“I’m here. Can you get us out?”
A long pause. “We can’t get anyone into the Orchid District, but if you can get out… I’ll see what I can do to arrange transport. But—our sources say the Immari plan is to evacuate southern Spain late tonight, the survivors at least.”
Kate glanced out the glass door. The sun had almost risen now. It was going to be a long day.
“I’ll call you back. Be ready.”
CHAPTER 39
Immari Operations Base at Ceuta
Northern Morocco
David awoke to the second-loudest alarm he’d ever heard in his life. The loudest alarm had been in Langley, Virginia, in 2003: an airhorn held at his head, prompting him to jump out of bed, half-naked. His CIA training handlers had hauled him out of the barracks, still half-naked, and dumped him in the woods of northern Virginia.
“There are six snipers in these woods. You have ’til dusk to reach the barracks. Their bullets carry paint, and if any is on you, we don’t want you.”
They had thrown him out, the van still rolling, and he had seen them again as the sun set behind the one-story barracks building.
Since that evening, he had never slept in his underwear again, save for that single time, a slight oversight, a moment of weakness, when he let his guard down in Gibraltar, with Kate.
Now a flood of footsteps echoed through the door. He took up position in the opposite corner of the room, diagonal from the door, ready to assault anyone who entered. Had Rukin found out? Bugged the room? He would have heard everything.
The door clicked open, but it didn’t swing. Two black hands peeked out from the door, held straight out, showing that they were empty. The owner called through the rush of footfalls behind him. “Kamau.”
“Step inside. Then close the door,” David said from his crouching position, then quickly, silently, on bare feet, stepped to the other corner of the room, in the door’s blind spot.
Kamau entered the room and pushed the door closed behind him. He instantly focused on the corner David’s voice had come from, then spun to the other corner, facing David.
“We’re under attack,” he said.
“By whom?”
“We don’t know. The major has asked for you.”
David followed Kamau into the hall, which was awash with men, all rushing to their positions, paying no mind to David and Kamau.
Outside the residential wing, the inner courtyard of the citadel buzzed with activity. David wanted to stop, to make a tactical assessment, but Kamau pressed on, jogging toward a high tower.
They raced up the rickety iron staircase, and Kamau grabbed David’s arm just before the last landing. “They don’t know what’s going on either. He’s testing you.”
David nodded and followed Kamau into the command center. It exceeded David’s wildest expectations. It had eight sides; every other wall was filled with a floor-to-ceiling window that allowed a clear view of each direction of the camp. The other four walls held computer screens that showed maps, charts, and readouts David couldn’t begin to understand.
The interior of the room looked like the bridge of the starship Enterprise—from the original series. At the center, two technicians hunched over tables and computer screens. A single chair was set off from them, and the major occupied it, as if he were Captain Kirk directing a voyage to nowhere. “Deploy batteries four and five. Fire at will.” He spun around to David.
“You knew about this.”
“I didn’t. I don’t even know what this is.”
A technician spoke up. “The planes have dropped their payload.”
The major eyed David.
Out the side window, guns along the north wall rotated quickly and fired into the night.
The shots seemed to instantly connect, exploding in a cascade of midair explosions. The remains of the attack planes rained down into the water below.
“Seven targets, seven kills,” another technician said.
David marveled at the air defenses. He wasn’t well versed on surface-to-air defense systems, but what he had just seen was more advanced than anything he was aware of.
This base wouldn’t be taken from the air.
The tech that had fired the barrage of missiles punched his keyboard a few times and shook his head. “Radar’s clear. It was just one group.”
The major stood up and walked to the window. “I saw only seven explosions. Why didn’t anything hit us? Did the missiles miss?”
“They fell short, sir.”
Out the western window, a plume of water and light rose up.
“What the hell was that?!” Rukin demanded.
The techs worked their computers. Another man stood up and pointed to one of the screens. “I don’t think we were the target, sir. I think they deployed mines in the straits. A piece of one of the planes hit one of the mines as it sank, I assume.”