Breaking Through (Book 2 of the SEAL TEAM Heartbreakers) (41 page)

The call made, she crept back down the hall to look in. “The ambulance is coming.” She clung to the wad of Kleenex she’d found in her purse and wiped at the tears determined to stream down her cheeks. She forced herself to step back into the room and face what was happening to Evan. He was facing it, and so could she. Drawing a deep breath, she sidled around the bed and sat down.

“His right side is paralyzed. It’s affecting his speech,” Russell said, his voice hoarse. His features looked wooden with control.

Another wail of pain built inside her. She smothered it and reached for Evan’s left hand. She held it tight in her own. “You’ll need to get dressed. You’ll want to ride with him in the ambulance. I’ll follow you in the car.”

He nodded and rose. He set Evan’s hand along his side and when he bent to brush a kiss against his son’s forehead, Clara had to look away for fear of losing her composure. “I’ll be right back,” he murmured.

Evan turned his head and focused on her. “Afraid.”

“I’m right here, Evan. I love you.”

“For him.”

Dear God.
“I won’t leave him. He’ll be okay.”

Evan fingers squeezed her hand, and then relaxed, and his eyes closed.

CHAPTER 33

“They have run away, Yasin. The SEAL I shot has gone into hiding. The Captain has disappeared into the desert at one of their training camps. We are watching his whore wife and son. He will return and we will be ready.”

“Who is we, Tabarek?” Yasin bent forward in his chair and rested his forehead atop his desk. He had not slept in many hours. He paced the house, the yard, the street, eaten alive by guilt and worry. “You do not need to know, Yasin. You need to send the money.”

He had no more money. They had drained him. Nausea cramped his stomach and he dragged a trashcan close. “The SEALs did not kill my son, Tabarek. Someone took him.”

“How do you know this?” Tabarek’s tone grew sharp, intense.

“An American newspaper reporter has been investigating missing boys. There are at least thirty who are missing, possibly more. They have been taken off the street. The military believes they have been taken to a training camp by al-Qaeda.”

“If this is true, your son is to be revered, Yasin. He has become a warrior against the Americans.”

Sanjay would be considered a terrorist by the Americans and his own people. Would his captors convince him to become a martyr to their cause? Would he be forced to give his life as a suicide bomber? Tears ran down his cheeks.

“The Americans did not kill your son. But they killed my brother, my cousins. They must pay for that. We are watching Brett Weaver’s sister. Since her lover has gone, there have been many men at the house, driving her to the hospital where she works. I am sure her SEAL lover knows nothing about how she consorts with these men. She is a whore like all American women.”

Stop! Yasin smothered the urge to scream into the phone. He rubbed at the ache above his eyes. Since Levla’s confession, they had not been able to touch each other without crying. Losing their son had irrevocably changed their relationship.

“Have you discovered the names of the other men who killed my brother?”

He would no longer help this man. The lie came easy. “I have tried, Tabarek. But the base commander guards his men’s names well. Weaver and Armstrong are the only two the American investigators mentioned.”

“Who were these men? Will the Americans be able to identify you as the source?”

What if they could? By giving Tabarek the men’s names, he had become as much a terrorist as Tabarek. Allah would punish him for this. He was already being punished with this never-ending ache inside his chest. “I do not know. But I was not the only one they spoke to.”

“You must keep trying to discover the names. We will kill as many as we can. Our lives will not be lost in vain.”

Yasin flinched. A man who had made a conscious decision to give up his life was more dangerous than a rabid animal. “And what if this jihad is not Allah’s will, Tabarek?”

“It is. Do not doubt it.” He paused. “Send the money, or we will come for your daughter.”

Always the same threat. He lived in fear every moment he was away from the house. How could he free himself of this?

He could go to the base commander and tell him everything. But they would arrest him, leaving Levla and Amira unprotected. They were all he had left. He would not allow them to be hurt. But he had no more money.

