and did it ourselves-Brenner and Zamo shared a set of shackles, as did Buck and I. Kate, being a woman, had her own set of shackles. We kept the keys. Last thing, we pulled off our shoes and socks, and the Bedouin put them under the straw.
Buck reminded us, “Scuff the soles of your feet on the floor.”
Right. Never underestimate the intelligence or the perceptive powers of the enemy. They’re not as dumb as they look. In fact, these guys probably knew what prisoners were supposed to look like.
This could be a setup, of course, and we could be real prisoners in about five minutes, or real dead. But Musa and his Bedouin had other opportunities to double-cross us. And bottom line, our hands were free and our guns were ready to be drawn.
Someone called out in Arabic from the stairwell and our buddy, Yasir, called back.
I asked Kate, “You okay?”
“I’m fine.”
Buck reminded her, “Keep your head and eyes down.”
A few seconds later, the five hooded Al Qaeda guys with three Bedouin guiding them came up the stone stairs and into the tower room.
The Bedouin placed the five Al Qaeda guys in a line, shoulder to shoulder, about five feet in front of us, then one by one they pulled off the black hoods. And we were face-to-face with the enemy.
CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE
The Al Qaeda delegation looked like a firing squad, lined up with their rifles slung on their shoulders.
Also, five men were more than they needed to ID the Americans, so this was a power play or a show of force, and the Bedouin shouldn’t have allowed it. But they did, so I expected the Al Qaeda guys to throw their weight around.
Four Bedouin remained in the diwan, including Yasir, who seemed to be hosting this occasion.
The Amriki were supposed to look frightened, nervous, tired, and dejected, which meant mostly just looking down and keeping our mouths shut, unless spoken to. On the other hand, Al Qaeda knew we were not tourists, so we could show a little defiance now and then.
I looked at the five Al Qaeda fighters standing in front of us. They were on the young side-maybe early to mid-twenties, though their faces appeared weather-beaten and old beyond their years. They were beardless, but not exactly clean-shaven, and they looked pretty grim, though they should have been enjoying this.
The guy on the far right, however, was smiling and looking at me, which seemed strange. And then I recognized him.
Nabeel al-Samad said to me, “Hello. You remember me?”
My teammates all turned their heads toward me, and the four Bedouin, who spoke no English, seemed confused that the Al Qaeda guy was smiling and speaking to the American captive. Hey, we had bagels together.
I was supposed to just nod, but I said, so my teammates understood who this guy was, “Nabeel and I had a breakfast meeting in New York.” I added, “He had some important information for me.”
Nabeel thought that was funny and he translated for his compatriots, who also thought that was funny.
What wasn’t so funny was Nabeel saying to me, “Jewish deli for me not funny. You not funny. You not go home ever.”
Nabeel needed help with his verbs, but I got that I was supposed to appreciate the moment and the message, which in better English was, “So, Detective Corey, we meet again, and this time the situation is reversed, is it not, Detective Corey?” Hee-hee-hee. Fuck you.
Anyway, I played the game and looked down at the floor.
Bottom line here, soon after the State Department applied for my and Kate’s visas, that information had gotten to Al Qaeda in Yemen. Happens all the time and it’s not usually a problem for American tourists, businesspeople, or diplomats heading to Sana’a-unless their names happen to be on the Al Qaeda kill list.
Anyway, the fun part was over and it was time for business.
Nabeel said something to Yasir, who handed Nabeel our five non-diplomatic passports.
Nabeel had sheets of paper in his hand, which I was certain were the photostats of these passports gotten from the Bilqis Hotel. Nabeel passed the five passports and photostats around to his four buddies, who studied the passport photos and looked at us.
Nabeel, who had seemed to me like a pleasant putz in New York, had another side to him, and he said to the Amriki sharply, “Look up! Look to me!”
We all looked at Nabeel as the other A.Q. assholes glanced between us, the photostats, and the passports.
Nabeel, of course, made a positive ID on Detective John Corey, and the other Al Qaeda geniuses seemed to agree that Buck, Brenner, and Zamo were the Amriki in the passport pictures. The problem was Kate, wrapped in her scarf, and Nabeel said to her, “Take off hijab.”
So Kate pulled her scarf away from her face, and the five Al Qaeda assholes stared at her a long time. I mean, how many women’s faces had they seen in their lives?
They all seemed to agree that Kate’s photo matched her face, and Yasir collected the passports.
Nabeel said to Kate, “Put on hijab!”
Nabeel then produced two more sheets of paper, which he showed to Yasir. Yasir nodded, then said something to Buck in Arabic. Buck replied in Arabic, and said to us, “They also have copies of John and Kate’s diplomatic passports-probably from the Yemeni consulate in New York. And they want to know where-”
“Shut up!” shouted Nabeel. Then to all of us he asked, “Where diplomatic passports?”
Buck replied in English, “At the embassy.”
“You lie.”
But Yasir jumped in and said something, maybe assuring Nabeel that the Bedouin had searched us and not found any diplomatic passports in the possession of the Americans.
So Yasir, Nabeel, and the other four Al Qaeda assholes got into an argument, and Buck, sotto voce, was translating snippets, saying, “They want to search us… and search the bedding… and search the diwan.”
Right. These things never go the way you want or expect. I asked Buck, “Who the hell is in charge here?”
Buck said to us, “Yasir seems to be losing control.”
Great.
Nabeel interrupted his argument long enough to tell me and Buck to shut up.
But Buck, understanding these people, said something to Yasir in Arabic, and his voice was firm. I heard the word “Musa.”
Yasir seemed to find his balls and backbone, and he shouted at Nabeel and at the other Al Qaeda shitheads, who shut up.
I mean, what’s the pecking order here? You tell ’em, Yasir. Meanwhile, I glanced at my compatriots, and I could see they were a bit uneasy. While Nabeel and Yasir were talking, I said in a low voice to Brenner, Zamo, and Kate, “If I say pull, on the count of three, you know what to do.”
They nodded.
As Kate likes to point out, I sometimes change the plan. But only when Plan A is not going well. I mean, bottom line here, The Panther’s prize was right in front of his jihadists, and I wouldn’t put it past them to get the drop on the Bedouin and re-kidnap us. Or just blow us away.
So if we had to, we would draw on these five bastards and waste them all before they even got their AK-47s unslung. And that would be the end of the negotiations and the end of Operation Clean Sweep, and unfortunately the end of any chance we had of vaporizing The Panther with a Hellfire. But sometimes you gotta think of yourself first, and you have to take what you can get-like five jihadists who were getting a little too aggressive.
Nabeel and Yasir seemed to have settled down a bit, and they were still jabbering away.
Meanwhile, I noticed that the other four Al Qaeda guys were eyeballing us as if trying to determine if we
