by Nathan Swain
“I agree, sir. We will alert MI5 of her disappearance immediately.”
“I’ve already done so. You may stand down, Marsden.”
“But we have a procedure, sir…”
“You have a procedure for the kidnapping of the foreign secretary’s daughter?”
“No, not exactly, sir.”
“I didn’t think so.”
Dashni withdrew a cigar from a small wood box embossed with a sketch of St. George slaying the dragon. He sliced the nub of the cigar off into an ivory dish on his desk.
“Forward any inquiries directly to my attention Marsden. Understand?”
“Yes, sir. Perfectly, sir.”
“Excellent, Marsden. The home secretary will be pleased with your professional courtesy. I’ll be sure to send him my glowing reviews.”
Marsden swiftly exited the room, gently shutting the door behind him.
A click sounded as Dashni brought his fat index finger down on his mahogany and glass cigar lighter, igniting the Cuban Montecristo curled between his thumb and index finger. Putting his feet up on his desk, he sent a cyclone of smoke rings spiraling into the crystal chandelier above. Dashni giggled to himself. Marsden, what an arse. God help the good people of Cambridgeshire with that philistine as their lord and protector.
Dashni had never advised MI5 about Olivia and had no intention of doing so. The agency was ridden with leaks. News of her disappearance would be disclosed to the media in days if not hours. It would be used by the intelligence services to distract from the battering they were taking in the press because of no WMD. No, I’ll not give them shelter from that storm.
Dashni wanted to force them to seek cover elsewhere. And he had been constructing the ideal pretext for more than a year. Democracy and human rights would become the new basis for the war and occupation. With those banners carried before him, Dashni’s cause could not fail.
All that complicated his plans was a message he received to his personal email account just before Marsden arrived in his office.
It read: “Your daughter is now a prisoner of the Islamic Republic of Iran.”
Chapter 60
A bolt clicked and the thick, steel door to the cell opened slowly.
“Olivia?” a guard asked softly.
“Yes,” she responded.
There was no sense in delaying the inevitable.
“Will?” the guard asked.
Eastgate was lying next to Olivia on the cold ground of the cell. But he didn’t respond. She knelt down to look into his eyes, and they were open, but pained.
“Will, time to get up.”
Eastgate’s mouth contorted, as if to make words, but no sounds came out.
Finally, with painstaking effort, he uttered: “Can’t move.”
The guard repeated. “Will, can you come with me?”
“Yes, we’re coming,” Olivia said. “Just give us a moment.”
The guard left the cell.
The hag was pressing down on Eastgate’s chest, just above the rib cage. She looked terrible in the watery, gray light of the cell. Her hair smelled like greasy dish rags. Her dirty finger nails tapped insistently on his right shoulder. Eastgate had been attempting to rouse himself for ten minutes, using his tools and cues.
You are awake. You are awake.
Moment by moment—each one seeming to last an eternity—the hag began to lift and his breathing eased.
Olivia gently placed her hand on Eastgate’s head. “Did they poison you?”
Eastgate managed to shake his head. No.
“What can I do?”
Eastgate flexed his legs, and he slowly lifted his hand onto Olivia’s open palm on the floor. She laced her fingers around his.
A minute later, movement returned to his arms like water filling a glass, and he was able to rotate his neck enough to answer Olivia’s worried gaze.
“Just need five minutes.”
“OK, I understand,” Olivia said. “I’ll buy us some time.”
Olivia walked over to the cell door and stood on her toes. “Listen, he’s not well. Bring a bucket unless you want to mop up a heap of sick.”
The grunts of the guards could be heard outside the cell. Olivia’s Farsi was rough, but she had no trouble interpreting the gist of their response.
In a moment, an old man in overalls appeared with a bucket and a bottle of glass cleaner spray.
Olivia accepted it from him reluctantly. What am I going to do with this? Wash the windows?
“Thank you,” Olivia said.
The man left and Eastgate was able to prop himself up against the cell wall. Olivia placed her hand on his leg. “I think you have a moment to rest.”
Eastgate sprayed a little glass cleaner on his hand and inhaled. The sharp odor opened his sinuses.
“It should help get me moving.”
“Whatever floats your boat, mate,” Olivia responded, bewildered.
“Thank you.”
“No problem. Do you want to talk about it?”
The door to the cell opened again. “Please come with me now,” the guard with the soft voice said.
“Sleep paralysis,” Eastgate said. “Stuck between awake and sleep. Conscious but unable to move.”
“I understand,” Olivia said.
“That’s the short story. I left out the gory details.”
“That’s OK. I’m not a morning person either.”
Olivia sighed and beckoned the man forward with a curled index finger. “Come on then. We’re ready for our daily serving of verbal abuse.” A guard wrapped their heads with the same thick, gray cloths from before.
“Stay here for a moment,” the guard said.
Olivia reached out for Eastgate’s hand. Their fingers interlocked. Eastgate could sense the anxiety pulsing through her.
“It’ll be OK,” Eastgate said.
“If they torture me, I don’t know what I’ll say.”
“Don’t worry. They’re not going to torture you.”
