Resurrection Day (73 page)

Nikki parked the car and Collins walked alone through the cemetery gates. The graveyard was empty, and he moved past the granite and bronze tombs to the small hill shaded by pines until he came to the headstone where he had laid his wife and son to rest. He placed the flowers on the grave, said the prayers and the words he wanted to say, the same words he always said — that he missed them, that he longed for them back, that their passing had left a terrible sorrow, an unending ache.

That nothing could replace them, nothing, not ever. His eyes swept over the smooth granite and the gold-leaf paint on the cold chiselled-words that inscribed his pain. Until we're together again, I'll miss you, always.

He would always come here and be haunted by their absence. There was no cure for his pain, and if truth to tell, he didn't want any. He never wanted to forget the sacredness of his memories with his wife and son. And though he knew his dreams would still reclaim him, he was aware now that they would do so less often. He would move on, make another life for himself with Nikki and Daniel. Not to forget his past, because he could never forget, but to make himself whole again, heal himself, and in so doing honour the memory of the two people he had loved and lost.

For a fleeting moment an image flashed before his eyes: the grainy photograph he would no longer keep, of the cold, hard face of the man who had helped take Sean's life. But then the image was gone and with it went the hatred, the rage, the vehemence that for so long had made a stone of his heart. On this day, at this moment, he simply wanted to remember.

When he had finished talking, when he had finished his whispered words to the dead, he touched the stone that bore their names. 'I miss you Annie, I miss you, Sean.'

Then he turned and walked down the hill towards the gates where Nikki waited.

Afghanistan

As the sun rose over the horizon, Abu Hasim climbed up the hill. Clutching his gown and using his cane, he reached the top and unrolled his prayer rug. Facing south-west to Mecca, he invoked the name of Allah, the Master of the World, the All Merciful and All Compassionate, the Supreme Sovereign of the Last Judgment. Then he knelt, prostrating his body three times, touching his forehead to the ground each time, glorifying the name of God and his Prophet. His ritual over, Abu Hasim sat back on his rug, breathing heavily, staring out at the lofty pinnaces of ochre mountains that spread jaggedly across the horizon. There was no sound but the whisper of a gentle breeze.

All evening and morning he had waited anxiously for word from Washington. When the ultimatum had expired by three hours and no word had come, when he had received no news that the aircraft had landed with the prisoners, his triumph of the last few days had evaporated, replaced by a hollow feeling in the pit of his stomach, the sickening certainty that his gamble had failed.

By morning his fear had grown. He had no doubt now that the device had been found and neutralised. He would pay for his failure. The Americans would use all the technology at their disposal to try to locate him. Missiles would rain down on his camps, of that he was certain. Which was why he had moved his base fifty miles up the valley to a secret place, the deep tunnels bored into the rocks where no one ventured but him and his men. The Americans could look, but could they find him here? He turned as he heard a noise, saw Wassef Mazloum, his ravaged-faced commander, hurrying up the slope. When he reached the top, Mazloum handed him a folded slip of paper. 'A message came, Abu.'

'From whom?'

'Our friend in Islamabad. The Americans told him to give it to you.'

Abu Hasim rose, unfolded the paper, read the message. He face turned very pale, as if a cold hand had suddenly twisted deep inside his bowels. For several moments he stood there, beads of cold sweat on his brow, his gown blowing in the breeze. Then he turned to stare out at the desolate landscape, the parched, stony mountains that surrounded him like prison watchtowers, held out his hand and let the paper fall. It blew away, snatched by the wind. Abu Hasim turned, left his prayer rug on the ground where it lay, and walked down the hill.

Mazloum watched him go, until his eye caught sight of the piece of paper, blowing over the rocks. He had read the words, recalled the simple message. They were from the blessed Koran, a chilling prophecy for the Day of Resurrection:

There shall befall them the evil consequences of what they do, and they shall not escape. For their soul shall taste of death, and they shall be paid fully their reward, wheresoever they hide.

Moscow

The snow was falling heavily at Sheremetyevo airport the following day, the flakes swirling in a brutish, icy wind that blew in from the Russian steppes. An hour after his aircraft touched down, Alexei Kursk was in the back of a taxi as it drove towards Mazilov. He ached to see his wife and daughter again, but as the taxi rounded a bend and came to a bridge over the Moscow river, he said to the driver, 'Pull in here.'

