Code name death, p.1
Code Name: Death, page 1
part #3 of Code Name Series
SNUFFED
The expression on Quinncannon’s face changed from uneasiness to trepidation. “What did you mean when you said, ‘Oh, shit. A snuff?” he asked.
Jenny turned to John, imploring him to answer for her. “They are called snuff films,” she explained. “They are sexually explicit until the final scene when someone is killed or ‘snuffed’.”
Quinncannon pointed to the blank screen. “Wait a minute! You aren’t about to try to tell me that that is real, are you? Did I just see a picture of my granddaughter being murdered?”
“I can’t say for certain, Mr. Quinncannon,” John finally said. “But, yes, I’m afraid that what you saw was real.”
“Oh, my God!” Quinncannon said. Closing his eyes, he turned away from them, but not before they could see tears beginning to form.
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CODE NAME: DEATH
WILLIAM W. JOHNSTONE
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Copyright © 2001 by William W. Johnstone
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First Printing: May 2001 10 987654321
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Contents
ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE
SIX
SEVEN
EIGHT
NINE
TEN
ELEVEN
TWELVE
THIRTEEN
FOURTEEN
FIFTEEN
SIXTEEN
SEVENTEEN
EIGHTEEN
ONE
1980
Just off the coast of Beirut, on the emerald green water of the Mediterranean, a rusting freighter rode at anchor under the noonday sun. When the bilge pumps kicked in, a stream of water started spewing from the discharge pipe, giving the illusion of some great beast of the sea relieving itself.
A ship-to-shore water taxi met John Barrone at the freighter and ferried him across the harbor. As it approached the docks, the water changed from a clear sparkling green to a dirty brown sludge. The boat operator steered around something that was floating in the water. John thought it was an automobile tire, but as it drifted by the boat, close astarboard, he saw that it was a dog, dead and bloated. The sight of a dead dog floating in the harbor didn’t surprise him. All life was cheap in Beirut, including human life.
As the water taxi approached the wharf, John stood up, steadying himself against the rocking of the boat. The operator killed the engine and allowed the craft to drift the rest of the way. John grabbed one of the access ladders to stop the boat, then stepped up onto the bottom rung.
“Twenty-one, six, sixty-five Shari Umar ad Daag,” the boat operator said as John started up to the top of the pier. Until that moment, John had assumed the water taxi was just one of many plying the harbor. He knew now that it wasn’t by chance that the water taxi had come to the ship looking for a fare. This particular taxi had been waiting specifically for him, and its operator was John’s contact What the boat operator had given him was a street address.
Without answering, John nodded, climbed to the top, then walked to a taxi that stood less than fifty feet from the ladder, its back door already open.
“It is a nice day today,” the driver said. “I hope our weather holds.”
“If it does not, my trip will not be spoiled,” John replied. This was the sign and countersign. John had just connected with his second contact. In the cellular concept of operatives, each contact would know only what he was required to know. The taxi driver knew to pick up John, but he didn’t know where to go. John gave him the address he had received from the boat operator.
The city of Beirut was divided into several enclaves, each defended by its own army of zealots, representing such factions as the Kataeb, the Tiger Militia, Guarthans of the Cedars, Zghorta, Lebanese National Resistance Front, Murabitun, Amal, and Hizb Ullah. Pickup trucks in various states of repair, most of them sporting mounted guns and filled with armed soldiers, patrolled the streets.
The taxi was unmolested during the first part of its transit. The driver, making sure it would stay that way, sped across the various zones. Through his window in the backseat, John looked out onto what could only be described as a war zone. Many of the buildings had been destroyed, and there were huge piles of rock and brick in every block. Even those buildings that hadn’t been turned into rubble showed extensive damage. Most were smoke-blackened, many had windows broken or missing, and artillery fire had left several gaping holes in the brick walls.
As they left one area and crossed the border into another, a truck, mounting a brace of 40-millimeter guns, suddenly pulled out of an alley. It blocked the road and the guns were brought to bear on the taxi, forcing it to stop. One of the armed militiamen started toward the taxi.
“What is this group?” John asked.
“This is the Hizb Ullah,” the driver said. “Be careful of them. They are one of the worst.”
“What do they want?”
“They will ask to see your papers,” the driver explained. “But it means nothing. They have no official status. They just want to show who is in charge in this neighborhood. Do nothing to anger them.”
