Adhering to his schedule, at exactly 11:45 Brian walked outside and went down the sidewalk. He frequently ate lunch at his desk, but the CIA wanted him more visible, so he strolled two blocks to a Mexican restaurant with a huge covered patio. He was craving Tex-Mex after those few days on the island. Although he was apprehensive every minute, he found himself really enjoying the routine of a margarita, chips and salsa, and an enchilada plate.
Most of the tables around him were full. He saw couples, foursomes, single men and single women, casual diners, business diners – all kinds. How many of them were agents? Who knew?
After an uneventful lunch, Brian spent the afternoon catching up on a hundred things that had accumulated while he was away. When he heard a tiny ding, he looked at his watch. It was already nearly six and the gallery would be closing soon. He had to be in his car by 6:05 to drive eight blocks back to the condo, and then he was scheduled to have a drink alone in the Lobby Bar of the hotel next door at 6:30.
So far this day was just like any other day in his routine. There's nothing out of the ordinary, he thought as he sipped a martini and chatted with the bartender, whom he'd known for several years. The bar was packed as usual and he'd been lucky to get a barstool next to a nicely dressed young couple engaged in conversation. She turned and smiled as he sat down, then went back to talking with her boyfriend.
"I saw you on TV this morning," the bartender said. "I just want to say I'm glad you decided to open a gallery here in Dallas. It's putting this part of town on the map. I'm sure you're aware that a lot of your out-of-town customers stay here. The Ritz is your kind of place, after all. Since I know you, it's interesting to hear these people sit at the bar and talk about you and Bijan. I never say anything; I just listen.
"I hope it's not all bad," Brian quipped. "Don't tell me if it is. I'm not sure my ego could take it!"
"Never. In fact, just the opposite . . ."
Suddenly there was the muffled thump of an explosion somewhere across the lobby, maybe a hundred feet from the bar. White smoke began to rise and people began screaming. A dozen hotel staffers rushed in that direction as Brian watched a man stride purposefully across the lobby toward the bar. At the moment Brian noticed the rifle he carried, the man began firing. The girl seated next to Brian had seen it too. She yelled, "SHOOTER!" and her male friend dropped to the floor on one knee, a pistol in his hand. The girl leaped on Brian, pulling him backwards off his barstool and onto the floor. By now her filmy dress was bunched around her waist and she drew a small pistol from a thigh holster as she shielded Brian with her body. He couldn't see a thing in the terror of the moment, but he would later recall having felt no fear but only thinking how good she smelled.
Two shots rang out. He heard glass breaking and thought it might be the huge mirror behind the bar. He hoped his bartender friend was safe back there.
From somewhere in the bar he heard a man shout, "Take him alive! Take him alive!" Then there were more shots.
Although it was over in seconds, it seemed to him like five minutes before someone in the lobby yelled, "All clear!"
The female agent who'd been on top of him extricated herself and stood up. He sat up and she stuck out her hand. "Special Agent Sara Malloy, FBI. Sorry about that, Mr. Sadler."
Don't mention it.
Brian looked through the bar door into the lobby. It seemed like everyone there was holding pistols. There was a small crowd gathered in the middle, presumably where the attacker was lying. Now that things were over, he began to shake as he realized the enormity of what had just gone down. This was it. The guy had been after him.
"What happened?"
"I think the shooter tossed a smoke grenade across the lobby to draw attention away from him. This was your guy; I'd bet my career on it. He was coming straight to the bar. There are agents everywhere in here, some ours and some CIA. Right now we need to get you out of here. Once the cops arrive, they'll lock this place down tight. We don't need them talking to you."
"I know the back way," he started to say as she shook her head.
"So do we. No talking. Just keep up." Malloy took a position on one side of Brian, and the man who'd posed as her boyfriend was on the other. They walked slowly away, unnoticed amid the chaos. She pulled out her phone and made a call as they wound through service hallways beginning to fill with terrified employees who were also trying to get to the back doors.
