Destiny in the Ashes Read online

  “Well, we’ll see about that!” she said.

  Herb held up his hand. “Hold on, Claire, don’t go off half-cocked. Wait until we’ve won the election; then you can clamp down on these black marketers as hard as you want. But for right now, they’re the ones with the power to get you reelected, so don’t do or say anything to rock the boat.”

  “Don’t worry, Herb,” Claire said with a sly smile. “I’ll tell them what they want to hear, but as soon as the election is over, they’re going to rue the day they stole from the government.”

  “That’a girl,” Herb said, grinning.

  She leaned forward across her desk. “I want you to begin to put together a list of these black marketers, and as soon as I’m ready, we’ll have the FPPS take a close look at their tax returns and maybe even confiscate some bank accounts in the bargain.”

  “Hell, if you do that, the treasury might even show a profit next year.”

  The team split up into groups of two to search the city for the Arab terrorists. Coop and Jersey, Harley and Anna, Hammer and Beth, with Corrie staying at the hotel to monitor the cell phone communications and to guard their gear.

  Each team member was dressed in the typical garb of medical people, white coats over white pants or skirts, and each carried “doctor” bags that contained their Uzis. Their handguns were worn in shoulder holsters for easy access in case of an unexpected confrontation.

  By noon, Coop and Jersey had covered most of the foursquare-block area they’d been assigned by Harley.

  Coop rubbed his stomach as they left the building they’d just searched. “I’m so hungry I could eat a horse.” He moaned, as if in pain.

  Jersey gave him a look. “You’re always hungry, Coop, and horse meat is probably just what we have been eating since we’ve been here.”

  “How ’bout we head on over to Marinaro’s and see if he can fix us up a meatball sub?”

  “You really are going to live dangerously, aren’t you?” she asked, smiling.

  “Hey, eating horse, or whatever it is, is better than starving to death.”

  “Yeah, well, that may be true, but we’ve got one more building to cover before we break for lunch.”

  Coop looked at their list. The address was right up the street. It was what appeared to be an old apartment building, with four apartments on each floor, and about ten floors for them to cover.

  “Jesus, Jerse, that’s gonna take all day,” he complained.

  “Standing here and griping about it won’t make us finish any sooner.”

  Coop grabbed her arm before she could walk off. “Hey, at least let’s get a cup of coffee at that diner over there,” he said, pointing across the street to a small cafe.

  “All right,” she replied, “but only a ten-minute break, then it’s back to work.”

  “You got it,” he said as they crossed the street.

  The diner seemed typical for what they’d seen of downtown Indianapolis. There was a long counter with stools covered with stained and torn plastic, and several booths with formica tables lining the front windows. Coop took a corner booth, where he had a good view of the street and the people coming and going along the sidewalk, as was protocol when in a hot zone.

  Jersey picked up a menu, then rubbed her fingers together, grimacing. “Now I know what they mean when they say ‘greasy spoon restaurant.’ ”

  Coop gave an uncertain half grin. “Well, the coffee’s probably safe anyway.”

  A waitress approached, her dress as grease-stained as the menu. “Yeah, whatta ya have?”

  Coop raised his eyebrows and looked at Jersey. She held up the menu to the waitress. “A cup of hot tea, please.”

  “And a cup of coffee,” added Coop.

  A few minutes later, the waitress plopped the cups down, slopping the coffee and water into the saucers, and sauntered off. Coop shook his head and placed napkins in the saucers to absorb the liquid, then looked around for some sugar.

  Finding none on the table, he motioned for the waitress to come back.

  “Yeah?” she asked, her hip cocked.

  “We’d like some sugar.”

  She looked surprised. “Sugar? It’s gonna cost you extra.”

  Coop sighed, forcing himself to stay seated and not jump up and strangle the rude woman. “All right, just bring it,” he said through tight lips.

  After a moment, the waitress returned and placed two single packets of sugar on the table. “That’ll be two bucks extra,” she said, and walked off.

