Buried in Black Read online

  Drake was well aware of the fact that the clicking drove his dad apeshit, but at least they had overcome the blinking tic.

  “You are your mom’s son.” He put his hand on the boy’s shoulders with another reassuring pat. “Drake, there could be lots of answers to a lot of questions. But in there somewhere”—he tapped his own head—“is also your dad. You’ve gotta let me out, too.” He winked. “And most importantly, find yourself.”

  Tension continued to lift from the boy.

  “So, a recap. And then I’m done lecturing. Rely first on what you’ve learned and how you’ve trained. Second, rely on your gut. Whatever your answer, whatever your choice, you won’t be wrong. Because it’s your choice. And there’s rarely only one option. And you can’t use your energy stressing on a decision. Make your decision and free your mind to respond if you need to make another quick decision.” He rapped Drake on the noggin. “Mind memory is still muscle memory. It becomes second nature; instinct is developed with self-confidence. Believe in yourself, kid. That I can’t teach. That’s on you. That’s your inner voice. Let your inner voice, not your tight head voices, get you out of problems,” his father shared with the utmost of compassion to the family’s fragile flower.

  Drake affirmed again with a slow nod.

  “And the problem of the day, my boy, is beating this heat.”

  “It’s Africa, Dad. It’s always hot.”

  “Well, if we were someplace cooler, you wouldn’t learn how to chip ice. Right?” Alex Woolf lifted the pick and chipped a large corner of the ice block, sending tiny shards of ice into their faces. Both dad and lad had a good chuckle. Alex grabbed a small glass goblet and filled it halfway with the ice pieces scattered across the unevenly tiled countertop. He offered a small handful of the ice chips to his son.

  “Yeah, we wouldn’t want to be anywhere cool, would we?” The boy smirked as he dropped a few frozen bits onto his tongue.

  “Ha…ha.” Alex playfully stepped on his son’s shoe. “Quiet, boy. Hand me that scotch, please. Because I decided a couple hours ago that I’m done working for the day.” He smiled.

  Taking the bottle, he searched Drake’s dark eyes for a glimmer of courage. “You wanna taste it? Just make sure your mother isn’t coming down the hall.” Dad gave a wink and a nod of approval then tossed a glance to the kitchen door, encouraging his teen to take a peek before imbibing.

  Their eyes re-locked. A knowing smile broke across each of their faces. “Check, check, checkmate.” They recited the Woolf father-and-son catchphrase with a sneaky chuckle.

  Drake pushed the thick swinging door out a crack and peered down the long hallway. He saw shadows shifting under the turquoise front door’s threshold gap. Drake held his breath for a moment, wishing his brother had come back home. No way is that happening. Dad said not to worry. Mom still cried at night. The shadow was probably just Mehdi, the driver, coming back from the market.

  Drake’s mother descended the side stairs toward the kitchen. He stepped back and slowly guided the door to a partial close keeping an eye on Mother’s whereabouts.

  A faint knock on the entryway door beckoned Dr. Woolf to change course, which she obliged. Her long legs whipped the ruffled crepe panels of the draping yellow zest minidress along the way. It was a favorite off-the-shoulder outfit reserved for the house until Tunisia’s women’s rights could catch up to the less conservative Italian fashions she treated herself to when visiting the other side of the sea. Feeling elegant, she waved her arms widely as if they were gliding over clouds while giving the fabric an extra sweep of flutter. She hummed the Smiley Lewis song “I Hear You Knocking.” Her head bobbed in rhythm with a touch of facial sass.

  “Hayya ’ala salah…” The dua, a second Islamic call to the late afternoon’s Asr prayer, reverberated again, ping-ponging through the neighborhood. It summoned believers to line up. An unusually hastened call after the first.

  Drake sensed from the singing that his mom was in a good mood today, but she was way too close to the kitchen. He wasn’t going to chance it. The teen waved off the alcoholic spirits and detected movement from the back window. His buddies were still loitering in the garden. They were nodding. He extended his neck to view what they were looking at and saw a man. Drake squinted and stepped closer to the glass to see if he could recognize the stranger.

