by Brad Taylor
He said, “That isn’t Adnan.”
“I know. We believe that Adnan was killed in a crusader air strike. Everyone is talking about it. Much like happened to us.”
The man speaking was an emir of Jabhat al-Nusra, and the one who had bankrolled, sheltered, and championed the Khorasan group. He had a direct line to the heart of al Qaida, and wasn’t someone to trifle with. Even so, Rashid—known as the Algerian—understood the respect he commanded. As Rashid was one of the few remaining Khorasan members, and a man who’d served faithfully in both Afghanistan and Syria, Jabhat al-Nusra listened to what he had to say. He’d fought valiantly on all fronts, but that wasn’t what made him special. Like many before him, he’d come from a European state, but unlike them, he brought with him some specific skills.
He’d defected from French intelligence, the highest-ranking man in any country to ever do so. He’d served in the belly of the beast of the DGSE—Directorate General of External Security—learning the dark arts, and then had decided to use those skills in the fight for Allah. He hadn’t been instructed in the ways of tradecraft and treachery at some camp serviced by camels. He’d been trained by the best, in a first-world country, and everyone knew it.
A fact he could now use, even as he was talking to an emir in Jabhat al-Nusra.
“So, this new man is the go-between to get the explosives we developed? He’s the new contact?”
“Apparently so.”
Rashid hit the play button again, just to be sure. When the conversation ended, he said, “What, exactly, is the Islamic State planning?”
“We don’t know. Only that it will be big. After our members were martyred, Adnan reached out, saying that he had an attack against the West, and could succeed.”
“Yes, yes. I know all of that. I’m the one that agreed. When it was Adnan.”
At a loss, the emir settled for “It’s still Adnan. The mission was already put in motion, with some Amriki that are without scrutiny. Completely clean. This man is the one who is leading them.”
“Amriki. Americans. It sounds tempting, but I’m not so sure.” He said it offhand, hiding his true feelings. Hiding his hatred. He needed to be convincing.
“Adnan called them the Lost Boys. They are undetectable. In fact, one is in Jordan right this minute. He’s planning an attack there, with some of our members.”
That picked up Rashid’s interest. “What members?”
“Remember al-Britani? The one who relishes being in the propaganda? Delivering justice?”
“Yes. I do. I used to lead him. He’s not that impressive. He fought when he had to, but spent more time in front of the camera after the fact. He has half the world chasing him because of it.”
The emir said, “Not this time. He’s in Jordan right now, and he has one of the Lost Boys with him. They’re planning a synchronized attack with the man you just heard. A significant blow that we can claim with the Islamic State. It will be our joining. Showing the world that our fight from the past is done.”
“Really? And why wasn’t I told about this?”
Rashid saw the pique in the emir’s face, and knew to back off. If only to get what he wanted.
“Because you were with the Khorasan group. Tasked with the very attacks they are conducting. Yet you failed.”
Rashid heard the words and felt the sting. He wanted to lash out, but he was too close. Too close to getting his hands on the man who had humiliated him.
Two years before, in response to al Qaida siding with Jabhat al-Nusra over a question of legitimacy, the Islamic State had declared them an enemy, slaughtering al-Nusra as easily as the regime’s soldiers in a vicious bloodletting that rivaled the civil war itself. Al-Nusra should have mopped up the Islamic State in short order. Would have beheaded all of them for their treachery, as they had the better men and skill, except for one soldier: Omar al-Khatami. The Chechen. Fighting for the Islamic State, he had proven to hold a battlefield prowess like none other—even the Syrian army—and had laid waste to huge swaths of al-Nusra terrain. The culminating point for Rashid was a battle in a village outside of Aleppo.
Terrain cut off, no supplies coming in, men beheaded or shot on sight, al-Nusra had collapsed, and Rashid had fled, escaping dressed as a woman, his face hidden by a niqab veil, his body cloaked in black. He’d been stopped at a checkpoint, and had known he was dead. The only question was how slow it would be.
