“And what is that?” asked Nebuchar, a malicious smile on his face. “Did you finally realize that the only reason Candela fucks you is because of your money?”
Nebuchar laughed at his own joke. Aswan remained silent until his son had finished laughing.
“Perhaps you’re right,” said Aswan, controlling his anger at his son’s remark, “but I would rather be making love to a twenty-three-year-old model than a bottle of gin, like you do every night.”
Nebuchar nodded. He stared at his father for several moments. “Don’t worry, Father, I fuck whatever I want. I just don’t have to pay for it, like you.”
“Enough. Can we stop this? I didn’t come here to insult you or to be insulted.”
“Yes, fine. What do you want?”
“I came to tell you that I straightened it out with Hassan Nasralla,” said Aswan. “You’ll make a payment to Hezbollah to atone for killing Pasa. He wasn’t happy, but he also didn’t like Pasa very much.”
“How much?”
“Ten million euros.”
“Is this why you came here, to collect the money?”
Aswan Fortuna paused, then reached his hand out and placed it on his son’s knee.
“I realize what a bad father I’ve been to you. I’m sorry.”
Nebuchar looked down at his father’s hand on his knee.
“I want to talk to you about the money,” said Aswan. “The money that Alexander left us, the money that funds jihad.”
“A billion?” asked Nebuchar. “Two?”
“Twelve billion.”
Nebuchar sat up. He leaned forward, incredulous, taking another cigarette and lighting it. “I knew it was more than a billion, but—”
“Yes. Your brother was a prodigy.”
“Yes, he obviously was. Unlike me. Is that what you’re thinking, Father?”
“No, it’s not what I’m thinking. I’m getting old. I’m making you trustee, Nebuchar. You’ll have a fiduciary relationship to the funds. You will have access to the money, and, as you will come to understand, you will take on the responsibilities of the money. There are many people who depend upon the money, many groups.”
“Groups? Hezbollah?”
“Hezbollah, Al-Qaeda, Lashkar-e-Taiba, Taliban, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Muslim Brotherhood. These are the main ones. But there are dozens of others you don’t know about. We fund splinters; a small group who breaks off from Al-Qaeda, for example, we will back them. We don’t choose sides and we don’t tell them what to do, as long as the group believes in violent jihad.”
“How much did we spend to sponsor them last year?”
“Last year, the total was six hundred and eighteen million dollars. Much of that paid for IEDs used in Iraq. The details are all in here.”
Fortuna handed the folder to Nebuchar.
“In addition, we fund more than nine hundred madrasas throughout the Middle East, Africa, Europe, and Indonesia. That number is growing.”
“What is that number?”
“Last year, we spent almost two hundred million on the schools. That’s our future. If I could spend more, I would.”
“How does this all happen?”
“Ah, yes, it sounds complicated. It
is
complicated. Alexander designed it all. There are three primary agents: one in Moscow, one in London, one in Dubai. They handle the disbursement of funds. They’re paid monthly from different accounts. These accounts are in banks all over the Middle East and Europe, even a few in Russia and Canada. Accounts are set up automatically each month based on a sequential series of numbers. For example, three accounts every month are established with an account number that is your birthday followed by the date the account is established. These new accounts are funded by the oldest accounts, which are wound down. It’s automated.”
“Will the money eventually run out?”
“I don’t think so,” said Aswan. “The money is invested, also automated. The financial institutions are selected by the three agents.”
“Are they aware of what you’re doing?”
“Yes, of course. They’re believers. But the institutions themselves are oblivious. As for the recipients, they are largely successful in masking where the money comes from. It’s always the challenge. The CIA, MI6, Interpol, are constantly on the trail. Because it’s so dispersed now, we are able to suffer the loss of one account. Lashkar-e-Taiba, for example, has accounts all over the place: Montreal, Moscow, Dubai, UAE, despite the fact that the money is used exclusively in Pakistan.”
Nebuchar flipped through the folder.
“Your brother was indeed a financial genius,” said Aswan. “Alexander’s greatest gift to jihad is that he guaranteed its funding into the distant future. Perhaps until its ultimate victory.”
“What do you want me to do with this?” he asked, holding the folder open.
“Put it somewhere safe. Learn it. Ask me questions. It’s time for you to begin to play the role that you must play, Nebuchar. And I must begin to teach you. I must also begin to treat you like a son. We have a great deal to be thankful for.”
