“Shit,” Scott swore violently under his breath. “What now?”
“We go back and try to work our way up the street and see if we can sneak past them.”
“Sounds good.”
Scott turned around and worked his way back up the alley. They were only halfway through it when they heard voices and shouting coming from the street out front.
This can’t be happening, Cain thought. Not now. Not this close.
Unfortunately, it was. They were trapped between two groups of armed gunmen, and there was no way out.
Cain thought for a moment. We need a distraction, or we’re never getting out of here.
“Call your insurgent contact,” Cain ordered. “Tell him we’re trapped in the row of homes at the edge of the field. Tell him we need them to somehow distract the men in the field, or we’re never getting out of here. And if we don’t get out of here, his supply of money and weapons runs out.”
Scott was already dialing the number.
There was only one place to hide. Cain checked the doorknob on the right. It was locked. He heard Scott speaking Arabic as he moved past him to check the door on the left. He turned the knob, and it began to open. Bingo.
He looked back at Scott, who’d just hung up the phone. “We’re good. He said we’ll hear his signal in three to four minutes. He told us there’s an SUV waiting for us, but no matter what happens in the field, we have to get to the other side of the soccer stadium. He can’t risk sending all his men here.”
“Okay. We’re going in here until then. Be ready, but no matter who’s inside, no shots. We can’t risk drawing them right to us.”
“Roger, boss.”
Scott slung the assault rifle across his back, drew a Glock pistol from a hip holster, and picked up the nuclear weapon.
Cain slowly turned the knob all the way and pushed the door inward. The sounds of the television were more distinct. He stepped through the opening into a dimly lit kitchen, the light from the back windows the only source of illumination.
Scott entered behind him. The kitchen was clear. That’s one small blessing, Scott thought.
The two men moved quietly from the kitchen into an adjoining living room and family area. Two worn couches were arranged in an L configuration, facing the television. Neither man paid attention to the Arabic soap opera unfolding on the small screen. It was the occupants of the house which drew their attention.
A young boy no more than ten sat on one of the couches, staring at the intruders. He was too shocked to speak. An older Iraqi woman, in her sixties at least, sat on the other couch. Before she could speak, Scott began to whisper in Arabic.
“We’ll be out of here in a few minutes. We’re being hunted by some bad men, and we need a place to hide. Please don’t shout, or they’ll come in here and kill all of us. We’ll be gone shortly.”
The story sounded plausible to the old woman, who knew there were still insurgents in the city. She’d heard the stories of what they did to their own people. There was no way she was going to bring them to her home.
She nodded, moved over to the couch with her grandson, and put her arm around him, as if to shield him from these two intruders and the horrors outside.
Scott whispered, “Thank you,” trying to make the lie sound sincere, and turned back to Cain. “What now?”
“Now we wait. Let’s go to the kitchen, but keep these two in sight just in case they do something foolish.”
They didn’t have to wait long: several automatic weapons suddenly fired in the field outside.
“Let’s go! That’s our cue,” Cain said.
CHAPTER 57
Ahmed had led them through a series of narrow alleys and small streets. They’d linked up with the group of Iraqis they’d spotted disappearing down the street when they first encountered Ahmed. They now numbered seven.
Logan was beginning to like the odds.
They moved swiftly, a single column of men weaving between the houses. Logan knew they were getting close when the sound of gunfire erupted. Logan estimated it was only a block or two over, toward the western edge of the neighborhood.
The street’s residents must’ve sensed something dangerous unfolding near their homes. They hadn’t encountered a single civilian on the streets. Smart people.
The gunfire increased in volume and intensity, and Logan heard the sound of at least one light machine gun.
The group emerged from another alleyway onto an abandoned street. Ahmed suddenly halted next to an old white pickup parked on the street. He turned to Logan and pointed toward the row of houses that faced them, raising his hand as if moving up and over an invisible obstacle.
