Land of the Gods

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

From their room on the fiftieth floor of the Burj Al Arab hotel in the Umm Suqeim district of Dubai, the breathtaking view of the sunset over the Persian Gulf had weaved a spell over the exhausted team and given them a few moments of peace to gather their thoughts. Losing Mokrani’s ring had laid them all low, but Ryan’s violent kidnapping had hit them much harder and now they were licking their wounds and trying to work out the best way forward.

If there was a way forward, thought Hawke. Maybe this time they were just up against too many people who wanted them dead. On this mission, their enemy had included not only the Athanatoi, but also Razak and his guerrillas, the Yakuza and Kozlov and his Russian mafia thugs in Vegas. Worse, they had lost valuable friends and teammates in Danny Devlin and Magnus Lund at the lethal hands of the mystery sniper. Maybe this time, he thought darkly, they were doomed to fail. It was all starting to get to him in a way like previous missions had never done.

“The priority is getting Ryan back,” he said, breaking the gloomy silence. “We’ve rescued friends before and we’ll do it again. The risk of kidnap and death is part of our lives and we all knew that from the start, including Ryan.”

“But we don’t even know for sure who took him.” Zeke scratched his neck and frowned.

“It was Athanatoi,” Nikolai said. “I’m certain of it.”

“And how could they know where we were?” Lexi asked.

“Just a coincidence.” Lea switched on the plasma screen and dialed Eden. “They’re researching the rings’ locations from their copy of the Codex and we got to Mokrani at the same time.”

Scarlet lifted her eyes from the floor to Nikolai and back to Lea. “A hell of a coincidence.”

“Enough speculation.” Hawke crocked his neck and pulled a beer from the fridge. “We can’t afford to waste the time. We have to look at what we have got, not what we haven’t got.”

“We still have five of the gods’ rings.” Eden’s face loomed above them on the giant plasma screen on the hotel wall. “Those, plus the eight idols locked in the Bank of England’s vaults still put us at a strong advantage over the Oracle. Remember he still only has two rings.”

“With two more to get,” Hawke said. “That gives us only seven of the rings even if we presume we’re successful finding the two remaining ones, and no Ryan to help decipher them.”

Eden nodded. “What are the chances of being able to use the seven rings to locate the Citadel? Anyone?”

“Ask Ryan,” Reaper said.

The words hung in the air. Lea said, “Not great, Rich. Seven rings isn’t even ninety percent of the puzzle… but you never know.”

“What about the sniper?” Scarlet changed the subject. “Any news on that?”

Eden shook his head. “Sorry, but no. I’ve made contact with several good sources of intelligence information in France, Germany, Israel and the United States. No one knows for sure. They only have theories.”

“And what are these theories?” Hawke asked. “Because whoever this bastard is they’ve taken two of our own and we don’t know when he’ll strike again.”

“So far, my Israeli colleague speculates that it could be Gideon Dayan, a former Mossad man gone rogue over a year ago, but he has his doubts due to the equipment being used. The French have a different theory.”

He paused for a second too long.

“And?” Hawke said.

“You’re not going to like this, Hawke, but Paris is telling me it could be the Spider.”

Hawke felt his blood turn to ice. The Spider was the Cuban hitman behind his wife’s murder in Vietnam, a man he had sworn to kill as soon as he had tracked him down. Finding out that he could be the killer behind the deaths of two more of his close friends and colleagues was a hammer blow, so he had to be sure. “You are talking about Alfredo Lazaro?”

“Yes, I am. They’re not one hundred percent on it but it’s possible. They can’t be sure about the attack in Miami, but they have good intel placing him in Athens during the exact hour Magnus was murdered outside the Theatre of Dionysus.”

“Bloody hell,” Lea said. “This is too much.”

“Just hang on,” said Hawke. “This is just speculation from the French, right?”

“Right,” Eden said.

“So let’s not get carried away. The sniper could still be anyone, and we’re making a massive mistake if we focus our attention on Lazaro.”

Lea was not persuaded. “But don’t you think that it’s a hell of a coincidence that the hitman who killed Liz was in Athens the exact same hour that we were?”

“A coincidence, maybe,” Hawke said. “Maybe the bastard is following me around again, maybe he wants me dead too. I want him dead, so that makes us equal, but we can’t make strategy based on speculation. Lazaro is a dead man one way or the other, and in the meantime, we go forward on the basis that the sniper is still unidentified.”

