SEAL Team Six: Hunt the Fox (17 page)

“How did that happen?”

“Which, the baby or the injured colleague?”

“The baby.”

“It’s a long story. How should we proceed from here?”

“Continue a couple kilometers on the same road,” Janice instructed. “You’ll see a refugee camp on the right with a big AFAD sign.”

“What’s AFAD stand for?” asked Crocker.

“Turkish Disaster and Emergency Management Directorate. Pull up to the front gate and ask for Captain Nasar. He’s with the Askeri Inzibat—the Turkish military police.”

“He knows we’re coming?”

“Yes, Colonel Oz just informed him. He’s awake and expecting you.”

“Cool.”

“There’s a clinic there and a contingent of guards and soldiers. They’ll take care of you—feed you, tend to your wounds, whatever you need. Oz and I are on our way. We should be there in about two hours.”

“Thanks.”

“You’re welcome. Sorry about your colleague.”

“Nothing serious. He’ll be fine.”

O
nce arrived
at the AFAD camp, Crocker left Suarez guarding the Sprinter and made sure the women and baby were taken care of and his men were shown to the visitors’ tent, where they could wash up and rest. Then he escorted Akil to the clinic, which was housed in an old train station. In the entryway he stopped to receive grateful hugs from Amira and Natalie, who were being shown to an empty room with beds.

A male nurse cleaned the wound on Akil’s shoulder and summoned a doctor to stitch it up. While they waited, Crocker put his feet up on a chair and fell asleep. He dreamt he was back in the Himalayas sharing a tent with his old friend and climber Edyta Potocka. As a kerosene lamp burned in the corner, she ran a hand over his chest and sang a Polish lullaby.

So sweet he wanted to cry.

Didn’t she die in an avalanche?
Crocker wondered.

She seemed happy and vital now, kissing his face, snuggling up against him and laughing. Snow fell outside the tent, and the wind howled like a wolf, but he felt warm and safe. Then, realizing someone was calling his name, he opened his eyes into the fluorescent light and blinked.

“Crocker. Crocker, sorry to bother you,” a woman’s voice entreated.

She looked down at him with brown eyes, not light-blue ones like Edyta’s. Mancini stood by her side.

What is he doing here?

“Crocker?”

“Go away.”

“We can’t. Wake up.”

It took him a couple of seconds to realize that she was Janice, the CIA analyst he had first met in Istanbul. He looked at his watch: 0726. That couldn’t be right. “Is it really after seven?”

“Something like that,” Janice answered. “Crocker, we have a serious problem.”

He’d slept almost three hours in the waiting room, totally unaware of where he was or of the passage of time.

“Where’re the rest of the men?” he asked Mancini as he sat up.

“They’re in the visitors’ tent.”

“Good. Very good. So what’s up?” He wiped the spittle off the side of his mouth and adjusted the light-green medical robe the nurse had given him when he arrived. Saw the long scabs on his arms from last night, and remembered that they were safe inside Turkey.
By the grace of God.

“It’s a very serious situation,” Janice said.

“What?”

“The sarin canisters are missing.”

“What did you say?” Crocker asked, not sure he had heard correctly.

“The canisters have been taken.”

“Taken? What are you talking about?”

“According to Mancini, you arrived with eight canisters of sarin.”

“That’s correct.”

“Well…they’re missing,” Janice stated.

“From the van? From the Sprinter?”

“Yes, from the Sprinter.”

“How the hell did that happen? Who took them?”

“Unclear.”

“You mean they’re not in the van?”

“They’re not in the camp.”

“Holy shit!” He jumped to his feet, ignoring the soreness that ran from his neck to his ankles. “Where’s Suarez? He was guarding them.”

“Suarez was shot,” Mancini said. “Two bullets in the back.”

“Oh, fuck. Bad?”

“Yeah.”

He ran out with them to look. Turkish EMS officials were wheeling a stretcher to a red-and-white ambulance with blue flashing lights. Suarez, immobile, lay on his back with an oxygen mask over his face.

Crocker was torn between going with him and staying. “Where are they taking him?” he asked one of the EMS workers.

“To…hospital,” the man answered in broken English.

“From the local hospital he’ll likely be medevaced to one of our NATO facilities,” Janice added. “Depends on his condition.”

“Who shot him? How the hell did this happen?”

