Sleeper Cell Super Boxset (7 page)

***

Dylan gripped the back of the headrest of the passenger seat until his knuckles turned white. The taxi driver turned onto East Boulevard and pulled up to the gated community where his children and ex-wife lived. The security officer stepped out of his booth, and Dylan rolled down his window. “Dylan Turk to see Evelyn Harth.”

“I know who you are, Mr. Turk,” the security officer drawled. “You and I both know you’re not supposed to be here. I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”

“Listen, I know when my visitation times are, but you have to listen to me—”

“Mr. Turk, if you don’t leave right now, I’m going to call the police. Now, please leave.”

The driver shifted the car into reverse. “Hey!” Dylan smacked the back of his seat. “Do not move this car.” The driver stopped and threw his hands up into the air. “Hey, buddy, I don’t want any trouble. I’m just trying to make sure neither of us go to jail.”

Dylan opened the door and stepped out. The security officer backed up and headed for his post. “That’s it. I’m calling the cops.” Before he could even pick up the phone, Dylan was on him, shoving the overweight, minimum-wage, glorified mall cop up against the wall. The taxi driver immediately peeled off, his tires squealing, not even bothering to collect his fare.

“Listen to me!” Dylan scrunched his face in a combination of pain and anger while the security guard looked at him in horror. “I need to get my family out of this place. Now! So open the gate.” The guard absentmindedly reached over to the gate’s control panel. A buzz sounded, and the clank of the gate’s chain pulled the piece of iron open. “Thank you.” Dylan shoved the guard off of him then sprinted into the community.

Dylan’s forearm pulsed where the pirate had cut him open earlier. He glanced down to make sure the stitches weren’t tearing and was greeted by the uncomforting sign of blood soaking through his shirt sleeve. Dylan shook it off and kept up the run, his body and mind still screaming for a rest after the long night, but Dylan unwilling to comply.

A few of the neighbors were just getting up, walking out to grab their morning papers. Dylan ignored the hasty stares and turned onto Cover Street, his eyes on the seventh house on the left. He cut through the yard and didn’t bother slowing down when he made it to the front door, slamming his body and fists into the thick oak door. “Evelyn!” He beat his fists on the wood paneling with a violent fervor, his heart pounding like a jackhammer.

Another round of pounding, and Dylan watched the foyer light turn on, and Peter, Evelyn’s new husband, opened the door, still tying up his robe. “Dylan, what the hell are you doing?”

Dylan pushed Peter aside, still sweating and panting, his sweltering body feeling the cold rush of the A/C inside the house. He spun around, looking up to the second floor, where he knew his children were. “Sean! Mary! Come down here now!”

Peter grabbed Dylan’s shoulder and violently shoved him around, his glasses almost flying off his face from the force. “Dylan, get out of my house before I call the police.” Dylan tried wrenching himself free, but Peter refused to let go. Dylan grabbed Peter’s wrist and twisted it hard, forcing the man to release his hold.

“Dylan!” Evelyn rushed down the stairs, her black hair bouncing at her shoulders. “You need to leave. Now.” She blocked the staircase so he couldn’t ascend, but then Dylan saw Mary peek her head out behind the corner of the wall at the top of the second floor.

“Mary! Go get dressed, honey, and come downstairs.” Evelyn looked back and refuted Dylan’s orders, and the little girl just sat there, frozen. Dylan gripped Evelyn’s shoulders, his eyes wild, and not realizing the amount of pressure his fingers were digging into her robe. “Evelyn, we have to go, now. You, the kids, Peter. We need to get out of the city.”

Evelyn looked taken aback. “Have you been drinking again?”

“What?” Dylan shook his head, trying to clear his thoughts, get a grip on what was happening. “No, I—”

Evelyn shoved Dylan hard in the chest, a flash of pain covering her face. “You have to stop, Dylan. You can’t keep doing this. You need help.”

“I haven’t been drinking!” Spit flew from Dylan’s mouth, and his words rang throughout the house like the thunder from a storm at sea. His face and body grew hot until his face was a beet red. He clenched his fists at his side, searching for a way to make them see, make them understand. “I haven’t had a drink in over a year. You understand me? A year! You’re in danger, everyone is in danger.”

