Al-Quebeca

Chapter 1

Paris

Outside the Louvre, tourists milled like pigeons, taking pictures of each other against the backdrop of 17th century architecture. Mustafa Nadir heard a distinctive drawl and turned to watch a man with a video camera directing a blonde woman to cross the courtyard.

Nadir, who’d learned English watching movies, pegged the man as an American, possibly a Texan, which made targeting him a distinct pleasure. But what really interested him was the high-definition digital camcorder with which the man was shooting mementoes of his Paris vacation. Not to mention, the bulge of a wallet in his pants.

Laughing, the blonde beckoned to her companion and headed toward the Jardin des Tuileries. The man slipped his camera into a carrying case. They spent a few minutes admiring the garden before descending the stairs to the quay along the Seine.

Nadir, in cap and sunglasses, followed. A breeze carried a stink off the river. The Texan raised his hand to secure the flap of hair over his bald spot. The woman held his arm and pointed at the Eiffel Tower in the distance. In a few minutes they came to the Port des Tuileries where brightly painted houseboats were docked two-deep along the quay.

The Texan took out his camcorder again. Nadir looked around and saw no police. During the day the cops were busy managing traffic or patrolling the Champs Elysees, the Louvre and the Eiffel Tower to discourage pickpockets. Down here on the quay, tourists were out of sight and out of mind.

Nadir approached the couple. He took a switchblade from his pocket and pressed a button on its handle. The blade popped out with a click. The couple turned to face him.

Do not say a word, Nadir said in near-perfect English. Give me the camera or I will cut off the nose of your wife.

The man stared at him, likely seeing nothing recognizable except his own reflection in mirrored sunglasses – a frightened victim.

Nadir pointed the knife at the woman. She gasped and raised her hand to her mouth, perhaps to stifle a scream, perhaps to protect her nose. He snapped his fingers.

The camera and your wallet, Nadir said. Be quick or this will be the worst vacation of your life.

The man handed over the camera. Nadir shoved it into his shoulder bag. The man gave up his wallet. Nadir took the cash and returned the wallet.

Sit down, he told the man, pointing to a bench a few meters away. He beckoned to the woman. Give me your purse and join your husband.

She did as she was told. He opened her purse, took a wad of euros from her wallet and handed the purse back.

Do not move for ten minutes. My accomplice is watching you. If you move before your time is up, he will follow you back to your hotel. Your next visit will be the morgue. You understand?

They nodded.

He walked briskly away, crossing the pedestrian bridge to the Rive Gauche. He removed his cap and sunglasses and entered the Musée d’Orsay métro station where he caught the next train east.

He changed trains at Saint-Michel, transferring to the Number 4 line going north. He got off at Strasbourg Saint-Denis and walked a dozen blocks to his temporary quarters, a small apartment shared with two other men.

He sat on the living room carpet and counted the money. Three hundred and twenty euros. He hefted the Sony in his hands, estimating its street value. He hated being a mugger but consoled himself that this wasn’t his real life. He was just marking time until called upon to serve as a soldier of Allah.

He stashed three hundred euros in a box hidden behind the kitchen stove, joining a few thousand euros, a 7.65-mm Beretta and a forged Tunisian passport in the name he currently went under.

He left the apartment with the Sony in his shoulder bag. An acquaintance owned an electronic shop three blocks away. As Nadir walked through the Muslim neighborhood, he was pleased to see every woman observing the hijab, unlike the infidels in other Paris arrondissements.

The merchant was just ringing up the sale of a digital camera. After the customer left, the merchant beckoned to Nadir and they went into a back room with a desk and a filing cabinet.

Nadir handed over the Sony. The merchant checked the model number, shot a five-second pan of the room and verified the playback. Two hundred euros, he said.

Nadir nodded. He wouldn’t haggle. The merchant paid him better than the average thief, knowing he was connected. The man opened a safe beneath his desk and counted out the money. Nadir stood to leave.

It’s a coincidence you showed up, the merchant said. I received a message for you, just an hour ago.

Yes?

Abu Hadeeda wants to see you.

