Page 10 of Fighting for Valor
But as I round the corner, Zaman is heading right for me. Fuck. He could still pass me by. Flattening myself against the wall, I hold my breath. As Zaman stops in front of me, I can almost feel death hovering over my shoulder.
“Amir Faruk says the cameras are down,” he snaps.
With the knife still tucked inside my sleeve, I lower my head. “I will check on them now.”
“You will come with me. Invaders have taken the boy and his mother.” He grabs my arm and pulls me down the hall. “You will help find them.”
Death would have been a blessing. Now…I’m trapped. When Zaman lets me go in front of Faruk’s desk, I quickly clasp my hands behind my back. “What can I do for you, Amir Faruk, sir?”
He leans forward, his eyes wild. In the years I’ve been here, in all of my fractured memories, I’ve only seen him this out of control once—when his son was diagnosed with Alpha Thalassemia, a rare blood disorder that is fatal without treatment. His hair sticks up in all directions, and he tugs at his tunic. “Infidels have kidnapped my son, Lisette, and the doctor. You will find out how they got in and where they are going.”
“It will be my pleasure.” The words make my stomach turn, but maybe…I can send Faruk’s men in the wrong direction and buy his wife and son—and the doctor—some time to get far away from this horrible place. If I don’t get rid of the knife first, though, he’ll find it, and then I won’t be able to make good on my vow to end the life of the man who stole mine.
“Take him to the computer room. As soon as you know how the infidels broke in, report back.” Faruk rounds the desk and grabs my arms. His thick fingers dig into my biceps, squeezing to the point of pain. “You will find them for me, Isaad. Or I will send you back to the well.”
I stumble on the way out of Faruk’s office, banging into a tall plant and going down on one knee. I push the knife into the dirt as far as I can and hope it’s enough. Zaman growls at me in Pashto—something about being a clumsy idiot—and when I straighten, he shoves me down the hall.
I can walk on my own, fucker.
For so long, Faruk owned me. Not only my actions, but my thoughts as well. I didn’t dare challenge him, even in my own mind. But now…it’s like I’m awake for the first time in years, and if I’m not careful, my expression or my body language is going to give me away.
Despite knowing who I am now, so many of my memories are fuzzy. I know I was trained to do this. Infiltrate. Blend in. Adapt. But my skills are rusty. Anyone looking at that plant will see the knife poking out a half an inch.
In my little office with the ancient laptop computer, I enter my password. Zaman crosses his arms over his chest and leans against the door jamb. Does he suspect me of turning off the cameras? I’ve done Faruk’s bidding for years—most of the time without protest or question—but Zaman has always hated me. The feeling’s mutual, and I hunch my shoulders as I bring the cameras back online. My quick glance at Zaman finds him tapping on his phone, probably messaging Faruk, so I delete the video file from the kitchen that shows me stealing the knife, then rewind the recording to when I saw the doctor being taken from her room.
“Here is footage of the…the infidels.” The words stick in my throat, and Zaman arches a dark brow.
“That is not all Amir Faruk asked of you.” He ends with a word I’m pretty sure means fucker, but though my Pashto is pretty good after all these years, no one’s ever bothered to translate the insults Faruk and Zaman have hurled at me.
“This is all I have of the doctor. After they round this corner, the cameras shut off.”
Zaman brings the phone to his ear and tells Faruk what I’ve found. I can’t delay long—not without Zaman getting impatient and beating the crap out of me, so I scan through all of the other footage until I find the other man talking to Lisette and Mateen, and then running with them. “This is the man who took the boy.”
More muttering into the phone, and I pull up a complicated-looking screen of code. It’s junk. Doesn’t do a fucking thing. But when I want to make Zaman or Faruk think I’m working, I run this program. Making a show of scanning through the lines of letters and numbers that mean nothing, I pull out a small notebook and pen, then start writing down random time stamps.
Zaman only gives me five minutes before he demands to know what I’m doing, and he does it by cuffing the back of my head with his elbow. “Amir Faruk requires an update.”
“These are times over the past three hours when a signal from outside the compound disrupted our security systems. These men are experts. The first few attempts did not take down the cameras. But after an hour, glitches started to occur. This line,” I point to the last time stamp, “turned off the cameras completely.”
Zaman snatches the notebook from my hand. “I will take this to Amir Faruk. Track the doctor and the boy. Now. We have men searching for them, but they have so far come up empty. If you have not found them by the time I return, you will regret the day you were born.”
I already do.
Finding Mateen is simple. The transmitter in his little video game has a battery that should last five days. Right now, he’s moving steadily southeast, occasionally doubling back. The guy who was with them…I bring up the footage I gave to Zaman. He’s not Special Forces or SEALs. Black ops, maybe.
Taking Lisette and Mateen…he didn’t plan on it. The way he changed tactics from stealth to speed, the rapid-fire words I assume were for the benefit of whoever was on the other end of those comms, and his path after he got the two of them out of the compound all say he was trained to think on his feet and react to anything. And to kill.
Half a dozen tracer dots move on the map. All but one of them belong to Faruk’s men. Mateen’s little group only has a two-kilometer lead. This…is going to be tricky. Hacking into a GPS device on the fly isn’t child’s play, even for me. I just hope I have enough time before Zaman comes for me. If not…Faruk will kill Lisette, and his son will end up just like him one day.
I wipe my brow, the house’s air conditioning no match for the heat of the day. Other than one break I was allowed to piss, I’ve been at this computer since 3:00 a.m. Almost fifteen hours. My shoulders ache, and I’ve burned through the meager snack one of the kitchen girls brought me a few hours ago. Despite barely moving from my chair, my heart is racing. I think Faruk suspects I’m not the same broken, obedient lackey he trained all those years ago. I’m still broken, but definitely not obedient. Not anymore.
Mateen’s GPS is sending accurate data back to my machine, but I managed to cobble together a little program to adjust the coordinates enough to throw Faruk’s men off their trail.
The door bangs open, and I flinch, my shoulders hiking up to my ears before I get myself under control. Zaman grabs me by the back of the shirt and jerks me out of my chair. The punch to my solar plexus catches me off guard, and I fall to my hands and knees, retching and trying not to vomit.
“You are working against me!” Faruk roars. He waves a phone in my face, and on screen, I see a blurry photograph of Lisette, Mateen, and the American. “This picture was taken five kilometers from where you said my son was.”
“I do not…understand,” I say, holding up my hands and trying to look beaten. It’s not hard. I’ve had a hell of a lot of practice. “I can show you the map, Amir Faruk, sir. I am only reporting what the GPS shows me.”
