“Blindfolds on,” the guard told them.
Tiffany glared at him over her shoulder, but he shrugged. If they were going to see Abd, they had no choice but to follow the rules. She was surrounded by SEALs, killing machines without the need for weapons, and Tex had already coordinated with Trace for tap into the visual feed in the interrogation room. He rubbed her hand to sooth her, and then they all put on the hoods. The guards help directed them into the same windowless van the prisoners rode in to get to the camp. Cry Baby never understood the need for double-blindness, but he could see that in the event a blindfold fell off or was removed, the location would still be hidden.
He held Tiffany’s hand in his between their sated bodies as they rode along. Her elevated breathing worried him, and he wondered if she had any issues with claustrophobia. It wouldn’t be enough to stop her from working in the field, but it’d be something she’d have to watch out for. He tapped the inside of her wrists with steady, metered strikes until her breathing slowed and her heartrate went back to normal. By that time the vehicle stopped.
“Slide to the left, and exit in line,” the guard said.
Closest to the door, Cry Baby reached for the opening to orient himself, and then put Tiffany’s hand on his back as he stepped from the van. As they’d been briefed to do, they traveled in line, hand to the shoulder in front of them, into the facility and waited for the guard to removed their hoods. Cry Baby blinked against the sudden florescent lighting, until he saw a familiar face in front of him, and went to his knees.
“Heim,” Cry Baby whispered.
Heim, looking haggard but otherwise unhurt, approached him and gripped his shoulders. “On your feet, James. I’m okay.”
“How did you get here?” Wolf asked.
Heim squinted and scratched his jaw. “I’m married to the Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy’s daughter, and this SIS agent had the Director of the SIS personally write to the unites States Special Operations Command. They released me as an asset, though the rest of the team is still detained. SIS sent me to assist with your mission. I’m a damn SIS asset,” Heim repeated, slack-jawed.
Cry Bab blinked at Tiffany. It wasn’t everyday he had contact with the United States Special Operations Command. They ran the special operations of the Department of Defense, and were the governing body they answered to. “You wrote to USSOCOM?”
“No, Chief wrote to General Raymond A. Gregory, the current Commander of USSOCOM. Be specific.”
“Vixen, you are fucking scary,” Heim acknowledged.
“I see they’ve explained who I am to you as well,” Tiffany said to him.
“Ah, yeah. That was about the time the Commander was bitching about the women in his SEAL team’s lives. From MCPON’s daughter, to world-renowned celebrity and activist, and now a top-tier SIS agent, he can’t get a word in edgewise, and he couldn’t take the credit for getting me sprung. We’ll be getting pounded in PT for the rest of the year, watch,” Heim said.
“How are the guys holding up?” Cry Baby asked.
“Snake is angrier than a fucking cobra, and ready to just break out and deal with the consequences, but I was able to keep him calm. For now, he’s good. Hawk has been communing with his Spirit Father and not talking to anyone, and Welsh has been spending same time trying to get introduced to Hawk’s Spirit Father.”
“And Glitz?” Mozart asked.
“He’s a bit worried, though he won’t say much. He was detained before he could get the check-in call from his cousin.”
“Need us to call her?” Abe asked.
Cry Baby snorted and clapped Abe on the shoulder. “No, we don’t need to call him. Big Boss is a member of the Republic of Korea Navy Special Warfare Flotilla, aka the Korean SEALs, and they check in with each other when they are both not activated on mission. If one doesn’t check in….”
“Then the other goes knocking, holy shit. What’s his MOS?” Dude asked.
“About that…let’s just say he’s Heim, on steroids, with a ridiculous record for longest shot under torrential wind conditions,” Cry Baby answered.
“Wait, you mean that Big Boss who won in the Interservice Rifle Competition?” Abe asked.
“Yeah, he got a special dispensation to compete because Heim bitched about it,” Cry Baby explained.
“And then he kicked your ass. Smooth one, man,” Mozart joked.
