Act of Terror jq-2

by Marc Cameron

  His rational mind told him what the man with the scorpion on his neck was doing. It was textbook brutality from the Cold War-era CIA KUBARK interrogation training manual. Strip away the clothing and all manner of identity, plant seeds of doubt.

  Understanding the system did little to protect against it.

  Quinn was shaking with rage by the time the box opened to let in a flood of light. Restrained, he could do nothing but wait for what happened next.

  This time, they tied him down. Thick leather belts strapped his ankles and wrists to the gray metal chair. His naked skin was tender and wrinkled from hours in the saltwater chamber.

  Across from him, the bald man with the scorpion tattoo on his neck sat in a similar chair, rubbing the point of his chin as he stared at his prisoner. A blue cordless drill hung from his other hand. The harsh interrogation light was gone, allowing Quinn to look around the windowless, gray room. He gave a silent nod of understanding when he saw the disheveled figure of Lt. Colonel Fargo slouching in the corner. A younger Hispanic man with muscular shoulders and a narrow waist leaned against the wall beside him. He was the one who’d hit him with the hose.

  Squaring his shoulders, Quinn pressed his back hard against the chair and fought to regain his composure. The man with the scorpion tattoo was a professional. He knew the tricks, the subtle nuances of human behavior that displayed flickers of weakness. Quinn was pretty sure this one would be able to kill a weakling like Fargo with a prolonged stare.

  “I have my doubts that pain will work on you,” the bald man said, suddenly standing to loom over Quinn, his face just inches away. There was the hint of chocolate ice cream on his breath.

  A milkshake. Quinn studied the man’s solid muscles through the thin fabric of his gray Under Armour T-shirt. Someone this ripped wasn’t the type to eat ice cream before bed. It had to be near lunchtime, which meant he’d been a prisoner more than twenty-four hours.

  If Hunt had gotten the message out, Thibodaux would be looking for him by now.

  The bald man smiled. “You’re mulling over thoughts of rescue,” he whispered. “I can see the pitiful flash of it in your eyes. They all think of rescue for a time.” He pulled the trigger on the drill.

  Quinn braced himself as the motor revved to a high-pitched whine. He kept his eyes open, focused on the twisted face of his captor.

  The man released the trigger on the drill.

  “No.” He stood up straight again, taking a half step back from Quinn to study him, hand to chin, like an artist. “The pain of a drill bit going through your kneecap wouldn’t work on you.” He took a quick breath and raised his eyebrows, wrinkling his smooth scalp. “But have you considered this possibility? Let’s suppose you are rescued shortly after I ruin your knee. Where would you be then? On a government pension, making forty percent of whatever pitiful salary they’re paying you now? And if you’re not convicted of spying, do you think your friends overseas will prop you up?”

  “Do you honestly believe I’m a spy?” Quinn whispered. “Is that what Fargo told you?”

  The man shrugged. “I’ll tell you what I believe,” he said. “I believe you don’t think I’ll hurt you because we are both Americans.”

  With that, he handed the drill to Fargo and pulled a set of hooked pruning shears from his back pocket.

  Quinn struggled against the restraints, trying to rock his chair, but found it was bolted solidly to the floor.

  The bald man moved closer, nodding as his black eyes flicked over Quinn from head to foot, searching to find a suitable target. “You have taken remarkable care of yourself… considering how you’ve abused your body over the years…” He touched the cool blades to a white scar on Quinn’s shoulder. “Isn’t it amazing the horrible things that run through the mind of a naked man when someone gets near him with a cutting instrument?” He turned to look over his shoulder at Fargo. “What do you think, Colonel? Shall we conduct a little operation?”

  “You’re the expert in these matters.” Fargo nodded, staring at the floor. “Do as you see fit.”

  Across the room, the Hispanic man gave a scoffing chuckle.

  “Quinn,” Fargo spat. “You have to admit that you have an awful lot of explaining to do.” The words fell flat, sounding like something one would say to a disobedient child rather than a prisoner about to be mutilated.

  “So far,” Quinn said, gritting his teeth as the bald man stooped beside him and pulled the little toe of his right foot away from the rest. “So far, no one has asked me any quest-”

  He arched his back as the bald man clamped the shears around the toe, cutting skin and crushing bone in an agonizingly slow process. There was a sickening snap as the bone broke under the metal jaws. Quinn’s breath came in ragged gasps. Excruciating pain shot up his leg from the jagged nubbin.