“Let me say this now while I still can,” Olivia said. “I owe you an apology for how I doubted you before. For my condescension. You were right all along. You’re not a crank. If I had taken you seriously from the beginning, things might be different. Allison might still be alive.”
“You were careful. I wouldn’t have believed my story either.”
“You were right,” Olivia repeated.
The sound of hurried footsteps carried down the hallway leading to their cell. Eastgate squeezed Olivia’s hand tightly.
Chapter 61
A guard led them through several corridors, whispering directions at the end of each new hallway. “Right. Left. Left.”
For the first time, he said, “Go down the stairs.”
Olivia’s mind filled with dread. Where are they taking us? What are they going to do? She pictured a swimming pool at the bottom of the staircase, its deep-end filled with hydrochloric acid or flesh-eating barracudas. Light began to seep through the thinning threads in her blindfold.
“I’m going to open a door now,” the guard said. “Step outside. We’re getting into a car.”
Olivia exhaled deeply. She was elated to be leaving Evin. She didn’t care where they were going. It can’t be as bad as that place.
Eastgate heard men walking alongside them. They must not have known his language profile. They were speaking openly in Farsi.
“Will they admit any crimes?” one of the men asked.
“What crimes?” the other responded. “They have committed no crimes. We are only supposed to entice them.”
Eastgate was concerned. Another interrogation. No problem. But what will the enticement be? Something irresistible?
They were transported by car for a few minutes. When it stopped, the guard instructed them to remove their blindfolds and step out of the car.
Eastgate soaked in as much information as he could. Cypress trees. Expensive hotel. Wealthy people. Tourists. The lobby of the hotel was appointed with strawberry c
ream marble and gold-leaf fixtures. It was a strange place for an interrogation.
A small, cautious looking man—probably the prison guard—punched the button for floor twenty-five. Eastgate and Olivia were led into a master suite. A camera was placed between the television and bed.
Eastgate was amused. What are we doing here, filming a porno?
“Please sit down, Will.”
“Thank you, I will.”
“Are you ready to admit that you work for the CIA?”
“No.”
“No, you aren’t ready or no, you don’t work for the CIA?”
“Correct.”
The small man sighed.
“Will, why do you make this so hard on yourself?”
Olivia shook her head. Please stop. You’re making it worse.
“If you answer truthfully, you and Olivia can stay here tonight,” the man said, gesturing grandly, “in this lovely hotel room together. And then we will fly you back to your homes, or wherever you wish to go. Perhaps on a holiday to Paris?”
“I was being truthful. I don’t work for the CIA.”
The interrogator looked at the other two men, and they quickly removed Eastgate from the chair, substituting Olivia in his place. One of the arms of the chair was slightly lower than the other. Olivia instinctively searched for a knob to make it level with the other, as if she was back in her office, sitting in one of the University’s ergonomically-correct chairs.
“Olivia, are you ready to admit that you are working for MI6?” the interrogator asked.
“I am not working for MI6. I’m a professor of archaeology from the University of Cambridge. I’m here for research.”
“Then why did you use a false identification?”
“My University thought it would help avoid trouble. Apparently, it was bad advice.”
Feigning disgust, the interrogator turned his head.
“We’re guilty of being stupid. I don’t think that’s grounds for imprisonment.”
“I have to say, I don’t understand your decision making. Don’t you want to stay here tonight with Will in this comfortable bed and luxurious room? Just admit what you did and we will leave you alone in here.”
The interrogator pointed to a kitchenette in the suit. “The champagne is sitting right over there.”
Eastgate was amused. This guy is really selling the idea of us shacking up together. He’s probably installed a two-way mirror in the other room to watch.
“Wait here,” the interrogator said, leaving Eastgate and Olivia alone.
“I think the only drug they might force on us is Viagra,” Eastgate quipped.
“That’s all. No beatings, no more verbal abuse?”
“No, not today. They’ll want us to think of this hotel room as a sanctuary. They’ll save the beatings and verbal abuse for another day. And then bring us back here until we give in. The purpose of today was to put the idea in our heads, to plant a seed.”
“Will and Olivia, we’re leaving,” the guard with the soft voice said.
This time, he led Eastgate and Olivia to the back stairs. By the time they reached the bottom floor, Olivia’s legs were trembling from the pounding.
“Follow me,” the guard said, walking out a back door into an alley. They were covered in shadow. The gray sky above was laced with jet streams of smog.
“Wait here. And don’t try anything,” he added, pointing to the surveillance cameras mounted on the building cornices all around them. “We’re watching.”
Olivia looked around her. There was no one in sight. “Why not run? This may be our last chance.”
Eastgate looked up at the surveillance cameras across the street. “They’d probably love it if we did. It would give them a great excuse to shoot us dead, since we’d be fleeing arrest. The video footage would lead the nightly news”
“Good point. But maybe better to die now than later.”
“Let’s wait. There’ll be other chances to throw a Hail Mary if it comes to that.”
A blue bird with red tail feathers landed on a window sill across the street from the hotel. It pecked at an invisible foe. A moment later, the sound of a churning car engine scared the bird away. A gray IKCO Samand peeled down the alley, screeching to a halt in front of them.
