Nolan was still lost for words. Finally, he said, “Look, if I see this guy with a weapon in his hand, I’ll kill him. And if I don’t, one of the guys will do him. But if he’s unarmed, I’m sorry, but it wouldn’t be possible to kill him. That’s not what I do, what any of us do.”

  “Then I will have to be content with that. If you see him, you will know him. He’s tall, very tall. About six feet six, with a big, black beard. Seyid has one feature that sets him apart more than his height, though. He wears a black eye patch. He lost an eye when a missile hit the convoy he was traveling in. He has sworn revenge on the West ever since. All he lives for is to kill Americans and Westerners, nothing more.”

  Nolan nodded. “I’ll keep an eye out. He sounds like a nasty sonofabitch.”

  “He is also a sick-minded, perverted rapist.”

  The Chief didn’t go down that road. The potential for embarrassment was too great.

  Agnetha moved away and chatted with other members of the platoon, and he was left on his own. He took out his combat knife and a stone and began sharpening the blade, a soothing activity when under stress. Nolan carried a Ka-Bar, the classic and traditional Marine Corps bladed weapon. The iconic military fighting knife featured a seven-inch blade made of high carbon steel, hardened to resist breakage under severe pressure. The blade featured a razor sharp cutting edge, and a secondary edge above the prominent swedge, all hand honed and polished. He let his mind drift off, thinking of the good times with Grace and the kids. Once more his thoughts shifted to Carol Summers, the plucky San Diego detective. Would it be disloyal to Grace’s memory if anything ever developed in that direction? Probably not, she wouldn’t want him to spend the rest of his life in isolation, but that was something to consider for the future, if Carol was interested in him, and if he ever got back. He knew that Talley hadn’t fully explained the dangers of dropping into Rahimi’s mountain lair to kill him and rescue Professor Bergmann. The journey in the V-22 Osprey would be a nail biter, as the reliability problems of the revolutionary aircraft were still an unknown. The night rappel would be fraught with danger, dropping down a rope from the rear of the Osprey in high winds when the aircraft would be unstable and hard to control. The LZ would be on an exposed mountainside, and they would be assaulting a facility about which they had almost no intelligence, only the word of the elderly Afghan. There’d been no indications that the Taliban or Al Qaeda had a camp in that area. It was all an unknown. It was also quite possible that Rahimi had the place rigged for demolition if he thought it was about to fall. That would be something to watch for, and he made a mental note to talk to the men about checking for mines and booby traps. And then there was the problem of exfiltration. They could drop down a rope onto a mountainside but not up it. SAR, search and rescue, employed simple techniques of winching personnel up into a helicopter, but a whole platoon on a windswept mountainside, when they might be under fire? It wasn’t going to happen. It looked like it was going to be a long, cold walk back afterwards. He heard a loud noise and looked up to see the Osprey moving into the hover as it completed its long flight from Bagram to pick them up for the mission. The light was fading as night crept over the countryside like a heavy tarpaulin. It was time to lock and load, and time to finish Gemal Rahimi.

  And Mohammed Gul, if he’s anywhere in the vicinity, he’s going down. It’s just a question of when. And his boss, too, whoever that is. They’re dead men walking.

  Chapter Seven

  They were wearing the tribal clothes they’d been in since they’d gone into action. Except for Waverley, who resolutely refused to change out of his camouflage uniform.

  “This is official military uniform, Lieutenant. If the enemy captures me wearing this, I will be protected under the Geneva Convention, which I cannot say for you and your men wearing those Afghan clothes. You could be shot as spies.”

  “Colonel, the Taliban and Al Qaeda never signed the Geneva Convention,” Talley replied with a smile. He neglected to add that American military uniform was so hated and despised by the insurgents that wearers could not expect to enjoy any kind of easy captivity. A quick death was the best a prisoner could hope for, yet most were subjected to appalling treatment. The jumpmaster came through from the flight deck.

  “The Captain says we’re ten minutes to target, Sir.”

