Waiting for us in the small living room was her older brother, Alan Ames. My quick IvarDuggans.com search revealed that he had been born in Inglewood as Alim Ibrahim Azmeh, and changed his name when he was eighteen. He was twenty-six years old, married, and a father of two. Employed as a surgical nurse at the UCLA Medical Center, where—I noted—his father had studied. Arrested for aggravated assault three years prior, charges dropped.
He sat at one end of a white couch, looking calmly over his teacup at us when we came into the room. He stood briefly, nodded without speaking as Taucher and I introduced ourselves, then sat back down. He was husky, dressed in jeans, a rugby shirt, and white athletic shoes.
“Tea?” asked Marah. “Juice?”
Taucher and I declined and Marah settled onto the couch opposite her brother. Their blood relationship was easy to see—slender faces, expressive brown eyes, coffee-with-cream skin. Their hair was black and straight, Marah’s streaked with henna. They both resembled their father in the one picture of him I’d seen. Not striking similarities, but even so. Different degrees of his aquiline nose.
The house was small, mid-fifties, probably three small bedrooms and two baths. Built in the era of Eisenhower, Elvis, and Khrushchev. Black-and-white TVs, green front lawns. Sears and Roebuck, Briggs & Stratton. Skinny ties and showing-top flattops. My grandpa Dick as a boy, playing catch in the street, Liz jumping rope.
Now a sun-filled living room. Polished windows. Facing the couch sat two wooden armchairs with red-and-gold Arabesque upholstery—one for Taucher and one for me. Persian rugs on a dark laminate floor. An entertainment center along one wall, a few CDs and DVDs and a modestly sized flat-screen TV. Bookshelves on another wall: college textbooks, sociology, psychology, American history, economics, art. More art. For the serious reader, I thought. For the searching young mind of Marah Azmeh. The other wall was densely hung with framed photographs—family and friends, at a glance.
Taucher thanked them for agreeing to meet us on short notice, although—she pointed out—it was their duty as American citizens to be vigilant against terror. Marah nodded. Alan didn’t.
“Tell us what happened to your father,” she said.
“You know exactly what happened to him, Agent Taucher,” said Alan. “You probably know more than we do. He was blown to pieces by an American drone on April twenty-second, 2015.”
“I’m sorry for your loss and I understand your anger,” Joan said briskly.
“You certainly do not,” said Alan. “I have less than one hour before work.”
“I’ll be direct,” said Taucher. “An assassin has murdered one of the three drone operators whose targeted strike killed your innocent father and eight others. That drone operator’s name was Kenny Bryce. We know that this assassin intends to murder both of the other operators as well. He has called his actions ‘justice’ and ‘vengeance.’ So we are here to find out—do you know who this assassin might be? Do you know any relatives or friends of the collaterals who died that day and who are angry enough to kill in revenge? Have you heard of any such person, perhaps even secondhand? A rumor, even. A suspicion.”
I wondered how Taucher’s calling their father a “collateral” would sit with them.
Marah collected Alan’s empty teacup and excused herself to the kitchen. I could see her back and hear the clink of porcelain and the faint sound of liquid being poured.
Alan Ames folded his hands on his lap. “I do not murder. My sister does not murder. We do not associate with murderers. Are we finished?”
“But you have other brothers and sisters overseas,” said Taucher. “Uncles and aunts and cousins. Have any of them ever communicated anything about avenging your father’s death?”
“Ask them if they are murderers,” said Alan.
Marah returned with Alan’s teacup and saucer and set them beside him. She sat again, her face passive, looking at me.
“They’re half a world away,” said Joan.
“Mr. Ames, do any relatives or friends of your father live in the United States?” I asked. It was certainly possible. My IvarDuggans.com search had failed to reveal both Marah and Alan as related to Dr. Ibrahim Azmeh, yet here they sat.
Alan’s face closed on his sister. “Marah? Speak to these people.”
