Tursunov brushed his question aside. “How did you find this chemist?”
“Brother, if you think that—”
“Answer my question.”
“I find it very insulting—” Abdel began, but the Tajik cut him off again.
Tursunov was leaving nothing to chance. He had fought alongside Abdel’s brother, but that was a lot different from having gone into battle with Abdel.
The ISIS hierarchy had selected the Moroccan to oversee operations in France. He hadn’t been Tursunov’s pick. Organizations, no matter how noble or devout, made mistakes. He, on the other hand, survived by avoiding them.
“Answer my question,” he repeated.
The Moroccan looked at him. He was disappointed by his distrust. Finally, he said, “He is my nephew.”
Tursunov had been right to question him, but it was obvious the man was insulted.
Before he could say anything, Abdel added, “You bled with his father in Syria.”
The Tajik was confused. “Aziz?”
Abdel nodded. “Yes. Your chemist is the son of a lion.”
“I don’t understand. He never spoke of a son. Only a wife and daughter in Marrakesh.”
The Moroccan poured them each another glass of tea. As he did, he recounted his brother’s story. “The boy is from an earlier marriage. It was not a good match. His wife, Safaa, was beautiful, but not a good Muslim. Aziz was devout. He was also strict and they often fought.
“Much of her family lived in France. One year, she took her son for a visit and never returned home.
“She divorced Aziz from abroad, renounced her Moroccan passport, and took full French citizenship.
“Eventually, Aziz remarried. His new wife gave birth to a daughter and soon thereafter he took up arms for the jihad.”
“Did he ever see the boy again?” Tursunov asked.
“He made only one visit to France. Its decadence repulsed him, and Safaa’s family treated him quite badly.”
The Tajik could only imagine what the experience had been like for Aziz. It was understandable that the man would keep such an embarrassing chapter of his life hidden. “How did you become connected with the boy?” he asked.
“He found me. Years ago, after he had moved to Paris and had begun his university studies, he walked into this very shop. For a long time, he had wanted to reconnect with his father’s side of the family, but his mother had forbidden it.”
“And you encouraged him, as a good and pious Muslim, to pursue jihad?”
“No,” Abel replied. “As a good and pious Muslim, he came to that decision on his own. My job was to direct him. Younes is a smart, talented young man. He better serves our cause through his mind. Picking up a rifle or strapping on a suicide vest would be an insult to Allah and the gifts He has bestowed upon him. I merely made these truths clear.”
“I see,” said Tursunov, still concerned about the surveillance of the mosque and Abdel’s connection to the chemist. “Has your nephew been involved in any previous operations?”
“None.”
“How certain are you?”
“I am positive.”
“What about his Internet searches? The videos he watches online? The message boards and the chat rooms he visits?” the Tajik asked.
“I have trained the boy myself,” the Moroccan replied. “I would trust him with my life.”
Tursunov paused and then said, “Good. Because you are about to trust him with all of our lives.”
CHAPTER 22
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* * *
RIQDALIN, LIBYA
Diverting the Reaper north of Al Jmail, they found Umar Ali Halim’s compound right where the SAT phone salesman had said it would be.
Set in the barren desert outside Riqdalin, the only glimpses of vegetation came from humble, family-owned farms with neat rows of irrigated agriculture.
Locals grew modest quantities of dates, almonds, grapes, watermelons, olives, and tomatoes—but only enough to live on. There wasn’t enough arable land or fresh water for much else.
As the drone circled above, it fed back a series of images. Double doors, large enough to drive a truck through, secured the entrance. A ten-foot-high wall surrounded the rectangular compound. There was a main house, a guesthouse of some sort, what appeared to be a barn, a handful of vehicles under a sun shade, and a smaller structure without windows.
Stacked stones framed two outdoor animal pens. A handful of men milled about carrying rifles.
From Afghanistan to Somalia, everyone on Harvath’s team had hit targets like this before. They could almost do it in their sleep.
But Harvath had a rule about walled compounds: never go over a wall you could go through and never go through a wall you could go around.
He’d seen guys get shot off walls, fall off walls, and torque knees and ankles landing hard off walls.
One this size would require a ladder, preferably two. The first to put a sniper in place to watch over the courtyard, the second to get another team member up and over, who could then open the double doors from inside.
Special operations teams often used lightweight, collapsible ladders. The problem was that Harvath’s team didn’t have one, much less two.
Even if they had, he wasn’t sure ladders were necessary. Halim was a smuggler and Harvath had yet to meet one who didn’t have at least one alternate way in and out of his compound. It was just a matter of finding it.
Two hundred meters south of the compound was a large warehouse surrounded by chain-link fence, topped with razor wire. From what the phone salesman had told him, this was where Umar Ali Halim housed his “customers” before they were sent off in leaky, unseaworthy boats for the death cruise to Europe.
Mustapha Marzouk, the graduate student in chemistry from Tunisia, whose trail the CIA had sent Harvath to track down, had stayed in that very warehouse. He was sure of it.
When the Italians had interviewed the three survivors from the doomed fishing trawler, they had spoken of being kept in a long, metal warehouse-type building. It allegedly had large roll-up doors and ventilation fans at each end and was surrounded by razor-wire fencing—just like the images captured by the Reaper.
Harvath tried to remember all the details from the stacks of files he had gone through at the blue lockhouse back in the States. It was less than three days ago, but it already felt like weeks.
There had been so many horrible refugee accounts, he couldn’t get through all of them. Many hadn’t even been translated, only those the CIA felt had the greatest intelligence value.
The tales of torture and gang rape by Halim and his men were some of the worst Harvath had ever read. There were two details in particular, though, that he thought might prove helpful, but that he needed more information about.
As part of the operation, the CIA had assigned a handful of SSOs, or Specialized Skills Officers, to Harvath’s team. SSOs were subspecialists in a wide range of areas. One such SSO was named Deborah Lovett, and she was based out of the U.S. Embassy in Rome.