Khamenei’s voice cut off as they both heard the sound of shattering glass nearby, then some shouts. Both men jumped up from the desk and made their way to the windows that faced the parking lot and looked out. Smoke was coming from a room a few doors down, but they didn’t see anything.
“Call the front desk, if they have to get the fire department here, we’re all going to have to leave and regroup.”
“I’m on it—
The explosion knocked both men into the far wall. The shaped charge and been placed by Rob only an hour earlier, and the FBI’s HRT team tossed in flash bangs. Up and down the hotel, more booms and bangs followed, and suddenly there was shouting.
Khamenei came to slowly as the sedatives wore off. He kept his eyes closed in case his captors were nearby. He could feel the cold metal restraints on his wrists and ankles. He was in a soft bed, so he guessed the hospital. The last thing he remembered was the explosion, and bouncing off the cheap sheetrock. He’d fallen on his side and had remembered seeing the blank eyes of Sammy. Something had been sticking out of the back of his head. At one point it had been wood, but in the end, it had been shrapnel that had killed his favorite toady.
“He’s awake. Good. Bring him into the other room,” a voice said out loud.
Khamenei faked it for a few moments more, then opened his eyes. A dark-skinned doctor stood next to a pair of suits. He recognized the doctor immediately.
“Doctor Dante Weaver. So nice to meet you. Who are your friends here?”
“Special Agents Korey and Gorman,” Korey explained, pointing to the others.
“So, I take it I’m at the farm’s medical facility?” he asked, looking at Weaver.
“Nope,” Dante said, “I’m just here in case your heart stops. I’m pretty good at what I do, you dig?”
“I dig,” Khamenei said.
He knew he was dead. Not only had his mission failed, he’d been captured by the FBI and agents who worked at the farm or owned it. It had to be the mole, he even thought he knew of three people the mole could have been… but that didn’t matter. His failure would ensure his death. Talking to these folks would ensure his death, and he didn’t discount that they might just kill him themselves. They’d been willing to tar and feather his agents once, and had told them that if they kept the nonsense up, the locals would be given hunting permits for feds. Khamenei decided he was fucked.
“Good. Now, we want to know who you report to, what your orders are and all that kind of stuff,” Special Agent Korey said.
“I want my lawyer and my phone call, right now,” Khamenei said, knowing it was a long shot.
“If you weren’t a wanted terrorist in half a dozen countries, you’d probably get one. Now this isn’t Gitmo, but it’s about as close to it in the states as we can get, outside of most federal reach.”
That confused him, but he didn’t spend too long pondering it.
“If I refuse to answer your questions?” Khamenei asked. “You what, plan on torturing me? Waterboarding me?”
“Worse,” Gorman said with a shrug.
“Call me if you need me, I have my radio on,” Dante told the agents, then walked out.
Before the door closed, Khamenei saw several people walking past his doorway. They were all wearing white clothing like the doc, but they were all dark skinned like Khamenei was, just a different ethnicity. They were American Indian or a mixture if he had to guess by their features alone. He was about to ask about that when a big man, a former football player and politician, pushed open the door.
“Is he talking yet?” Governor Christian asked.
“Not yet,” Gorman said. “He honestly just woke up. We kept him out for a day before we got here, and he’s probably still a bit foggy in the head.”
“If he wasn’t already,” Korey said.
Khamenei fumed. “I’d wondered where you’d escaped to. Where is this?”
“Oh, when you guys snatched me, my wife bugged out to family and friends. Her tribe was more than happy to help us out. When the agents of the FBI here needed a place for you to recover before questioning, the tribe again offered their help. Welcome to the rez.”
Khamenei didn’t understand it, until he did. That happened about the same time as Governor Christian left, closing the door behind him. He wasn’t great at American History, having grown up somewhere else, but he knew the Native Americans on the reservations had their own police force and treaties with the government.
“You think you can get away with this?” Khamenei asked. “You cannot understand the forces you are challenging right now.”
“I’m guessing you’re not going to cooperate?” Gorman asked.
“Not a chance in hell,” Khamenei said.
Both agents looked at each other, then shrugged. As they turned, Khamenei struggled against the restraints. He didn’t have enough room to do any of the tricks he knew to get out of handcuffs.
“Don’t say we didn’t warn you,” Korey said, then shut off the light and walked out the door with his partner.
“These fucking amateurs think they can psych me out? This is stupidity.”
“They say people who talk to themselves wet the bed.” Angelica’s voice came out of the dark.
Khamenei jerked his head to the left where the voice had come from, and winced as the light turned on. Rob and