  The bald man stood, holding the bloody toe in front of Quinn’s face. “This little piggy’s going in the garbage,” he laughed maniacally, throwing his head back.

  A sudden pounding rattled the metal door behind Quinn. The bald man’s eyes darted upward, he face creased with impatience.

  There was another knock, followed by a muffled voice. “Someone wants to see the colonel.” The voice was muffled, unidentifiable.

  The bald man stared hard at Fargo, who let the drill hang limply by his side. “Did you tell anyone you were coming here?”

  “I… er… I mean… no, of course not.”

  The bald man nodded. He raised his voice toward the door. “Jimenez, go see who it is.” He turned back to Quinn. “I want to get to this messy business of softening our traitor so the Colonel can ques-”

  It seemed to Quinn that the door exploded off its hinges. The limp body of another man tumbled forward on top of the startled Jimenez. A bright white flash, like a sudden bolt of lightning, filled the room, followed by the booming crack of a stun grenade. A moment later, a dark form hit Fargo like a cannonball to the chest, propelling him backward and into the wall.

  Quinn recognized Emiko Miyagi as she shot by, wearing black BDUs. Her dark hair was pulled back in a short ponytail. A wakizashi, the Japanese short sword, flashed in her hand.

  “What the hell?” Fargo held up the drill to ward off the woman’s screaming attack. A moment later the revving drill and his hand, separated from his arm, lay convulsing on the concrete floor.

  Jimenez growled, pushing away from Fargo in time to meet Jacques Thibodaux. The big Cajun ignored the attempted punches and scooped the startled Echo up by one arm and the seat of his pants. Jimenez weighed in at nearly a hundred and eighty pounds, but in his rage, Jacques lifted the man high overhead with a guttural roar before slamming him into the concrete floor. Leaving him where he was, the big Marine strode past to loom above the bleeding Lt. Colonel Fargo. Drawing his Kimber, Jacques put a ten-millimeter slug into the man’s knee. Fargo screamed, clutched the amputated stump with his good hand, writhing in a rapidly growing pool of his own blood. Jericho’s toe lay on the floor, inches from his contorted face.

  “You all right, l’ami?” The big Cajun turned to free Quinn with a quick swipe of his Benchmade knife, before helping him to his feet.

  “I’m fine, considering.” Quinn’s teeth chattered from shock. He looked down at the butchered, aching mess on the side of his foot. “Who really needs a little toe anyway?”

  A slow dread crept into his body as he took stock of the room. “Where’s the bald guy?”

  “I was wondering the same thing,” Thibodaux grunted, kicking Fargo in his wounded leg. “There’s not a hell of a lot keeping me from putting another bullet in you. Where’d your cue-ball buddy go?”

  Fargo craned his neck to look around the room. Sobbing, his face was contorted with unspeakable pain. Blood pulsed between his fingers “I… don’t… know… He was right here when you came in. I… I swear it.”

  “Well, he’s not here now…” Thibodaux said. “He didn’t just vanish.”

  “Fargo’s right,” Quinn said, still looking around the
room. “He disappeared the moment you guys breached the door.”

  “What’s his name?” Thibodaux prepared to kick Fargo again.

  “Bundy,” he said through clenched teeth. “First Sergeant Sean Bundy.”

  “I found something,” Miyagi said, Japanese short sword still in her hand. She used her foot to push at an elongated wooden flap that ran along the wall behind her. Six feet across and roughly a foot high, it was painted the same color as the concrete block that surrounded it. All Bundy had to do was drop to the floor and roll to escape the room in an instant.

  “Dammit.” Thibodaux glared, breathing through his nose as he focused all his rage on Fargo.

  Quinn raised his hand. “Hang on a minute, Jacques.” He limped over to stand over Fargo. “Why was I on the Congressman Drake’s list?”

  Fargo shook his head. “I… I’m sorry,” he sobbed.

  Quinn’s voice hummed with tension. “Tell me how my name got on the list.”

  “I saw how much you traveled overseas. How… how good your Arabic was… It just makes sense. I had you added after the fact so my team could investigate.”

  “Where can we find Sean Bundy?”

  “He’s… a senior interrogator… out of Fort Huachuca. Will someone pleeeeease help me stop this bleeding?”

