Terror Rising: Book 0 – The Insurgence (10 page)

Angela scribbled away, beginning to
understand the assistant director a little better: she did things
her way.

“
That’s what I thought,” Sutherland
said. “Mahmoud, we checked your backgrounds—what little we could
find—and discovered that you’re all Syrians, here on expired
student visas.” He began pacing the room again like a defense
attorney, his leather dress shoes tapping along the floor. He
stopped and looked at his watch, then to Mahmoud. “How about we get
you back home in about thirteen hours on a one-way flight? Sound
good?”

The men remained silent as Mahmoud jerked
his head up, galvanized with fear. “No! You can’t send us back
there. They’ll kill us all!”

Sutherland stooped down right in front of
Mahmoud’s shaken face again. “Then tell me everything I need to
know, Mahmoud, or I’ll have no other choice.”

“
We were fleeing from ISIS!” Mahmoud
said, voice rising. “They accused us of being spies—”

Sutherland smacked the wall, cutting him
off. “You expect us to believe that? Where are your families? What
are you doing meeting up in an abandoned outpost?”

“
We’re trying to get our families
here. Trying to get citizenship first!”

“
Bullshit!” Sutherland shouted. “You
start telling me what I need to know, or we send you to your
buddies back home.”

“
We are
not
terrorists,” Mahmoud said. “I
know that you have your suspicions, but I can explain
everything.”

Sutherland sighed and looked up at the
ceiling panels and the two long, white fluorescent bulbs that
illuminated the room. He pulled a picture from his pocket and held
it close in Mahmoud’s face. “This man. He’s a Border Patrol agent.
Very important that we find him.” His finger pointed at Captain
Martinez’s official department headshot. “What do you know about
him?”

Mahmoud’s eyes tried to adjust. He opened
his mouth and shook his head, trying to answer. Sutherland grew
impatient and walked down the line of men, slowly walking the
picture past their faces. “Answers, gentlemen. We know he was at
your meeting place because he’s the one who told us about it.”
Sutherland paused. “Right before he disappeared.”

Mahmoud shook his head in disbelief. “I
didn’t… we didn’t.”

Sutherland lashed forward with his open hand
and hit the wall just above Mahmoud’s head. “Start talking, damn
it! We’ve got one Border Patrol agent dead, one missing, and six
Syrians with expired visas in an abandoned outpost.”

“
We were hiding!” Mahmoud
shouted.

The eyes of the other men widened as they
looked at Mahmoud, urging him not to say anything more. A man with
a facial scar stood up at the other end of the bench, livid.

“
That’s enough, Mahmoud!”

Thaxton’s hand went to her pistol as she
rose from the bench across from the men. “Sit down,” she said.

Mahmoud froze and stared back at her with
contempt.

“
Shakir. Sit!” Mahmoud said in
forceful tone.

The scar-faced man slowly sat as Thaxton
stared him down.

“
The truth is…” Mahmoud began. “We are
all six of us friends. We came here together. And we are living in
fear. Not only is ISIS trying to kill us back home, they have
fighters here. There is a fatwa against each of us. We were meeting
to discuss where we could go to be safe. There’s too many of them
in this state.”

Sutherland crossed his bulky arms, not
convinced, as Angela continued rapidly jotting down words on the
notepad.

“
Going into hiding from ISIS after
staying past your visas? Not buying it,” Sutherland
said.

“
Don’t you
see?”
Mahmoud shouted, jerking at
his handcuffs. “We are men without a country! We thought that we
had chance here.”

“
Oh yeah?” Sutherland said. “And what
school do you attend? Where do you live? How do you know all these
ISIS creeps?”

“
We live together. All of us. We have
little money,” Mahmoud said.

“
What’s your major?” Sutherland
asked.

“
There is no school!” Mahmoud shouted,
cracking.

Wary of all the back and forth, Thaxton
stepped forward, pulled a digital recorder from her pocket, and
pressed the stop button. Angela paused in her note taking and
stared down at her efforts to keep up, wondering why she had even
bothered.

“
That’s enough,” Thaxton said. “We’re
getting nowhere fast.”

