Merry Christmas, Alex Cross Part 12

A small, fit, and exotically attractive woman with burnished copper skin, Azizz wore a dark wool coat, gray cashmere scarf, dark wool slacks, and a ribbed turtleneck sweater. A pair of calf-high black leather boots completed the look, an outfit that suggested she was perhaps some stylish congressional aide instead of a fanatical member of Al Ayla, the Family.

Azizz's real first name was Hala.

A plague upon them, she thought as she pushed her way through the revolving doors into the vaulted marble Amtrak facility. Hala was pleased to see that what she'd heard on the taxi radio on the way into the city was true: though everything else had come to a near standstill, Amtrak trains were still running. They were heavily delayed by the storm, though, and Union Station was packed with travelers. she thought as she pushed her way through the revolving doors into the vaulted marble Amtrak facility. Hala was pleased to see that what she'd heard on the taxi radio on the way into the city was true: though everything else had come to a near standstill, Amtrak trains were still running. They were heavily delayed by the storm, though, and Union Station was packed with travelers.

It was perfect. Even better than she'd planned.

Indeed, the events that were about to unfold were supposed to have taken place earlier in the day, around eleven, give or take ten minutes. But the storm had changed things, delayed the intricate timing of her plot by some five hours at least, the last time she'd checked.

Kicking the snow off her boots, she looked around the main hall, ignoring the voice of Nat King Cole crooning about chestnuts on an open fire, paying no attention to the Christmas trees and lights, the token menorah, and the darkened shops to her left and right. She saw only the long lines at the ticket counters ahead of her and the scores of anxious travelers sitting on benches and on the floor, some groggy from Christmas dinner and eager to be on their way home, others frustrated and hungry because they still hadn't gotten to their holiday feasts, having been separated from their families by the freak storm.

Hala felt no pity whatsoever for any of them. As far as she was concerned, they were pigs who ignored the teachings of their own prophet Isa, swine who believed in only what they could buy, drink, or stuff down their fat throats.

Americans are weak. They know nothing of sacrifice, or of G.o.d.

She flipped open a throwaway cell phone and hit Redial.

"Yes?" a male voice answered in Arabic.

"Why?" Hala asked.

"One, four, and zero," he replied.

She glanced at the big clock inside the station. It was 5:25. She calculated and then said, "Seven and five."

"Inshallah," the man replied and hung up.

Hala stuffed the phone in her pocket, thinking, And now, finally, it begins. And now, finally, it begins.

She almost smiled at that thought before reaching up to remove her sungla.s.ses and scarf. She'd grown her hair out recently and stopped dying it auburn. Now luxuriously thick, long, and near jet-black, her hair was pulled back severely into a bun so that her face, with its extraordinary bone structure, was visible to everyone, infidel and believer alike.

Indeed, that's how Hala wanted it. She looked around at a young family moving toward the ticket line.

She flashed on her own children, Fahd and Aamina, back in Saudi Arabia, abandoned to her mother while Hala fought and sacrificed for G.o.d. Seeing her young son and daughter in her mind now, seeing them that last time in her husband's arms, Hala felt a moment of desperate, almost crippling grief, but she quickly compartmentalized the emotion, used her husband's death and the soon-to-be-eternal rift between her and her children to fuel her anger, and her will.

Her head felt light, speedy, undulating. Stuffing the scarf and sungla.s.ses into the Macy's bag, Hala understood that this was what it was like to be a martyr, to give one's soul over to the Eternal One.

She was at peace with it, submissive even.

Hala looked around, spotted security cameras aimed at various angles inside the station. Before going in search of something to eat, she made a point of walking in front of each and every one of those cameras, looking right up into the lens and giving the people watching a nice icy smile.

CHAPTER

47

SHORTLY AFTER THE PECAN PIE WITH VANILLA ICE CREAM WAS DEMOLISHED AND the dishes cleared, Nana Mama began to read out loud from the King James Bible and the Gospel of Saint Luke: "'And it came to pa.s.s in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed. And all went to be taxed, every one into his own city. And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judaea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, to be taxed with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child.'"

My grandmother has been reading Luke's account of Jesus's birth after every Christmas dinner since I came to live with her, when I was ten. As exhausted as I was, hearing her recount the circ.u.mstances of Jesus's birth, I felt rooted by the words of the Bible and connected by the strength of Nana Mama's moving delivery. Bree was sitting in my lap, and I hugged her and laid my head against her back, listening to her heartbeat and feeling like I could drift off to sleep a very happy man.

