Ulterior Motives (Covert Missions Book #3) , livre ebook

Baker Publishing Group - Andrew Olsen Mark

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147 pages

English

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When an al-Qaida email is intercepted, promising a New Year's Day attack on America, it leads to the capture of the group's leader. But even under fierce interrogation, the terrorist clings to his jihadist beliefs and resists divulging anything of the threat. Desperate, the Army resorts to a contingency paper that proposes to break a subject's resistance by inducing a religious conversion. One hitch: the top-secret attempt must be masked as an offer of clemency, and must rely on a completely innocent mentor, a so-called witness who is unaware of the project's true aims. They find that witness in Greg Cahill, a disgraced FBI agent who has since turned to Christ and serves in a prison ministry. Lured by an offer of restoration, as well as the lifting of a restraining order that's keeping him from seeing his son, Greg begins an unlikely friendship with a man the entire country despises. Despite himself, he begins to share his faith--yet with a combustible result unforeseen by either himself or his government handlers.

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Thriller

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Publié par	Baker Publishing Group
Date de parution	01 mars 2009
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781441208415
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0202€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

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ULTERIOR MOTIVES
BOOKS BY MARK ANDREW OLSEN
Hadassah: One Night With the King 1 The Hadassah Covenant: A Queen s Legacy 1 Rescued 2 The Road Home 1 The Watchers The Warriors Ulterior Motives