He had too many burning questions to be able to leave the camp. As soon as the ambulance left he returned to the Sprinter, where Mancini and Janice were standing. Saw a pool of Suarez’s blood on the pavement and four Turkish soldiers guarding the back of the vehicle. The mattress Jamila and Tariq had rested on had been pulled out. Inside, all that remained were discarded wrappers, MREs, and a few boxes of medical supplies.

“Did anyone see what happened?” Crocker asked.

“Most of the Turkish guards were sleeping over there,” Janice said, pointing to a large camouflaged tent fifty feet away. “One of them says he heard an engine.”

“What kind of engine?”

“A truck engine.”

“He hear shots?”

“He claims he didn’t. Maybe the weapons the attackers used were suppressed.”

“The Turks didn’t have anyone guarding the gate?”

“They did, in fact. Both of them were shot and killed.”

Crocker turned to his left and saw for the first time that the gate wasn’t really a secure gate, only an opening in the fence with a barrier and sandbag-covered guard station.

“Did anyone see the vehicle?” Crocker asked.

“The lighting wasn’t good. It was a little after five a.m. All this individual saw was the back of a truck. Maybe a two-and-a-half-ton. Maybe a black Volvo. Maybe a dark-green Mercedes.”

“So they knew we had arrived. Someone informed them.”

“Who?” Janice asked.

“The attackers.”

“Or they watched us enter,” Mancini added.

“Video surveillance?” Crocker asked, his brain spinning wildly.

“There’s a camera at the gate, but it isn’t working.”

“Is Colonel Oz aware of all this?”

“He and Captain Nasar are on the phone with Ankara now.”

“Who’s Captain Nasar?”

“The camp commander.”

Crocker now remembered him greeting them when they arrived. “Why didn’t anyone wake me up before?” he asked, his anger and alarm rising.

“The Turks were handling it,” Janice explained. “There was a lot of confusion.”

“Where are Akil and Davis?”

“Davis was with me in the visitors’ tent,” Mancini answered. “I thought Akil was with you in the clinic.”

“He was. That’s right.”

The enormity of the disaster took time to process.
What the hell happened? Who did it? How did they know we were here and had the sarin?

Zeid and Babas were dead, so it couldn’t have been them. Dozens of questions ran through his mind.

Anders and Grissom were irate when Crocker spoke to them on a phone in Captain Nasar’s office.

“Jesus Christ, Crocker. How the hell could you allow something like this to happen?” Grissom asked.

He had no answer, only confusion and rage.

“All of us risked our lives to bring out the sarin,” he said, mustering all his reserves of self-control. “So the idea that anyone
allowed this to happen
is highly insulting.”

“Insulting, did you say?”

Crocker bit down hard on his anger, but still some slipped through. “Yes, insulting. You heard me right!”

He went on to explain that since the camp was guarded by Turkish soldiers, he had assumed it was safe. As an extra precaution he had left one of his men to guard the truck. Apparently his assumption had been wrong, and for that he took full responsibility. He was as shocked and angry as Grissom and Anders. While he felt terrible about the missing sarin, he was equally concerned about Suarez, and immediately started to second-guess his decision to leave him alone with the truck.

“This is an unmitigated disaster!” Grissom shouted through the phone. “Do you know what that sarin can do if it’s released in Istanbul or Ankara, or both? We’re looking at mass murder on an unthinkable scale, Crocker!”

“I’m well aware of that.”

“You didn’t finish the job, man! You screwed up.”

Crocker had to fight hard to keep from losing it. “I told you before, I take full responsibility. But as bad as this is, and as pissed off as we are now, we need to focus on recovering the sarin.”

“Not you, Crocker,” Grissom responded. “Hell no. I want you and your men the hell out of Turkey. Drive immediately to Ankara, get on a plane, and get out ASAP. You’ve done enough damage already.”

Crocker’s mind was still partially focused on Suarez and the horrible possibility that he might have lost another team member.

“Don’t you have anything to say?”
Grissom screamed through the phone. Crocker heard Anders in the background telling him to calm down.

“I understand your anger,” responded Crocker, “but I think you’re making a mistake.”

“You’ve got balls, Crocker, but no fucking sense.”

“We’re not running out of here with our tails between our legs, sir. That’s not happening.”

“You’d better, before the Turks arrest you and hold you for questioning.”

Crocker hadn’t even thought of that. “I seriously doubt they’ll do that, but I’ll take that risk.”

“Nobody gives a rat’s ass what you think!” Grissom shouted. “Just do as you’re told, and do it now!”

