The CALLSIGN_A Taskforce Story Page 5
“Yeah. As long as we’re here.”
Khalid said, “No, no. My wife has prepared dinner. Another time.”
He pushed past me into his office.
Chapter 10
I felt the adrenaline spike, flooding through my veins, and waited to hear Khalid ask what the hell Retro was doing. I glanced at Jesse and said, “Block the door.”
I entered the office to find Retro packing his bags and Khalid shutting down his computer. Nothing amiss at all.
Retro glanced at me with a grin and said, “We going to follow you, Muhammad? I’m looking forward to some home cooking.”
* * *
An hour and a half later, we were all stuffed and going into food comas. Khalid’s wife had been the epitome of hospitality, and, truthfully, Khalid himself was growing on me. It probably wasn’t the correct thing to think given my line of work, but I was glad this mission profile explicitly prevented us from harming him, as we didn’t want to spike al-Qaeda about their compromise.
His wife brought out tea, and I felt my phone vibrate. I risked a surreptitious glance and saw a text that the GPS tracker was in place.
Retro had purchased international smart phones for all of us and had embedded an application that tracked each one. I’d given instructions to Kranz, Reaper, and Bull to wait until we were stationary, then to drive to our location and emplace a civilian tracker on Khalid’s vehicle. It wouldn’t transmit, but it would record every bit of movement that Khalid made for three weeks, including changes in elevation and temperature, and it was seamlessly integrated with Google Earth. The only bad thing was we would need to recover it to get the data, but when we did, we’d know everywhere he had gone. And would have our pattern of life with little work.
It was another Retro purchase, and it made me wonder what the hell the CIA was keeping hidden from us. If this could be bought open source, they had to have something that would do exponentially more.
I relaxed after reading the text, feeling the anxiety that had been a slow burn for the last two hours disappear. I saw Khalid answer his phone and turned my attention to his wife, taking a small cup of tea from her.
Khalid left the room, then returned in a few minutes with a sense of urgency and his laptop.
“Mr. Logan, I’m sorry, but something has come up at the plant. I have to return to meet my boss.”
“Something with security? Should I go?” I asked.
“No, no, it’s just a mechanical error. I hope you enjoyed tonight.” He motioned us toward the door.
“I’m sorry to hear that, but I definitely enjoyed the meal. Thank you.”
We headed to the driveway and I smelled something rotten.
What does a CAD/CAM designer have to do with any mechanical issues?
The city of Aden was on a spit of land that jutted out of the coast of Yemen like the head of a golf club. The city was on the shaft of the club, which is where the desalinization plant was located, just southwest of the airport. Khalid lived on the top edge of the face of the club and should have followed us up the coast road before turning off to the plant.
Instead he turned south, heading into the heart of the peninsula, through a desolate area of desert. The only thing at the south end of the peninsula was an industrial zone and a bunch of shantytowns.
In the car with Retro and Jesse, I called the other part of the team. “Kranz, you got eyes on? You see that? We’ll get the golden egg off tonight’s data. He’s going to meet someone.”
“Yeah, I’m on it. Right behind him.”
What?
“What do you mean you’re behind him? Let him go. I say again, let him go. We’ll get the data and analyze it later.”
“He’s got a laptop with him, and he’s on a road in the middle of nowhere. This is our chance.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I said to Retro, “Turn this thing around. Catch up to them.”
I keyed my radio again. “Kranz, back off.”
He didn’t reply. I looked at the map and saw he was right: the road Khalid was on was a deserted strip through the desert, not that it mattered one iota. Maybe later, if we got Omega for a takedown, but not now.
“Reaper, Reaper, what’s your status?”
“Was headed back, but I’m on him now. I can see taillights about two miles up.”
“Kranz, you’d better answer me or I’m going to fucking crush you.”
He came back on. “Pike, he’s running. He knows I’m on him.”
Jesus Christ.
“Back off, damn it. Let him go.”
“That’s not how it works. We’re compromised, and he’s got the data with him. I’m going to get it before he burns the information.”
I started pounding the dash, infuriated that I’d let Kurt talk me into taking this walking disaster.
We were now on the desolate road, and I could see the lights in the distance, off through the desert. Two up tight and one farther back.
“Kranz, you’re right on his ass. He probably thinks you’re some sort of militia. He has no idea who you are. Back off!”
Instead I saw his headlights close onto Khalid’s bumper—then I saw the headlights of Khalid’s vehicle spin off the road.
I pulled out my NODs and fumbled for my Glock underneath the seat, saying, “Gas it. Get there—now!”
We closed within a hundred meters, moving over eighty miles an hour, and I saw Reaper’s vehicle slide to a stop, broadside in the road.
Retro hit the brakes and I bailed out the passenger door, Jesse right behind me. I saw Kranz running to the vehicle, then heard the pop-pop-pop of rounds. In stark relief, illuminated in the eerie green of my night vision, I saw Khalid desperately shooting toward the sound of Kranz.
He dropped to the ground and rolled away. I heard another crack and saw Khalid snap sideways, then crumple back into the car. Reaper closed the distance with his Glock at the ready.