Chapter 2

Las Vegas, Nevada

At 06h00, Major Douglas Copeland got up without disturbing his wife and left his Desert Shores home to drive across town to Creech Air Force Base. After clearing security, he checked into the command center of 432nd Wing. An intelligence officer briefed him on the latest intel out of Helmand Province, Afghanistan’s notoriously lawless region where Pashtun tribes had refused, despite British, Canadian and now American military presence, to shake off their Taliban allegiances.

Copeland went to the Ground Control Station and signed into his operational control module. He had three computer screens – one each for radar, live camera, and communication with field units. In the adjacent chair, a sensor operator went through his pre-flight checklist.

Seventy-five hundred miles away on Kandahar Air Force Base, a ground crew towed an MQ-1 Predator drone from its sandbagged enclosure to the tarmac. The sergeant in command radioed Copeland, announcing handover for operational control.

Accessing the Predator’s flight system via satellite, Copeland ran through the pre-flight checklist, remotely powering up each sub-system. As he checked the drone’s flight functions, the sensor operator verified each communication and navigational component – satellite, cameras, radar, laser designator and payload of two AGM-114 Hellfire missiles.

Air traffic control cleared the drone for takeoff. Copeland taxied out to the runway. At 20h00 local it was dusk in Kandahar but the sky was clear except for a thin haze of pollution hanging over downtown. He gave it throttle and the Predator surged forward, the sound of its engine in his headset reminding him this was real, not a game. He pulled the stick back and climbed into the Afghanistan sky.

Their target was in Musa Qala, a hill town 80 miles northwest of Kandahar, a stronghold of Taliban resistance. Under the Brits it had been a bargaining chip between Karzai and the Taliban – a hands-off agreement in exchange for a peace the insurgents never respected. Under Canadian control, it had hosted a few bloody but non-conclusive battles.

At cruising altitude Copeland handed the Predator off to the sensor operator and went to the washroom for a nature break. He splashed water on his face and ran his fingers through his hair. No grey had appeared overnight. Fifty-five and still going strong.

He’d retired from the Air Force in 2001 but a year later, after the USA started ground ops in Afghanistan, he was offered a two-year contract to fly drones. Flying military ops from Creech at no physical risk, working regular hours and going home for dinner – a sweet deal! He was now on his fifth contract. He reminded himself it was his wife’s birthday next week, requiring a dinner reservation and tickets to Cirque du Soleil.

He returned to his station. In his absence, the sensor operator had taken a call from a field informant. The local Taliban leader had just gone to the roof of the main building for a leg massage from one of his local wives.

The Predator arrived over the target at 20h45. Only 15 minutes remained before local sunset.

They acquired the target residence via GPS and viewed it via camera from two miles out. The house was in a compound on the outskirts of Musa Qala. The camera zoomed in until the house filled the frame. On its flat roof two people sat together on a large carpet with cushions.

The sensor operator pulled back on the camera zoom. They saw a yellow Toyota pickup leaving the compound. Okay, our man’s clear, the sensor operator said. Lock and load.

Copeland turned toward the target. The sensor operator activated laser guidance and put the sights on the rooftop lovers now entwined on the carpet. Even with the fading light at this distance they could see the woman’s bare knees and the man’s naked butt oscillating between them.

Target locked, the sensor operator said. Fire when ready.

Copeland released one Hellfire. The cockpit camera showed a plume of flame as the supersonic missile shot ahead. He switched to infrared and they watched the red seed of the missile’s flare descend to earth, blossoming orange atop the distant compound.

They did a fly-over at 3000 feet, both cameras on. The roof was gone and only two walls of the house remained standing.

As the Predator regained altitude, Copeland set a course for Nawzad, another Taliban hot spot where they’d been invited to support a night mission. And they still had the second Hellfire to bring to the party.

Chapter 3

Clichy-sous-Bois, France

Abu Hadeeda lived in Clichy-sous-Bois, a suburb east of Paris. There was no subway connection so Mustafa Nadir took the commuter train to Raincy and caught a bus.