He reached inside the bottom drawer of his desk and withdrew the gun he had purchased on the street. It was an American pistol. One like the military used, probably stolen from a dead soldier’s body. He had not asked when he had paid for it. He loaded the weapon and placed it carefully in the top drawer. He stared at the cell phone that lay in the center of his desk and scooping it up, rose to his feet. “No more.” He left his office and went downstairs into the kitchen.

Amira, his daughter looked up from the table where she read. “Are you well, Baba?”

“I am well, daughter.” He moved to a large cabinet in the corner and withdrew a hammer from one of the drawers. He sensed her movement behind him, but moved on through the back door to the concrete patio behind the house. He knelt on the ground, and placed the phone on the edge of the concrete slab. He swung the hammer with all the pain and anguish he held inside him. With every swing the hard knot eased a little more, and was replaced with resolve. He pounded every component of the phone into tiny pieces, then scooped them up in his hands. Leaving the hammer, he moved outside the courtyard wall through an iron gate and flung the pieces onto the hard-packed earth.

Amira stood waiting just inside the kitchen door. “Why did you do that, Baba? Will you not now need a new phone?”

“I have a new one already. I did not wish anyone to find and use the old one.”

She nodded. He paused to cup her face in his hands and look down into her dark eyes. Levla had been as lovely at this age and just a little older when they’d been promised to one another. But had she ever been so trusting, so loving as Amira? “You are my world, Amira. You and your mother are everything to me.”

A smile spread across her delicate features, her thin arms looped around his waist and she hugged him. ‘Sanjay will come home soon, won’t he, Baba?”

“He will come home soon,” he said. But it no longer mattered if his son came home. A man who had decided to give up his life for a cause was a dangerous being. He would wait for Tabarek’s men to come. And he would protect the family he had left. But they would not take his daughter.

***

Tess drew a deep breath, attempting to settle the uncontrolled, nervous flutters beneath her ribs. She had to calm down. At this point, if they called her into Senator Welch’s office, she doubted she would even be able to speak. She ran through the information Brett had gotten during his trip to the base the day before. Why had no one discovered it before?

She scanned the room for a distraction, and noticed the warm gold color of the walls, the foot-wide crown molding that decorated the ceiling, the expensive artwork that hung behind the secretary’s desk, and the heavy maroon area rug that covered the floors.

History had been made within the Russell Senate Office Building since 1909. And it was an impressive place, with its rotunda and highly polished marble floors.

She focused on the woman behind the large maple desk in the anteroom. She had introduced herself as Madeline Schaffer, the Senator’s secretary. She looked to be in her early forties. Her hairstyle was short and hugged her head like a cap. Her clothing, a skirt and blouse, appeared all business. Her movements confident and quick, she opened envelopes and sorted the correspondence into neat stacks. “How long have you been with the Senator?” Tess asked.

“Nearly ten years. I worked in his law office before he ran for the Senate.”

“It’s a shame about his stepson,” Tess said. She truly felt sympathy for any family who had made such a sacrifice.

“Yes, it is. Michael was mischievous and smart. Always laughing and pulling pranks. We were all stunned when he joined the Marines.”

Tess read grief in the woman’s face and said, “I’m sorry for your loss.”

The woman nodded. “Thank you.” When the phone buzzed, she reached for it. “The Senator will see you now.” She rose and came around her desk. Tess, on shaky legs, followed her back out into the main hall. The cream-colored walls glowed with care beneath the lights. The sound of their shoes on the marble echoed along the way. Tess curbed the urge to place each foot as lightly as possible.

Ms. Schafer paused outside the second door on the right and tapped lightly. At the sound of a male voice from within, she opened the door and stood back. “Good luck,” she murmured softly.

Tess’s face felt stiff as she smiled in response. She was trying to ambush the woman’s boss and she was wishing her luck. Her thoughts jumped to Brett waiting for her at their hotel. If Senator Welch was responsible for releasing his name to terrorists, directly or indirectly, the world deserved to know. If he wasn’t, no harm would be done.

Tess stepped past the woman into the office and the door closed behind her.