Omar had interrogated him, searing his voice into Rashid’s brain. Omar had punctuated each statement with the blade of a knife, then, inexplicably, had left the room without killing him.
Lying in a pool of spit and blood, Rashid had feigned weakness, lulling his captors. When he’d seen a fleeting opportunity, he’d seized it. Using his skills and a healthy dose of luck, Rashid had slaughtered the guards holding him with a steel spring torn from a mattress, fleeing into the dark still dressed as a woman.
A shameful woman.
The rage that memory brought could never be calculated, and now he had the means to deliver retribution.
If only he worked this right.
He said, “Okay. Let’s give him the contact in Albania, but tell him the meeting is twenty-four hours later. Tell him we’ve had issues.”
“Why?”
“I want to vet him. I want to be sure he’s who he says he is. I know Adnan, but I don’t know this man. I’m going to Albania personally.”
The emir smiled and said, “That’s not necessary.”
“It is to me. I’m going. And I’m taking my men with me. I need support assets. I need passports and clean money. Credit cards and cash.”
The emir considered him, seeing the conviction, and said, “The fight is here. Now. If they succeed, they succeed. If they don’t, nothing has been harmed. Let them continue.”
Rashid nodded and said, “I have the skill to blend into the population. The intelligence training to evade the crusader net. I want to help him, and this is the best way.”
The emir pursed his lips and sat back. “You feel this is necessary for success?”
Rashid smiled, saying, “Yes.”
But he failed to articulate what he meant by success.
24
I felt the heat start to rise inside the car and wondered why the hell I’d decided to control the operation. I could have put Knuckles in charge and been inside with Jennifer.
Dumbass.
Truthfully, after the last operation, I wasn’t looking forward to another follow-and-catch mission. I wanted some high adventure, not the boring slog of building a pattern of life, then a single takedown. Yeah, the final endgame had been a little fun, but the damn buildup was murder. But apparently, this guy was somewhat important, made more unique because he was American.
Kurt had called, redirecting us just as we were headed to Hyrax Hill in Kenya, the famed cradle of civilization discovered by the Leakeys back in the 1920s, and the reason we had supposedly come to the country. Which aggravated the hell out of Jennifer.
She could live with the guns and blood, but she did so primarily because we always got to do some digging around old pottery shards to maintain our cover—although I secretly believed she was beginning to like the Jason Bourne stuff. This time, her expected trip was cut short.
We were redirected to Jordan under some flimsy excuse of checking out the deterioration of Umm el-Jimal, some Byzantine relic full of archaic bricks. Ostensibly we were under contract for UNESCO, the UN organization charged with preserving culturally significant sites around the world. Before Jennifer got to drag me to that place, though, she had to build a pattern of life on our target, and this one had some peculiarities.
Kurt had given us a complete data dump, and the history of this guy really made me wonder what the hell we were doing in the grand ol’ US of A. The target was an asset recruited, trained, and inserted into Syria by the CIA only to end up killing other CIA assets. Made me shake my head. The second head-scratcher was why we were chosen for the mission. When we were used,
it was precisely to evade the prying eyes of the host nation, which sort of defeated the whole “coalition of the willing” thing. But then again, given the sensitivities with Jordanian politics, I could at least buy that.
Anyway, it was going to be an in and out. The detail we’d gotten from the CIA was spot-on, with potential locations, current photographs, and biodata. We’d deployed with Omega authority in hand and had found the guy yesterday right where they said he’d be—at his father’s hotel—and now we were doing the necessary boring work of developing his habits so we could pick a kill zone.
Easy stuff. Except for the heat in my car.
My earpiece crackled and I heard, “Trigger. Got Hipster. He’s headed out. This time with a uniform in hand.”
Looks like he got the job.
