Foreign Influence

Together they moved into the living room and secured it, making sure no one was lurking beyond the apartment’s front door. Then and only then did they tend to the hostages.

Their chairs had been duct-taped in a sort of circle and the men to them. Harvath removed their hoods and the hostages wildly gestured with their chins at their chests.

He opened the shirt of the man nearest him and instantly understood. He didn’t need to see vests on the other two to know that they had them as well.

“Everyone relax. We’re going to get you out of here.”

Instead of calming down, the man who Harvath was standing in front of became even more agitated. He was gesturing even more urgently, but not at the vest anymore. He seemed to be nodding toward the corner of the room. Harvath turned and looked behind, but couldn’t understand what the man was trying to tell him.

When Harvath couldn’t figure it out, the man became even more impatient. His eyes were wide and he was yelling from behind the layers of duct tape that had been wrapped around his head and over his mouth.

“Don’t move,” Harvath said as he pulled out his knife. The man didn’t listen and Harvath had to sling his weapon and grab the man’s face as he carefully made an incision along the left side of the tape.

Peeling enough of it away to get a good grip, he then pulled back-hard.

“The camera!” John Vaughan shouted as the tape came free. “There’s a camera between the books! The vests are triggered to remote detonate!”

It took Harvath a second but he found the camera and spun it so it faced the wall.

When he turned back around, Casey had opened the shirts of the other men, revealing their explosive vests.

“Get out of here, before they detonate!” said Vaughan.

“Easy,” replied Harvath. “The men who brought you here drove off in their truck. That’s a wireless camera with a limited range. If somebody was watching us, they would have already detonated.”

“I’m Sergeant John Vaughan with the Chicago Police. There’s going to be a terrorist attack.”

“We know,” said Casey as she examined the man’s vest with her flashlight, “but I need you to be still for a minute. Don’t talk, okay?”

Vaughan fell silent as she examined his vest and then looked under and behind his chair.

“Are you looking for the trigger?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“There’s something in the small of my back. I think it’s a cell phone.”

Casey put her flashlight between her teeth, bent down, and very carefully slid one of her hands behind the police officer. “I feel it.”

“Can you disarm it?” Harvath asked.

“I won’t know till we get him out of the chair and I see it.” Straightening back up, she looked at Vaughan and said, “There’s something called a mercury switch. The way it works is-”

“I’m a Marine. I was in Iraq,” interrupted the policeman. “I know what a mercury switch is.”

“I’m trying to figure out if moving you will trigger this vest.”

“We got the crap jostled out of us in those crates. Trust me, there’s no mercury switch.”

“So all they did was tape you to the chairs?”

“Yes,” said Vaughan.

Casey took out her knife. “Let’s cut him loose.”

Once Vaughan was free, Harvath helped him stand, while Casey studied his vest. “It’s similar to the mechanism they used in London; probably how the vests in Amsterdam were set up.”

“Who are you?” asked Vaughan.

“That’s not important,” said Harvath.

“Don’t worry,” added Casey. “I know what I’m doing.”

“Thank God, because-”

“Done,” she replied, having disco

“What?”

Casey raised her finger to her lips for him to be quiet as she studied the buckles on the vest. She then put the flashlight back in her mouth and carefully unfastened them.

“Now very slowly,” she ordered, nodding at Harvath to grab the opposite side of the vest, “we’re going to lift up and I want you to slide out of it. If you feel even the slightest tug, a snag, even if you think you’re imagining it, I want you to freeze. Okay?”

“Okay,” said Vaughan.

“Good. Now on three and remember, slowly. Here we go. One. Two. Three.”

The policeman slowly slid out of the vest and backed away from it. Harvath then took it from Casey and held it up for her to examine.

Her eyes narrowed as she moved in to look at something. “What the heck is this?”

“What did you find?” asked Harvath.

“I’ll tell you after we look at the other two vests. Let’s hurry up.”

CHAPTER 69

Everything went okay?” asked Jarrah when Rashid returned.

“No problems,” he replied. “Everything is in place.”

“And Mohammed Nasiri?”

“Mohammed is ready, as are the rest of our brothers. He told me to thank you and that he is sorry for any trouble he may have caused.”

Jarrah smiled and looked up at the two men behind Rashid. “You have done very well. Go and prepare yourselves. We will pray together shortly.”

When the two men had left, Marwan motioned for his protégé to sit with him. “Come and take tea with me.”

“I think caffeine is probably the last thing I need right now,” said Rashid as he sat down and dried his palms on his thighs. He looked at the empty tables where the suicide vests had been constructed and the reloading equipment he had used to build his special ammunition. “Did you think about what I asked?”

“I did.”

“And?”

“And how are your testicles, from where the woman kicked you?”

“For the tenth time, Marwan, I’m fine. And in case I didn’t make myself clear the other nine times I said it, if you ever want something that stupid done again, you can do it yourself.”

Jarrah pointed at the closed circuit television set near him. “We have it recorded on video, if you would like to watch.”

“Have you been replaying it for everyone? Is that what you’ve been doing? You think that’s fu

“She kicks hard, like a donkey,” the man said with a chuckle. It took him a minute to compose himself. When he had, he reached into his pocket and set a pill bottle on the table. “Here.”

Rashid picked it up and read the label. “Valium? You think I’ve got some sort of an anxiety disorder?”

“It has nothing to do with a disorder. It will help you to relax. Trust me, you need it.”

“The hell I do.”

“There’s two left. Take them.”

“No. And what do you mean there’s two left? What happened to the rest of them?”

“I gave them to the Shahid.”

“Without asking me?”

“I don’t need your permission, Shahab.”

“What about your shooters? Did you give them Valium too?”

“Of course not. They’ve been given amphetamines.”

Rashid shook his head. “Just like Mumbai.”

“Have faith in Allah, Shahab. Today we will strike a mighty blow for Islam, Insha’Allah.”

Rashid leaned forward and poured two glasses of tea. “I guess you’re right. We have worked very hard for this day.”

“Yes, we have,” said Jarrah, accepting his glass and setting it down to cool.

They were quiet for several moments, each man pondering what was soon to happen. It was Marwan who eventually broke the silence. “I want you to know something.”

“What’s that?”

“I want you to know that I believe in you.”

“Let’s not go down this road again, Marwan. Okay?” said Rashid. “I’ve got enough on my mind already.”

The man raised his hand. “I’m telling you the truth. Sheik Aleem has gone to Los Angeles to prepare the next attack. He wants you to go to New York.”

“Are you serious?”

Marwan smiled. “Yes.”

Rashid thought about that. “You know after today, it’s going to be nearly impossible to pull off the same kind of attack.”

“With Allah’s help, nothing is impossible,” replied Jarrah, “but Sheik Aleem and I agree with you, which is why the next attacks have been designed to be different.”