Sound of Silence(36)

Mohammad Asil Marik-Sayb Karza, second son of former Islamic State leader Mohammad Ahmad Marik-Shah Karza, killed by U.S. Forces in 2009. Asil Marik-Sayb assumed lead of a hidden transient section of Afghan rebels. Their main task is infiltration into Special Forces operations, gaining military intelligence and weaponry for use in Islamic State factions. The group's last known location is northern Afghanistan, in the Bamyan province. 



Bamyan. The location of the ambush. My team's location when Bear called.

Dax taps on his keyboard. "The interesting thing here, Cade, is that Asil Marik is a ghost. I dug deep and still nothing. He was well hidden in the cyber world and so was this." He taps again. A window opens another site. The eagle and stars logo in the corner stamps it as military special ops. He buzzes past firewalls and passwords faster than I can take a breath.

"How are you doing this?"

He shakes his head. "I'm not, and it's better if we don't know how security was breached. A friend of a friend is a super hacker. He can get in anywhere. When my genius level detective work didn't bring up anything, not even a sheep farmer in the goddamn Afghan mountains, I got in touch with Astra."

"Are you going to jail for this?" I groan. "Cara's going to fucking kill me. Dead, Dax. She will not mess around if your ass is behind bars."

"Calm down. We're untraceable. This feed is coming in as if we're watching Netflix. We're streaming Astra's path in to the mainframe, and the connection is scrambled. Nothing pinpoints back to Lilyfalls or me. Astra is good-the best. He's been at this game for over twenty years, and no one has a clue who or where he is. He could be a she for all we know."

He smacks his hand down. "There. Do you see?"

Narrowing my gaze, I drill down to a black dot designating one spot in the Middle East. The pixels recalculate and what was a satellite view of the Earth zooms in to a mountain-scape and closer to reveal two men covered by headgear and cloaks. Their hands clasp, dark skin against light.

"Asil Marik," Dax says, pointing to the Afghan man, but it's his partner that I can't stop staring at. There's something familiar about his stance. He's tall, towering inches above the mercenary, about my height, about my dad's height. Fuck. Is it possible? The tightening in my chest says it may be. But other than the straight line of his nose, his features are hidden and eyes darkened by garb.

"So why the mountain of red tape?" I ask, continuing to scrutinize the details.

"Look in the background, past the men."

Crates. One cracked open exposes top-of-the-line military-grade AW50 rifles. The kind we use in the field, the best weapon in the world for our snipers. And if this picture reflects what I think it does, then they're in the hands of the Islamic State, too.

"Who is Marik meeting with?"

"Unknown. His scarf covers most of his face, but Astra's placing what details we do have through facial-recognition software. It's a slow process because we have little to go on. We're working through possibilities."

Hair bristles on my neck. "What else do you have?"

"Nothing. The minute Astra got this far the rest of the file disappeared. The video feed ends because the file was deleted, or hidden under more firewalls we can't breach. Not yet anyway."

"Print a still shot of that scene for me, will you?"

Dax nods and turns to face me on a deep breath. "I'm not into conspiracy theories or spy games, Cade, but something feels off here. The Islamic State has our best technology. That can't be good. It took me months to get this morsel of information, and I'll keep trying. Astra is intrigued and will hunt around, but if you want more you'll need an insider. Do you know someone in D.C., have any high-reaching connections that could get deeper into Asil Marik and the weapons trade in Afghanistan?"

I close my eyes and pinch the bridge of my nose. Spending months in Washington's newest military rehabilitation center wasn't at the top of my list of fun things to do, but I had good company. And one person became a close friend.



       
         
       
        

"Yeah, I do."

"Who's that?" he asks, twisting to print the picture and then tap his way out of the evidence.

I rub my hand up and down my face, tugging my cell phone from my back pocket at the same time. "Charlie Carter McKenna."

His head whips around, eyes wide. "The First fucking Lady of the United States?"

I chuckle. "Yes, and she owes me a favor I'm about to collect."





"DON'T PEEK, SUNSHINE."