A Long Gray Line Read online

  “Where did they go?” his wife asked.

  He had no idea. Did he really see four of them? There was a curve in the ditch twenty meters to their front. Mike would have given anything for a grenade or two.

  “Stay a few steps behind me and to my right, Lisa,” Mike instructed his wife. “We’ll try to flush them out.”

  His weapon up and in front of him, Mike carefully approached the bend. If the jihadists were going to ambush them, this is where they’d do it. He used the slice-the-pie technique to clear the bend. To his surprise, two more jihadists lay face down at the bottom of the ditch. Mike squatted next to them.

  “They’re dead,” he said. “Bullet wounds to the head.”

  “Maybe they got hit by McArdle’s or Sonia’s fire?” Lisa said.

  “Not possible,” he said. “The wounds are at the back of their heads.”

  Out of nowhere, three men wearing desert ghillie suits appeared on top of them shouting, “Raweenee edeek. Raweenee edeek!”

  They were covered for all angles. Lisa looked his way, silently asking him what to do. There was no way they’d be able to take down all three men without being killed. Mike dropped his pistol and raised his hands.

  Things weren’t looking good.

  CHAPTER 16

  Twenty-three kilometers north of Ar Raqqah, Syria

  The flex cuffs around Mike Walton’s wrists were so tight they cut into his skin. He and Lisa hadn’t been in the ditch for more than two minutes when a pair of small SUVs came to a halt right behind them.

  “You go. You go in truck,” a soldier wearing a ghillie suit said. “You go now. Both you.”

  Mike turned around. The rear passenger door was open. “Go now,” the man repeated. “Or die here.”

  “What did you do to our friends?” Mike asked. “The ones that were on the other side of the road.”

  The three men looked at him like they didn’t understand. Then one of them asked, “Mustafa?”

  Mike was about to say that he didn’t know anyone named Mustafa when he remembered that McArdle’s cover name was Mustafa Kuftaro.

  “Yes,” he said. “Where is he?”

  “Gone. Mustafa gone. There,” the man said, pointing to a third SUV accelerating away. “Need medical.”

  “What about us?” Lisa asked. “What will you do to us?”

  “No time. Talk later,” the man replied. Mike could see the man was getting nervous. “We go now.”

  Mike made up his mind and said, “Let’s go, Lisa. I think they’re with the Kurdish forces.”

  “What if they aren’t?”

  “What choice do we have?” he said, standing up. “Let’s go.”

  He hurried up and climbed into the waiting SUV. Lisa did the same. Someone closed the door and the driver punched the gas pedal as soon as one of the ghillie-suited men sat in the passenger seat.

  “Took you long enough,” the driver said in perfect English.

  That surprised Mike. The man sounded like an American. “Who are you?”

  “Captain Burke. United States Special Forces,” the man said.

  “We need to go back there,” Mike said. “There’s something we need from the smashed SUV in the ditch.”

  Burke reached for something at the feet of his passenger. “You looking for this?” he asked, holding Mike’s brown leather satchel.

  “Yeah, that’s it.” Mike was relieved. If they were to lose the laptops and flash drives, all of this would have been for nothing.

  “These are your guys in the desert ghillie suits?” Mike continued, his chin pointing toward the man in the passenger seat.

  “Depends,” Burke replied laughing. “Did they do a good job?”

  “They know how to use these,” Lisa replied, showing him her tied wrists.

  Mike saw Burke look at Lisa in his rearview mirror. “Too tight?” he asked, but continued before they could reply. “Sorry about that. His name’s Vian.”

  The Special Forces officer issued his passenger an order in Arabic. Vian pulled out a small knife. Mike offered his wrists and Vian cut the flex cuffs. He then did the same to Lisa.

  Mike massaged his wrists. He could see they had cut through his wife’s skin, too, but she wasn’t complaining.

  “Where’s Mustafa?”

  “Mustafa’s en route to receive medical attention,” Burke replied. “When we found him, he was unconscious. We have our best medic with him.”

  “He saved my life,” Lisa said.

  “He’s a good man.”

  “What about the girl?” Lisa asked.

  “She’s with him. She refused to leave his side,” Burke said. “Spirited girl, she is.”

  “You know Mustafa well?” Mike asked. He wondered how much the Special Forces officer knew about McArdle’s mission. Did he know anything about the IMSI?

  “I know his real name isn’t Mustafa,” Burke replied. “He’s been feeding valuable intel to the Kurds for a while now. As far as I know, he’s with the CIA and the Kurds owe him. So here we are.”

  “Can you get us out of here?” Mike inquired. “People in Washington need what’s in the bag.” It was a white lie; nobody in Washington knew where they were.

  “I didn’t know the CIA had assets in Ar Raqqah,” Burke said.

  If Burke thought they were with the CIA, that was fine by Mike. He wouldn’t say anything to change the soldier’s mind. “So? Can you get us out of Syria or not?”

  “Yeah, I can,” Burke said, clearly disappointed Mike didn’t offer more info. “The Kurds will get you across to Turkey. You’ll be in Washington in ten days or so.”

  We can’t wait that long.