“
I don’t think that’s the case,”
Angela said. As all eyes fell on her, she realized she had spoken
out of turn. Thaxton stared back at her with near amusement on her
face.

Having garnered their attention, Angela
decided to continue. “I think all of this is pretty revealing.” She
paused, trying to read Sutherland’s and Thaxton’s straight-faced
expressions. “I mean, don’t you agree?”

Sutherland sighed and turned to Mahmoud. “I
would if I didn’t think it was one-hundred percent bullshit.”

“
I don’t lie…” Mahmoud said
softly.

“
What?” Sutherland asked, leaning in
closer.

“
I said I don’t lie. Are we here
illegally? Yes. Are we Muslim? Yes. Are we Syrian? Yes.” He paused
and took a deep breath. “Are we terrorists? No.”

Thaxton cut in, intrigued. “This ISIS mafia,
as you referred to them. You know where they’re operating?”

Mahmoud shook his head. “Your agent,
Martinez. He asked us the same thing.”

“
Well?” Thaxton said, looking down the
line of men. Their eyes remained averted from her deepening
glare.

“
Only I and Shakir speak English. And
we met Captain Martinez outside a mosque service, trying to make
new friends. Trying to weed out any ISIS who were after us.” He
paused, staring ahead. “We think Martinez was there for the same
reason.”

At the end of the bench,
Shakir grunted in anger while shaking his head. Sutherland looked
up, annoyed. “You have a problem there,
Sha-kir
? Something you wanna add to
the conversation?”

Mahmoud raised a hand. “Please. He is only
afraid. We are all afraid.”

Angela scanned the faces of the men. They
were groomed and dressed as Americans, but she could see a
hopelessness in their eyes, a despondent, vacant look that didn’t
seemed bred in deception. They looked as though they had been
through hell.

“
Martinez…” Sutherland said. “Where is
he?”

Mahmoud looked around, reserved and
nervous.

“
Eyes up here, Mahmoud,” Sutherland
continued, pointing at his own eyes with two fingers.

Mahmoud began rubbing his hands together
nervously. “There is a place we know little about. One of our
friends. He went there. He volunteered to join the Islamic State so
that we would know where they were. So that, when the time came,
we’d have… something to offer.”

“
To offer who?” Sutherland
asked.

“
The U.S. government,” Mahmoud
continued. “People like you.”

“
Interesting,” Thaxton said, cutting
in. “And what is this information worth to you?”

Mahmoud made direct eye contact with her for
the first time, not hesitant in his response. “To put us somewhere
where ISIS cannot find us.”

Sutherland tilted his head back and laughed.
“Ah. Sort of like Witness Protection for foreign nationals.”

Angela’s hand began to hurt from writing so
much. She then glanced at the mirrorlike Plexiglas window,
wondering about the reaction of her watching colleagues. The sound
box had been turned off, preventing anyone outside from hearing
what was being said in the room. She was certain that she’d be met
with a barrage of questions when she left the room.

“
You told Captain Martinez about this
place? This ISIS hideout?” Thaxton asked.

“
Yes,” Mahmoud answered. “He said he
would help us.”

Thaxton turned around
thinking to herself, holding one arm by the elbow as her hand
rested on her chin. “His last known location was at
your
meeting place.” She
then turned to Angela. “Did you get a call from him after
that?”

Angela shook her head. “I didn’t even get a
call about the first place. He just said that he was going to do
some investigating.”

Thaxton turned to Mahmoud. “Why haven’t we
heard from him since?”

Mahmoud shrugged, trying to come up with a
good answer. “I-I don’t know. Maybe he got caught.”

Angered, Sutherland stepped forward. “And
you better damn well hope that he didn’t and that nothing happened
to him, or it’s your ass.” He glared down at the line of men. “All
of you!”

Thaxton placed a hand on Sutherland’s
shoulder, calming him. “That’s okay. We’re good here.” Her eyes
traveled across the room to Angela. “I think our work is done
here.”

Sutherland looked around, confused. “Ma’am?
I’m sorry, I don’t know what you mean. They haven’t told us—”

“
I think Agent Gannon can take it from
here.” She then walked to Angela. “I want you to write down the
location and description of this place they’re talking about and
report to Chief Drake’s office when you’re done.”