  A loud noise from behind the entryway door jolted Drake. The bottle of scotch slipped from Alex Woolf’s hand and shattered on impact, and the auburn booze splashed across the floor, onto their legs, and up to the cabinets, but neither looked down.

  Their attention was laser-focused beyond the solid kitchen door.

  A shrill scream pierced Drake’s ears.

  Shouting.

  Alex grabbed his son and flung him toward the back door.

  Automatic muzzle report.

  Drake recognized the sound immediately. Kalashnikov. Same as he used in desert target practice with Dad and Tom Mendle, the embassy’s regional security officer.

  As noises flooded the house, his father, intently watching Drake without a word spoken, closed his eyes knowingly and then snapped to action in a controlled harmony of movement and directives.

  “Drake. Out the back,” the spook ordered in a muted voice. “I have to help Mom.” He pushed his tearing son closer to the rear door and turned toward the melee in the other room.

  Drake was rigid from fear. His hands wouldn’t lift to the door handle; mentally they were one with his sides.

  “Go, Drake,” Dad commanded, his eyes frantic. “Get out NOW!” he mouthed. “Get the Marines at the embassy gate and find Tom.” Alex Woolf pushed past the swinging door, looking back one last time. “I have my gun,” he lied, patting his bloused overshirt. “I love you and I’ll be with you.” He winked. “Always.” And charged toward death to buy time for his son’s escape.

  Drake Woolf touched the back-door handle. As the kitchen door swung closed, automatic gunfire erupted again.

  Curses and wails from Dad filled his ears amidst the loud staccato snapping of rounds.

  Drake was losing his own war battling the burden of decision and the anguish of losing Dad. Fear pitted Drake’s core, clawing and gnashing at entrails demanding action of the pathetic weakling shell that locked rage in.

  Mom? Dad? His lip quivered. “Dad?” He sobbed without sound as the emotions rushed over him.

  Drake, get going. The inner voice commanded Drake. It roared, demanding to be released. He stared at the kitchen door. Dad wanted him to get Tom. Ordered him to get Tom.

  Get out, Drake.

  He turned to the back window and saw his local friends. They were smiling. Amir seemed to be particularly enjoying himself watching the large two-story embassy housing unit. The boys could no doubt hear the terrors from within with windows cast open and sounds of Hell resounding. Sounds that most certainly traveled to the minaret tower down the street.

  Goddamn you, you stupid kid. More head voices were screaming.

  Drake could hear Tunisian Arabic, Derja chatter starting up again. It was rushed and seemed to be growing louder, moving toward the kitchen.

  Move, you shit!

  The rage inside gripped him with terror. The voices were angry. Unlike anything he had heard before. His eyes locked on the steel ice pick resting on the counter.

  Listen to Dad.

  He looked at the back door. They would come for him next if he didn’t run.

  Trust your gut.

  His tongue clicked. Hypomania boiled over.

  Kill them all!

  Drake seized the steel kitchen pick and rushed to his parents, barging through the heavy door.

  As he moved toward the attackers, his surroundings slowed.

  Three men. Tunisians. Who exactly, he had no clue.

  Kalashnikov rifles. Lowered rest position. Facing parents on the floor. Deep pools o
f red blood.

  Drake screamed a banshee war cry. It sounded distant. He sprang toward the closest man. Ice pick raising high, he whipped his arm down to the man’s back.

  The long metal spike sank deep and true. Drake rotated his wrist to rip the piercing wound wide then yanked the pick from the bellowing intruder and hurtled himself at the next. Blood trailed the spike like a red ribbon whip.

  The second man twisted in Drake’s direction, but untrained muscle memory failed to raise the intruder’s AK weapon.

  Die!

  In flight, Drake raised the pick for the attack and came down clenching it with both hands, thumb over top. He drove the steel in the chest of the surprised North African before him.

  The ice pick hit bone, and Drake’s wrists folded upon resistance. Drake’s trailing legs found promise and sprang him up as he wrenched the pick to the side and heaved the steel again but deeper to an unprotected beating heart.

  The invader’s mouth fell agape. The man shuddered violently before his eyes rolled back.