  As Coop handed one packet to Jersey and was in the process of adding the other to his coffee, he stiffened and looked down at the table.

  Keeping his voice low, he whispered, “Don’t look around, but two characters just walked in who may be what we’re looking for.”

  Jersey sat up a little straighter and let her hand rest on her black bag on the seat next to her. She didn’t turn around, but kept her eyes on Coop, following his lead.

  He leaned back and took a drink of his coffee, then began to talk about the weather and other innocuous subjects while watching the men out of the corner of his eye.

  Using broken English, the two men ordered some doughnuts, and left with a paper sack full of the pastries. Coop noticed they paid the exorbitant fee with crisp, new fifty-dollar bills.

  After the men left the diner and walked down the street, Coop threw a couple of five-dollar bills down on the table and he and Jersey hurried out the door.

  At the first corner, they crossed the street so that they could follow the men without being observed.

  As they walked, they paused frequently and looked into store windows, pretending to window-shop. After the men turned into the building they had been about to search, Coop turned down a side street and pulled Jersey out of sight into a small alley.

  “Get on the cell phone and tell Corrie we may need backup ASAP!” he said.

  In the building, Abdullah El Farrar and Mustafa Kareem were discussing their plans for the attack on Claire Osterman when they heard a loud cheer and much raucous laughing from the room next door. Kareem excused himself and went to investigate. He returned a few moments later and smiled. “How like children the men are. They sent out for doughnuts and are fascinated over them, chewing and rolling their eyes as if Allah himself had sent them the food.”

  “We must let them have their fun while they can,” Farrar said, his eyes clouded. “I fear they will be sorely tested in the next few weeks, and assuredly many of them will be called home to sit at Allah’s side.”

  After taking out a thin, black cigar and lighting it, he continued. “It is strange how this country which provides so much bounty for the body provides so little sustenance for the spirit. The Americans seem to feel that their wealth is their due and that no price will be exacted in order for them to keep it. Even the present time of few resources seems to sap their will to try and regain their old strength.”

  “I agree with you, brother,” said Kareem, “but it would be dangerous to forget the lesson of the great war. The Americans will fight, and fight fiercely, if they feel their way of life is threatened.”

  “You’re right, Kareem, but the other side of the coin is that the citizens are divided into many sub-groups. Unless all of the sub-groups are threatened equally, it is extremely hard for the American politicians to get a consensus of opinion for any meaningful action. It therefore behooves us to pick our targets with extreme care.” He went to stand before the window, looking out with his hands in his pockets. “As long as our actions are seen to threaten only the rich and powerful, and not the average citizen, we are virtually assured that the response will be weak and uncoordinated.”

  “So, that is why you have decided to attack the American president when she is speaking before an audience of the upper echelon of their citizens?” asked Kareem.

  He turned. “Yes, we are going to hit the most influential woman in America while she is with the richest of the rich. That way, the ordinary citizens will not feel th
reatened and rise up against us.”

  “At least, not until our forces that are on their way here arrive on their shores,” Kareem said.

  “By that time, it will be too late for the Americans,” Farrar said. “Our army will sweep across the country like a whirlwind, destroying everything and everyone before it.”

  Downstairs, after calling for backup, Coop and Jersey slipped through the front door of the apartment building.

  They stood in the foyer, their backs against a wall, and pulled out their Uzis as they peered up the stairs.

  “We better be careful, Coop,” Jersey said. “These men may not be terrorists after all, just a couple of Arabs living here.”

  He shook his head. “Did you see that stack of new money they had?” he asked. “No one dressed as they were would have that much money on them, and if they did, they certainly wouldn’t show it in public like that. Not if they knew this country at all.”

  “You’re probably right, but . . .” Jersey began, just as a man carrying a Kalashnikov machine gun over his shoulder walked by on the landing to the second floor.

  Coop nodded at the man. “Satisfied now?” he asked.

  Jersey jacked a shell into the firing chamber of her Uzi and nodded.

