The Cabal (28 page)

“You have good information,” McGarvey said, impressed.

“It’s my part of the world,” Hadid said. “My life depends on good information.”

They moved forward slowly, until ten minutes later they reached the border crossing and a pair of Kuwaiti army border guards, armed with American M16s, asked to see their papers.

Hadid’s and his family’s papers raised no interest, but McGarvey’s passport and especially his U.S. Army credentials did, and one of the Kuwaiti border guards took the documents across the road to a low concrete block building, with machine-gun emplacements looking north on the roof.

Traffic began to back up behind them, and a U.S. Army captain jumped out of his RG-33 at the head of a convoy and came up to them.

“What’s the trouble up here?” he demanded, and he spotted McGarvey in the backseat. “Who the hell are you?”

“I’m an American freelance journalist,” McGarvey said, meeting the officer’s eyes.

The captain held out a hand. “Let’s see some ID.”

“No,” McGarvey said. “And I suggest you get back in your fucking thirty-three until we’re cleared here.”

At that moment a Kuwaiti officer came from the concrete block building, and ignoring the American officer, looked in at McGarvey. “You have an American Army pass. Why is it you didn’t fly direct to Baghdad?”

“I’m doing a piece on convoys traveling the Baghdad Road,” McGarvey said. He glanced at the captain. “And the men running them.”

The Kuwaiti officer handed McGarvey’s papers back. “You may pass,” he said, smiling slightly. “Good luck.”

“Is there something we should be aware of tonight?” Hadid asked, but the Kuwaiti had turned and headed away.

“Maybe I’ll see you in Baghdad, Captain,” McGarvey told the American. “What’s the name of your CO?”

The captain turned and stalked off, and Hadid moved past the barrier where they were stopped by a pair of Iraqi police who inspected their papers. When they looked at McGarvey’s he was sure they recognized the name, but they handed the papers back, stepped aside, and waved them through.

“They might be expecting me,” he told Hadid when they were on the other side and accelerating into the dark night.

“I saw it, too,” Hadid said. “But I have a few tricks up my sleeve, you’ll see.”

Kangas and Mustapha had flown first class from Washington and had fully indulged in the free bar service, so that by the time they touched down at Baghdad’s International Airport, if not drunk they were certainly less than sharp.

Their contact man at Dulles had assured them that McGarvey was traveling undercover as a freelance journalist by the name of Tony Watkins, and was driving up from Kuwait, which gave them a twelve-hour head start. They weren’t worried. It wasn’t often that the cheap bastards handling travel arrangements for Admin sprung for first class, and they’d meant to enjoy every minute of it, because once they got to Baghdad they figured they’d be put up in some shit hole of a hotel.

It was early evening and the airport terminal was fairly busy. Since the so-called peace, a lot of international business was returning to the country, especially people interested in oil.

Through passport control and customs a young man came up to them and without a word handed Kangas a thick manila envelope then turned around and walked away, lost in the crowd almost immediately.

“Welcome to the hot zone,” Mustapha said. “Make sure it isn’t a fucking letter bomb, because that kid was for sure not our quartermaster.”

“Too light,” Kangas said, and he and Mustapha went down the corridor to an empty boarding area and opened the envelope. Remington had provided them with five thousand in U.S. currency, mostly hundred-dollar bills, a pair of presumably untraceable credit cards, and confirmed reservations for a suite at the new Baghdad International Airport Hotel and Business Center, along with a photo of Harry
Weiss, their on-the-ground Admin contact, who would meet them once they checked into the hotel.

“This keeps getting better,” Mustapha said.

“There’s always a catch,” Kangas said. He was beginning to get a seriously bad feeling between his shoulder blades. He’d never really trusted Remington, and with this added luxury he was becoming even more distrustful.

“Yeah, taking McGarvey down,” Mustapha said. “We’ve already seen the bastard in action.”

“He won’t be expecting us,” Kangas said, but he wasn’t so sure.

The hotel was on the airport property and just down a walkway from the terminal. Big and ultra modern, especially by present-day Iraqi standards, the place reminded Kangas of hotel/business centers in places like Dubai. Everyone was in a hurry, everyone seemed to have bags of money, and everyone smiled at everyone else without meaning it. It was, he suspected, a dangerous place. But it was handy to the airport, so once their business in town was finished they could get back here and get out on the first available flight. Admin had provided them with open-ended tickets, which meant they could hop aboard any flight. Their first-class status gave them priority.

The lobby was plain and functional, yet luxurious at the same time. The clerks, almost all of them young, dressed in identical gray blazers with gold buttons, bustled seemingly everywhere.

The clerk at the reception desk brought their reservations up on his computer, printed out the arrivals document, and had Kangas sign it. “Welcome to the Baghdad International Airport Hotel, gentlemen. A credit card will not be necessary, your firm has arranged for all of your expenses.”

“Right,” Kangas mumbled.

The clerk handed them each a key card. “Will you be needing help with your luggage?”