Crocker took a deep breath. Through the window he saw Colonel Oz standing in the cement courtyard outside with Akil, Mancini, and Janice pointing past the gate and looking highly agitated.

Maybe Grissom’s right.

“Sir, we brought the sarin into Turkey,” he said into the phone, “and now we’re going to help the Turks recover it.”

“How?”

“I can’t answer that now.”

“Of course you can’t, because you’re out of your depth. And you’re not going to accomplish a goddamn thing, because you’ll be behind bars in a Turkish prison. Like
Midnight Fucking Express,
but worse.”

Crocker hung up the phone and tried to compose himself. Going to prison wasn’t a concern. Recovering the sarin was. They had to act quickly, and they needed a plan.

As soon as he stepped outside Janice separated herself from the group near the gate and hurried toward him, her hair flying and her fists clenched.

“Have you seen Hassan?” Janice asked.

“Hassan?”

“The engineering student. Have you seen him?”

“Not since we arrived this morning. Why?”

“When’s the last time you saw him?” she asked with desperation in her voice. “Do you remember?”

“He was walking with Jamila and Tariq over to the clinic,” Crocker said, gesturing behind him. “Why?”

“Did you see him go inside?”

“No, I didn’t see him enter the clinic. No. Have you talked to Jamila? She should be able to answer that.”

Janice nodded and looked at the ground deep in thought.

“Something happen to Hassan?” Crocker asked. “What’s going on?”

“He’s missing.”

“What do you mean, missing?” asked Crocker.

“He’s not in the camp.”

“What?” It made no sense.

“We’ve questioned everyone. Oz had his men search the camp. Nobody can find him.”

It seemed incredible.

“What about Jamila and their son?” Crocker asked, as he tried to grasp the implications.

“They’re still here,” Janice answered. “Everyone else has been accounted for.”

It was hard to believe that Hassan would have exited the camp voluntarily and left his girlfriend and son behind.

“Maybe he was kidnapped,” Crocker conjectured out loud.

“Why?” Janice asked. “Why in the world would the hijackers want Hassan? Why would they bother to take him? Why?”

Hoping to find answers, Crocker ran to speak to Jamila. He found her sitting in a sun-filled room in the clinic, nursing Tariq. She seemed as confounded as he was, but strangely calm, given the fact that the father of her son had suddenly disappeared.

“I’m worried about him,” she said, shaking her head. “I can’t find an explanation. Hassan was happy the last time I saw him. He kissed me and Tariq good night and told me he loved me. It was the first time he ever said those words. Then, next thing I hear, he’s left the camp without telling me.”

He noted sadness in her voice, but no fear or anxiety, which was odd. “When’s the last time you saw him?” Crocker asked.

“It was about thirty minutes after we arrived. Sometime after four. We were here in this room, Tariq and I. Hassan kissed us goodbye and left.”

“Did he say where he was going?”

“He said he was sleeping in the visitors’ tent with your men. Tariq and I remained here in the clinic with Natalie and Amira. If something was wrong, he didn’t tell me.”

Strange.

“Did he mention anything about wanting to meet someone—anyone—here in Karbeyaz?”

“No.”

“Does he have relatives here? Friends?”

“Not that I know of.”

“Did he say anything about expecting someone to visit him?”

She shook her head as Tariq pulled back from her nipple and yawned. Jamila quickly covered herself, and Crocker looked away.

Very fucking strange.

She held a crying Tariq to her chest and patted his back.

“Did he mention anything he was worried about?”

“No,” she answered. “But Hassan and I don’t have such a close relationship where he tells me everything. He keeps a lot to himself. Maybe he’s worried about the responsibility of being a father, and went away to think about that.”

Curious answer.

“You think that could be the reason he left the camp?” Crocker asked.

Tariq burped loudly.

“It’s the only one I can think of,” she whispered, laying the baby down on the bed.

“So you think Hassan left because he’s not sure he wants the responsibility of being a father?”

She nodded. “I hope not, for our son’s sake.”

When Crocker related what he had heard from Jamila to Colonel Oz, the colonel seemed highly skeptical. “This man leaves because he doesn’t want to be a father, and the WMDs are taken at the same time? I don’t believe in such a large coincidence. Forget that theory. It’s bullshit!”

Crocker had his own doubts. There were contradictions in Jamila’s story. She’d said the last thing Hassan had told her was that he loved her. Then she’d suggested that he might have left the camp to get away from her and their son.