She leaned forward. “Friends, certainly. Dad was a great man. He was fun and outgoing and popular. Tons of friends. Friends from his childhood in Damascus have immigrated here. Friends from his college days in Paris. People who laughed and argued and smoked and hugged you and talked about ideas and politics. And he had even more friends from medical school here in L.A. Like, I couldn’t count them if I had to.”
She cleared her throat. I sensed truth and gentleness in her, in the way her words and emotions and expressions came out as one. Authentic and undiluted. “He left my mother and the United States to return to Syria when I was ten years old. Which meant more friends and more children for him. He married twice again, but not through divorce. This is legal in most of Syria. I can’t even guess about my father’s friends in America, but none of his children are here that I know of, except for Alan and me and Ben.”
I glanced at Taucher, who eyed me back.
“Correct,” said Alan. “Our father was the stereotype of a Muslim woman-owner. He wasn’t devout. But he liked the three-wives idea. He was still married to all of them the day you slaughtered him.”
Marah took a deep breath and a shamed glance down, then politely changed the subject. “Ben is the youngest,” she said. “Benyamin. He lives in Santa Ana. I didn’t hear back from him about this meeting.”
“We’d like his address,” said Taucher.
“Yes, sure,” said Marah.
“Is there anything else to talk about, then?” asked Alan.
I hit him with a quick jab: “Did you ever think of getting vengeance for your dad?”
He considered, eyes hooded. “I was furious when I heard. I would have probably killed the messenger if it hadn’t been Marah. But serious, actual revenge? No. Impractical. I couldn’t see myself going up against the U.S. Air Force, or the CIA, or whoever was responsible for firing that missile into a group of doctors and nurses.”
“Never fantasized that you could get away with it?” asked Taucher.
A consideration, then a smirk. “We all have our fantasies, Agent Taucher. Maybe even you.”
“You’re a rude dude,” she said.
“I’ll be happy to report that remark to your superior.”
“I’ll give you his name and direct number before we leave.”
“Which will be soon, I hope—”
“Alan . . .”
Alan stood. “I can’t be late for work. I don’t want your boss’s name or number. I loved my father and you killed him for no reason. We received twelve thousand dollars for him. I will never forgive and never forget.”
Alan embraced his sister and whispered something in her ear and did not look back on us. The front door slammed. Marah sat back down on the couch, sat forward and lowered her head, then snapped back her mane of copper-black hair and looked at us.
25
“SORRY,” SHE SAID. “Alan’s, like, really pissed at America for not doing enough in Syria. Yet managing to kill Dad. Dad loved America. That’s why he came here to study and start a family. We’d visit Syria to see our relatives and roots, but he thought America was our future. Alan hated the drones long before Dad was killed. For Alan, it became a point of honor to collect the condolence payment. It was very difficult to get. Interview after interview. Delays. He felt like a suspect in a crime. One of the conditions was that we couldn’t speak in public or to the media about the payment. They didn’t tell us the amount being offered until after we had signed everything. When the check for twelve thousand five hundred dollars came in, Alan just about choked, he was so mad.”
“I might have, too,” I sai
d.
Taucher gave me her battle glance. “It’s war. Things happen in them.”
Marah faced Taucher with a nod and silence.
“Does Alan talk about vengeance for your dad?” I asked.
“Some angry threats at first,” said Marah. “Then nothing. He doesn’t have room for that. He’s a busy father and his wife is pregnant again and his job pays well. They live just one block away.”
“Is he always that hostile to the authorities?” asked Taucher.
“He gets along well with the local police,” said Marah. “He helped operate on an officer in the ER a few years ago and they became friends.”
“So he’s just reacting to my fizzy personality?” asked Taucher.
A small smile from Marah.
“Is your mother still in the U.S.?” Taucher asked.
“She lives in France.”
“Tell us about Ben,” I said.
