He dressed in khakis and a US Navy sweatshirt and thought about calling to see if any of the others were awake. None of them were in any shape to be receiving phone calls this early. They started the previous evening at Bryant’s with steak dinners and moved to the bar afterwards. Heath was surprised when Dana Morton joined them. She’d changed out of her funeral clothes and was in a skirt and blouse open at the neck to show off a gold chain. Introductions were made and, of course, Chili and Pig made clumsy plays for her attention. But while Dana wasn’t exactly “one of the boys” she made it clear that she could hold her own and mutual respect was quickly established between the rowdy SEALs and Spy Girl as Woody dubbed her. Priest, as usual, had little to say and sat nursing a soda and lime as round after round were ordered.

  The party moved from Bryant’s when it got loud and crawled its way up M Street. Somewhere along the line Chili and Pig picked up a trio of hostesses from Korean Air. Heath couldn’t recall a lot of it and was glad for that. He dimly recollected getting maudlin while talking about Manny and having a long talk with Dana that he sure as shit hoped she had forgotten. This was after they switched from beer to Jack or Jaeger shots. He wasn’t sure of anything until waking up in the bed smelling of cigars and spilled liquor. How he got to his room would remain a mystery.

  He sat propped in the bed channel surfing between the early morning news assholes until his stomach began growling. There was no shaking this headache until he ate something. The breakfast buffet was open another hour but he didn’t want to go down there alone. That’s when he remembered Priest. Douglas Bannion didn’t drink, smoke or talk about pussy. Hence his SEAL name. Priest was probably up doing calisthenics or reading one of the pile of books that went with him everywhere. In any case it was a dead cert the man was awake and sober.

  Heath called the desk and was connected to Priest’s room. No answer. Heath slipped on sneakers and made his way one floor up to Priest’s room and rapped on the door.

  “Just a second,” came a female voice from within.

  Heath smiled. Priest, you dog.

  Dana Morton swung open the door and stood blinking at Heath, her slim body wrapped in a hotel robe.

  “I thought you’d be room service,” she said.

  “And I thought you’d be a Korean stewardess,” Heath said.

  ****

  As it turned out, Priest wasn’t in the room.

  “Doug helped me to the door and left,” Dana said pouring from a pitcher of Bloody Marys that room service brought and handing Heath a glass.

  “He’s a gentleman, that guy.” Heath took a few gulps of the dog that bit him.

  “I wonder where he slept,” she said.

  “Probably hanging upside down in a stairwell,” he said.

  She tilted her head, brows crinkled.

  “Most of the teams think he’s Batman,” Heath said.

  Dana smirked and uncovered the dish on the service cart. A dollop of scrambled eggs and three strips of bacon.

  “Pretty sad,” she shrugged.

  “Then let’s go downstairs and hit the buffet,” Heath said. “My treat.”

  He went down and got them a table. Dana joined him twenty minutes later in a sweater and jeans. They piled plates with breakfast and returned to the table. Heath motioned mutely, his mouth jammed with hotcakes, for the waiter to keep the coffee carafe on the table.

  For a tiny girl, Dana Morton ate like a Viking. Heath knew she could hold her alcohol. Fate might have made her SEAL. From what Freeman told him, she had a warrior’s soul. She sure fought the wonks and fobbits when it came to the best interest of the team, a group of men who were only names to her.

  “So, you said former agency,” Heath said, allowing his first empty plate to be taken away.

  “Yeah. I butted one head too many,” Dana said after a slug of black coffee. “I soared too close to the sun, I guess.”

  “Blair said there was some fuckery at Citadel,” he said using the current codename for the White House.

  “Let’s just say I intruded on their version of reality.”

  “Are you working?”

  “Private sector. Security consulting. It’s not what I wanted to be doing but at least I’m paying my own way and staying the fight,” she said and set her cup down. “Actually, that was kind of my ulterior motive for catching up with you guys. This was the only opportunity I had for meeting any of you in person. I’m looking for someone who can act as a field operative for me. Someone with your skill sets.”

