by Erez Aharoni
What should he do now? How severe was his condition?
He knew who he would like to come and take care of him. He called the number he remembered by heart with trembling hands. The phone rang and rang but there was no answer. He was about to hang up when he heard Gali’s voice. She had finally answered.
“Gali,” he spoke, barely above a whisper.
“What happened?” she asked. Her voice sounded like the pleasant jingling of bells to his ears.
He could barely speak. “Gali, it’s Ofer,” he finally managed to say. “I need your help.”
His voice told her the whole story, without him having to describe his condition.
“Where are you?” He heard her voice becoming tense through the receiver.
“The old Central Bus Station, Hanegev Street… the parking lot… the orange section…”
“I’ll be right there,” he heard her saying before losing consciousness again.
He woke up when he felt a hand touching his forehead. He couldn’t remember anything. “Who am I, what am I, what am I doing here?”
Thankfully, he recognized Gali. The short hair and burning eyes. A sugary smell rose to his nostrils. The touch of her hand had revived him. Gali bent towards his slumping body and gave him a long hug.
He began to slowly regain his memory. It rose from the deeps and loaded in his mind like a restarted computer.
“My whole body hurts,” Ofer whispered.
Gali released him from her hug, and her pupils sparkled. She was tanner than he remembered. The bangs of her hairstyle and honey brown hair color suited her.
“How did this happen? Why didn’t you call an ambulance?”
“I can barely remember.”
“It’s a good thing you called me. I’ll take you to the hospital.”
“No, no. I don’t want to go to the hospital. I’m being chased… and they tried to rob me. I don’t know who they are. I want to go home.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, no… I don’t think I broke anything. I can try to get up slowly, if you’ll help me.”
“So you’re coming with me,” said Gali firmly.
He was powerless to resist. As he felt her arms embracing his shoulders and trying to raise him up, he agreed with silence. She helped him to straighten up and slowly get into her vehicle. His entire body screamed. He bit his lip and moaned.
“Are you sure you don’t want to go to the hospital?” she asked again.
“Yes, I’m sure. You need to get the bag that’s over there,” said Ofer and pointed backwards.
Gali left him for a moment and returned with the bag.
“Why is it so important now? What’s in this bag?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” said Ofer, “but it’s not mine… I have to keep it safe.”
Chapter 41
Despite his condition, Ofer managed to follow the course of the vehicle. They drove all the way down Allenby Street and then turned right to Pinsker. Gali parked the car and hurried to help Ofer get out. He groaned with pain. He felt as though his back were about to break. His ribs were hurting him. He wasn’t sure if he had broken his ankle or not.
He leaned on Gali’s shoulders and limped slowly to the building entrance, marveling at her physical strength and her ability to carry the weight of his body. They climbed to the second floor with measured and agonizing steps. The building had seen better days; the smell of mold filled Ofer’s nose and he sneezed loudly.
“This is where you live?” he asked.
“No,” said Gali. “This is where my friend lives.”
“So why did we come here?” he persisted.
“Because I’m being chased as well. It’s a long story. I’ll tell you once you get back into a more human shape and are able to listen.”
He finished the rest of the climb up the stairs with great difficulty. Gali opened the door to the interior of a charmless Tel Aviv apartment. Gali arranged him on the living room sofa as if he were a lifeless doll.
“I’m making you a cup of tea and then I’ll get some bandages. Don’t make any unnecessary movements,” said Gali.
She found the kettle in the kitchen, as well as some tea bags and sugar.
The tea was sweet and Ofer found it to be delicious. She took off his shoes and removed his pants. Her long fingers rubbed some ointment on his wounds, ugly chafing wounds but not too deep. He swallowed two painkillers she had placed in his hand.
“Your injuries don’t seem to be too serious.”
“They tried to kill me… or rob me… or both,” said Ofer. “I’m sure of it.”
“Who is trying to kill you, Ofer?” asked Gali, and before he could answer she added, “Just know that you are not alone. I’m also being chased. We need to talk about a million things.”
He finished sipping the tea, and she laid him in bed and covered him with a blanket. He wanted to shut his eyes and get some sleep.
“May I…?” she asked with a whisper.
Before he had a chance to respond, she got into bed and snuggled close to him. He felt the warmth of her body caressing his back. The pleasant sensation that spread through his body was the best medicine he could have hoped for.
“Remember…” Ofer began.
“How could I forget?”
“… that night in the grove?”
“I remember you were naughty… but with a heart of gold.”
He caressed her arms and hands. She caressed him back and glued herself to him.
“I remember the scent of pines. Every time I smell pines I think of the way we parted.”
He felt her nipples harden as they pressed against his back. Putting his pain out of his head, Ofer turned towards her. Some things in life are worth any effort.
She closed her eyes, brought her head closer to him and kissed him gently on the mouth. His tongue yielded to hers. “That’s not a mouth you have there, that’s a grater,” she said and laughed when his dry lips moistened.
He shivered from pleasure and excitement and weakness and infinite yearning. The brownish legs that were wrapped around his hips were like a life preserver in the tumultuous ocean of trouble and calamities he had found himself drowning in.
