86

ADEN, YEMEN

Saleet had the guards stop the vehicle on the outskirts of Aden in a bombed-out warehouse complex on the mountainside overlooking the harbor. They pulled behind some abandoned buildings, where they could have some privacy, and the men all got out of the car.

Moe opened the trunk and pulled out a shoulder-fired missile launcher. Larry grabbed an AK-47.

“You think we need that?” Wyatt asked, staring at Moe’s huge gun.

Saleet shrugged. “I hope not. But it is hard to say.”

Next Saleet retrieved a long, rectangular piece of red-and-white cloth. “Covering your head is a sign of respect,” he said to Wyatt. He folded the cloth diagonally. “We need to show respect to Mokhtar al-Bakri.”

“I had a hat in my backpack,” Wyatt said.

“You are no longer in America, my friend.”

Wyatt stepped forward and bent down so that Saleet could wrap the cloth around his head, letting part of it hang loosely on the back of Wyatt’s neck. Saleet tied it with a black cord and stepped back to admire his work.

“It also hides your wound and those hideous eyebrows.” Saleet adjusted the kaffiyeh and pronounced it perfect.

He then handed Wyatt a long brown suit coat made of lightweight linen. It was similar to what the other men were wearing over their robes. The arms were a little short, but otherwise it fit well.

“Still the American with your jeans and T-shirt,” said Saleet. “But maybe you don’t stick out quite so much now.”

The imam spoke to Moe and Larry for a few moments, and then they took off on foot. “The house is down that way,” Saleet said to Wyatt. He pointed down the mountain, toward a crowded neighborhood of larger homes built into the mountain with concrete or mud walls, trimmed with white brick columns and adorned with domed windows, many of them featuring stained glass. There were five- or six-foot-tall brick fences around most of the properties and intricate carvings colored with deep red and purple hues.

“We will give them a head start, and then the three of us will head to the house. We do not want to look like we brought an army.”

A few minutes later, Saleet climbed back into the Land Rover, and Curly got behind the wheel. This time Wyatt had the entire backseat to himself.

Following directions from Saleet, Curly made his way to a house that had been destroyed by Hellfire missiles and never rebuilt. There was still rubble and debris everywhere, and it looked like someone had chopped the house nearly in half, exposing the elaborate archways of the interior and the colorful tile walls, now falling apart panel by panel. There were steel beams exposed in the upstairs circular bedroom as well as in several rooms downstairs.

The three of them got out of the vehicle and walked toward the ruins. A man Wyatt assumed was al-Bakri stood in front of the house, staring sullenly as they approached.

Behind him were several bearded men hanging out in the ruins, eyeing Saleet and Wyatt, AK-47s at their sides. In the shadows of the first-floor rooms, Wyatt saw three or four more men with rounds of ammo strung across their chests, holding their guns casually. He counted another two upstairs. Curly followed a step behind Saleet and Wyatt, carrying his own AK-47, a lone gunman against al-Bakri’s small militia.

“Are you sure you trust this man?” Wyatt asked Saleet under his breath as they walked toward al-Bakri.

“I am certain that I do not,” Saleet said. “But Allah is in control.”

That thought didn’t do much to comfort Wyatt. He knew Larry and Moe had taken up positions somewhere nearby, but if they had to use that missile launcher, Wyatt didn’t like his chances of getting out alive.

Al-Bakri looked to be about forty-five or fifty with a thin nose and close-shaven beard that had turned half-gray. His eyes were set deep, and he regarded Wyatt with a mixture of disdain and suspicion. He wore a blazer over a long white robe, and he had tucked a short dagger into the front of his belt.

Saleet and Wyatt stopped a few feet away, and Saleet exchanged greetings with the man. They shook and then al-Bakri extended his hand toward Wyatt. Wyatt looked him in the eyes and shook hands, surprised by the strength of al-Bakri’s grip.

“Do you speak English?” Wyatt asked.

Al-Bakri waited a beat before he answered. “A little. I prefer translation.” He looked at Saleet.

Saleet said a few words to al-Bakri in Arabic, and al-Bakri nodded. The two of them sat down, and Wyatt followed. Curly took a few steps back but remained standing. Wyatt noticed that the men in the bombed-out residence were now leaning against the walls, not missing a thing.

“Please thank him for coming,” Wyatt said. “Please let him know that I am sorry about the death of his daughter.”

Saleet spoke to al-Bakri, who kept his eyes glued on Wyatt. Al-Bakri said a few words in return, his face expressionless.

“He thanks you for your condolences,” Saleet said. “He would like to know more about your fight with the U.S. president. Do you mind if I explain it to him?”

“Be my guest.”

