Collateral Damage (Stone Barrington 25)

At eight-thirty Holly went down to the situation room and, with the help of Phyllis Schackelford, familiarized herself with the controls on the table beside her chair. Everything was clearly labeled, but she put Phyllis at her left for the meeting, in case she needed help.

Stone arrived at eight forty-five and looked around the room. “Just like the one in the White House,” he said. “Maybe a little smaller.”

“Wait until you see my office,” Holly whispered.

The two other section heads arrived and introduced themselves, and at the stroke of nine, the elevator doors opened, and the police commissioner and the FBI’s AIC, followed by half a dozen assistants, arrived and were seated at the table.

Holly addressed them. “Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the first meeting of what we will call, for working purposes, the joint executive committee for New York intelligence, or EXCOM. I’ve asked you here to tell you what we’ve learned from our sources abroad and to begin to coordinate our efforts to stop these bombings and capture or kill the persons responsible for them.”

She sat down. “First of all, I must tell you that a few weeks ago, at the grand opening of a hotel called The Arrington, in Los Angeles, while the presidents of the United States and Mexico were in residence, an al Qaeda group attempted to infiltrate three powerful bombs into the hotel and explode them. Through a combination of good work by the Secret Service and The Arrington’s security personnel and good luck, their efforts were thwarted. Two of the team were captured, one was killed when his bomb exploded at Santa Monica Airport, and two others were killed in New York during a firefight with CIA officers. You will know about this from official reports and from the news media.

“What you don’t know is that an attempt to detonate a nuclear device at the hotel was narrowly averted, again by Secret Service and private security personnel, and by Stone Barrington, who is sitting to my right.” She paused to let this sink in. “The reason you have not known about this until now is that, for obvious reasons, the information was confined to only those people directly involved in the incident.”

“How big a device?” the commissioner asked.

“Big enough to decimate a significant portion of Los Angeles and kill, either immediately or in the months following the blast, something like a million people.”

“Jesus Christ,” the commissioner said.

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sp; “Before you ask, we have good reason to believe that there is no other nuclear threat out there. There were six on the team that assembled and transported the device—three are dead, two are in custody, and a Pakistani called Dr. Kharl, who designed, obtained the materials for, and assembled the device, died in Dubai a few days later. Without him they do not have the resources to construct and deliver another such device. However, the sixth member of the team, whose name is Jasmine Shazaz, and whose brothers were the two team members who died in New York, is still active and is believed to be in the city as we speak. She is responsible for the three explosions that took place in London recently and the two explosions that have recently occurred here. Last evening we learned from a foreign intelligence source that there are four other al Qaeda cells operating in Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Atlanta, and that they are well financed and equipped.

“It is our immediate task to find and capture or kill Jasmine and her local team and to discover anything we can about the identity and location of the teams in the other cities. As you know, the president has authorized the CIA to work domestically on this and other cases of terrorism for the duration of his second term, and he has asked the Congress to change the Agency’s charter to that effect.”

The AIC spoke up. “I should tell you that the Bureau objects in the strongest terms to this action by the president,” he said. “We believe his executive order to be unconstitutional and we will urge the Congress not to alter the Agency’s charter and open up that can of worms. We have the intelligence resources and the staffing to uncover and counter any terroristic threat to this country.”

“I’m sorry, Agent, but if that were true you would have known that al Qaeda teams were operating in five major American cities,” Holly said.

“Exactly right,” the commissioner interjected. “Why do you think we have such a large antiterrorist unit in our city?”

“Gentlemen, I don’t want this to devolve into internecine warfare. What we have to do is too important to have interagency rivalries damage our efforts. I suggest that it is the obligation of all of us to follow the president’s executive order until such time as the courts might overrule it.”

“Are you going to be flooding this city with CIA agents on the ground?” the AIC asked.

“I expect we will have a few people brought in, but I regard our primary purpose as one of intelligence. We simply don’t have the manpower to do what the commissioner can do, with his thousands of officers, and we have no wish to interfere with any investigation the FBI is currently running.”

“Well,” the AIC said, “I guess that’s the best we can hope for.”

The commissioner spoke up. “Exactly what would you like my department to do?”

“Our intelligence tells us that the New York cell is quartered in an apartment or house somewhere on the West Side of Manhattan. We would like you to act on that intelligence by putting as many people as you can into the West Side, distributing the only photograph we have of Jasmine to every shop, restaurant, and bar. This is now a manhunt, and the NYPD is the best agency to lead it.”

“I can do that,” the commissioner said.

“And what would you like the Bureau to do?” the AIC asked archly.

“We’d like you to contact every source of intelligence that you possess, every agent, every snitch, and enlist them in the hunt for Jasmine.”

Stone spoke up. “May I make a suggestion?” he asked.

“Certainly,” Holly replied.

“Since these people will know that we’re looking for them, they will hole up and hunker down, and they’re going to have to eat. Since they are of Middle Eastern origin, I suggest you contact every Middle Eastern or Indian restaurant on the West Side that delivers meals, and find out if any of their deliverymen has seen Jasmine.”

“I’m sorry,” the AIC said, “but I don’t know who you are, Mr… . ah, Harrington?”

“Barrington.”