Sky Sentinels

“I’ll keep it in mind,” Lyons said. “Anything else we need to know?”

“Probably a lot. But that’s all I have for now. I’m sure you’ll find out yourself when you get to K.C.”

“We’ll keep you informed,” Lyons said. “And thank Striker for me.” He disconnected the call.

The flight from Oklahoma City to Kansas City, Missouri, was almost an up-and-down hop for the Concorde, and Lyons saw that it was only a little past 1500 hours on his wrist. As they deplaned to the runway, they saw the marked KCPD helicopter waiting for them on the ground, blades whirling as it warmed up for flight.

In a way, it felt like Oklahoma City all over again. But the mall was going to get a lot more complex than the church had been. It was far bigger, and there were thousands more places for men—or explosives—to hide.

Jack Grimaldi was the last one out of the Concorde but he raced past the men of Able Team as Lyons, Schwarz and Blancanales began pulling equipment bags out of the storage compartment. Lyons saw the air ace say a few words to the KCPD pilot inside the chopper, and then the uniformed man reluctantly stepped down.

Grimaldi patted him on the shoulder as he took the man’s place at the controls.

It took a little less than four minutes for Grimaldi to get them over the tall downtown buildings of Kansas City, Missouri, to the Kansas border and then to Shawnee Mission, Kansas. Actually, Shawnee Mission was a region rather than a suburb, made up of several independent smaller towns that, if combined, would have taken over from Wichita as the state’s largest city.

“There’s the mall,” Grimaldi said, nodding toward the bubble windshield in front of him. “Carpenters Square.” He turned to glance at Lyons. “Want me to do a fly-over?”

Lyons nodded silently, frowning slightly as he looked out the side window of the chopper. Below, he saw what looked almost like a replay of the scene at the church they’d just come from. Blue-and-red lights whirled above both marked and unmarked squad cars, and the sirens were blasting so loud he could hear them all the way up in the helicopter. Most of the marked units were from Kansas, but some of the Missouri officers had crossed the state line as backup, too. Such was usually the case when a residential area spanned more than one jurisdiction—the cops on both sides knew each other and worked together frequently.

The mall itself appeared to be in a classic cross configuration, with two long hallways that intersected in the middle. At one end of the north-to-south hallway stood a large, three-story Dillard’s store. At the other was a JC Penney.

Kohl’s and Jan and Jeni’s Sportwear made up the tips of the other long strip of stores.

“Take her down a little lower,” Lyons told Grimaldi. “I want to get a look at the entrances and exits.”

Grimaldi nodded and dropped the bird in the air, hovering a few feet off the ground and almost directly in front of one of the entrances into Dillard’s. Through the glass, the Able Team leader could see several men with red scarves around their necks looking back at him. As he watched, one of them raised his AK-47 and fired.

But Jack Grimaldi had seen the man, too, and he twisted the chopper slightly in the air, not unlike a boxer sliding off a punch. The 7.62 mm bullet struck the windshield of the chopper and careened off, leaving only a tiny scratch in the glass to show where it had been.

That scratch was directly in front of Carl Lyons’s nose.

The radio suddenly blasted with screeching and scratching. Grimaldi adjusted the squelch as a stern voice said, “KBI-1 to Missouri chopper—whatever your call name is!”

Lyons lifted the radio microphone from where it was clipped below the control panel and said, “Just call us AT,” he said. “AT-1, 2 and 3. I’m 1.”

“Well, whoever you are, get your ass out of there,” said the same KBI voice. “They’ve just called and said if you don’t land or fly away they’ll ignite the whole mall right now!”

“Affirmative,” Lyons said. He nodded at Grimaldi, who immediately raised the helicopter straight up in the air. He glanced down at the mike, as if it might actually be the man he’d just talked to. Whoever the guy was, he sounded as if he was used to being obeyed.

Carl Lyons’s best guess was that KBI stood for Kansas Bureau of Investigation, a state investigative unit. And KBI-1 would undoubtedly be the director.

But he didn’t sound as if he was going to be as easy to get along with as Dwayne Langford had been back at the church.

“AT-1 to KBI-1,” Lyons said into the mike. “What’s your 10–20?”

“We’re set up at the edge of the parking lot, north side,” the surly voice came back. “There’s a place where you can land over here, and I’m ordering you to do just that right now!”

Grimaldi turned to the Able Team leader again. “Want me to land?” he asked.

Lyons nodded. “I’m not sure this clown’s ego could take it if we didn’t.”

Grimaldi laughed and turned the chopper that way.

A few seconds later they were coming down on the asphalt parking lot next to one of the SWAT vans parked around the mall. Lyons saw the same hectic activity that he’d seen outside the church in Oklahoma City, with flashing lights and sirens blaring, with every SWAT team and other unit anxious to get started but not knowing how or where.