‘Hello, Miss Kelly.” Senator Welch strode toward her, his hand extended. His grip felt warm around her nerve-chilled hand.

Welch stood about six feet. When elected to the Senate for the first time, his hair had been prematurely gray. Since then, it had turned completely white, the color a striking contrast to the healthy tan of his skin. For a man of fifty he appeared in good physical shape. She’d read somewhere he played tennis and golf every chance he got.

“I would have known you were your father’s daughter just from looking at you. But you’re a darn sight prettier than he is.” He smiled.

Tess forced a smile to her face. “Thank you, Senator.”

“Please come in and have a seat.” He pointed to the dark leather couch against one wall. The room, decorated in gold and blue, had a decidedly masculine tone to it. Welch took a seat in a chair diagonal to her. “Would you like anything to drink?”

“No thank you, sir. So, you’ve met my father?”

“Yes, possibly four, maybe five years ago, during my re-election campaign. He’s a sharp man and doesn’t beat around the bush.”

“No, he doesn’t.”

“I read the story he’s covering in Iraq.” His features settled into solemn lines. “Darn shame about the missing boys over there. I hope they’re able to find them, or at least give their families closure.”

“I hope so too, Senator.”

He scooted back in his chair and crossed his legs. “What sort of story are you doing that you wanted to interview me, Ms. Kelly?”

“I have a large readership of military families in my area, Senator. And I know that you and some of the other senators have been working on a package to help those families whose husbands and fathers will be discharged once they’re home. My thoughts are to write a piece that might assuage some of their concerns.

“I think we can do that to a certain degree, but not completely. The problem is a complex issue and may take years to address satisfactorily.”

She drew a deep breath. “Understood. Might I use my recorder, or would you prefer I use pen and paper, sir? I prefer using both, so there’s no question of my misquoting you.”

“Both will be fine.”

She eased into the interview, asking some background information. She asked how he felt about being on so many committees and how he had time to do so. Welch projected the charm and wit of a practiced politician.

Tess looked down at the notes she’d taken and the questions she’d written down.

“There are one hundred thousand military personnel in San Diego alone. What kind of financial package are you working on for those who are discharged?”

“We’ve spent billions paying military salaries. Once they are discharged, some of that money can be redirected to create civilian jobs and training programs for those coming out. ”

“And what about those who have been injured during their service? Do you have programs in mind for them?”

“We’ve spent millions caring for them. Some of that burden may have to be shared with the individual states they settle in. We’ve been at war for twenty years, and our debt is astronomical. We have serious economic issues. It’s time to find a way to solve them. Everyone is going to have to make sacrifices.”

“What kind of incentives are you going to offer the individual states to make it worth their while to take on this extra burden, sir? 

“That will all be part of the financial package we’re working on.”

She waited for him to finish, and when he continued to look at her, she moved on. “Don’t we have to make sure the country is secure before any of this can take place?”

“Certainly. But there are other methods we can use more thoroughly to ensure that what happened on 9/11 never happens again.”

“Are you talking about covert technologies?”

“Yes, as well as more strenuous use of diplomatic channels. We can use harsher economic sanctions against those countries that harbor terrorists.”

“President Clinton tried that in Iraq to control Saddam Hussein. The SEALs had to go in and board vessels to confiscate the oil cargo ships were smuggling for the sanctions to have any affect. If you cut funding for the SEALs and other special operations, who do you plan to have take on those types of missions?”

“It has always been my belief that we need to revisit our policy on foreign aid. If we cut aid and combine that with sanctions, it will put pressure on countries to turn over terrorists in exchange for payments. Eventually they’ll police themselves.”

“Are you talking about Afghanistan?”

“Among others.”

It was like wading through sludge trying to pin him down. When she asked another couple of questions and got similar answers, she nearly sighed aloud in frustration. She changed tactics and moved on to the harder questions.

“There has been speculation that you, Senator Skidmore, and Senator Drummond, have a history of voting for cuts specifically directed at the Naval Special Warfare Group. Is there some reason for that?”