Cold Snap (50 page)

Hugging the bushes lining the lane, they
moved forward slowly. They heard shouting. Hoping the men inside
were distracted, Ari picked up the pace.

"Who else did you call?"

Ari recognized the voice of Sayid Mohammed
Al-Rafa'ee. He also recognized the sound of a harsh slap.

"No one!" came an unfamiliar voice.

"You called Lawson, didn't you? You set up a
trap!"

Slap!

Ari reached the house, but one glance at the
old boards of the porch floor warned him against trying to look
through the front window. He was trying to catch Abu Jasim's
attention when an abrupt shout from his right stripped his
attention. He whirled to find a gun pointed through the bushes.

"Fuck!" Ahmad ran forward, gun raised,
slipped on a patch of ice, dropped straight on his ass. The gun in
the bushes shifted in his direction and Ahmad, sitting up, fired a
single shot. A man stumbled forward, shaking some dead leaves onto
the ground. He tried to raise his gun again then sat down and
watched the blood coming out of his chest.

Ari and Abu Jasim dropped when the house
windows exploded outwards, bullets zizzing inches above them. Abu
Jasim rolled to his side and took aim.

"No!" Ari shouted. "Hostage!"

"Fuck him!" Abu Jasim shouted back, obviously
inured to innocent human shields. But something in the back of his
mind cautioned him that the colonel must be obeyed, even if only
partially, and he shifted his aim to the front door.

The explosion deafened the men and roused
every crow in the vicinity. Ari rolled to the side and saw black
birds scattering frantically in the air. Then he caught a bizarre
image of Ahmad and the dying terrorist, both seated, both oblivious
to the explosion...and both crying. Ari jumped up and grabbed Ahmad
by the coat collar, dragging him into the bushes.

"Oh..." Ahmad sobbed. "Oh..."

Ari slapped him. "Stay alive!"

He turned and saw, to his horror, one, two,
three, four men racing out from behind the house. Obviously, the
terrorists had not been completely abandoned by the Chaldeans. He
shouted a warning and Abu Jasim squirmed sideways on his thick
stomach. One of the men took aim at Abu Jasim with an M-16 and Ari
raised his Glock. Abu Jasim spotted something Ari hadn't and
frantically cried, "His head!"

Ari tried to heed but the man was squeezing
the trigger. Ari's bullet caught him in the collarbone. The M-16
dropped as the man fell. Abu Jasim studied him with a brief,
horrified look. He leapt up and ran at Ari.

"What—"

Before Ari could ask more, Abu Jasim was
dropping on him and Ahmad like a maniacal bull. Ari caught a
glimpse of the wounded man pulling something at his chest.

He had always found suicide bombers
revolting. One of the worst images that revolved in his mind was of
a small mountain of Yemeni soldiers slain when a comrade
approached, smiled, called them to gather round, and pulled the
cord. All of those men who still had faces had died with expectant
grins.

He would not die with a smile. He would die
oofing and woofing from the great weight of this Saddam Hussein
lookalike crushing the wind out of him. The blast tossed them end
over end, into and beyond the boxwoods. It sliced off the head of
the man Ahmad had wounded and shortened the bushes by several
inches. When the roar and flash subsided, Ari found a corn husk in
his mouth. And he was alive to enjoy it.

Abu Jasim had been flung to the side. He was
moaning, grabbing behind him. Ari turned him over and noted his
peppered ass.

"It's an improvement."

Ignoring Abu Jasim's oaths, he looked around
for Ahmad. Annoyingly enough, he was again sitting up, and again
crying. After giving him another slap, Ari spent a moment counting
his luck. Because the Chaldean had been on his back, most of the
blast had been directed skyward. There was a dreary smudge where
his body had been. Ari tried not to think that much of the man's
personal autopsy lay in pieces on his new coat.

His phone was vibrating. Ari recognized Ben's
number, but when he answered he could barely hear through his
concussed ears. He could just make out Ben's voice, but not his
words.

"I'm temporarily half-deaf," he said. "Roll
down your window and follow the sounds of devastation."

