Nasser, however, had sailed her many times, all in preparation for this day. He learned quickly. While he would never trust himself to sail it across the Atlantic, he knew he could manage the mission before him.
Once clear of the bay, Nasser activated the auto pilot and left the cabin. On the rear deck, twenty bikini-clad beauties—none over the age of thirty—danced to loud music and sipped beer from bottles even though the sun was barely up. Each had brought a boyfriend.
The party had been planned and promoted for months. Nasser had spent time in upper-end night clubs catering to the upcoming generation of Hedonists. He never went home with the women, but he did buy drinks for them and their friends.
Today they were on an ocean-going party to celebrate Nasser’s new acquisition: a Hollywood studio. When asked the company’s name, he demurred, saying the lawyers had warned him to be discreet. He spent money like he printed it himself. That was proof enough.
He walked through the crowd. Several of the women approached him, running their hands over his shoulders or along his face. He could only imagine how they would behave once they were deep into the liquor.
DELARAM CUT THE STEMS of roses, placed them in thin glass vases, and framed them with baby’s breath.
“Make them look good.” Abasi removed another stack of flowers from the large, white pails they had transported them in. “Show some pride in your work.”
Delaram looked at him. “There is no pride in what we do.”
“It must be done. You do it to save your parents.”
“And why do you do it?”
“I do it to further Allah’s kingdom and to punish the infidels. You will be honored.”
“None of your kind will remember me. Just my parents, assuming you keep your promise. Are you religious men people of your word?”
“If it serves the greater good.”
“In other words, no.”
He raised a hand to strike her.
“Careful,” she said. “Someone will certainly notice the bruise.”
He lowered his hand. “Do as you are told. Women like you cannot understand why brave men like me do what we do.”
“Insanity?”
Abasi struck her on the back of head so hard her knees buckled.
“Get up. I know other places where bruises won’t show.”
Delaram steadied herself, forcing back the hot gorge that rose in her throat. A minute later the large dining room stopped spinning.
“No more talk. We are falling behind schedule.”
Standing erect, Delaram tried to clear her mind. She lifted a hand and touched the heavy vest under her maternity dress. The irony struck her again: Those who saw her assumed she was about to give life; instead, she was about to take it.
CHAPTER 22
AFTER ALDO PARKED THE van, Mitchell led the team through the underground parking lot to a set of elevators. Before they exited the vehicle, Aldo said his goodbyes and shook Moyer’s hand.
“Thanks for the ride . . . and the excitement.” Aldo offered a small, polite smile. “You’re going to go back to your men and have a good laugh, aren’t you?”
“Certainly not. That would be rude.”
“You’ll forgive me if I don’t believe you.”
Mitchell swiped a keycard through a slot on the button panel. “Direct ascent to the top floor,” he said.
“So, can I talk you out of telling the president about our being held at gunpoint by Italian police or do I have to shoot you?”
“It might be worth being shot.” Mitchell moved his gaze from the lit floor numbers over the elevator door. “Maybe I’ll just let you tell him.”
“Yeah, right. I forgot to RSVP for lunch.”
“He wants to see you,” Mitchell said. “In fact, he insisted on it.”
“When?” Moyer had trouble processing what he heard.
Mitchell looked at his watch. “In about fifteen minutes. You’ll have only a few minutes with him. He’s meeting with the Prime Minister of Canada and the President of Mexico. Sort of a North American Summit. First, I want to show you something.”
“When you say the president wants to meet with you, do you mean just me, or the whole team?”
“The whole team. As you know, he loves the military. He never served, and I think he feels guilty about it.”
“Well,” J. J. said, “as commander in chief, he is serving now.”
“Roger that,” Mitchell said. “Just so you know, he cheers for Navy in the Army-Navy game.”
“Then I won’t bring up their embarrassing loss last December.”
“You’d be wise not to.”
The elevator stopped at the top floor with a slight lurch. When they stepped from the cab, several men in suits stopped, stared, and then reached under their suit coats.
“Stand down,” Mitchell said firmly. “They’re with me.”
Moyer watched the eyes of half a dozen Secret Service agents shift to the ID card he wore around his neck.
“I’m thinking we ought to stow our gear,” Rich said. “I’m getting tired of getting the evil eye.”
“You won’t be seeing POTUS with weapons in hand,” Mitchell said. “You can keep them in the weapons locker in Oz.”
“What does POTUS mean?” De Luca asked.
Mitchell glanced at the Italian. “President of the United States.”
They stopped at the end of the hall. Two agents stood by a pair of double doors. Mitchell said nothing to them as they stepped aside. Mitchell ran his ID card over a reader mounted to the wall and a solid click emerged from the lock. Mitchell swung the doors open.
Inside Moyer saw an array of monitors with male and female agents watching them. A large table dominated the center of the room. Rolls of blueprints cluttered the surface. To one side was a large metal cabinet, the kind used to store weapons.
“This way.” Mitchell walked to the cabinet, passed his ID card over the reader, and the doors swung open. “Sergeant Major, please secure your weapons and store them here.”
“Will my ID open this?”