  Coop put his finger to his lips and started up the stairs, keeping his back to the wall. At the top, he peeked around a corner, then jerked his head back.

  He laid his Uzi down on the floor and took his K-Bar assault knife from a scabbard under his coat.

  As a small, thin, dark-skinned man with a rifle in his hands walked around the corner, Coop slipped his left arm around the man’s neck and pulled his face tight against his chest as he slipped his knife up under the man’s ribs and into his heart. The muffled groan was barely louder than a gasp. Coop lowered him to the floor and whispered down the stairway to Jersey, “Scramble, the party’s heating up fast.”

  Less than a minute later, Jersey skipped up the stairs, her Uzi cocked and ready. Coop started to say something to her as another youth leaned over the stairwell above them on the third floor, saying, “Amal?”

  His eyes widened when he saw them, and he began to shout as he reached toward his shoulder holster.

  Jersey didn’t hesitate. She leveled her Uzi at him and loosed a burst of five rounds, cutting him down. Coop bounded up the stairs, screaming for Jersey to cover her ears as he lobbed a stun grenade down the hallway. Several doors opened and men began to emerge like ants from a disturbed anthill just as the grenade went off.

  The shock wave from the blast threw Coop backward down the stairs into Jersey, and they both ended up in a tangle at the foot of the stairs.

  “Jesus!” said Coop, looking astonished when he realized he couldn’t hear himself talk. He felt himself shoved aside and saw Jersey’s lips move, but couldn’t hear what she was saying.

  The floor where he had been lying disintegrated in a hail of bullets and splinters as Jersey began to spray upward with the Uzi on full automatic, the gun bucking and jumping in her hands.

  Coop jerked his Beretta from its holster under his arm, and rolled over in time to see a man dance under the impact of the bullets and then topple backward out of sight.

  Coop struggled to his feet once again, and scrambled back up the stairs just as another man appeared, blood running from his nose and ears, and opened up with a Kalashnikov machine gun. Coop crouched and put three shots in the man’s chest, horrified as he saw Jersey picked up and thrown back against the wall as bullets tore into her chest, shredding her jacket.

  Coop screamed incoherently and threw another stun grenade, then followed with a tear-gas canister. He didn’t wait for the explosion, but ran back down the stairs and took Jersey in his arms, covering her body with his.

  The door burst open and Harley and Anna, followed closely by Hammer and Beth, entered, their hands full of weapons.

  Coop pointed up the stairs and shouted, “Terrorists, up the stairs—automatic weapons and probably grenades!”

  Harley and Anna squatted, covering the stairway, while Beth and Hammer ran partway up, taking positions where they could cover the advance of the others.

  In a matter of seconds Harley and Anna proceeded rapidly up the stairs. Harley threw himself to the floor as a burst of automatic fire boomed ahead of him, while Anna began to fire as she ran to his side.

  The noise was incredible, and soon the stink of cordite was joined by the irritation of the tear gas as visibility steadily decreased to zero. Coop felt Jersey’s neck for a pulse, and was astonished to find one.

  He picked her up in his arms and staggered out the door and down the street, out of the way of any stray bullets. As he laid her down, he was grabbed from behind, his arms pinned, and he was thrown up against the brick wall of the building.

  “Let’s see some ID—fast!” said a man holding a pistol to Coop’s head. He was dressed all in black, and Coop knew immediately the man was with the FPPS.

  “Okay, okay, but first get an ambulance for the lady,” gasped Coop as he reached in and pulled out his wallet.

  The man looked down and muttered, “One’s on the way, should be here any minute.” He quickly scanned Coop’s ID, then lowered his gun and released Coop’s arms.

  “Want to tell me what the hell’s going on here, and what a medical team’s doing firing off automatic weapons and getting shot in my city?”

  Before Coop could answer, the ambulance arrived and the paramedics rushed to Jersey’s side. Coop squatted down as the paramedic asked what her injuries were.

  “She took several hits from a Kalashnikov in the chest and a blow to the back of the head. She’s been unconscious for about ten minutes.”

