“Well…no, not really.”
I smiled. Something had happened. “What’s that mean?”
“The drop was off by about a thousand meters. Idiots never waited for me to initiate before tossing it out of the plane. No signals, no commo, nothing. Like they had someplace else more important to be.”
“And?”
“And I got stuck in the sand. Okay? I’m still sweating like a hog from digging out.”
I started to rib her just for fun when my phone buzzed from an incoming call. “Gotta go. Brett’s on the other line. Go take a shower. See you tonight.”
Brett said, “He was just dropped off at the Financial Centre metro station. I’m on him, Knuckles is off.”
“Okay. See if he’s meeting anyone on the train and give us a call when he gets off. We’ll parallel on Sheikh Zayed Road.”
I confirmed instructions to Decoy and Knuckles, trying to piece together what Lucas was doing. Why leave his vehicle on a major thoroughfare and take the metro?
Brett called twenty minutes later. “He’s off at the Internet City stop. Talking on a cell phone. He did nothing but ride. I see his van approaching. Knuckles is coming to get me.”
“Stay on him. Something’s up.”
We lost him for about ten minutes, forced to conduct a lost-contact drill of trolling the neighborhood he had last been seen entering. The next call came from Decoy and did nothing but muddy the waters even more.
“I got him. He’s parked in a section of hardware stores, just sitting still. Like he was at the electronics store. Isn’t getting out.”
He gave his location, and I asked, “How long was he unsighted? Could he have gone inside?”
“I don’t know. I suppose he had time to get out and purchase something.”
It was Brett who broke the code on the strange activities. “I see him. Got him from the north. He’s looking through binos at a store entrance.”
49
The Ghost exited the taxi outside a hardware store and slowly turned around, as if to get his bearings. In reality, he was looking for the white-panel van. He was now sure he had seen the same van at both the Burj Khalifa and the electronics store, and while it might have simply been a coincidence, he had decided to run a surveillance detection route to see if he could flush out anybody on him.
He’d entered the metro, hoping to see the white van disgorge a passenger, knowing if he was under surveillance that’s what would have to happen or risk losing him. The van didn’t appear, and he had ridden for a few stops before getting off again, spotting nothing suspicious. Nobody on the train paid him any undue attention. He’d attempted to memorize anyone getting off with him, but none had spiked or done anything that indicated they were interested in what he was doing.
He entered a rustic hardware store with a large front window. Perusing a shelf of tools, he maintained observation on the front door, waiting to see if anyone entered.
After five minutes, he began to believe he was imagining things. He dropped a hammer back on a shelf and proceeded toward the exit. Before he opened the door, he saw a car directly across the street, a long scratch in the paint on the passenger side. The damage held no interest to him, but the man in the passenger seat sure did.
He stared hard through the window, trying to convince himself he was wrong, but the more he studied, the more he was sure the man had been in his metro car and had exited with him. Now he was in his own vehicle, driven by someone else.
But the man hadn’t entered the metro with him. He’d come on at the next stop and hadn’t given him a second glance. And he wasn’t giving him or the store any attention now. He was looking down the street.
He decided to find out once and for all. And take the fight to them if it proved true. He had a small wad of explosives left, and one detonator. He’d thought about simply cramming it all on the final radar-array in the elevator shaft and was now glad he hadn’t.
He walked the aisles until he found a small spool of soft soldering wire, rated to melt at three hundred degrees. He continued and purchased a roll of electrical tape, a metal funnel, and a package of magnets. Moving to the checkout counter, he glanced again at the front door. He saw the vehicle was gone.
He exited the store and hailed a cab. He told the driver to head downtown, rapidly assessing a plan of action. He needed to separate the followers from their vehicles, which meant he would need to dismount in an area that contained at least some Westerners. He knew they wouldn’t risk raising attention by trying to penetrate a locals- only area.
He also needed the ability to wash himself. To lose the surveillance and let him execute his plan. He gave the driver directions to the Bastakia Quarter, an ancient Persian merchant center that was now a pseudo cafe/art area. It would have both tourists and locals and was big enough, with winding walkways between two-story buildings, that the surveillance would be forced to follow on foot. It also had limited parking areas. Few choices for them to leave their car, and few areas he would have to survey. Most important, it was anchored on the west end by a mosque. A place no Westerner would dare enter.
The cab dropped him off in one of the two parking areas, and he rapidly moved into the labyrinth of ancient buildings, weaving through swarms of tourists and locals alike. He saw an open double-wood door and entered, finding himself in a courtyard with men smoking water pipes and women drinking coffee. He ran to the east wall and peered out, seeing the parking lot and the roundabout that led to it. Within a minute, he saw the white-panel van coming through the roundabout. He had been right.
The van didn’t stop at the parking area, but kept going until it was headed south on the eastern edge of the village. The Ghost saw brake lights flash, then lost sight of it.
He didn’t want the surveillance to think they’d lost him. He wanted all of the men out and tracking him.
He left the building and headed south, cutting toward the eastern edge. He could recognize only two of the surveillance team who were on him, but that didn’t cause any concern. He was fairly sure the rest would find him and pick up a follow. Especially since he planned on being very visible.
He traversed back and forth, entering cafes and galleries and stopping at various historical sights, acting like a tourist, all the while giving anyone the best opportunity to spot him without acting in any way that said he believed he was under surveillance.
He finally began moving west with a purpose. He reached the front steps of the mosque and hesitated, giving the surveillance a final opportunity to see him enter. Climbing the steps, he took off his shoes, but instead of placing them on the floor, he carried them with him, walking at almost a trot to the back.
He went to the nearest men’s restroom, glad the time was in between prayers, leaving the room deserted. He swiftly pulled out the metal funnel and began cramming a baseball-size lump of explosive into it. He formed it in the same shape as the funnel, using the metal as a guide, building up an inch-thick layer around the circumference and leaving a cone-shaped space in the center. When he was done, it looked like the funnel simply had a smaller capacity. His hope was to create an improvised shaped charge. He knew it wouldn’t be perfect, but it should create enough of an explosive jet to accomplish what he wanted.
He placed the electric blasting cap into the small end of the funnel, seating it in the explosives. He then flipped a switch on his final detonator, turning off the WiFi function and making it work manually with a closed-loop electric circuit. He attached both wires from the blasting cap to the detonator and taped it to the bottom of the funnel.
Satisfied with the device, he exited the mosque and immediately entered a government building on the right side, threading his way north until he exited on the Dubai Creek. Now, the walls and fence of the mosque itself