They had each carried only a single overnight bag. They’d be
staying only as long as was absolutely necessary. Hopefully they’d be in and back out in twenty-four hours or less. “Not necessary,” Kangas said.

They took the elevator up to their twelfth-floor suite, the balcony looking toward downtown Baghdad, about fifteen miles away. In addition to a pair of bedrooms with king-sized beds and separate Jacuzzis, the sitting room was well furnished with a modern couch and chairs, a desk, a large HD plasma television, and a well-stocked minibar. A guest half bath was just inside the entry hall.

The red message light on the telephone began blinking at once and Kangas answered it.

“Message from Mr. Weiss. Please meet him in the lobby bar at your soonest convenience,” a recording of a woman’s voice said. “If you would like to hear this message again, please press one.”

“Our quartermaster wants to meet downstairs in the bar,” Kangas said hanging up.

“That was quick,” Mustapha said.

“The sooner the better.”

Although security at this hotel was probably reasonably tight, this was Baghdad, and Kangas felt vulnerable without a weapon, something he expected their quartermaster was going to fix first thing.

They used the stairs to the tenth floor, where they made sure the corridor was empty before they took the elevator to the lobby. It was an old survival trick they’d learned in the CIA. Never willingly give up any information about yourself. In this case, by taking the elevator from the tenth floor, anyone spotting them emerging into the lobby wouldn’t necessarily know they were staying on the twelfth. It was minor, but such little things in the field added up.

They recognized Weiss, seated at a booth in the far corner of the lobby lounge, from his photograph. Kangas thought he looked like a poofta, the same as Remington: narrow, sloped-shoulders; light, sand-colored hair; and tiny round face with droopy eyes that seemed to see nothing.

But he looked up from his drink as Kangas and Mustafa came over,
and motioned for them to sit across from him. “You assholes look like shit,” he said.

“Pleased to meet you, too,” Kangas said, letting Mustapha slide in first. He never liked for his movements to be confined.

“First class doesn’t mean you show up drunk. Do you have any idea who the hell you’re going up against?”

“We’ve seen him in action, we know,” Mustapha said. “But he won’t be here until sometime tomorrow. By then he’ll be road weary, but we’ll have had a good night’s sleep and a big breakfast.”

“And this city belongs to Admin,” Kangas added.

“I speak the language, do you, prick?” Mustapha said.

Weiss sat back. “Okay, if this weren’t so important to Roland I’d tell you guys to get the fuck out of here first thing in the morning. As it is I hope you go up against McGarvey one hundred percent. If you miss the smallest step he’ll have you for lunch.”

“We’ll take care of our business,” Kangas said. “What about our equipment?”

“In a leather satchel at my feet. Wait five minutes after I’m gone, then pick it up and take it to your room.”

“Where will he be staying?”

“The Baghdad Hotel where a lot of journalists who don’t care to stay in the Green Zone hang out,” Weiss said. “Give me the photo you got at the airport.”

Kangas had figured Weiss would want it back. He handed it over. “Not a very good likeness.”

Weiss gave them both another appraising look, before he got up. “Stupid bastards.”

As soon as he’d left, Kangas reached under the table for the satchel, then slid out of the booth, Mustapha right behind him, and they left the lounge, holding up just at the entrance to see which way their quartermaster was heading. But Weiss was nowhere to be seen.

“Not bad,” Kangas had to admit. The man might have looked like a poofta but he knew his tradecraft.

Heading north from the border away from the head of the Gulf, toward Basra, the night turned warm, even sultry. This, Hadid explained, was the region of the famous Fertile Crescent, the confluence of the Tigris and Euphrates, near the Garden of Eden.

More oil rigs dotted the horizon, and to McGarvey the area seemed anything but fertile. It was mostly desert now, and when a breeze blew it stank of oil and natural gas.

“We’ll have no trouble until after Basra,” Hadid said, checking his rearview mirror often. “It starts to get bad once we get near An Nasiriyah. The convoys take the route on the west side of the river, but we’ll cross over and take the eastern route. It’s about the same distance, but I know it better.”

“Wouldn’t we be safer traveling in the middle of a couple of convoys?” McGarvey asked.

Hadid glanced at him and shook his head. “No,” he said, and he checked his rearview mirror again.

For the moment they were alone on the road, though in the distance behind them they could make out the lights of an oncoming car or perhaps the convoy that had been directly behind them at the checkpoint. It was time for the weapons.

Hadid pulled over and they all got out and went around to the back of the car where Hadid opened the lid and brought out a Glock 17 for McGarvey with a silencer and three magazines of ammunition plus three AK-47s with the satchel of spare magazines, which went to McGarvey, Saddam, and the woman.

They all piled back inside the car and Hadid pulled away before the oncoming lights had reached them.

Saddam and Miriam both handled the AKs with practiced ease, checking the actions, loading the weapons, and racking rounds into the firing chambers as McGarvey was doing the same.

The woman looked up, catching McGarvey watching her. “Little children know how to use this weapon,” she said.

“Have you ever killed a man?”