Nadir walked from the bus station to Abu Hadeeda’s neighborhood. The apartment buildings were studded with satellite dishes, washing draped from balcony railings. Young men who should have been working loitered on street corners, their glances at Nadir betraying curiosity and suspicion. Unemployment was high in Clichy-sous-Bois and the riots that had spread throughout France in 2005 had originated here.

Nadir wondered why Abu Hadeeda lived here rather than in central Paris. But with so many disaffected youth simmering in the streets, where better to recruit the young and restless to Allah’s war?

He went into a building and pressed the buzzer for a ninth floor apartment. Someone asked him in Arabic what he wanted. He was here to see a car for sale. What car? A 2001 Volkswagen Passat. The door buzzed and he went upstairs in an elevator smelling of clove and saffron.

In the apartment kitchen a man demanded his wallet, frisked him and ran a security wand over his body while another man with a pistol watched. They ushered him into the living room where a thick-set man in a pinstripe robe sat in a leather chair.

Abu Hadeeda, Father of Iron, was in his late forties. He wore a full beard and a taqiyah, a black skullcap adorned with Arabic script in gold thread praising the might and mercy of Allah. They’d met six months earlier when Nadir had first arrived in Paris. They’d talked for three hours, Abu Hadeeda asking about Nadir’s family and Pashtun tribal alliances, and the details of his role in coordinating a suicide mission on Bagram Air Force Base that had killed several American servicemen.

Abu Hadeeda extended his right hand to his guest. Nadir pressed it to his forehead and sat on the carpet at his feet. Abu Hadeeda’s left hand remained motionless. It was a webbed paw of badly-rendered skin grafts between finger stumps. In the last year of the Soviet occupation, Abu Hadeeda had been a bomb-maker. One day a detonator had gone off, taking part of his hand with it. Protective goggles had saved his eyes but his cheeks and forehead were pock-marked like he’d taken a shotgun blast of rock salt in the face.

After some small talk about Nadir’s life in Paris, Abu Hadeeda shifted the conversation to Afghanistan and asked Nadir if he was in touch with his family. Nadir admitted that, for fear of revealing his whereabouts, he’d had no communication with them in three months.

Abu Hadeeda said he had some bad news. Nadir’s mother and two sisters had been killed when their house was destroyed by an American drone missile. With the local Taliban leader dead, a Canadian Special Forces unit had attacked Musa Qala. In the ensuing battle two dozen freedom fighters had been killed, Nadir’s younger brother among them.

Nadir fought back tears. He’d seen other men crumble under bad news, hurl themselves to the ground, pound the earth with their fists, cry to Allah for revenge. But he was numb in his heart and couldn’t make his body convulse in grief or fury. His mind, however, was already racing. His mother, brother and two sisters dead! He must avenge them, but when and how?

Abu Hadeeda observed this cold-hearted warrior and the strength of his silent grief. He summoned coffee and a plate of pastries, figs and pistachios. He sat on the floor beside Nadir and after they had drunk the strong coffee and Nadir had refused to eat anything, Abu Hadeeda told him of a mission that required his participation.

There was a cell in Montreal, Canada, planted twenty years ago, that had lain dormant like a sleeping cobra, uncoiling itself occasionally to assist jihad in discreet ways. The time had come for this cell to do something important. Its members had developed a good plan; now all they needed was a leader to execute it.

Abu Hadeeda reminded Nadir that bin Laden himself had promised vengeance upon every foreign country that had invaded Afghanistan. England and Spain had been punished with subway bombings in London and Madrid. Canada was the only major ally of America that had never felt the wrath of Allah.

Was Nadir willing to take up the sword? Nadir agreed without a moment’s hesitation.

Abu Hadeeda opened a small wooden chest and withdrew an ancient .455-caliber Webley revolver. He opened the cylinder to reveal a single cartridge among the six chambers. He removed it, placed it in Nadir’s hand and closed his fingers over Nadir’s fist. They remained motionless a few moments before Abu Hadeeda replaced the cartridge in the revolver.

When the infidel attacks your family, Abu Hadeeda said, your fury is like a lion tormented by dogs. You want to tear their heads off, rip out their hearts and drink their blood.

Nadir nodded. It was true. His hands clenched and flexed like the claws of some fierce beast.

