A moment of stunned silence from Jenny on the other end. When she finally spoke, she sounded more like herself. “That means a lot to me, Dad.”
“We’ll talk more about soccer when I get home. Sound good?”
“Yeah. Thanks.”
He felt something opening in his chest when Ritchie walked in and pointed at the glowing LED numbers on the clock. Dark eyes burning. Jaw clenched.
It was 12:14. Time to hump.
“I gotta go, sweetheart. I love you. Be your best.”
“Get home safe, Dad. We miss you.”
He bit his bottom lip and hung up. Looked at Ritchie standing there like Johnny Blaze from Ghost Rider. Black 5-11 pants. Black shirt with cargo pockets. Black belt. Half expected flames to start shooting out of his head.
“You get the things we talked about? We set to launch?”
“It’s all teed up for you, Tiger.”
“Tiger? Where the hell did that come from? You know I don’t play golf.”
Crocker checked his Suunto GPS watch, which featured separate fields that measured altitude and barometric pressure. It also had a 3-D compass, a bottom timer for diving, and a route planner.
Ritchie led the way to the service stairs, Cherokee cheekbones reflecting the fluorescent light. Black military boots echoing off the cinder block walls, then outside.
No one could mistake them for tourists now.
Beyond his shoulder a low hiss rose from the city, which threw off an eerie orange glow.
Crocker could practically smell the adrenaline pouring out of them as they crowded into the black Suburban. Davis, Ritchie, Mancini, Akil in a cloud of musk, always anticipating a chance to bump into an attractive female, even on an op.
Bull-necked Mancini, already starting to sweat, rechecked that every man was fully equipped—.45 Glocks in carbon holsters fitted with attached pistol lights and loaded with hollow-points, three mags, AK-47s with collapsible stocks with twenty-eight 7.62 x 39 rounds in each of the eight mags, knives, emergency medical gear, comms with earphones and throat mikes, GPS units, nylon black belts with heavy-duty belt rigs for rappelling.
He’d cleaned and inspected everything himself. Probably half a dozen times. No wonder he drove his wife crazy.
Crocker went over the plan again as Ritchie started the engine. “Target: Abu Rasul Zaman, aka AZ, forty-nine. Expect him to be accompanied by Islamic guards from Yemen. These guys will be ferocious. There’s a high probability that we’ll run into women and children, too. If the women aren’t armed, we don’t shoot. If they engage in aggressive action, do what you’ve gotta do. Our orders are to take AZ alive.”
Akil, as they pulled out of the parking lot: “I know his background. The guy’s a sadist, boss.”
“The Agency wants him alive, if possible.” They were on assignment to the CIA, which they had been doing often, especially since 9/11.
“Fuck the Agency.”
“Orders, Akil. No stepping out of line.”
“All right.”
Tires squealing, Crocker asked Ritchie, “You know where we’re going?”
“Is the pope Catholic?”
Davis shook his blond surfer hair and laughed. Ritchie amused him. Davis, like Ritchie, seemed like the most easygoing guy in the world, until he got into a fight.
Crocker handed out maps and the latest surveillance photos. He said: “AZ Central is a three-story concrete structure. First floor houses some kind of store. We think the second floor is being used for meeting rooms, offices. AZ and his men live on three.”
“Any intel on the interior?” Mancini asked.
“I’m expecting an interior stairway.”
“Maybe an elevator?”
“Three floors. Cheaply constructed. No visible motor on the roof.”
Mancini: “The motor might be housed in the basement.”
“The building doesn’t have a basement,” Akil countered.
Crocker continued. “Keep an eye out for booby traps. We might have to breach through security doors between floors.”
Each man had a specialty. Mancini handled equipment and weapons; Davis ran the comms; Akil, maps and logistics; Crocker had been trained as a corpsman (the navy’s version of a medic); Ritchie was the explosives expert and breacher. They were all the best in the world at what they did.
Ritchie asked, “Who’s driving the van with the explosives?”
Akil raised his hand. “I got that.”
Ritchie continued: “All right. Then drive her right up on the curb. I’ll set it off. Give you sixty seconds to seek cover.”
Akil frowned. “Don’t you think they’re gonna hear us? I mean, we’re pulling up right under their noses.”
“No, but—”
Crocker cut Ritchie off. “Akil’s right. Let’s do this one the old-fashioned way.” He pointed to the map. “Come up this perpendicular street. Tie a brick to the pedal. Keep that sucker in gear. You jump out here. What’s that, approximately?”