.”
“It’s all gone tits-up, Derek. Maybe we can prevent the New York attack. Report in at the Federal Building, write up your report, and come on home.”
Derek hesitated. His gaze locked with O’Reilly. “Jim, you trust my instincts, right?”
There was silence, then Johnston asked, “What’s on your mind?”
“I have a gut feeling, Jim. A gut feeling that there’s more going on than we think. I want to talk to somebody who was in that raid in Pakistan. Do you think you could arrange that?”
Johnston said, “I can do that. At this phone number?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. I’ll be back to you in the next half hour.”
Derek clicked off and returned the phone to O’Reilly. She asked, “What are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking that we’re not done yet. And neither is Kalakar.”
She stared at him. Finally, she shook her head. “No, Derek. I’m following orders. I’m going back to the FBI. I’m done working with you.”
“Then drive me to Greg’s place so I have a car.”
Her expression was opaque, unreadable. The waves washed ashore, receded, came ashore again. Metronomic and timeless. She nodded and walked back toward her bucar.
CHAPTER 32
John Seddiqi studied the computer monitors in front of him. Triangles and lines and computer readouts indicated where most of the airplanes in California, Nevada, and Colorado were at any given moment. He was in the air traffic control tower at LAX and Vice President Newman’s plane was coming into the Los Angeles airspace now. The atmosphere of the ATC center was one of intense professionalism.
Sweat beaded up on his forehead. Seddiqi couldn’t forget his argument with his wife this morning after Kalakar had left.
She had turned the moment he was gone and asked, “What did you agree to do for him?”
“Nothing. It’s none of your business.”
He should have known better. Ghazala Seddiqi was a good wife, a good Muslim, but she was strong minded and outspoken. Hands on hips, she had said, “It is my business, John. I have a bad feeling about him. He wants you to do something bad. What does he want you to do?”
“Nothing. Nothing. Leave it alone.”
She walked across the kitchen and sat down across from him. “You’re afraid of him. Has he threatened you? What’s wrong, John?”
“He’s just a friend of my cousin Shaukat, in Pakistan. He needed to stay with us a few days. And now he’s gone. It’s nothing.”
But in truth, Kalakar felt like a threat to him. He did not know exactly what the man had planned, but John was certain it was something bad. And now there had been that suicide bomb explosion in the Port of Los Angeles. So far there were twenty-one dead.
Had Kalakar been involved in that?
Had Kalakar been on the boat that plowed into the cruise ship? Was h
e dead?
Despite himself, John hoped he was. Then this would all be over.
But he didn’t think so. John suspected that Kalakar was connected in some fashion with al-Qaeda, although he didn’t believe his cousin Shaukat was. The whole thing confused him.
