Gathering Storm. Don Pendleton

Blancanales said.

      Kurtzman beamed at them. “That’s what I like to hear. Enthusiasm. Now somebody bring me some of my coffee. I wouldn’t want to dry up halfway through.”

      CHAPTER THREE

      Aboard the Petra

      “So, my friend, are matters progressing as you wish?”

      Razan Khariza raised his head from its contemplative position on his chest and studied the speaker. His host. His lifelong ally.

      Radic Zehlivic, an Albanian Muslim, stood in the middle of the luxurious saloon of the oceangoing motor vessel Petra. Zehlivic was a multimillionaire. He had made his fortune over the years from astute playing on the world stock markets. He was a man who took great chances, investing in risky markets that had paid him back handsomely. Any money made was plowed back into further dealings and Zehlivic’s fortune had grown and expanded. He had investments in property, land, in oil and ship building. He played the Western world at its own game, using wealth and an inborn intuition to manipulate the financial game for his own gain. He had percentage holdings in innumerable companies across the globe and was respected within the financial and business communities. Yet his name seldom made the headlines. He was as reclusive as he was smart. He stayed true to his faith, doing little to advertise his wealth beyond his close circle of friends, using his money to fund those who were working against the West. There were few people he trusted. Oddly, despite the man’s reputation both inside and out of Iraq, one of his trusted circle was Razan Khariza.

      Zehlivic’s mother had died giving birth to him, and his late father had been a clever and industrious man who had made his money from property dealings in his own country. His talent for turning quick, profitable deals had also made him enemies. In the end he had transferred his money to London, moving himself and his son there, where he had restarted his business operations. The British had been easy to manipulate and no one ever knew the duplicitous methods Zehlivic Senior used to work his deals.

      Father and son lived in a country house in Buckinghamshire, just outside a small village. Zehlivic Junior still owned the house and used it often on his visits to the U.K.

      He had met Razan Khariza at the private school they had attended in England. In fact they had spent much of their youth in the country, and though their paths went in different directions in their early twenties, each had kept in touch with the other, Radic’s admiration and devotion to his Iraqi friend becoming ever stronger.

      In the tumult of the military action that had deposed Saddam Hussein and had seen the total dispersion of his regime’s high-echelon members, Khariza might have died or been captured if it hadn’t been for the assistance he’d received from his friend. A telephone call from Zehlivic had offered help during Khariza’s darkest hour.

      Through Zehlivic’s chain of contacts, his knowledge of the country and a considerable outlay of money, Khariza had been spirited out of Iraq just ahead of the attack that hit Tikrit. A body had been substituted for Khariza, dressed in his uniform and carrying identity papers and personal belongings. When the local party headquarters was hit during a running battle, the body was deliberately mutilated with a grenade and then taken to a local hospital where the medical examiner, bought and paid for by Zehlivic, carried out an autopsy, making sure that all files and details matched the dead man identified as Razan Khariza. Members of the fedayeen were never fingerprinted or had medical details revealed during the regime, so there was nothing for the Coalition forces to match to. All they received was the formal declaration and postmortem photographs of Khariza’s badly mutilated body.

      Though Khariza had been an important functionary within the regime, his death was accepted as a minor victory within a larger canvas. He was listed as dead and as he had no family to claim him, the body was handed over to the hospital for interment. It was, in fact, quickly cremated and the ashes scattered.

      The doctor who had performed the autopsy had prepared to leave Tikrit himself once the formalities were over. With his few belongings packed along with the extremely large amount of cash he had been paid, the doctor had been picked up by some of Zehlivic’s people and driven away late at night. He was never seen again. As soon as the car he was in reached a safe distance from Tikrit, it stopped and the doctor was taken out. He was shot twice in the back of the head and his body buried. The car drove on, taking away the doctor’s luggage, along with the money. The body was never found.

      Razan Khariza, out of Iraq, went into hiding, courtesy of his friend Zehlivic. He remained in obscurity for as long as it took for the hostilities to cease and Iraqi reconstruction to start. When other members of the late regime began to surface, and Khariza heard of their survival, he began to contact them. They, glad to find out he was alive, rallied to his call. They needed someone with his leadership qualities to ferment their plans for a return to Iraq.

      In their eyes, America and its allies might have won the initial engagement. What they didn’t realize was the true fact that the war was far from over. In truth, for the fedayeen, it had only just begun.

      They wanted their country back as it had been before, with control in the hands of the Ba’ath Party.

      So they began to organize resistance, to create diversions that would confuse the enemy and allow the fedayeen time to get their own people into place. They would locate the immense hoards of cash that had been sent out of the country and placed in secret accounts. As soon as that money was in their hands, they could buy any weapons they needed to mount major offences.

      That, however, seemed to be a stumbling block at the present time.

      Which was why Radic Zehlivic’s question jarred Khariza’s mood.

      Khariza pushed to his feet and crossed to gaze out the window, watching the gentle swell of the blue Mediterranean. The sky was cloudless and hazy blue. Peaceful. Calm. Khariza felt a pang of guilt. Here he was, safe and far away from the struggles in Iraq. He countered that thought with the realization there was little he could do in any physical sense at this point in time. Until he had the various strands under his full control, all he could do was wait. Khariza disliked the feeling of helplessness. He was a man of action, of control, and he was feeling impotent right now. There was so much to do. To arrange. Matters were progressing, but at an alarmingly slow pace.

      Until the huge money caches were back in his hands, all he and his people could do was initiate the low-key portions of the operation—the individual removal of interfering officials, the strikes against various factions that would lay the blame on others. Important as these incidents were, they paled into insignificance when compared to the main events. And those couldn’t be brought online until Khariza had the money to pay for the ordnance purchases. They wouldn’t come into his hands until money had been exchanged. It was simply a matter of business. The amounts of cash being talked of were extreme and Khariza’s suppliers weren’t going to deliver purchases until they were paid. It was as simple as that. If Khariza took the items, then failed in his intentions, the sellers would find themselves losing both goods and payment, and that wasn’t how they operated. Khariza’s policies didn’t interest them any further than the cash in hand. His goals were his business, not theirs, and they had no intention of coming out the losers. So the Iraqi had to curb his impatience and wait.

      There had been an unexpected complication in the form of the journalist, Abe Keen. Despite Khariza’s security, the man had discovered the meeting at the villa. He had taken photographs and had slipped away before any of Khariza’s people could stop him. By the time he had been located, Keen had left his hotel in San Remo and was on his way to the airport. Although Khariza’s men had followed him, the journalist had reached the airport and had even gone through Customs to wait for his flight in the departure lounge. Unable to prevent him leaving the country, Khariza had contacted his team in London, where Keen lived, and had given them the instructions that would lead to the eventual death of the man.

      Now Keen was dead and the photographs he had taken were in Khariza’s hands. Why then, he kept asking himself, did he still feel uneasy?

      Perhaps because he wasn’t totally convinced that Keen hadn’t sent copies of the