An Act of Treason by Jack Coughlin & Donald A. Davis

Author:Jack Coughlin & Donald A. Davis [Coughlin, Jack & Davis, Donald A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9780312572655
Amazon: 0312572654
Barnesnoble: 0312572654
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Published: 2012-01-30T06:00:00+00:00

27

ISLAMABAD

KYLE SWANSON SAT WITH his back propped against a stone wall, blindfolded and with his hands cuffed behind him. His ankles were bound together. Spots of wetness told him where he had been bleeding, but the cuts were insignificant. The boys out in the street had taken their own sweet time bringing him to a headquarters area. Once inside, the rifle butts and kicks had given way to slaps and being jerked around and dragged across a smooth linoleum floor. There was still an odor of smoke in the air. It had taken them long enough to catch him, Kyle thought with satisfaction. If he had just kept going and not helped that woman and her kids, who knows? He might be back at Bagram by now, having a cold soda. Didn’t work out that way, but he was glad that he had stopped to save those lives. It was rare in his line of work to actually have an opportunity to do something good for someone else.

Now that they had grabbed him, Kyle knew he would be moved up the chain of command and out of the reach of the maddened soldiers on the street. He presented his captors with a problem, and killing him would not really solve anything. Swanson rotated his neck to get some relief from the tight muscles. A thin band of light showed beneath the blindfold, but he could not see anything. That, plus the smooth floor, indicated that he was probably secluded in an office somewhere, or an interrogation room, and not in some prison cell. Questioning would follow. Worrying would do no good, and wondering what might happen next would only lead to nightmare speculations. Shakespeare had written long ago that “present fears are less than horrible imaginings.” Stay calm. Wait. Give the Pakis time to figure out who he is and what to do with him.

* * *

IT DID NOT TAKE long. He heard the door open and boots stepping across the linoleum. Two sets of hands stood him up and removed the handcuffs and the blindfold, leaving the ankles hobbled. The room was small and rectangular, with an enclosed toilet area at one end. Kyle blinked in the sudden light, but it wasn’t really bright, certainly not interrogation room bright. “Bathroom?” he asked. The two guards helped him move to the toilet and stood outside the open door while he urinated. He washed his hands and glanced into the mirror covering a small medicine cabinet. Filthy. Without asking, he left the water running and washed his face, too, sluicing the water into his aching eyes. Then he hobbled back out, and they put him in an ordinary folding metal chair.

Sitting three feet away was a bearded man in clergy robes, about forty years old, with dark eyes and dark skin, and a second man stood nearby, older, dressed in a suit. The second man spoke in clipped English. “This man is a revered imam in our city,” he said. “His name will not be disclosed, but he has something to say to you.

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