The Protector (36 page)

“Keep calm,”
Farshad
urged. “If he asks, we are car salesmen.”

As the deputy waved them through, they held their breaths against his careful scrutiny. In spite of his suspicious gaze, he let them pass. Shahbaz wiped his brow with a stained sleeve.
   

Farshad
caught sight of a warehouse abutting the railroad tracks. “Park over there,” he instructed. The brick structure stood deserted on this Saturday afternoon, its cargo doors firmly shut. As they eased between the empty loading docks, he powered down his laptop and pulled out his copy of the
Qu’ran
tucked inside his briefcase.

“What do we do now?” Shahbaz asked, turning off the engine.
   

“We reflect and we pray,” said
Farshad
flipping through the worn pages to find the passage he had memorized. Having performed this brainwashing ritual numerous times with the newest generation of Taliban recruits, he did not necessarily need to read it.
  

“Hear the words of Allah:
Whosoever shall oppose Allah and His Prophet shall be severely punished. Therefore cut off their heads, and strike off all the ends of the fingers. This shall they suffer because they have opposed Allah and His Prophet.
”
 

“We shall punish them!” Shahbaz agreed, thumping the steering wheel with the palm of his hand.

Farshad
reached inside his briefcase and retrieved the pistol he had stolen from Mustafa Masoud’s bedside. Through their email exchanges, he had learned that, in addition to violent video games, Shahbaz was a paintball aficionado. As such, he was capable of firing a weapon with moderate competence.

Not too well, though.
Farshad
didn’t want him killing the target—though he would not tell Shahbaz that. He needed the boy to be his scapegoat. Once the FBI believed they had stopped the man hunting her, the security around Miss McClellan would ease, giving
Farshad
more of an opportunity to capture her.
 

“For me?”
The boy’s eyes widened.
 

“The time has come to glorify Allah and to take back the Cradle of Islam,”
Farshad
intoned.
 

Shahbaz turned the gun over in his grease-stained hands and said nothing.

Farshad
flipped the pages and read again, “
Allah has purchased of the believers their persons and their goods; for theirs is the garden of Paradise: they fight in his cause, and slay and
be
slain.
You must be willing to give your life, Shahbaz.”

The youth’s expression darkened.
 
He did not look up.
  

“When you shoot the target, you will be killed instantly by those protecting her,”
Farshad
admitted. “You will not suffer,” he promised. “You will ensure your salvation as a martyr for Allah. Trust me, if you were taken alive, you would be tortured and questioned by the FBI. You would be forced to betray your brothers in faith.”
Namely me,
he added silently. “You would be cast into eternal damnation!”

“But I would never betray them,” Shahbaz insisted.
 

Farshad
made no comment. “Do you believe in the holy scripture?” he inquired.

“Yes, yes.”

“You would not wish for Allah to punish you, would you, Shahbaz? You would not wish to die the way
Itzak
died.”

The boy’s frown froze into a look of fear. “It was you who killed
Itzak
,” he realized, his eyes rising to regard
Farshad
in horror.
  

“He deserved it,”
Farshad
answered simply.

Thoughts flickered in Shahbaz’s eyes.

“Think of what you have to gain,”
Farshad
continued. “You will be greeted in Paradise by seventy-two virgins. You will never have to suffer humiliation, pain or poverty again.”

Memories flickered in the boy’s eyes: memories of a tortured life, of disillusionment and discrimination. At last, his eyelids fluttering, he met Farshad’s gaze. “Tell me what to do,” he said with youthful determination, “and I will do it.”

**

Caine’s
cell phone rang, jolting
Eryn’s
heart. She held her breath as he answered, dreading the news that Ike had been apprehended by the HRT unit. But as his face fell with disappointment, her anxiety subsided. Ike had eluded the law, yet again.

Knowing he was safe gave her the courage to speak up. “I want to make a statement to the press,” she said the minute
Caine
put his phone away.

An awkward silence filled the narrow room. Between the high windows and the poor ventilation, she’d begun to feel like she was sitting in a prison cell, only she hadn’t been granted a phone call yet.

“No.” It was Jackson who answered from his seat on the other side of the table.
“Absolutely not.”

“It’s not a good idea,” seconded
Ringo
.

“Wait a minute.”
Caine
waved them into silence. A crafty look usurped his frown of disapproval. “Let’s hear what Miss McClellan wants to say to the press.”
  

She sat up straighter, lifted her chin in the air. “I want to clear Ike’s name.” Her gritty eyes burned from lack of sleep. Her head throbbed, but she refused to accept their offer of a motel bed as long as the man she loved was being maligned.

“Sir.”
Jackson all but growled the word. “Can I have a word with you in the hall?”

“I don’t need your input, Rookie,”
Caine
shot back.

“What about my input?” said the second agent on a strained
note.
“Sir, this story’s been in the news all day. That’s plenty of time for the terrorists to have seen her on TV.”
 

