The house looks like a collector’s wet dream. Glittering lights, red tile floors, and plush rugs everywhere. The walls are painted gold, for fuck’s sake.
Two women dressed in black burkas with full face coverings dart past me, their heads bowed. Shit. I should have left my gun at the door.
Or not. A pair of guys stand sentry at the end of the hall, Kalashnikovs held at the ready. Behind them, a plain room holds half a dozen computer monitors, a simple desk, and averyuncomfortable looking stool.
Right. Not going in there. Turn after turn, I commit the layout to memory. This place is a goddamn maze with men everywhere.
Until I find stairs down to a lower level. The hallways here are quiet. Pristine. White tile floors without a spec of dirt.
Muffled voices come from a room at the end of the hall. I edge closer as my watch buzzes. Shit. I’ve already pissed away ten minutes.
“He will never stop,” a woman with a French accent says. “Every good thing about Mateen…Faruk will destroy it.”
I pull a small mirror from my pocket and angle it around the door. The kid lies on a narrow bed with an IV hooked up to his arm while Joey takes his blood pressure.
The other woman sits in a chair, fiddling with the sleeves of her abaya.
“Mama? Is Papa mad at me?”
“No, my sweet boy. Papa wants you to get better. Lie back now and let Dr. Joey work.”
Another buzz from my watch, and I shove the mirror into my pocket and hightail it out of there.
“I found her,” I whisper once I’m back outside. “The kid’s hooked up to an IV. I couldn’t stick around. Give me twenty minutes to map the rest of the place, then I’ll meet you back at the barn. We’ll infiltrate tonight.”
* * *
The moon risesalong the horizon as Ford—his hands bound and a hood over his head—stumbles. Trevor doesn’t bother to catch him. All part of the act.
I jerk him up and drag him toward the gate.
“Thanks, asshole,” my oldest friend mutters.
The guard raises his rifle when we approach. “Stop. What is your business here?”
I answer in Pashto. “This man is responsible for the explosion last night in Kabul. At the auction. Amir Abdul Faruk will pay for him, yes?”
The guard pulls a phone from his belt, dials, and cups his hand around the speaker. Quiet words pass between him and someone on the other end of the call for a full minute.
Two other guards join the first. “Hand him over,” one demands.
“No. Not until you pay.” I gesture to Trevor, and the CIA assassin pulls a blade from his belt and holds it to Ford’s throat. “Ten thousand American dollars or we cut off his head.”
All three guards draw down on us, shouting, threatening, ready to drop us in a heartbeat. Shit.
“Abdul Mahmud sent me here!”
The guards fall silent at my declaration, and the first one is back on his phone in seconds. It doesn’t take long.
“You go in,” phone guy says. “Wait by the fountain for payment.”
As we pass the guards, one of them slams the butt of his rifle into Ford’s skull. He collapses with a groan, and they grab his arms and drag him away.
Trev and I exchange a glance. This wasnotthe plan.
At the fountain, we stand with our backs to one another, surveying our darkened surroundings.
“Two hostiles at each guard tower,” Trevor whispers.
