Fade (2005) (2 page)

The face of the approaching man was almost invisible, covered by a thick beard that grew up his cheeks almost to his eyes. He continue d to shout as he slipped a hand behind his back to retrieve what wa s undoubtedly some kind of weapon.

Al Fayed took a step forward, putting a hand on the man's elbow an d pinning his arm long enough to retrieve his own knife and shove i t through the man's beard and into his throat.

Surprise was the only thing that registered on his face as his eye s angled downward to watch the knife slide back out and blood fan acros s his chest. Then a brief moment of confusion before he crumpled to th e ground.

The girl's tired grunts turned into a piercing scream, tipping off th e man holding her that al Fayed was running up behind. He was faste r than he looked and managed to roll to the side and retrieve an archai c but undoubtedly effective pistol from his waistband.

Al Fayed threw his knife as he closed the distance between them, hopin g to distract the man's aim. To his surprise and in keeping with hi s stellar luck on this mission it stuck in his chest. Not deep enough t o seriously injure him, but plenty deep to cause the bullet that shoul d have hit its target instead to smash into a building across th e street.

The man was still on his knees when they collided and al Fayed jerke d right as they fell to the ground, closing his eyes against the burn o f gunpowder as a bullet screamed past his left temple. He ignored th e flash of pain and the ringing in his ear, covering the man's face wit h his hand and shoving his head back into the unfortunately soft dirt.

His own gun was trapped between them, so he was forced to begin th e surprisingly difficult process of working the knife out of the man'
s breastbone.

It was almost free when an intense ache in his lower back suddenl y robbed him of most of his strength. He fell to the left, throwing hi s body weight into one final yank. The knife came out with a we t crunching sound and al Fayed swung it behind him in a clumsy, blin d arc. He caught the young girl across the throat, missing the critica l arteries but creating a gash deep enough to make her drop the blood y shiv that she'd stuck him with in order to clamp her small hands ove r her own wound.

They hit the ground simultaneously and al Fayed used his momentum t o roll onto his hands and knees. When he tried to stand, though, hi s body wouldn't do what it was told. He turned his head slowly towar d the girl, watching her choke violently, spewing thick fountains o f blood from her mouth that then fell back into her face. The entir e scene had the feel of an out-of-focus and slightly overexposed movie.

He heard movement behind him and managed to crane his neck far enoug h to see the man rise unsteadily to his feet and aim his gun. The flas h was surprisingly dim and was followed by an impact to al Fayed's bac k that was sufficient to cause him to collapse face-first into th e dirt.

The girl was motionless now. Not dead but watching the sky, waitin g for it to come. Strangely, the smile that stretched his chapped lip s hurt more than anything else. He'd obviously been a little smug i n assuming that the girl was so unfit. It had all been a setup designe d to draw him into the alley so that they could take what he had and us e it to survive another few days. It had been stupid to allow himself t o be lured so easily, and stupidity was not rewarded in this part of th e world.

Charles Darwin would not be cheated.

Chapter
One.

"Roy Buckner."

"No."

Hillel Strand looked over the file in his hands as the distance betwee n his eyebrows and the tops of his reading glasses increased. "Jesu s Christ, Matt. What now? The man's former Army Delta with multipl e successful missions in hostile territory. He has a reasonably clea n service record.. .."

"I know all about Roy," Matt Egan said. "We're looking for scalpel s and this guy's a sledgehammer. A violent, arrogant, rednec k sledgehammer."

"At this rate our team's going to consist of you and the secretaria l pool, Matt. Is it possible that your standards are a bit high? Thes e guys are Special Forces. I think we can expect them to be arrogant an d a little violent."

"To a point," Egan agreed. "But Roy has a real problem wit h overestimating his abilities which I'll admit are considerable and he'
s a little too enamored with killing. A story about Roy: He was on a joint mission in Syria a few years back with a SEAL I worked with th e best operator I've ever known. Roy spent the entire missio n grandstanding, trying to prove he was the best man, and damn nea r brought the entire thing down around their ears. He doesn't know it , but that SEAL was within about three seconds of putting a bullet in hi s back. And if he had, I'd have supported that decision."

Strand tossed the file onto his growing "maybe" stack and began diggin g through the ones they hadn't reviewed yet, finally pulling one fro m near the bottom.

"Your SEAL," he said, opening the manila folder. "Salam al Fayed. I a ssume there's no discussion necessary? We want him, right?"

Egan sighed quietly and leaned back in his chair, gazing at th e photograph clipped to the file in Strand's hand. It had been a lon g time since he'd looked at that face. But nowhere near long enough.

Homeland Security had finally stabilized its organizational structur e and Egan had been brought in to help create a division that would b e involved in the more tangible side of ensuring the safety of America'
s citizens. The exact mission of the euphemistically named Office o f Strategic Planning and Acquisition was still a bit hazy, but the botto m line was that the government was moving to what politicians politel y called "a more surgical approach."

Apparently, they'd finally come to the rather obvious conclusion tha t the U
. S
. couldn't go to war with every country that hated it or wa s starting a nuclear weapons program, and this was their solution.

Matt Egan had been recommended for the job as Hillel Strand's numbe r two at OSPA and during his interview, Darren Crenshaw, the new directo r of Homeland Security, had described the program as being based on a Mossad-type model. Egan had assumed that his response to tha t characterization essentially, "Yeah, and look how well it's worked ou t for the Israelis" would quickly end his candidacy. It turned out tha t the opposite was true. General Crenshaw was looking for someone to b e a voice of reason in what was becoming an increasingly paranoid an d reactionary choir.

"I think it would be best if we stayed away from al Fayed."