Cry Baby sighed, that would be another problem they may have to face, but right now they had to get serious. It was good to hear about his team, and know that they were alright, but until they got some sort of lead about who was betraying them, they couldn’t relax.
“This is my cue, fellas” Tiffany said. “Here’s how the interrogation is going to go. I’m going to go in, but Abd has issues with speaking directly to a woman about such matters. He’s warped his Islamic beliefs into fanatical extremes, and I am little more than an infidel. We will have Trace come in and take over for me when it gets too much.”
“Why not have Trace in from the beginning?” Cookie asked.
“Because sometimes you can get more from what’s not said and reactions than from actual words,” Tiffany told him.
“Then let’s do this,” Tex announced.
Cry Baby whirled at the voice, and Tex entered from a hidden door to the right of the room they’d been directed to.
“When did you get here?”
“About five hours ago. We had to get set up properly,” Tex explained. “We’ve got wo days of unrestricted access to the prisoner, but that’s it. We don’t get what we want by then we are removed from the black site, and our chance is gone.”
“Roger that. We’ll stay here on standby, and for any protection Vixen may need. If you need us to come in for any reason, lift two fingers into the air. We’ll see it and rush in,” Wolf explained. Then he tapped Cry Baby.
“What?” Cry Baby asked.
“If she doesn’t raise her two fingers, she isn’t asking for our assistance, you understand? We go in under blue status.”
Cry Baby bristled. There was no way in hell he’d wait until she was incapacitated to rush in if the prisoner did something to her. It only took seconds to die.
“Are you out of your—”
“That’s the plan, or I don’t go in,” Vixen argued.
“That’s dangerous and you know it.”
“But it’s my job. Sometimes they want to push my buttons and see how far I’ll go. Other times they think I’m weak and want to show me how strong they are. When I don’t break down and call for help, but beat them at their own game, it validates me. I’ve been doing this for years. Let me do my job.”
He knew she was right, but that didn’t make it easy for him to accept. He grit his teeth and forced his hands to unclench. Arguing with her, right now in front of the other SEALs would only belittle her skills, and tell her that he didn’t believe she was strong enough. He refused to do that. He knew what she could do, had fought and made love to her. He knew her skill and inner strength. He sighed and closed his eyes for a moment.
“You kicked my ass, you could kick his, easy. But you stay safe in there, or I’ll still paddle you when we get back home. I swear to God, Vixen. Quiera que regreses sano y salvo.”
“What does that mean?”
“Come back safe and sound,” he said.
“That’s so hot. Talk to me like that in bed later, okay?”
He choked on a laugh, and the SEALs joined him. But Tiffany was already walking out of the room, and into the lion’s den.
Chapter Eleven
Vixen
Tiffany took a breath, but kept her shoulders relaxed and squared. Interrogations was more about learning about the signals someone gave off versus verbal tics. She’d learn from the best how to build rapport, break down communication and frustrate a suspect until they were too upset to think clearly, and how to ferret out the truth between a multitude of lies.
All of those would help her with Abd.
She would
be operating from the blind, as she wouldn’t have the luxury of days with the suspect. She needed to hit, hard and fast, but give Trace the proper baseline he needed when he took over the interrogations. Fundamentally, she needed to antagonize Abd on things that she already knew the answers to and watch his reactions. Trace would be watching and studying what she could bring out in Abd on the other side of the closed-circuit television they’d set up—and so would the SEALs.
She’d never had audience to her work that could rival how important this mission was. She’d been in dangerous situations where lives hung on the balance, and one wrong move could ruin everything. She’d lied to dictators, and helped topple countries for the good of Country and Patriotism. But this was personal. She’d seen the relief when Cry Baby spotted Heim, the instantaneous way his shoulders relaxed just a bit. The bond between SEALs was unlike anything she’d seen. She trusted Trace with her life, but they operated in two different capacities, often not in anything more than contact over the phone or comm unit for months at a time. She wanted to do this right for Cry Baby, and the men that he wanted to protect.