A police siren blared out front, and Dylan watched a cruiser pull into the driveway, blue-and-red lights flashing in the morning air. He shook his head and turned back to Evelyn. “No, this is a mistake.” The police officer walked through the front door, and Peter pointed at him, screaming that he was drunk, that he was mad, and that he was violent.

“Sir, I’m going to have to ask you to calm down and come with me.” The officer moved his right hand to the sidearm at his belt. “Now.”

“Officer, listen to me, call DEA Agent Cooper. She’ll tell you why I’m here.” Dylan made a move for Evelyn, and before he realized it, he was on the floor, convulsing as three hundred watts of electricity coursed through his veins. The sting of the metal prongs in his back digging into his flesh. Even after the electricity had run its course, his muscles continued to spasm. The officer cuffed Dylan’s arms behind his back, and when Dylan looked up the staircase, he saw Mary and Sean at the top of the stairs, both of them looking down at him with the same pale-ghost tint on their faces.

This was how they were going to remember their father. It didn’t matter what happened after that. This moment and all of the times that he came home stinking drunk from the bar, falling and vomiting over himself, those memories would be the ones that stuck.

The officer picked him up and half carried, half walked him back to the cruiser, where he was placed in the backseat, head leaning against the window, and he tried to regain control of his faculties. A dull ache blanketed his body. He watched Peter and Evelyn speak with the officer and the hordes of others that had walked outside to witness Dylan’s episode. Each stare from the neighbors around seemed to be accompanied by a whisper. Whispers he could hear even through the police car.
The drunk father. The worthless oaf. Couldn’t keep it together. Couldn’t keep his family above water. Useless. Craven.

Dylan pushed himself away from the view of the window to the middle of the backseat, hiding himself from judgement. The officer opened the driver-side door and backed out of the driveway. Dylan maneuvered his way up to the chain mail that separated him from the officer driving. “Did you call Agent Cooper?”

“The Harths have chosen not to press charges, but I’m taking you to the station to cool down. Twenty-four-hour watch period.”

“I’m not drunk!” Dylan shouted louder than he anticipated. He shook his head as the tires bumped in the dip between the driveway and the road. “Listen, I’m sorry for what happened.” The houses and trees of the community flew by the window as he turned back to look at the house. “You have to call Agent Cooper. You nee—”

“Oh, I called her. She told me to take you down to the station.”

“What?”

“Apparently she has some more questions for you.”

“No, this... no, you have to call her again. We’ll talk to her together. Please, you don’t understand. They’re going to blow up Boston!”

The police officer turned up the radio in the car, drowning Dylan out, and no matter what he said, no matter how hard he pleaded, the officer wouldn’t listen. No one would listen. A group of madmen were loose in the city, armed with bombs that Dylan helped smuggle. One member of his crew was dead, one was in the hospital, he was in handcuffs, and only God knew what happened to Billy. It was all too surreal, too foreign. He needed to get his kids out of Boston.

***

Deputy Director Perry glanced over Agent Cooper and Agent Diaz’s work. He knew that the two were drilling a hole into his skull with their stare, but he took his time. While most agents were about speed, he was only concerned with accuracy. He’d been around long enough to know that when it came down to national security, having a spotless, consistent record with no fuck-ups would beat out the rest. After all, it was how he made it to where he was.

“Care to share your intelligence?” Cooper asked.

“In a moment, Agent Cooper. I’d like to make sure I understand what you understand first.” He looked up from the file, smiling. “We wouldn’t want to rush to any false conclusions. Not with a matter like this at hand.”

“Rushing to conclusions?” Cooper asked, squinting her face in a questionable glance. “You mean like the release of the captain of the boat that escorted the terrorists and their bombs into the country?”

Perry returned his concentration to the file. “If you really think that man, with his history of alcoholism and TV dinners, is a member of a terrorist group, I would say that there would be no problem with your application to Homeland being overlooked during the admission process. Or did you think I didn’t already know everything about you, and everything about anyone worth a damn or who threatens our way of life?”

Despite the snide comment, which normally would have had anyone else back down, Cooper snatched the file from his hands and slapped it back down on the table. “Who the fuck do you think you are?”

Perry offered a polite smile, while her partner pulled her back. She eventually stormed off on her own steam, leaving Diaz and Perry alone. “Is she always like that?”