Logan nodded and spoke as he studied the houses. “John, this is it. The field is on the other side. We still have an element of surprise. Let’s use it.”
Logan gestured to himself, Ahmed, and John and then toward an alley two houses up on the other side of the street. He next gestured to the four remaining men and pointed to an alleyway directly across the street and another one two houses down. They understood; two men would cover each avenue of approach, while Ahmed would follow the Americans.
Ahmed issued instructions to his men. Within a matter of seconds, the group divided and jogged quickly to their respective objectives. Logan hoped his newfound Iraqi companions would be safe.
We’d better find the bomb, or this whole country won’t be safe.
This time Logan entered the alleyway first, scanning the narrow terrain for any threat. John followed closely; Ahmed entered last.
More gunfire—followed by the sound of screaming. Logan moved faster. He reached the end of the alley and held up his right hand in a fist.
Freeze.
He slowly craned his head around the corner of the house to gain a vantage point of the unfolding battle in the field. A moment later, he returned to cover and huddled with John and Ahmed.
“Good news; bad news. Good news is that Cain and our friend Scott are four houses down, fifty meters away. Scott is carrying the suitcase. They’re crouched in front of a low wall that runs along the back of all these yards. They’re creeping along it, moving in this direction. The bad news is that there are two pickup trucks one hundred thirty meters away with mounted light machine guns. They must be helping Cain because they’re shooting at a group of Iraqis—must be Ahmed’s cousin and his friends—in the middle of the field. I couldn’t tell how many men were in the trucks, but at least two of our friends are down. The rest are hiding behind a cluster of small boulders, holding up their weapons and firing blindly. They’re pinned down. The second they move from cover, they’ll get torn to pieces.”
Logan looked at John and went on. “We have to help them, but the second we expose ourselves, there’s a good chance Cain and Scott will see us. I want Cain alive, but Scott can burn in hell. It’s about time he paid for what he did to us in Fallujah. We need to take down the gunners and Scott at the same time. You ready for some sharpshooting, John?” Logan asked.
“Always,” John replied, a hard edge to his voice.
“So when I break left, you step out to the right. Make the shots count. Once they hear them, it will only be seconds before they figure out where they came from.”
Logan pointed at Ahmed and gestured for him to remain behind John. “I hope he understands me.”
“So do I,” John said. “I don’t need to get shot in the back.”
“Ready? We do it on three. Once this starts, it doesn’t stop until we either have the suitcase or we’re dead, understand?”
“I’m all in, Logan.” Now, he smiled. “Enough with the pep talk. Let’s finish this.”
“All right, then. Here we go.”
Logan turned back to the edge of the alley and raised his M4 to the ready position. John and Ahmed moved to the other side of the alley and did the same, John with his M4, Ahmed with his AK-47.
The gunfire picked up once more, and then . . .
“One . . . two . . . three!”
John emerged behind Logan. He saw the two pickup trucks parked near each other at an angle, mounted machine guns firing at the boulders in front of them.
Oh shit, John thought. There were now four more bad guys moving toward the boulders on foot, two from the other side of the trucks and two from this side. John didn’t know where Ahmed was, and he didn’t have time to look. The new threat captured his attention.
Still have to get the gunners first, John thought, as he placed the dot of the scope on the forehead of the closest man.
Meanwhile, Logan exhaled as he prepared to depress the trigger. Bastard must’ve caught our movement with his peripheral vision. Scott was now looking directly at Logan, his face captured perfectly in an expression of surprise. Too late, you arrogant prick.
Logan and John pulled their triggers at the same time, perfectly synchronized after years of training and fighting side by side.
Logan’s bullet struck Scott Carlson in the center of the forehead, just above the eyes. Logan saw his head snap back. Scott fell to the dirt, his torso coming to rest on its side, the weapon pinned between his body and the wall. The man that Logan had vowed to hunt down for leading them to an ambush in Iraq was finally dead. That’s for all the widows and fatherless children you created, you sonofabitch. Burn in hell.