“A sound plan,” Eden said. “And I’ll continue shining my torch in the darkest corners from this end with a view to getting a firmer ID on the mystery man with his finger on the trigger.”

Hawke settled down again, but the sound of Lazaro’s codename had unsettled him. The Spider was a ruthless assassin raised in the back streets of Havana. He was a predator, a killer without conscience, and the man who had snuffed out his young wife’s life without a hint of mercy or regret.

Up till this moment, he’d always planned on tracking Lazaro down and avenging Liz’s murder the old-fashioned way, but now there was the possibility that the Spider was hunting him again. Is that why the team was being targeted? Could Lazaro have killed Danny and Magnus because of their association with him? The mere thought of it felt like a lead weight on his shoulders. Now, more than ever, he had to hunt the Spider down and end the threat.

“Moving on,” Scarlet said, sensing the anguish her old friend must be feeling, “What’s the skinny on the last two rings?”

Eden blew out a breath and smiled. He, too, was relieved to move away from Alfredo Lazaro. “Good news. Less than an hour ago I received a message from our old friend Ali al-Majid. He has kindly decided to accept our million dollars and in return has given us the locations of the two last rings. The first is what he believes to be the Ring of Romulus. He says it’s in the private possession of an academic. His name is Professor Qasim al-Hashimi and he works in the Iraqi Museum in Baghdad.”

“Sounds like we’re getting warmer,” Lea said.

“Not just warm but hot,” said Eden. “We’re almost there, team.”

A shocked silence fell over the team as they each processed what Eden had just said.

“Is he going to cooperate?” Hawke asked. “Or do we need another million?”

Eden gave a firm nod as a smile broke out on his face. “He is, but only on the condition that he can go with you on the journey to the Citadel.”

“I have no objections,” Lea said.

Lexi shrugged. “Nor me. He’s an archaeologist. He could be useful.”

“Wait a minute,” Hawke said. “What sort of man is he? Can we trust him? Is he fit enough to reach the Citadel?”

“Fit enough?” Zeke asked.

Scarlet rolled her eyes. “It’s not going to be just lying around with a red bow tied on it, Zeke. It’s going to be underground, or in a hidden mountain pass, or fuck knows how hard to find. If our Prof is a major league lardy then he could get seriously hurt, especially if someone’s shooting at us.”

“Major league lardy?” Zeke said. “That’s not very nice.”

She shrugged. “I’m not very nice.”

Hawke sucked his gut in. “If he wants in then fine, but we tell him the risks first.”

“Like Lex just said, he’s an archaeologist,” Lea said. “He’s going to be used to visiting excavations all over the world, right?”

“Right,” Eden said firmly.

“You said Ali had information about two rings?” Lea asked.

“Yes, the last ring should be even simpler to secure, or at least to borrow temporarily.”

“How so?” Scarlet said.

“According to Ali, the Ring of Sudas is in the possession of the American military in Camp Angel, outside of Baghdad.”

“I didn’t think there were any US soldiers in Iraq anymore,” Lexi said.

“Over five thousand of them,” Zeke said immediately. “The Victory Base Complex near the airport was a major military camp until 2011 when we officially pulled out. Last I heard the Iraqi Government wanted to turn it into some kind of university.”

“So the rumors go,” Eden said.

“Near the airport, you say?” Lexi asked.

“Yes. It’s inside the Al-Faw Palace,” Eden said. “It’s an enormous building in Baghdad built by Saddam Hussein in the nineties to commemorate an Iraqi victory during the Iran-Iraq war and as Zeke says, up until 2011 it was occupied by the US military as a logistics facility.”

“And today?”

“It’s very hard to get detailed information out of Iraq,” Eden said. “But a trusted CIA contact has confirmed Ali’s intel. He tells me that there is a small US contingent in the palace, unknown to the general public. They’re probably working alongside the Iraqis as they establish the university there, but that’s of no concern to us because also not available to the public is the neat little fact that Saddam had vaults built into its basement in order to stash various treasures for his own personal use. Thanks to Ali, and my CIA contact, I can tell you that the last ring is among those treasures.”

“Getting hotter!” Lexi said, unable to conceal her excitement.

“You said borrow?” Lea rarely missed detail.