Caine
sent
Ringo
a reprimanding look. “Now, don’t say that. You’ll scare her.” His gaze swung back toward
Eryn
. “At this given moment, we have over forty HRT soldiers patrolling the town. You’re completely safe, Miss McClellan.”
 

Neither Jackson nor
Ringo
seemed to agree, but
Eryn
wasn’t as concerned about terrorists right now as she was about Ike’s reputation. He was already burdened by guilt for what had happened in Afghanistan. He didn’t deserve to have the media calling him a kidnapper.
 

“I just need to make a statement,” she insisted.

“We can arrange that,”
Caine
said, sounding as if he relished the limelight. Turning to
Ringo
, he instructed him to advise the press of her decision. As the man took reluctant leave,
Caine
looked back across the table at
Eryn
. “So, where do you think Ike, as you call him, is at this moment?”

“I have no idea,” she answered with a heavy heart. He’d been planning to hand her off, anyway. Maybe he hadn’t followed her as she’d first supposed. What made her think he’d want to stick around to watch events unfold, anyway?

**

The cellular tower on Highway 33 was by far the tallest structure within Elkton’s city limits. Buffeted by a breeze that blew an evening thunderstorm closer, Ike climbed the tower’s inner ladder to its pinnacle, two hundred feet off the ground. Throwing one leg over a rung, he grubbed in his pack for his field glasses.

He’d avoided all roadways by four-wheeling through pastureland. Nor did he wish to test his luck by trying to sneak past a glut of reporters in broad daylight. With his face all over the news, he’d be recognized eventually. For now, this was the closest he dared to get.

Peering through his field glasses, he quickly located the RV owned by the Feds, made glaringly apparent by its size and shiny appearance. Parked alongside it, in front of the Sheriff’s Office, was the green Taurus he’d followed earlier.
 

The activity teeming around Town Hall made his gut coil. North Stuart Avenue was jammed with vehicles all parked fender to fender in a town that hadn’t seen this much activity since Stonewall Jackson headquartered here during the Civil War.

Blue lights flashed at every street corner as police directed traffic. Spectators and media personnel thronged the nearby shops and restaurants, all awaiting a follow-up report on
Eryn
McClellan’s so-called abduction and recovery.

The crowd infuriated Ike. Her story had been on the news all day. The odds were extremely high that, amidst all those reporters and thrill-seekers, there were gun-toting or bomb-carrying terrorists just waiting for
Eryn
to make an appearance.

God damn it!

The wind gusted suddenly, and he shot out a hand to keep his seat. This was exactly the kind of situation Stanley would have wanted to avoid.

The buzz of an incoming helicopter had Ike peering through his field glasses over the treetops.
 

The MH-6 Little Bird that had chased them earlier that day slowed over a field outside of town and nestled onto it. An armored vehicle drew up alongside it to collect the crew as they leapt off the exterior benches. Then the vehicle took off with the added personnel, lumbering down 340 toward Elkton,
blaring
its horn to clear traffic.

At first Ike was relieved to note the heightened security. But then he considered that it was probably in response to a corresponding increase in threat-level. He counted a total of twenty four soldiers as they jumped out of the vehicle. Half went to work clearing a perimeter around Town Hall. The other half disappeared into nearby buildings, popping out on rooftops, where they positioned themselves over the crowd.

Such precautions could only mean one thing:
Eryn
was due to make an appearance, possibly even speak to the press. Christ, could he trust any of those soldiers to pick out a terrorist in a crowd? He needed to get the
hell
over there before the worst possible scenario took place.

**

Shahbaz tugged down the brim of his baseball cap, concealing his dark eyes. The Teacher had sent him into a drugstore with a wad of cash to transform his appearance. He had bought a baseball cap, a T-shirt, shorts, and a sweat shirt with a large pocket in front, in which he stowed the gun. Figuring he looked like any other American youth, he had returned to the car, only to be banished to the drugstore once again for shaving cream and a razor. In the employee restroom, he had shaved the five o’clock shadow that darkened his already swarthy complexion. The Teacher had taken one more look at him and nodded his approval.

Now, blending seamlessly into the crowd, Shahbaz eyed the ominous clouds that billowed closer, turning the sky a charcoal gray. The rumor that Miss McClellan intended to make a statement rippled from the front of the crowd to the back. The impending storm reflected Shahbaz’s agitation. All his life he had idolized martyrs for their courage and sacrifice. He had imagined what it must be like to go out in a blaze of glory while making such a clear statement of protest.

Death wasn’t such a terrible thing, provided it came swiftly. It was life that was hard, a grueling struggle for income, a hopeless battle against prejudice. Death had to be easier, especially if the scriptures could be believed, and all those virgins would be there, fulfilling his every desire.
  

The crowd pushed closer to the building, shrinking the clearing that the soldiers fought to maintain. Shahbaz joined them, jostling for a better view.