The First Commandment Quotes
"Life in Cuba hovered somewhere between absolute misery and 'the bath is ready does anyone have a razor blade?'"
"To his Muslim brothers he was nothing short of a superhero in the radical Islamist pantheon."
"Privately, Roussard hoped the torture involved the attractive blond soldier and that she would disrobe down to her lacy, black lingerie and rub herself against him."
"He doubted the Americans were dressing them in new clothes only to execute them, but nevertheless the uncertainty of what they were about to face filled him with more than a little trepidation."
"Though he knew it was wrong, his fantasies of what he wanted to do to that woman were what kept him nicely occupied during the long, lonely hours of isolation he endured."
"The floors, the walls, the ceiling … they were all covered with blood."
"She had already suffered so many traumas."
"She saw beyond the waves of constant wisecracks, through the never-ending stream of jokes, and over the pile of rocks that Harvath had stacked to wall himself off from the rest of the world."
"The rationale was that if the terrorists weren’t playing by any rules, then neither would the U.S."
"The killer had left behind a shell casing with the message—That which has been taken in blood, can only be answered in blood."
"The secretary of defense took you for a ride and asked if you were up to taking out his killer."
"The president had given them a direct order."
"It was one of the few reminders he had of the way she was, the way they were, before they had been torn apart."
"The lamb’s blood contained a radioisotope."
"He knew he was going to have his revenge—and much sooner than he would have thought."
"He had placed it in the drawer right next to him. He was sure of it."
"Harvath’s head snapped back so suddenly that the shock startled him awake."
"But the worst part was knowing that her current suffering was his fault."
"The plastic surgeons had done a fabulous job in matching the pale blue of her surviving eye to a replacement, but no matter how Tracy applied her makeup, she still couldn’t completely hide the thin facial scars."
"You know every one of those cases of people dying in America via a TASER are bullshit. Ninety-nine percent of the time they have an underlying heart condition."
"What’s the link? What do these guys have in common that they’d all be released at the same time?"
"He supposed an Al Qaeda connection probably could be established among the five, but not in such a way that the release en masse made any sense."
"As soon as this assignment is complete, he told himself, I can return to my brothers in Iraq. Then once more I will be home."
That’s the first thing we need to get straight," he replied. "I wasn’t the first guy in.
"Their balls are so big they’ve actually begun building mosques like this one outside Matamoros, Mexico—only a few miles across the Rio Grande from Brownsville, Texas."
"The fight Gosse had overheard that day sprang from Aposhian’s telling Rutherford to just let the John Doe situation go."
"The congenitally corrupt Mexican government had neither the desire nor the guts to take a stand against the Zetas and the drug cartels."
"It was his second assignment with SEAL Team Two. They’d been sent into Finland in the middle of one of the worst winters on record."
"The bottles of sobering Turkish coffee were burning a hole in his stomach."
"His only reaction was one of pure instinct. He raised both his arms to protect his face."
"You show me Al-Tal or I will tell you nothing."
"The night you were freed from Guantanamo you boarded an airplane. Tell me about it."
"But this guy’s practically a national hero."
"I think we’re each going to have to do what we feel is right."
"The whole plan had been based upon being able to track the five men, and it had fallen apart."
"There was no making sense out of any of it. And what terrified him was that there were six plagues left."
"Scot, I heard about your mother and I want to let you know how incredibly sorry I am."
"He knew better than to ask for the president directly."
"The driver of the truck circled the parking lot just outside the Marine compound and then stepped on the gas."
"I’m not at liberty to discuss any of this with you. You need to obey my orders or else you and I are going to have a very big problem."
"The more pressing question was, when was it going to stop?"
"Scot, you have no idea what you’re doing."
"You called the White House press office for comment on a story you want to run."
"You can’t delete these images. Even if you could, there are more on both your laptop and desktop at home."
"For the record, Mr. Sheppard, their deaths were an accident. The U.S. government is not in the business of murdering its own citizens."
"That depends on if you’re going to cooperate or not."
"Good music is good music, and when it comes to funk, Bootsy is one of the best."
"In life, even the smallest advantage is better than no advantage at all."
"You don’t think a guy like me can appreciate classic American funk music?"
"Sometimes the simplest lie was always the best."
"Every single time you pulled a trigger, you knew the person on the receiving end deserved to die?"
"Bad things happen every day. Innocent people are killed. Sometimes these innocents are children."
"It was set up to be her private, personal account."
"As long as Tracy was alive, there was still hope that she might pull through, and Harvath told them so."
"Remember Terri Schiavo? We had talked about her once, and Tracy told us she would never want to live like that."
"He’d find a way to get into the hospital without being apprehended. He had to. He had to be with Tracy."
"The man didn’t have to say it. Harvath knew he and his wife were seriously considering removing their daughter from life support."
"All these tubes and wires. The ventilator. This is not what Tracy would have wanted."
"If you’d heard what they had to say, you might feel differently."
"Scot, you’re a good man. We know you cared for Tracy, but Barbara and I feel this is a family decision."
"Tracy was still not able to breathe on her own."
"Bill and Barbara Hastings were Tracy’s parents and her next of kin, so that gave them the power to make medical decisions on Tracy’s behalf."
"The new EEG suggested further decreased brain activity, and they had been attempting to wean her off the ventilator without any luck."