But then my cell phone rang again.

Nana Mama stopped reading and shot me a withering look. I glanced at the caller ID. There was no name, but I knew that number, or a variation of it. The call was coming from someone inside the Federal Bureau of Investigation, where I used to work as a criminal profiler.

I winced at the reaction I knew I was going to get, but I whispered, "I have have to take this. Keep going." to take this. Keep going."

Stonily, Bree stood to let me up. Stonily, Nana Mama read on, raising her voice as I left the room, calling after me as I headed into the kitchen: "'And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn.'"

"Alex Cross," I said, kneading at the pain growing between my eyes.

"How fast can you get to Louisiana and D Street?" asked Ned Mahoney, an old friend and special agent I used to work cases with at the Bureau.

"Tomorrow," I said, suppressing a yawn. "Maybe the day after."

"I'm sending a car for you."

"It's Christmas."

"I know it's Christmas," Mahoney snapped. "That's why I need you you."

"Ned, I've got a very angry ninety-something-year-old grandmother shouting the Gospel of Saint Luke at me, and-"

"We think it's Hala Al Dossari, Alex," Mahoney said.

A chill spiked through me, got me wide awake. "You think Dr. Al Dossari's at Louisiana and D?"

"Worse," Mahoney said. "Inside Union Station. And she's carrying a very big Macy's shopping bag."

"s.h.i.+t," I said.

"Uh-huh," Mahoney said. "I'm sending a four-wheel-drive vehicle to you. I expect you to get in it."

He hung up as if there were no counterargument to be made.

Out in the dining room, my grandmother was still reading, even louder than before. "'And the angel said to them, Fear not: for, behold-'"

I returned to the dining room and Nana Mama stopped, studied me for a long moment, read it all in my body language. "Are you needed again, Alex?"

I saw faces clouding, my wife's included.

"It's a sad fact of life that not everyone believes in peace on earth and goodwill toward men," I said. "The FBI's sending a vehicle to pick me up."

CHAPTER

48

AS DARKNESS TOOK CHRISTMAS DAY, THERE WERE ONLY FIVE FOOD PLACES open inside Union Station: Pizzeria Uno on the mezzanine level; McDonald's and Sbarro, in the northeast and northwest corners of the station; and Great Wraps and Nothing But Doughnuts on the lower level, northwest side.

Hala bought a gyro at the Great Wraps and devoured it, thinking that this might well be her last meal. She was fine with that. Though the sandwich was mediocre at best, the spiced meat made her think of home and of Tariq barbecuing a lamb behind their house as part of the celebration for her daughter's first birthday. It had been one of the best days of her life, and she clung to that memory as she waited for the group of j.a.panese tourists at the next table to get up and head to the escalator back to street level. Hala slipped in among them, carrying the Macy's bag low enough that, she hoped, the security camera would be blocked from seeing it.

Upstairs, she plotted her way across the rear of the station, ch.o.r.eographing every step so the cameras would get only glimpses of her.

It was 5:47, twenty-two minutes since she'd shown her face to the cameras. She figured there was zero chance that the police had been alerted to her presence yet. That meant at least twenty-five minutes before there could be any direct response. She added ten, maybe fifteen minutes because of the snow, and decided that she'd see the first indication of law enforcement somewhere around 6:25.

Hala headed east through the station, pa.s.sing the dark entrance to the MARC suburban rail lines on her left and the staircase down to Amtrak gates A through L. With the rear of the ticket counter to her right, she glanced overhead at the board giving approximate times of train arrivals and departures.

The Northeast Corridor Acela Express 2166 was leaving for New York City and Boston in fifteen minutes, approximately four hours late. The next Acela was due to leave at 6:50, also several hours late. But the Crescent, heading south to Atlanta and New Orleans, was only thirty minutes behind, scheduled to depart at 7:30.

Perfect.

Hala pushed on, weaving in and out of the crowd, doing her best to keep other people close to her as she headed to the McDonald's, which was jammed. She slid into the crowded restaurant, skirting those waiting to order, and grabbed a small soda cup someone had left on an empty table.

She transferred the cup to her left hand, paused a moment, and then brought her right index finger to her lips, moistened it with her tongue, and reached into her coat pocket. Her finger found a clear pharmaceutical capsule that stuck to her saliva. She waited until the soda counter cleared, then angled quickly at it.