This pistol has been in my family four generations. Abu Hadeeda spun the cylinder, cocked the hammer and placed the muzzle to his ear. It is one thing to take up arms in rage, another to fulfill God’s will. If our cause were not just, this would end here and now.

He pulled the trigger and the hammer snapped on an empty chamber. He handed the Webley to Nadir. Nadir spun the cylinder, put the muzzle to his temple and pulled the trigger. Nadir looked Abu Hadeeda in the eyes. The older man nodded.

Now you know you are chosen, Abu Hadeeda said. Now you have faith as well as desire for revenge to give you guidance and strength for what lies ahead.

Abu Hadeeda described the Montreal plot and gave Nadir the phone number of a single Montreal contact to memorize. He told him to get ready to leave within a few days. They would be in touch via the usual channels.

Abu Hadeeda embraced him and Nadir left the apartment. Walking back to the bus station, he felt light-headed, bodiless and exhilarated, as if he had died a common thief but been reborn a warrior. Allahu Akbar!

JANUARY

~~~

SATURDAY

Chapter 4

Montreal, Quebec

Sophie Gillette, Detective-Sergeant Homicide of the Service de Police de la Ville de Montréal (SPVM), was off-duty Saturday night. An attractive brunette just shy of thirty, she wore a cashmere sweater that concealed her curves but a short skirt that didn’t hide her spectacular legs. She took another sip of wine, allowing the Bordeaux to linger as she looked into her boyfriend’s eyes.

Remind me why we came out tonight instead of staying home like sensible people?

Because it’s our six-month anniversary. And you needed to stretch those lovely legs, said her boyfriend Peter Weldon.

I could have stretched them in bed.

The weekend is young. He tapped his glass against hers.

Their booth had a view of the stage where a three-piece jazz ensemble had just played the last song of their set. The restaurant was full, as was normal on weekends, and they had one of the best booths because Weldon had reserved it weeks ago.

La Maison du Jazz was a favorite of journalists, visiting celebrities and jazz aficionados, a mecca for anyone who liked cool jazz and spicy southern-style ribs. The interior was Art Nouveau, with intimate booths and lush leather banquettes, chandeliers and dim lamps, smoky mirrors and dark woodwork at every turn.

Weldon laid a hand on her knee. Excuse me a minute, Sophie. There’s someone I should say hello to.

She better not be hot. You know I’m packing.

Don’t get all territorial. He gave her thigh a squeeze and slid out from the booth.

She watched him make his way through the crowded restaurant, the eyes of several women tracking his passage. She wasn’t possessive but he was worth holding onto. Weldon was both handsome and fit, looking five years younger than his true age, thirty-six.

Across the room, Weldon approached a booth occupied by two older men. They shook hands all around. Weldon sat and chatted. Gillette assumed they were government guys.

Weldon worked for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and was currently assigned to Montreal as regional liaison officer. His mandate was to improve cooperation among various security organizations, including both the RCMP and the Sûreté du Québec, the provincial police force that cooperated on major cross-border crimes like drugs, kidnapping and terrorism. Monitoring all this from Ottawa was CSIS, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, counterpart to America’s Department of Homeland Security.

Gillette checked her phone for messages, responding to queries from girlfriends as to when she’d be available for a girls’ night out. Not for another week or two, she emailed back. She couldn’t share details, but nearly a quarter of the detectives in the SPVM were seconded to a major operation against the biker gangs of Montreal.

For the last several years the Hells Angels and Rock Machine had lived in relatively peaceful coexistence, operating within boundaries of various Montreal boroughs. But the sagging economy had slashed drug margins to the bone and the biker gangs had started poaching on each other’s territory again. Bikers being territorial animals, competition had stirred the beasts within.

Gunshots were traded on a regular basis in some east end neighborhoods, much to the terror of local residents. Three months ago a crime beat reporter for Le Journal, Montreal’s popular French-language daily, had been shot in the newspaper’s parking lot after one of his articles exposed the names of several full-patch members of both clubs. The reporter had survived to ride a wheelchair the rest of his life. His newspaper howled for a police crackdown.

The SPVM’s response was Operation Fat Bob, named after a Harley Davidson motorcycle. Fat Bob was gathering evidence against the leadership of both gangs to put them behind bars, decapitating their organizations and making Montreal streets safe again.

With a final round of handshakes, Weldon extracted himself from the government guys and returned to her side. He finished his glass of wine and nuzzled her cheek. Should I get the bill now?

Before she could reply, a waiter delivered a pair of Spanish coffees.

We didn’t order these, Weldon said.

Compliments of the gentlemen. The waiter indicated the booth across the room.

Friends in high places? she asked Weldon.

Can you ever have enough?

Gillette sipped her coffee. She had no powerful friends to speak of, although her boss Lieutenant Dallaire appeared to take an interest in her career. Right after Labor Day he’d moved her from Vice to Homicide. Currently she was on rotation, exposing her to more assignments and jurisdictions than was normal for a junior detective.

Gillette was chagrined to admit, however, that in these past three months, Weldon had seen her through the saddest time of her life. Just a month after her promotion she’d learned that her younger brother – her only brother – had been killed in Afghanistan. His Special Forces unit had shipped to Kandahar in the previous New Year, and had seen nine months in combat, conducting search-and-destroy missions against the Taliban.