Nebuchar stared at his father. He smiled.
“Would you like to share a glass of wine, Papa?” asked Nebuchar.
“Yes, that would be nice, Nebbie.”
RAWALPINDI
Margaret met Dewey, Iverheart, and Millar in the back alley and took Karreff’s mistress. With her was a pair of men, both dressed in bishts.
“Who are they?” asked Dewey.
“Cleanup crew,” Margaret said.
“Check the basement and the stairwells,” said Dewey. “And get rid of the Range Rovers out front.”
* * *
Iverheart drove the minivan and turned out of the alleyway behind the apartment building, retracing their path back to Jinnah Boulevard.
Dewey glanced at his watch. Nearly 2:00
A.M.
He sat in the back of the minivan. Millar sat to his right, bouncing his left leg up and down, the adrenaline flowing.
“How bad is it?” Dewey asked, looking at Millar’s neck.
Millar pulled the blood-soaked neckline of his dark T-shirt down. The wound was covered by a small dishcloth soaked with blood.
Dewey reached up, flipped on the light of the minivan, then pulled off the towel.
The bullet had penetrated the skin and muscle at the very juncture of the neck and shoulder line. A small, black hole was ruptured and torn, blood coursed out.
“Half an inch and it would’ve hit the carotid. You’re lucky you’re not dead.”
From a small brown duffel bag, Dewey removed the IFAK. Inside was a small plastic package which he ripped open. He took out a presutured needle.
Dewey looked at Iverheart in the rearview mirror.
“Pull over.”
Iverheart turned the minivan into a parking lot, next to a squat cement building, now dark. He extinguished the vehicle’s lights.
Millar leaned his head against the front seat so that Dewey had a clear view of the wound beneath the overhead light.
Dewey took the sutured needle and stuck it into Millar’s neck, puncturing the skin beneath the bullet wound.
“Oh, fuck,” groaned Millar. “That hurts.”
Dewey pulled the needle through the skin, stitching up the wound. In less than two minutes, Millar’s bullet hole had been crudely sutured.
Dewey placed the needle back in the IFAK. He removed a small tin canister filled with clotting agent. Dewey took a large pinch of the powder and sprinkled it on the wound. Millar flinched as he spread it around the suture. Dewey placed a large bandage over the wound and taped it securely to Millar’s shoulder.
“Let’s go.”
* * *
Iverheart drove to the eastern section of Rawalpindi by Raval Lake, which they could see in the distance, illuminated by the moon. After several more miles, Iverheart took a left onto an unmarked dirt road, then took a right into a deserted field. There they saw the sudden, sharp metallic outlines of the Black Hawk.
Iverheart parked the minivan. The pilot started the chopper. Within two minutes, they were airborne.
The Black Hawk flew across the dark sky at nearly two hundred miles per hour. It stayed low, at less than five hundred feet, moving to the east, toward the war front in Kargil. The chopper flew in darkness, the pilot relying on instruments and night vision technology.
Dewey stepped into the cockpit and tapped the pilot on the shoulder.
“ETA?” asked Dewey.
“Forty-five minutes,” said the pilot.
“We need to move drop-off,” said Bradstreet over the COMM bud. “I’m sending the coordinates right now.”
“Why?” asked Dewey.
“You’ve got heavy air fire in the corridor east of Drass all the way to Kargil. The National Highway is getting worse. Both sides are blowing everything out of the sky. You need to drop off farther back in the Pakistan supply line.”
“Is Bolin still at the target?”
“Affirmative. Bolin hasn’t moved, but you do not have a clear flight path. I don’t want you to get shot down.”
“What about the approach to the building?”
“Target is a high point-of-view structure. A house at the edge of Drass on the front side of a hill. Your team needs to come up from the south. There’s a reservoir at the base of the hill. Target is due north from the reservoir, straight up the hill, maybe a mile.”
Dewey looked at his watch: 4:10
A.M.
He moved into the cabin.
Millar reached into his vest and removed a small tin. He quickly spread black on his face then passed it to Iverheart, who did the same, followed by Dewey. Millar handed Iverheart and Dewey each a small plastic packet no bigger than a cigarette pack. Inside, raw protein in thick, agarlike syrup form, enough nutrient to sustain them for a week, if necessary.
