Suicide Mission by William W. Johnstone

“The detonator is not armed and will not be until I place it where it’s supposed to go.”
    â€œOf course. You intend to handle the delivery yourself?”
    â€œWhen a task is this important, I prefer to see to it myself, yes. Your job is merely to get me over the border and provide transportation to San Antonio.”
    Sanchez nodded and said, “That won’t be any trouble.”
    It shouldn’t be, Tariq thought. While the main business of the cartel was drugs, they also did a thriving trade in illegal immigration. The so-called coyotes who worked for them smuggled thousands of people across the American border every month. One more “wetback” would not be noticed.
    Tariq knew he could pass for Mexican. Many of his countrymen could. Some of them had already been smuggled across the border and waited now on American soil, sleeper agents going about their day-to-day lives until the day came when they were needed to strike against the enemies of Islam.
    If Tariq had anything to say about it, that day would be soon.
    Estancia spoke up, addressing Sanchez as he picked up some photographs from the table where several computers sat.
    â€œI’ll take care of this,” the big man said.
    A look of annoyance flashed across Sanchez’s face, so quickly that most people probably wouldn’t have noticed it.
    Tariq did, though. He could tell that Sanchez would have preferred that Estancia wait until they were alone to mention the photographs. Out of curiosity, Tariq glanced at them. He couldn’t tell much about them, except that they were pictures of an unclothed woman.
    He loathed these Westerners and their obsession with sex. Whatever this was about, Tariq wanted no part of it, and yet he was concerned. He had to make sure the matter didn’t have anything to do with why he was here. He couldn’t allow anything to threaten his sacred goal of killing millions of Americans.
    â€œIs there a problem?” he murmured softly.
    â€œWhat?” Sanchez asked, and it seemed to Tariq he was trying not to show how distracted he was.
    â€œA problem?” Tariq repeated as he gestured at the photographs in Estancia’s coarse, sausage-like fingers.
    â€œOh, no, just a personnel matter.”
    Tariq thought at first that Sanchez said “a personal matter” and wondered if the shameless woman was his mistress. Then he realized the man had said “personnel.” That meant it was related to business, and right now the cartel’s most important business was helping Tariq’s organization deliver death and despair to the Americans.
    â€œI wouldn’t want anything to interfere with our plans,” he said.
    Sanchez took his glasses off, polished the lenses with a linen handkerchief, and slipped them back on. Tariq recognized that for what it was, a momentary distraction to allow Sanchez to exert an iron grip on his emotions.
    â€œNothing is going to interfere with our plans, I assure you, Señor Maleef. Everything is set for tomorrow. By the time the sun goes down a second time from now, the world will be changed forever.”
    â€œChanged for the better,” Tariq said.
    â€œThat goes without saying.”
    Sanchez snapped his fingers at Estancia, who hurried out. Tariq didn’t even glance at the man or the photographs he held as Estancia went past him.
    He had no interest in the woman in the pictures. When his work on this world was done, there would be scores of beautiful virgins waiting for him in the afterlife. Until then he was fine with his monastic existence. The needs of the soul were much more important than any crude desires of the flesh.
    Anyway, he had been too quick to worry, he told himself.
    No Mexican slut could pose any threat to the glorious destiny that awaited him.

C HAPTER 9
    Del Rio
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    Bill drove into Del Rio in the middle of the afternoon. He had been here before, which meant he sort of knew his way around,