Gillette had taken a few days off to attend the funeral and spend time with her mother, then gone right back to work, ignoring the advice of the department shrink who’d said she needed more time to process her grief. In defiance of her grief, Gillette had instead immersed herself in 12-hour work days and spent most of her downtime with Weldon. Despite whatever else Fate had dealt her, she was grateful for his presence in her life – his emotional stability, physical affection and ever-ready humor.

Not to mention, his willingness to brave a winter blizzard to take her out for their six-month anniversary...

Chapter 5

Sick with anxiety, Tariq Shirazi looked over his shoulder, wondering if anyone had followed him. He’d argued bitterly with his host, leaving the party on terrible terms. Blown out of proportion, the clash had disturbed him. Haddad was a friend – not only a mentor at work, but a central figure in Tariq’s social life. Their wives got along so well. But after what had happened tonight, Tariq wasn’t sure if he should confide in his wife or just forget the whole matter.

It was still snowing when he came out of the Villa Maria subway station. Just as he arrived on the street, the 103 bus pulled away. A couple of kids pursued, yelling for it to stop, but the bus continued west into Notre-Dame-de-Grâce, one of Montreal’s urban neighborhoods.

Tariq pulled up his parka hood and crossed the street in front of a delivery van parked near the subway entrance. He relished the fresh air the walk home would provide. Born in Iran, he was no stranger to winter and had spent school holidays with family and friends on the ski slopes of the Alborz mountains north of Tehran.

A snowplow clattered up the street, clearing the way toward a highway on-ramp a few blocks north. The van started up and followed Shirazi though the intersection.

Along Monkland Avenue, cars were parked helter-skelter in deep snow. A woman in a Mercedes was trying to dislodge her car from a snowbank. Tariq paused to lend a push. The delivery van paused, waiting for the Mercedes to be on its way.

Tariq turned onto Wilson Avenue, a residential street of semi-detached houses. Cars were buried and trees drooped with wet snow. His walkway, which he’d shoveled before leaving, was filled again. He mounted his front porch and took out his keys. As he put his key into the lock, he heard muffled steps mount the stairs behind him.

He turned and saw two men. Just before one thrust a fabric shopping bag over his head, he saw a delivery van in the street, its side door open.

One of the men punched him in the face, opening a salty gush of blood into his mouth. They dragged him from the porch and threw him into the van. Doors slammed and the van lurched down the street. Tariq struggled to break free.

The men twisted his arms behind his back. Something encircled his wrists and he heard the zipping sound of a plastic cable tie locking his hands together. Someone punched him in the face again and he thought he would vomit with the pain.

The van braked for the stop sign at the end of the block, slewing in the deep snow. In a moment they’d turn the corner and leave the neighborhood and he’d be forever beyond help. It was now or never.

As soon as the van turned left, he rolled head over heels to the right side of the vehicle. The bag came off his head and, despite his hands behind his back, he found the side door handle. He jerked the handle and slammed his shoulder against the door. One of the men clutched at his coat as he hurtled from the vehicle.

The van skidded to a halt. Tariq gasped for breath and struggled out of the snowbank that had broken his fall. He ran back along the one-way street. He heard gears crunch, an engine rev. He looked over his shoulder and saw the van reversing toward him.

He tried to get off the street but lost his footing. The van struck his hip and sent him flying. He had a brief sense of weightlessness before he crashed to earth. He tried to get up but something was broken and he couldn’t make his legs work. The van slid past him in a slow-motion blur, skidding to a halt at the corner to his street.

Tariq lay face down in the snow, breathing with a stabbing pain. A bearded man ran toward him, knife in hand. Now he knew he was going to die. Seema, my love, I’m sorry. I should have stayed home tonight.

The man crouched behind him. Tariq waited for his head to be jerked back, the knife to slash his throat. Instead, the blade nicked his wrist, cutting the cable tie binding his hands. He felt himself being rolled over. The man’s bearded face loomed close. He was half-numb with shock so the knife didn’t scare him as much as it should have.

"Kahlet," the man swore in a hoarse voice. Bastard. He spat in Tariq’s face.

To Tariq’s surprise, the man sheathed his knife and ran back to the van. He heard its door slam. The engine revved, wheels spun, and the white bulk of the van retreated to the periphery of his blurry vision. Then he heard the engine rev again and in a moment he saw the chrome teeth of the van racing toward him, and the hard black rubber of its front wheel aimed straight at his head.

Chapter 6

A ring tone played a guitar riff. Gillette retrieved her phone, frowning at the call display. What’s up? I’m not on duty tonight.

The dispatcher was apologetic. It was a crazy weekend. Between the snowstorm that had paralyzed the city, and several officers down with the flu, he’d had to call her. Before Gillette could even mention she’d had a few drinks, the dispatcher asked her to take charge of a hit-and-run scene in NDG.

Isn’t that something Patrol can handle?

A dead body requires an investigating officer. Sorry, it’s yours.

Gillette closed her phone. Minutes ago, she’d anticipated going undercover with Weldon. Now it looked more like she’d be freezing her tush on the street for an hour or two...

Weldon raised an eyebrow. What’s up?

I’ve got to go to NDG.

Weldon signaled their waiter for the check. Get your coat. I’ll drive you.

She looked wistful. He leaned across the table. She met him halfway. They were still lip-locked when the waiter placed the bill on the table.