The driver braked to a halt. 'Wait. I won't be long,' Kursk told him, and climbed out.

The glacial wind had died, but the snow still fell. Not far away he could see his home, the outline of the small, brick-built house on the river bend, the roof covered in white, a plume of wood smoke curling from its chimney. As the snow drifted down, his mind was flooded by memories. He and Nikolai on the steps of St Basil's Cathedral, both of them eighteen, the day they graduated from high school. And farther back, another memory, of two small boys, sitting on the riverbank, twelve years old, their arms around each other's shoulders. We're blood brothers, remember?

And the day Nikolai's father had been cremated, when they had walked across the fields until they came to the small rise where a willow tree overhung the banks, and Nikolai, desolate, had scattered his father's ashes on the water.

The willow tree was long gone. As Kursk stepped towards the middle of the bridge he looked down. There were icy patches near the embankments, but the water wasn't completely frozen, wouldn't be until late December; for now the Moscow river still flowed on its way to the sea.

Kursk took the parcel from under his arm. Unwrapping the brown paper from the ceramic vase, he scattered Nikolai Gorev's ashes. They drifted down to the cold water, falling with the flakes of snow, until they sank and were embraced by the depths of the great river. 'It's over now, Nikolai,' he said aloud. 'You're at peace.'

Kursk stood there, lingering for a few minutes until he had finished a silent prayer, and then he turned and walked back to the waiting car.

Florida

The white-painted house was on a hill, a private rented villa that looked out over the sea and the Florida coast. Not the same splendid views as her old house in Tyr, no sweeping gardens of olive trees, no scent of jasmine or bougainvillaea, but for several weeks now it had been her home.

It was a warm December day, and Karla Sharif sat on the veranda, staring out at the blue water. The armed FBI men who protected her never let her out of their sight, and one of them sat near her now, reading a magazine as he basked in the sun. That morning she had finished writing her letter, it was in her pocket now as she waited for her visitor to appear The silver four-wheel-drive Explorer with black-tinted windows came up the hill ten minutes later. It braked to a halt on the gravel driveway and when the passenger stepped out of the car he climbed slowly up the steps of the veranda.

He was a big man, tall and robust, and she remembered his name: Tom Murphy. The other FBI men stepped away to allow them their privacy, and as Murphy went to sit in one of the cane chairs near by he wiped his brow with the back of his hand-

'How's your health? Is it on the mend?'

Her wounds still hurt, her scars still livid, but they were healing. The doctors had warned her it would take months until her body had repaired and she would be right again. But the other wounds the ones that would never heal, hurt her most. 'Thank you yes '

'I wanted to tell you we'll be moving you pretty soon,' Murphy said. For security reasons I'm not at liberty to say where, or when exactly you'll be departing. But soon you'll start your life again with a new name and identity.'

Karla Sharif asked the question she was desperate for her visitor to answer. 'And my son?'

Murphy told her what he knew. That the Israelis had moved Josef to a different high security prison. A place where the prisoners were kept in solitary for their own safety where he was watched twenty-four hours a day and kept separate from the other inmates.

'Do you think I'll ever see him again?'

A flicker of sympathy showed in Murphy's eyes. 'That's not up to me. I know Major Kursk made a request on your behalf that your son be released. But we'll have to wait and see. In time, perhaps, it'll be considered. But even if that happens, it will be up to him whether he wants to see you or not.'

Karla nodded, bit her lip. 'Will you do something for me?'

'If I can.'

'Will you see that Josef gets this?' She took the unsealed envelope from her pocket. 'It's a private letter to my son, but I left it open. I know that under the circumstances you'll have to read it.'

Murphy nodded, opened the envelope. He slid out the handwritten letter and took his time reading the pages. When he had finished, he looked thoughtfully out to sea, as if moved by the words he'd read, then finally he folded the pages and returned his gaze to Karla. 'I promise you it will be delivered.'

'Thank you.'

Murphy stood, slipped the envelope into his pocket. He didn't offer to shake her hand, even though for some reason he looked as if he wanted to, but gave a nod instead. 'We probably won't be seeing each other again, and I know it might seem odd me saying this, considering everything, but good luck to you.'