“The baby,” she said. “He’s twenty-two now. Two years younger than me, and four behind Alan. Ben is our free spirit. Very American. He travels and studies what interests him. Likes art and adventure. Stays in campgrounds. Surfs and climbs rocks. Some college, too. Serial girlfriends until lately. Works but always needs money. Odd jobs, usually in the health-care field. Dad’s doctoring had a big influence on the three of us.”
“Is he political?” I asked.
A pause. “More spiritual than political.”
“Explain ‘spiritual,’” said Taucher.
“He’s a searcher,” said Marah. “We were born into Islam, but when Ben was a teenager he accepted Christ. Then he rejected Christ and became a Jew. Then he came back to Islam.”
“When did he return to Islam?” asked Taucher.
Marah looked out a window, apparently in calculation. “Just over three and a half years ago.”
“When your dad was killed,” said Taucher.
Marah nodded. “Ben changed. He went from outgoing to quiet. From happy and carefree to solemn. Ben had been a lot like our father—energetic and loveable and fun to be around. When Dad died in Syria, the Dad part of Ben went away.”
“That’s very unfortunate,” said Taucher.
A beat from Marah while she ordered her thoughts. “Well, misfortune lies beneath everything that’s happened in Syria. Millions of misfortunes, many of them final. We know the doctors were not the targets. Our State Department said that the doctors ran to help Gourmat, the Islamic State leader, in the time it took the missile to travel from the sky to the ground. So there’s luck involved, too. Bad luck.”
“So, back to Ben,” said Taucher. “Around the time your father was killed, Ben returned to Islam and became withdrawn?”
She nodded. “But a few months after leaving, he began to send emails, and call and text. He even sent me a snail-mail letter just a few weeks ago. He seemed to be moving on.”
Taucher and I traded looks: Ben’s letter.
“After leaving where?” asked Taucher.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” said Marah. “Leaving here. Ben lived here with me for about a year. That would have been from the middle of 2014 until a couple of months after Dad died. I miss him. We really had some good times. And recently, he’s started to sound more like himself. I think he’s getting okay again.”
“In the calls and texting?” asked Taucher.
“And letter and emails, too. I think he’s healing. Grief can’t last forever, can it?”
“When did you see him last?” I asked.
“The day he left here,” Marah said wistfully. “So, June of 2015. Time zooms right by, doesn’t it?”
I sensed the timing was right to ask a big fat favor of Marah. She was leaning. And I wanted to beat Taucher to the punch before her fizzy personality took over again. “Can we see his room?” I asked.
“Sure,” said Marah, standing.
A short hallway, bath on the right, scent of soap and shampoo on my way past. On the left a closed door that Marah opened for us. I followed Taucher in. Small and square, a mattress on the floor, a blue sleeping bag for a bedspread, one pillow. The light fixture in the middle of the ceiling was covered in a Japanese-style paper dome, orange. The floor rug was thick underfoot and brightly colored, a budget Persian-themed knockoff. Posters on the walls, neatly tacked: Yosemite’s Half Dome at sunrise, two Hapkido fighters, the Great Mosque of Damascus, Beyoncé onstage, waves lined up at Rincon, hillsides covered in what looked like California golden poppies. A wooden desk sat before the room’s one window, through which a grape-stake fence half covered in ivy was visible. No electronics on the desk—rather, two stacks of paper, one white and one colored. A small brass incense holder with a fresh stick. Faint smell of sage. A Rastafarian-colored beanbag humped in the corner by the closet.
“So he left in April of 2015, after your father’s death?” asked Taucher.
“Not until June,” said Marah.
“Is there a picture of him?”
“Just a second,” she said, heading down the hall. She came back with her phone, tapped up the photos, and held the screen so Taucher and I could see. Ben’s face looked like his siblings’ and father’s. Same sharp face and expressive eyes. His long black hair was spiraled and coppered—a surfer’s sun-bleached dreads. Ben smiling next to a pretty dark-haired woman. Then a blonde. Ben in a martial-arts gi, getting into a small gold-colored pickup truck. Ben with a surfboard under his arm. Ben at the desk in this room, turned to face the camera, pen in hand.