“Don’t worry about that. I’ll be Mr. Congeniality,” John promised.
John rolled the window down and smiled up at the militiaman as he approached.
“Are you American?” the armed man asked.
“I’m Canadian,” John lied. Though he wasn’t Canadian, he had a Canadian passport to verify his claim.
“What is your business in Beirut?”
“I am in the import-export business.”
“Passport.”
John folded a fifty-dollar U.S. note inside the passport, then handed it to the militiaman. The militiaman opened the passport, saw the bill, then looked up harshly at John. “This is American money,” he said, tapping the bill with a stubby forefinger.
John shrugged his shoulders. “Yes, it is,” he replied. “As a Canadian it pains me to say it, but the American dollar is stronger than ours.”
The militiaman looked over his shoulder at the others. When he was sure he wasn’t being observed, he slipped the fifty-dollar bill into his pocket. Then he handed the passport back to John and stepped away from the taxi. He waved to the driver of the truck and the truck backed up, allowing the taxi through.
At 21665 Shari Umar ad Daaq, John met his team, consisting of four Israelis and two Lebanese. Although all six had military experience, they were now civilians hired for this operation, as was John, by a very wealthy American. As prearranged, John gave each of them access numbers to their own private Swiss bank accounts. A telephone call verified that fifty thousand dollars had been placed into each account. That was the agreed-upon fee.
The American who had contracted for their services owned an international investment and banking company called Quantum Dynamics. Four of his employees, three men and one woman, had been taken hostage by the “Party of God’s Deprived,” an extremist Islamic group. This had happened at the same time the Iranian students had taken over the American Embassy in Teheran. The U.S. Government was so obsessed with the embassy problem in Iran that they were unable, or unwilling, to deal with a few private citizens being held captive in Beirut.
When the American businessman realized that he could not count on help from the government, he took matt
John had never worked with any of the members of this particular opteam before, and he knew that he would never work with them again. On an ultradeep cover mission of this sort, that was often the best policy.
“All right, now that you have all been paid, let’s get down to business,” John said to his men. “Do we know where they are being held?”
“We know where they were as of ten o’clock this morning,” David Bin-Yishai replied. Bin-Yishai, a former Israeli colonel, was John’s second in command. He opened a folder and pulled out a glossy eight-by-ten photograph. The picture he produced was a satellite image of the city of Beirut.
“How did you get this?” John asked.
“Our benefactor provided it,” Bin-Yishai replied. “It is nice to have friends, and satellites, in high places,” he added with a chuckle.
The picture was of the Hamra district of West Beirut, and though it was taken from an orbiting body in space, the buildings were as clear and distinct as if it had been taken from a low-flying aircraft.
“Do you see here, where Tariq Saib Salam crosses Shari Kamil Shamal?” Bin-Yishai asked, pointing to the street intersection. He handed John a magnifying glass. “Look here, at the second building from the left. The terrorists occupy this entire building, but we believe the hostages are being kept upstairs.”
“What kind of security?” John asked.
“They have guards posted out front and more inside. They also have someone with the hostages at all times, and these people have sworn to die before they turn the hostages over.”
“Sworn to die, have they?” John said. “Then let’s see what we can do to allow these gentlemen to fulfill their destiny.”
For the next hour, John and the others planned the mission. Using the satellite photo, they were able to trace the alleys and roads along their twisting paths, thus establishing the best possible approach routes. The pictures provided such detail that they could even plan the final assault
31545 Tang Saib Salam,
Temporary Command Headquarters,
Party of God’s Deprived
One of the biggest surprises the terrorists had received when they captured the hostages was the discovery that the person in charge of Quantum Dynamic’s Beirut office was a woman. Even before the raid, they knew the name, Casey Northington, but they had no idea that Casey could be a woman’s name.
This was proof, they told each other, if proof were needed, of the moral decadence and societal dysfunction of American culture. What sort of people would put a woman in charge of men, especially in a city like Beirut where all Americans were at risk? Perhaps if they had known beforehand that the office head was female, they would have made alternate plans. But once the mission was under way it was too late to change.
The woman hostage disturbed Mehdi al Ahmed. She was in her mid-forties, fully as old as Ahmed’s own mother, and yet she made no effort to cloak her sexual appeal. On the contrary, she played up her attractiveness by bleaching her hair and painting her face and wearing provocative clothing.
