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Buckingham sighed in frustration. There was no way the Al Jazeera reporter was going to talk. He had personally spoken to Mahari after both the third and the fourth messages had been delivered. He’d tried everything he knew — begged and pleaded, threatened and yelled. But nothing had worked. “Reporter’s privilege,” was Mahari’s only reply. “Have to protect my sources. Don’t you do that in America?”
The Islamabad Al Jazeera station was being watched around the clock. Various Embassy personnel were taking turns recording car plate numbers and taking photographs of the visitors coming to and from the station. For the better part of three weeks now, various agents had also been trailing the increasingly joyous reporter, and it was during the course of this exercise that they found out about the second apartment, and the growing collection of Samsonite cases. This was reported back to Buckingham, who let the Intelligence Community back home know. That little bit of information left no doubt that Mahari’s contacts were drug dealers. A major drug exporter would have rooms full of unlaundered American currency, to fund Mahari’s growing collection; a religious leader, such as the Emir, would not. Turbee’s connection between the terrorists and the drug lords was once again reinforced. Not that it helped them much.
Mahari was careful when he went to pick up the DVD’s and the payments. He never used the same route twice. Over three weeks of following him, though, Buckingham had become convinced that the supplier of the messages was located somewhere within the busy Peshawar marketplace. That was the reason that he had suggested Richard’s involvement. Richard had practically grown up in the Peshawar marketplace, and knew every one of its twists and alleys. Twice in the week before, Mahari had made the trip from Islamabad to Peshawar, and each time he could be seen entering an area full of tiny shops. That was where he shook the tailing agent. Every time. He was always seen leaving the market area an hour or two later, with a happy expression on his face and a Samsonite case in his hand. It was obvious what was happening.
After this most recent message, Buckingham and his superiors had decided that, on the next trip to Peshawar, Richard, with Jennifer in tow, would follow Mahari. Buckingham reminded them both about the President’s orders. A light touch was required. No knocking reporters over the head, or mindlessly destroying a shopkeeper’s home and business. Al Jazeera was a station that was acquiring an enormous viewing audience, not just in the world of Islam, but throughout the world. They would delight in showing the world anything the Americans did wrong. More bad publicity was the last thing the American military needed.
Richard’s orders were to stand by, and be ready for a call from Embassy staff. As soon as it became apparent to the agents that Mahari was making another trip to Peshawar, Richard was to be contacted, and then report to the Embassy forthwith. An Embassy helicopter would whisk him off to Peshawar within minutes, since a motor vehicle would take a good two hours to traverse the clogged and overused highway. Richard would follow the reporter into the market area, and hopefully find out where Mahari was giving them the slip.
While Ba’al and Izzy were proceeding southward through the Flathead Valley in Montana, Richard, at his home in distant Islamabad, was receiving the call from Embassy staff. Mahari was on the move. He looked like he was heading toward Peshawar. It was time to put Buckingham’s plan into motion.
First, however, Richard had some requirements to see to. He opened his medicine cabinet. It had been an incredibly difficult week. He didn’t feel up to another mission, and especially not one where he would be responsible for another agent’s life. But he hadn’t been given a choice, and his conscience wouldn’t allow him to offer anything less than his best. In his current state, his “best” would require reinforcements. The Vicodin was necessary, of course. He had three bottles, from various Internet drugstores. Maybe 100 pills. He also found a small amount of Ativan. Before he left the house, he took three Vicodin and one Ativan, downing the pills with a tumbler of scotch. He pocketed the rest and headed for the door, ready to take on the bad guys.
Peshawar. The city of flowers. It was only a short journey from Islamabad, and the scenery was beautiful. After returning to the Islamabad Embassy and moving back into his childhood home the week before, Richard had made several visits to this very marketplace. He had practically grown up among these shops, and was naturally drawn back. Sometimes nostalgia brought him here, to walk the streets and reminisce about safer times, when his father and Zak had been at his side and his mother had been waiting for them at home. Sometimes it was just an attempt to escape the house and neighborhood in which he’d experienced the death of his parents. Now, dressed in a Pashtun dishdash, with a beard tacked on, and with his dark complexion, he came here on a mission for his country. He had learned the languages spoken here as a boy and knew that his speech would mark him as a local, if his complexion didn’t. The only possible problem was his blue eyes, but he solved that with a pair of dark sunglasses.
The mission was almost ridiculously easy. Jennifer was waiting for Richard in the chopper, and when they got to Peshawar they had almost an hour to wait for Mahari. They had been briefed on where he would park his vehicle. Once the reporter arrived, they picked up the tail easily, and since Richard was as familiar with the marketplace as Mahari, it was like tailing someone through a basic shopping mall — and not even a large or busy one. The path meandered a bit, and Mahari even tried the “in the front, out the back” trick a few times, but Richard was able to follow without being detected. Eventually Mahari entered a small shop, located in the older section of the marketplace. The shop seemed to sell pipes of various kinds, along with the different substances one would use for those pipes. Richard and Jennifer stalled in the street behind him, doing their best to look like casual locals.
It was 4pm on the late and rainy September 1 afternoon. Ray was sitting in room 237 at the Day’s Inn in Glendale, with his friends Sam, Hank, and Ted. These were the other men the Emir had sent to Los Angeles as part of his cell. They’d been little more than boys when they made the trip over, and had spent months huddled up together in a single house, trying to regain the feel and comfort of home. Now they were older and had all started living like real Americans. They’d long since lost the religious fervor that had driven them into the Emir’s service as children. None were happy about being called into action. They sat across the room from Massoud and Javeed, who had been personally delivered by Kumar. In keeping with the central rule of cutout cell organization, no one in the ever more crowded motel room had even noticed Kumar when he came in. Ray had given the two boys a short, cynical stare. He didn’t need to say what he thought of their involvement.
The air within the room, now filled with seven people, three of whom smoked, was sullen and heavy. Ghullam was giving instructions in short, staccato Urdu monotones. Each participant was given specific and detailed direction as to his role. Both Ray and Sam were truckers, and had spent most of the past ten years hauling eight-axles across the vast USA. Both loved the open road, and neither wanted to be in this tense, cramped motel room. However, they both had a healthy fear of the Emir. They warily took note of Ghullam’s steely gray eyes, his size, and his movements. They’d seen his type before, and knew what his role was.
They were each given maps and diagrams. For three hours they went over the plan again and again, tackling each possibility. Ray was secretly relieved. Even after all the talk of details, his only responsibility was to drive a truck from point A to point B, and back again. No crashing into fuel dumps or refineries, no blowing things up in the middle of Los Angeles. Just drive the truck to the middle of nowhere and assist with some minor details. That was it. He’d be working with Ted as his wingman. Hank and Sam would be working together, and were taught how to use the television camera and the satellite uplink that came with it. They were told that it was absolutely necessary to have a video broadcast of what was about to happen. Hour after hour, day after day, the American networks would replay it. The coming events needed to be embedded in the American psyche, in the way that previous attacks had been. It was part of the terror.