No Remorse (39 page)

Mac inhaled sharply, despite himself. He coughed up blood.

“Oh yes, Mac, your colleague Rosco told us many things before he died. Tally too. We just need some confirmation from you in case they lied.”

Rosco dead? And Tally? And Mai? “I don’t believe you. Mai is alive.”

“You mean the Mai Fanning who was in Surrey Hospital? I’m afraid that she bled to death from her wounds, with a little help from another of our contractors. After your little spoiler in Dubai, Ziad here decided to have a second man on standby. So now little George is an orphan. Perhaps I could sponsor him? Then when he’s old enough and we find the right recipient, we could harvest his organs? With Mai gone, my fortress is finally secure. Or it will be, when you tell me how you got inside, and how you were able to access the vault and kill our bomb-maker. Poor old Mahomet. He was too old to be still working, but he was supporting a son at Karachi university.”

Looking up and down the length of his body, Khalid lifted the surgical gown covering Mac and held the blade of the khanjar to the underside of his testicles. He jabbed the point of the weapon around his anus. “You shall answer my questions and refer to me as ‘Highness’. Or I shall shove this blade up your rectum.”

Mac closed his eyes and prepared himself, tensing all his muscles and gritting his teeth.

“Mmm. You are a man prepared for pain. Perhaps you enjoy it, neh?” Khalid dropped the gown and put the khanjar back in its scabbard. “I think we will wait until they have brought the woman. Dr. Gammal will be finished with her soon. I suspect you will not be so keen to allow Tally to feel pain. Your colleague Rosco became quite talkative to get Ziad to stop hurting her. Even though he too was hurting quite badly by that stage.”

Tally? Alive?
One of the first things they taught at Delta’s counter-interrogation training was to delay and distract. “You’re disgusting. Evil. How can you kill young kids for their organs?”

Khalid hesitated, as though considering whether to answer. “Because there is a strong and growing market demand. And it gains me influence in powerful circles. Why should wealthy people have to accept an unhealthy organ from a dead person, when they can have a living, growing organ from a healthy young teenager? As a Delta operator, you would know that emotion only causes weakness. I lost any feelings of remorse when a Saudi court ordered my friend Muna to be stoned to death.” He turned to the guard positioned outside the door. “Has the boat arrived with the woman yet?”

“No, Highness.”

Khalid turned back to Mac. “Tally is quite pretty isn’t she? Or was. Quite unwilling at first, Ziad tells me. Not really my type, though. I prefer goods that are undamaged. Well, I’m sure that soon you’ll be more than willing to answer my questions about how you got into this place and who else knows. And what Derek Wisebaum is scheming this time. That devious fox. He and I go way back, you know. He almost killed me once, during a waterboarding session in Qatar.”

Mac tried not to react. Rosco had obviously told them a lot. But it was the way Khalid had spoken about Tally that made him cold inside. “It’s over,” he said, trying to sound more confident than he felt.

“Actually, it’s only just begun, Mac. You probably haven’t seen the news. I have exploded the first bomb in Saudi. There is no shortage of bomb-makers in Pakistan. Another will be arriving shortly.”

“We know about Saudi Arabia. About your plans to bring down the regime. We won’t let it happen.”

“You think? You know, Americans have an interesting position on democracy. It’s apparently a fundamental right, except for countries that supply oil. The Saudi regime will eventually go the same way as the rest. But I want to see it happen in my lifetime. Now I possess the catalyst that will achieve it. Very soon. Americans will actually support me and our Hunnafite government. They will have no choice, as they had none with Mubarak and Gaddafi and the others.”

“But you offered to sell us that radioactive material. Ziad called me. My government is willing to negotiate.”

Khalid glanced at his watch. “Perhaps I may have. But that was before I discovered what was in the two containers from Saddam Hussein that my father left me. What is another five hundred million dollars now? That was just a delaying tactic so the Israelis would allow us to reach here safely. But after they attacked us, we realized your Rosco had been telling the truth. Which brings me to the other girl, your friend’s daughter, Sophia. Unfortunately, she is not negotiable. Her liver is needed. It will give Sheik Zodhami perhaps another ten or twenty years, maybe more. Unless one of your drones gets him first.”

He turned to Ibrahim and they shared a laugh.