  “Do you have a satellite phone?”

  CHAPTER 17

  IMSI Headquarters, NY

  Charles Mapother’s heart sank. He didn’t want to lose another member of his team. Every time one of his assets was injured or worse, killed, he felt responsible. As the director of the IMSI, he was the one sending them in harm’s way. And Frank McArdle had been a real trooper. Tasked with providing intelligence to the Kurdish forces, he had done a terrific job. Ambushes and assassinations of key ISIS commanders by the Kurds had occurred because of the information McArdle had delivered to them.

  Mapother’s goal had been to see McArdle go up in the ISIS chain of command while continuing to provide actionable intel to the Kurds and the Special Forces teams supporting them. But his ultimate objective was to kill ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. But that dream had disappeared in smoke when Mike told him what had happened to McArdle.

  “Can the Special Forces team help you reach the Incirlik Air Base?” Mapother asked.

  “Yes, their team leader told me they could. But they need a set of orders.”

  “They’ll get their orders,” Mapother replied. “How long will it take for you to reach Incirlik?”

  Mapother heard Mike ask one of the Special Forces soldiers. “They say we should be able to reach it within twelve hours after they’ve received their orders from SOCOM.”

  SOCOM was the United States Special Operations Command. Headquartered at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Florida, SOCOM was tasked with synchronizing the planning of special operations and providing its operators with the support they needed to complete their mission. Mapother had a few friends at SOCOM but they’d never issue an order without knowing exactly the reasons behind the mission. Mapother didn’t blame them. He’d do the same. He disliked asking DNI Phillips for his assistance but he didn’t have many options if he wanted things done rapidly.

  “Okay,” Mapother replied. “Tell them to expect their orders momentarily. Call me when you reach the base.”

  Mapother looked at his watch. He was looking forward to giving his analysts access to the contents of the laptops and flash drives Mike and Lisa had seized. It was too bad they hadn�
��t captured Mouin Bashi, but sometimes getting the right intel was better than getting the man.

  “Get me the DNI on the phone, Jonathan,” Mapother said. “I need him to do something for me.”

  CHAPTER 18

  Split, Croatia

  The taste of the grilled squid and the vegetable salad that came with it was mind-blowing. The Sheik couldn’t remember the last time he had eaten such a delicious dish. A vibrantly colored blend of cherry tomatoes mixed with chopped red peppers, corn, broad beans and chickpeas drizzled with touches of lemon juice and olive oil was not only visually appealing, it tasted great too.

  The last twenty-four hours had been nerve racking, not that he would admit it to anyone. Bashi had confirmed that the first team inside Croatia had received the go-ahead for the mission on the Israeli embassy. His concerns weren’t with them but with Bashi’s man Zebar Selam. The man hadn’t responded to Bashi’s request to contact.

  And that was worrisome. Zebar was a fighter and a good tactical leader. He was one of the key links between the Sheik and the ISIS fighters. The moment the Sheik had been made aware that Zebar had missed a communication, he had given Bashi the green light to investigate. Time was of the essence; they had an operation underway.

  The glass of white Chardonnay wasn’t helping at all, and once again the Sheik found himself cursing Omar Al-Nashwan’s death. He’d have his revenge, but in order to do so, he first needed the Russians to back him one hundred percent. Russia’s assistance came at a price; the Sheik knew that. He just didn’t know what it was yet. He had spent a lot of time thinking about what they would ask him in exchange for the cash infusions but finally gave up. Veniamin Simonich, the Russian president, wasn’t the type of guy to simply give out of generosity.

  The Sheik’s phone chirped next to his empty plate. It was Bashi.

  “Talk to me,” the Sheik said.

  “We need to meet. Now.”

  The Sheik fought the urge to throw his glass of wine across the room.

  What now?

  _________________________

  The Sheik walked through the narrow streets of the Diocletian palace until he reached a tower-like house topped by a gothic-style bell right at the exit of the Iron Gate. He looked at the clock and noticed it was divided into twenty-four parts instead of the usual twelve.

  He was at the right place. On his left was the restaurant Bashi had described with its large terrace and red canopy. The Sheik entered the restaurant through its front entrance and took a seat at the bar. His phone vibrated again.

  “Where are you?” he asked.

  “You’re clear, Sheik,” Bashi replied. “Nobody followed you. I’ll be there in one minute.”

  The Sheik had always been a strategist, a planner. With Omar Al-Nashwan, he had had the perfect tactician. That’s why they had been such a great team for so long. A former Special Forces officer in the United States Army, Al-Nashwan had received the kind of training the Sheik never had. Now that he was gone, the Sheik had to trust others for his personal security. Bashi was no Omar, but he had served with the Pakistani ISI —Inter-Services Intelligence— before joining his network more than a decade ago.

  “Why did we need to meet again?” the Sheik asked. He didn’t like meeting with his associates in public more than it was necessary but Bashi had assured him they were safe here, well under the radar of all the intelligence agencies that were looking for him.

  “Zebar’s dead.”

  That changed everything. The Sheik took a few deep breaths before he trusted himself to speak without shouting. “How?”