  As man and boy fell, Drake heard a crack. What felt like the hardest-ass punch he could imagine jettisoned him and the assaulter with massive force. Drake landed on the man, and another ghost punch hit Drake’s side, flipping him over to the right. He felt like he was falling for an eternity in darkness before yet another shocking impact to his left shoulder sent him further into the empty and soundless abyss.

  The ice pick rolled from his open hand into the growing pool of blood. A picture on the wall, two smiling brothers and doting parents, looked beyond the flaccid bodies bleeding out on the floor.

  “Qad qamat as-salah…” sang into the house from a distance, and the late afternoon prayers began.

  * * * *

  Military Hospital, Place de Tunis, an hour later

  He hadn’t cried in decades, but Tom Mendle wiped watering eyes as he watched young Drake rushed to surgery down the mint green corridor with its peeling paint. Blood stained the white sheet covering the boy lying atop a gurney that looked like an abandoned asylum’s rusted relic. Two Marines and the embassy deputy security officer stood by Tom’s side.

  “Tom, the kid took three 7.62s at close range,” offered the deputy to his boss as a dose of reality. “He’s probably not gunna make it. At least he grabbed your hand.” The deputy shrugged. “He knows he’s not alone.”

  All eyes were on Tom, hoping he would accept the condolence to relieve his aching heart.

  Mendle shook his head, rejecting the words. “We had warnings.”

  “Woolf had the same warning. It’s not on you.”

  Tom Mendle bristled at the deputy’s remark. “I mean warnings weren’t on Woolf provided he stayed north and away from talking to the Tuaregs,” he waffled. “Maybe it’s random.”

  Tom filled his lungs. Stress constricted his chest. He tried to breathe it out. Fail. His insides grew tighter. Tom wished he had a baby aspirin just in case this was causing another grabber. “I’ve seen the two dead guys. This isn’t random. Tunisia doesn’t support this type of attack on Americans. But we’re seeing more shitheads roaming around lately. There’s something growing. I don’t know… No one here wants Algeria’s shit to spill over. Maybe the locals do. Alex had a better handle on it than I do. His wife heard chatter from the women she tutored in private. Bad shit’s coming.”

  “Tom, our embassy people are pretty safe. They’re hands-off.”

  Mendle was lost in his thoughts. “Woolfs were good people. Smart. Damn they were smart folks. And that kid. Sonofabitch, that twitchy quiet kid is aces. I mean the balls on Drake to go after those dudes with a friggin’ what…ice pick? Holy shit. Never would have expected it from that bag of mis-wired nerves.” Tom shook his head in disbelief.

  The deputy security officer knew exactly what Tom meant. “I know. Pretty crazy. Alex would’ve done the same. Maybe he’ll pull through, though. Clearly, he’s a fighter. Who should we call? Langley first?”

  “CIA is protocol. They’ll handle it. I know the kid’s uncle, though. Alex’s NSA sister’s husband. Robert. He and Alex were like brothers if you saw ’em together. Did same tours overseas.” Tom blankly stared off into the hospital’s empty corridors, looking at absolutely nothing.

  “The uncle military or spook?”

  “Huh?”

  “The uncle. Was he prior military or Agency too?”

  “Both,” Tom replied. “Robert was Special Forces then CIA tactical advisor with the Phoenix program. Vietnam. He was one of the Blue Light plank holders and then did about five years with Delta after that. He’s at Bragg now. Intel chief. Tougher than nails,” he muttered. “Black program-type shit. He loves to be involved in the dirty stuff. They don’t have kids.”

  The deputy’s forehead lifted and eyebrows shot up in astonishment. “Wait. Bob? As in Robert O’Toole, the JSOC J-2 is the kid’s uncle? THE O.T.?”

  Tom exhaled a small pocket of air from his nose. He smirked at the deputy’s revelation. “Yeah. THE one. So,” he drew out, “we’re letting Agency boys handle that call. O.T.’s going to make it worse here when he finds out.” Tom stiff-fingered his deputy’s chest. “We need to get hunting these goons and their links to any others before O’Toole has someone order us to. If it comes from Langley in the next week, believe me, it’s coming from Bob. And we’ll need bodies. Not names.”

