Throw Down

For a moment, the two men fell silent, staring into each other’s eyes. But Bolan hadn’t missed the slight tone of voice change, or the ambiguity, in two of Father O’Melton’s answers. When he asked if this snitch had converted to Christianity, instead of a simple yes, the priest had said, “That’s what he told me.” And when questioned about the informant’s willingness to help, O’Melton had answered, “That’s what he said.”

Father O’Melton might be a man of God, but he wasn’t naive by any means. He knew what double and even triple agents were made of, and that there was always the possibility his informant was trying to play him and the feds rather than help them.

Bolan finally broke the silence again. “There’s something in how you’re answering my questions, Father. The tone of your voice. And the fact that your answers come in sort of a neutral way, such as ‘that’s what he told me’ instead of just a simple ‘yes.’”

“I’m just reporting to you as best I can,” O’Melton said.

“That’s good,” Bolan stated. “But there’s one thing that bothers me.”

“It bothers me, too,” the priest said. “Christianity and Islam are similar in some ways, but quite different in others. For a Christian to deny Christ is a mortal sin. But Muslims are allowed to masquerade as Christians or Jews or anything else they find advantageous in order to further their Islamic jihad.” He paused to cough again, then said, “The typical American—and I might also include the typical American Christian—either doesn’t know that or chooses to ignore it. But it’s right there in black-and-white in the Koran.”

Bolan nodded. “I’ve read it.”

O’Melton smiled again, but this time looked more sad and weary. “What that means for us,” he said, “is that if we use this guy, we can never be sure we can trust him until the op is completed.”

Bolan leaned back on the bed. “You say ‘us,’” he said. “What exactly do you mean by that?”

“I want to go with you,” O’Melton said. “I feel a calling to help. I speak reasonably good Arabic and Farsi. And I’m well-trained to assist you, both in combat and in helping interpret any theological leads that might come up.”

“The heavens didn’t open this time, either, I’m guessing,” Bolan said.

O’Melton threw back his head and laughed. “No, again it wasn’t that dramatic. Just a feeling God’s given me. Like maybe this was my calling all along—to be trained as an Army Ranger, then go to seminary for training as a priest, then combine the two in order to help save the world from...well, who knows what?”

The Executioner sat quietly for a moment. If Father O’Melton could remember what it was like to use a gun, he might indeed be valuable during this mission. And what, exactly, was that mission? Bolan wondered. At this point, it was to meet the priest’s informant and run him for all he was worth, taking out every Hezbollah terrorist or other threat to the world until they’d exhausted the man’s use.

But Bolan was getting his own “feelings” at the moment. And one of them told him that this could turn into a much larger operation than they were able to see at the moment.

He sat up straight again. “Well,” he said, “let’s take your man and go with him. Where is he?”

The priest didn’t answer verbally. He just stood up and walked to the side of the room. Bolan had noticed that they were in a connecting room when he’d first entered. He watched O’Melton unlock their side of the twin doors and rap his knuckles on the other.

A moment later, that door opened, too.

And standing in the doorway, Bolan saw one of the scruffiest looking men he’d ever seen.

* * *

ZAID AHMAD WAS PERHAPS five feet five inches tall if he stood on his toes and stretched his neck as high as it would go. Bolan estimated he’d tip the scales at a hundred forty pounds—if the dirty BDUs he wore were soaking wet. Ahmad sported long hair like some young prophet from another century, and his beard looked to be at least a foot long. Both hair and beard were just beginning to sparkle with tiny patches of white.

Father O’Melton stepped back and let the man shuffle across the carpet.

Ahmad’s dark brown eyes darted nervously from the priest to Bolan and then around the room. The Executioner didn’t blame him. Brognola had already told him that Hezbollah knew Ahmad had turned on them and even tipped the authorities off about Saint Michael’s. So the swarthy little man had a price on his head. In fact, he was probably number one on the Islamic hit list.

O’Melton took the frightened man’s arm and guided him toward the desk, pulling out the chair and turning it around so he could sit down. Ahmad did so, then leaned forward with his hands folded and his arms between his legs, looking as if he was trying to further shrink his already diminutive size.

Bolan had seen such behavior thousands of times in the past. Even when the subject wasn’t obsessing on it, his subconscious mind always held the knowledge that he might already be marked for death. In this case, Ahmad’s body language suggested that he was trying to make himself the smallest target he possibly could.

Of course, there was another viable answer to the man’s nervous demeanor. He might just be one heck of a good actor.

“Let’s start at the beginning,” Bolan said. “What do you want me to call you?”

“Zaid is my first name. Ahmad my second. Please choose whichever one you like.”

“Okay, Zaid,” Bolan said. “Father O’Melton tells me you’ve turned to Christianity.”

For a second, the informant’s eyes lit up. “Yes,” he said. “I have accepted Jesus Christ as my personal savior.”

Bolan continued to stare into the man’s face. “What caused this drastic change?’ he asked.

“In addition to the Koran,” Ahmad said. “I began to read the Bible. Especially the New Testament. I cannot explain it to you any more than I was able to explain it to Father O’Melton, but a change came over me. And I recognized the writings of Paul the Apostle and the other writers as the word of God.”

Bolan waited while the man in the desk chair caught his breath. Then he said, “Who all knows about your conversion? Your Hezbollah buddies?”

“I have heard that they do,” Ahmad said. “At least the Hezbollah men here in the U.S., on assignment with me. I have even heard that there is a bounty out on my head. I fear I would be killed immediately if they find me.”

“So how is it you were allowed to stay away from Saint Michael’s during the attack?” Bolan asked.

“I wasn’t,” Ahmad replied. “I was dressed and ready. I even entered the chapel with the other men. But in the confusion that followed, I was able to sneak back out and get away.”

Bolan’s eyebrows lowered. The story had holes in it big enough to ride a camel through. “So explain to me how it was that, if they knew you’d changed sides, they allowed you to come along on this strike. And tell me how you got away.” He stared deeply into the man’s dark eyes, looking for any sign of deception. “I’m assuming you had on the BDUs you’re still wearing, and were armed.”

“I had a pistol belt, extra ammo and an AK-47,” Ahmad said.

“And you’re telling me that with all the hoopla going down at the chapel, nobody—not just your own Hezbollah team—”

“My former Hezbollah team,” Ahmad interrupted.

“Okay, former team. How is it that none of them, or any of the cops who’d already arrived at the scene, saw you sneak back out of the chapel in full terrorist battle gear?”

Father O’Melton cleared his throat. “I can answer that,” he said. “I was waiting for him a block away in my car.”

That statement made Ahmad’s story a lot more plausible. Not a lot. But some.

“So you think you can still help us with future Hezbollah strikes?” Bolan asked.

“I do,” the man in the green BDUs said. “That is, if the suspicions the Hezbollah men had about me died here, with them. If they didn’t pass them on before the gunfight.”

“I’m assuming you mean other Hezbollah cells back in Lebanon and Syria,” Bolan said. “But even if word never left the men who died here today, how are you going to explain to your people back home that you survived the attack on the chapel when all the other men died?”

“By telling the truth,” Ahmad said. “Or at least part of it.”

Bolan’s eyebrows furrowed even deeper. “I think you’d better explain a little more, Zaid.”

“I will contact another Hezbollah cell and tell them I pretended to convert to Christianity to further the jihad,” he said. “And that a priest helped me escape.” For the first time, a smile crossed the man’s face. “They will think it’s hilarious.”

“That sounds like it might just work,” Bolan said. “But I’ve got one more question for you.”

“Please ask it,” Ahmad prompted.