1 with Tommy Tenney 2 with John Bevere
ULTERIOR MOTIVES
MARK ANDREW OLSEN
Ulterior Motives Copyright 2009 Mark Andrew Olsen
Cover design by Lookout Design, Inc.
Scripture quotations are from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means-electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise-without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
Published by Bethany House Publishers 11400 Hampshire Avenue South Bloomington, Minnesota 55438
Bethany House Publishers is a division of Baker Publishing Group, Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Printed in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Olsen, Mark Andrew. Ulterior motives / Mark Andrew Olsen. p. cm. ISBN 978-0-7642-0275-9 (pbk.) 1. Terrorists-Fiction. 2. Prisoners-Fiction. 3. Clergy-Fiction. 4. Undercover operations-Fiction. 5. Terrorism-Prevention-Fiction. I. Title.
PS3615.L73U67 2009 813 .6-dc22
2008051035
To Bret, who helped birth this novel s high concept premise, and so many more creative babies through the years.
ULTERIOR MOTIVES
TABLE OF CONTENTS
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
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
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Admittedly, this proposal has the potential to be incredibly controversial. It will strike some as being contrary to every fiber of America s body politic, not to mention the spirit of our Constitution. Nevertheless, Tabula Rasa remains squarely centered on our latest understanding of modern global conflicts.
This is because military strategists wishing to prevail on the field of battle can no longer treat hatred, genocide, and international terrorism as divorced from ideology and religion.
To put it simply, religion forms the basis of our enemies compulsion to destroy us. And if we do not address it clearly and directly, religion will fuel the inferno of their eventual victory.
Excerpt from the prologue of the Tabula Rasa Protocol, classified Defense Department policy proposal, drafted by Captain Delia Kilgore, United States Army.
Current status: reviewed without comment, archived with prejudice-no action taken.
CHAPTER 1
Palmdale, California
The boy s outline danced, ecstatic and elusive, across the razor-thin crosshairs of a spotting scope. Trying to follow its exuberant path caused the hidden watcher to grit his teeth in frustration. Even the finest military-grade optics could not keep his lens focused on the youngster s manic figure. The child would not quit leaping out of view, veering away, seized by sudden peals of laughter.
The excitement was understandable, though. It was, after all, Robby Cahill s sixth birthday party.
At last, the boy paused to catch his breath. Just as quickly the intruder took advantage of the interval to reacquire the young body in his sights and bore in on his tousled head. He lingered over those eyes, glowing in the sunlight. Cheeks as ruddy as an apple. Sandy hair swaying in the breeze.
Good , thought the watcher. Almost within range. Not one foot too close, not an inch too far.
The intruder s stealth grew more pronounced with every passing second. The closer he crawled beneath layers of concealing leaves and shrubbery, the more he worried about early detection-an inadvertent reflection from the scope, a stray glint of light that could instantly give him away.
The man wouldn t let that happen. He was too good for that. Too experienced.
And today the stakes were too high.
Neither Robby nor his mother, Donna, could see the man, but they each suspected, in their own silent ways, that he might be near. Only brief, sidelong glances betrayed their suspicions. And yet they had no idea he d already made it so close to their location, inching toward them through the underbrush.
The very potential of his presence had brought the police cruiser there, idling conspicuously beside the curb in the shade of Armstrong Park s vast hundred-year-old magnolia tree. It was the reason for the drawn, tight mouth of the boy s mother. And for the unusually terse nature of her comments to the other boys mothers. Donna Cahill was taking no chances.
At that moment, the intruder was in fact less than 120 yards away from the birthday party, slithering slowly through a cluster of pungent rosemary bushes under an improvised mat of native twigs and leaves. He wore camouflage perfectly suited to the ground cover, selected on several reconnoitering trips the week before. His face and lips were covered in carefully applied swirls of camo paint. Even his army boots were smeared with dark polish to prevent any shine and to blend into the terrain.
The man was so well concealed that the boy might have stepped on his back without ever seeing him, without even a second s awareness that anyone was underfoot.
The factors capable of betraying his presence ticked through his mind in a cascade of crucial data. Time, brightness, temperature, wind, sun position -each contributed to the play of light upon him. He had chosen the shadow of these bushes for the angle and blending of illumination they would provide at this time of day. His mind continually monitored the exact position of both key persons-Robby and Donna-to make sure he did not move while they were facing his way. Fortunately, there were no dogs about; one of the worst threats to a well-hidden asset. He had nothing left but unobstructed brush to traverse before reaching the perfect position.
He kept the mother firmly planted in his peripheral vision. She ranked first on his list of vigilant, even paranoid, observers of whom to beware. He knew she would be looking for him. He also knew that she remembered what kinds of areas to watch. Indeed, the woman knew more than most folks did about sniper stealth tactics. Fortunately for him, she had been eyeballing the trees all morning rather than the ground, distracted by her knowledge that most people rarely looked upward, and that as a result leafy canopies made the ideal approach route.
Now she seemed engrossed in chatting with the other mothers over by the picnic tables. Better still, her glances around the park had grown more and more sporadic. He hoped she was, at last, entertaining the prospect that he might not be there after all. And yet, he could tell, she was also wrestling with a vague, emerging awareness of his presence.
He wriggled one more foot closer, taking almost a full minute to do so. The boy would be in range soon. He reached into a side pocket and extricated the tool he had chosen for the mission.
Great day.
Donna, you seem tense, said the mother of Robby s best friend. Is everything okay?
Nothing unusual, replied the party s hostess with a quick world-weary grin. Just a little tired.
I was wondering about the police car, the mother persisted. Are you sure there isn t anything we should be worrying about?
No! she responded, a bit too emphatically. There s nothing for you to worry about. It s, uh, just a new regulation . . . something about private parties on city property. Gotta pay for police protection.
I didn t know that, said her friend. It s just that you seem really on edge today.
Donna Cahill looked down at the ungarnished hot-dog bun in her hands and sighed. Nothing new. You know how parties are. No matter how well you think you ve prepared, there s always something that goes wrong at the last minute.
Don t I know it, the woman laughed. Just a fact of life.
Donna shook her head. Good thing the kids are clueless about what we go through, she said softly, or no one would have any fun at all.
Twenty yards away, little Robby Cahill was also looking around for signs. He had seen none, but then he d been playing hard with his friends. Star Wars Jedi combat, laser tag, and even Transformers, stomping around the yard and growling as pretend robots.
But his gaze kept drifting back to the sidelines, scanning for a glimpse.
Suddenly the event he d waited all morning for happened. His eyelashes flickered against a blinding assault, and he winced. A small flare of light glittered in his retinas, washing out his world. Robby knew right away what it was, and that it was too strong and steady to be an accidental reflection from a passing car. Robby squinted and shielded his eyes with an uplifted hand.
Then he jumped high in the air and squealed.
He started running toward the light. He giggled loudly, pumping his arms and stocky legs like a superhero.
Donna screamed and lunged for the boy. Her fingers grazed his waist but failed to capture him.
Stop him! she shouted in the direction of the police car. It s him ! It s him !
The police car s engine switched off. The door flew open. A young officer jumped out and sprinted across the grass, fingers fumbling with his gun holster.
Seventy yards away, the ground erupted in a flurry of upward motion. The bushes flung debris up and around a figure that rose from their midst. Leaves and branches flew about the standing man