The First Hostage: A J. B. Collins Novel by Joel C. Rosenberg Page A

those places. I don’t think Abu Khalif would risk being captured   —and the president being rescued   —here in Jordan. Not when he has other, better alternatives.”
    I could hardly process the information. This was the first I’d heard of additional ISIS offensive operations outside of Amman, and certainly no one had mentioned that any Jordanian territory had actually been seized by ISIS in the north   —not in my hearing, anyway.
    “So where do you think they are?” the king asked.
    “I cannot say for certain, of course, but in my opinion the most logical thing to do would be to evacuate the president and take him into Syria or Iraq.”
    “Dabiq?”
    “No, that’s too far north   —past Aleppo, almost to the Turkish border,” Jum’a said. “They wouldn’t have had time to get him up there this fast.”
    “What about Homs?”
    “Maybe, but again, that’s quite a ways north. And if they were driving, they’d have to make a wide berth around Damascus, given that Assad’s forces are still in control of most of the capital.”
    “Then where?”
    “If it were me, I’d take him to southeast Syria, to the heart of ISISterritory, somewhere along the Euphrates, someplace the Americans would never go.”
    “Deir ez-Zor? Mayadin?”
    “Perhaps, though again, if I were Abu Khalif, I’d create my base camp someplace even smaller, a little town or village that was off the radar, discreet, unnoticed. There are a hundred of them up and down the river on both sides.”
    “And what if they took him to Iraq?” asked Prince Feisal, now on his feet and poring over one of the maps on the wall.
    “They wouldn’t,” the general said.
    “Why not?”
    “Because you’ve got too many forces trying to retake northern Iraq,” Jum’a explained. “You’ve got the Kurds, the Americans, the Shia militias, the Iraqi regular forces   —they’re all trying to retake the north. Why should Khalif take the risk? Why not set up his base camp in Syria? No one’s trying to retake Syria except Assad, and he simply doesn’t have the strength to get the job done.”
    “Okay, but what if they did go to Iraq?” Feisal pressed.
    “Then they’re crazy.”
    “And they’re not?”
    “Abu Khalif is crazy like a fox. He’s not a lunatic. Take my word for it. He’s not in Iraq. He’s in Syria.”
    “But Khalif was just in Mosul,” noted the prince. “He was just there with Mr. Collins. They’re testing chemical weapons there. They have a warehouse full of munitions, captured from Aleppo.”
    “Had,” the general insisted. “They had a base in Mosul. They had a warehouse full of chemical weapons. The only reason to reveal it all to Collins and the New York Times was if everything was being moved. I guarantee you   —none of it is there today.”
    The prince let it drop.
    The king nodded but made no comment before turning to MajorGeneral Ibrahim al-Mufti, his air force commander. “Could they have moved the president by air?”
    “Not from Amman, Your Majesty,” al-Mufti replied. “They would have moved him in the trunk of a car or the back of a van or truck, driven him a few kilometers, switched vehicles, and kept moving like that until they could get well outside our initial perimeter.”
    “But then, couldn’t they have put him on a small plane or helicopter and flown him out of the country?”
    “If they had help from locals, yes, I’m afraid they could have.”
    “Did we detect air activity heading to Syria or northern Iraq overnight?”
    “I don’t know, Your Majesty. I just sent an e-mail to my intel chief and told him to run the tapes on all air traffic control stations for the last twelve hours. It’ll take some time, but I will let you know when I hear something.”
    For several moments the king said nothing. He showed no emotion. He had a pretty strong five o’clock shadow and was clearly exhausted. He had to be. Yet he struck me as remarkably calm, given that his kingdom was under attack