Angela looked passed Thaxton to Sutherland
with a confused expression. Her head went down, nodding. “Yes,
ma’am… I think I should be able to handle that.”

“
Good,” Thaxton said, turning to
Mahmoud. “You will tell her everything you know about this
location, and I’ll see to it that you’re taken care of.
Understand?”

After a long pause, Mahmoud said a faint
“yes.”

“
Because you and your friends aren’t
going anywhere until we confirm every bit of information you give
us. And once we have Captain Martinez back, then we can
talk.”

She beckoned Sutherland to the door, but he
didn’t look happy or convinced. He finally conceded, letting out a
loud sigh, and left the room with Thaxton. The door shut again, and
Angela felt a tinge of nervousness being left in the room with six
men restrained only by their handcuffs.

Their reflections showed in the window, and
Angela knew her every move was being watched, not just by her
colleagues, but by the FBI duo who had just left the room. Her
suspicion was confirmed the moment she noticed the switch to the
room mic, located right next to the door, had been turned on.

She turned to the men and tried to sound her
most confident. Their festering disapproval made her uncomfortable,
but she let out a deep breath, smiled slightly and began. “So, Mr.
Mahmoud. I believe you have some information to share,” she said,
pen in hand.

He said nothing and her heart started
racing. Now what? A long silence followed. All the men looked away
from her except Mahmoud. He slowly lifted his cuffed hands and
pointed at her.

“
You Martinez partner?”

She didn’t understand whether it was a
question or a statement but answered nonetheless. “Yes. I am.”

“
He told me about you. Said you were
smart.”

Angela smiled slightly. “Well, that’s nice
to hear. What can you tell me about this location?”

“
El Paso, Texas,” Mahmoud said. “Never
seen it, but our friend. He sent an email about two weeks ago.
Brief. Only one line of GPS coordinates.”

Angela paused, fearing that whatever they
gave her could turn out to be misleading, or a dead end. “Do you
have those coordinates?” she asked.

“
Yes,” he said, placing his index
finger against his forehead.

Angela waited, but Mahmoud
seemed in no rush to disclose the information. He crossed his legs
and leaned forward with a more casual tone than before. “Martinez
also said that you can be trusted. That you are
loyal
.”

Angela nodded. “To my partner, yes. To this
job, absolutely.”

Mahmoud smiled, exposing a missing tooth in
his top row. “He also said that you were naïve.”

Angela paused, unsure how to respond. “I
don’t agree. But everyone is entitled to their opinion.”

“Yes,” Mahmoud said, smiling. “Yes they
are.”

Shakir, however, seemed less than smitten
with their exchange. “Quit flirting with this bitch and get us out
of here!” he shouted, waving his hands in the air and jangling his
cuffs.

Angela brought one hand to her side,
hovering over her pistol.

Mahmoud’s face flushed as he began to shout
at Shakir in Arabic. Shakir shouted back.

“Gentlemen!” Angela shouted. “Enough!”

The men calmed as they turned their heads in
her direction. Angela shuffled on the bench and brought the pen
back to the notepad, waiting. “The coordinates. Now, please.”

Mahmoud rubbed his tired eyes as he nodded.
“Okay. Here you go.” He paused, thinking to himself, then spoke.
“31761970…”

Angela wrote each digit down as Mahmoud
paused again to think of the rest. “1062960792.”

“That’s the latitude and longitude, right?”
she asked.

“Yes,” he said.

“And you’re sure about those numbers?”

“I am.”

Angela leaned back, studying him. “That’s
impressive,” she said, smiling. “I don’t think there would be any
way I could have memorized all those digits.”

Mahmoud nodded with a nervous smile that
quickly dropped. “When you fear for your life, you’ll memorize
anything.”

Angela said nothing, rising from the bench.
She went to the door and opened it, only to find a group of Border
Patrol agents outside the room, waiting for her. Surprisingly,
Thaxton and Sutherland weren’t among the agents. Angela quickly
closed the door, locking it.