Kharrazi regarded his soldier with an air of wariness. “You will not fail me, will you, Nihad?”
Nihad Tansu appeared to stand taller now. He looked around at the other soldiers, the center of attention. “This woman is already a corpse, Sarock. That much is certain.”
“Good,” Kharrazi smiled. Then the smile faded as he turned and pointed to Huseyn, alone, still sitting at the folding table. “First, get rid of this coward.”
Huseyn became lightheaded and his body lost its ability to hold itself upright. He saw the wicked expression on Tansu’s face and he surrendered to a wave of nausea. There was nothing in his stomach to purge, so he bent his head down and shuddered with his mouth open, gagging on pure fear itself. When he looked up, he saw Tansu over him with his knife gleaming in his hand. “Please,” he begged. “Make it quick.”
Just north of Little Italy in Baltimore on a narrow, dead end street, sat a group of abandoned warehouses. To the naked eye they appeared as innocuous as negligent businesses harboring a tax write-off. To a select few in the FBI, they were known as ten acres of training ground for new recruits. On select occasions, it became a perfect meeting place for the seedier activities of the Bureau. Whenever an informant had information to exchange and couldn’t afford to be seen strolling through the front door of the FBI building, or sharing a booth in a local restaurant with a man in a blue suit, the warehouse district was used.
The warehouses were topped with six-foot walls around their perimeter. Stingy slits in the walls allowed just enough room for snipers. It was dusk and a group of dark clouds threatened overhead. Nick thought he saw a shadow cross one of the slits on the roof as he maneuvered his car through the minefield of potholes. He was comforted to know it was one of his own up there. Someone almost as good as the guy sitting next to him, and that would have been plenty good enough. Nick turned into what looked like a dead end alley. At the end of the alley, a steel door yawned open as they approached.
“I guess they know we’re here,” Matt said.
Nick drove into the warehouse and found a huge parking lot taking up the bottom floor. There were already several cars there. He parked next to the familiar sedan of Walt Jackson.
Their shoes echoed on the cement floor as they made their way to the elevators. Matt pushed the third-floor button and waved at the undetectable miniature camera above the doors.
When they got out on the third floor, they found themselves before the only room in the entire building with a padlock and silent alarm. Now, however, the door was open and Nick could smell the coffee brewing before he saw the strange inhabitants.
Along the left wall, sitting on an odd array of army cots and folded chairs were Jimmy Ferraro, better known as Jimmy Fingers, Don Silkari, and several other Italian Americans. At the end of the row, sitting in the only leather chair in the building, Sal Demenci picked lint from the sleeve of his jacket.
Across the room from them sat Walt Jackson and FBI Director Louis Dutton. The room was noiseless, save for the humming of a second hand refrigerator, copy machine, and computer that occupied the far wall. The only things the two sides of the room had in common were the Styrofoam cups of coffee they drank.
Nick and Matt grabbed a couple of folded chairs and diplomatically sat in the middle of the congregation.
Nick nodded to Sal, “I hear Tommy’s going to make it.”
Sal smiled faintly. “He’s a fighter, that kid.”
Louis Dutton sat behind a worn wooden desk and scribbled notes on a legal pad, while Jackson sat next to the desk, elbows on his knees, foot tapping the linoleum floor.
Just as Dutton glanced at his wristwatch, the elevator dinged and a slow-moving pair of footsteps grew louder. The large angular frame of Samuel Fisk filled the doorway. He stopped for a dramatic moment and looked over the incongruous crowd, his hands by his side like he was there for a high noon shootout.
The long, awkward silence continued as Fisk made his way to the desk and withdrew a bottle of scotch from the bottom drawer. As if by sleight of hand, a shot glass appeared, and he filled it to the brim. Fisk managed to appear professional while downing the booze with one quick gulp.
He wiped one side of his mouth with his fist and looked over the Italian Americans without judgment. He sat at the edge of the desk, his back to Dutton, and acknowledged Nick and Matt with a look.
The Italian Americans sat with their legs crossed, checking their nails, the usual look of boredom fixed on their faces whenever in the presence of the law.
Fisk pointed the empty shot glass at Sal Demenci. “Sal, how much prison time have you done in your life?”
The opening line didn’t amuse the left side. They watched Sal frown. “I don’t remember,” Sal said. “Is it important I know the answer?”
Fisk grinned. “Now I know why they call you all wise guys. No it’s not important. What is important is how much evidence we have against you to send you back.”
“You threatening me?” Sal bristled.
Fisk shook his head. “Not at all.” He turned to Walt and the SAC handed him a manila file. Fisk opened the file and read silently. He looked up at Sal and said, “Hmm, racketeering, extortion, pretty impressive.”
“That why we’re here?” Sal snapped. “You gonna make me come all the way down here just to bust my chops? I thought we had a deal?”
Fisk’s face lightened. He leaned over and handed Sal the file. Sal took it from the Secretary of State warily, as if it were flammable. He perused the file with Silk hanging on his shoulder, and they both raised their eyebrows at what they saw.
“Pretty interesting stuff, huh?” Fisk said.
Sal closed the file and left it on his lap. “Why are you showing me this?”
A loud clap of thunder boomed overhead and Fisk went over and peeked through a slat in the horizontal blinds. The sky was dark now and rain pellets began to dance off of the bulletproof glass window.
Fisk turned and stuffed his hands in his pockets. He said to Nick, “Do you know what Sal here is?”
Nick gave Fisk an are-you-kidding-me expression. He knew that there was no right answer, so he looked at Sal and said the first thing that popped into his head. “Italian.”
This got the room chuckling.
“That’s close,” Fisk said. “He’s Italian, but he’s also American. Like me, like you, like everyone in this room.”
Sal nodded. Silk nodded. Tony the Butcher nodded. They seemed to understand where Fisk was going and they liked it.
Fisk splashed another pinch of scotch and downed it with a flip of his wrist. He pointed the empty shot glass, “You see, Sal, if you and your men help us out here,” he shrugged, “maybe these files get lost. I don’t know, maybe they go away permanently.”
“Maybe?” Sal asked.
“Definitely,” Fisk said. He looked back at Dutton and Jackson, who reluctantly made agreeable expressions.
Now Fisk took a different stance. He seemed to be addressing the government employees in the room, while looking at Sal and the gang. “I’m not going to debate the constitutionality of this meeting. There’s no question that we’re… uh… I am trampling on certain amendments. And I am here to tell you that I am taking full responsibility for this arrangement. No one outside of this room is aware of any of this. Personally, I don’t think Thomas Jefferson wrote the Constitution with foreigners in mind. He was declaring an official document to protect the citizens of the United States against their own government. Assuring them their right to bear arms and speak freely against what could be a totalitarian regime in the future.
“There was no way these rights would have been afforded to the Redcoats, should they have needed them, and they will not be used to protect the invasion of Kurdish rebels in our country, killing our innocent population.”