Jihadi Bride, page 28
“Of course, I’m sorry,” he said.
“Where have you come from? What are you doing here?”
“Mosul, I think,” Erik said. “I was captured. Maybe a week ago?” He scrunched up his face. Was it even that long? “Yesterday, I escaped.”
The men spoke among themselves.
“Rafiq Talibani can vouch for me,” he said.
“Be quiet,” the soldier who spoke English said. He continued to confer with the other soldiers, then at last turned back to Erik. “Stay here. Don’t move.” He walked off through the chicane, and the remaining soldiers closed ranks behind him, their rifle barrels pointed at Erik.
* * *
Mosul, Iraq
29 May 15 – 0415 Local
Abu Noor al Kanadi woke to shouts and was halfway into his boots and a chest rig when he caught the anger in the voices instead of urgency. He allowed himself to move slower, took a moment to be grateful that he hadn’t woken up to a coalition attack, then entered the bunker’s stairwell. It was nice to sleep underground, cool. He’d miss it when they returned to Raqqa. But return they would, and soon, Inshallah. At the top of the stairwell, he found Yahya and Xarbi. A vein throbbed at Yahya’s temple as he yelled at Xarbi. “What’s this?” he asked.
Xarbi’s eyes widened, and Yahya’s face grew even redder, if that were possible. “My apologies, Emir.” Yahya bowed his head. “We did not mean to wake you.”
“Then why did you?”
Yahya shut his mouth and glared at Xarbi, who’d broken out in a sweat. “It was a mistake, Emir,” Xarbi said, and Yahya slapped him, and he became silent.
“The prisoner escaped,” Yahya said.
Al Kanadi forced his face to remain a calm mask. “How?”
“He overpowered these idiots and fled in one of their trucks,” Yahya said with a snarl. “The others are dead.”
“And this one survived?”
“Regrettably.”
“He’s dead, though,” Xarbi said. “We shot him in a minefield.” Yahya slapped him again.
“Explain.”
“We found him crossing a minefield toward Kurdish lines,” Yahya said. “We –”
“I shot him!” Xarbi said.
“We think.” Yahya glared at Xarbi, then faced al Kanadi. “By the time we found him, it was dark. We shot at him, but then the Kurds saw us, and we had to leave.”
This was the risk of empowering subordinates, they sometimes failed. “Is he alive?”
“No, Emir,” Xarbi said. “I hit him.”
“Shut up.” Yahya beat Xarbi around the ears, then met al Kanadi’s gaze. “It’s possible, Emir. I’m sorry.”
Al Kanadi looked away. He had to assume the worst, that Petersson would make it to freedom. The Caliph didn’t like failure, and the escape of a prisoner would devalue al Kanadi’s stock. For that alone, Xarbi would have to pay.
And what of Petersson? The man couldn’t know much, there’d been no opportunity for him to learn anything. He didn’t know where he’d been held, or anything about his daughter. “I assume we got pictures of Petersson?”
“Of course, Emir,” Xarbi said.
“I was talking to Yahya.” Al Kanadi smiled at the dead man and then turned back to Yahya. “Send the photos to Mamdouh soonest. He must be ready to go.”
“Should we tell him Petersson escaped?”
Al Kanadi considered the question and then shook his head. “No. Don’t trouble him with that.”
“Should we activate the cells in Erbil to see if they find him?”
“No. The man is no threat.”
Yahya nodded. “I understand.”
Al Kanadi paused. “One last thing.”
“Yes, Emir?”
He nodded at Xarbi. “Get rid of this thing.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
DARKNESS FALLS
Guinea, Africa
02 June 2015 – 1114 Local
The woman squeezed the rag and drained its blood and sweat into the filthy water.
She’d lost count of the patients she’d tended. The tears had returned one time, when she’d wondered where the patients came from. Had they been like her at some point and were being punished? Or had they been made playthings in her torment? The idea pained her, and since concern for the patients increased her suffering, she pushed it deep down inside and tried to forget.
She took a breath and wiped sweat from the forehead of the man in front of her.
The door to the isolation shelter opened with a whoosh of air. Composed – the one thing left to her was how she faced death – she glanced over her shoulder.
“Hafsa.” A guard beckoned, clad in the omnipresent yellow suit and blue gloves. She stood and followed him outside, eyes squinted against the sunlight. She tried to remember a time when she hadn’t been Hafsa, but her mind played tricks on her. It was like hearing stories about when she’d been a kid, familiar, but not her. She’d always been Hafsa.
The guard steered her to another shelter, through a screening anteroom and into an isolation chamber that held a single wooden table and two flimsy folding chairs. A person sat at the table, a man from the size, although the yellow plastic suit made it difficult to tell. She thought of her father and then summoned what strength remained and pushed her father from her mind. She would not sully the memory of the last thing she held dear by associating him with this place.
The person at the table gestured at the empty chair. “Sit.” Mamdouh’s voice was unmistakable, even through the metallic tone of the gas mask’s voice box.