Abd was a gaunt form in his orange jumpsuit and wiry hair. Born in Phoenix, Arizona under the name of Donovan Prichard, Abd converted to Islam during his junior year at Caltech. the conversion came with a name change, and frequent travel to different countries on the terrorist watch list. His wide green eyes assessed her with cunning and calm as he folded his slender hands in his lap and waited. They had him released, as she’d requested, but two guards, armed with rifles, stood at attention behind him and against the walls. She didn’t acknowledge them as she studied Abd as well.
Nonverbal communications were good for several things, from reinforcing or modifying what was said in words, showing that some had something to say or was done talking, exposing the emotional state, or define relationships. Abd’s relaxed, almost gloating expression told her he’d been expecting someone to come see him, and he was enjoying it.
“Donavan Prichard, what a long way you’ve come from Caltech. What did you study there, anyway?” she asked.
He frowned at her. “My name is Abd Al Alim bin Abdul, and you will call me such. My time at that school is irrelevant, and my study of biological engineering as well.”
Maybe not irrelevant, you still answered the question. He took pride in what he studied, and she wondered if he’d finished his degree somewhere else under his Islamic name.
“I wouldn’t say time at Caltech is ever irrelevant. It’s one of the hardest schools in the States to go to.”
“And yet I hear the British accent, and you speak the Queen’s English, so what does Caltech matter to you? It would have made more since for you to talk about Oxford.”
“I enjoyed University, as much as the next, but we always knew we ranked second,” she stated.
“An Oxford Man, then. Let me guess, a Human Sciences Major?”
“Why would you think that would be my study?” she asked, titling her head to one side.
His lips twitched and she noted the movement. “Because then you could advocate on the position of women in society,” he told her.
“Ah, it’s because I have a vagina,” she answered. She nodded gravely. “That could have been a good subject.”
“You shouldn’t speak such foulness. If you fear high-handness from your women, remind them of the teaching of Allah, then ignore them when you go to bed, then hit them,” he said. His quote from the Qu’ran in Sura was off with a few choice words, but she knew that arguing with that directly wouldn’t work.
“And for women are rights over men similar to those of men over women,” she quoted back. “If you hit me, I’m going to hit you back. Allah said I could.”
She had no intention of making light of the words in the Qu’ran, but she tired of many zealots twisting the words of Islam for fear and terrorism. There were dark teachings and words to be found in many religions, from Christianity to the African Gods of ancient civilizations.
His frown smoothed out, but she saw the way he pressed his fingers into his sleeves, a sure sign he was agitated that she not only knew of what he spoke, but the correct verbiage.
“Why are you here?” he asked.
“Because Hakeem bin Mohammed Tahib is dead,” she told him.
He didn’t bat an eye. “I know.”
Dangerous territory. Inside the walls of GITMO Abd got no mail, no television, and was under restricted access to everything. There was no contact from the outside world, after he plead guilty at Camp Justice for his crimes. He openly admitted to hacking in to the DNS Infrastructure to provide thousands of names, addresses, and protected sensitive information to the Taliban and ISIS sensitive groups for attacks and conversions. Except before the mission, Abd have never hidden what he’d done. He’d gloated, much like he’d been ready to do when she walked into this room.
Did she asked him how he knew, or did she assume she already knew that he knew?
“How did you know?” she asked, making the choice to go with what might push him.
“Isn’t that what you’re here for? You want to know about my connection to Hakeem? How he was my martyr, my instrument?”
His confident smile was back, and he dropped his arms to his side. He felt in control, which most likely meant that he’d toy with her for the answers to the questions that she wanted to know—the exact ones he’d just said. But in the toying, he may give her something, anything. They only had today and tomorrow, and just a few hours each day at that.
Honesty, and her best hear me roar impression might be the best route to take.
