Spies Lie Series Box Set

by D S Kane

  Crane said, “Hang on a sec.” Jon could hear file drawers opening and a computer keyboard clinking. “Yes, old boy, you’re in luck. We follow all their personnel when they travel. So, one of their low-level operations staff is returning to Karachi from Cleveland. She’s in play right now. On her way to JFK, where she’ll change planes after a stopover. I’m sending you the details.” Jon heard the email beep as it entered his cell. He thanked Crane. I’ll have to move fast.

  Jon used the library’s Internet connection to book “Michael O’Hara,” the identity the Brits had given him, on his target’s flight on Pakistani International Airlines to Karachi for later that evening. He scanned her photo. Attractive woman.

  He bought a small spinner suitcase and some clothes at a nearby store, and packed fast, standing on the street. Just after noon, he took the stairway down to the IND station on West 4th Street. He caught the subway to JFK, carrying passports for all his identities in the jacket pocket of his business suit.

  It was just after lunch hour and the subway car was crowded with workers. As the train left Manhattan and entered Brooklyn, it emptied to just a few passengers headed home. He recognized no one in his car or the ones adjacent to his.

  When the train entered the station near the airport, he boarded a bus and took it to Terminal 4. The arrivals and departure board for PIA listed his flight, PK 722, leaving at 8:05 p.m. for Karachi. Near the counter, he inserted his Michael O’Hara debit card and printed a boarding pass. At an airport traveler’s shop he bought a sewing kit, more clothing, and sundries. On the other side of the security gate, he went to the men’s room and used the sewing kit and an undershirt to craft a pouch. He dethreaded the spinner’s cloth lining, placed the spare passports in the pouch, and placed the pouch within the lining, then re-sewed the interior of his suitcase.

  He placed the remainder of the clothing into the suitcase to fill it. Then he pulled the suitcase behind him as he strolled to his gate, where the final few passengers were waiting in line.

  His objective was to find the contact Crane had given him. He scanned the photo once more; a woman in her late twenties, dark skin, ebony hair, thin face. Crane had her working in the bank’s operations headquarters. Could he convince her to help him? The math told him the odds were steep against him. Bad odds to find her. Worse to convince her.

  Several of those in front were wearing Western garb, but most were dressed in Middle Eastern and Far Eastern clothing. The odors wafting off several of them were offensive, reminding him that soon, he’d smell just like them. Then it occurred to him body odor could be used as a disguise.

  He found his target and sat next to her, not caring that his assigned seat was two rows further back. The aircraft wasn’t even half-full. No perfume. She resembled her photo. Straight raven hair and dark skin. He nodded at her as he sat, but said nothing. When the aircraft taxied into position, he noticed her hands, rigid on the armrests. “You don’t like flying?”

  The woman stared straight ahead. He worried he’d upset her more by speaking to her without a chaperone present. As the plane lifted off the ground, one of her hands left the seat, closing over her mouth to smother a scream. He touched the other hand, next to him with a death-grip on the armrest. “Nothing bad will happen. Have faith.”

  Now her piercing brown eyes settled on his. “If it is Allah’s will.” She smiled, then averted her gaze.

  The plane crawled through a cloud layer lighting them with the afterglow of a rosy dusk. It leveled and Jon picked an in-flight magazine from the seatback. As he opened it to its first page, his companion faced him. “I am Sandhia Sorab.”

  “What a pretty name. I’m Michael O’Hara. Is your destination to home or for a visit?” Jon felt his face split in a smile.

  She brushed her hair off her face. “Karachi is home. I am returning from a visit to my brother in Cleveland.”

  Jon smiled. “Ah. And it was a pleasant trip?”

  “No. He isn’t a pleasant man.” She looked away.

  “Home is a better place for you?”

  “Yes. The rest of my family is gone now. But I have managed on my own. I’m a banker. I have friends there.”

  “Which bank?”

  “Bank of Trade. I’m one of the supervisors in the money transfer area.”

  “It sounds like an important job.”