Saleet began talking, contemplative at first and then faster, and eventually al-Bakri turned his attention from Wyatt to Saleet. It was a lively interchange, as the two men cut each other off several times, their conversation gaining intensity as they spoke. Al-Bakri shook his head a few times and it was driving Wyatt crazy not to know what they were saying. After a few minutes, he put a hand on Saleet’s arm. “Why is he so upset?”

Saleet turned to Wyatt with a slight smile. “He is not upset. I am only trying to explain that he can trust you.”

A few more words were exchanged between the men and Saleet translated for Wyatt. “He wants to know what will happen if you win your case against the president. What will be her punishment?”

Wyatt paused to think it through. He didn’t really have a case against the president. But that surely wasn’t the answer al-Bakri wanted. “Tell him that the man who caused this destruction, the leader of the CIA, will lose his job. And if I get what I’m after, we will take every dollar he has. The president might lose her job too.” Wyatt knew it probably sounded like little solace to someone who had lost his only daughter.

Saleet began explaining, silhouetted by the sun setting low in the sky behind him. Wyatt wondered how long they had until the call for prayer at dusk. And what would happen then? Would everything stop while the men bowed toward Mecca and recited their evening prayers?

“Okay,” Saleet said after another series of exchanges with al-Bakri. “He says he is ready for your questions.”

“See if we can record it,” Wyatt said. Saleet nodded and pulled out his phone. He asked al-Bakri a question in Arabic.

But before al-Bakri could respond, his head jerked skyward. He had apparently heard it before anyone else, and it took Wyatt a second to realize what the buzzing meant. He looked up as al-Bakri rose, pulling his dagger from its sheath.

A drone, barely audible, flying high above them. Wyatt scrambled to his feet as al-Bakri lunged at him. It was an unexpected move and Wyatt barely dodged it. He heard the pop of gunfire from behind him and saw al-Bakri take the hits, getting blown backward, blood spurting from his chest and neck.

Wyatt and Saleet turned and sprinted toward their car as al-Bakri’s men returned fire, the bullets spraying the ground around Wyatt.

“Keep your head down!” Saleet shouted.

Curly fired back, but his resistance was short-lived. One second he was returning fire; the next he was blown back, his AK-47 flying out of his hands. Almost instantaneously, Wyatt heard a terrible explosion behind him and turned to see smoke pouring out of the house—Moe’s rocket launcher finding pay dirt.

In the chaos, he grabbed the AK-47 next to Curly’s body and raced with Saleet to the Land Rover. He jumped into the passenger seat and ducked down. He heard the window break and metal ping as bullets riddled the car. Saleet hit the gas and spun the vehicle around, spitting dirt from the tires. Wyatt poked up his head and fired out the window in the general direction of the house where al-Bakri’s men had been keeping watch. It felt like a scene out of the movies, but Wyatt was pretty sure his bullets were landing nowhere near their target.

As they sped away, with Wyatt firing as fast as he could at the bombed-out structure, he saw a second explosion, far more powerful than the first. A missile pulverized the building where al-Bakri’s men had been stationed, reducing the shell of the house to heat and smoke and ashes.

“Hang on!” Saleet yelled.

They quickly left the house behind them, flying down the road, jerking around steep curves, trying to put as much distance as they could between their vehicle and the drone that had wiped out al-Bakri’s men. But when Wyatt cleared out the rest of the glass from his window with the butt of the gun and leaned out, cutting his arm as he did so, he saw the drone now chasing them at a distance, making up ground, like a hawk sweeping in for its prey.

“I thought you could outrun these things!” Wyatt yelled.

At that moment, Saleet misjudged a turn and the right wheels hit the ditch. The car jerked to the right and bounced around, spitting up dirt and dust until Saleet got it back on the road.

His face was white, eyes wide. “You want to drive?” he shouted.

“It’s a little late to be asking now!” Wyatt shouted back.

Saleet pulled into the left lane and passed a slower vehicle. He had a death grip on the wheel. The road was steep going back down to the city, the turns sharp, and the drone was closing the gap.

The first drone strike had taken out al-Bakri and his men. It probably could have killed Saleet and Wyatt as well before they fled in the Land Rover. But he was an American citizen. Surely they wouldn’t launch a second Hellfire missile at him right in the middle of the city of Aden.

Saleet slowed down behind a string of three or four cars in the right lane.

“Pass them!” Wyatt shouted.

Saleet shook his head, murmured something in Arabic, and pulled out to go around. He was on his horn when a car coming from the opposite direction nearly crashed into them head-on but veered off at the last second, bouncing into the ditch.

An explosion rocked the road behind them and Wyatt felt the heat. The drone was locked on now. The soulless hawk flew behind them, moving ever closer. They were nearly at the foot of the mountain, but the traffic would be heavier ahead of them, slowing them down, and the chase would soon be over.

“How can they do this?” Wyatt yelled. “I’m an American!”