Shadow Maker
James R. Hannibal
PRAISE FOR
SHADOW CATCHER
“Shadow Catcher is the best kind of thriller, one infused with an insider’s intimate knowledge of his subject . . . An intense, well-written tale of action and intrigue.”
—Mark Sullivan, author of the Robin Monarch series and the Private Berlin series
“Just the right combination of authentic settings, nonstop action, backstabbing villains, and rough justice. Hannibal has a flair for the gutsy, the lost, and the fanatical. It’s a wild, wicked ride.”
—Steve Berry, New York Times bestselling author of The King’s Deception
“Get out of the way, Nelson DeMille. Brad Thor—you’ve got competition. James Hannibal is the new kid on the block with one of the better military/covert ops thrillers that I’ve read in a while. Shadow Catcher will keep you guessing, on the edge of your seat, and eager for more. Well done!”
—Raymond Benson, author of The Black Stiletto series
“The insider detail will fascinate you. The action will thrill you. Shadow Catcher by James R. Hannibal takes you on a riveting journey into today’s U.S. military and CIA in a high-stakes battle against Chinese espionage. Hannibal is the real deal, and Shadow Catcher is as authentic as it gets. You won’t want to stop reading.”
—Gayle Lynds, New York Times bestselling author of The Book of Spies
PRAISE FOR
WRAITH
“Hannibal brings together a terrific mix of real air technology with intrigue and nonstop action. A true suspenseful story that will keep you turning the pages until the exciting finale; it really is a great tale.”
—Clive Cussler, #1 New York Times bestselling author
“Hannibal, a former Air Force officer, offers an insider’s view into some of the U.S. Air Force’s most intriguing weapons systems in his promising first novel, a post-9/11 thriller . . . Hannibal demonstrates that high-tech weapons are only tools, and that it’s the people doing the fighting who win the day . . . Will please military fiction fans.”
—Publishers Weekly
TITLES BY JAMES R. HANNIBAL
Shadow Catcher
Shadow Maker
THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP
Published by the Penguin Group
Penguin Group (USA) LLC
375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014
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This book is an original publication of The Berkley Publishing Group.
Copyright © 2014 by James R. Hannibal.
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eBook ISBN: 978-1-101-61840-0
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Hannibal, James R.
Shadow maker / by James R. Hannibal.—Berkley trade paperback edition.
pages cm
ISBN 978-0-425-26689-2
1. Undercover operations—Fiction. 2. Terrorism—Prevention—Fiction. 3. Chess—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3608.A71576S54 2014
813'.6—dc23
2013036771
PUBLISHING HISTORY
Berkley trade paperback edition / June 2014
Cover images: “Flag” © Leonard Zhukovsky / Shutterstock; “Drone”: HIGH-G Productions / Stocktrek Images / Getty Images; “landscape”: From the Heart / Flickr / Getty Images.
Cover design by Richard Hasselberger.
Hashashin symbol illustration by John Carroll.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Version_1
Shadow Maker is dedicated to the outstanding professionals of the 111th Reconnaissance Squadron, whose daily battle to preserve life may never be fully appreciated by the world at large.
Contents
PRAISE FOR JAMES R. HANNIBAL
TITLES BY JAMES R. HANNIBAL
TITLE PAGE
COPYRIGHT
DEDICATION
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
PROLOGUE
PART ONE
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
PART TWO
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
CHAPTER 29
CHAPTER 30
CHAPTER 31
CHAPTER 32
CHAPTER 33
CHAPTER 34
CHAPTER 35
CHAPTER 36
CHAPTER 37
CHAPTER 38
CHAPTER 39
CHAPTER 40
CHAPTER 41
CHAPTER 42
CHAPTER 43
CHAPTER 44
CHAPTER 45
CHAPTER 46
CHAPTER 47
CHAPTER 48
CHAPTER 49
CHAPTER 50
CHAPTER 51
CHAPTER 52
PART THREE
CHAPTER 53
CHAPTER 54
CHAPTER 55
CHAPTER 56
CHAPTER 57
CHAPTER 58
CHAPTER 59
CHAPTER 60
CHAPTER 61
CHAPTER 62
CHAPTER 63
CHAPTER 64
CHAPTER 65
CHAPTER 66
CHAPTER 67
CHAPTER 68
CHAPTER 69
CHAPTER 70
CHAPTER 71
CHAPTER 72
CHAPTER 73
CHAPTER 74
CHAPTER 75
CHAPTER 76
CHAPTER 77
CHAPTER 78
EPILOGUE
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
There is a long cast of characters that made Shadow Maker possible. First and foremost are my wife and our remarkable sons. Without their support and encouragement, there is no way I could keep writing, let alone survive the intense emotional roller coaster that authors ride after publication. I am also thankful for AP, whose generous friendship has kept me sane, though how on earth he manages to do that while denying me sleep and strapping cameras to my head, I’ll never know.