  She smiled back and shook her head. “No, not actually so. Hard hours. I’ve been there since school.”

  He thought hard how to reel her in. A slew of equations streamed through his consciousness. Pick the right approach. Not too fast. Careful. Ask questions.

  “Which school?”

  “Just a school for women, in Pakistan. Nothing you’d ever have heard of.”

  He dropped the magazine back into the seatback. He remembered his non-credit banking coursework at Dreitsbank, and his internship the previous summer at Bank of London, in foreign exchange. In his head he conjured the organization chart for a typical money-center bank and determined Crane had struck gold. “Money transfer. Sounds important. What’s a day there like? Can you tell me?”

  Sandhia seemed to focus on something in front of her he couldn’t see. “The bank is nothing like anything else in Karachi. So modern, so clean. And everyone is polite. I arrive at eight in the morning.”

  “You seem so Western.”

  Her eyes looked startled. “Well, I am. I was educated in the West.” She turned face away.

  “Are you devout?”

  “No. Too long in the West. London, Amsterdam.” She picked the in-flight magazine from the seatback.

  Jon sought to force her attention back to him. “What do you do?” He wished he could take notes. It was possible she could provide him with all the knowledge he’d ever need about Bank of Trade’s money transfer accounts and transactions.

  By the time the aircraft touched down, he’d arranged a date with her the next night. And for the entire air voyage, the voice of Lisa Gabriel remained silent.

  Jon entered Sandhia’s address into his cell from the slip of paper she’d given him, and followed his GPS to her home. Just as she’d said, it was near the market. Ah, here. He knocked on the door. Her footsteps within grew louder and the door opened. She was dressed in a traditional Pakistani purple sari with gold threads in an ancient paisley pattern. A plain black silk scarf covered her hair.

  Her smile was demure as she stepped outside and locked the door behind her. “There’s a good restaurant two blocks away.”

  He smiled back. Lucky she didn’t invite him in. He wanted to keep this as “professional” as he could.

  The restaurant was dim, and Jon felt uncomfortable in its romantic atmosphere. The tables were brass trays, leaving Sandhia closer to him than he’d wanted.

  He waited until they had finished a shashlik appetizer. The skewered chunks of marinated spiced lamb, roasted onion, and red pepper reminded him of a dinner he’d had with Lisa in the Marble Arch area of London. Also a Pakistani restaurant. Now, for the first time in over a day, her ghost inside his head shrieked. Don’t you still love me? He needed to act soon. “I’m a banker, just like you.”

  Her face reflected surprise. “Which bank?”

  “First Manhattan. I work in foreign exchange.” He waited for her reaction to his lie.

  “I thought you might be a professional.” She smiled.

  She pulled back and looked down and to the left. Bingo. Her body language said she was lying. He guessed she thought he was a rake, a raconteur. If she thought that, it wouldn’t be easy to enroll her in his project. “What do you do in funds transfer?”

  “I supervise. I told you that on the plane.”

  Wrong question. Now she’s wondering about me. “No, I mean, local or global transactions.”

  He watched her face relax. Now she stared into his eyes. “Oh. Global. About 50-50 incoming and outgoing.”

  The waiter arrived with their entrées and a plate of saffron rice.

  He wondered how to get her to d
escribe the area. “It must be like a factory there. All those transactions. A machine could do all the work.”

  She shook her head. “No. Things go wrong and our job is to handle them, making them right.”

  “How?” He thought, I’ve got you now.

  “We have repair stations where workers research incorrect information entered by the sender, such as a receiving bank’s name or the format of its account numbers.”

  For a few seconds they remained silent.

  “Do you supervise the repair stations?” He remembered that one-off transactions, not to be repeated, often contained errors, since the customer might misspell something or enter incorrect information. Repetitive transactions almost never failed, since they were corrected and then stored in the computer for future use. He was sure Houmaz hadn’t set up a repetitive transaction, since this was likely to be his only chance at funding his project. Besides, one-offs were easy to trace. Therefore, the queue of one-off transfers was more likely to contain the bomb maker’s among them.