Two men in tan sports jackets and sunglasses stepped briskly out of the car. They opened the back door and directed Eastgate and Olivia inside.
“Please,” one man said, holding his arm at a right angle, like the maître de at a fine restaurant.
Sitting in the back seat was Tadita.
Chapter 62
“I don’t understand,” Eastgate said, looking around for signs of a trap.
Tadita looked up at Eastgate. Her eyes projected hope. “I trust these men with my life. They are like brothers to me. They will take you over the mountains into Turkey. It won’t be comfortable but it will be better than Evin, I assure you.”
Eastgate took Olivia’s hand and stepped into the backseat of the car.
“Why are you doing this?” Eastgate asked Tadita.
“My darling. You didn’t believe my story, did you?”
Tadita shook her head, a streak of sorrow darkening her gaze.
“I have become so good at lying these many years that I apparently can fool even those who knew me the best. Even you.”
“The surveillance,” Eastgate said.
“Yes, we were being watched. And my apartment is bugged. What I told you was for the ears of the intelligence agents monitoring us from the apartment across the street.”
“You didn’t have us arrested?” Olivia asked.
“Hello, Professor Nazarian,” Tadita said, reaching to shake Olivia’s hand. “It’s a great pleasure to meet you. I have followed your work for several years with great interest. And no, I did have you arrested. It was the only way to protect you.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Before you arrived in Tehran our foreign ministry received a tip about your arrival and that you were not who you purported to be.”
“I thought you spotted our visa photos,” Eastgate said.
“Heavens no. If I reviewed every cultural visa this country issued I wouldn’t even have time for prayers,” Tadita said with a wink, her words colored in sarcasm.
Eastgate was relieved. This is the real Tadita, at last.
The car speeded north toward the mountains. The sun was beginning to set. They would soon hear the distant call to prayer of the Maghrib over the loudspeakers of the nearby Shah Mosque.
“Who gave us up to the government?” Eastgate asked.
“An interested third party.”
Eastgate and Olivia shared a knowing glance. The Flaming Sword.
“They asked that we detain you for six months and then release you to their custody.”
“What third party?”
“Unfortunately, my darling, there are some secrets between us I must keep. But I will say this: your enemies are very resourceful”—Tadita looked morosely at Eastgate—“and deadly.”
The driver abruptly turned off the highway running parallel to the mountains, slowed the car, and eased it onto a rutted dirt road. The car bumped and careened down the path into a clearing in the woods.
“Why are you helping us?” Olivia asked, looking over at Tadita. But Tadita’s eyes were all on Eastgate.
The answer to her question was so painfully obvious, Olivia wished she hadn’t asked it. The reason for their rescue was clear: Tadita was still in love with him.
“Let’s just say I’m doing it for an old friend.”
“Tadita, they’ll put you in Evin for this,” Eastgate said, “or kill you.”
“If they find me. I have my own escape plan, you see,” Tadita said, taking Eastgate’s hands into her own. “Seeing you again made me realize that it is worth risking my life in order to get it back. Thank you.”
Eastgate was nearly overcome with emotion. The Iranian government had already stolen a decade of Tadita�
�s life. If they found her now, they wouldn’t hesitate to take it all. He thought for a moment of staying behind, to help Tadita get out of Iran. But an escaped Special Forces soldier by her side would only be a liability to her. He chose to trust Tadita. Her intelligence and will to survive would see her through.
“Thank you,” Eastgate said, frustrated he could say nothing else.
Tadita put her hand around Eastgate’s long jawline and kissed him slowly.
Olivia looked away.
Ten second later, the car screeched to a halt. Tadita motioned for Olivia and Eastgate to get out.
“This is Karzan,” Tadita said, standing next to them, with one hand still on the car door. The driver, a middle-aged man with a salt-and-pepper goatee, turned and nodded.
“Hello,” he said, bowing slightly.
“Karzan and his men will lead you to safety.”
The men removed rucksacks, canteens, and walking sticks from the trunk of the car. They loaded provisions on two pack mules at the edge of the woods.
Eastgate and Tadita embraced. Tadita paused for a moment and looked over at Olivia.
Tadita walked back to the car, turned, and blew a kiss.
Chapter 63
The cabin where they stopped for the night was in a small clearing at the base of Mt. Tochal, which loomed over Tehran to the north of the city. Used mostly by smugglers transporting contraband over the Caspian Sea, the cabin was like a second home to Tadita’s men.
A grove of beech trees swayed nearby in the winds swirling around the rough edges of the mountain. A river fed by a natural spring ran past the cabin. During more care-free times, the men spent afternoons fishing there and sunning themselves on the flat rocks on the riverbanks. Tonight, they were watching closely for security forces arriving from the south in pursuit of their new clients.
Karzan split logs of beech wood into kindling with a hatchet and built a fire of cedar logs and old newspapers from the cabin. His men cooked a dinner of meatballs made of minced meat.
Karzan passed Eastgate and Olivia a blanket to share around the fire, but they put it aside as the flames grew from a small orange flame to an intense blaze of white and blue.