  Talley nodded. Waverley gave the crewman a black look for not offering him the info first, but he said nothing. They were all watching and wondering how he’d cope with the night drop. They checked their own gear, then each other’s. Abraham said he’d be okay dropping down a rope in the dark onto a mountainside, and they’d no reason to suspect he wouldn’t be up to it. He’d shown himself to be incredibly fit, with the strength and endurance of someone half his age. He’d given the directions to Rahimi’s camp as best he could, and they’d calculated an LZ that would be approximately three miles away, and on a slope that would shield the aircraft noise from the enemy.

  “I cannot say more until we are on the mountainside, and I am able to recognize the ground. Besides,” he’d smiled at them, “without me, you will not be able to find this place. I would not wish you to leave me behind.”

  Talley smiled back. “We wouldn’t dream of it, Abraham.”

  “I need a gun, Lieutenant.”

  He nodded. “I guess so, it could be hot down there. What did you have in mind?”

  “A pistol, like the one you soldiers carry, the one with the large barrel that makes the bullet almost silent.”

  “A P226 Sig Sauer with a suppressor? That’s a close quarters killing gun, my friend.”

  Nolan smiled. At least the old guy knew about guns; the Sig Sauer P226 was the preferred weapon of most US Special Forces, and for one reason only. When you needed to kill someone who was nearby, there was nothing better.

  “I plan to do my killing at close quarters.”

  After they’d rooted around the stores carried in the aircraft, they found him a Beretta 92FS, the official service sidearm of the United States Military. Fortunately, this one was fitted with a heavy silencer. He seemed satisfied as he eagerly checked the load, sliding out the clip and peering at the mechanism with what was clearly long experience of weapons. He was an Afghan.

  “Three minutes,” the jumpmaster intoned.

  Talley leaned across to shout to Nolan. “Look after Waverley. Despite everything, he could be the key to this mission. We need his expertise to evaluate what we find in that place.”

  “I’ll do that, don’t worry. He says he’s done this before.”

  “Not like this he hasn’t. Just try and stop him falling off a cliff.”

  Nolan looked across at Agnetha. Someone had lent her a quilted parka to wear against the cold winds that swirled inside the cabin through the open ramp. She looked up and smiled.

  “Take care,” she shouted.

  He nodded. “See you back at Bagram.”

  The forward motion of the Osprey eased, and the propellers screamed for lift in the thin air as the wings rotated, turning the aircraft into a helicopter as it prepared to go into the hover. The noise, which before had been bad, was now deafening. There were four coiled ropes fastened to a beam over the ramp. They stood up, and the first four men took a hold. The jumpmaster heard something through his earpiece and tossed the line over the side. Simultaneously, he looked across at them.

  “Green light, go, go, go!”

  There wasn’t time for conscious thought. Talley and Nolan were in the first group, together with Merano and Rose. Nolan was second in command, in case Talley met with an accident; the odds were not good on this kind of a rappel. Merano would set up a sniper position and cover them while they deployed. Waverley came next, sandwiched between the next four Seals, and Abraham was squashed inside the last squad. It was an operation they’d done many times before, and generally without mishap, even at night. Except that the winds were higher than anything they’d encountered before. And they’d not done this from an Osprey V-22, where the massive downdraft from the twin rotors meant a drop through hurricane force winds. The ropes swirled, twisted and intermingled with the winds that swept the mountaintop; winds that were a powerful force impossible to counter.

  Nolan was thrown across the snow-covered rocks by the force of the gale. He could see he was tumbling towards a dark, deep, shadow that could only be a chasm. He flinched as fire burst through his leg as it snagged on a rock, but he ignored it. He also ignored the agony that swept through the rest of his body from the huge demands he’d made on it over the past few days, and the blackness that threatened to swallow him during these past weeks since that terrible day. What was necessary was to stop his tumbling over the edge. There were two rocks close together, and as he was dragged over them, he frantically unslung his SWS rifle, using it to jam between the rocks so it acted as a grab bar. His arm was almost torn from his socket with the force of the gale, but the rifle held. Then the mountainside started to fade, as his mind started to lose it.

  No, not now, if I lose it now, it’s all for nothing!

