Ahmed started the car and pulled out of the McDonald’s parking lot, heading east. “No one knows. Just that he was killed by Americans.”
Abdullah felt the anger rise. He took a deep breath which caught in the back of his throat. Naseer was the closest thing he had to a son. He knew that he was risking his life, but Naseer’s? “We must fight on,” he said. “We must kill the Americans.”
Ahmed nodded. “The Brotherhood have been waiting for such an opportunity. Muhammad has grown soft. This caesium will be our weapon. With your leadership, we will strike them down.”
Abdullah nodded his agreement. “What about the meeting?”
“We will meet him in a junkyard. He believes he is selling it to a street gang from Los Angeles.”
“Does he know what we actually plan?”
“Of course not. We will have to kill him once we have the caesium.”
Abdullah nodded. “The man would betray his own people. Allah will find no fault with us.”
He stewed as Ahmed drove. The cost of revenge inched higher, taking the lives of good young Muslims. The Americans were to blame. He thought about what Naseer said, about there being no innocents in America, and he thought about his one-time home in New York City.
It is madness.
He did not believe in killing innocents. How innocent are they, really? Any of them? And, Allah did say that innocents killed during battle would know the mercy of Allah — they would become martyrs.
It was unthinkable the week before, but now?
They had just reached Hutchins when Ahmed spoke up. “We will be there soon.” He pointed in the back. “There are guns under that blanket.”
Abdullah stretched back and lifted the corner of the plaid blanket. “Do you expect trouble?”
Ahmed shrugged. “This is America. There is always trouble.”
Deion kept pace with Jakobs’s Ford F150, maintaining a hundred yard distance through Hutchins. He glanced back in his mirror to make sure Johnson and Martin were still following.
“He’s slowing down, looks like he’s turning,” Nancy said, monitoring the GPS tracker on her laptop.
“You got a location?”
“A junkyard,” Nancy said. “Pull over.” She pointed to a stand of trees.
He pulled the van to the side of the road, Taylor following suit. To the south he saw a rusty chain-link fence that marked the property line. Beyond lay a maze of rusted automobile frames of every make and model, waiting to be crushed.
“Roger, get the quadro-copter airborne and get us eyes on Jakobs.”
“You got it, boss,” Roger said.
He scanned the site through his binoculars, but the trees and stacks of cars obstructed his view. He joined Nancy in the second van as Roger took out the quadro-copter, a device three foot square and painted light blue. Roger checked the battery pack, then set it on the ground and activated the powerpack. The four sets of blades whirred to life and the quadro-copter shot up and was soon out of site, the whir of the electric powered blades fading to a quiet whisper.
Deion looked up, squinting, but there was no sign of the quadro-copter. He turned to Roger. “Nice.”
Roger grinned. “Can you imagine what I would have done with this in college? The mind boggles. Anyway, video is up.”
They gathered around the laptop and saw the birds-eye view from the drone. The junkyard appeared deserted, except for Jakobs’s F-150 threading through the aisles of junk, stopping roughly in the middle.
“Must be the meeting point,” Martin said.
“I don’t see anybody else,” Deion said.
Roger activated the thermal imaging, but the summer heat made the entire junkyard a wash of red. “That’s no help. Can’t tell if he’s alone in there. What’s the plan, boss?”
Deion put on his combat vest, opened the weapons locker, and withdrew an MP5SD. “Roger, stay with the drone and get Wise on comms. Nancy, you and Martin are with me.” The others put on their combat vests, grabbed their weapons, and headed south. They hopped the chain-link fence and started threading their way through the piles of junked cars.
Eric’s voice came through comms. “What’s the sitrep?”
Deion was explaining when Eric interrupted him. “Why are you going in? You don’t even know who he’s meeting.”
“We got this, Eric. Roger, how we doing?”
“You’re within thirty yards of the truck,” Roger said. “We got a car entering to the east.”
“Occupants?”
“Can’t tell from this angle.”
He motioned for Martin to take the entrance. The big man nodded and headed to the entrance, his MP5SD at the ready.
“Nancy,” Deion said quietly, “Be ready. I’m going to flank him.”
Nancy gave him a thumbs-up and he worked west until he could see the F-150 through a crack in the wall of cars.
“Car is in the lot,” Martin said over comms. “Crown Vic. Two black males.”
“Let them pass,” Deion said.
They waited until the Crown Vic eased into the narrow clearing. Two black men got out, one short and wiry and one with a shaved head. The driver, the short man, approached Jakobs, who climbed out of his truck. Deion was close enough to hear their conversation.
“Darrell?” Jakobs asked.
The bald man nodded. “You got the stuff?”
Jakobs hitched his thumb to the F-150’s tailgate. “In there. You got the money?”
Darrell pointed to the Crown Vic. “Blue bag in the back seat.”
“People, we got a problem,” Roger said over comms. “There’s another car pulling in. Silver Camry.”
Shit. “Martin, do you have eyes on the car?”
There was a pause. “Two men. Middle-Eastern.”
“Deion, you need to call for backup,” Eric said over comms. “Call in the locals.”
“We got this. Roger, we need you.”
“On my way,” Roger answered.
Jakobs opened the door to the back of the Crown Vic, grabbed the black duffel bag, then spun at the sound of the approaching car. “Who the fuck is that?”
“Just some friends,” Darrell said, arms outstretched, palms up.
The car slowed, its tires crunching on the loose rock, then stopped. Both men got out.
Jakobs drew back, his face red. “Nobody said anything about any towel-heads. Bad enough I got to deal with you two.”
The passenger, an Arabic man with a clean-shaven face, stepped forward and spoke in lightly accented English. “There is no reason for concern. You have your money.”
Jakobs backed away. “No way.” He turned to Darrell. “I was told to sell it to you. Dyer didn’t say nothing about their kind,” he said, pointing at the Arabic man.
“No problem, man,” Darrell reassured. “It’s cool. You got your money.”
Jakobs shook his head. “Forget it,” he said, pulling a chrome revolver from the back of his pants.
The black man produced his own gun and the two stared each other down, the situation tense.
Time to introduce ourselves. Deion stepped through the cramped space between the cars and yelled, “Federal Agents, lay down your weapons!”
All five men turned to face him. On the other side of the clearing, Nancy burst through a crack in the junkpiles. “Federal Agents!”
Jakobs fired his pistol wildly and the bullet zinged off the car next to Deion. Deion ducked and fired at the same time as Nancy, the muted bark of the MP5SD’s echoing among the cars. He caught Jakobs across the chest. Jakobs crumpled forward and he saw Nancy’s weapon catch the bald man in the stomach. The bald man pitched forward, a look of shock on his face. The wiry black man jumped in to the car and came up with an AK-47, cutting loose, forcing Deion to take shelter behind a crumpled SUV.