By now they were in the midst of a dozen people pushing and shoving. In seconds everyone poured out into a parking garage. The workers ran for the street as a four-door sedan pulled out of a parking slot and stopped next to them. They had undoubtedly been caught on security cameras but snatching Brian out of danger was the only priority for Agent Malloy and her partner. They'd deal with the Dallas police and discussions about jurisdiction later.
"Go! Just get out of here!" she ordered the driver.
In front of the Ritz-Carlton, a Dallas police car pulled under the porte cochere, and two officers rushed into the hotel with their weapons drawn. They saw a dizzying sight – there were at least ten people holding handguns.
"Hands in the air! Everyone drop the weapons! Now!" the officers screamed, hoping against hope these were the good guys and they weren't walking into an ambush.
"CIA!" a man in shorts and a polo shirt shouted as he dropped his weapon. He held his hands up and said, "Hold your fire! I'm going for my badge!" He slowly put his hand in his pocket and drew out a shield and ID. Except for the ones guarding the perpetrator, who didn't move a muscle, everyone else did the same.
The officers relaxed a little and asked the agent, "What's going on?"
"Shots fired! There's the shooter." He pointed to a man lying on the floor facedown with two agents in suits and ties on top of him, their knees on his back and their weapons aimed at his head.
"The perp's gun is there," one of the men said, pointing to an automatic rifle on the ground beside him.
"Kick it over here," the Dallas officer said cautiously, and the man did. These two officers were well trained, but they had never been taught how to deal with something like this. They were so significantly outnumbered they had to take the CIA man at his word and assume everyone else was friendly. They breathed easier as five more police cars with sirens screaming pulled up in front of the hotel and a barrage of officers stormed inside.
"What the hell are all you guys doing here?" one officer asked an FBI agent who'd clipped his badge on his shirt. The cop had never seen so many armed government agents in one place, especially here in his hometown. What was going on? Was some celebrity here? If there was, the Dallas cops should have known about it beforehand. But no one did. And no one answered the cop's question.
The lobby was pure mayhem. Hotel guests still cowered behind furniture, unsure if it was safe to come out.
"Is anyone hurt?" one policeman yelled, glad that everyone seemed okay.
The shoot-out in a Dallas five-star hotel not only headlined the local news that evening, it was the lead for the national broadcasts too. No one had been killed, but the real story here was why it had happened. And that raised questions no one was willing to answer. Reporters interviewed a hotel guest – a businessman from Houston – who had been in the lobby.
"I saw some guy – dark, maybe a Muslim – walk in and toss something into a flowerpot. It started smoking like hell and people began yelling. I think it was a smoke grenade, and I'd bet it was to draw attention away from where he was headed. The guy pulled a rifle from under his coat, and I saw him fire two shots into the bar. I hit the deck at that point, but I heard other gunshots."
"Who did you believe the shooter was after?"
"I don't know. As I said, he fired shots into the bar and was walking toward it. The bar was packed – I'd just come out myself – so I don't know who he might have been trying to kill. The thing that surprised me was that once he started shooting, it looked like everyone in the lobby except me had guns too. I don't know if that's how our open-carry law
in Texas is supposed to work, but it was like the gunfight at the OK Corral, do you know what I mean? Everybody had guns and some of them were shooting. They must have been shooting at the guy who started it, but while I was on the floor, I thought it was a terrorist attack and we were all going to die. Somebody just told me no one was hit. That's amazing, with all the lead flying around this place."
Developing news followed that eyewitness report. An FBI spokesperson said the agency believed that the perpetrator had acted alone. Neither his name nor his description were released, and he had been taken to an undisclosed site for questioning. The spokesperson said the men and women in the bar and lobby who had drawn their own weapons were government agents providing undercover protection for an unnamed person identified only as a high-ranking official. Agents refused to release any further information about that person, citing the need for security until the matter could be investigated.