Of course, my books would go nowhere without the advice and hard work of my agent, the amazing Harvey Klinger, as well as the team at Berkley—Natalee Rosenstein, Robin, Loren, Erica, and many others behind the scenes. Preceding them in the chain of events is a host of reviewers who see the book and tear it apart (in the most helpful way possible) long before it gets to Berkley. I am extremely grateful to Baron1, Sideshow, Fester, the Millers, Jonathan, the Stanleys, Tawnya and James, and both Nancys. I am also grateful to the rest of my brothers and sisters in arms for the constant flow of ideas, and to London in particular for the use (with permission) of the word disingenuous.
There are others who have patiently fielded my research questions. Thank you to Steve Galloway at Heckler & Koch, Noah Durham at the National Archives, Stayne Hoff at AeroVironment, and to Skin, the only man I know who must flee from zombies on a regular basis.
Finally I thank God for His blessings and inspiration, without which I could not write a single word.
PROLOGUE
Yemen
35 kilometers northwest of `Amran
September 2005
Baba, is this the man that is going to kill you?” An adolescent boy lifted a picture from his father’s open briefcase and held it up for him to see.
Naseem Kattan crossed the room in three quick strides and slapped the photo from his son’s hand. “That is not for your eyes,” he growled, slamming the case closed. “And speak the tongue of your fathers. The English language is an offense to your heritage.” He glared at the child. He had only been outside for a few moments, and he could swear that the case had been locked.
The boy nursed his hand and looked down at the dirt floor, more surprised and embarrassed than hurt. “But is he, Father?” he asked, obediently switching to Arabic. “Is he going to kill you?”
Kattan’s anger subsided as quickly as it had risen. The boy showed no ill intent. He was just curious. How could he not be? Curiosity was a by-product of his intelligence. He reached out with one curled finger and lifted his son’s chin. “Let us return to our game, Masih.”
The two sat down at a wooden table in the main chamber of their small house. It was more of a hovel, really—a three-chamber structure built of mud. Kattan despised this place, not just the house but the whole village, raised out of the dirt by dirty peasants. Everything here—the air, the water, even the food, tasted of the desert dust, and the desert had long ago ceased to satisfy him.
Over the last two decades, Kattan had developed a taste for the finer things, but the finer things could be tracked, particularly in Yemen, where they were few and far between. He could easily afford to stay in an upscale hotel on the coast in Aden, but there were only two, and the owners were surely on the American payroll. That is why Kattan stayed in this desert hovel whenever he returned to his home country and brought Masih out to see him. With no credit cards to trace, no networks to bug, and no greedy innkeepers or politicians to buy, the Americans could not control this village. The lords of satellites and microprocessors could not control the dust.
Kattan scanned the chessboard, carefully considering his next move. He found a tempting target, checked to be certain there were no threats, and then struck, claiming Masih’s bishop. Immediately he caught the faintest hint of a smile on the boy’s lips. Masih saw something that he didn’t. Unbelievable.
Synagogue bombings in Turkey, the Oasis Compound massacre in Saudi Arabia, two months of coordinated car-bomb attacks in Baghdad. Kattan had planned the most successful strikes against the infidels and their collaborators in recent history. Large body counts and nothing left behind that could be traced to him or the organizations that hired him. He was a renowned master strategist who could look at a plan and see every outcome, predict the enemies’ every move and steer them toward destruction. He nurtured this ability by playing chess, and both his friends and his enemies considered him a master of the game, but Masih . . .
Masih showed signs of real genius.
After four moves with a barely contained grin, the boy captured his father’s queen. “Check.”
Kattan leaned back in his chair and searched the board, trying to see what he had missed. There was a time when he intentionally made mistakes just to prolong their games. Now he wondered if Masih did the same.
“Who is he, Baba?” asked Masih, looking up as he placed the queen next to the rest of his prisoners. “Who is that blond man from the picture?”
Kattan sighed. He could see that the child would not let this go. “He is my persecutor. He has followed me for months, interfering with my holy work, my jihad. But he is only an annoyance, a mosquito to be swatted into oblivion when he comes too close.” He positioned his knight to block Masih’s next attack.
