The Phoenix Affair - Dave Moyer (smart ebook reader TXT) 📗

side of the van facing a blank wall of a building, not someone’s front door or windows if you can. What color and make of van, Johnson?”

“We can be there in fifteen or twenty minutes,” the man replied. “Dark green Ford van, we’ll find a spot. Are you armed, Phoenix?”

“No, but that won’t be a problem,” Cameron said. If there had been anyone in the room, they’d have seen a dark look on his face, a cold, almost reptilian gleam in the steel blue eyes. “You guys have a cell phone, I’ll call you to make sure everything’s ready?”

They exchanged numbers, Cameron thanked Ripley, and they rang off. He glanced again at the elbow at the corner of Queen, hadn’t moved. He stowed his phone and walked to the counter, where called for the waitress back in the kitchen and asked for a large glass of grapefruit juice.

The juice came and he alternately studied the map and watched the corner and the Embassy. At ten after ten, his phone rang and he answered, “Fahd, how good to hear from you. Are you finished?”

“Yes, Paul, it’s done, and praise be to God. I’m just coming out and back to the café. Is there any coffee left?”

“Plenty, my friend, but don’t come just yet. We, err, have a small problem.” He explained quickly.

“In the name of God, who are these damned people? They’re really starting to piss me off.” Fahd said quietly. An embassy clerk sat at a reception desk only ten feet away in the hall. “What should we do, Abu-Sean? I want a piece of these people.”

“Eventually, Abu-Mohammed, but not this time I think. Here’s the plan.” And he told him.

*****

It was twenty after ten when a green Ford van drove right past Cameron’s window going West on Curzon and turned right on Queen to be lost from view. He could not see, but the van continued to the end of the block, made a U-turn at the corner, and returned, parking on the East side of Queen half-way between the door steps of two gorgeous town houses. The passenger got out, crossed the street and disappeared through the fence and then around the back of another townhouse. All this was watched by the Arab in the stocking cap, Selim Khan, who was twenty five and not Arab at all, but rather Pakistani. Selim was bored, he’d been out in the cold and rain for way too long, and he wished this Saudi would just come out so he could follow him to his hotel and quit for the day. The pictures had been sent to the number he’d been given. He didn’t think anything about the green service van parked a hundred meters to his right.

Five minutes passed, and Selim tensed as the Saudi came out the front door of the embassy and crossed the drive. He came out of the gate and turned directly toward the waiting tail, Selim was surprised and a little shocked by this, but he had no idea where the man intended to go, after all. So he simply looked bored and took out his phone again, pretending to make a call. He took a step out onto the walk along Curzon and turned to the East, faking a conversation. Traffic was light, just a few people walking on either side and very few cars. He turned back West as the attractive woman he’d chosen to watch passed the alley into Shepherds Market and a man came out the same way.

The Saudi was turning the corner onto Queen, so Selim stood fidgeting on his side of the street for a moment, still faking his conversation, and then he began to amble northward, slowly at first, letting the distance build up until is man was about twenty-five meters ahead on the opposite side. At this point he closed the phone and began to walk casually along, matching pace with the taller man he followed.

Cameron was twenty paces behind when he rounded the corner on the East side of Queen, but he was walking faster, silently, flowing, as Fahd had said after the encounter in Paris, like water down the cobbled walk. His wool coat was buttoned to the top, collar up, seemingly against the cold. His breathing was deep and even, his hands were open wide and swung naturally at his sides as he walked, closing the distance, needing to time it perfectly. Now that he was close he could see that his opponent was fairly slight, but wiry looking, he walked heavily, probably not trained very well if at all. “Good he thought, just another few paces and it begins.”

Selim approached the van, saw the driver nod a greeting to him, which he returned. Then something happened—the van driver looked beyond him at something, and at the same time he heard a footstep. By reflex, he turned quickly, his right hand found the small knife in his coat pocket just in case. What he saw was a man, European, dark hair, deep, blue eyes, who came to an abrupt stop two paces away, and said, “Assalamu alaykum, sedeek,” “Peace be upon you, friend.”

Something about the man did not look right. His feet were oddly placed, one slightly ahead of the other and about shoulder width apart, his arms hung loose at his sides, his stare was intense and dangerous. He’d used Arabic in London, which was definitely not normal. He did not speak again. Selim did not like this. In English he said, “and upon you be peace, good day.” He started to turn, but as he did he noticed the man just start to move, and at the same time he heard and sensed movement to his rear. Again, by reflex, his right hand came out with the knife, and he pivoted to his right rear to place the wall of the building to his back.