  She nodded. “Yes. By the time I arrive, the outgoing repair queue of funds transfers with missing or incorrect data is filling. So, it appears you know much about the global money transfer function.”

  “Just what I learned in school, and at the bank. Electronic funds transfers, foreign exchange. And, come to think of it, we might share a client. Some guy who sends money to your center from First Manhattan every so often. Tariq Houmaz.”

  He watched her face tighten and her hands clench. “Who are you?”

  “Huh? I told you.”

  She rose from the cushion. “Take me home. Now.”

  He touched her hand. “If I’ve offended you, it wasn’t intentional. Please. I meant no harm. I was just curious.”

  He watched a war of emotions waging within her. She sat. “How do I know you don’t work for my government? If they thought I was loose-mouthed, they’d hurt me.”

  “I’m a Brit.” He plucked his Michael O’Hara passport from his pocket. “Not a Pakistani.” He opened it, displaying every page for her.

  Then she amazed him by picking up one of the skewers and chewing off a piece of lamb. As if nothing had alarmed her. She seemed capable of changing in an instant.

  “Sandhia, I don’t work for your government. Promise.” Jon locked his eyes to hers, no smile this time.

  “Are you even a banker?” The corners of her mouth tightened. She wasn’t convinced. Never would be. No lie would work this time. He could see her gathering herself and preparing to rise from the table.

  He sighed, dropping to the next equation bubbling up in his head. “No. I graduated college, majoring in global banking and economics from Cambridge. Then earned my MBA from the University of London.” He watched her face relax as his lies fell away. But not enough. She still clenched her legs. This wasn’t going well. “Just graduated. And I’m unemployed. My girlfriend was killed by a bomb manufactured by Tariq Houmaz when she was in Tel Aviv. I want to know as much as I can about her murderer.”

  Her face melted. She settled back on the seat and reached out. She touched his hand. “I’m so sorry.” He watched and saw the disappointment in her body, her legs crossing. She was no longer interested in his body, and Lisa’s voice remained silent.

  He remembered Ben-Levy teaching them that assets became what the handler wanted because it was what they wanted. What would her motivation be if he convinced her to help him? Who in her life had tormented her? She either had lost someone close to her or was worried it might happen. He recalculated his subsequent moves in this chess game, and decided her brother was at risk.

  He took a deep breath. “Thanks. Look, I came here to find out all I can about her murderer. And, on the plane ride here, I found you. Perhaps it was the will of Allah. We’ll see if it was. You see, I’m begging for your help. Can you see if he’s wired money into or out of the bank during the last four months?”

  “What will you do to him if you find him?”

  “Murder the son of a bitch.” As soon as the words left his mouth, he regretted them.

  She nodded but he could see her stiffen. He wondered if she was shocked. But she bent toward him and uncrossed her legs. In seconds, she seemed to relax and soften, and he suspected she was aroused. Her head cocked to the side as she examined him. She moistened her lips, dragging the lower across the upper one. “If I do this, can I ask a favor in return?”

  He grinned. “Anything,” he lied. Jon doubted she’d succeed. He also worried what she’d ask him to do. He didn’t want to spend more time than necessary in Karachi. He worried about his exposure here to the same government officials she feared. “Let’s order the next course and you can tell me what you want from me in return.”

  The waiter arrived with gulab jamun, a sweet dessert. Over a glass of wine, she told him about her family. “My brother, Ravi, got a student visa to go to the University of Ohio. He studied electronic engineering but couldn’t find a job. They hire Americans first. After six months he was homeless and started dealing drugs and guns to make money to survive. He’s been on the run since his visa expired three years ago. He’s bitter about how he’s been treated.”

  Jon nodded. “I can’t say I blame him. Bloody rough. We have the same problem all over Europe and Great Britain as well. He’s the one you were visiting?”

  She nodded. “I think he’d have been better off if he’d returned to Karachi after earning his degree. But by that time, he was becoming an evil man.”

  “Why did you visit him?”

