shirts right now.”
Lyons wasn’t known for joviality, but that one made him smile. “They’re good at that,” he said. Then, changing the subject, he said, “Have the men inside ID’d themselves or given out any demands?”
“No demands yet,” Langford said. “It’s almost like they’re waiting for us to get set up on purpose in order to make the biggest splash possible.”
“That’s a legitimate possibility,” Lyons said, nodding. “Any idea who they are? The briefing we got on the plane said they were all dark-skinned, wearing khakis and shouting what sounded like Arabic to a kid who got away.”
Langford nodded. “We had a brief conversation with the boy. They didn’t claim to be a terrorist group at all. They said they were Iranian Revolutionary Guards. Sounds like a load of crap to me.”
“Me, too,” Lyons said. “The Iranian government openly sponsoring a terrorist attack on a Christian church inside the U.S.? That’s like declaring war.”
“My thoughts exactly,” Langford said. “But they could be Iranian rather than Arabic. Most people around here wouldn’t know the difference between Arabic and Farsi if they heard it side-by-side.”
Schwarz and Blancanales had so far remained silent. Schwarz looked at Langford, “You have any idea where they are inside the church?”
“That kid that sneaked out right at the beginning,” Langford said. “He’d been in the bathroom when the shooting started and the grenades went off, and he ran for the closest exit. He said it looked like they were taking everyone into the sanctuary.”
Lyons felt his jaw tighten as he nodded his understanding. That meant explosives. If the terrorists were armed only with firearms, they’d have spread the hostages out throughout the building. The Able Team leader was about to speak again when a dark red Toyota Tundra pickup pulled up, followed by two black-and-white OCPD cars, sirens blaring and lights flashing. It had obviously run one of the roadblocks.
A man wearing a large turquoise bolo tie, a gray suit, black cowboy boots and a white straw fedora stepped out of the truck while a woman Lyons assumed was his wife stayed inside.
Officers from the two squad cars leaped out after him, guns drawn. Ignoring them and the other officers stationed around the church, the man in the bolo walked toward Langford and Lyons.
Langford held up his hand and shook his head to the uniformed men. They lowered their weapons.
“Somebody you know?” Lyons said.
“Oh, yeah.” The OSBI director grinned. “Retired agent. And I’d forgotten he went to this church.” He paused a moment, then said, “Carl Lyons, meet Gary Hooks. Former agent and close-quarters-combat expert with and without weapons.”
The two men shook hands.
“You’re a little late for the service, Gary,” Langford said.
“We always are,” Hooks said. “My wife can’t stand that canned music they play on Sunday mornings. So we get here just in time for the sermon and sneak into a back pew.” He looked around for a moment, taking in all of the other officers, weapons and equipment. “Then again, maybe God made me late on purpose,” he said. “My guess is none of you know jack about the layout inside of the church.”
“No details or schematics,” Langford said.
“It’s fairly simple,” Hooks said, tightening the turquoise bolo around his neck. “Right behind those front doors is a foyer that is about ten feet wide and circles the sanctuary. But it’s a killing ground. They—whoever they are—could stand just inside the sanctuary itself, with the doors propped back, and kill every one of us who opened one of the outside doors before we even got inside.”
“Any other ways in?” Blancanales asked Hooks. “Ways these guys wouldn’t know?”
“Well,” Hooks said, squinting slightly, “this isn’t ancient Rome and we don’t have any catacombs to hide in. But there’s a way in they may not have thought about, particularly since they’re Muslims and particularly since this is a Baptist church.” He looked up at the roof of the large building. “There’s one way in I think enough of us could use to get the drop on them. That’d give the rest of these guys time to come through the doors,” he said, then cleared his throat. “Your team, Lyons, plus Langford and me. Our job will be to take out the sentries at the sanctuary doors from behind so the SWAT teams and other officers can come in and join us.”
“And just how do you plan to get behind them, Gary?” Langford asked,
Hooks grinned. “Since you’re a Methodist, I wouldn’t expect you to know,” he said.
Langford laughed, and it was obvious to Lyons that this was an old joke between the two old friends. “Don’t worry,” Hooks said. “I’ll show you all the way. But we’ve got to spot and disarm whatever explosives they’ve set up, too. And that could get tricky.” He paused a second and cleared his throat. “You know what this is, Dwayne,” he said, using Langford’s first name. “One giant suicide bombing. Those men inside plan to blow themselves up along with everyone else, and you know it. I know that because they haven’t paid a bit of attention to what we’re doing outside here. Has anyone so much as seen a face in any of those windows?”
Langford shook his head. “But you’re retired, Gary,” he said. “You don’t have to—”
“I’m not retired when somebody tries to blow up my church,” Hooks said. He glanced around. “You’ve got some good men out here,” he added finally. “I know, because I trained most of them in close-quarters combat. But none of them know the inside of that church like I do.”
Langford laughed softly again, then looked at Lyons. “He never was worth a damn at taking orders,” he said.
“I think what he’s saying makes sense,” Lyons said. “We need Hooks to come with us.”
“Then let’s get on with it,” Gary Hooks said.
“I know this is a foolish question, Gary,” Langford said. “But do you have a gun on you?”
“One or two,” said Hooks. “But I need one more.” He turned swiftly and returned to his pickup, kissed his wife, and came back carrying a worn canvas briefcase. A moment later he produced a 5.56 mm Kel-Tec PLR-16 pistol and began stuffing extra loaded magazines into the pockets of his gray suit.
As soon as he returned, Langford turned to a man at his side. “Give me your AR, Don,” he said.
As he grabbed the AR-15 from his subordinate’s hands he said, “Everybody ready?”
Lyons nodded. “Then let’s go. You know the layout,” he said, looking to Hooks, “so you lead the way.”
A second later they were following the man in the gray suit and turquoise bolo tie around the building to the side of the church.
T HE RECENTLY PURCHASED Pizza Hut building was not the only addition the Southern Hills Baptist church had planned. A vacant lot where an old crumbling wood-frame house had been torn down stood adjacent to the church’s gymnasium, and the workmen who were building new Sunday-school classrooms had left several ladders