  He fought to regain full consciousness, and slowly it started to come back to him. He could actually see his rifle was bent with the force of holding his weight against the fall, but it had stopped him. If he’d gone over the side, he wouldn’t have needed the rifle anyway. He ducked behind the rocks and started to crawl back to where the rest of the platoon had dropped. It was chaos; sheer, bloody chaos. The Osprey had ascended two hundred feet to remove the effects of the rotor wash, but the damage was done. He found Talley, and thankfully, he was unhurt. The Lieutenant was down on his knees like the rest of them, crawling around to check on the damage to his platoon. He turned as Nolan crawled up to him.

  “Any injuries, Chief?”

  “Only to my rifle. I’m okay. How’s everyone doing?”

  “So far, there are four men missing. And Waverley is dead.”

  “Jesus Christ! I thought he was vital to assess the technical side of this operation.”

  “That’s right, he is. Or he was, but we haven’t got him. He slipped on the line and came down the last twenty feet upside down. Broke his neck, and there’s another problem. Abraham is injured.”

  “Damn, how bad?”

  “Dave Eisner is looking at him now.”

  Both men looked around the area they’d dropped into. The bleak mountainside covered with snow in many places, and in some parts the fierce winds had scoured the snow from the rocks, so they stood out of the white carpet, like so many rotting teeth. The howling gale made it hard to move and even to breathe properly. The moonlight was dim with only a quarter moon, and it was difficult to make out any distinctive features of their location. It was also bitterly cold. They crawled over to a sheltered spot twenty yards away where they’d dragged the elderly Afghan. They could see immediately he was in a bad way. Eisner looked at them and shook his head.

  “How do you feel, Abraham?” Nolan asked the old man.

  He tried to smile, but his teeth were gritted against the pain. “I am fine, American. Just a scratch, I think. But up in these mountains, it is the kind of scratch that I will not recover from.”

  “Nonsense, we’ll get you out of here and to a hospital. You’ll be fine.”

  “No, I will not be fine, American. I will never leave this place.”

  Nolan and Talley exchanged glances.

  “We need to know where the camp is, Chief. Ask him if he can still lead us there, he trusts you. Tell him we’ll carry him all the way. I’ll talk to the Osprey. They need to report back about Colonel Waverley, and we’ll need a fresh set of orders now that he’s gone.”

  Nolan looked at his officer. “Boss, if we try to get him to show us the location of the camp, it’ll kill him. Any movement will kill him, come to that. We need to get him medevacked out of here.”

  “He’s dying, Chief. You know that. Don’t you think he’d rather go, knowing that he’s helped us to destroy the people who took his granddaughter? There’s a good chance we might even get her back. Wouldn’t you want to go knowing you’d achieved that?”

  Nolan nodded. “I’ll talk to him.”

  He walked carefully back over to Abraham, trying to avoid slipping on the icy mountainside. “My friend, we need to know where Rahimi’s camp is. Are you still able to help us?”

  Dur tried to move his head, but the pain was too much. He closed his eyes, and his lips moved. Nolan put his head closer to listen.

  “Yes, I will help you. But I must have your solemn word that even though I will die here, you will lead my granddaughter to safety.”

  “We’ve already promised that.”

  “Yes, but now I will not live to see that promise kept. I must know that you will not fail me.”

  “You have my word, Abraham. We will free your granddaughter.”

  “Then I will lead you to his camp. Can you help me? I cannot walk.”

  “Sure, we’ll fix up a gurney and carry you. Thank you, Abraham. You can be sure we’ll kill the folks who took Najela and bring her home.”

  “In that case, I shall die happy,” he murmured, but then he slumped into unconsciousness. Nolan looked at Eisner. “Can you fix him up enough to get us there?”

  “Yeah, I’ll give him some morphine for the pain, and a shot of something to bring him back to consciousness. But I doubt he’ll last long, not up here.”

  “Okay, do your best for him.”

  Eisner nodded. They felt the increased downdraft as the Osprey began to descend.

  “What the hell’s he doing?” Dave asked. “I’m trying to keep this guy alive. They’re not helping by blasting a gale in this direction.”

