Something was going on.
Then Elizabeth hurried in. “Hey, Jenna.”
“Has something happened?” Jenna’s headache was starting up again.
“Sorry, but I’m in a hurry, and I can’t stop to talk.” Elizabeth grabbed a tray, piled three sandwiches, three bananas, a small carton of milk, a soda, and a cup of coffee onto it, and carried it out of the mess hall toward the elevator.
Jenna sent a quick text to Derek to make sure everything was okay.
She waited, but he didn’t reply.
* * *
Derek satin the front passenger seat of the armored Land Rover, taking mental note of the guards and security cameras. He’d come with a minimal security team—just Jones, O’Neal, and Cruz. This was a casual visit, after all. Arriving with the cavalry might give Kazi the idea that Cobra was intimidated.
Derek wasn’t intimidated. He was angry as hell.
They’d gotten an ID on the kid who’d driven the car bomb. He was Qassim’s oldest son, Perooz. It left no doubt in Derek’s mind that the car bomb had been either a test of Cobra’s strength or an attempt to force them to relocate Jenna. Neither one was acceptable.
“Park here. O’Neal, stay with the car. Jones, Cruz, you come with me. Leave the hardware here.” Derek adjusted his tie—they were all dressed in business suits with body armor beneath—and climbed out.
Kazi’s uniformed security met them at the bottom of the front staircase and escorted the three of them inside, where guards scanned them for weapons. The scanner didn’t pick up the wire that was stitched into his suit jacket.
If the situation went tits up, O’Neal and everyone in the Ops room would know immediately and move into action.
After the security check, Derek left Cruz and Jones at the entrance and followed one of the guards to Kazi’s reception room, his shoes clicking on polished marble, the sound echoing thanks to the large domed ceiling.
Kazi sat on a gilded chair on an ornate Afghan rug, wearing a black suit, his beard short, his hair neat and trimmed. Years of violence seemed not to have left their mark on him, his demeanor like that of a benevolent prince welcoming peasants into his home. “Welcome, Mr. Tower. Won’t you join me for some tea?”
It would have been unforgivably rude to refuse or to speak of business matters without first making conversation, so Derek thanked him for the tea, the conversation all small talk and bullshit. It would be another cold winter in Balkh Province. The Patriots might make it to the Super Bowl again. How wonderful that the winner ofAfghan Starthis year had been a woman.
“We are making progress, Mr. Tower.” Kazi set his tea aside. “Why did you seek an audience with me?”
An audience.
The bastard thought he was a king.
“We know who planted the car bomb outside our headquarters.”
Kazi’s pupils dilated for a split second before he pasted a look of concern on his face. “Yes, a terrible thing. One of the victims in that blast has perished, I am afraid. You say you know who is behind this atrocity?”
Derek handed Kazi the file folder with the drone images of Qassim from the abduction attempt on Jenna and of Perooz as he climbed out of the car. “The first images were taken during an unsuccessful attempt to abduct or harm a client of ours while she was out helping survivors of a Daesh raid on a village north of Bawrchi. One of the guards from the hospital, a man named Hamzad, appears to be working with Alimjan Qassim, a Uyghur fighter, who has been causing havoc in the rural part of your province with his militia.”
Kazi studied the images of Qassim, a deliberate and fixed neutrality on his face. “You Americans and your drones.”
He looked at the next image.
“The young man in the second photo is Qassim’s oldest son, Perooz. He parked the car and disappeared around the corner ten minutes before it exploded outside our walls. We assess that he was working for his father. Perhaps Qassim meant to test our strength, or perhaps he hoped to force us to move our client. Either way, he failed and managed only to hurt and kill his own people.”
A muscle twitched in Kazi’s jaw. “May I keep these? I will pass them on to my intelligence unit and demand to know why I have not heard of this man.”
“Of course. We are always happy to share what we learn with you.”
When it serves our goals.
“I can assure you, Mr. Tower, that we will not rest until the guilty are punished.” He slipped the photos back inside the folder and handed it to the silent guard behind him. “How is your client? How is Miss Hamilton?”
Derek had put Kazi off-balance, and Kazi was trying to do the same to him.