  “From what I’ve been told,” Bashi started, “Kurdish elements inserted in Ar Raqqah raided my apartment.”

  “The Kurds?” That didn’t make any sense whatsoever. They had indeed intensified their aggressive actions north of Ar Raqqah since they started receiving aid from the United States, but they had never attempted such a bold move before. And for what? Did they know that Zebar was indirectly working for him? Or maybe they had learned where Zebar lived and simply raided Bashi’s apartment to exact some kind of revenge? Zebar Selam was known for his cruelty and efficiency. Maybe the Kurds had had enough of him?

  “I know it’s hard to believe the Kurds could successfully run an operation deep inside ISIS-held territory, Sheik,” Bashi said, “but I believe the information to be accurate.”

  “How so?”

  “People we trust in Ar Raqqah indicate that they’ve witnessed two men and a woman escaping the scene in an SUV belonging to a man named Mustafa Kuftaro.”

  The Sheik recognized the name. “I’ve heard of him.”

  “Yes, Sheik, I’ve mentioned him to you in the past,” Bashi explained. “He is a new addition to Zebar’s team. Trustworthy, we were told.”

  “Was he killed in the raid?”

  “His body wasn’t found,” Bashi said.

  The Sheik sighed. A traitor.

  “And there’s more,” Bashi added. “The vehicle was later spotted and engaged by a six-man ISIS team about twenty kilometers north of Ar Raqqah—”

  “Tell me they took prisoners,” the Sheik interrupted, but knew right away it wasn’t the case when Bashi’s eyes went to the floor.

  “They didn’t,” Bashi said. “The six ISIS fighters were attacked and killed by another Kurdish element.”

  At least it confirmed that the Kurds and not a U.S. Special Forces team had conducted the raid. This meant the Sheik’s original plan was still a go. But with Zebar dead, he had no means of communication with the team already on the ground. Unless…

  “Did you find the flash drive Zebar was supposed to use to communicate with his cells?”

  Bashi shook his head and said, “I was told at least two laptops and at least as many flash drives were stolen.”

  The Sheik smashed his fist on the counter so hard the whole countertop shuddered. Two patrons seated on stools at the end of the bar looked at them. Bashi gestured for them to stay still and asked the bartender to send the men another round.

  “You shouldn’t worry, Sheik,” Bashi continued. “The flash drives used by Zebar are sophisticated; the Kurds don’t have the necessary software to crack a 256-bit encryption key.”

  “Maybe not but the Americans do, and they’ve been helping the Kurds a lot recently.”

  “I personally helped Zebar pick the men for the Zagreb mission, Sheik,” Bashi continued. “They’re good. They’ll succeed.”

  “Maybe,” the Sheik conceded, “but what about the other cells? They were supposed to be activated in twenty-four-hour intervals.”

  “Without the flash drives, there’s no way to make contact with any of the embedded cells,” Bashi admitted.

  The Sheik rubbed his temples with the tips of his fingers. He had to find a solution. Failure wasn’t an option. How could he ensure widespread panic across Europe if six of his seven teams couldn’t be activated? Did he really need the other six teams? Maybe he didn’t.

  “When are you supposed to meet with the Zagreb team?” he asked Bashi.

  “In a few hours, why?”

  “I’m placing you in charge of the Zagreb cell, Mouin,” the Sheik said, placing his hand on Bashi’s shoulder. “Can I trust you with this?”

  That seemed to take Bashi by surprise. “Who will manage the other operations if I’m with al-Julani’s cell?”

  “I will,” the Sheik reply, his tone making it clear this wasn’t open for discussion.

  “How will you contact the other teams?”

  “Let me worry about this, my friend,” the Sheik said. “Just make sure the attack on the Israeli embassy is successful.”

  CHAPTER 19

  Incirlik Air Base, Turkey

  It was clear the Colonel in charge of the 39th Air Base Wing was less than thrilled to welcome them on his turf. Mike didn’t believe the fact that they had arri
ved in the middle of the night played a role. The Colonel wasn’t a pleasant man, period.

  Mike had to give it to Mapother, though. Captain Burke received his orders fewer than two hours after his call with the IMSI director. They crossed over to Turkey at Ras al-Ayn and it went without a hitch. They drove for eight hours straight with only two stops for gas and bathroom breaks.

  “We need to head back south, Mike,” Burke said, shaking his hand once he had made the introduction. “Give me a shout if you’re ever in Syria again. Best of luck.”

  Once they were alone with the Colonel, Mike said, “Is there a place we can talk?”

  “I have no idea who you are and what you want, so we’re fine talking here,” the Colonel said. “I received a phone call from a three-star general at SOCOM to let me know that I was supposed to expect your arrival.”

  “And we really appreciate your warm welcome,” Lisa said.

  Mike shot her an angry look.

  “What can I do for you?” the Colonel said after a few seconds.

  “We need to be on the next military flight to Washington,” Mike said.

  “That’s all?” the Colonel replied. He sounded relieved.

  “When is it?”

  The Colonel looked at his watch. “It’s leaving in four hours. It will stop in the UK to refuel before continuing on its way to the States.”