Another man appeared and whispered to Ibrahim.

“Highness, Sheik Zodhami is arriving in the launch,” Ibrahim said.

“Ah. I must go and greet our distinguished guest, the next leader of Al Qaeda. Later this afternoon, I will introduce you to the conversion ritual. You’ll have a ringside seat to watch your friend Tally take conversion.”

Ibrahim gave him a cold smile as he followed Khalid out the door.

Alone in his cell, Mac concentrated on listening. Despite the pain in his head from when Masoud had broken his nose, his thinking was clearer now. That was good, because his timing would need to be perfect. He clung to the hope he’d be able to free the others before the interrogation began, before this conversion ritual Khalid had spoken of. Hopefully, they would bring Tally to one of the cells. But where were Sophia and Danni?

About twenty minutes after Khalid left, there was a whirring, then a metallic
thunk
, like a heavy electronic lock turning. Soon after, a guard’s head flashed by the observation panel in the door. Tally’s face appeared as the guards escorted her shuffling form past. She glanced in his cell and they locked eyes for just a moment. Mac's heart lifted at the sight of her. She was alive, almost within reach. Her face was hard to read because of the mass of bruises and the cut lip, but he hoped she had gained strength from seeing him.

More sounds of a door nearby being unbolted. Voices. A female voice. Loud protests. Laughter. The guards had not passed back again. They were still in the cell with Tally. Mac started to become anxious.

Muffled yelling. What were they doing to her?

He couldn’t risk waiting any longer. He felt the angry heat in his face as he turned over and kneeled on the bed. Pushing the stainless steel ring, he forced the mounting rod inwards against its spring-loaded locking mechanism and turned it until it was horizontal. There was a soft
click
. Keeping the pressure on, he turned the ring back the other way one eighty degrees until it was horizontal again. Eased off the pressure. The mounting rod began to slip out of the wall. He turned the ring vertical and it slipped all the way out. Squeezing under the bunk, he pushed back against the flap. The panel swung on an upper hinge, allowing him through. He clicked the panel back in place and stood up.

Free!

Sort of.

This was Bill’s contingency plan. Mai had said that Bill was worried that Khalid would lock him in one of these cells. Every cell had an escape panel and Bill had cleverly disguised their functionality, even from other workers, during the assembly of the building.

Mac squeezed along the narrow cavity between the building and the cave wall, feeling his way in the darkness. There was steady dripping above him, and a smell like ozone. He tried to stop his handcuffs clinking against the steel mounting rod and ring.

According to Mai, Bill had left some other useful items behind. Somewhere.

Mac’s eyes quickly adjusted to the tiny amount of ambient light as he squeezed along to the next cell and put his ear to the wall. More laughing. Tally’s muffled protests. The guards were still there. Apparently enjoying themselves.

At waist height, he located the wire that had a small round ball on the end, like a fishing sinker. Slowly he pulled.
Click.
The panel in Tally’s cell was unlocked.

He lay down. Keeping the handcuffs tight to stop them clinking, he swung back the flap and peered into the cell. One pair of feet. Slowly, quietly, he slid into the dark space under the bunk.

Tally was yelling in Arabic, “Stop! Have you no shame? I will tell Khalid what you are doing!”

One of the guards laughed. “Keep going, brother. Ziad said it does not matter anymore. This one is for everyone’s pleasure.”

Mac rolled out and brought the metal ring up with both hands, ramming the foot-long mounting rod into the standing man’s crotch. The guard squealed and bent at the knees. Mac leapt to his feet and shoved him against the wall, then thrust the rod up into his face. The mounting rod embedded itself in the guard’s right eye socket and he stopped moving.

“Mac! Look out!” Tally screamed. She was trying to prevent the other guard moving off the bunk. He was greatly disadvantaged by having his trousers around his ankles. He managed to roll off the bed, then scrambled towards the two submachine guns that were leaning against the toilet. Mac leapt on him and they fought for the weapon. He elbowed the guard twice and the man lost balance and fell backwards, his head smashing against the metal bed frame.

“Oh, God. Thank—”

“Later. Give me your hands.”

“What?”

He grabbed her hands and held them close to the steel ring. Going through the unlocking process, he slipped the mounting bar out of the wall.