His name was Hussein, but we didn’t use that on the radio. He had a wispy mustache thing, and was skinny, wearing tight jeans and looking like some twentysomething that frequented Brooklyn coffee shops arguing sections of Proust, which is where Retro had come up with the code name “Hipster.”
From what we could tell, he’d been interviewing for a position inside the hotel. I guess trying to build a new life for himself. I hated to crush that aspiration, but it was my job. Okay, I didn’t at all. Seeing an asshole cut off someone’s head does that to me.
I said, “Roger. Loose follow. Just confirm the same route and residence.”
Amman, Jordan, is a unique city in that the entire place is split right down the middle, with the haves and have-nots clearly separated, much like all of the small towns you read about in old stories of America, with a “right side of the tracks” and a “wrong side of the tracks.” In this case, the entire section of west Amman was the right side, with high-end shopping, expensive cars, leafy parks, and spas. The east was the wrong side, with claustrophobically close stone buildings, dripping pipes, and refugee camps from the spillover of wars from the formation of Israel to the invasion of Iraq and the current Syrian fight.
The Grand Hyatt hotel, where Hussein’s father worked, was right in the center, and from it, Hussein had routinely walked the four kilometers home, winding his way through the narrow streets until he reached the famed Citadel, an old Roman ruin in the heart of the city. From there, he entered the packed confines of the east, leaving the glow of west Amman behind and slinking his way past the cloistered buildings, scattered clotheslines, and open markets to a concrete apartment complex of the kind that was ubiquitous in east Amman. Really, the same type of thing you saw all over the Middle East.
Parked within view of the hotel entrance, I saw the target exit with a smile on his face, and I wondered how long he’d hold it.
I said, “I got him. Retro, he’s on the same track. You ready?”
“Roger.”
From there it was a boring leapfrog, with me manipulating teams. Something I could have done in my sleep. The only hard part had been following his route on day one, since it appeared that every street in Jordan had multiple names, depending on who was doing the talking or who had made the street sign. We’d created our own surveillance maps, with our own codes for the major arteries, so everyone was on the same sheet of music, and if he followed his pattern we’d be set on that piece of the puzzle. What I really wanted to know was where he actually stayed at night. We had the building, but we might want to take him down right in his room, and so, after triggering, Jennifer got the job of rushing ahead to pick him up at the endgame while everyone else continued to confirm his route.
Jennifer and I had scoped out the area beforehand and had found a coffee shop that afforded her a view of his apartment complex. While east Amman was rustic, to say the least, the city had tourists traveling all over, with many wanting to see the old-world charms of the east, so she would blend in just fine. Actually, better than fine. She’d gone in for tea earlier, just to check it out, and they’d fawned all over her, amazed that a Westerner would want to see them.
Of course, true to form, she’d had her head covered in a scarf, learned enough Arabic to say hello, and had done research to be able tell the servers the history of the area. She was perfect that way. I’m sure if I’d gone in, they would have spit in my cup, mainly because I would have ordered a beer.
The apartment building had two entrances, and her sole function today was to see which door he used, then trigger Brett to penetrate so he could get atmospherics inside. Possible stairwells, mailboxes, or anything else we could use to neck down the location of his apartment. Building a pattern of life was like LEGO blocks. One brick at a time. Since there was no rush on this, and we had a handle on him, I would take all the time necessary to get it perfect.
I got all the calls saying he was continuing on his route, plotting each one on my computer for historical reference and growing bored. Wishing we had a more interesting target.
I realized I hadn’t heard from Jennifer after her jump from the hotel to the coffee shop. I broke squelch. “Koko, Koko, this is Pike. Status?”
I heard nothing.
I sat up, now more alert. Not concerned, but anticipating.
I got a call from Retro, “Hipster is one block out. I’m off. Koko, you set?”
Nothing.
I waited, then came on again, “Koko, I’m about to call an abort and redirect to your location with all assets. Answer if you’re on the net.”
She did.
“Pike, Pike, standby.”
