The Survivor (42 page)

Rapp glanced down at the badge, noting the name, and then hung it around his neck. “Let's go, Jack.”

They walked to a heavily guarded service entrance where Warch cut left and went around the metal detector. He lectured Rapp about some imaginary screwup loud enough that everyone understood they were together and angrily enough that no one dared interrupt. When they were out of earshot of the checkpoint, Warch lowered his voice and looked down at the ground to obscure his lips from anyone watching through a scope.

“We're in a shoot first, ask questions later environment, Mitch. With the terrorist shit storm going on in this country, Chutani's made it clear that this dinner is to go off without a hitch. If it doesn't, his security people and their families are going to end up in a hole somewhere. Every finger on every trigger is shaking as near as I can tell.”

“Where does that leave your guys?”

“We have a fairly free hand. The head of Chutani's security knows
that having us here can't do anything but help him. Best case he's got a bunch of extra guns. Worst case he's got a scapegoat.”

They entered the presidential palace through an unassuming door isolated from the pomp and circumstance of the main entrance. This time Warch greeted the Pakistani soldier manning the security station by name and asked after one of his children. Rapp was completely ignored.

They continued down a broad hallway, passing no fewer than five Pakistani security personnel and a man carrying a silver tray who looked suspiciously fit and alert. At the end of the corridor, they ducked into a room lined with monitors. The two men watching the various video feeds immediately stood. Warch thumbed toward the door. “Why don't you guys take a break.”

As they passed, Rapp began to suspect that Warch's initial protests had been just for show. The Americans seemed prepared for his arrival, and it was hard not to notice that all the security checkpoints had been manned by Pakistanis whom Warch was on friendly terms with.

When the men were gone and the door was closed, Rapp approached the largest of the monitors. It depicted a richly decorated room full of well-dressed people grazing on food arranged on a central table. Sunny Wicka was one of a small group that included Saad Chutani and his wife. More interesting, though, was Ahmed Taj, who appeared to be making an effort to stay close to Carl Ferris. The senator had a good-sized scotch in his hand and already looked drunk.

It was a match made in hell, Rapp knew. A foreign intelligence czar who wanted to take down the CIA and a megalomaniacal American senator with exactly the same goal. How deep was Ferris in this thing? Would it be worth putting the screws to him? Probably not. He was a moron and Taj would be smart enough to keep him in the dark. The Pakistani would just play on Ferris's ego and greed for power. He wore both on his sleeve.

Rapp recognized a few other members of Congress, but none were important or dangerous enough that he had bothered to remember their names. Warch's men were also in evidence, trying to blend into
the walls. No Pakistani security presence was obvious, but Rapp suspected he knew why.

“Are all the waitstaff ISI?”

“Yeah. It's driving that prick of a chef nuts. They've been training for a month but some of them still don't know a dessert fork from a hole in the ground.”

“When this thing hits the fan, get Sunny and her people out first.”

“When what hits the fan, Mitch?”

Rapp ignored the question. “Where's the dinner being served?”

Warch used a computer mouse to switch to a view of the dining room. The only people in it were a few kitchen staff and a man in a chef's uniform screaming at someone trying to straighten a listing ice sculpture.

“Is that Obaid Marri?”

Warch nodded. “The only person my guys are more afraid of than me. He hit a Black Stork with a frying pan for knocking over a flower display. Nearly cold-cocked the guy.”

“I'm surprised he got away with that.”

“Totally protected. I guess he's some kind of hot shit cook. Chutani loves him.”

Marri shoved the man working on the sculpture and then stalked toward a set of double doors. A moment later, he appeared on the monitor displaying video from the kitchen.

“I'd like an introduction.”

“To Marri? Trust me, you don't.” Warch glanced at his watch. “Look, Mitch, they're going to start seating people for dinner in less than two minutes. After that, you've got maybe another fifteen before the soup starts rolling out. Are you going to tell me what we're doing here?”

“Take me to Marri,” Rapp said. “I'll fill you in on the way.”