  The deputy drew a quizzical expression, not exactly following the plan.

  Tom clarified. “O.T. may be intelligence, but he gives absolutely two shits about names unless they’re on a list to get whacked.”

  “Holy shit, Tom. That’s more of an Agency job. That’s not on us. We’re the watch, not a tactical team.”

  “Yeah,” he said flatly, “But we’re the closest thing to being able to. Alex didn’t give an ounce of respect to the Agency’s social party types who never walked the alleys and snubbed his way of getting intel. Plus, I think we need to start by finding Drake’s brother and that band of holier than thou bearded assholes he hides out with. Talk about shame of the family.” Tom tightened his lips for a moment then reflected in a low mutter, “Kid’s been a struggle. Didn’t stick out college. Army wasn’t going to work. A real shady fucker. Streetwise and had the gift of languages like his mom. But never did anything with it. What a waste.”

  * * * *

  When the Maghreb sunset prayers ended, a Range Rover appeared small and black on the road traveling into the vast Tunisian desert area south of Tataouine. Red sunlight faded from the purple African sky and men hugged in the shadows of old medina’s winding streets. Dexter Woolf, scourge of his family, bounced along in the SUV. Even as the blindfold slipped, he saw nothing but darkness.

  Part I

  “Send Me”

  Chapter 1

  Sidon District, Lebanon, Present Day

  From under a dust-covered rough and ready tarp tent, Drake “Birddog” Woolf eyed the persistent stare camera feeds on his laptop monitor. No movement in the structure. The high-value target appeared to be literally sleeping in his “bed-down location.” Others in the two-story refugee flat were also in deep slumber according to the four image panes on his computer’s dust-caked display.

  Drake blinked dry, bloodshot eyes to focus and wiped the screen with the back of an equally filthy hand. Americans like Drake, in this secret unit, were no strangers to the Levant, their periodic and established presence dating back to the 1980s when they started conducting human and signals intelligence against militant cell phones and other electronic communications. To Woolf, this ancient battleground was home to many of his non-official cover missions against Hezbollah and other targets of opportunity using classic espionage tradecraft and new high-tech bells and whistles.

  Let’s go, Drake. The dark voice prodded from within.

  It’s not time. Drake had more targeting preparation to do before rushing in and needed to keep focused on tasks
beyond the kill.

  His IBM ThinkPad was recycled from India and procured from the Middle East to fit a closer pattern of life to his indigenous cover legend and backstops. This meant he had to look the part to play the part if he was caught. The computer’s screen cast a dim, hazy glow on Drake’s tanned and chemically bronzed face. His foul breath passed through a four-year-old beard that hung like dark cloth from his emaciated cheekbones and flowed over cracked and blistered lips.

  Woolf’s tongue was swollen from dehydration. It made a slight clicking sound as he contemplated his move after days of surveillance. The quiet clicks had persisted since he was a young teen. Ever since that day, and even before he decided to speak again to the aunt and uncle who brought him back from a zombie-like state of mental purgatory.

  Woolf knew he needed to take his meds, but he couldn’t afford slowing down his mind. They could wait. He had business to attend to. But the voices would persist.

  Drake switched screen views to his network and signal monitoring utility feeds for COMINT, or communications intelligence. He had to continue validating the target and ensure there was a strong connection if he was going to get what he needed for the job. And to get what he wanted for himself.

  An internet protocol, or IP, address mapped to the house’s location in addition to the other triangulated bearings that targeted the exact position of the known violent extremist. This showed the team supporting Drake from afar who was in the house and where the signals were coming from. It confirmed the baseball card, or BBC, as it was often called when the detailed descriptions of an adversary matched.

  In addition, the National Security Agency’s Global Access Operations brainiacs had pushed the highly classified Y-LOCKCHECK communications surveillance data to Drake’s system fields, validating a bunch of other techie mumbo-jumbo that basically said in bits and bytes and data blips that, yes, the asshole is indeed in the house and plenty of his nasty pals are nearby.