Commentators speculated that the dignitary being protected was perhaps the President of Mexico or a Central American country. ABC pointed out that the sheer number of agents, both FBI and CIA, meant there was someone in the hotel who was very important indeed, and that person might not necessarily be an American citizen. That was all they had, and it wasn't much.
CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR
Harry couldn't have been happier at how the first part of Operation Clawback had gone. He had assembled the island team – the Vice President and the Secretary of State – and this time Bob Parker joined them. All four were on the line with Don Case and the chief justice, who were again in Case's secure office. The only one of the group missing was Michelle Isham. No one had heard from her since she left the Senate after yesterday's vote. Harry wasn't going to push her to join them for more updates. She'd been through enough for now.
Nicole and Jennifer Harrison had also been invited to listen in on today's call.
Using prearranged codes, the director told the team that things went extremely well. Ox was safe in the Panda cage and Elvis was at Mama Bear's den. Elvis would give a concert, after which they expected him to be on the horn.
Everyone except the women whooped and yelled in mass jubilation. Having understood nothing, they were confused.
"Tell them," Harry said to his Chief of Staff. Bob took Nicole and Jennifer to the far end of the room, away from the boisterous and noisy celebration. Ox was Brian, he explained, and he was safe in the Panda cage. He was doing fine at a CIA safe house near the zoo in Fort Worth, Texas. Elvis was Zarif Safwan. He was at Mama Bear's den, an isolated hunting lodge in the Great Smoky Mountains, where the CIA was holding him under tight security. The government was about to release his identity to the media. His wealthy boss would be very, very unhappy that his security chief was in the CIA's hands. Once that happened, Don Case anticipated that Zarif would begin to "get on the horn" – to start talking. He might prefer to cooperate than to be a dead man when Amin Hassan found him.
As Nicole broke down in tears, Jennifer held her hands and hugged her tightly. For Nicole, the floodgates had finally opened. All the tension of the past few days, all the secrecy and fear, were finally coming to an end. She knew it wasn't finished, but the worst part – the part involving Brian – was over. He was safe at last.
_____
Zarif Safwan sat in front of a crackling fire in the great room of the cabin nestled on the side of a mountain in Swain County, North Carolina. Four Suburbans were in the garage, and a helicopter sat on a nearby landing pad just in case anyone needed a quick exit.
Eleven CIA agents were guarding Safwan; the agency knew his boss would spare no expense to silence him. The agents had also been told that ultrahigh security measures had been implemented. All communications would come directly from Director Case. Code words would be used at the start of each message, indicating that no one was under duress. The agents didn't know who Safwan was, but given the security associated with his capture and detention, they would ensure the director's orders were followed.
Zarif spent the night in a comfortable but very secure room with no windows. Two agents sat in chairs five feet from his bed all night long, weapons at the ready. It took him a while to fall asleep with people watching him, but it finally happened. The next morning they took him back to the great room, offered him coffee and sat him down in front of a television so he could watch himself on the news.
The agency had given the networks nothing but Zarif's name, and Case was confident they would easily flesh out a story. The Dallas attack was so bizarre that people immediately thought of terrorists. Now there was a link to Syria – Zarif himself – and terrorism became even more of a possibility. Connecting the dots on this news release was as simple as googling his name and learning something extraordinary – his boss was a very well-known man. In the last few days the name of Hassan Group had been on the news frequently. It was about to take over a major company headquartered in Dallas, Texas, the city where the hotel shootings occurred.
Don Case called the prisoner. "You know Hassan will kill you. That's why I've had you taken to a place where no one can find you. Do you understand that? We brought you here for your own safety. If we put you in a jail cell anywhere in America, you're a dead man. Amin Hassan can make it happen, and you know that better than anyone. We'll help you if you'll help us."
He knew they were right, and he made his decision. He held all the cards, but they had no idea what he knew. He could deliver far more than they could have imagined.