  Quinn nodded slowly. “I think the man from Louisiana is about to help you out with that.”

  Fargo’s eyes snapped open as the big Cajun stepped forward.

  Muscles and tendons on the side of Thibodaux’s neck flexed. “Before you tortured my friend, you paid a little visit to my wife and boys. Remember that?”

  Fargo nodded quickly. Sobbing so hard he could barely breathe.

  Jacques raised the pistol level with Fargo’s contorted face. “Lucky for you she didn’t lose the baby or I’d have put you down a hell of a lot slower than this.”

  No one flinched at the shot.

  “Sit down, Quinn-san,” Miyagi said, sheathing the wakizashi. “I need to take a look at your injury.”

  Quinn sighed, realizing he was standing there in nothing but what God gave him. “First, I need some pants,” he sighed.

  Mrs. Miyagi gave him a stoic wink. “Do not dress on my account, Quinn-san.”

  “I’m about the same size as the guy you clobbered.” Quinn nodded toward Jimenez, who lay unconscious on the floor. “Think you could help me out, Jacques?”

  CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO

  Quinn limped to a chair so he could examine his mutilated foot. Just looking at it made white-hot fury rise like an angry phoenix in his chest. He shot a glance at Fargo, whose lifeless body slumped against the far wall, and thought about borrowing Jacques’s pistol so he could shoot the dead man again.

  “Garcia?” He almost hated to ask the question.

  “She was still unconscious when I left the hospital.” Thibodaux nodded. “I hear she’s doing better now though. They got her on some IV antibiotics strong enough for a horse. Whatever she got poked with was pretty nasty.”

  “I’m assuming Hunt got the information to you about this Dr. Badeeb?” Quinn dabbed at the raw flesh around the shard of white bone.

  “She did…” The Cajun gulped, grimacing. For someone as tough as he was, he had a weak stomach when his friends were injured. “Whoooeee, son! You are gonna need to put somethin’ on that.”

  “Jacques.” Quinn glanced up impatiently through narrowed eyes. He was having trouble focusing and desperately needed something to wrap his mind around. “Badeeb. Could you get anything?”

  Miyagi gave Quinn a small plastic packet. “Take this,” she said. “It’s honey. It will help with the shock.” She shooed his hand away from the wounded foot and knelt to pick at it with a small needle. Quinn had no idea where she’d gotten the thing, but presumably carried one with her at all times. She glanced up at him with prodding brown eyes, as if to say, Go on with what you’re saying. I’ll handle this. Quinn relaxed and relinquished the throbbing foot to the mystical Japanese woman.

  “We got lucky on this one, cher.” Thibodaux’s grimace perked into a full grin. “Dr. Nazeer Badeeb is a Pakistani pediatrician who has an apartment near Georgetown.”

  “We sure it’s the same guy the kids at the orphanage were talking about?” Quinn winced as Miyagi poured some sort of noxious liquid over his foot. It burned as if she’d set him on fire. He threw his head back and gritted his teeth as he spoke. “For all I know, the name Badeeb is the Smith or Jones of Pakistan.”

  “I told you, l’ami,” Thibodaux scoffed. “We got lucky. This Georgetown doctor Nazeer Badeeb is also licensed to practice medicine in Pennsylvania, Arizona, Ohio, and Texas. You remember Timmons and Gerard?”

  “The CIA shooters?” Quinn said, mesmerized as Miyagi tapped a hair-like needle in the top of his foot, numbing the pain as surely as a local anesthetic.

  “The very same,” the Cajun said. “Your new CIA friend, Agent Hunt, had the forethought to check their medical records. Turns out Nazeer Badeeb was each boy’s pediatrician while they were in their early teens. He helped with the adoption exams.”

  Thibodaux pulled a notebook from the breast pocket of his black Nomex tactical shirt and flipped through the pages with fat thumbs.

  “Badeeb immigrated legally back in 1980. Records show his first wife and two kids were killed in a dustup along the Paki border between American operatives and Russian forces during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Those that know him say he blames the U.S. for the deaths-though he didn’t divulge that little factoid when he was trying for his citizenship.”

  “Keep your friends close and your enemies closer…” Quinn mused. He got to his feet with a groan, feeling ten years older than he had only a week before. “So, have you picked him up?”