“Ofer, how did you end up in that law office? Is that really who you want to be?” Gali asked softly.
“Are you kidding? They get hundreds of candidates every year. I graduated with honors. I’m considered to be a rising star. I’ll be a partner in a few years… is your way any better?”
“I think so. I’m doing something meaningful. That’s a decision I made many years ago. After my father left home. I saw the way he was financially ruined and it horrified me. I decided to fight over values and not over money.”
“Don’t underestimate our values. We also conduct our righteous wars. Rich people are mistreated sometimes, too. At least they know they need to pay for it… but that’s not the important thing… when you grow up without a father, like I have, and you witness your mother’s existential struggles, you get your priorities right… I swore that I’d never be in her position.”
“Looks like we both grew up without our fathers but have chosen different paths.”
“You are wrong. The paths we have chosen are not so different. We are both relentless, uncompromising and struggle for what we believe in.”
Gali placed her hand on his mouth, signaling for him to shut up. She took off her clothes without disentangling herself from him, threw them on the floor and remained naked.
His feet were trembling. “Are you sure?” Ofer asked.
“Sure I’m sure. As sure as it’s night outside. As sure as I was ten years ago.”
“You may regret it.”
“Cut it out, you idiot,” she said. “It’s too late. You think you’re the only one who still remembers that day in the grove?”
“So why didn’t you…? All these years…?”
She touched a finger to his mouth. “Now shut up, you’ll get all the explanations later.�
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Ofer obeyed her instructions with love.
When she climbed on top of him, a pain-filled moan escaped from his mouth.
“Should I stop?” asked Gali, concerned.
“Too late. If I don’t get this medical treatment right now, and in generous quantities, my situation may become critical.”
“In that case, I’ll need to offer my body to science…” She rose from the bed, went to the kitchen and then came right back.
“What happened?” asked Ofer.
She opened her fisted hand and revealed a packaged condom. “Would you believe my friend Naomi keeps them with her tea bags?”
He passed his hands over her body. His palms moved along and across her back and shoulders, caressed her abdomen and breasts. He examined the contours of her body. He felt the coppery taste of her skin with his tongue. She emitted catlike purrs of pleasure and curved back towards his lips.
“Don’t move, just stroke my back,” she asked. He did as she asked and felt the nape of her neck with his lips. How he had dreamed about her neck.
She settled herself carefully on top of him. He penetrated her and she began to move back and forth. They made love with melting slowness, moving with a heat that rose and spun until they climaxed almost at the same time.
Ofer’s shivering did not cease.
“You’re a broken man. I may just finish you off before whoever it is that’s chasing you gets the chance.” Gali lay by his side. “Now that you’re healed, can you tell me who is after you and why?”
“I can. I’ve discovered that Jacob Rodety was murdered. He was the expert who was supposed to support our group in the tender. Yitzhak Brick’s group. The chambermaid who opened his hotel room door for me was murdered as well. They both have ties with…you’ll never believe who.”
“I’ve counted two bodies so far. I’m trying to follow. Ties with who?”
“Your philanthropist. Igor Harsovsky. His people were the ones who murdered both of them. That’s my guess. I tried to tell you when we met at the cemetery. And the icing on the cake, in my opinion, is that he is responsible for an attempt to assassinate Brick on his yacht.”
“Listen, you’ve really lost it. I don’t even know…why would he want to murder a chambermaid? Who was Natalia really? Harsovsky’s wife told me she used to be a genetic engineer and worked as a chambermaid because she had no other choice.”
“In any event, Harsovsky is somehow related to her. I know that for a fact. Listen, Gali, Harsovsky sent someone to kill me as well. He has an army of hoodlums. You saw some of them yourself at Natalia’s funeral. He sent a member of this gang after me. I was able to escape at the last moment and I’ve managed to—”
“Ofer, I’m beginning to regret rescuing you. Your imagination is spinning on a carousel. Harsovsky is in the hospital after someone tried to spray him with an M16.”
Gali became annoyed. She was on the verge of defending Igor but then recalled the guard next to his hospital room and the collection of bodyguards at the funeral.
“You don’t have to believe me, but it’s all true. Harsovsky was an agent for Viromedical in Eastern Europe more than ten years ago! That’s the man you’ve chosen to be your sponsor? You’ll end up like everyone around him. He only takes care of himself and needs you to serve as a backdrop so he can sabotage the tender. He’ll throw you to the dogs and buy the factory himself if he gets half a chance. He knows exactly why.”
“Why?” Gali did not relent.
“Because it’s a good and profitable factory with a great reputation—”
“Don’t make me laugh. It’s a factory that manufactures toxins that kill people, and makes other people sick, including children.”
“How do you know all that?”
“I have proof. I infiltrated the factory. I took samples from their sewage system to be checked. I obtained documents. I have an evaluation from the central virus research laboratory.”
“Got it. So who’s after you?”
“The General Security Service. They back up the factory because it’s owned by the state. And as always, what they call ‘national security’ always comes first. They know I obtained the information in a way that’s not entirely legal. They want to silence me, find my sources, and silence them as well.”
“Sounds like a conversation between two paranoid people, doesn’t it?”
