Vengeance: A Derek Stillwater Novel (Derek Stillwater Thrillers Book 8)

by Mark Terry

  “He’s an advisor to the President.”

  “Intelligence?”

  O’Bannon nodded.

  “Jesus Christ, O’Bannon. Spit it out. Is he an asset of yours?”

  “A counterpart. How this works, Stillwater, is he’s very high in Egyptian intelligence. I know your time with the Agency was very short, that you’re more of a blunt instrument, but you know how this crap works. So Ali Urabi works at cross-purposes to us. But we share information with him if we think it’s worthwhile, and vice versa.”

  “And el-Sisi says he might be able to help.”

  “Yes, but … ”

  Derek said, “Either tell me what the problem is or I’m walking out of here.”

  “The problem is he probably won’t talk to you.”

  “Who will he talk to?”

  Licking his lips, O’Bannon said, “He’s pretty much my asset.”

  “So get your ass out of the office and talk to him.”

  “This is a sensitive—”

  Derek got up and headed for the door. “Do your job, asshole.”

  “Stillwater.”

  Derek turned, waiting.

  “We’ll do this. But I want you to remember something. Something important.”

  Derek waited.

  “You can’t believe everything he says.”

  “Everybody’s got an agenda. I got it. Let’s go.”

  35

  O’Bannon rode in the front seat of a Toyota driven by an Embassy Security Officer whose shoulders were so wide Derek marveled that he’d been able to get into the car at all. The officer had a shock of black hair, hard angular planes to his face, and thick hands. He said nothing. Derek rode in the back. Noa had been informed that she was not welcome on this particular meeting. To her credit, she hadn’t seemed very surprised.

  Before they left, Derek pulled her aside. “You know what’s going on?”

  “I know who this asset is. Derek, intelligence works the same way for everybody. We share what we can. Egypt may hate us, but we are allies of sorts, and they have significantly more problems with Syria and Iran and Iraq than they have with us. So if we get intelligence that might be of value to them, we may trade it for intelligence of value to us. That’s how this works.”

  “Okay. I understand. What are you going to do?”

  “I’m going to read the materials el-Sisi gave on the Nazif Brigade. And I’m going to worry about you.”

  He kissed her. “I’ll let you know just as soon as I know something.”

  “And Derek?”

  He raised an eyebrow in question.

  “Watch your back. It’s dangerous out there.”

  And now, they parked a block or so from the Cairo Marriott. To his driver, O’Bannon said, “You know the drill. Special attention today, though. Everything’s hot.”

  Leaving the car and stepping out into the baking sun, they walked down to the Garden Promenade Cafe. It was only about a block and a half, but O’Bannon took his time, stopping periodically to glance around.

  “This isn’t subtle,” Derek said.

  “In case you hadn’t noticed, there was a revolution recently and the U.S. Secretary of State was kidnapped by extremists today. I’m not looking for subtle. I want to make sure nobody’s following us.”

  “This where you usually meet?”

  O’Bannon shot him a look. “I’m a professional, Stillwater. Let me do my job.”

  With a shrug, Derek looked around. The Nile River was nearby. The streets were mobbed. This was something of a tourist area, except that the Arab Spring had pretty much killed Egypt’s tourism industry, at least for a while. Still, business continued and the area was filled with Western and Middle Eastern businessmen in either their suits or their robes, all carrying briefcases and cell phones.

  The café was an open-air restaurant alongside the south side of the hotel and casino, which was all orange stucco and arches and wrought-iron balconies. They slipped between massive acutely trimmed circular hedges. O’Bannon nodded. “He’s here.”

  Glancing around at the other people, Derek appreciated that the restaurant was basically off the street, but was overlooked by the twenty-some story part of the hotel. Who knew who would be watching?

  Thinking of his recent experience with a sniper, the pain in his leg still present and real, he limped after O’Bannon to a small round table in the shade of one of the circular hedges and sat down.

