52

SOMEWHERE IN YEMEN

The radio call came from the sniper on the roof.

“Are we expecting company?”

The kid in charge of communications on the top floor of the main house relayed the question to Badr Hassan al-Ruzami, Kairos’s chief of operations.

Ruzami looked up from the maps spread out before him. “Is it a Range Rover?”

A moment later, comms nodded.

“Forest green?” Ruzami asked.

“No, sir,” comms said. “It’s gray.”

“Then yes,” Ruzami said. “Let them through.”

Ruzami jumped up, strapped on his holster and sidearm, dusted off his uniform, and headed downstairs to meet his guests. His bodyguards went with him, but with several teams deploying to Mexico and Canada, the house was a little quieter now.

The dust-drenched Range Rover pulled to a stop. Ruzami could tell there were three men inside, though with the windows so filthy and smudged, he could not see their faces. The driver remained where he was. The man in the front passenger seat got out, an AK-47 thrown over his shoulder, and opened the back door. Out stepped an old man with a cane, and Ruzami smiled broadly. “Father, how good to see you,” he exclaimed, bowing slightly.

Abu Nakba spread out his arms. The two men embraced and kissed each other on both cheeks and then headed to the front door.

“Come in, out of the heat and the flies,” Ruzami said. “Would you care for some tea?”

“I would,” the old man said.

Soon the two men were alone on the top floor. The communications operator was gone. So were the bodyguards, now standing post at the bottom of the stairs. The teakettle whistled. Ruzami turned off the stove and prepared the Kairos leader a cup of mint tea, adding a spoonful of honey, just the way the old man liked it. Setting it before him, Ruzami retreated to the other end of the large wooden table, took his seat, and watched his leader close his weary eyes and take his first sip.

Ruzami had only known Abu Nakba for a few years. But the stories of his cunning and cruelty were legendary. The time he’d cut the tongue out of the mouth of an Egyptian businessman who had double-crossed him. The night he had cut off the arm of a woman who dared serve him tea with her left hand. The Israeli tank commander he had gutted in Gaza in front of his fellow tankers. To say nothing of the jihadists he had persuaded with the sheer force of his personality to become suicide bombers, including those who had agreed to have the bomb surgically implanted inside their own bodies to avoid detection.

In his mideighties now, the man had certainly lost some of the vim and vigor he’d possessed in his younger days. Yet mentally he remained as sharp as ever, and Ruzami had no doubt this latest series of operations would go down as his greatest.

“You were right, Father,” Ruzami said, turning to business.

“About what?” the old man asked, his eyes still closed.

“About everything. I know you’ve been on the move. But have you seen any news?”

“Very little, my son.”

“Then you should know—the Americans are rattled. First, they were crowing that they’d killed you, taken you out in a huge air strike. Then you completely turned the tables on them. No one’s talking about the peace deal anymore. All of Washington is talking about scandal. The word impeachment is in the air—if Clarke even recovers from his stroke. And now the kidnapping. And the video. Hernandez must think you rose from the dead. It’s been something to behold.”

The old man shook his head. “Parlor tricks, Badr. Enough to buy us much-needed time but little more. The hard work remains ahead. What news from Mexico? Have your men arrived yet?”

“Most of them, yes,” Ruzami said. “Farooq is expected to land later today still.”

“And the weapons?”

“The purchase was completed. My men have taken possession of them. They will go into Texas when the first team leaves tomorrow.”

“What about the team going in via Canada?”

“They are all entering the country separately—Ottawa, Montreal, Quebec, and Vancouver. They should converge in Winnipeg in forty-eight hours.”