  “I’m a lifer, Dana. This is the only life I care about,” Heath said.

  “Oh, not you. But is there anyone you know? Anyone from the teams. It’s my own business. I’d make him a partner.”

  Heath thought of one name but Dana brought up Flame before he could.

  “Like Randall O’Donnell,” she said. “I understand he’s being discharged on a medical.”

  She was right. Flame received a head wound on their extra covert op to Sinaloa. It left him with some issues that could be treated with meds but were too severe to allow him to return to active duty. Flame was still back in San Diego finishing rehab. He was due to be set on the street in a few weeks with zero prospects.

  “You sure you can handle him?” Heath smiled.

  “I read his files. I think he’s just what I’m looking for.”

  “His files tell half the story.”

  “He’ll need work, right? It’s something he’d be interested in?”

  “Well, Flame’s not bad off for cash. He still has most of a pile of money he won in Atlantic City,” Heath said.

  “Is there anything I can do to entice him?” she said.

  “I’d suggest you make your pitch in person, Dana,” he said.

  It took her a moment to get it. She blushed.

  CHAPTER SIX

  THE BEKAA VALLEY, LEBANON

  Dr. Khan was a refugee out of necessity. But, standing in heat and flies while on the long line for water, he was starting to regret his choice of camps.

  The queue, mostly women, snaked along a lane between tents that spread over the hills in every direction. Parviz Khan stood out among the burkhas and veils in his worsted wool grey suit and Italian loafers, hugging a five-gallon jug to his pudgy form. He lowered the empty jug to the muddy ground and wiped the sweat from his glasses once again. The line was not moving and had not for some time and so he let the jug to remain there though he kept a close eye on it. The children in the camp would steal anything… anything.

  The line to the single pump faucet stirred and shuffled forward. Khan picked up his jug and tramped a few more paces before stopping again. The water was brackish and gritty and need to be boiled before it was safe to drink. He treated his with a tincture of iodine and a drop or two of chlorine before he’d put it in his mouth. Even then he put his health at risk. He had no idea how deep this perfunctory well was. He did know that it was far too close to the open latrine trenches that ran in a row just beyond the last row of tents. But even at a Euro a gallon he would fill his jug and gratefully.

  The camps in Lebanon were here at the displeasure of the government. Officially, Beirut was neutral to the struggle within Syria. Unofficially, Hezbollah was on the side of President Assad and viewed those who fled the fight as cowards and, worse, apostates.

  But, the world was watching and so land was set aside for those fleeing the conflict. But, unlike camps in Jordan and Turkey, almost all humanitarian efforts were turned away. Even the United Nations was barred from providing shelter, food and clean water to the fleeing million or so now squatting near border towns in the Bekaa.

  And what aid they did receive had a price. Rent was collected on sheds and tents. Default on your lease and you were evicted in favor of others with ready cash. Protest the eviction and risk a visit from the local Hezbollah thugs. A year in the camps and money was growing scarce. Fathers sold the favors of wives and daughters in exchange for a pound of rice or a gallon of fresh water. The number of suicides was growing at an alarming rate.

  It was an understatement to say that all this was a humbling experience for Dr. Khan. He was once the chief doctor and virtual administrator of a hospital in Dayr al Zawr along the banks of the Euphrates. He lived in a big house with servants and swimming pool. It was not a large city or a particularly ambitious place. But Khan had established himself as a discrete practitioner and a man who could keep secrets. And a man who could keep secrets was a man of great value in a theocratic police state like Syria. An abortion here for the daughter of a general, a case of gonorrhea treated for an imam, a rather severe and unexplainable rectal tear for a commerce minister. All found their way to Al Qurat Hospital along the river highway. And all knew their medical troubles would go no further than Dr. Khan. No paperwork. No record of their arrival or departure.

  Services like that were dear and Khan made sure he charged prices commensurate with their value. All was lovely and serene for the doctor until the uprising.