“I think it’s unlikely General Tucker will allow any of the treasures off the site, and I would doubt appealing to the Iraqi Minister of the Interior will help either.”

“Great.”

“And we can’t risk losing an easy opportunity to secure the ring because of frankly unimportant concerns. If we know about these rings, then so must the Oracle. From now on it’s just a race against time to see who gets to them first, which is why you’re all on a plane to Baghdad as of an hour ago, got it?”

“Why not get President Brooke to get us the ring?” Lexi asked. “It’s in US custody after all.”

“First, it’s not in US custody — not officially. It’s in Iraqi custody, and…” Eden paused, and they all saw something was on his mind. “I didn’t want to brief you on this until this mission was over, but it looks like things are getting too serious across the pond to keep you in the dark any more. I know you’re aware of vague talk of a coup, but it’s worse than we thought. I had a communiqué from Alex Reeve earlier today in which she outlined to me what looks like a full-scale coup against President Brooke.”

“Holy shit,” Lea said. “Who’s behind this?”

“It’s confirmed now. Vice President Davis Faulkner.”

Hawke blinked, unable to believe what he had just heard. “So she wasn’t being paranoid then?”

Eden shook his head. “It doesn’t look like it. Agent Brandon McGee has become a trusted friend of hers and he briefed her on the coup after receiving intel on it from another trusted source, an Agent Suzie Matsumoto.”

Reaper twirled a cigarette paper in his calloused, nicotine-stained fingers. “Who is she?”

“Matsumoto is an agent with the US Secret Service attached to the Vice President’s protection team.”

“Mon Dieu…”

Zeke was sitting up now, and dropped the empty beer bottle on the carpet as he slid off the bed and walked closer to the plasma screen. “Is this some sort of joke?”

“No joke,” Eden said. “I’m sorry.”

“I can’t believe it,” he wandered over to the window and stared blankly out at the setting sun. “A coup?”

“Technically not,” Eden countered. “They’re invoking a special amendment in the Constitution to force the President out of the Oval Office, but it for all intents and purposes it adds up to the same thing because it’s totally bogus. Brooke has done nothing wrong.”

“Is this an episode of the Outer Limits?” Zeke said quietly.

“No,” Lexi said. “Welcome to a day in the life of ECHO.”

Nikolai had kept his counsel, but now his low Russian grumble filled the room. “Is this Faulkner operating alone?”

All eyes turned to him. Eden spoke first. “We don’t know. What are you suggesting?”

The Russian monk shrugged. “Nothing. Just that the Oracle and Faulkner are… how shall I say — acquainted with one another.”

His words shocked the entire team. “Davis Faulkner knows the Oracle?” Hawke asked. “How?”

“He in an acolyte, but other than this I know nothing more than what I have said. I was too low in the food chain.”

Hawke, still blindsided by the revelation that Otmar Wolff and Davis Faulkner were associates, walked to the window and worked hard to consider the consequences. It explained the attack on Jack Brooke for one thing, and it meant the future was likely storing up even more trouble for the ECHO team. Now, more than ever, time was of the essence.

“We’re getting closer now, Rich,” Lea said. “I know it sounds callous but we have to focus on our mission here in the Middle East. We’re going to need the idols.”

“No problem,” Eden said. “I’ll have them flown out to you from London on a Royal Air Force transport plane at once.”

With Eden’s words hanging in the air, Hawke turned and faced his team. “All right then, it’s time to cross the border. We’re going to Iraq.”

Jessica Clarke looked down at the screen of her iPhone and sighed when she saw the caller ID: PEGASUS, a.k.a. her pain-in-the-ass boss Tony Garcetti.

She took the call. “What is it?”

“You’re flying to Iraq.”

“Iraq?” Jessica asked. “What the hell are they doing in Iraq?”

“Don’t ask me, Cougar,” Garcetti said. “I’m just passing orders down from the organ grinder to the monkey. Brand new intel hot off the press.”

“You’re the monkey, Garcetti.”

“I’m starting to believe it.”

She cut the call and sighed. Looked at her bag, all packed with weapons and ammo and ready to go. Same old same old. A note for Mrs Kowalczyk asking her to check on Matty. A drive to the airport. An unmarked government jet. Bland men in sombre suits and ear pieces checking her ID. A long, tiring flight and then a hunt in the desert for the next target on her list. Another new home for the next bullet in the box.

But then, Mexico.