“Neath the shade of swords,” Jamal responded from beside him, and the room erupted, the cries echoing off the empty walls. “Allahu akbar! Allahu akbar!”
The bed was empty by the time she woke, the warmth of the covers enfolding her, tucked carefully around her body.
Another side of this man, Carol thought, remembering his words of the previous night as if they had been spoken in a dream. I’ll still be here…
And he had held her close as she cried herself to sleep, his chest a pillow for her head. She could still feel his arms encircling her waist — those rough, deeply calloused hands. Hands that had killed…and wiped away her tears.
Contradictions.
“I have to get out. Leave all of it in the past.” She turned her head, looking across the room to the recliner where he slept, studying his face, his chin shrouded in thick black stubble.
But could he? Leave it all behind…
Despite everything that had gone before, she found herself praying that he could. Before it destroyed him.
Carol pushed back the covers, padding barefoot into the bathroom. A glimpse of herself in the mirror and she shook her head, taking in the dark circles under her eyes.
She thought of the FBI in that moment, picking up her watch from beside the sink. They’d heard nothing from Parker — not since Richards and Han had shadowed him to the Bureau’s Las Vegas Field Office.
And the attack was only twenty-four hours away…
“Who knew a uniform could look so good?”
Paula Gonzalez smiled, glancing back to where her husband still lay in bed.
“You’ve said that before,” she retorted, brushing a speck of lint away from the Delta Airlines logo as she buttoned her shirt.
“So?” He arched an eyebrow. “Just means it’s still true.”
She laughed, making a face at him in the mirror. After forty years on earth and two pregnancies, she wasn’t the girl he had married. Not any longer. But he hadn’t seemed to mind.
“You’re just feeling guilty that you get to lay in bed while I go to work.”
A shrug. “I never said you had to take an extra flight.”
“I know,” Paula replied, reaching for her pilot’s hat. Delta was one of the few airlines that still required their pilots to wear the hat as part of their full uniform. It was a nice touch…even if it did bad things to her hair. “But we can use the extra money.”
An understatement. He hadn’t had an hour of overtime in months. “Remember what I told you, baby,” she continued. “The kids only get one present tonight. The rest…have to wait till tomorrow morning when I get home. Remember?
“Yeah, yeah. What time does your flight get in to Vegas?”
She leaned down to kiss him on the lips. “We’ve got a brief lay-over in Salt Lake City — should touch down at McCarran a few minutes before eight…”
“We’re coming up empty, boss,” a voice announced from the computer. Marika reached for her cup of coffee, listening to the reports come in from the FBI agents that were now fanning out across Vegas. Watching screens wasn’t the same as being out there. In the field.
They had gone to the mosques first, three of them just within a few miles of downtown Vegas. Call it profiling — it was reality. They knew who they were dealing with.
“We just left the Masjid Ibrahim. The imam, Edward Fayed, said that he was familiar with Abu Kareem,” the agent’s voice continued. “Didn’t know him personally, didn’t know he was in the Vegas area.”
“Do you believe him?” Powers asked. Marika glanced over at him — the S-A-C had come to work in a suit, but the jacket had been discarded hours before, revealing the Glock in his shoulder holster.
“Yes. Remember two years ago, when Fayed alerted us to that wannabe jihadi in his congregation?”
A nod from Powers. “Carry on, then. Initial reports from Masjid al-Noor are also negative.”
The door opened just then and Agent Chase burst in, seemingly out of breath. “We just got a flash from the LA Field Office. They’ve had a sighting of Abu Kareem. Just a few miles from LAX.”
A curse erupted from Powers’ lips. “Is it a positive ID?”
“Assistant Director Dietz seems to think so. He’s already given the callback orders to his teams here in the city.”
There were no words. Marika closed her eyes, forcing herself to take a deep breath. “He can’t do this — has it occurred to Dietz that Abu Kareem’s presence in LA could be a diversion?”
The S-A-C shook his head. “He can and he has. We’re grasping at straws here — and if they have a lead on Abu Kareem, that’s our best shot.”
A pause before Powers went on. “You realize…we could have been played. LA could be the target and Nasir abu Rashid’s presence here the distraction. If they suspected him, they could have fed him false intel, knowing it would get back to us.”
“But the CIA’s intel—”
“Has been wrong before,” he retorted, cutting her off. “Agent Chase, get me a direct line to LA. I want to talk with Dietz — have him patch us in to everything that goes down there.”
“I have not spoken of this till now,” Tarik began, looking around at his men, “for I feared that we had been betrayed…but Allah has not left us alone in this struggle.”
He gestured to the map of Las Vegas spread-out on the table before them. “There has been a cell of mujahideen in this city for years, led by a lawyer named Samir. Simply waiting — going about their lives as they were bidden. They will join us in the attack.”
“How many?” Omar asked, moving closer to the map.
“A dozen men, all of them veterans of our fight against the imperialists in the mountains of Afghanistan. Half their number will aid you, the other half join us in the main attack.”
“Insh’allah,” the negro murmured, his eyes closing as if in prayer.
“It is time that you left for your appointed post,” Tarik advised, turning toward him. “Yours it is to strike the first blow.”
He reached out, embracing the black man and kissing him on both cheeks. “Go with Allah’s blessing, my brother. We will meet in Paradise.”
The emotion of the moment…it felt as if it might overcome him. All those years in prison. The years of his youth.
Vengeance.
“I don’t like staying here,” Carol exclaimed suddenly, looking up from her computer. She was hooked into the motel’s wi-fi network, monitoring the news coming out of the city. None of it relevant. “Not being able to know what is happening.”
Harry moved away from the window, letting the shades fall back in place. “Thomas will contact us when it is necessary to do so. He’s a professional, none better.”
“Welcome to field work,” Tex observed, looking up from the small desk at one end of the motel room. The big man had his Glock field-stripped and laid out on the newspaper in front of him for cleaning.
It was true, Harry thought, taking the case containing his UMP-45 and opening it on the bed. For all the glamor that the movies showed, most of a spy’s life was spent in motel rooms like this one.
Waiting.
The cellphone in his shirt pocket buzzed even as his hands moved over the metal receiver of the submachine gun and he plucked it out of his pocket. Thomas. Speak of the devil…