“Nope. You’ll need me or one of our shift supervisors to open the locker.”
Moyer didn’t move.
“Look, gentlemen, I know you Army guys love your weapons. So do federal agents, but this hotel has the top leaders of twenty countries here. Certain rules had to be set up. This is one of them.”
“Do as the man says,” Moyer ordered.
“I suppose that means sidearms too,” J. J. said.
“I’m afraid so: sidearms, body armor, knives—anything and everything that looks like a weapon.”
Moyer looked in the locker and saw enough weapons to wage a war on a small country including sniper rifles, M5-A4s, and several Close Quarter Battle Receivers, a version of the M4A1 his team carried. Moyer set his M4 assault rifle in an empty portion of the rack and set his M9 on one of the shelves. He slipped from his “kit” and set it inside the locker. The others did the same.
“I want a receipt,” J. J. said.
“You got something better—my word that no one will mess with your gear.”
Mitchell closed the doors to the gun cabinet, and Moyer heard the lock set.
Mitchell checked his watch again. “We have enough time for me to put to rest some of your doubts.” He looked at Zinsser. “The monitors you see are tied to street cameras mounted around the area. We can see everything for five blocks out and the ocean to our west. The small marina is closed to traffic for the next few days.” He pointed at a special bank of monitors. “These monitor hot spots.”
“Hot spots?” Rich said.
“If you’ve followed the meetings—the G-8, the G-20—there are always protests. The numbers can get pretty large, upwards of twenty thousand. The Italians thought it best to create areas where people can congregate. There will be media there so the protesters should be happy. The Naples police with the backing of the Italian army have those areas as part of their responsibility. Their job is to handle cr
owd control. It wouldn’t do to have Americans taking on Italian citizens.”
Mitchell touched his ear and tilted his head slightly to the right. Moyer had taken notice of the ear monitor the moment he stepped up to the agent at the airport. “The president is ready for you. Follow me.”
Over his career Moyer had met high-ranking military leaders, briefed generals, and once gave a verbal report to the secretary of defense, and he had done so without a sense of intimidation. Meeting the president, however, was different. He had given scores of briefings to bigwigs, but he always had time to prepare. Just one more source of tension.
Moyer wished he had voted for the man.
DELARAM’S HEART AND MIND were numb.
Helplessness had given way to despondency. Hope seemed a distant memory, a foggy recollection that lived in a distant time that Delaram could barely remember. She was shutting down. With each minute that passed what remained of optimism dripped away. She reconciled herself to the one fact that rattled most in her brain: Today was the day she would die.
The dining room began to vibrate with activity. Several men in suits gave orders to workers dressed in white who moved between round tables covered with white lace tablecloths. Five tables dominated the center of the room; a dozen others formed a perimeter around them. Their tablecloths were red. The center tables had eight padded chairs: enough for forty diners. Delaram noticed the workers had paired the seats so they formed four sets of two. Husbands and wives, she decided. She also decided the tables with the red tablecloths were for assistants, or maybe the media. She couldn’t be certain.
Male and female workers set the tables with linen napkins, ornate silverware, crystal goblets, tumblers for drinks, and cups for coffee. The employees worked at a steady but unrushed pace. Abasi had told her they were setting flowers for a lunch meeting. A walnut lectern stood near the window wall that overlooked the ocean. The window was tinted, and Delaram guessed that people could see out the window but not in.
“Slower,” Abasi said to Delaram. “We will wait until the servants have left the room before we set the vases.”
“They’re employees, not servants.”
“What do I care? They work for infidels.”
Delaram glanced at her captor. “The way I see it, so do you.”
She saw him start to raise his hand, then lower it. He would not strike her in front of the others. Delaram returned to clipping the bottom of rose stems and setting them in the vases. The vest she wore rubbed against the worktable at which she stood. Because of her attempt to activate the vest back at the villa, her bomb had been altered. Abasi had to arm it first. Only then could she trigger the explosion. If she failed to do so, then Abasi could do it himself at a distance.
Delaram clipped another rose stem.
CHAPTER 23
MITCHELL, TRAILED BY MOYER and his men, walked to a pair of double doors a few strides from the communication center. Two agents eyed them as they approached. Mitchell nodded at the men. “Raptor is expecting us.”
One of the agents knocked on the door.
“Raptor?” J. J. said.
“Every member of the presidential team gets a code name. The president is ‘Raptor,’ the first lady is ‘Turtledove.’”
“Good thing it’s not the other way around,” Rich said.
“She picked her own name; we assigned his. The secretary of state is ‘Vagabond.’ Seems apropos.”
“We know a little about nicknames,” Moyer said.
A tall, thin man in a dark suit and red tie answered the door.
“Good morning, Mitch.” The man had a deep Southern accent. Moyer guessed Virginia.
“Morning, Jimmie.”
Jimmie stepped aside, and the men entered the spacious suite. Once everyone had cleared the threshold, Jimmie closed the door and locked it.
The entrance led to a sitting room with expensive and antique looking furniture. A man in a yellow pullover sweater and a pair of khaki Dockers rose from the sofa. The woman sitting next to him turned and smiled. Both had gray hair, pleasant smiles, and tanned skin. The president seemed shorter than Moyer expected.