  “Nope,” Thibodaux said. “Palmer put a team on his clinic, but he hasn’t showed. He’s married again, this time to a Chinese Muslim gal named Li Huang. She’s supposed to have a crash pad in Chinatown.”

  “In D.C.?”

  “Nope.” Thibodaux shook his head. “New York. And there’ve been a few more developments while you were off in Bootystan with your new girlfriends. They’ve announced the location of the VP’s daughter’s wedding. She’s getting married off the south end of Manhattan on Governors Island at five o’clock.”

  “Tonight?” Quinn glanced at his wrist, remembering the Breitling had been reduced to molten bits by the Hellfire missile strike. “What time is it now?”

  “Ten past eleven in the morning,” Mrs. Miyagi said. She returned the vial of antiseptic to the cargo pocket of her BDU pants and took out a white pill, handing it to Quinn.

  “Provigil,” she said.

  “Thank you.” Quinn nodded, popping the pill dry. Provigil was a drug the military sometimes gave pilots to keep them awake during long missions. It didn’t cause the jitters like caffeine or amphetamines and there was no crash when it wore off. It had yet to be determined if there were any negative long-term effects. After what Quinn had just been through, he didn’t care. He had to keep moving. Sleep was not an option.

  “Governors Island has to be the target,” Quinn said. “Can we have them postpone it?”

  Thibodaux shook his head. “Not a chance in hell. According to Palmer, the vice president and Mrs. Hughes feel safe enough since they didn’t release the location to the public until a day ago.”

  “But many people must have already known,” Mrs. Miyagi mused.

  “And two can keep a secret,” Jacques said. “If one of them is dead…”

  “I don’t like it.” Quinn used Mrs. Miyagi’s shoulder to get to his feet. “We have to keep the president away at least.”

  “Palmer-san has advised him just so,” Miyagi said. “But the president does not want to appear weak in front of the entire world. He has yet to decide what he will do.”

  “Secret Service has tripled the number of agents on-site. They’re sweeping with Explosive Detection K9s and X-raying everything from the fruit baskets to wedding gifts.”r />
  Quinn nodded, his brain in overdrive. If he was a terrorist, he’d pick the wedding.

  Killing so many world leaders along with the president would not only throw world economic markets into a tailspin, it would prove that the United States was touchable-weak.

  The wedding was as ripe a target as they came. Still, the politicians were just that-politicians-and they were wont to do what politicians did while they depended on him to look after the dirty little details like keeping them alive.

  Suddenly heady with the situation, Quinn looked down at Miyagi and smiled. She and Thibodaux had taken care of things with such explosive force and precision, he’d forgotten to thank them.

  “I…” He took a deep breath, feeling energy flow into his system. The focusing effects of the Provigil were coming at him fast. “You both…”

  Miyagi put the tip of her finger to his lips to shush him. Apart from picking at the bone of his butchered toe, it was the tenderest thing he’d ever seen her do.

  “Warriors do not speak of thanks. We do our duty.” She arched a thin black eyebrow. “Is that not so, Thibodaux-san?”

  “I expect it is.” The Cajun shrugged.

  “Very good.” She led Quinn toward the door. “Are you well enough to ride?”

  Quinn flexed his shoulders, amazed at how good he felt. He took a deep breath and nodded. “As a matter of fact I am.”

  “Excellent,” she said. “We haven’t much time. I have already spoken to Palmer. Your bikes will be waiting for you in New York.”

  Quinn looked up. “The GS is fixed?”

  “You will use my Ducati.” Miyagi shook her head. “But see that it comes back in one piece.”

  CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE

  Washington

  Hartman Drake turned the wheel of his black BMW 7 Series sedan and smiled as the luxurious vehicle accelerated up the GW Parkway toward Arlington Cemetery. He glanced at the navy-blue Suburban in his rearview mirror. Considering his past, it was difficult to keep a stupid grin off his face. As a United States Congressman, Drake wouldn’t normally have rated a 24-7 security detail. But as the new speaker of the House, not to mention the leader of a public crusade against some extremely powerful-and now embarrassed-men and women within the government, he got dozens of threatening phone calls and hundreds of hateful emails each day. Civil liberties groups rallied outside the Rayburn House Office Building. Dark figures loitered in the shadows across Independence Avenue, photographing him as he came and went. Someone had even gone so far as to throw a brick through the bay window of his home in a gated community in Vienna, Virginia.