  Ali Urabi was an older Egyptian man, thin, probably in his sixties, bald with wire-rimmed glasses. He wore an open-necked white dress shirt and khaki slacks. He didn’t look like a spy, which, Derek supposed, probably meant he was a good one. He looked like an aging professor of accounting.

  The Egyptian cocked a head and studied Derek. “You are Derek Stillwater?”

  Shooting a glance at O’Bannon, Derek nodded. He and Urabi shook hands.

  “I understand what you’re doing here in Cairo, but I do not know exactly what you’re doing here at the table with me.”

  “That makes two of us.”

  Urabi nodded. “I do not know the location of Robert Mandalevo.”

  Leaning forward, O’Bannon said, “You have people looking?”

  “Of course. And General el-Sisi, I believe, has people looking. It is possible the Mukhabarat is … interrogating … people as we speak to acquire information.”

  “And Morsi’s people?”

  Urabi turned back to look at Derek. He splayed his fingers. “Egypt is a complicated place, Doctor.”

  Derek felt like he was wasting time. Why was he here? What did el-Sisi think they were going to get out of this guy? What did O’Bannon think he was going to get?

  “What,” O’Bannon said, “do you know about Hussein Nazif’s family?”

  “They seem to have disappeared,” Urabi said.

  “When?”

  “Well, since we started looking for them today. The neighbors suggest, from what I’m hearing, that they left their various homes in the last several days.”

  “Meaning that they had some idea what was going to happen,” Derek said.

  With a slight bow of his head and a tiny shrug, Urabi said, “Perhaps.”

  Derek stared at Urabi. With a glance at O’Bannon, he leaned forward. “Then my next question is this: did anybody in Morsi’s government know this was going to happen today?”

  “Jesus, Stillwater,” O’Bannon started, but Urabi raised a hand.

  “An interesting question. But I’m afraid I do not know. I am also afraid, Dr. Stillwater, that I need to speak with Mr. O’Bannon without you.”

  Derek got to his feet, feeling the frustration flashing across his face. Without a word to either of them he walked toward the street. Why in hell had O’Bannon wanted him to come? If he and Urabi were swapping state secrets, neither of them would have wanted him there to witness it.

  Out on the street in front of the hotel, he stood in the shade of a palm tree and watched pedestrians and traffic. His gaze drifted over the hotel room windows. They reflected the harsh, dazzling Egypt sunlight, but he thought he saw people standing at some of them. Watching.

  Tourists?

  Friend or foe?

  Out of the corner of his eye he saw the broad shoulders of O’Bannon’s driver. Turning his head, they locked gazes. Derek gave him a minute nod, which the driver returned.

  Traffic was so heavy and the vehicles so old, the street smelled of exhaust. The Nile was right there alongside the hotel, and had its own strong, swampy smell. Everywhere people smoked—cigarettes, cigars, pipes—and the odor was everywhere.

  A man with a shaved head walked along the street toward him. As he neared, he stopped and pulled a pack of cigarettes from a pocket and lit it, cupping his hands around the cigarette as he did so. It was the Israeli, Aaron Kadish. Once he got the cigarette going, he headed on his way, saying, “Plug in” as he passed by.

  Derek thumbed the power back on his phone and put his earbud in. He punched up Irina’s number
. “I’m here.”

  “What’s going on?”

  “I’m standing around waiting for the Agency to get some useful information. What’s going on where you are?”

  “No one’s heard from Mandalevo. I’ve been trying to track Nazif’s Internet usage, but I hit a dead end. Maybe your NSA is doing something. Wait, I’ve got Johnston and Konstantin here.”

  Johnston: Nothing on our end. How are you holding up?

  “Things got hairy in the City of the Dead and we had one dead from phosgene.”

  Konstantin: Do you think it was a deliberate trap?

  “You mean set for me? I wonder. There’s a little feel of us playing cat and mouse here, that he had things planned. I don’t see how he could have made this capture and stayed ahead of us without some planning and some decent intel.”

  Johnston: You think someone in State or someone in Cairo?

  “God, Jim, let’s hope in Cairo. I don’t think we can trust anyone in the—”

  He broke off. From down the street O’Bannon’s driver sprinted into traffic, a machine pistol in his fist.