“Come in, gentlemen, come in.” The president’s voice was smooth, powerful, and rode on a wave of unshakable confidence.
“Mr. President,” Agent Mitchell said. “May I present the Army Special Ops team we spoke of before? This is Sergeant Major Eric Moyer, team leader.”
The president stepped forward and shook Moyer’s hand. “Ted Huffington, Sergeant Major. I’m pleased to meet you.”
“The pleasure is all mine,” Moyer said. For a moment he felt he should bow then corrected himself. The guys would never let me forget that.
“This is my wife, Marni. She’s the real brains of the operation.”
“Not the brains, honey, just the heart.”
Huffington chortled. “If you say so, dear.” He looked back at Moyer and the others. “It pays to be diplomatic at home as well as on the world stage.”
“Yes, sir,” Moyer said.
The president turned to Jimmie. “We could use a few more chairs, Jimmie.”
“I’ll bring some from the dining area, sir.”
“Pete,” Moyer said.
“Yes.” A second later. “Oh. Of course.” He spoke to Jimmie. “Let me help.”
A few minutes later four straight-back chairs were brought in. Moyer and Rich took seats on the second sofa directly opposite the president and his wife. De Luca sat in a leather reading chair. The rest of the team took spots on the dining room chairs. Mitchell stood by the door. It looked like something he did often.
Another knock came on the door. Mitchell answered before Jimmie could take two steps. A woman with dark hair entered. Moyer had seen her on television.
“Ah, glad you could make it, Brownie,” the president said. “Gentlemen, this is Helen Brown, my chief of staff. She may be the smartest person you ever meet.”
“Are you trying to make me blush, Mr. President?”
Moyer guessed the woman hadn’t blushed in many years.
“Of course not. Facts are facts.”
Marni Huffington rose. “Well, I’ll let you talk. I’ll watch Jimmie get your suit ready.”
“Don’t let her fool you. She’s going to watch Italian soap operas.”
“Don’t make me hit you, dear,” Marni said.
“She wouldn’t dare. Mitchell would protect me. Isn’t that right, Mitch?”
“Maybe.”
The comment brought smiles. Moyer admired the president’s ability to put people at ease.
Huffington patted the spot where his wife had sat a few moments before, and Helen sat.
“The sergeant major was about to introduce his team to me.”
Moyer took his cue. He motioned to Rich. “This is Rich Harbison, assistant team leader; Jose Medina is the team medic; Pete Rasor specializes in surveillance and communications; J. J. Bartley, weapons and explosives; Jerry Zinsser, electronics and doubles on communications. Our Italian liaison is Captain Ilario De Luca, of the Italian Army. He’s our in-country intel man.”
The president’s expression saddened. “When I was first made aware of your mission, I failed to make the connection.” He paused for a moment. “You lost a man last year? In Venezuela?”
“Yes, sir. Martin Caraway. He was a good soldier.”
“You did good work down there and got no credit for it.”
“We were just doing our duty. We are proud to serve.”
Huffington nodded. “It’s men like you that make me proud to be commander in chief.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“Fill me in on your mission?”
“Sir?”
“I want to know how your mission is going.”
“Excuse me, sir. I just assumed you were being briefed.”
Huffington leaned forward. “Sometimes information is slower than I like, especially when I’m out of country.”
Moyer noticed Helen Brown shift in her seat.
“Yes, sir.” Moyer spent the next ten minutes briefing the president on everything they had experienced since being deployed.
“And you think that El-Sayyed has targeted the G-20?”
“It’s our best guess, sir, and the most important one.”
“The Italians think the target is in Rome. You don’t think that’s important?”
“It’s very important, Mr. President, but not as important as the lives of twenty of the world’s leaders, their spouses, and staff.”
“Good answer.”
“Captain De Luca has maintained contact with his people in Rome and a manhunt is underway.”
Helen Brown spoke for the first time since entering the room. “Agent Baker tells me this facility is the safest place on the planet with the possible exception of Fort Knox. Is that right, Mitchell?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Helen turned back to Moyer. “So why the concern?”
Moyer didn’t like her tone. “We’ve been given a mission, ma’am. My job is to successfully complete that mission as efficiently and secretly as possible. My gut tells me El-Sayyed has targeted this area.”
“Your gut?” Helen smirked. “The president likes evidence a little more solid than a gut feeling.”
“I can speak for myself, Brownie,” Huffington said. “Mitchell?”
“Yes, Mr. President.”
“You’ve done a few spec ops missions in your day. Given your experience, would you trust the work you and the others have done or the sergeant major’s gut.”
To Moyer’s surprise, Mitchell Baker didn’t respond immediately.
“Is there a problem, Mitch?” Huffington asked.
“No, Mr. President. No problem at all.”
Helen furrowed her brow. “What? Are you saying that Mr. Moyer’s gut takes precedence over months of planning and implantation? You’ve repeatedly told us this location is secure. So what is it? Your skill or his gut?”
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