“You gentlemen are up and about early,” O’Malley said, rising and extending his hand.
“Early bird and all that,” the tall man said. He nodded to the case behind which the doctor stood. “Still snug in there?”
“I was just about to open it.”
“Oooh, I just can’t wait,” murmured the shorter man with asperity.
The doctor undid the locks and lifted the lid, then swung open the side doors so that the contents were revealed. Inside the case a large man lay in a fetal curl, his head swathed in white bandages. He turned his face toward the newcomer and opened his eyes, which were red-rimmed with fatigue and pain.
“Sebastian,” he whispered.
Gault smiled down at him and then extended his hands; together he and Dr. O’Malley helped El Mujahid to his feet while Toys hung back by the tent entrance and watched; he wore a smile but it did not reach as far as his cold cat-green eyes. The Fighter was a little unsteady and his bandages were stained with blood seepage, but for all that he still exuded an aura of great animal strength. They helped him into a chair and O’Malley set to work removing the soiled wrappings. The gash was ugly and it disfigured the Fighter’s face. Gault privately thought that El Mujahid might have done too thorough a job because his lip had a sneering curl, proof that nerves and muscles had been damaged. All that had really been required was a disfiguring wound; but, he reflected, never tell a tradesman how to do his own job, and El Mujahid’s job was mayhem and slaughter. He flicked a glance at Toys, who appeared to be mildly disgusted, but whether it was from the ugly wound or the man whose features it distorted was not clear. Gault figured it was both.
O’Malley gave him a shot for the pain, though El Mujahid appeared not to need it; and he gave him vitamins, antibiotics, and a stimulant. When he had applied a fresh dressing Gault thanked him and suggested the doctor join Nurse Anders outside for a smoke. Toys went with him.
When they were alone, Gault pulled over a folding chair and sat down, bending close to the Fighter. “You did yourself quite a nasty, my friend. Are you sure you can complete the mission? It will be a lot of travel. Another helicopter, a ship, trucks, and all of it in a few quick days. That’s enough to tire the average bloke, but with that injury ”
The Fighter grunted. “Pain is a tool; it is a whetstone to sharpen resolve.”
Gault wasn’t sure if that was a quote from scripture, but it sounded good.
“The trigger device is already in the States,” Gault said, “in a safe in the hotel room we’ve booked for you. The combination is Amirah’s birthday.”
Gault looked for the flash of anger in El Mujahid’s eyes, saw it, and mentally nodded to himself. Yes, he thought, he knows about us. It was something Gault had begun to suspect, but he didn’t yet understand why El Mujahid was leaving the matter off the table.
Aloud he said, “I suggest you leave it in the safe until the very last minute. We wouldn’t want an accident, would we?”
“No,” said the Fighter in a soft voice, “we wouldn’t want that.”
TOYS STOOD JUST beyond the campfire light, lost in the deep black shadows cast by a stand of date palms. He was staring at the entrance to the tent where Gault and El Mujahid were deep in conversation. As soon as he had left the tent his smile had vanished as surely as if some hand had reached into his mind and flicked off a switch. His features changed in the absence of observation. He became a different kind of creature.
“Amirah,” he murmured aloud, his lips curling into a feral sneer at the taste of the name. Before Gault had met her, before he’d allowed himself to fall in love with that woman, his friend and employer had been perfect. Brilliant, wonderfully ruthless, efficient and inflexible. In short-beautiful. Now Gault was getting sloppy and he was getting far too confident. Overconfident. Against Toys’s frequent cautions Gault was taking unnecessary risks, spinning plans within plans, and all of it because of that mad witch.
“Amirah,” he said again.
God, how he would love to see her bleed.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Baltimore, Maryland / Tuesday, June 30; 3:25 P.M.
THE FOUR OF them stared at me. Half an hour ago we were strangers and I was beating the crap out of them; now I was supposed to lead them on an urban infiltration mission against unknown odds and, very likely, plague-carrying walking corpses. How could I open a dialogue with these men with all of that hanging in the air?
Okay, I thought, if you’re going to do this, Buddy boy, then you’d better get it right the first time.
“Attennnn-hun!”
They shot to their feet and snapped to attention with all the speed and precision of career military. I walked up to stand in front of them and gave them all a hard, steady look. “I don’t make threats and I don’t like speeches, so this one will be short. If you’re here then you know what’s going on. Maybe some of you know more about this than I do. Whatever. You four are supposed to be the best of a good lot, all active military. Until this afternoon I was a Baltimore police detective. Church says that I’m a captain, but I haven’t seen any bars on my collar or a paycheck with ‘Captain’ Ledger on it, so it might still sound hypothetical to some of you. But from this point on I’m in charge of Echo Team. Anyone who doesn’t like it, or doesn’t think they can work with me can leave right now without prejudice. Otherwise hold your line. You have one second to decide.”
Nobody moved a muscle.
“That’s settled then. Stand at ease.” I gave them a quick rundown of my military and law enforcement career, and then told them about my martial arts background. I wrapped it up by saying, “I don’t do martial arts for trophies or for fun. I’m a fighter, and I train to win any fight I’m in. I don’t believe in rules and I don’t believe in fair fights. You want a fair fight, join a boxing club. I also don’t believe in dying for my country. I have a kind of General Patton take on that: I think the other guy should die for his. Any of you have problems with that?”
“Hooah,” murmured Sergeant Rock, which was more or less Ranger slang for “fucking-A.”
“We may actually be doing a field op as early as tomorrow. We don’t have time for male bonding and long nights around a campfire telling tales and listening to a harmonica. They brought us on board to be field ops. First- liners and shooters. We’re going to try a quiet infiltration, but if we get a kill order then scared or not we’re going to put hair on the walls. When we lock and load, gentlemen, then those living dead motherfuckers had better start being scared of us because, by God, sooner or later we are going to wipe them out. Not hurt ’em, not slow ’em down we are going to kill them all. End of speech.”
I shifted to stand in front of Sergeant Rock. His dark brown skin was crisscrossed with scars, old and new. “Name and rank.”
“First Sergeant Bradley Sims, U.S. Army Rangers, sir.”
Sir. That would take some getting used to. “Okay, Top, why are you here?”
“To serve my country, sir.” He had that noncom knack of looking straight through an officer without actually making real eye contact.
“Don’t kiss my ass. Why are you here?”
Now he looked at me, right into me, and there were all kinds of fires burning in his dark brown eyes. “Few years ago I stepped back from active duty to take a training post at Camp Merrill. While I was there my son Henry was killed in Iraq on the third day of the war. Six days before his nineteenth birthday.” He paused. “My daughter Monique lost both her legs in Baghdad last Christmas when a mine blew up under her Bradley. I got no more kids to throw at this thing. I need to tear off a piece of this myself.”
“For revenge?”
“I got a nephew in junior year of high school. He wants to join the army. His choice if he enlists or not, but maybe I can do something about the number of threats he might have to face.”
I nodded and stepped to the next man. Scarface. “Name and rank.”
“Second Lieutenant Oliver Brown, Army, sir.”
“Duty?”
“Two tours in Iraq, one in Afghanistan.”
“Action?”