•  •  •

They entered the kitchen and Rapp stopped for a moment, flipping his ID badge to face his chest and surveying the tightly controlled order. Obaid Marri ran his kitchen like an African dictator and one of
his standing orders was that no waitstaff was allowed inside unless they were serving. That meant no ISI. With the exception of him and Warch, everyone in the room was a professional cook. And by the looks of them, they were all terrified of the man in charge. Only a few dared even a brief glance in their direction before returning to whatever they were chopping, stirring, or arranging.

No one but Marri spoke and he was too absorbed in doing just that to notice Rapp and Warch approaching from behind. Finally, he heard their footsteps and spun. He fell into a stunned silence for a moment before jabbing a chef's knife in their direction. “What are you doing in here? Get out! Do you hear me? Get out!”

That turned out to be enough for everyone to stop what they were doing and watch—a problem Rapp had anticipated. “Chef Marri? I'm Mitch Keller.”

“What? Why are you speaking to me? Why do I care who you are?”

“I'm Thomas Keller's brother,” Rapp said, using a name he'd pulled off the Internet on the way there. Apparently, Keller was one of America's top chefs.

Marri lowered the knife. “From The French Laundry?”

Rapp smiled and nodded. “He wanted me to send his compliments if I got a chance. He's planning a trip to Pakistan next year and was hoping to get a chance to meet you.”

Rapp extended his hand and Marri, still looking a bit confused, reached for it. With the fireworks over, the kitchen staff went back to concentrating on their tasks. So no one noticed when, instead of shaking hands, Rapp grabbed the chef's testicles and gave them a hard squeeze.

Marri doubled over, his breath coming out in a loud rush. Once again, all eyes were on them.

“Chef? Are you all right?” Rapp said, feigning concern. He slid an arm beneath Marri's and pulled him upright. The man was trying to speak but, as planned, the pain and surprise prevented it.

“It's the heat,” Warch said to the staff as Rapp led the man to a walk-in refrigerator. “He'll be fine. Just keep doing what you're doing. We have to stay on schedule.”

It was one of the drawbacks to treating your staff like slaves, Rapp reflected. None had the courage to question or take charge. In the absence of Marri screaming orders, they'd listen to anyone with a plan and an authoritative manner.

Warch rushed ahead and opened the thick metal door, following Rapp and Marri inside before pulling it closed.

“Are you . . .” the chef managed to get out. “Are you insane? Do you know who I am? President Chutani—”

Rapp gave the man an open-handed slap to the face that was hard enough to knock him to the floor.

“Mitch . . .” Warch cautioned.

“If you can't handle this, Jack, get out.”

“I'd just like to avoid getting shot or thrown in jail.”

Marri raised his arms defensively and Rapp knocked them out of the way before grabbing the front of his coat. “We know all about your plans with Taj.”

“What? You're crazy!” Marri looked up at Warch. “Get him off me. I don't know what he's talking about. I don't even know Ahmed Taj! I work for the president.”

“Really? Because I hear that you grew up in the same town. That you both attended a madrassa financed by Taj's father. Not too many people know that, though, do they? Because the place burned to the ground and the administrators are all dead.”

“It isn't true! Who told you this?”

“Kabir Gadai.”

The fear in his eyes grew but he repeated his protest, this time even more emphatically.

Men like him were all the same. They became accustomed to their position of unshakable authority and it made them prone to panic when it slipped away.

“Where's the poison?”

“Poison? I—”

Rapp clamped a hand around the man's throat, silencing him while he searched through the pockets of his chef's jacket. It was possible the vial could be hidden in the kitchen but it seemed unlikely. Too easy for someone to stumble upon it.

There was a hesitant knock on the refrigerator door and Warch opened it a crack.

Rapp heard a quiet voice and he tightened his grip on Marri's throat.

“Is the chef all right?”

“He's fine,” Warch said in a reassuring tone. “The heat of the kitchen got to him but he's feeling better. He'll be back out in a moment.”

By the time he pushed the refrigerator door closed again, Rapp was finished with his search. He'd come up empty.

“Please tell me your informant didn't lie to you,” Warch said.

