cradling the M4 in the crook of his right arm, Walland leaned over and flipped off the lid. What he saw turned his spine to ice.
There was nothing to drink in the small compartment. All he saw was money. Stacks of hundred-dollar bills, neatly wrapped in plastic. Walland didn’t know how much he was looking at, but he knew exactly where it was supposed to be. More importantly, he knew what Kealey was about to do.
He grabbed for the radio and pressed the transmit button. “Colonel, I think we have a serious problem here.”
The guard Kassem had sent for the water had never reappeared. Kealey didn’t know how many men might be waiting outside the door. He didn’t know how Owen would react, and he didn’t know if his plan, hastily composed at the last possible moment, had even the slightest chance of working. Somehow, he doubted it, but he was beyond caring.
His next movements were somewhat detached, almost mechanical in the precision with which they were carried out. Kealey reached down for the backpack, his hand slipping into the main compartment. He flipped a switch and lifted the bag, tossing it onto the table, counting the seconds in his head. At the same time, he used his left hand to grip the lower edge of his T-shirt. Arshad Kassem reached for the pack and pulled it across the table, his gaze fixed on the younger man. When he got to five, Kealey closed his eyes and threw himself to the floor.
The charge went off a split second later. Kassem and his bodyguard were instantly blinded by the flash of light, then deafened by the following concussion. The older man was blown out of his chair as Kealey struggled to his feet, ears ringing with the blast, pulling up on his shirt as his right hand wrapped around the butt of his Beretta 9mm pistol. The weapon came up an instant later. He had just enough time to meet the wide eyes of the guard over his front sights before he pulled the trigger. The man’s head snapped back, and he crumpled to the floor in a lifeless heap.
Kealey couldn’t hear the footsteps in the hall, but he knew they had to be coming. He scrambled for the dead guard’s AK-47, jarring his fingers on the tile floor in the process. He lifted the weapon and squeezed the trigger as the door flew open. His rounds caught the advancing guard in the chest, propelling him back into the hallway. At the same time, Kealey flipped the metal table onto its side to put an obstacle between the door and his own body.
Kassem was splayed across the floor, his hands and face scorched by the magnesium powder in the improvised charge. He was howling in agony, hands pressed to his ravaged face. Trying to block out the screams of pain, Kealey listened for movement in the other parts of the building. He heard feet pounding overhead and then a shouted phrase in Arabic.
He wouldn’t last long in this little room, he knew that much. Sliding the Beretta into his waistband, he leaned over and slammed a fist into Kassem’s face. The man went instantly limp. Kealey crouched and grabbed him by the front of his shirt, lifting him up and onto his shoulders. It took all his strength; Kassem weighed at least 200 pounds. His radio was still transmitting. Tilting his head down to his hip, he shouted, “Paul, light up the second floor. Now!”
Walland wasn’t sure what was happening, but when the sound of the explosion reached him, his training took over. The M4 snapped up in his arms, and he instantly found the guard on the left through his telescopic sight. He squeezed off a 3-round burst, then switched his aim to the next fighter as the first hit the ground. The man’s AK was already coming up, his finger landing on the trigger as Walland’s second burst tore through his chest. A wild spray of bullets ripped into the frame of the first Tacoma, shattering the glass in the driver’s side door.
Owen flinched as cubes of safety glass exploded over his upper body. He turned to the left and tracked for targets with his rifle, but saw right away that Walland’s shots had found their mark. The radio traffic was coming loud and fast; he heard Walland shouting something on the handheld and then Kealey calling for cover over the SINCGARS.
He immediately grabbed for the handset and shouted, “Gregg, Morales, that’s you! Hit the second floor with everything you got!”
Kealey was moving as fast as he could through the dimly lit hallways, struggling to keep Kassem’s body on his shoulders and his weapon up at the same time. The sound of a heavy machine gun thumped in his ears, growing louder as he pushed forward. He reached a corner and cut it wide, catching sight of an armed guard on a wooden staircase. He was about to fire when a volley of rounds ripped through the front of the building. Kealey saw a flash of red, saw the man’s left leg collapse, and he went sideways, crashing through the banister to the floor below. The sound of the splintering wood was lost in another hail of automatic fire. Tipping his head back to the radio, Kealey said, “Owen, tell your guys to watch their fire. I’m coming out.”
He burst into the sunlight a moment later, shards of cement from the building’s façade crumbling beneath his feet. The Delta troopers in the first two trucks continued to pour rounds into the second floor as Kealey heaved Kassem into the back of the first Tacoma, then climbed in after him. He caught a jagged piece of metal on his way over the side, felt a sudden tearing pain, and looked down to see a bloody rent in his trousers, just above the left knee.
Owen was turned around in his seat, eyes wide in anger. He had to shout over the sound of gunfire. “What the fuck happened in there? And what the hell are you doing with him? There’s no way we’re taking him—”
“I can’t explain it right now. Just drive.” Kealey was fighting to stay calm, but when the Delta colonel didn’t respond right away, he fixed him with a fierce look and screamed, “Now, Paul! Let’s go!”
The other man seemed stunned by the expression on Kealey’s face, but it pushed him into action. The truck accelerated rapidly a split second later, the other vehicles following suit. Soon they were racing back to the train yard. Owen called the other vehicles for a sit rep, breathing a long sigh of relief when the casualty count came back zero. Then he punched in the frequency for the Agency pilots on the dash-mounted SINCGARS radio. Once the call went through, he hurled the handset against the dash and turned to glare at Kealey through the open rear window of the truck cab.
“I hope you have a good fucking reason for this.” There was a hard edge to his elevated voice. “One way or another, you owe me an explanation.”
“I know.” Looking down at Kassem’s unconscious body, Kealey felt strangely numb. “And you’ll get one, I promise. But for now, just get us out of here.”
CHAPTER 7
SYRIA
With night slinking in, the sun slipped low to the west, red light bleeding over the sparse landscape, climbing over the limestone hills that surround the dead cities of the Byzantines before sliding south to touch the modest peak of Talat Musa on the Lebanese border. Far to the north, a lean figure wandered past the great earthen mound of the Aleppo Citadel, surrounded by humanity but, at a mere twenty-six years of age, lost to it already. No one cared to notice. They were occupied, as always, by the menial tasks that filled their waking hours. Had they looked closer, they might have thought the young man walked without haste, without purpose. These descriptions, however, were not applicable to any part of his life.
Rashid Amin al-Umari had been a driven man since the fall of the Baath regime. His drive was mired in hate, which was not unusual in this tumultuous region, though a rage of such rigidity is rarely forged by one incident, as was the case with this young man. Despite his youth, al-Umari often felt that he had nothing left to look forward to. All that remained to him were memories. Memories of the good years, the years before an American bomb stripped his world away.
He remembered that day with the kind of clarity that only enduring pain
