Enemy of Mine

Feeling more confident, he walked slowly toward us, sighting down the barrel of the AK. He broke the plane of the front of the vehicle, then whipsawed onto the ground as if his thigh had been hit with an invisible sledgehammer. A split second later, the crack of the bullet reached our ears, and I was on him, first subduing, then providing first aid for the large in-and-out hole in his thigh.

We reached the foothills of the Chouf Mountains, and I saw Aziz’s eyes squint, in his mind believing I had lied, and he was now being turned over to the Druze for some incredible torture. I told Brett to signal Knuckles and Jennifer in the car to our front, then pull over.

“I wasn’t lying before. I mean you no harm. We came here because it’s the only safe place I know. I have no idea who’s going to be looking for you in the Dahiyeh, but nobody here knows what’s gone on. Samir specifically asked for my help because he was afraid of another civil war. I was told I couldn’t harm anyone, and I tried to live up to my promise.”

He looked at me with distrust, but there was a little spark of hope in his eyes that made me think he was putting on an act. Maybe this’ll work out.

We’d fled the scene of our assault immediately after Knuckles’ sniper shot, linking up with his car south of the airport. He’d hit the guy hard in the thigh, but had missed the femoral artery. We bandaged him with some QuikClot and morphine from our aid bag, checking his vitals every few minutes. He’d live but he wasn’t going to a hospital anytime soon. We’d packed all of them into our van and left their two vehicles behind. I’d flex-cuffed each of their ankles and wrists, but offered water and treated them with respect.

I said, “We’ll get your man to a hospital as soon as we can, but I want you to watch something first. Will you do that?”

Aziz nodded his head, and Decoy sat him upright. I placed a computer in front of him, and explained what he was about to see, lying about how we had gotten it.

I hit play, keeping my eye on Aziz’s facial expressions. The jerky image began, and I could tell immediately that Aziz recognized the surroundings, even if we didn’t. That was a definite plus because he’d know we hadn’t faked the film. No way could we have re-created some inner sanctum of Hezbollah. The boy entered the frame, and the truth began to solidify. Aziz began to believe. When he saw the boy die, he strained against his bonds so hard I had to hold him back. I knew at that moment that Samir was safe.

The WAV file ended with Lucas still on the screen, a grainy, bloody image that punctuated his crimes. I waited.

Aziz said, “What do you want from me?”

“Do you see?”

“Yes,” he hissed, “yes, I see who is to blame. And he will pay, no matter where he goes.”

“Well, then, we’re on the same sheet of music. I want him to pay as well, and you people know more about him than anyone else. Did you give him anything we can track? Any cell phones or other devices? Anything at all?”

He smiled for the first time. “Why would I help the CIA? I can do this on my own. Leave us be. I understand your methods and won’t seek retribution. Samir is safe.”

Brett and Decoy heard him and smiled, thinking we had mission-complete. They waited on me to say something sane, like “Okey-dokey. We’re out of here.” Instead, I said, “We don’t work for the CIA. We don’t work for the U.S. government. Infidel is personal to us. I want him, and you can help. If you get him first, so be it, but I’m still going to hunt him.”

I saw Brett shake his head and scowl. I waited on Aziz. I could see his mind working over the issue, wondering about potential downsides. Wondering what he could give us that would let them go. Something harmless.

He finally said, “He had a cell phone, but he’s no longer using it.”

“What’s the number?”

He gave it to me, and I didn’t recognize it as a Lebanese number.

“What’s this? Where’s it from?”

Samir spoke up. “It’s their internal network. An internal phone.”

Shit. No good to us. It wouldn’t work anywhere outside of Lebanon. I saw a small smirk on Aziz’s face. He’d given what he could and knew it wouldn’t help.

I said, “Watch them,” and exited the van, walking to Knuckles’ car.

He rolled down the window. “How’s it going back there?”

“About even. Samir’s okay, but I’m getting little help on Lucas.”

“Well, let’s call it a win.”

“Maybe. You have a Taskforce phone?”

He looked at me warily. “Yeah. Why?”

I passed him the number. “See if they can track this. Get us a historical pattern. I’m looking for his bed-down site before he left. Last ninety-six hours, focusing on repeated locations.”

He studied the number, then said, “Pike, they need to know the network. They can’t just crack ‘Lebanon phone directory.’ This number doesn’t even look real.”

“It’s Hezbollah’s internal network.”

“What the hell are they going to do with that?”

Jennifer spoke up. “You sure it’s the internal network?”

“Yeah. No doubt.”

She turned to Knuckles. “Tell ’em to look at Cedar Hill’s reporting. He’s already cracked the network and passed it to them. They’re sitting on it right now.”

“Cedar Hill? Who’s that?”

“Louis Britt, the Taskforce case officer here. The one that helped us infil you and gave us the location of the computer we hit. He’s already passed the information on Hezbollah’s network.”

Knuckles pulled out his smartphone and started typing a secure text to a number that would never be used again. I was a little concerned that the request would bounce back to Kurt in one way or another, but figured the little minions who did such work would just assume it a standard request from a deployed team. Especially since it was coming from Knuckles’ phone and not mine. At least that’s what I hoped. If Kurt found out we were operational without Council sanction, I was going to get roasted.

It took a couple of back-and-forths over text, but eventually, the hackers in the rear locked onto the network. In twenty minutes, Knuckles had the tower track of the phone. The last connection was more than forty-eight hours ago, but when we brought up a map, we had one location it had stayed overnight for two consecutive nights. A hotel. The bed-down location.

“All right. I’m going to get Samir. We’ll go to the hotel and see what we can find out. I’ll send Decoy and Brett up to Samir’s house. They can hole up with the Hezbollah guys until we get back.”

“What then?”

“We get out of here. One way or another.”

44

The hotel was a small, boutique affair with less than fifteen rooms that catered to frugal travelers. It was clean, with a utilitarian lobby that was only thirty feet across. The receptionist was almost fawning at first, probably because they’d lost a ton of tourism dollars due to the upheavals in the Arab world and thought we were looking for a place to stay. As soon as we began asking questions about Lucas, using his Canadian identity, her demeanor shifted. She gave us the usual stonewall about not being able to discuss guests for privacy reasons, but she looked fearful, glancing at a door to her rear as if she hoped someone would bail her out of the conversation. He’s been here, and something happened.

I was about to request to talk to a manager when Samir touched my arm. I thanked the woman and backed off. Samir motioned toward the exit, and we followed him. He approached a young man of about nineteen or twenty, filling up a mop bucket. The boy smiled and shook Samir’s hand. They held a conversation for about three minutes in Arabic. When it was done, Samir pulled us aside.