She sat. Deep inside, another girl felt the urge to leap across the table and rip off Mamdouh’s mask, spit in his face. But not Hafsa.
“I’m told you’re infected.”
She swooned for a moment and then met his glare. “No. Not yet,” she said. “I don’t have any symptoms.”
“They haven’t presented, but they will.” He shrugged. “We’ll be leaving soon.”
“We?”
“I will accompany you,” he said. “It is my duty.”
“Where are we going?”
“Canada. As you were told.”
“No.” The room spun. “You’re a monster.” The words had slipped out, and Hafsa cowered into the chair, certain the blow would come. It always did.
“No different than our enemies,” Mamdouh said. “Not a week goes by when the Syrian apostate doesn’t use chemical weapons.” He slapped the table and Hafsa jumped. “On his own people.” Mamdouh stood. “The Iraqis used chemicals too, with Western assistance, tested them on other Iraqis. I experienced it firsthand. All told, they’ve killed millions with their bombs, their landmines, their weapons of mass destruction. Under the principle of reciprocity, it is, therefore, permissible to attack them with the same methods.”
“But why? What will this accomplish?”
Mamdouh peeled off his gas mask. Uncovered, his eyes glowered beneath a sweaty brow. “They have no respect for us, and yet they preside over a society as diseased as the bodies of these pathetic people,” he said. “Our culture has thousands of years of history, and they treat us like slaves. They are concerned with nothing but pleasure and money, and you ask me why? Their arrogance has made them ignorant of God and the prophet Mohammed, may peace be upon him. It dooms them as surely as their filthy drug addicts crave their next fix. They are weak, and they think they’re untouchable, but they shall reap the rewards of their diseased ways. We will destroy them from the inside out. And you will help.”
She struggled to breathe. “I will not.”
He stared at her, then pushed a yellow manila folder across the table. “Look inside.”
“No.”
“Then I’ll do it for you.” He opened the folder and tossed the contents on the table.
She glanced at the documents and then reached out and picked up a photo of her father. “Where did you get these?” she asked.
“We captured him in Iraq.”
“That can’t be.” She sifted through the pictures. In one, her dad’s face was dirty and blood trickled from a cut over his eye. In another, a masked militant stood over her father’s shoulder, knife pointed at the camera. She pushed the photos away. “You’re lying.”
“He went to Iraq to find you. Little did he know you’d already moved on.”
Her heart beat in her throat. “What have you done with him?”
“Your weakness disgusts me.” Mamdouh’s face darkened. “He is the enemy. An infidel.”
“He is my father.”
Mamdouh’s hand shot out, grabbed her under the chin. His fingers dug into her flesh as he lowered his face to her level. “He is not Hafsa’s father.”
She struggled, but was unable to free herself. She pictured her dad’s head, severed and with its tongue protruding from his mouth as she’d seen in countless other executions. But what did it change? Was his life more important than those who’d suffer in the horror Mamdouh sought to unleash? She shuddered. Forgive me, Dad. “I can’t do this.”
Mamdouh held her and then shoved her backward. “So be it. Come.” He crossed the room to the door, which swung open as he neared. He barked a sharp command in Arabic and then continued through the isolation area. Two guards burst into the shelter and prodded her along after him with the muzzles of their rifles.
She trekked behind him, out into the blazing sun and then back into the room from where she’d been summoned, the man she’d been treating in the same position where she’d left him. In the next cot over was a woman, and it was to this cot that she was steered.
She and Mamdouh stood in silence before the cot, unspeaking, and then the partition door opened again and another guard entered, a young boy before him. The boy wore dirty, white shorts and his ribs showed through his thin chest.
Mamdouh pointed at the bed. “There is your mother. Go to her.”
“No.” Arielle moved to block the boy’s path.
Mamdouh’s gloved hand flew up to her chest, held her back. “There are five more children waiting outside.”
The boy stared at them, his face expressionless, and then ran to the cot. He hopped up beside the woman, threw his arms around her, buried his face in the crook of her neck.
A sob rent Arielle’s heart. She’d thought she was Hafsa now, that everything had been excised, that her last trace of empathy gone. She’d been wrong.
“There are villages full of children within an hour’s drive from here,” Mamdouh said. “I will spread this disease like the misery the West spread through my homeland if you do not cooperate.”
It was too much. She clenched her eyes shut, held her hands to her ears as her whole body heaved, one racking sob after another.
Mamdouh grabbed her wrists, peeled her hands from her ears, yelled into her face. “You think these people will survive? The West could cure this in a week if they wanted. But they don’t.” He snarled, like an animal. “They’re safe behind their democracies, their freedoms, unwilling to get their hands dirty. That leaves us to care for them, but that care comes with a price. Allah demands that we all serve.”
“Enough.” Snot and spittle dripped from her mouth.
“You will come, and you will cooperate, Hafsa,” he said, the words like knives into her heart, “or I will bring your father here to help infect every child in the area.”
Her heart snapped. “All right,” she said through her tears. I’m sorry, Dad. She wasn’t strong enough to do what had to be done, not like him. “I’ll do what you want.”
