The Russian scoffed. “Except, of course, the tariffs. We pay ransom to transport oil that is now moving freely. This is behind the Turks’ fine talk of safety and environment.”
“The tariff they’ve agreed to barely recoups their operational costs.”
“But it increases our own. And why a low tariff? That alone is suspicious.”
“Because, Mr. President,” the secretary said, “the Turks know a 95 percent traffic reduction achieved peacefully is a bargain.” She paused. “And the tariffs are a pittance compared to the cost of military action against Turkey, which will draw NATO in on Turkey’s side.”
The Russian glared. “This leaves Turkish hands on our jugular.”
“With respect, sir, history and geography placed those hands long ago.” Her voice hardened. “Will you fare as well in the grip of Iranian fanatics?”
He sighed, then gave a wan smile. “Points well-taken, Madam Secretary. You are disturbingly familiar with our oil distribution network.”
She smiled back. “I take it you concur with our analysis?”
He nodded, his brow furrowed in thought. “Fifty percent in days and full resumption in six weeks seems possible. But perhaps we can be secure much sooner. The Iranians are being quite accommodating. If we press them, I believe we can convince them to export heavily now, and put a six-week reserve on the water beyond their control. We will use the excuse that the recent disruption has us nervous, and that we are renting extra storage capacity in European ports. I think we’ll be back to business as usual in a week, or perhaps ten days.” He smiled a hard smile. “And then we will see about choking off their fuel.”
The secretary of state smiled back.
“Again with respect, Mr. President,” she said, “perhaps you might wish to supply them even more.”
The Russians looked at each other.
“Another ‘suggestion,’ Madam Secretary?” the foreign minister asked.
She nodded and presented the rest of the plan.
Borqei limped along on a leg full of Iraqi shrapnel, troubled after a meeting with Yousif’s adoptive parents. The couple had been shocked beyond belief when the boy’s bullet-riddled corpse was found on the street outside their home, the apparent victim of a drive by shooting. How Yousif got there remained a mystery, and the boy’s parents were hardly comforted when Borqei shared with them Motaki’s message describing Yousif’s death as heroic. He doubted they believed it any more than he did.
The press had lionized “Joe Hamad,” all-American boy, and linked his death to a Latino gang, prompting a reprisal. The Defenders of Islam was a motley collection of delinquents of Arab descent, none devout, but nonetheless determined to uphold the honor of Islam. Their single foray into southwest Detroit wounded a member of Los Pumas, the dominant gang, and tensions rose, with calls for calm from all sides. Borqei had been on television twice and received death threats, but that didn’t bother him like the loss of his protégé for doubtful ends. He trudged along, thinking of Yousif, praying he was enjoying the rewards of Paradise.
Lieutenant Manuel Reyes sat in the front passenger seat. He had suspected Dugan was an honorable man and was thus unsurprised at last evening’s phone call. He was equally unsurprised that the little “favor” he was undertaking now for Agent Ward seemed to be planned so that it would be impossible for him to take part in the Venezuelan operations. That is, it would have been impossible if he performed the favor tomorrow as requested. That’s why he was performing the little favor a day early.
“This is embarrassing, Manny,” Perez said from the driver’s seat of the lowrider, shouting over the Spanish rap. “If I have to listen to this pinche ‘music’ much longer, the only one I’m going to kill is myself.”
Reyes nodded. Both wore blue bandannas of Los Pumas with faded jeans and tank tops exposing garish, but temporary, gang tattoos. They dripped gold chains.
“That him?” Reyes asked, pointing across a vacant lot to a cross street.
Perez followed the finger. “That’s him. He looks just like the picture.”
“Move into the street,” Reyes said, “and raise the front.”
Perez nodded. The car lifted with a whine as Reyes silenced the throbbing music. They crept forward, a malevolent predator, high in front with the rear almost dragging.
Borqei was well into the street when they struck him waist high, trapping his body between the pavement and the rear bumper. They striped the street with gore to the end of the block, where Perez raised the rear and sped away, leaving just another gang-related death.
Manuel Reyes and Juan Perez stood before a crude shack, dressed in sweaty camouflage, eyeing a group of similar buildings. A paved runway lay in contrast to the dirt track providing access to the camp from the Venezuelan interior to the east and the Colombian border ten kilometers west. A man emerged from a building and trotted over.
“The gringos finished, Teniente,” said Corporal Vicente Diaz, “the camp is secure.”
“Bueno, Vicente,” — Reyes checked the time—”eat and rest. You too, Juan.” He nodded at Perez. “I’ll join you in a moment.”
As they moved away, Reyes watched with approval. For two years, young Diaz had played a disaffected Panamanian in FARC, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia. He’d been invaluable, monitoring activity in the Darien, the jungle sprawl between Panama and Colombia used by FARC as safe haven. He wouldn’t be able to return undercover, but Reyes and Captain Luna agreed this mission justified the loss.
Reyes turned as the leader of the “gringos” approached and smiled at the term. Sergeant Carlos Garza, US Army Special Forces, and his five men were hardly gringos. Natives of places from Puerto Rico to Texas, they shared Hispanic heritage and a desire to be the best soldiers on the planet. Special Forces had seen to that, then immersed them in language training. Now, whether their native dialect was East LA slang, Puerto Rican Spanglish, or Tex-Mex, they could pass as native in any Spanish-speaking place on earth.
Reyes and Perez had had to scramble to meet “Garza’s Gringos” the night before to crash the Venezuelan border with Colombian forces in hot pursuit, bolstering the illusion with a hail of intentionally inaccurate gunfire. The FARC commander had been waiting at the training camp, alerted by the Venezuelans at the border. He saw a truckload of new recruits led by Diaz, a man known to him and trained in that very camp. Such arrivals were not unprecedented, and the FARC leader decided to bed them down and deal with it all in the morning. A day that never dawned for the twenty narco-terrorists in the camp.
“The camp is secure, Lieutenant,” Garza said as he reached the shack’s porch.
“Diaz told me. What now?”
“We take their places and wait. After the hit we’ll place bodies to mimic a firefight, dressing a few with no tattoos or other marks in Colombian uniforms and mangling them with grenades. Make it look like a cross-border action.”
“Need help?”
“No, sir,” Garza said, “my men are more convincing FARC if we get visitors. Diaz gave us passwords.” He paused. “A good man, Diaz.”
Reyes smiled. “I agree, Sargento, though it is nice to hear from another professional.”
Garza hesitated. “Sir, can I ask something, one professional to another?”
“Ask away, Sargento.”
“I expected Diaz, but not you and Perez.” He paused. “Your presence is unplanned, and unplanned is risky. I don’t know what numb nut OK’d this, but if it ends up costing casualties, I assure you that individual and I are going to have a discussion.”