On the run, I shouted, “Kranz, you okay?”
He rose and moved unsteadily to the car. He reached in back and pulled out the laptop. I ignored him and went to Reaper, now attempting to staunch the life flowing out of Khalid through the wound Kranz had created. But it was worthless. Khalid’s head was split at the top, with about a golf-ball-sized chunk missing, brain tissue oozing onto the front seat of the car. I thought about his wife whom I’d just left.
Kranz said, “Got the laptop. We need to get the hell out of here.”
I felt a rage unlike anything I had ever experienced. I slowly turned toward him, trying to regain control. Trying to maintain the mantle of leadership entrusted to me.
Reaper said, “You stupid bastard. You just destroyed whatever is on that laptop.”
Kranz said, “Bullshit. It’ll be a month before this makes it through the AQ system. You military guys never want to think outside the box. We had a perfect opportunity, and I took it. Besides, I’m not the one that killed him.”
Reaper swung a hard right cross with his entire body behind it, his oversized fist connecting right above Kranz’s left eye. The impact sounded like a baseball bat hitting a rack of ribs. Kranz’s head popped back, and he dropped to the ground like a puppet with the strings cut.
Nobody moved for a moment; then Jesse knelt next to Kranz, putting a white light on him. He said, “Jesus, you hit him so hard I can see your knuckles on his skull.”
I said, “Is he dead?”
“No. He’s breathing. But I guarantee he’s got a concussion.”
I looked at Reaper, who was now staring at the ground, knowing he’d be court-martialed for attacking his second-in-command. The rest of the team was a little shell-shocked at the whole event. I felt a crushing disappointment, because I was the team leader and this was about as worse a mission as I could devise. Our first operation.
I waited until they were in motion, then looked at Reaper, patiently ready to hear the worst. I said, “What the hell am I going to do with you?”
He said, “Sorry. I . . . just lost it. I didn’t mean to hit Kranz so hard.”
I kicked the dirt, considering my options, which I knew should be charging him with assaulting a superior officer. But I really didn’t want to do that, since Kranz deserved everything he got.
Reaper said, “Look, I’ll make this easy. I shouldn’t have exploded like that, and I know that’s not what this unit is about. I understand the risks of my behavior. I’ll fly home tomorrow and turn in my kit. The plant doesn’t know I’m on the contract, and there’s no way both of us can remain on this team.”
The statement made my decision harder, not easier. He was proving to be everything we needed. Then his last sentence hit home.
He’s right. No way can both of them stay after this. Perfect.
I said, “You still want a job?”
His eyes held hope. “Yeah, of course. The mission is why I joined. I’ll do whatever shit job you want to give me.”
“You’re the new two IC. Kranz is fired. He’ll be lucky if I even get him evac’d.”
He looked at me in surprise, then stuttered something, unable to stitch together a coherent sentence.
I smiled. “There still has to be some punishment, though. Forget about Reaper. Your callsign is now Knuckles.”
Enemy of Mine
A Pike Logan Thriller
Brad Taylor
Dutton
Prologue
Two months ago
The time to start recording came and went, and I hesitated still. I studied the screen, searching for whatever was causing my reticence. I saw nothing out of the ordinary. Nothing I hadn’t seen a hundred times before. A simple room, ten feet by twenty feet, with only a beat-up desk and chair. No place to hide. No weapons of any kind. A room tailor-made for a takedown.
Yet a vague unease made me pause, like the fleeting stench of something rotten under the floor. Made me believe that perhaps I wouldn’t want anyone in the future to see what I was about to witness.
The camera was located just above the single door to the room, allowing me full view of its entire length. The image it fed to the screen was grainy and harsh as it strained to work in the dim light of the single fluorescent bulb. The corners were hidden in shadows, but the desk was clearly illuminated. Good enough to trigger the assault when the time came.
I caught movement and saw the top edge of the door swing open. I quickly dialed my phone, alerting the team. “Stand by.”
A figure entered the frame. It was a woman. Not the target. She moved to the desk, then turned around, giving me a clear shot of her face. I knew her.
What the hell is she doing here? Why didn’t she stay home?
I said, “We have an innocent on the X. I’m calling an abort.”
A voice I didn’t recognize answered. “Mission takes priority. No abort.”
A small girl entered the screen, running to the woman.
“You’ve now got two innocents. One child. Abort. My call.”
“It’s not your call. It’s a Taskforce call, and the mission takes priority.”
The decision made no sense. We had plenty of other opportunities to get this guy, and the noncombatants had the potential to turn the hit into a fiasco. At the very least, it would be impossible to keep the operation from leaking out.
“Who the hell is this? Put on the team leader.”
All I heard was “Mission takes priority.” Then a click as he hung up. I was redialing when another figure entered the room. A man, but not the target. The man didn’t turn around, but I knew who it was. The woman’s face showed fear, and the child darted behind her back. The man advanced toward them both and I saw he was holding a club.
The phone connected and I said, “The innocents are in trouble. Execute, execute, execute.”