The child took that piece as well. “Check,” he said again. “Will the blond man attack us here?”
“No,” said Kattan, offering his son a reassuring smile. “The American cannot attack this house, because it has a special defense.”
At this, Masih’s eyes began roving the room, searching the drab furnishings and the dirt walls for something extraordinary. Kattan knew he would not find it.
They continued playing in silence. Three moves later, the boy declared checkmate, snatching up his father’s king with a wide grin.
Kattan shook his head, but the sting of defeat at the hands of a twelve-year-old was overpowered by the swell of his pride. Look what he had created for the service of Allah: a strategist of unseen brilliance. And Masih already knew the Western mind-set, better than his father, better than any who had come before him. Under Kattan’s tutelage, this boy would bring devastation and humiliation to the infidel on a scale that the mujahideen had never dreamed.
“Go get a pail of water from the pump,” said Kattan, standing and tousling the boy’s hair. “I will make us some tea. Then we will pray.”
“But there is a full jug of water by the hearth.”
Kattan frowned. “Do as you are told, boy. You may have beaten me at chess, but there is still much that I can teach you. For instance: tea tastes better when we make it with water fresh from the well.”
As the boy departed, Kattan went to the hearth to build the fire and cast a furtive glance at the water jug. He had lied. Whether stale or fresh from the well, the state of the water would make no difference in the tea. Like everything else out here, it would taste like dust. He had sent his son to the well for another purpose. The blond American might be watching. Kattan could not be certain he had eluded him at the border. But if he was out there, beyond the edge of the village, the sight of a child near the house would keep him at bay. The infidels did not have the stomach to kill the children of their enemies. That was one of their most exploitable weaknesses.
Kattan had not told Masih the nature of the special defense of this house, because Masih was the defense. His own son was his blessed shield.
The terrorist turned from the fire to watch Masih through the open door, pumping water into his pail. The boy was just starting to get some definition in his arms, on the verge of becoming a man, a benefit of letting him live across the sea with his harlot mother. Spared the indignity and starvation of growing up in the desert, Masih had some meat on his bones—much more than Kattan had acquired by that age.
Suddenly, the doorframe and the wall between them evaporated in a blinding flash. Kattan felt flesh ripping from his body as he was slammed into the eastern wall of the house and then dropped onto a pile of rubble. His eyes stung, he choked on a swirling cloud of that cursed desert dust. He could not feel his arms or his legs, yet pain surged through his body.
The cloud thinned. He saw his son, broken, blood staining the mud beneath him black. Masih was still clutching the king in his little hand. He moved his elbow back to his chest and started to rise.
Kattan tried to call out to him, but only a scant whisper escaped his mud-caked lips, “Masih.”
The boy did no
t look up. He collapsed back into the dust and did not move again.
Weakness from blood loss overtook Kattan, and he could not hold his gaze level any longer. His eyes drifted along the ground to the scorched photo of the blond American that lay between him and his son, amid a scattering of burning papers. Then the papers, the rubble, the dirt, all but the photo turned to black. As the terrorist’s mind began to fade, one final thought lingered—a name—flickering in the darkness like a dying flame. Nick Baron.
PART ONE
OPENINGS
CHAPTER 1
Washington, DC
The Christmas decorations are up. That was the first thought that passed through Nick Baron’s mind as he walked beneath the grand arched entrance of Washington, DC’s Union Station. He was six feet tall and plainly dressed in a brown leather jacket and faded jeans. His wife, Katy, walked next to him, pushing a stroller. She was more elegantly dressed, still resisting the inevitable soccer mom persona. Her auburn hair fell to her shoulders beneath a stylish winter cap. She wore jeans as well, but they were midnight blue and fit her slender form snugly, descending into high-heeled riding boots. Katy was enjoying her afternoon. Nick was not.
His attention to the Christmas decorations did not spring from a yuletide appreciation for the thirty-foot tree in the main hall or the lighted garlands that adorned every horizontal surface, or amusement at the model-train displays stretching across the usually empty floor space. He took notice of the decorations because they cluttered the station, and clutter in public spaces made him uneasy.
They paused in front of the welcome center, a two-story island of cherrywood in the center of the marble hall. While Katy checked the marquee, Nick’s steel-blue eyes roamed the crowded station. Smaller versions of the central Christmas tree created shadows in every corner and alcove. Rows of poinsettias and ten-inch riser skirts masked the empty spaces beneath the model trains. All the extra floor displays compressed the heavy holiday traffic into nicely segmented kill zones. What a nightmare.
