There was a second of silence, then he asked, “Is this Corey?”
“Yeah. Are you around?”
“John, I’m sitting right next to you.”
“Good. Do you speak Arabic?”
“Why are you calling me on the phone?”
“This is a secure landline.”
“You’re a fucking idiot.”
“Me? You’re the one still talking on the phone.”
He hung up and came around to my cube. “What can I do for you?”
I explained about Nabeel and said, “I need you to be in the interview room.”
“To translate?”
“No, Al. I just need you to hold him while I head-butt him.”
Al smiled politely.
I said, “I have to see Walsh at nine. If Nabeel shows while I’m with El Cid, maybe you can go down and get him.”
“Sure.”
I also informed him, “I may be out of town for a while. Maybe you want to handle this guy.”
“Okay.” He asked, “Where you going?”
“Sandland.”
“That’s a derogatory term.”
“Sorry. I’m going to the shithole of Yemen.”
“You screw up?”
“Not recently.” I let him know, “This is a promotion.”
He thought that was funny. He asked me, “Kate?”
“She’s coming.”
“Good. It’s b.y.o.b. in Yemen.”
“Yeah? I thought the babes were hot.”
“No, it’s the guys who will make you lose your head.”
So, with all the cultural jokes and slurs out of the way, I thanked Al for sitting in on the interview—formerly known as the interrogation—and I promised to bring him back a crucifix from Yemen.
I spent the next half hour on my computer, reviewing and updating my cases for whoever was going to get them.
Kate came over to my desk and said it was time to go see Tom.
On the way up the elevator to Tom’s office, she asked me, “Are we still okay with this?”
“I’ve always wanted to go to Sweden.”
“It’s Yemen, John.”
“Oh… well, that’s different.”
We got off at the 28th floor—housewares, supervisors, aggro, and bullshit—and walked to Tom’s door.
I was about to knock and enter, but Kate said, “Last chance.”
I knocked on the door and said to her, “You make the decision. Surprise me.” I added, “Remember the Cole.”
I opened the door and we entered.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Tom stood and greeted us at his desk. He asked, “How was your weekend?”
I informed him, “We saw the Monet exhibit at the Met.” And I got laid Saturday night. How about you?
All the pleasantries aside, he asked us, “So have you reached a decision?”
Kate, without even a glance at me, said to Tom, “We’ll take the assignment.”
He smiled. “Good. Have a seat.”
There’s a grouping of armchairs and a couch around a coffee table that Tom uses for important people, or people he needs to screw nicely, and Kate and I took the chairs facing the window. Tom sat on the couch and began, “First, I want to say that I appreciate your willingness to accept this overseas assignment.”
And so on. We got a short speech that he probably gives to everyone who’s going off to some craphole or another.
I interrupted Tom’s good-bye, good-luck speech and asked, “Are you going to tell us what this is about?”
He feigned surprise at the question and replied, “It’s pretty much what I said Friday.” He elaborated, “One of the three masterminds who were behind the Cole attack is in Yemen. He has been indicted in absentia. You will be part of a team that is looking for him.”
I asked, “What do we do with him when we find him?”
“You arrest him.”
“And?”
“And, we will extradite him to the U.S. Or maybe to Guantanamo.”
“Right. But as I was told when I was there, and as you probably know, Tom, the Yemeni constitution specifically forbids extradition of any Yemeni citizen for any reason—including terrorism and murder.”
“Yes… that’s true. But they make exceptions. And that’s what Kate will be working on as our legal attaché.”
“They haven’t made an exception yet, but okay.” I asked him, just to set the record straight, “Are you sure we’re not supposed to terminate this guy?”
He informed me, “We don’t assassinate people.”
“We don’t assassinate people,” I agreed. “But we have used Predator drones with Hellfire missiles in Yemen and elsewhere to… let’s say… vaporize about fifty or a hundred people.”
“That’s different.”
“I’m sure the vaporized guys understood that.”
Tom seemed a little impatient with me and said, “I’ll give you both a piece of information that you will get in Yemen. This suspect holds an American passport. He claims dual citizenship—Yemen and U.S. So yes, we have a good case with the Yemeni government for extradition.” He also reminded us, “We don’t kill U.S. citizens.”
“Actually we do if they’re enemy combatants. Also, as you know, if we do