He crouched, suddenly realizing he had spoken
too loudly. Would he be able to hear gunshots? Hopefully, the
opposition would be as disoriented as he was. He saw movement
beyond the narrow screen of bushes and hustled back to Abu Jasim,
who had rolled onto his side and was trying to instruct Ahmad on
how to use the grenade launcher. Ari gestured him into silence and
pointed towards the lane. Nodding, his face twisted in pain, Abu
Jasim began pulling himself around to face the bushes. With a gruff
nudge from Ari, Ahmad rose and helped turn his uncle, dragging him
into the gray tangle of roots that rumpled the ground under the
bushes. Ahmad had dropped his gun. Ari took Abu Jasim's Walther P99
from under his coat and put it in his hand. Sweeping his arm
towards the small turnaround in front of the house, he let Abu
Jasim know he was to start shooting anyone who came that way. The
wounded man held up one, then two fingers. Ari held up four, then
shrugged. He didn't know how many were left.

His phone vibrated. Looking at it, he saw
Lawson's number on the display. Opening it, he thought he heard a
faint whisper.

"Be prepared," Ari said in what he hoped was
a low voice. "At least one of them was wearing a suicide vest. We
can't join you just yet."

He pocketed the phone and gave Ahmad a look
of reassurance, though he was less than reassured by the young
man's shaking limbs. When he turned to move towards the house,
Ahmad grabbed his arm. Ari frowned his admonishment. Taking a deep
breath, Ahmad reached up and removed something from the side of
Ari's head. He gaped at the strip of flesh for the briefest moment
before hastily tossing it aside. Ari patted him on the shoulder,
then nodded towards the side of the house.

Using the boxwoods to screen their movement,
Ari drew up behind a propane tank propped against the wall. He
raised his eyes over a window sill and tried to sort out the chaos
Abu Jasim's grenade had made in the front room. He saw two legs
tipped up in the air, crooked over a fallen chair. He could not see
the rest of the man, but several jerks of the feet told Ari he was
still alive. There was movement at the far end of the smoke-hazy
room and Ari ducked. He tugged on Ahmad's jacket and cocked his
head towards the back.

A crow on the telephone wire overhead began
cawing. Ari was gratified that his hearing was returning, but
bothered by the unwanted attention. He waved violently at the bird,
which leaned down and screeched.

Reaching the back door, Ari stood Ahmad to
the side, then stretched out and turned the knob. He was lifting
himself up the two narrow steps when an automatic pistol barrel
jutted out from the entrance. Ari dodged sideways off the steps and
the man followed. Then he spotted Ahmad and half turned away.
Bursting forward, Ari whipped his knuckles into the man's side. The
man gave a small 'woof', whirled back on Ari and brought a large
fist down on his forearm. Ari's gun flew up.

Ahmad took aim but was afraid of hitting Ari.
He bent down and bulled forward, catching the man in the small of
his back. They both stumbled forward into Ari and all three fell to
the ground.

Ari found the man's head conveniently next to
his own and jabbed at his eyes. The man swore and dropped his gun
when he raised his hands in defense. He threw Ahmad back as he
rolled off, giving Ari a vicious plug in the ribs as his knees hit
the ground. Ari tried to roll away but found his legs tangled
against the house wall. As he pushed up on his hands he saw the
man's arm cocked. Guessing the man's target, his windpipe
puckered.

Suddenly, the man's face went tight as he
roared in pain. He jerked sideways, and Ari could see Ahmad with
his teeth well-set in the man's ankle. As the man kicked him off,
Ari regained his feet and swung his foot at his head. He connected
solidly, but it didn't seem to faze the oversized Chaldean, who
hauled himself up and struck out at Ari's crotch. Ari turned and
caught the blow in the hip.

"Peasant!" he cried out in pain, falling
against the house.

The man was reaching down for his Uzi when
something rose above his head and thunked down hard. He stood up,
staggering backwards. Fighting the pain in his hip, Ari pushed off
the wall and gave him a solid kidney punch. The man reversed
direction, was lurching forward when Ahmad whacked him in the head
again with an old board he had found near the house foundation. The
board snapped in two and the man continued forward, swearing. The
lithe Ahmad slipped out of range as he frantically searched for
another board. Everyone's gun was on the ground at the man's feet.
A smug grin appeared under the man's bloodied head as he realized
this. He also realized that if he bent down to get one of them he
would open himself to attack from two directions.

Ahmad began pulling at a pipe used to hold up
a clothesline. The man turned to Ari. Keeping his head turned up,
watching for any sudden movement, he bent his knees and groped in
the dirt. He reminded Ari of the raccoon he had encountered at
Manchester Docks. Ari darted forward, but suddenly the Walther was
in the man's hand, and it was pointed at his head.