“She just got off a job,” Diaz said. “We weren’t even supposed to be here.”

“And yet, here you are.” Perry picked the file back up and finished thumbing through it. “She’s been undercover quite a bit. You think she’s burnt out?”

“Honestly? I still don’t know how she’s sane. Nobody’s been on as many undercover operations as she has. There are guys who lose their minds after one sixth-month stint, and I’ve seen her do at least a half dozen of those. She’s a fighter. Fighters are passionate.”

Perry tossed the file back on the ground, and his phone rang. “Perry.”

“We have a fire just south of Boston. Local PD are on the scene, but it looks like we’ve got a lot of traction. Three vans, big tire tracks leading into the city, and the dogs picked up a scent heading into the swamps.”

“Pull a stats report of all the different routes that truck could have taken, and then track every available camera on those routes. I want video, goddammit.” Perry hung up the phone then walked to Diaz until he was nose to nose. “Do you trust your partner?”

“Of course.”

“Even with all the rumors circling her? The kickbacks, the fact that half of the agents in the DEA think she’s been undercover for so long that her head’s not on straight?”

“There isn’t another person I would trust my life with, sir.”

Perry shook his head, brushing past Diaz. “My director spoke with your boss, and they’ve reached an agreement that we should combine our resources to find out what’s going on. I’ll need your man power.” He was almost out the door before he called back, “Better go find your partner. We’ve got work to do.”

Chapter 6 – Saturday 7:30 a.m.

Kasaika peeled his dirty clothes off and washed and cleaned himself, but even after the soap and cold water, he still couldn’t remove the stench of the swamp off him. Once dry, the alarm on his watch went off, as it did five times every day. He pulled out his mat and went to the living room, where the rest of his comrades waited. He expected to see them cleaned, washed, and ready for their morning prayers, but every single one of them, including Sefkh and Zet, were loading ammo, checking their weapons, or stuffing their face with food. “What is this?”

The only ones that stopped their actions were Sefkh and Zet. “We need to hurry, brother,” Sefkh said. “The bombs are already in place. We need to head south. Our contact will be meeting us there.”

“It is time for prayer, Sefkh,” Kasaika replied harshly. “Or have you forgotten why we are doing this? Why so many of our brothers and sisters have died? Or the oppression and ridicule these westerners have done to our people, our religion, our way of life?”

“We have not forgotten,” Zet replied. “But I’m sure Allah will forgive us this blasphemy for our greater purpose.” He loaded a magazine into the rifle and slung the weapon over his shoulder. “After all, we do all things in his name.”

“
La Hawla wala quwata illa billah,
” Kasaika replied. “I have not forgotten, but I think I may be the only one who hasn’t.” His voice boomed, and the room filled with quiet where there had once been the busy scuffle of routine.

Sefkh stepped between Kasaika and the circling mob of stern looks. “Everyone, please. My brother is right.” He clasped Kasaika on the shoulder. “It would be unwise to break our laws and tradition in such a moment.” Sefkh was the first on the ground, and with him praying, the others soon followed. The last to lower himself was Zet, and he did so with disdain on his face.

Once the prayers were said, Kasaika and the men rose from their positions, and Sefkh received the first confirmation that the bombs were in place. “We have thirty minutes. We must hurry.”

***

The garbage truck rumbled along the downtown streets of Boston, the air brakes squeaking whenever the driver slowed and stopped. Two men rode on the back, and at each stop they looked for their physical marker of where to set the bomb that they pulled from the back of the garbage truck’s carrier. The bags were no bigger than a backpack and placed strategically all over the city. Small enough to stay out of view, large enough to inflict damage.

The empty sidewalks and streets were easy to navigate. Early Saturday mornings offered minimal congestion, which is exactly what they wanted. No one to call and offer suspicious tips, all law enforcement still too groggy and tired to have any real vigilance. With the dew still fresh on the morning grass and leaves of the city, it was a perfect time to strike.

Bombs were placed at power sub-stations, bridges, water utilities, market places, federal and state buildings, and the port. The blasts of the bombs were minimal, but the initial structural damage wasn’t what was so critical. All they needed to do was stir the pot enough to trigger a lockdown of the city. Once Boston was clogged to keep anyone from getting in or out, there would be enough chaos to get away with almost anything they wanted.