Mamdouh’s grip on her wrists relaxed. “Good –”
She leaned into him, pressed her lips against his and forced her tongue into his mouth. Hands grabbed her shoulders, tore her off him and she bit down on his lip, held on, tasted the coppery tang of blood and then she was off, thrown to the floor. She glanced up, anxious to see his dismay or even anger. To her horror, he was smiling.
“Didn’t I tell you the Iraqis experimented on their own people?” he asked. “I can’t be infected twice. Why do you think I’m in charge of this operation? Why do you think I’m the one who will accompany you?”
She no longer felt the hands on her body. Numb, she looked to the bed and stared at the boy, who still hugged his mother.
“We leave in one hour, Hafsa,” Mamdouh said. “Be ready.” He walked out, leaving the guards to supervise her. A pair of robes dropped to the floor at her side.
She knelt for a moment, the ground hard on her knees and then felt a hand on her head. She flinched, glanced up to meet the gaze of the boy. He’d reached out to touch her, but now he pulled back. They stared at each other for a moment, then he went back to his mother, nestled into her wasted chest.
Hafsa looked down and then picked up the clothes and began to dress.
* * *
Erbil, Iraq
02 June 15 – 1541 Local
Rafiq’s headquarters was more inviting than Erik remembered.
“Let’s get you settled,” Ray Parker said. He entered the main room with Erik’s duffel bag over his shoulder. “Rafiq will come by a little later.”
“I’ve got a lot to thank him for.” Erik followed Ray into the room. The aches and pains from the past week had taken their toll. “I understand he and his dad helped get me out of custody.” From the checkpoint on the FLOT, the Kurdish guards had transferred him to a detention facility for questioning. He’d dropped Rafiq’s name every chance he got, but had still endured four days of interrogation until Rafiq’s father had been able to secure his release.
Ray scratched his head. “Yeah, well Rafiq’s old man is busting his balls over this whole thing. Don’t get me wrong, Rafiq wanted to be clear of Chris and Mark, but not like this.”
“Rafiq didn’t have a choice, Chris made that pretty clear.”
“You and I know that, but Rafiq’s old man don’t care,” Ray said. “All he knows is he’s down two cowboys who were delivering body count.”
“I get it.”
“Listen, I’m sure you want to call home.” Ray gestured toward an adjoining door. “Why don’t you use Rafiq’s office?”
“Thanks, I’ll take you up on that.” Erik moved into the office and sat at a desk. Outwardly calm, the gears in his brain wouldn’t stop, untouched by the weariness that had settled over him. He’d failed. He was no closer to finding Arielle. If al Kanadi and Xarbi were to be believed, she wasn’t even in the Middle East anymore and he didn’t know if he should stay here and try to dig up leads, or limp back home. Instead, he pulled out his phone.
Jordan answered on the fifth ring. “Holy shit, you’re alive,” Jordan said. “We were getting worried. How are you?”
“I’ve been better,” he said.
“Buddy, there’s so much to follow up on in that statement,” Jordan said. “Did you…”
“Find her?” he asked. “No. I don’t even think she’s in Syria anymore.”
“Ah, shit. Sorry, man. Stephanie said things were getting pretty intense.”
Right, the last time they’d talked had been during the suicide bomb attack. “You could say that.”
“What now then?”
“I’m not sure,” he said. If Arielle was no longer in Syria, he was practically back at square one. He didn’t know if Rafiq’s offer to work in the headquarters was still open, but even if it was, he wasn’t sure there was much point. Whatever information he’d gather would likely be about Caliphate networks and who was working with al Kanadi as opposed to his daughter. Which reminded him. “By the way, Farah Xarbi is alive.”
“No shit. How did you learn that?”
“He tried to cut my head off.”
“Pardon?”
“It’s a long story. I’ll give you all the details when I get home.”
“I can’t wait. In fact, the whole team will want to sit in on your debrief,” Jordan said and his smile could be heard through the phone. “And you thought the counter-rad team was a waste of time.”
Erik smiled, remembered how he’d bitched about Xarbi, about his hockey player associate from Montreal. “Speaking of which, are we still keeping tabs on Nathan Martel?”
“Of course, although his wings have been clipped.”
“What do you mean?”
“His passport was revoked.”
“I see.”
“He’s still trying though. Apparently, he has a plan to go to the airport in a few days.”
“Why?”
“He’s supposed to be meeting a family member, but we’ll have to take his word for it because his follow has been pulled. Wiggins decided it was a waste of resources to track a guy who can’t leave the country anyways. Caused a big argument, but he didn’t change his mind.”
“He never does.”
“Are you going to be able to handle coming back to a desk? Maybe you’ll get the itch to be an operator again.”
“Depends if I have a desk to come back to.”
“Yeah, about that,” Jordan said. “Stephanie keeps asking if I’ve heard from you.”
Erik fidgeted. “I had a good reason for not calling.” Not that she would like it.
“Hey man, forewarned is forearmed, right? When will you know if you’re coming home?”
