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“What’s her relationship to Rapp?”
“Personal.”
“And where can I find her?”
“Presumably with Mitch.”
“And the girl?”
“Her name is Anna.”
“Did he take her on his killing spree, too?”
“No, she’s not with him.” There was no way Kennedy could lie. As odious as this investigation was, it was authorized at the highest level. “She’s staying with me.”
“Excuse me?”
“Was I not clear?”
“You kept this secret?” His eyes lit up at the potential chink in her armor.
“Just because you don’t know something doesn’t mean it’s a secret, Joel. Claudia told me she and Mitch needed to get away and asked me to keep her daughter so her school year wouldn’t be interrupted.”
“But you’re still going with the story that you have no idea where they are and no way to contact them. So, if the little girl gets sick or falls down a well, you can’t get in touch with her mother?”
“I have email addresses for both her and Mitch. I’m happy to share them with you.”
He leaned forward in his chair and stared directly into her eyes. “You know that I’m coming for you, too, right, Irene?”
“Of course I do. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m late for a meeting.”
CHAPTER 44
Franschhoek
South Africa
WHY are we just sitting here?” Joel Wilson said. “We should be following them in.”
Nassar watched the scene through the windshield of the SUV they’d hired. On the surface it wasn’t much different from Wilson’s breach of Mitch Rapp’s home, but beneath the surface the differences were considerable. The men working to open the gate on Claudia Dufort’s house weren’t a well-trained FBI SWAT team. They were a random collection of his own people, local police, and men supplied by Mullah Halabi.
It was a dangerously unpredictable mix, but it was Halabi’s people he was most concerned about. While they were reasonably disciplined by terrorist standards, the contrast between them and his General Intelligence Directorate operatives was still rather stark. It made sense to limit Wilson’s exposure to the ISIS men as much as possible.
He glanced over at the impatient American and felt his fears diminish. The man had eyes, but they were glassy with a fervor that Nassar normally equated with Islam. While those men saw only God and their duty to Him, Wilson saw only Rapp and the revenge that was so close at hand.
“The presence of the African police creates an unstable situation, Joel. And the chances of Mr. Rapp hiding at the home of a woman he’s known to be involved with is far-fetched in the extreme. This is a job for soldiers, not generals.”
As if to punctuate his words, two shots rang out. Wilson went for the door handle, but Nassar grabbed his shoulder and activated his headset. “Report.”
“Two guard dogs,” came the reply in his earpiece. “We’re clear.”
“Copy. The compound is secured, Joel. We can go in now.”
“What about those shots?”
“It was nothing.”
Nassar pulled through the gate, parking in a courtyard overflowing with palm trees and bougainvillea. Mullah Halabi’s men were near the front door in what seemed to be a wary détente with Nassar’s team. Wilson was blind to the obvious tension, instead focusing on irrelevant matters that so easily distracted Americans. In this case, it was the two dead guard dogs and the local policeman pinning a terrified African woman against a tree. When one of them slapped her, Wilson jumped out and ran in their direction.