What the hell? I broke in again, something I hated doing as surveillance chief. In my mind, the more the SC talked, the more screwed up he was. The team should be running the show, as had happened up until this point.
“Koko, the target is a block out. Are you set or not?”
“No. I’m not set. Pike, there’s someone in the coffee shop. I can’t get in without compromise.”
Now things were getting downright strange.
“What do you mean? Someone in the coffee shop how? Someone you know?”
Which would be impossible.
“Yes. She’s dressed like an Arab, but I recognize her. She’s focused on our target building. She’s conducting surveillance.”
The words ran through my head, but even after review they made no sense.
I said, “She who?”
“Shoshana. Shoshana is operating on our target set.”
25
Hussein bounded up the steps to his apartment, running through all of the things he needed to do before his first day of work tomorrow. He wanted to make a good first impression, showing the hotel he was his father’s son. Forgetting, for the moment, the reason he’d really come.
He opened the door to his small two-room apartment, and that purpose came crashing back, slamming into his conscious brain like a wave tossing him onto the rocks.
Ringo was sitting at his makeshift kitchen table, typing on a laptop.
Hussein kicked the door closed, then stood silently.
Ringo said, “Lost Boy. You’re home. And I see you have a uniform. So we are ready. Good little man.”
Hussein said, “How did you get in here?”
Ringo’s condescending grin leaked out, and he said, “Did you think Omar would let you loose on your own? I’m on the lease documents. I only had to pick up a key.”
Dumbly, Hussein remained at the door. Ringo said, “Come inside. Cook me some food. I saw you’ve been shopping, and I’m hungry. It was a long trip.”
Hussein thought about his past, then his future. He remembered his father’s touch, and realized he could get out right now. Kill Ringo and flee.
Ringo saw the slice of emotion on his face and stood up, pulling out a thick knife with a blackened blade. Menacing.
He said, “I’m staying here, with you, Lost Boy. Unless you have a problem with that.”
Hussein said, “No, no. Of course not. Where are the others? The team? I don’t have room for them all.”
“Don’t worry about them. They’re here, and they’re ready. We’re all waiting on you. Did you meet your fat
her? Get the key?”
Hussein circled around him, entering the small kitchen area. He said, “Yes. Yes, I did. But I don’t start work until tomorrow.”
“That’s no problem. We aren’t attacking for forty-eight hours. You’ll have a full day of work to figure things out. Just don’t give any indication of what’s going to happen.”
Now within view of the laptop’s computer screen, Hussein saw Ringo was on Twitter, going back and forth with direct messaging. The sight provided something to knock Ringo back and gain the initiative.
He said, “Why are you on Twitter? Why are you still using social media after we were told not to?”
Ringo abruptly sat down, putting the knife on the table and closing the web browser, his fear of disobeying the Chechen clearly evident. He said, “I’m not. All I did was check my Twitter feed.”
“No, that’s not all you did. I saw the feed. I saw the direct message app. Who were you talking to?”
“None of your damn business. I’m in charge here.” He picked up the knife, tapped the table with the blade, then used it to point at Hussein. He said, “You need to remember that.”
Hussein leaned into a doorjamb and crossed his arms. “I understand my place. I don’t understand what the Islamic State is planning. What is it?”
“You don’t need to know. You open the door, and we’ll do the rest.”
“I want to know. My father told me what happened at this hotel in 2005. Are you going to repeat that?”
Ringo scoffed and said, “Hell no. I’m no shahid. My life is worth much, much more.”
Hussein took that in, wondering what else it could be. He said, “I need to understand so I can help. I’m working in a vacuum.”
Ringo said, “The plan is mine. You just provide the entrance. Can you do that?”
“Yes. I can now. My father gave me a job.”
“Dumbass. Hope he stays away from work in two days.”
The words reminded Hussein of the threat that would affect someone other than himself. A thought that gave him an unfamiliar sense of apprehension.