  Two panel vans raced down the street, zigging and zagging through the clots of cars. Derek saw the doors of the vans were open and men with AK47s knelt in the doorways.

  Reaching for his gun, he flung himself behind a cement planter for a tree near the hotel entrance. Suddenly a hand gripped his shoulder. It was Kadish.

  He hissed, “They’re coming for you! Move!”

  Together they sprinted toward a waiting car, just as gunfire chewed through the air.

  36

  Secretary Mandalevo came to bit by bit. The world was gray and dim around the edges. The first thing he felt was pain. Untied, he reached for his eye and felt the bandages.

  After a moment he realized the pain was more extensive. During Nazif’s last outburst he had been beaten unconscious. Knife-like pain jabbed through his side. Probably broken ribs.

  Something was wrong with his right arm. It throbbed and was so swollen it looked like a sausage, straining at his sleeve. He suspected a broken elbow.

  He thought of his daughters, wondering if he would ever see them again. Adults now.

  With a groan, he struggled to sit up. There was more wrong with him than broken ribs. He could barely straighten up. He sprawled on a rug in a bare room. A bucket was placed in one corner.

  No window. Bare floor. Single door.

  Attached to one wall, a small digital camera.

  He wondered if this was being broadcast, or if they were just watching him.

  For a moment he was back in a hospital room, sitting next to his late-wife, watching the morphine seep into her veins. A beautiful woman, an intelligent woman, a ferociously wonderful woman, slayed by cancer, now wasted to skin and bones, sleeping the sleep of the dead. He held her hand and reached down to kiss her cheek—

  And back to his empty room in Cairo somewhere.

  Struggling to his feet, he leaned against the wall, gasping for air. A wave of vertigo swirled around him.

  He vomited blood and sank to his knees.

  Something inside of him was broken. Something seriously wrong.

  What if they were broadcasting this?

  He took a deep breath.

  Climbed carefully to his feet, leaning against the wall.

  With a defiant glare at the camera, he took a step toward the door. And another.

  Air burned like lava in his lungs, spears of pain slashed through his side, his eye and skull throbbing in time to his heartbeat.

  But he walked. Step. Another. Another.

  Gripping the knob with his right hand he turned.

  Locked.

  Of course it was.

  Summoning his strength, he made a fist and pounded on the door. Once. Twice. Three times.

  Then he turned and shuffled slowly back to the far wall, where he stood, back pressed to the wall, waiting.

  He didn’t have long to wait. The door opened and Hussein Nazif appeared, flanked by two of his thugs.

  “So, you are awake.”

  “What do you want?”

  “We have been over this, Mr. Mandalevo. I want my brother released. I want Derek Stillwater and the other man turned over to me for justice. But I believe we will get Stillwater without your help. And then there will be justice.”

  “You mean vengeance.”

  Nazif shrugged. “He killed my son. Twelve years old.”

  “Who carried an assault rifle and used a Taser to torture a man. On your orders.” Mandalevo grayed out a minute, almost falling, then drew in a molten chest full of air. “You turned your son into a soldier and he died doing his duty, the duty you assigned him. Not Derek Stillwater. He didn’t kill your son. You did.”

  In a flash Nazif crossed the room, his hand gripping Mandalevo by the throat, pressing him to the wall, choking him. Voice harsh and low, “You know nothing about duty. You know nothing about war.”

  He let go of his throat and Mandalevo slid to the floor.

  With a kick to the ribs that caused fireworks to explode through his entire body, Nazif spat out something in Arabic. His two men rushed forward and hauled Mandalevo to his feet by his arms. The pain from his broken elbow pushed him deep into himself, away from this room, away from these madmen.

  “Daddy! Daddy! Watch me!” One of the twins, Meghan, at the beach. She was three, maybe four. And with that she flung herself into the waves, splashing the green churning foam, jumping over the crest like a dolphin, laughing and giggling.

  And then he was in a different room, sitting in a chair facing a camera once again.

