“Wait,” his son said.
“Gerry, there’s no time.”
“I want you to do something. I want you to tell Yolanda how much I love her.”
Valentine swiped at his eyes with his hand. “You’re not going to die.”
“Promise me, Pop.”
Valentine felt his chest heave and his throat constrict. “I’ll tell her. Then I’ll call you right back.”
“Thanks, Pop. I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
“Oh, shit,” his son said.
“What’s the matter? Gerry?
The line went dead. Valentine frantically dialed his son’s cell number, and got put into voice mail. He hung up, waited for a dial tone, and punched in 911. Gerry wasn’t going to die, he told himself. Gerry wasn’t going to die.
While he waited for an operator to come on, he found himself staring at the sky north of Las Vegas. Hordes of giant black locusts were gathering and descending upon the city. It was like watching something out of a science fiction movie. Down below, he saw everyone on the street staring at the sky as well.
As the hordes got close, he realized what he was looking at. It was a squadron of Apache military helicopters from nearby Nellis Air Force Base. He covered his ears as they passed over his balcony, then watched them make a sharp turn and head southwest.
Toward Whiskey Pete’s, he thought.
46
The gas station Amin was parked at had a convenience store.At 12:10, he went inside and killed a few minutes browsing through the crowded magazine rack. Normally, he hated these places. They were always run by smiling Arabs.
At 12:14, he took two bottled waters out of the cooler and went to the front of the store. A mountain of a man was at the register. His name tag said EARL. All the other customers in the store seemed to know him. Amin got on line to pay.
At 12:16, he put the waters on the counter, and Earl rang them up. From his wallet he removed a hundred- dollar bill and saw Earl frown.
“It’s the smallest I have,” Amin said.
Earl snapped the bill, then held it up to the fluorescent light. Amin tried not to act insulted. He stared down at the stack of Sunday newspapers next to his feet. A headline caught his eye. He put the newspaper on the counter.
“This, too,” he said.
At 12:17, he got back in the car. He’d parked near the car wash. There was a pay phone on the back of the building. Seven minutes was plenty of time, he thought. He handed Pash a water. His brother unscrewed the top and took a long swallow. Amin indicated the trunk with a tilt of his neck. “Did Gerry give you any trouble?”
“No,” Pash said. “He was quiet.”
“Good.” Amin started the engine. Then he stared at his younger brother. Pash looked very nervous.
“Did you call them?” Amin asked.
Pash’s head snapped. “Who?”
“You know.”
“No, I don’t.”
“The police.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Did you call the police while I was in the store?”
“Come on, be serious,” Pash said.
Amin grabbed him by the arm and squeezed his younger brother’s biceps so hard that it made his eyes bulge. “The charade is over. I know what you did.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You called the police in New Orleans and Biloxi and Detroit and the other cities, and told them where the explosives were hidden. It wasn’t someone in the network, like I first suspected. It was you.”
“I didn’t—”
Amin grabbed the back of Pash’s head and banged it into the dashboard.
Pash pushed away, his eyes wide with fear. “Is that what you think? That I betrayed you?”
“Yes! You called the FBI and used some kind of code to tip them off. Somehow you made them know each time that the threat was real. Didn’t you?”
Pash took several deep breaths. “I only told them about the explosives. Never you.”
Amin raised his hand to strike him. Pash grabbed his hand. For a moment, they wrestled in the front seat of the car.
“Why must you kill innocent people?” Pash said. “What will it prove?”
Amin stopped fighting and glared at him. With his head, he pointed at the newspaper lying on the seat between them.
Still holding his brother’s wrists, Pash stared at the front page. The headline was about six baseball players who’d gotten caught cheating, but were still being allowed to play in a big game. “So?” he replied.
“Yesterday, a young Palestinian couple were killed by Israeli gunfire in the Gaza Strip. In Iraq, a family was shot in their car when the father didn’t stop at a checkpoint. Those stories aren’t in the newspaper. Take a look if you don’t believe me.”
Pash let go of his wrists. “If they’re not in the newspaper, how do you know they actually happened?”
“I saw them on the Internet.”
Pash stared at the headline. He shook his head.
“It is wrong,” he said. “But killing innocent people solves nothing.”
“Did you, or did you not, call the police while I was in the store?”
Pash gave him an exasperated look.
“Yes,” he said.
“Did you tell them about the explosives in the suitcase in the rental car?”
“Yes.”
“Did you tell them anything else?”
“I told them the waiters were going to Los Angeles.”
“Good,” Amin said.
Out on the highway, a police cruiser raced past, its siren blaring. Another followed, then another. The sirens pierced the Sunday-morning quiet, only to be drowned out by a squadron of air force helicopters passing overhead. Like the police cruisers, they were following I-15 toward Los Angeles.
“You . . . wanted me to call them?” Pash asked.
Amin looked sadly at him. He had tried to make Pash understand that by coming to the United States, he was part of the jihad. Only Pash had never accepted his reasoning.
“Yes,” Amin said.
“Why?”
Amin grabbed the paneling on his door and pulled it away, revealing the bags of TATP lining the interior. The deception hit Pash like a punch in the stomach, and he recoiled in horror.
Pulling out of the gas station’s lot, Amin drove the car back toward Las Vegas.