“There’s a panel under the bed. I’ll pass you the guns.”

While Tally squeezed out through the panel, he collected the men’s weapons and passed them through. He rolled over the unconscious guard and turned his head around as far as it would go, then he gave it a hard twist until he heard a
crack
like a tree branch snapping. They couldn’t afford to risk the man raising the alarm.

“The keys! Get the keys,” Tally said.

Mac searched the guards’ pockets. Then squeezed through the panel and pushed it closed.

“Thank God. I thought I’d die in this hellhole!” Tally said, her voice suddenly energized. “Thank you.” She moved against him, gently kissed his cheek, and her handcuffs clinked against his.

“You’re hurt,” he said, “Let’s get you out of here.” He wouldn’t tell her about Scotty just yet. She’d had to put up with enough. He fumbled with the keys, finally managing to unlock their cuffs. “Stay close. We haven’t much time before they discover us missing and figure out there’s this hidden space.”

“Is Scotty with you? Rosco’s dead. They tortured him—”

“I know. Bastards. Scotty’s dead. They killed Mai, too.”

“Oh, no. Mac, I’m so sorry... Oh, poor little George.”

Mac could hear the shock and sadness in her voice. He led the way, checking each cell as they went. They were empty. After a few minutes, they reached a dead end.

“Goddamn. Where could they be keeping them?”

He squeezed past Tally and began back the other way. Just past where he’d left his cell, he brushed against something dangling from a hook.

“Ah!”

A flashlight. He switched it on and shone the beam around. On the ground were three bottles of water and a sealed plastic container with chocolate, a pistol with a spare magazine, and a laminated plan of the entire complex.

“Fanning was a boy scout,” he said. “Pity he didn’t leave a silencer for the pistol.”

Tally gave a quiet laugh. “Oh, I thought you were carrying one.”

He hadn’t given a thought about being dressed in only a surgical gown, but now he realized he felt a draught at the back.

“Oh. I’m amazed you can still laugh… I’m so sorry, Tally. Christ, I’m
such
a fucking idiot. I never should have left you and Rosco in Paris. You must have— ”

“Shhh… It’s okay.” She placed her fingers on his lips. “I don’t want to think about it. Not now. Let’s get away from this place. You have every right to be angry with me, too. I wasn’t exactly up front about things.”

“No, you weren’t. And I don’t think Wisebaum told you the whole story, either. This guy has containers of radioactive stuff that he’s making into bombs to use against Saudi Arabia. Did you know about that?”

“That’s what this whole thing is about, Mac. Confirming that Khalid has them and where they are, so we can organize a raid to take them out. We can’t allow the Saudi regime to fail. It’s got more than a quarter of the world’s oil reserves. The assurance of our future supply.” Tally paused a moment as she flinched and put her hand to her mouth. She had to be hurting badly.

“You okay?”

“Uh huh. Anyway, because Saudi prices its oil in US dollars, we can just print money and buy oil. And right now, that’s critical. Any instability in Saudi Arabia would be disastrous for our economy.”

“So you guys knew this all along?” He shook his head, staggered at this revelation. “Why not let me in on your secret? I have a top secret clearance.”

“Need to know. Your connection with Sophia was perfect as a way of pressuring Khalid without him discovering that we knew about the uranium canisters. If he caught you, you wouldn’t be able to tell him anything. And we’d hoped you’d cause Khalid enough trouble to make him panic and shift the canisters, which he did. I’m sorry. It was done for the right reasons. I know that doesn’t… Sorry.”

He shone the light on her bruised face. “So we were expendable. Scotty died. Maybe if we’d known, we might have planned differently.”

She lowered her head. “As I said, I’m sorry. Truly I am sorry, Mac. It was wrong not to tell you. I argued with Derek about it, but he insisted. Thought you couldn’t be trusted not to attack Khalid.”

He exhaled. There was no point going there. “Another thing I don’t get is—how did they come to find you and Rosco?”

Tally shook her head. “I don’t know. Oh God, poor Rosco.”

There was nothing more to be done by further recriminations now. They had to find the girls. “He told them everything, I think. Anyway, there’s no time for this. Once Sophia and Danni are out, the game can change. Now you need to study this plan so you remember everything. We need to destroy it in case Khalid gets through to here.”