  Dayr al Zawr, situated as it was in the east of the country far from Damascus, became a city of war. Over two years time, it exchanged hands between Assad’s forces and the Free Syrian Army many times. And Dr. Khan changed sides along with it. One week treating wounded soldiers loyal to the president and the next week treating wounded rebels of the uprising. Often, they were the same men in the same uniforms wounded while fighting under two different banners. A man with a sucking chest wound does not question the allegiance of a bespectacled man working to save his life. The surgical mask hides many betrayals.

  But as the revolt that was supposed to be quelled in weeks stretched on to months and years, a new element entered the fighting. Backed with money and guns from Iran, or the Saudis, jihadists came in droves to the war zone like flies drawn to spilled blood. Al Qaeda was here in its many colors and names. Libyans, Gilzhais, Kurds, Egyptian Arabs, Beluchis and Somalis came and killed in the name of their own cause of world jihad. There were even Chechens here because they wanted to be wherever they could oppose Russians.

  They all cared nothing for Syria. In each town they visited they set up courts and hung or beheaded all who defied their version of God’s law. And the forces of Assad were no better. Their ranks were swollen with men of Alawite militias and Hezbollah who would drive away Al Qaeda only to set up their own mini regimes of terror. Despite what the world wished to believe, the struggle was just another chapter in the tired old conflict between the Sunni and Shia sects of Islam. The Sunnis supported overthrow while the Shias sided with Assad. They could easily have switched sides and loyalties. To these fanatics, the fight was the thing.

  From Dr. Khan’s medical perspective, the first signs of revolt were like a paper cut in the flesh of Syria. The sectarian rivalry had become the infection swelling what was mere civil disobedience into a civil war that might eventually kill the nation.

  The good doctor knew when an infection was beyond treatment. Syria might survive but Dayr al Zawr was doomed. It was the target of near daily bombing and strafing from the Mirages of the Syrian air force. The fighting in the streets moved from one part of the city to the other and back again like a traveling carnival of murder that would never end. The city was becoming a deathtrap, a noose, growing tighter with each passing day.

  Even a man with his skills was not safe. He was questioned and intimidated more and more as the common civilian rebels and army defectors were replaced by foreign fanatics. They judged all they met through the lens of their mad ideology and looked for ways to accuse anyone of heresy or blasphemy or not keeping The Word. In addition to that were the internecine grudge fights being fought between the disparate factions even within the rebel army. Al Qaeda killed Syrians whose loyalty they questioned. Syrians killed those suspected of looting or hoarding. Kurds killed Arabs. Arabs killed Kurds. Everyone killed Armenians.

  Dr. Khan decided that it was time to leave. While it was still possible he wired any funds still in Syrian banks to accounts in Indonesia, Singapore and tiny banks on tiny islands in the Caribbean. He emptied the safe in his house and took away forty thousand Euros and another fifty in gold coins. The currency was sewn into the lining of the suit he was wearing. The gold coins were hidden in compartments in the heels of his shoes and sewn into the walls of his luggage, which was being watched by a very large man from Homs that he employed for that purpose whenever he had to leave his tent.

  He chose his escape route because he believed that bribery would get him further in a near-lawless state like Lebanon. His false identification papers would not be questioned if they were handed over with a hundred Euro note. And they needed to be false because, despite his attempts at keeping a low profile, Dr. Khan had attained a certain level of notoriety for his close association with the Assad hierarchy. Or perhaps a better word would be infamy. A man who keeps secrets is of great value, remembered and much sought after by the enemies of those whose secrets that man keeps.

  Even with a suit crammed with money and no true rule of law in sight there are procedures and protocols. The slow-moving, maddening pace of bureaucracy ground on even here. Six weeks in this horrid press of humanity and Khan was still not able to work his way up to an official with enough influence to peddle to get him to Beirut and on a plane to anywhere but here. Khan was prepared to spend all he had and arrive penniless in France or Kenya or Poland. All he needed was access to a pen and paper and phone and he would be wealthy once again.