Ahmed felt that her appearance was inappropriate for any woman, but especially for one as old as this one. She should be dressed in veil and sari, preferably of a dark and unobtrusive color. She should be all but invisible when one passed her on the street.
This woman certainly wasn’t like that. Most disturbing of all, however, was the fact that Ahmed found himself physically attracted to her. He felt a sense of guilt over that temptation, because she was an infidel, an immodest whore who obviously reveled in her carnal nature. She also had a disrespectful attitude, and she swore like a man.
As Ahmed looked at the four prisoners in his charge, he repeatedly slid open and shut the bolt on his AK-47, though only partially so, not enough to eject a shell.
“Please stop doing that,” one of the hostages said.
Ahmed looked at the one who spoke to him, but he didn’t answer. Neither did he stop sliding the bolt back and forth.
“That is very annoying,” the hostage said.
Ahmed ignored him.
“Hey, Omar, I have to pee,” the woman said.
“My name is not Omar.”
“I have to pee,” the woman said again.
“You must wait,” Ahmed said.
“Wait? I can’t wait. I have to go now.”
“We have no women to go with you.”
“Well, hell, Omar, why don’t you go with me? The way you have been jerking off with that gun, you might get a thrill out of watching me pee.” The other hostages laughed.
“What is jerking off?”
One of the hostages made a motion as if masturbating, and all of them laughed again, including the woman.
“You are insulting me?” Ahmed said angrily. “Don’t you know that your life is in my hands?”
“No, it isn’t,” the woman said easily. “You are a peon, Omar. You can’t do jack-shit unless your superior tells you you can. And from what I can determine, everyone here is your superior.”
Ahmed’s face went purple with rage, and a blood vessel began to throb visibly in his temple.
“Casey, maybe you’d better back off a little,” one of the other hostages said.
“Don’t tell me what to do, Bill. This little pissant may have you frightened, but not me,” the woman answered. She looked at Ahmed again. “So, Omar, do you let me go pee, or do I squat right here?”
“You are Satan’s whore,” Ahmed said.
“And you are Allah’s faggot.”
Furious at her words, Ahmed stood up so quickly that the chair he had been sitting on fell over. “Woman, you have gone too far! You have defiled Allah, and I am going to — “
At that exact moment there was a loud explosion downstairs, followed by a long burst of machine-gun fire.
Three of Ahmed’s comrades burst into the room. “The Americans are here!” one of them shouted. The leader of the group assigned one hostage to each person, separating them so that rescue would be more difficult. “Ahmed, you stay with the woman,” he ordered.
“Yes,” Ahmed said.
“And remember,” the leader told all of them. “Do not surrender your prisoner! It is better to kill your prisoner and yourself than to surrender them.”
“Allah is Great!” Ahmed shouted.
“Allah is Great!” the others answered as they left with their own prisoners.
Ahmed was now alone with Casey Northington.
Even as the gunfire and explosions were going on all around him, Ahmed felt no personal fear. On the contrary, he found the present circumstances so exciting as to be erotically stimulating. He had never been more sexually aroused in his entire life.
Casey was an exceptionally astute woman, and she realized that the dynamics had changed. For the first time since she had been taken hostage, Ahmed actually had the power of life and death over her. And she knew, even before Ahmed knew, what he was going to do.
“No,” she said in a quiet voice. “Ahmed, you don’t want to do this.”
“Oh, so now it is Ahmed. What happened to Omar?” Ahmed taunted.
The gunfire was inside the house. It was close, loud, very fierce, and moving up the stairs, coming closer.
“Casey Northington!” someone shouted. “Casey, if you can hear me, tell me where you are!”
“I’m in here!” Casey called. “I’m at the top of the stairs!”
Pointing his gun at her, Ahmed squeezed off a short burst of automatic fire. Blood and brain matter spewed from the back of Casey’s head, like lava from an erupting volcano. Then, an amazing thing happened. At the exact moment Casey died, Ahmed experienced the most intense orgasm he had ever known.
When John kicked in the door to the room where he had heard Casey’s voice, he saw a man climbing through the window. He managed to get off only one shot before the man was gone. John started toward the window, but stopped when he saw Casey lying on the floor.