Logan sprinted toward Cain, who scrambled toward Scott’s body and the weapon. He hadn’t seen Logan yet.
John’s first shot was just as accurate as Logan’s. The bullet struck the gunner in the side of the head. The dead man pitched sideways off the truck, falling to the ground.
The two insurgents closest to their position turned, searching for the origin of the shot.
John didn’t have time to focus on them. First things first . . .
He moved the scope to the second light machine gunner. Gotcha. He pulled the trigger a second time as he heard Ahmed’s AK-47 open fire a few feet away.
John’s second shot struck the other gunner in the throat, his aim slightly thrown off by the sound of the AK-47 firing in such close proximity. The gunner raised his hands to his throat and fell to the bed of the pickup. Both light machine guns finally went blessedly silent.
John spared a glance to his right. Ahmed was firing his rifle from a kneeling position. John looked back at the battlefield and saw the two insurgents who had turned toward them—the ones John had ignored—lying motionless in the dirt.
That’s four down. Nice shooting, Ahmed.
Logan ran through the yards toward Cain. Their eyes locked as Cain glared at him with utter contempt.
Cain pushed Scott’s fallen body away from the wall and raised the G36C assault rifle as he grabbed the suitcase from the ground. He pulled the trigger.
Logan dove to his left, hit the ground, and rolled away—from nothing. He leapt out of the evasive maneuver and looked up to see Cain toss the weapon to the ground. Cain grabbed the suitcase, leapt over the low wall, and ran.
Logan smiled. Jammed . . . tough luck, shithead.
Logan broke into a dead sprint, twenty meters behind his prey. No escape this time.
John and Ahmed watched Logan pursue Cain. Ahmed aimed his AK-47 at the fleeing figure with the suitcase, eager to shoot the American who’d brought this violence to his city. The barrel was knocked up and away at the last second as he pulled the trigger, the bullets firing aimlessly into the sky.
Ahmed turned in anger, only to see John shaking his head from side to side. John pointed to Logan, who was fast in pursuit and almost across the field, moving closer to the abandoned soccer stadium.
John said, “He’ll get him. Trust me on this one.” He put his hand on Ahmed’s shoulder and pointed toward the pickup trucks.
The gunfight was almost over. Without the cover of the machine guns, the remaining two insurgents realized they were now outmanned. They turned around and ran toward the soccer stadium. Unfortunately for them, there was too much open space to cover.
John and Ahmed watched as the four Iraqi men that had helped them stepped out from behind the boulders, aimed their weapons at the fleeing insurgents, and opened fire. The fusillade struck both men in the back, and they pitched forward into the dirt.
Well, John thought, that’s one way to deal with insurgents.
CHAPTER 58
Cain was fast, even for the CEO of the world’s largest private army. Logan was surprised at how quick and sure-footed his movements were. Fortunately, Logan was faster.
The soccer stadium loomed closer as the foot chase continued. The distance between the two men shortened. Logan was only fifteen feet behind and closing rapidly.
Have to get him before he gets to the other side.
The grassy field suddenly gave way to tougher terrain below his feet. They’d reached the perimeter of the stadium.
A wall encircled the entire facility. Cain dashed through an opening, and Logan realized it was an entrance. The stone wall wasn’t a wall at all, but the back of concrete steps that served as bleachers. Logan thought the stadium resembled a high school track with solid seats instead of aluminum stands.
Cain raced across a dirt walkway before entering the field itself. Logan ran harder, pushing his muscles to maximum exertion. The gap between the two men closed to only a few feet.
The field was now abandoned to rocks, dead grass, and trash, though Logan imagined the turf had once been full with a short, manicured grass. Once used by insurgents to execute Iraqi policemen, the stadium was merely a ghostly shell of its former self.
Have to pick up the pace.