After flying for a half hour, the pilot reached his hand up and showed five fingers outspread, closed it, then opened the fist again: ten minutes.
They checked their weapons and packed ammunition and grenades into the pockets of their vests.
Dewey stared out the chopper window. The peaks of the Himalayas were visible in sudden, sporadic bursts of light from mortar fire in the valley beyond.
A bright light flashed beneath them. A burst rocked the chopper, kicking it violently sideways.
Out the right window, the horizon was increasingly dominated by orange and red flare-ups as the chopper moved closer to Drass. The steady sound of detonations could be heard across the night air as fires burned on distant hills.
The outline of the battle was illuminated by fires. This was the heart of the battle—epicenter of the rapidly escalating war.
Dewey leaned forward.
“The drop-off has been moved,” said Dewey over the din of the rotors. “We’re going to need to hijack a vehicle.”
“Is there a contingency?” asked Iverheart.
“Contingency?”
“If Bolin’s not there.”
“The contingency is to get the hell out of Kashmir.”
The chopper’s nose arced down and shifted left. The chopper flew over a tree line, then a cluster of small huts in a village now consumed in flames.
Another loud blast ripped the air. The chopper bounced hard. A mortar burst more than a mile away, its reverberation strong enough to send a shock wave through the chopper.
They passed over a mountain ridge and a great valley lay in front of them.
Like a curtain being opened, the combat theater spread out before them across the shelf of the dark valley.
Dewey stood, leaned into the cockpit, and registered the sight.
The battle lines spread for at least ten miles in two long corridors east to west. India was in the far distance, Pakistan closer. In between the two lines of combatants, the valley was dark.
In the orange light of the mortar fire, batteries of Pakistani soldiers were visible from above. Soldiers gathered in groups behind mortar cannons staged every hundred yards or so. There were thousands of men, spread out in a line as far as the eye could see.
Behind the front line, a supply highway wound east into the mountains. Trucks, troop carriers, fuel tankers, and other machinery rumbled along, the small yellow headlights flickering in a line that stretched back toward Rawalpindi.
A mortar blast hit the Pakistani supply line. The line of vehicles, like an ant trail, was lit up in the sudden burst of light. A constellation of flames came next. Several vehicles were now consumed by fire. One gas tanker burst into spectacular red and gold flames.
The chopper moved in a straight line parallel to the supply highway, closer and closer to the front. It bounced and heaved as high-altitude winds roiled the air.
Dewey glanced at Millar and Iverheart. Their faces were now darkened in black war paint. Millar had changed from his bloody T-shirt into a long-sleeve shirt.
They had completed the first part of the mission, but time was running out, and they all knew it. In addition to the looming Indian deadline, there was now the added set of complications that would soon be created by Karreff’s disappearance. Despite Margaret’s clean-up crew, his absence would inevitably trigger a reaction, most likely defensive in nature. Perhaps moving El-Khayab into hiding. Or, if the Pakistanis thought his disappearance was part of an operation, perhaps another nuclear strike on India.
Dewey tried to put the time pressure out of his mind. He needed to be calm. He needed to show confidence, for it was confidence above all that would enable Dewey and his team to insert themselves like a scalpel into heart of Pakistan’s war command.
The pilot waved Dewey forward.
“I need to put you guys down,” the pilot barked over the din of the chopper. “There’s shit flying everywhere.”
“Put it down over there,” said Dewey, pointing to the line of trucks headed toward the front. “Just off the supply line.”
The chopper swung right and descended toward the Pakistani supply highway. Within a minute the Black Hawk was hovering above the ground.
Dewey, Millar, and Iverheart pulled their night goggles down. Iverheart reached out and opened the door to his right. Dewey leapt from the chopper, followed by Millar and Iverheart.
Seconds later, the chopper lifted back up into the dark sky, turning north and disappearing. They were on their own.
RASHTRAPATI BHAVAN
NEW DELHI
President Ghandra looked out the two-story window onto the square in front of Rashtrapati Bhavan, the presidential palace. Hundreds of small flames danced in the blackness, candles mostly, along with the occasional burning fire, a Pakistani flag being lit up or else a photograph of Omar El-Khayab being torched. He looked at his watch. It was past four in the morning.