She watched as Murphy went back down the steps. When he reached the Explorer, he looked back at her one last time, then he climbed into the passenger seat and the four-wheel-drive swung round and drove back down the hill. She watched it go. When it had disappeared, she looked out towards the sparkling water. Her heart felt broken. Broken for the man she had loved, and for the son she couldn't be with. She remembered she had told Nikolai that she believed you paid a price for the wrong you do. It didn't matter whether the wrong was just or unjust, you still paid the price, just as Nikolai had paid, and she was paying now. The grief was unbearable. So many times during these last weeks she had wondered whether she should have told him her secret, but then what difference would it have made to him, or to her? In time she would no longer weep when she thought of him.

But she would always weep for Josef. She had told him everything in her letter, and how much she loved him. Told him he was still young, perhaps too young to understand or to forgive her for not telling him the truth about his past, but she hoped that some day he would find it in his heart to do so. She had his photograph by her bed. He was a fine-looking boy, tall and strong, and so much like his father. Every day, and every night before she slept, she prayed that some day she would see him again, and that they would be together. And however small or vain it was, she at least had that hope to cling to.

Acknowledgements

When I began writing Resurrection Day in earnest in the summer of 1999, I knew exactly what the book was to be about — a dramatic attack on America's capital, Washington, DC, by an al-Qaeda terrorist cell armed with a new and deadly weapon of mass destruction.

When I finished the first draft in late August 2001, I put it aside to mull over how I might cut down the manuscript, more sharply focus the story, and also make some headway on the next book. On September 11, I switched on my TV and like millions of others watched in horror as al-Qaeda hijackers crashed into the Twin Towers and the most astounding act of terror in history unfolded.

While writing this novel I had a constant dread that al-Qaeda might carry out a major terror assault on a US city. Having completed much of my research and interviewed many terrorist experts and listened to their opinions I had come to the stark conclusion that such an assault was not only possible, but imminent. The same experts also unanimously agreed that the terrifying scenario I intended to write about in my book, and which I outlined to them, was perfectly feasible. 'Yes, it could definitely happen,' they all said. 'But let's pray it never does.'

And then, on September 11, fiction became reality. Who can ever forget those extreme scenes of horror? Trapped victims hurling themselves from the World Trade Center's Twin Towers in final acts of suicidal despair. Lower Manhattan's soaring landmarks of steel and glass imploding, killing thousands of helpless innocents.

Since September 11, so much has happened that has changed the world. But it is important to reflect that the al-Qaeda attacks could have transpired in so many ways. If planned differently, they might have been even more massive in their scope and evil intent, the damage and the numbers of deaths even more horrifying. What if a biological or nuclear weapon had been used? Or the terrifying weapon of mass destruction I suggest in this book? After the events of September 11, extreme terrorist plots are no longer just the fantasy of thriller writers, but reality. We have come to live in the time of our fiction.

In the aftermath of the attacks, I genuinely believed my novel would not be published. It was too emotive a subject, the public's nerves were too raw, and I was convinced my publisher would have no appetite for a book whose subject matter was ripped from today's headlines. Unwilling to leave the manuscript aside, I carried on, for I still had facts to verify with the experts I had consulted.

But nobody wanted to talk. Doors that were once open were now firmly shut. The FBI, the CIA, White House staff, and the many authoritative US sources with whom I had spoken, simply stopped answering my calls. They were in shock, unwilling to talk; the premise of my book was too close to the bone and their national security was suddenly a very real concern. I had to use other means to reach my end — invoking a writer's fictional licence in minor instances where I couldn't verify the facts — but reached it was.

Resurrection Day was a massive undertaking, and there are so many people who helped adorn the tapestry of this book with the threads of their knowledge. Most requested that I not mention them by name, and after the attacks they expressed that view even more strongly. But I would like to thank them now, collectively, for their help and courtesy in answering my many questions this book could not have been written without them. I would also especially like to thank my editor at Hodder, Carolyn Mays, for her enduring faith in this novel, and for her incredibly incisive editorial judgment. The reading public is too often unaware of the vital input editors may make — they're the quiet, unsung heroes of the business, toiling away in the background — and I'm deeply grateful to Carolyn for her invaluable advice, courage, and patience.

Resurrection Day is fiction, but in many ways it is a story of what might have happened had September 11th not transpired the way it did, and the al Qaeda attacks had taken a dramatically different course — one with an even greater potential for human death and disaster.

It is also the story of what may yet happen.

But let's pray it never does.