  Nolan crawled off, fighting the hurricane force crosswinds and the violent downdraft, to where the platoon was grouped around a rappelling rope dropped by the aircraft. Six of the men were holding on grimly to stop it being blasted skywards by the turbulence. Talley was watching them, talking into the mic to someone on the bird. The Chief saw someone rappelling down the rope. It was inexpertly done, so it looked as if they’d sent down one of the crewmen from the Osprey to make up the numbers. Shit, they didn’t need that. Every single one of the Seals on the mountain was highly trained to carry out this kind of mission. They didn’t need a passenger. The figure reached the bottom of the rope, and the men grabbed him and pulled him down to the surface to stop the wind and downdraft sending him spinning into a chasm. Nolan crawled over to see the new guy, except that it wasn’t a guy.

  “What the hell are you doing here?”

  Agnetha looked up from where she’d been pulling off the harness. “They said your nuclear expert was killed, so I volunteered to take his place and check out the technical side of the facility.”

  “You shouldn’t be here!” Nolan exclaimed. “You’ve no right coming down on this mountain. This is a military operation, and a damn dangerous one. We don’t need civilians to take care of. We’ve got enough to do as it is.”

  She flared at him. “I have every right to be here, my father is held hostage by these people, or had you forgotten? And besides, who will evaluate the installation? Do you know what can be destroyed, or what can be removed? Are you an expert in fission weapons?”

  “You won’t do anyone any good, least of all your father, if you’re killed,” he snapped back. They glared at each other for a few moments, and then he left her and went to check the deployment of the men. They were on a mountainside in the middle of a raging storm, but it didn’t mean there weren’t any hostiles around. He found Vince Merano. He’d climbed a few feet to a shallow niche in the rocks and was using his night vision gear to sweep the area.

  “Anything?”

  The sniper shook his head. “Not so far. I’ve swept the whole area, and there’s nothing.”

  “Okay, I’ll go post the lookouts on the other side. I guess we’ll be moving out in about ten minutes. Time is not on our side. We have to try and find this place before dawn. You can see a long way in the daylight up here, and if we’re spotted, we could lose this bastard. Rahimi is sure to have an escape route, and he could slip away if he thinks we’re onto him. If he does that, he’ll blow the facility, and they’ll just start again someplace else.”

  “Who was that who came down from the Osprey?”

  He told him about Agnetha.

  “That’s crazy. I thought she’d got away safe on the bird that brought us here.”

  “Yeah, me too.” He noticed his friend’s concern for Agnetha was more than just casual. “You’re keen on her, Vince, aren’t you?”

  He sensed rather than saw his friend redden. “She’s a nice girl. Yeah, she’s okay.”

  “I’ll try and make sure nothing happens to her.”

  “Thanks, Kyle, I’d appreciate that.”

  Nolan walked away. The hurricane force crosswinds were not so dangerous now that the Osprey had left. The strong winds had eased too. When he looked back, Vince was gazing towards Agnetha. Well, well. He wondered did the girl know she had an admirer.

  Dave Eisner managed to rig up a lightweight gurney they’d dropped from the Osprey, and Abraham was as comfortable as they could make him, strapped to the fragile litter. A pole stuck up in the air with a drip bag. Nolan glanced at Talley.

  “You think we’ll manage to carry him this in these conditions?”

  “We have to, Chief. It’s that or we’re lost.” Talley shouted for Dave and the other three men to prepare the litter. “Pick it up, we’re moving out.”

  They started across the mountain, but there was no need for directions; the only route was a single path that led in one direction only. They were heading for an escarpment about five hundred yards away. The route was uphill, and the wind picked up again halfway there. Agnetha stumbled along behind the gurney, followed by the squad bringing up the rear. When they reached the ridge, they were all of them frozen with the bitter cold and biting winds, and yet the search for the camp had barely started. The effects of sub-zero temperatures, and the desperate fight just to keep moving in the teeth of the treacherous winds, sapped the strength and energy of all of them. They halted briefly while Talley consulted Abraham.