He was penned in, another man now to his right, bigger, and the first one to his left, the green van completing the trap to his front. Selim took a short step backward to get more space. The dangerous-looking man said in English, “Now, my friend, we simply want to talk with you, there is no need for the knife.”

But Selim had indeed been trained, at least for the six weeks he’d spent in the Afghan camp, and he thought he knew who or at least what these men were. It was all happening in slow motion, but really rather fast. Ten seconds had not passed, including the last remark, when he remembered the training on ambushes and what was to be done if caught in one—Attack!

This he did, taking two quick steps toward the man in the dark coat, swinging the knife in a wide arc at throat level, reaching out to find the target. He began to smile—it would be a good cut, this one would be dead and he’d pivot on his right foot, continuing the circle to his left to engage the next opponent who he could just hear already beginning to move behind him. His smile evaporated, though, just as the man did, just enough so that the blade missed and skimmed the surface of the thick wool of the collar of the coat, but not deep enough. There was no spray of blood from the severed neck arteries, no shocked look in the eyes, no familiar feel in the knife, only the same cold, hard look, and Selim felt his bowels loosen.

Completely in control, Cameron let the knife pass, glad he’d thought of the collar, watched the man’s expression turn to one of panic as he finished the first slash and began the second, cutting now from left to right. Cameron moved into the attack, so that his neck was even with the elbow of the outstretched knife-arm by the time it would have taken him, well inside the arc of the knife. As he pivoted on his left foot his own left arm came up forcefully under the Arab’s triceps, stopping the swing of the arm, the hand with the knife momentarily stopped in mid slash and the man lifted slightly off balance up and to his own front. Cameron’s right hand reached up and grabbed the stationary wrist, his own palm up, controlling the knife. Then a smooth, forceful move, he pivoted his hips and feet 180 degrees to his right, away from the man, and at the same time took the wrist down in a circle to his right while his left hand pressed on the man’s elbow. This propelled Selim in a circle around Cameron, but a descending, spiraling circle led by his knife hand, and the walk came up fast. He hit the cobbles with a thud, scraping his face hard and barking his knees. Cameron was in a controlling position above him, the wrist pinned to his right knee and his left hand putting breaking pressure on the elbow. Selim groaned at this and involuntarily relaxed his grip on the knife, which Cameron whisked out of his hand and put into his own pocket. Seizing the now empty hand from the rear so that he pinched the thumb with his own and bent the wrist at a right angle to the forearm, Cameron made a small twist to allow a little bend in the elbow, but leaving no slack in the connective tissues. Then he just dropped his weight, and his left knee, onto the back of the triceps, and the arm broke cleanly at the elbow with a soft “crack” and a short yelp from the Arab, who immediately passed out.

“That’s for the coat, dirtbag,” Cameron said, standing. He took a reflexive step back to clear the area, saw the Agency man standing a few paces away.

“What did you do that for?” the man asked, clearly in shock at the brutality. "You broke his arm."

“Pissed me off,” Cameron said. “It’s been that kind of week and my sense of humor is just done.” Fahd was just coming up the walk himself. The man on the ground groaned, starting to come to.

“Let’s get moving,” Cameron said, and the freeze frame broke. The van door slid open, the driver stepped out, and the two CIA guys picked up the semi-conscious Pakistani and tossed him into the back like a sack of potatoes. Cameron waived and began to walk North, intercepting Fahd and turning him around to also walk North. The driver zip-tied the man’s hands and feet, his passenger closed the van door and went around to his side. The van fired up, turned right on Curzon, and sped away. The whole evolution had taken just forty-five seconds.

Cameron and Fahd walked briskly for two blocks to the corner of Charles and Queen, then turned East. The weather had closed in again, mist falling in a heavy curtain that bordered on drizzle, and they would be miserable soon. Fahd decided that this would not do, and stepped out onto the street to hail a taxi. The black car pulled in at the curb and they piled into the warm, dry interior. They gave the address of their hotel and sat there, silent.

Traffic was heavy and it took ten minutes, but when they finally reached the hotel they went straight into the small restaurant and asked for a table at the back, and coffee. Only when it was steaming on the table in front of them did either man speak.

“Paul, who are these people? And where did you learn that?”

“Second question is easier,” Cameron replied. “It’s the aikido thing that I started when we were at school together. I could never let it go, I still go to class two or three times a week. Never really expected it to come in so handy, I just liked the exercise. But that’s it. Now the other thing. They’re obviously al-Qaeda, they’re obviously interested in you, which has to be because of this thing with your nephew. Two things about that