Zarif hadn't uttered one word since they captured him. Now he opened his mouth and said, "Let's make a deal."
_____
At nine that evening, Michelle Isham's daughter in Pennsylvania called the US Capitol Police. She hadn't heard from her mother since she voted for the Exxon bill yesterday. That was unlike her – the two of them were close and they chatted every evening. Last night the calls went to voicemail. The legislator hadn't shown up for work today, and her daughter's calls to the house still went unanswered.
Officers went to Senator Isham's Georgetown townhouse. The place was dark and no one responded to their bangs on the door. Her door had a keypad lock and her daughter had given police the code and authority to enter. They found the Senate Majority Leader dead in her bed with an empty medicine bottle in her hand.
Harry and his advisors took the news very hard. They had misread her. Her apparent strength, her outward signs of toughness, masked the depression for which she had secretly sought treatment over the years. They prayed together for her daughter and for the life of a woman who had stepped up to fight for America.
CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE
The proceeds from Zayed al-Fulan's fifty-billion-dollar loan were sitting in Hassan Group's investment account at a major New York bank. Amin had arranged loans for thirty billion more. He'd had to mortgage everything the group owned, but it was all worth it. He had a war chest and he was ready to go.
When the market opened the morning after President Parkes signed the Exxon-Hassan bill, Amin's buy orders were the single thing everyone was talking about. On the floor of the Stock Exchange brokers yelled, screamed and pushed to buy billions of dollars of stock. Exxon opened at $82, but within minutes it was at $95, then $105. The buy orders stopped suddenly as the sellers in the market learned that Hassan had reached his limit. He wasn't paying more than $105, at least for now.
Analysts at Amin's office in Dubai kept a close eye on eleven brokerage firms worldwide that were placing Hassan's buy orders. There were small variances here and there, up and down, among the markets in London, Hong Kong, New York and Dubai, and the traders took advantage of them to allow Hassan to buy as much stock as possible at the lowest price.
Hassan Group now owned ten percent of Exxon and had spent almost fifty billion dollars. When the buy orders stopped, the price fell back a little, sitting now at just over a hundred dollars a share. Amin gave instructions and his men began buying again. He got the last five percent he wanted at an average price of $124 – around twenty-five billion dollars. He
'd invested all of his partner's funds and all but five billion of his personal bank loans, and he had accumulated fifteen percent of Exxon's stock.
With his new ally Valgardo Capital, Amin controlled thirty percent of the company. The next largest shareholder owned less than two percent. Hassan now had effective control; he couldn't be outvoted unless a huge block of random shareholders banded together. In the world of corporate high finance, that simply never happened.
Amin had sequestered himself in his office all morning. Spending billions of dollars required absolute concentration, instant interaction with brokers worldwide, quick-response buy and sell offers and no distractions. He had made it clear there would be no phone calls, no visitors and no communication except with the trading desks at Hassan and the brokers executing his trades.
He had just bought the last shares when the door to his office opened.
"Get out!" he yelled to whoever was behind him without turning from his computer screen. He was furious that someone had disobeyed his explicit instructions.
"I beg your pardon?" Amin's business partner Zayed al-Fulan stood in the doorway. "You're a hard man to contact," he said sharply.
"Come in. I'm a little busy right now," Amin said in an attempt to appear minimally cordial. No one – not even Zayed himself – had the right to violate Amin's instructions. He was buying control of Exxon, and his partner should have respected that.
"We need to talk," al-Fulan said as he sat across the desk from Amin.
"Haven't you heard?" he shot back sarcastically. "I'm in the middle of something here. There isn't time –"
"I want my money back."
Amin laughed nervously. What? What was he talking about?
"That's not possible. Your money's invested, Zayed. You and I are the owners of fifteen percent of Exxon."
"Sell the shares. I'll sit here while you do it."
Order of Succession Page 21