The mechanical voice said, “Trouble from the target? Is the target there?”
“No. It’s someone else, but he’s bad. I know he’s bad. Get in there!”
“The mission takes priority. We wait for the target.”
The man jabbed with the club like he was holding a sword, hitting the woman in the stomach. She doubled over.
“Dammit, get your ass in there, now!”
The phone was dead.
The man swung the club upward, catching the woman in the jaw. The impact split her jaw sideways in a spray of blood, the stark white of bone punching through the red flesh of her cheek.
I screamed at the flickering image and grabbed the edges of the monitor, desperately trying to will myself to the scene.
The woman fell backward onto the desk, exposing the girl. She cowered at the man’s feet, tears running down her face, her mouth open in a shriek I couldn’t hear. The man grabbed her by the head and lifted her off the ground. He rocked to the left once, then violently swung to the right, whipsawing the small child into the wall by her head. She crumpled in an unnatural heap. The man withdrew a knife from his jacket and held it up high. In full view of the camera. For me to see. Then he began to slowly turn toward the lens . . .
. . . And I woke up, drawing in great gulps of air. I was disoriented and bathed in sweat, the feeble light from the outside parking lot finally showing me the corners of the hotel room. I felt an echo, and wondered if I’d screamed for real. I began to sit up when the nausea hit. I scrambled for the toilet through the dim light, reaching it a second before spewing out everything I had eaten in the last six hours.
The heaves subsided and I curled next to the toilet, still trembling at the aftershocks of the dream.
The man had returned, and now he was bringing my family with him.
I should have never looked at the pictures.
It had been four years since the murder of my wife and daughter, and I had never had a dream of the crime. I had dreamed of the man plenty. He stalked me like a Freddy Krueger, popping up in all sorts of weird ways, but never with my family. Never. I had been blessed with nothing but good dreams of them. Dreams that brought melancholy when I awoke, but good nonetheless. Ephemeral moments I tried hard to remember, but which faded away like fog hit by the morning sun. Unlike this one. Acid wouldn’t remove the etching it had left in my soul, I knew.
Why did I look?
I had come back to Fayetteville, North Carolina, to check on any progress in solving the crime, like I had done about every three months since the murders, as if my presence would cause something to break free. It never did. The case was as cold as Jimmy Hoffa, and the police barely tolerated me now. They were nice enough, but they knew it was going nowhere, and looked at me with pity.
This time I had decided to study the crime-scene photos to see if there was a clue they were missing, something I’d never done before. Something others had warned me against. Four years ago the officers had said the pictures were brutal, and because of it, at every visit, I had never asked. This time I did. And they were right.
Now the pictures had brought the stalker to my family. Had allowed him unfettered access to torture me every night, a faceless mass of evil that would never leave me in peace.
In all the dreams he was seen from the back. He never turned around. Never showed me his true nature, content to simply taunt me, like he had tonight with the knife. Deep inside, a part of me begged for him to show himself. A corner of my soul that lived in blackness and craved escape. Craved relief. It believed that if I could see him, I could kill him.
And it desperately wanted to do that.
Chapter 1
Present Day
When she saw her suitcase come up first on the conveyor belt, the investigator’s face broke into a smile. The flight from Beirut had been a long one, and she was ready to get home. Had she known how little time she had left, she most definitely would have preferred it to come out last—or not at all.
Across the baggage claim area, a man caught her expression, and grinned himself at the irony: He knew the airport luggage tag that had proved so efficient in delivering her suitcase would also be the cause of her death. All he needed to do was make sure she didn’t rip it off and throw it in the trash before she left the airport.
He watched her intently until she had exited, suitcase in tow, traitorous baggage tag flapping in the breeze. In her right hand, she held a briefcase, and in the swing of her arm the man caught a glimpse of the handcuff that attached it to her wrist. That was his target. Along with destroying the information in her brain.
She exited in the direction of the shuttle bus that ferried passengers to the Rotterdam train station, but she could just as easily be hiring a car to her destination. Either way, he knew where she was going: Leidschendam, home of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon.
Established in 2009, the tribunal was tasked with investigating the 2005 assassination of Rafic Hariri, the former prime minister of Lebanon. Amid rumors that high-ranking officials in the Syrian government and their terrorist proxy Hezbollah had a hand in the murder, massive protests had rocked the country demanding the removal of Syrian occupation forces from Lebanon. Called the Cedar Revolution, it proved to be the catalyst for a Syrian withdrawal from the country later that year. It could have ended with that—a Syrian retreat and rumors—but the tribunal was now investigating in earnest, turning over stones that should have been left untouched. Four Hezbollah foot-soldiers had already been indicted, with the inquiry climbing ever higher into the ranks.
The woman was an investigator for the prosecution, and had finally managed to find a well-placed person who would talk: a disgruntled former Syrian intelligence asset with an axe to grind and some inside knowledge. He had spent an hour-and-a-half with the investigator. Hezbollah had done what it could to prevent the meeting, but failed, managing only to make an example of the man after the fact to dissuade others who might think about talking.