Not surprisingly, Strand slammed the file down on his desk. "What ar e we getting paid for here, Matt? I'll tell you: To form a team that ca n get things done. Not to shit can every possible candidate." H
e pointed to the folders stacked on his desk. "These are the men we hav e available. We need at least eight. So far we have zero."

OSPA had access to current and former Special Forces operatives fro m the various branches of the military but, even with that kind of talen t available, it was a fairly delicate piece of staffing. This was mad e even more difficult by the fact that Strand was a political appointe e with no field experience and an apparent inability to face th e complexities of creating this team.

"A few years back he was on his way to his extraction point afte r completing "

"I read the file, Matt. He let himself get involved in some stree t scuffle and got shot."

Egan nodded slowly. "He almost died, Hillel. Actually, it's a miracl e he didn't. A radical Muslim man found him, took him home, and save d his life. It took us six months to find him and get him out."

"So you're saying, what? He's gone native? Some guy helps him out an d now he's a terrorist sympathizer?"

Egan considered just saying yes and being done with it, but he didn'
t want to risk the possibility that something negative might then fin d its way into al Fayed's file. "Come on. You read what happened. Whe n we got him back to the States we found out he had a bullet lodged nex t to his spine. There was a doctor in California who thought he coul d get it out but the procedure was expensive and experimental. Becaus e the doctor was using a new technique, the surgery didn't fit onto an y of the government's forms. So they just decided it wasn't covered. Th e bullet's going to paralyze him someday, Hillel, and we didn't lift a finger to help him. I think it's fair to say that when he walked awa y from us he didn't do it with a lot of warm feelings."

Strand sat thoughtfully for a moment, then opened the file and bega n paraphrasing from it. "Born to a first-generation Arab Christia n family in New York. He looks Arab and his Arabic is near perfect h e has no problem passing. No siblings. Parents dead. Unmarried, n o relatives in the U
. S
. He left the Navy to work for the CIA." Stran d looked up for a moment. "Recruited by you personally."

"That might as well have been a thousand years ago," Egan responded.

"I did some checking into this one. Currently, he has no real job. N
o money. No friends. Things haven't been going so well for our Mr. a l Fayed. Maybe he's ready to come back into the fold?"

"Look, Hillel... I knew this guy for years actually, he was one of m y best friends. Trust me when I tell you this is a dead end. Eve n before we screwed him over he was starting to put together this weir d mishmash of history, politics, and Darwin in his head.. .. Let's jus t say that he was on his way out one way or another. Besides, he'
s injured to the point that he really isn't qualified anymore."

"I'm not sure I like the defeatist attitude you're adopting, Matt. Yo u seem to be focused on 'why' instead of 'how." If there's anythin g we're learning from this process it's that no candidate's perfect. Bu t al Fayed is goddamn close. There are no other guys like this anywher e right now. We're looking at people with Arab backgrounds, but we'r e years from having anybody like this. Other than al Fayed, we don'
t have a single candidate who can move around unnoticed in an Ara b country. This guy could walk in here and be operational in a week. No t to mention how useful he could be in a training capacity."

"Hillel "

"What? You know the position I'm in. Those sons of bitches i n Congress are coming down on the intelligence community for not takin g chances but we know goddamn well that what they really mean is tha t they want us to take risks and win every time. If things get screwe d up, then they're going to be falling all over themselves to be the one s who nail us to the cross. We need to have the best and as I see it , even with his drawbacks, al Fayed is head and shoulders above anyon e else."

"But "

Strand waved his hand for silence. "I don't want to hear the reason s we can't have him, Matt. What I want to hear is a way we can hav e him."

Chapter
Two.

The house was warped and bowed enough that if it was painted in brigh t primary colors instead of peeling gray, it would look like a carniva l fun-house. It was situated about two hours from Washington, D
. C
." i n the center of a five-acre lot strewn with mature trees and jagge d boulders. Al Fayed had apparently been renting the property for almos t a year and was currently two months behind in his payments.

Egan eased off the dirt driveway about fifty yards from the house an d stepped from the car, looking out over the property. To the right o f the house was a large metal building that leaned a bit less radicall y but that was rusted in a pattern that made it look like someone ha d dumped brown paint over the edges of the roof. In front, and onl y slightly less rusted, was an old car resting on blocks fashioned fro m rotting logs. A Thunderbird was Egan's best guess, though hi s knowledge of classic cars was spotty at best. The little he did kno w had come from al Fayed who, after a few beers, used to go on about the m for hours.

"Are we just going to stand here?" Strand said, leaning over the roo f of the car and slapping a palm down on it.

Not if running away is an option, Egan thought as he forced himsel f forward through the patchwork of dirt, gravel, and weeds that covere d the ground. Strand came up alongside and frowned as he found himsel f forced to match Egan's unnaturally slow gait. On some level, h e probably knew that this wasn't a great idea and he wasn't anxious t o take point.

Egan slowed even more as they passed by the old car, examining th e graceful lines barely visible beneath the toll time and weather ha d taken. It was hard not to see it as another one of al Fayed's dream s that hadn't quite worked out.

The man who stepped out onto the porch didn't seem familiar at first.

His black hair was held back in a haphazard ponytail that hinted a t going well down his broad back. His arms and shoulders were thick an d powerful looking but lacked definition and gave him a beefy, almos t clumsy, look. That slight softness continued in his face, rounding i t out and smoothing the lines in the dark skin around his eyes.

Egan stopped a good fifteen feet from the house and Strand followe d suit.

"Hello, Fade."

The nickname had been bestowed by his teammates years ago based, it wa s said, on his ability to disappear into the background and slit you r throat. More likely it was because Salam al Fayed wasn't the name o f someone your average SEAL wanted watching his back. Either way, it ha d stuck.