“Shut up, Jack.”

“Come on, Mitch. This guy's famous all over the world and Chutani thinks the sun shines out of his ass. You'll walk away but I'm screwed. I'm paying for grandkids in private school and I've got a daughter getting married next month.”

Rapp was convinced that Gadai had been telling the truth and that the hyperventilating man on the floor was the one lying. But with no way to prove it and time running out, he was left with only one option. To walk into the dining room and put a bullet in Taj's head with half the world watching.

“Get off me!” Marri said, swinging a fist in what passed for a weak right cross. Rapp blocked it easily, and when he did, something caught his eye. The edge of the chef's thumbnail had been filed to a sharp point. Rapp examined it for a moment and then dropped a knee into the man's chest.

“Mitch!” Warch said from behind him. “This has to stop. It's time for you and me to get out of here before anyone finds out this happened.”

Rapp pushed up the left sleeve on Marri's chef's coat. He knew he was onto something when the man suddenly found the strength to start thrashing. Rapp rammed the back of his head into the concrete hard enough to daze him but not hard enough to knock him out. The groan that followed came from Warch, not Marri.

Rapp finally found what he was looking for on the underside of the man's forearm. The tiny blister pack was completely invisible, colored to perfectly match Marri's skin and glued down seamlessly. The only way he could tell it was there was the soft, fluid feel.

“Got it,” Rapp said. “On his arm.”

Warch let out a long breath. “Thank God.”

When the effects of his head hitting the floor faded, Marri started to whimper.

“Everything stays the same,” Rapp said, dragging him to his feet. “Except you put that in Taj's food instead of Chutani's.”

“I won't. Ahmed Taj is a great man. He will create a new Pakistan that will—”

Rapp had heard enough of this Muslim superpower bullshit from Gadai and his patience was finished. The dossier on Marri had been thrown together at the last minute from public domain information but it didn't paint a picture of a man with any real convictions. He was neither a religious fundamentalist nor a political radical. No, Marri was just a pathetic little man looking to better his social status. He had no desire to martyr himself.

Rapp glanced back at the slabs of meat hanging near the rear of the refrigerator. Finding an empty hook, he grabbed Marri with both hands and began driving him back. When they were less than three feet from the steel spike, he lifted the chef off his feet.

“Stop!”

Marri's scream was loud enough that it would have been heard throughout the palace if they hadn't been closed up in the refrigerator. Rapp didn't stop, though. He accelerated. Marri's back was only inches from the hook when Rapp pulled right and slammed him into a wall stained with dried blood.

The man was blubbering now and his legs wouldn't support him. When he crumpled to the ground, Rapp went with him, grabbing the back of his hair and forcing him to meet his gaze. “Decision time, Obaid. I leave you here on a hook or you do exactly what I tell you.”

“I'll . . .” he stammered.

“You'll what?”

“I'll do it.”

Rapp pulled the man to his feet and shoved him toward the door. Marri stumbled but Warch caught him. He straightened the man's coat and wiped away the tears that had started to flow down his soft cheeks. “Stay calm, Chef. It'll all be over in a few minutes.”

R
APP
kept his eyes locked on Obaid Marri.

The red marks on this throat and right cheek were still visible and he was sweating profusely, but those things were plausibly explained by the heatstroke story. If the kitchen crew had any curiosity about what happened in that refrigerator or why there was a security man standing watch over the kitchen, they didn't show it.

Marri was working on a bowl of soup, carefully arranging sprigs of cilantro before tapping chili powder artistically over the top.

“Secretary of State Wicka,” he said to the server waiting obediently at the end of his worktable. The man took it and hurried toward the door. Despite actually being an ISI operative, he passed by without giving Rapp so much as a glance. Such was the power of Chef Obaid Marri to beat down anyone in his presence.

He continued to personally adorn the dishes of the most important guests, prioritizing them based on the complex protocols that politicians were so obsessed with. While Rapp spent his time being shot at in places without electricity or running water, the world's elected officials filled their days worrying about who got the shiniest fork.