  But for now the only purpose his money served him was to keep him warm. Too warm. He sweated though his silk lining and drenched the bundles of bills. Standing in line he imagined the sweaty wool clinging to the stacks, delineating their unmistakable shape and making him a target of every man in the camp.

  The line for water crawled along and soon Khan was at the faucet. His damp five Euro bill was taken by a smiling boy with a Kalashnikov rifle slung about his shoulders. A more brawny boy worked the pump and filled the five-gallon jug to the rim then lifted it into the arms of Khan who struggled under the weight.

  The way back along the muddy lane to his tent was the worst part of his week. He was vulnerable with both hands occupied. The weight of the jug made his arms and shoulders ache. It sloshed from the open top over his shirtfront. Khan often considered hiring someone to wait in line for him and to carry it back to tent. But he was afraid they would simply steal the jug and he did not wish to draw more attention to himself by hiring menial labor. These people had nothing whatsoever to do all day but talk and he knew that he was a subject of much discussion already.

  Winded, the chubby doctor set the jug down on the ground to rest his arms and catch his breath.

  “Let me help you with that, father.”

  Khan replaced his perspiration-smeared glasses on his nose to see a tall man with eyes of flint lifting the jug from the ground as though it were a basket of kittens. Another man, with a gaze equally hard, stood to his other side. Both were armed with rifles slung casually over their backs. The flinty-eyed man wore a keffiyeh tied about his head in the pattern most popular with Hezbollah.

  “I would be most grateful,” Dr. Khan said, eyes goggling.

  He walked before the men even after they walked past his tent. The big stupid guard he hired stood before the tent and merely raised his shoulders in insincere regret.

  Khan followed the men to the edges of the camp where the sea of tents washed up against a collection of low, whitewashed buildings. They stood to either side of the door and nodded for the doctor to enter between them. He blinked and stared until his eyes adjusted to the gloom within. The room had dusty cedar floors and walls lined with cabinets. A business at one time, he guessed. At the center of the room was a table with a chair to either side. Standing by the table was a broad-shouldered man with perhaps the fiercest beard Khan had ever seen. The man’s frightening countenance melted away when he smiled a gap-toothed that crinkled his eyes.

  “Please sit, Doctor,” the man said and offered a chair.

  Khan sat and the man remained standing.

  “Do I know you?” Khan said with a dry mouth.

  “I have a few questions for you, Doctor.” The gap-toothed man ignored Khan’s question.

  “I will try to help if I can,” Khan relaxed. It was just a routine interrogation that would have an expensive outcome for his available funds. All a part of the process.

  “Dr Parviz Ali Khan. Chief surgeon, chief physician and head administrator of Al Qurat Hospital in Dayr al Zawr province and city.”

  “I am he.” No sense denying it.

  “You are favored by the Assad presidency and its allies.”

  “I am.” This could not help but help him with this man.

  “And yet you are here in Lebanon with the rest of the trash.” The man’s smile remained but did not comfort Khan. He made a miscalculation. This man would see him as a traitor.

  “There are many reasons for that if you will allow me to explain,” Khan stammered.

  “No cause for that, Doctor.” The man’s smile broadened and he raised his hand to quell Khan’s anxiety.

  Khan closed his mouth and waited.

  “I am pleased that you came to Lebanon. I welcome you to the Bekaa. I hope that we can reach an understanding and then I will make certain that you are free to travel where you wish.”

  Khan felt all the tension wash from his muscles and an involuntary smile creased his face to match the gap-toothed grin of this bearded charmer. Here was the man he sought. Here was a man he could buy to guarantee him passage out of Lebanon to a world of comfort and ease.

  “I will do all I can to aid you in that direction, sir,” Khan bowed his head.

  “I wish you to recall a day a few years ago. In your city. At your hospital.” The man hitched a seat on the corner of the table and leaned closer to Khan.

  Was this about a surgery— about one of his secret procedures?

  “It was in the early spring of 2003,” the man continued, still smiling, but the crinkles at his eyes were gone. “Just before Iraq was invaded by the Americans and their whore nations.”