Hala moved the cup to her right hand, the capsule still stuck to her finger. She held the cup up to the c.o.ke nozzle, pressed on the lever, and filled the cup halfway. Pleased to sense no one in line behind her, she acted as if she were waiting for the fizz to settle and moved the cup slightly left, giving her right finger access to the bottom of the nozzle.

Hala crammed the capsule up into the dripping nozzle, felt it lodge, and quickly moved her hand away. She pressed the water lever, rinsed her finger in case the enzymes in her saliva had made the capsule leak, and headed toward the customers waiting to order, not once looking back.

She stood there at the end of the line closest to the exit into the rail station, imagining the poison melting up in the nozzle, imagining someone getting a c.o.ke, trying to decide how long it might take until some people started dying and others started screaming.

CHAPTER

49

HALA AL DOSSARI IS BACK IN DC, I THOUGHT, SITTING IN THE Pa.s.sENGER seat of a blue Jeep Grand Cherokee that had come to get me. I THOUGHT, SITTING IN THE Pa.s.sENGER seat of a blue Jeep Grand Cherokee that had come to get me.

A doctor by training, a jihadist by choice, Hala was a member of Al Ayla, the Family, a terrorist organization seeded and rooted in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia and subsequently transplanted to the United States. At the moment, Hala occupied slot number six on the FBI's ten most wanted list, sought in connection with the poisoning of the Was.h.i.+ngton, DC, water supply the prior summer and suspected in the murders of at least six Saudi expatriates, including her late husband, Tariq.

I understood why Mahoney had called me. We'd worked together trying to catch Al Dossari after the water incident. I'd even helped construct an extensive profile of her.

But my mind would not call up the details. As we drove through the city, I stared out the windows. I couldn't believe how much snow there was. It looked like an avalanche had hit Was.h.i.+ngton. But wreaths still hung on doors, and Christmas trees still lit windows. Seemed like everybody in the District had given up on going outside and settled in for a sweet night. Everybody, of course, except me.

When do I start saying no, I thought, I thought, instead of just reacting to whatever crisis life sends my way? When do I begin to live Alex Cross's life? I mean instead of just reacting to whatever crisis life sends my way? When do I begin to live Alex Cross's life? I mean really really live it. live it. Here I was, blessed with terrific kids and a grandmother who was as healthy as a twenty-year-old and as smart as the Sphinx. And then there was the miracle of Bree. I'd found someone wonderful to love me just when I'd thought romance had left me lame at the starting gate. Here I was, blessed with terrific kids and a grandmother who was as healthy as a twenty-year-old and as smart as the Sphinx. And then there was the miracle of Bree. I'd found someone wonderful to love me just when I'd thought romance had left me lame at the starting gate.

When was I going to have the chance to enjoy life?

I called home, wanting at least to tell Bree that I was feeling these things.

The phone at my house rang. Then it rang some more. And some more. Then the d.a.m.n thing kept ringing. In my mind, I could see and hear the scene at home where that phone was ringing.

Nana Mama would most likely say something like "If you don't want a slap on the wrist, then I advise you not to answer the phone."

"But Nana," Damon would say, "what if it isn't Dad calling? What if it's somebody else?"

"Well, whoever it is should have called earlier," she would reply.

"What if it's an emergency?"

"They should call 911."

I hung up and then pressed Redial. The ringing started in again, and I had a vision of Nana coolly saying something along the lines of "I wonder who that could be?"

I hung up and stared morosely out the window. My family knew what a detective's life was like. Bad guys don't take holidays. They show up anytime, anyplace. Not just on a summer Sunday afternoon when you're sitting and painting a fence, but also on a Christmas afternoon when you're sitting and having dinner.

They all knew my job was an emergency-type job, like being a doctor or a firefighter. On top of that, it was a tough job. And beyond that...beyond that...Well, beyond that, I wished someone would answer the d.a.m.n phone. Because they were my family, and I was really missing them.

That longing remained as we pa.s.sed through police lines that closed off Louisiana Avenue for two blocks between C Street and Ma.s.sachusetts Avenue, including most of lower Senate Park. The road had already been plowed on both sides. But the only vehicles visible on that stretch of Louisiana were two black motor homes idling near D Street, wheels buried in the snow.

CHAPTER

50