“Yes, actually. That’s why I’m here. I’m happy we’ve got the unimportant stuff out the way. You don’t care about my education—and I was not a HumSci major, by the way. I went for Experimental Psychology, since you were rude enough not to ask me, and was in Catz—St. Catherine’s College in case you don’t ask me that either, wanker. Now, where was I? Ah, yeah, going over the rubbish we aren’t concerned with.”
Tiffany stopped to smile at his angered expression. Good, she wanted a rise out of him. She was here because she obviously had power, and he knew that. Most interviewers or interrogators had psychology degrees or instruction, par for the course.
“I don’t care about your failed education either. A Caltech drop-out isn’t impressive, it’s the ones that graduate that I think are chipper. In total agreement, that time in your life was irrelevant. Let’s talk about after Pakistan, where you met you wife Seherunnisa. Did you know she’s been detained by the Secret Intelligence Service?”
Tiffany stopped smiling with the final question and flipped the fake badge Trace had made her years ago for moves like that. While she had real identification for her service in SIS, she didn’t use it with suspects. But the design, information, and picture looked enough like the real stuff to fool the studied adversary.
“You lie,” he roared.
Bingo.
He’d finally given her something. It wouldn’t be much, and once she played the trump of this card he wouldn’t give her much more, but at least she knew that Trace would have a starting place tomorrow. She just hoped that Cry Baby and the other SEALs understood why she didn’t go directly to what they needed to know.
“You didn’t know?” she asked.
He clamped his mouth shut, but it was too late. His wife meant something to him. But even more...he didn’t have a connection in here, because his wife had been detained. So, he knew that Hakeem died because his death had been planned before Abd was even detained and found guilty. They had their window.
“You lie,” he said calmly, attempting to regain his former calm.
But she hadn’t lied. “No, I didn’t. Want to know why? Because I’m the SIS agent that tracked her down, brought her in, and signed the release form for her transfer to our black site.”
Tiffany flipped over the badge she’d brought in to make sure the image on the was visible. It pictured her, in her Kevlar suit, with Seherunnisa in zip ties b
eing put into a secured car.
“Altered,” he hissed.
“Of course not,” she said. “Look closer.”
She leaned forward for him and pointed to a newspaper that was clutched in hands, the Dawn, and dated just a month prior.
“I found her in Jhtatpat after tracking her up from Nasirabad District, where you left her upon taking her back to Pakistan. She followed a path, travelling back and forth between Nasirabad, Nowshera, Dadu, and then back to the Balocistan Province. Had she not stayed twice as long as she normally did in Nasirabad and changed to travelling a more secured road to Jhtatpat, I never would have found her. But you know what they say about the best laid plans.”
He kicked at her with his feet. The guards exploded into action, jerking him from the chair and slamming him to the floor, but she never moved. Vixen knew the disrespect he showed her. The shoe was considered unclean to many in the Muslim populace, and why it had to be removed during prayers. Also, the foot was the lowest part of the body, and the show was associated with that dirty body part. He told her that she was lower than his foot, worthless, and deserving of contempt.
It didn’t matter. This as his game to lose, and he would lose.
Chapter Twelve
Vixen
“Jolly good show,” Trace praised.
Tiffany smiled at him. At forty-five, Trace had salt-n-pepper, giving him an air of sophistication and wisdom, solemn green eyes, and wore a traditional black and white suit with a black vest. She relied on his steadfast nature and quick analytical mind when she was in the field. She couldn’t ask for better back up and his praise warm her.
“Did you hear everything?” she asked.
“Crystal clear.”
“An effective way to give Trace information,” Cry Baby said, and her toes curled. He reached her and pulled her in his arms before he kissed the top of her head. She’d been so worried that he’d wonder why she hadn’t asked about who was the mole, but she shouldn’t have.
Special Forces: Operation Alpha: Protecting Vixen (Kindle Worlds Novella) (A SEALed Fate Book 3) Page 6