  The paramedic took Jersey’s pulse and blood pressure and looked up with a frown on his face. “I don’t understand it. Her pulse is steady and her pressure’s fine.”

  He tore her jacket open to examine her wounds and found a Kevlar vest, with five 9mm bullets embedded in it, but no blood. He whistled softly. “The wonders of modern science. Boy, is she lucky. Couple of inches higher and she’d be history.”

  He ran his hands lightly through her hair, examining the back of her head. “Oh, here’s the problem. She’s got a knot on her head the size of an egg. That accounts for the unconsciousness.”

  As he and his assistant lifted Jersey up on the stretcher, he told the FPPS officers that he was going to have to take her to the hospital for tests to see if she had a skull fracture.

  Coop turned to the FPPS man and said, “You have my ID ... can I ride to the hospital with her? I’ll wait there for you and answer any questions you might have.”

  The officer shook his head, “Damn right you will. Bulletproof vests, automatic weapons, hand grenades ... you’ve got a lot of explaining to do, mister.”

  Just then, Harley and the rest of Coop’s team walked out of the door of the building, Uzis slung over their shoulders.

  The FPPS man shook his head. “Oh, shit, not more of you?”

  Harley walked up to the man, holding out his ID. “I’ll explain it all to you later, sir, but for now could you call for some more men? The terrorists ran out of the back of the building.”

  “Terrorists?” the FPPS man asked.

  “Yeah, they plan to kill the president,” Harley said, causing the FPPS man’s eyes to widen and his face to pale in the light from the flames consuming the building down the street.

  Seven

  Abdullah El Farrar and Mustafa Kareem led their men out of the back door of the apartment building, and across an alleyway and around a corner to a second building he had rented for just such an occasion.

  Farrar, long hunted by the forces of the U.N., was no stranger to having to change locations at a moment’s notice. He always had a bolt-hole nearby to go to ground in, stocked with extra weapons and ammunition.

  As the men spread out, covering various windows in case of pursuit, Farrar and Kareem sat and made plans for the future.

  “How many men did we lose in th
e attack?” Farrar asked.

  “Three dead, two wounded slightly,” Kareem answered quickly.

  “Then we are still in good shape to go through with the assault on the president?”

  “Yes. We should have no problem in that regard.”

  “But you are worried about something else?”

  “Yes. How did the authorities know of our presence here? And how did they find us?”

  Farrar shrugged. “Mustafa, we have over fifty thousand troops and mercenaries on the way here by various means. It is impossible to keep such an undertaking secret, with so many people aware of it.”

  “But, my leader, how did they locate us here in the city?” Kareem asked, his face a mask of worry.

  “Perhaps it was mere luck,” Farrar answered. “After all, our men have been allowed to go out among the Americans often. It might be they were seen, or acted in some way as to bring attention to themselves.”

  Kareem nodded, considering the possibility.

  “In that regard, inform the men they are no longer to venture out of the building . . . at least, not until after our attack later this week.”

  “Yes, sir,” Kareem said, rising to give the men the message and to take care of the wounded.

  The FPPS men loaded the rest of the team into a van and followed the ambulance to St. Martin’s Hospital in downtown Indianapolis. Coop rode in the back of the carrier with Jersey, holding her hand as the ambulance sped through the streets.

  Jersey’s eyes flickered once, then opened and stared around the interior of the ambulance. After a moment, they drifted down to look at Coop’s hand in hers.

  She gave a wry grin. “Don’t get any ideas, Romeo,” she croaked through dry lips. “Just ’cause I’m unconscious doesn’t mean you can take advantage of me.”

  Coop gave a derisive laugh. “That’ll be the day,” he said. “From what I hear from your many man friends, you make love like you’re unconscious most of the time anyway.”

  Jersey’s eyes flashed. “Bullshit! Number one, none of the men I know would stoop to talking with someone like you, and number two, if they said that they’d be lying through their teeth.”