  Her eyes drifted away from him to the food. “He hadn’t written for many months. No emails. I was concerned. The bank owed me three weeks of holiday. I used all of them.” Tears formed in the corners of her eyes. “He’s the last of my family. He needs me. I want to move to Cleveland. Get me a visa. I don’t care which country. When I leave here I’m never returning. I’ll fly to Toronto and find a way to get inside the border of the United States. From there I’ll find my way to Cleveland.”

  Jon’s brows arched. “A visa? That’s the favor you want from me in return for the information I asked for?”

  “Yes. Only that. Can you? Will you?”

  What about his deal with Crane? But, if he’d been a student, he’d have no power to arrange it. “My uncle works in the government of Great Britain. I’m sure he has the connections to arrange it.”

  An hour later, they were standing at the doorway to her apartment. After she unlocked her door, he reached for her hand, to shake on the deal. But she pulled him close and then within the apartment. She used her foot to close the door. He was surprised when she kissed him.

  He tried to draw away but she gripped his shoulders. She stared into his eyes. “More.”

  Jon’s jaw dropped in surprise. She’d seemed so cold. He wondered if she felt nothing and wanted sex for its own sake. “But it’s against your religion, isn’t it? And it’s our first date. Surely—”

  “More.” Her voice was conversational yet insistent. And she pulled his face to hers.

  The kiss was sweet and hard, but the danger of her offer and the complications ran hard against his arousal. And Lisa’s voice cursed through the back of his head. He gulped. “Are you sure? Isn’t this against Islamic law?”

  She nodded and unbuttoned his shirt. “I’m as Western as you. Too long in your world. As long as no one ever finds out. If they do and I manage to escape, I’ll find you and kill you.” And, in one quick move, her sari flew off her shoulders. Confused, he ran a new set of equations. The math offered no resolution, and he fought against panic.

  His eyes snapped to her body. She wore no bra and was gorgeous. Oh God. What can I do to escape? But before he could react, she’d unbuckled his belt and his pants were dropping to the floor. She pulled off the rest of his clothing. Exposed.

  Frozen on the spot where he stood.

  She walked him out of his clothing, towing him further into the apartment. Her bed was in the corner of the single room. She pushed him down and kn
elt between his legs, her hand fondling his erection. Her lips gripped it and he felt her teeth nuzzle against him. Losing control, he reached for her breasts, thumbs rubbing the stems of her nipples. Before he realized it, she was atop him, and he was inside her.

  All the while, as she moaned with pleasure, Lisa’s voice screamed inside his head. For every instant his flesh responded to her heat and ecstasy, his dead fiancée’s sadness and jealousy draped over him in a corresponding wave. All he could do to stop it was to ejaculate. But, so distracted, it took him forever.

  Their deal was simple. In two days he had a thumb-drive containing the records he sought, and she had a promise that he’d get her a passport and a visa within two weeks, to any country in Europe or Canada or the United States. If he needed additional data on the transactions, he would contact her. He was sure Crane could accommodate the passport request in exchange for the intel. If she turned him over to the authorities, it would implicate her as well. And while the Pakistani secret police would kill him, the tortures they could inflict on her were unimaginable. No, he was safe with her.

  He ticketed himself on British Air and met with her one last time. His intention was a pleasant evening where he and his asset could bond.

  She said very little over dinner. At her door, she pulled him inside and shut it behind him with her foot. “I’m not letting you go without a little payment to seal our deal.”

  He sighed. “Yeah. Well, I thought we’d be better off with a business arrangement, not—”

  She pulled his necktie to draw him close. “Nonsense. Not negotiable.” She unbuttoned his white oxford’s top button, then the next. And kept on.

  Jon nodded and pulled her sari off, baring her breasts. Lisa’s voice howled inside his head

  Sandia unbuckled his belt and his pants dropped to the floor. “Come to my bed.”

  Jon followed her meekly. He’d no choice if he wanted to keep her as an asset.

  Before he could think of another argument, she was atop him, riding him, her voice growling as she climaxed. And she didn’t stop, just kept going again and again as if he wasn’t even there.