Logan breathed rapidly and pushed himself beyond his limits. He was almost upon his target. He prepared to surge one last time when suddenly Cain’s left foot landed on an old bottle that lay hidden in a patch of grass, and he lost his balance. His feet flew out from beneath him, and he sprawled facedown into the earth, the suitcase bouncing end over end, coming to a sudden rest a short distance away.
Logan stopped short and stared at the man he’d chased across the world, now lying only a few feet away. He slowed his breathing as he waited.
At least the running is over, Logan thought. Now for the hard part.
Cain pushed himself off the ground, stood, and turned to face Logan. As he brushed dust and dirt off his shirt, he stared at Logan, expecting the former Marine Force Reconnaissance captain to speak. Logan just looked back at him, fierce resolution on his face. The cut from the first day’s events had opened again, and a thin trail of blood trickled down his cheek.
Cain finally broke the silence.
“You do see the irony here, don’t you, Logan?”
No response.
Cain continued. “If you stop me, you’ll only delay the inevitable. Iran will get a nuclear weapon. It may not be today. It may not be tomorrow, but it will be soon. I guarantee it. And when they do, and when they choose to use it—as they’ve said they would—the resulting war will make Iraq look like a field exercise. The US will get sucked into it like we always do. We’ll commit our forces, maybe not in the most effective manner—depends on the administration in the White House—but we’ll commit. And depending on what the Quds Force does globally and how committed the Iranian military is, our casualties will be catastrophic, to both the military and to the public’s resolve.” He paused for a moment and laughed.
“What’s so funny?” Logan asked quietly.
“I was remembering something the secretary of defense once told me. He said, ‘Cain, privately, we call it the SGLI plan.’ You know what that means?”
Logan nodded, morbidly amused at the dark humor. SGLI was Servicemembers’ Group Life Insurance, the insurance policy that protected all men and women serving in the armed forces. If the casualties were high, the insurance plan wo
uld pay out hundreds of millions of dollars to the families of the fallen. And a war with Iran would definitely result in enormous casualties.
“It’s an appropriate moniker, albeit sick and twisted,” Logan said.
“So you see, Logan. If you take the long view—and I always do—something has to be done now to let the Iranian regime know that they’re vulnerable. That their aggression can be stopped. That using their Quds Force to facilitate IED attacks against US forces in Iraq and Afghanistan will not be tolerated. That those responsible for the loss of American lives, for the savage murder of my brother, will be held accountable and brought to justice.”
His voice rose, his emotion no longer suppressed by cool logic.
He’s coming unhinged. Wonder how far I can push . . .
“They need to know that not all of America will sit idly by while Iran pursues a course of action that will ultimately cause even more harm later than offensive action by us does now. I’ve watched this farce develop over the last several years, and it sickens me. I can’t take it.”
“I agree,” Logan said. “It is completely and wholly fucked up.” The raw bluntness of his statement had the effect of a slap to Cain’s face.
Cain shook his head, stupefied. “If that’s true, then why would you stop me? I can strike a blow that will do everything I said—that will save more lives than we stand to lose. But here you stand, ready to fight for a country that can barely take care of itself.” Cain’s eyes narrowed visibly. “Why?” The last word was almost a hush, barely audible in the Iraqi air.
“Because you don’t get to make the rules,” Logan snarled at him. “You are not above the law, no matter what your motives are.” He paused, choosing his next words carefully.
“But it’s not about geopolitics, is it, Cain? I know about your brother. I know what the Quds Force did to him. Hell, I found his body, remember? I still have nightmares about it.” Cain’s eyes glazed over for a minute, as if a memory of Steven slipped across them. “No man deserves that. But guess what? Here is the hard truth, Cain: it’s not your decision to make.” Logan let the words sink in. “Unless someone elected you president in the last few hours, it will never be your decision to make. You talk about bringing the Iranian regime to justice for all the American lives they’ve taken. That sword cuts both ways, Cain. What about you? What about all the lives you’ve taken in your personal vendetta? All the horror and violence your blind quest for revenge has caused?” Logan spoke forcefully, emphasizing his point.
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