As the chopper’s rails met the ground, a man in a dark blue shirt and bright red tie approached with a look of anger on his face. He reached out and opened Lyon’s door with one hand, and would have grabbed the Able Team leader by the arm and dragged him out if Lyons hadn’t intercepted his other hand first. Twisting the man’s wrist into a classic jujitsu hold, the Able Team leader watched the anger on the man’s face turn to a grimace of pain as he exited the chopper on his own.

“Well, we’re certainly off to a great start, aren’t we, Mr. KBI-1?” he said as he finally released the man’s hand.

The Kansas Bureau of Investigation director was too proud to rub his wrist where it had come close to snapping, so he stood upright and at attention as he said, “Okay, you’re under arrest for resisting an officer.” He turned to look at Schwarz and Blancanales as they exited the helicopter behind Lyons. “What happens to you two remains to be seen.” He ran his eyes up and down the blacksuits all three Able Team warriors wore, looking for any trace of a patch or insignia.

But, of course, he found none.

“What in the hell kind of dress-up is that?” he demanded. “Who do you represent, anyway? You’re not Missouri cops. The chief would have called me himself.”

Lyons had faced such irritating bureaucrats throughout his entire former career as a LAPD officer. He had never had any patience for pompous little jackasses like this man then, and if there had been any change in his attitude at all, he had even less now. “I get one phone call, don’t I?” he said sarcastically, pulling the satellite phone from its case on his belt. Quickly he tapped in the number to Stony Man Farm. “Since you didn’t get a call from the Missouri chief, I’ll let you talk to our chief.”

“Right,” said the Kansas director with the same sarcastic tone the Able Team leader had used.

It took less than ten seconds for Lyons’s call to be transferred to Hal Brognola.

The man in the red tie frowned in confusion as he took the phone from Lyons. It didn’t take long for Brognola to read the riot act to the KBI director. “Yes, sir,” was all he said before his face turned red and he handed the instrument back to Lyons.

“Thanks, Hal,” the Able Team leader said, and then disconnected the line again.

“All right,” said the man Lyons knew only as KB-1. “My name is Markham. Bill Markham. What are your plans and how can we help?” The words sounded as if they hurt coming out of his mouth.

“You can give us a rundown of exactly what’s going on,” Lyons said. “Then, unless one of my men or I tell you different, you can stay out of our way.”

CHAPTER FOUR

Iranian president Javid Azria rolled up his prayer rug, nodded to the staff with whom he had shared afternoon prayers and returned to his office, closing the door behind him. Alone and out of sight, he tossed the rug carelessly onto a padded armchair as he moved behind his desk. As he dropped down into his chair, he felt a grin creeping across his face.

The entire United States, including their president, was still in shock. The Americans simply couldn’t fathom the fact that a country such as his own was openly defying and attacking them at will.

And rather than denying the attacks or blaming them on terrorists, Iran was taking credit for them.

Azria opened the humidor on his desk and took out a long, thick, Cuban cigar. Snipping off the end with a tiny guillotinelike cutter, he stuck the cigar in his mouth and picked up the heavy marble lighter on his desk next to the phone. The cigars had been a gift from his most recent ally, and although smoking was forbidden by the Koran, he liked the Cubans and indulged in one every afternoon and another in the evening. The rest of his staff studiously ignored this small transgression on his part.

As he circled the end of the cigar around the flame in front of him, Javid Azria’s eyes caught sight of the painting on the wall to his left. It depicted Cyrus the Great in battle, a long scimitar in his right hand as he beheaded what was obviously a Jewish peasant. The painting was, of course, an artist’s rendition. Photography had still been centuries away when Cyrus had ruled the Persian Empire, so no one really knew exactly what the man had looked like.

Azria was fairly sure he knew, however. He saw Cyrus’s face every time he looked in a mirror.

He was in the process of starting the first real jihad the world had seen since the days of the Crusades. But this war was going to make those of the past look like an American Girl Scout meeting.

Turning the end of the cigar toward his eyes, Azria saw that it had lit evenly and set down the lighter. Contentedly, he puffed away as he awaited an eagerly anticipated phone call. His mind drifted back in time to his college days. He had been a dean’s list student at Yale when the Shah had been dethroned and Ayatollah Khomeini had taken over Iran. And he had not returned until long after that initial regime had taken control of the country. For a while, the theocracy had ruled Iran with an iron fist, beheading offenders of even the smallest Islamic laws just like Cyrus the Great was doing in his painting. But with the Ayatollah’s death, things had gradually loosened up. Students in favor of separating religion from government were now even allowed to demonstrate in the streets. The only thing that had not changed was what he perceived as an almost countrywide hatred of the Jews, and a certain amount of dependence on the United States and other countries in the Western world.

Azria leaned farther back in his chair. It was his mission in life to change all that. He could have felt it in his soul.