There was a distant snap, like a metallic
rubber band stretched to the limit. The man pulled a face and began
turning, as though to see who had hit him. Then he felt a deadly
warmth and reached up to find a gush of blood. He dropped to his
knees.

Ahmad was still straining at the clothesline
pipe.

"Stop that!" Ari hissed, pocketing his Glock
and picking up the Uzi.

Ahmad glanced up and saw the man on the
ground, still propped on his knees.

"What's wrong with him?" he asked.

"He's dead," Ari answered.

"Why doesn't he fall over?"

"He's stubborn."

"But how—?"

"Ben has arrived."

Ahmad turned in every direction. "Where?"

"Probably in those trees over there." Ari had
loaned Ben his M40 Sniper Rifle, with an effective range of 900
meters.

"Now don't you be stubborn, too. Stop playing
with that pipe and get your gun."

All of this was whispered as lowly as Ari and
Ahmad could manage, but anyone just inside the door would have
heard them. Ari watched carefully, saw no shadows, and approached
once more.

There was no one else in the back room. The
smell of scorched wood from Abu Jasim's grenade wafted down the
short, narrow hall. After doorways, Ari liked hallways the least.
He had nothing but sympathy for GI's sliding their way through the
corridors of a typical Iraqi home. He also had sympathy for the
people in those homes, which put him in a moral quandary.

Midway up the hall, Ari heard a mewling noise
from behind a closed door. A kitten in distress? He reached for the
knob, but before his mind registered the act his gun had come up
and he fired. The Uzi spit three rounds. The silhouette in the
front room fired at the same instant. A vicious, whizzing insect
tried to nip Ari's ear as the shadow yelled and fell back. Ari
whirled around.

"Ahmad?"

"I'm all right," said the young man, and
burst in to tears. Ari turned back front and edged forward. He
found Mohammed on the floor, gasping, reaching for his machine
pistol. Ari stepped forward, picked up the gun, and put it in his
large pocket. His coat was getting heavy.

"Growing your beard back?" Ari said. He
kicked the man's wounded shoulder, binding him with pain for a few
minutes and leaving him time to look closely at the prisoner.

The chair Ethan Wareness had been bound to
was knocked backwards by the grenade. It was impossible to
differentiate between the wounds of the beating and those from the
blast, but his eyes were open. Ari gave him a cursory inspection,
then gripped the back of the chair and hauled it up.

"Mr. Slimewad, we finally meet," said
Ari.

"What?" said Ethan dazedly.

"I have grave suspicions about you," Ari
said, reaching for his vibrating phone. "But I think we'll have to
wait to discuss them."

"I've got two and maybe three towelheads
moving in the bushes beside the road," came Lawson's voice on the
phone. "Coming my way."

"I'll be there," said Ari. He went back down
the hall and grabbed Ahmad. "Have you stopped your weeping?"

Ahmad gave him a belligerent look. "Hey,
I—"

"Come."

He followed Ari into the front room. Ari
pointed at Mohammed. "If that one moves, shoot him." He pointed at
Ethan. "If that one talks, shoot him." He lifted his phone and
called Ben.

"Can you see men moving in the field towards
the road?"

"I saw them," came a voice strained by
effort. "The house is in the way. I'm switching base."

"Don't forget, Lawson is on the other side of
the bushes. Make sure of your target."

"Okay, I'll tell them."

"Tell who?"

"Later," said Ben, the word fraught with
effort. He rang off.

Stepping over the blasted remains of the
front door, Ari surveyed the turnaround, saw no one and took a deep
breath. He burst out of the house at full tilt, sprinting up the
driveway thirty yards before digging his heels in the gravel just
out of sight of Bruce Turner's pickup. There was an irritable
protest overhead. Turning his eyes briefly upward, he saw that the
crow had taken up station in a bare tree by the lane. It leaned in
Ari's direction, cawing loudly. Certainly, it was in the pay of the
Chaldeans, Ari thought.

He pushed forward carefully. If a gunfight
broke out, Lawson would be shooting in this direction. And Ari
wasn't sure where Lawson had placed himself. He assumed the
detective would stay by Turner's truck, where he could intercept
anyone returning to the terrorists' cargo van—or anyone who took it
into his head to hotwire the Sprinter. But he would move back if
the Chaldeans outflanked him, knowing how easily they could take
him from behind.