~~~

Normally, it would have taken only fifteen minutes from downtown to the crime scene. Tonight, everywhere they turned, cars skidded and fishtailed on the streets. Snowplows worked to clear the main arteries of a city whose weather extorted $125 million a year for snow removal. Luckily, Weldon’s Saab had all-wheel drive. He headed west on the Ville-Marie Expressway.

Notre-Dame-de-Grâce was a popular borough of urban Montreal. It offered well-built houses on tree-lined streets, its commercial strips gentrified with trendy restaurants, cafés and boutiques. A couple of subway stations, excellent private schools, several parks and a low crime rate sealed the deal.

At the corner of NDG Avenue and Wilson, a parked patrol car diverted traffic from the crime scene. Two uniformed cops stood beside the car. Further down the block a blue tarpaulin shrouded a body. Two other cops stood nearby. At the intersection beyond, their car denied access from the other end of the block.

Gillette gave Weldon a parting kiss. Thanks for the ride. You’re a sweetheart.

Call me later if you get the chance.

Gillette got out, buttoned her coat and pulled up her hood. She wore high-topped leather boots with sturdy rubber heels, as stylish and winter-worthy as could be found in a city whose women all understood the trade-off between style and survival. In a climate where winter weather could freeze your ass off, it was a perennial challenge.

She showed her badge to the two patrol cops. They exchanged names. The female officer, Rennick, was English; her male partner, Tremblay, French. Gillette took a moment to shoot the shit, asking who they reported to, commiserating about the crappy weather. As was typical in Montreal where half of the population was bilingual, the conversation went back and forth in English and French, and often a blend of both that locals called franglais, wherein