“Yes, it sounds surreal. And all of a sudden, I’m frightened…”
“I hear you.” Perhaps it was time to tell her about the virus, the incubation period. It could be that two days from now… and that’s it. Ofer couldn’t make up his mind. He was afraid that if he opened his heart to her, she would throw him out of bed for fear of being infected. Perhaps he might really infect her? He decided not to say a word about his condition. “So how did you come to the conclusion the General Security Service is after you?” he asked.
“When you called and asked me to come quickly, I was in the middle of a press conference. I was about to announce a great scoop that revealed the truth about the Viromedical factory. It was supposed to be on all the newscasts. But a moment before we were about to begin, two General Security Service agents came in, showed me their IDs and let me know that the party was over. There was a riot, and I was able to get away just as you called. It’s obvious they’re after me because of the information I obtained and was about to expose. They sabotaged the event and wanted to take me for interrogation.”
“Your story makes even less sense than mine.”
“But that’s the truth…what can I do?”
His head was spinning and a dull pain in his abdomen area did not bode well. Please don’t throw up now, he begged his body. “We’ll talk in the morning,” he suggested. “I’m exhausted.”
“I’ll be out early in the morning. I’ve got tons of important things to do. I’m continuing in my own way. I have no other choice.”
“So, should I wait for you here?”
“I’ll leave the keys in the fuse box. Lock up and put the keys back there. Promise me you’ll talk to me later, I want you to see a doctor.”
“Sure, sure… a doctor…” Ofer mumbled and fell asleep.
Chapter 42
He was still sleepy when her moist lips fluttered on his forehead again. He opened one eye and immediately remembered. A combination of terrible pain and measureless pleasure.
“You sleep a little longer,” she said, “I’m heading out. We’ll talk later.”
He slept an uneasy sleep for twenty more minutes. The pain returned to assail him. For lack of any other choice, he opened his eyes. There was no way he could continue to sleep. Leaning against a wall he saw Rodety’s bag. Gali had brought it up to the apartment.
He remembered he had not yet opened the bag and tried to think of a logical reason why. The avalanche of recent events had turned his life upside down and his actions certainly hadn’t followed an entirely logical path.
“It’s time to see what’s inside,” he said out loud. He rose from the bed and opened the bag. Inside, there was a large, wrapped package. He started opening the package, feeling like he was in the middle of a “pass the parcel” game.
After opening the second layer, he lost his patience and tore the next one wildly. To his astonishment, the floor of the room turned green. Hundred-dollar bills fluttered to the floor like falling leaves.
“What… what’s this supposed to mean?” he mumbled and sat on the bed.
He counted the bills. He’d never seen so much cash. While counting, his thoughts drifted. Why did Rodety carry so much money on him? Who gave it to him?
He finished counting. A hundred thousand. Exactly. He stuffed all the money back in the bag and looked for a place to hide it. After some deliberation, he placed it at the bottom of the laundry basket in the bathroom. Then he lay back in bed and daydreamed. He pictured himself sleeping with Gali on the clear sand of an exotic beach. Warm sunbeams danced on their naked bodies. The waves murmured softly in the distance. Th
e incubation days were long gone, and the story of the deadly virus now seemed like a clouded nightmare that slowly dissipated from memory.
From inside his daydream he heard the sound of the key entering the lock and the door opening. He didn’t hear it closing again. Gali must be back. Maybe she forgot something, or better yet, perhaps she missed him.
The sound of too many footsteps came down the corridor. He opened his eyes.
Two strangers stood above him. Both were of average height but were definitely wider and more muscular than average. Their faces were covered with matching ski masks. One gray, one black. Only their penetrating eyes could be seen through the eye holes. He had a feeling it might be better not to see their faces. He assumed they were both the type of man you wouldn’t want to meet in a dark alley.
He was terrified, but after the previous night’s events, he couldn’t bring himself to move.
Ofer preferred to open a conversation. “Hello… how do you guys like your coffee?” he asked in a trembling voice, trying to keep calm.
“You’re Ofer Angel, right?” asked one of them, ignoring his stuttered hospitality.
“Yes, that’s me,” Ofer confirmed. He remembered well what happened the last time he failed to give an immediate answer to that exact same question.
The possibility that they had come to pay Gali a visit was off the table. A fear snuck into his heart that they might have hurt her right after she had exited the apartment.
“Where’s Gali?” he asked, trying to hide the shiver that refused to leave his voice.
“Your girlfriend? She’s not here?” asked the man who had spoken first. Ofer assumed the other one was the silent type, or perhaps he simply didn’t have much to say. “You’re coming with us.” He showed Ofer the back of his large hand. Then, suddenly, he turned it in front of Ofer’s face. A small black gun rested in the large hand.
“I can barely move.” Ofer tried to find an excuse.
“Pretty soon, you’ll see how you can leap like a tiger.”
Ofer felt like a frightened rabbit petrified in front of the headlights of a speeding vehicle. There was no point resisting. They had all the advantages. He tried to get up. Too slowly. The man wearing the gray mask came over to him and lifted him from the bed as if he were a pillow whose pillowcase he wanted to air.