  37

  Tumbling into the back of the car, Derek and Kadish peeled away. The rear window exploded, pelting them with tiny squares of safety glass.

  Kadish peeked his head up, then back down. “They’re coming after us.”

  From the front seat Noa said, “They weren’t after O’Bannon or his contact.”

  “No,” Kadish said. Pulling a machine pistol off the floor, he popped up and fired off a burst toward their pursuers.

  A burst of automatic fire chunked into the body of the car. Derek, sprawled half on the floor and the rear seat, pulled out his Colt.

  Tires squealing, they roared onto a bridge over the Nile. A round, ornate tower scratched the sky nearby. Billboards advertised McDonalds and Coca-Cola. Popping his head up, Derek noticed the vans, but also saw two tan Toyota pickup trucks with armed men in the back racing along after them.

  “More company,” he said.

  Peering back, Noa said, “I think that’s Egyptian Army.”

  Glancing upward, Derek said, “Two choppers. Military.”

  “Can we lose all these people?” Kadish shouted, raising his gun over his head and firing out the shattered rear window.

  The driver, a wiry man with a hawk nose and curly black hair, grunted. The traffic on the bridge was heavy, but he drove expertly, swerving in and out of the flow of traffic, slipping into gaps Derek didn’t believe would be possible.

  Behind them, the vans were closing, but so were the Toyota pickups, who were firing at the vans.

  With a roar, one of the vans closed the distance between them. Twisting, Derek took careful aim and fired at the driver.

  The gunman in the door returned fire.

  The driver said, “Hold on,” and jerked the wheel. The rear of the car hit the front right side of the van. The driver adjusted. The gunman lost his balance, reaching for the door.

  Kadish fired. The gunman tumbled from the door. Derek fired at the driver, who swerved violently, the van tipping dangerously, then righting itself, now a dozen yards from them.

  As soon as they came off the bridge, they were in an area of modern high-rises, museums, and sports stadiums. Off to one side Derek saw a massive blue swimming pool.

  Then the car swerved left, dodging through traffic, took a hard right, then another left, and slid into the entryway to an underground parking garage of a high-rise. The driver pulled close
to an elevator bank and stairwell. They piled out and he roared away.

  “Not much time,” Noa said. “Stairs. Third floor.”

  They sprinted to the stairs, Derek lagging behind, bad leg sizzling. Then they were on the third floor. He limped after them. Noa, using an entry card, opened a door and they stepped inside.

  It was an apartment, furnished, but seemingly empty. “What’s this?”

  “Another safehouse.”

  “They know we’re in the building, don’t they?”

  “Maybe.” Noa sat down and pulled out her phone, punched a button and spoke in rapid Hebrew. She clicked off. Looking at Derek, she patted the sofa next to her.

  He sat down, and then it hit him. Again. He leaned forward, bad arm cradled in his good arm, sucking in air hard, heart beating wildly, pulse pounding in his ears.

  Kadish said, “Drink?”

  “Water?”

  Kadish retrieved three bottles of water from the refrigerator, drinking half of his in one gulp.

  Taking a swallow, Derek said, “You were following me?”

  “Watching your back.”

  “Thank you.”

  With a sigh, Noa said, “Someone set you up.”

  “Me?”

  “Specifically you, yes.”

  Kadish said, “We caught some chatter. Said, basically, ‘Stillwater will be at Marriott.’”

  Derek grew very still. Slowly, thinking it through, he said, “el-Sisi? Urabi?”

  They didn’t speak, both of the Israelis watching him closely.

  “O’Bannon?” he said.

  Noa shrugged. “Maybe.”

  Teeth clenched, he powered up his phone. “Who’s on the line?”

  Irina: Johnston, Konstantin and myself.

  Johnston: Sit-rep.

  “The fucking CIA might have used me as bait.”

  Johnston: Derek—

  “O’Bannon demanded I come along for a meeting with this guy, probably his counterpart, then told me to go out on the street and wait, they had sensitive things to talk about. And about a minute later Nazif’s people showed up, and they were being chased by Egyptian military.”