As Marah swiped from image to image, I pictured that face, recessed in the dark interior of the 4Runner that night at the mall in Del Mar. And in the grainy Bakersfield video that Joan Taucher had shared with me at her professional peril. Very possibly the same man. Nothing stood out as fundamentally different. But nothing stood out as identical, either. If it doesn’t fit, you must acquit. Or must you?
Taucher’s look said maybe, too.
“Here,” said Marah. “This is Ben’s latest Telegram text, from three days ago. ‘Chillin’ here, sister. Need money for wedding and down payment on a house. Want to marry Kalima and have us a baby! You’ll love her. Let me know if you have fifty thousand dollars for me! We have a small humble home in Riverside County in our sights. Will pay you back! A rich private lender would be better, if you know such a person. My credit is bad and Kalima’s is worse.’ That is so Ben. They met on Facebook.”
“Sounds like a cool guy,” said Taucher. “Can I see that?”
Marah held the screen up and Taucher read through the message again. I knew what Taucher was doing, but Marah apparently didn’t.
“How much money have you given him?” asked Taucher.
“Maybe six hundred dollars over the last few years.”
“Where are you going to get that fifty grand?” Taucher asked with a dry smile.
Marah rolled her eyes.
“What kind of car does he drive?” I asked.
“A small gold pickup truck,” said Marah. “I don’t know the maker. It’s old. You know, it’s fine that you’re so interested in Ben, but whoever this terrible assassin is, it can’t be Ben.”
“Why can’t it?” asked Taucher, her combat face back on.
Marah’s eyebrows rose in a mask of pleading disappointment. “He’s the baby. He’s golden Ben and he’s never hurt a living thing in his life. He hasn’t eaten an animal since he was fifteen. I understand it’s your job to be suspicious, but you want to be correct, too. Right?”
“We have to be correct,” said Taucher. “And we appreciate your efforts to help us be correct. So, with your permission, we would like to look through this room. Desk, closet. All of it.”
The disappointment on Marah’s face now deepened. I watched her will it away. A strong young woman wrestling with a weighty opponent—herself. Stoic acceptance then, and a flash of anger in her dark eyes. “I’d have to be present,” s
he said.
“Of course,” said Taucher. “You’ve done the right thing, Marah.”
“Alan would kill me.”
“Alan has issues that help no one,” said Taucher.
Alan’s issues struck me as more dangerous than that.
26
TAUCHER MADE FOR THE CLOSET and I sat at the desk. The two stacks of paper were neat and the glass desktop had been dusted recently. I turned on the lamp and opened the top middle drawer. Pens and pencils, paper clips, a stapler and staples, index cards in a rubber band, a yellow highlighter.
Farther back in the drawer was a faux-leather folder bulging with loose papers. I slid it out and opened it. A complimentary bank calendar with a red stagecoach speeding through a green valley. A paper-clipped batch of printouts and magazine pages related to rock climbing, surfing, and nature photography. A flyer for a public gun range in El Monte—rates and hours. That caught my attention. It looked like the stuff that Ben might have swept off his desktop just before leaving.
From the corner of my eye I saw Taucher’s blurred form at the closet. I could hear the clothes hangers rasping on the wooden rod, Taucher impatient and forceful. I went back to the folder in front of me, listening over my shoulder.
Taucher: “Marah, would you mind reading me a few of Ben’s texts and emails? Just so I can get to know him a little while I’m having a look here?”
A pause that grew longer and longer. The women silent. The hangers no longer scraping on the dowel.
Marah: “I’m sorry. I think I’ve made the wrong call. I don’t feel right about letting you do this.”
I slid the folder back where it had been and quietly closed the middle drawer. Felt our friendly citizen slipping away fast.
I opened the top left drawer, found hanging folders labeled “Bills,” “Surfing,” “Climbing,” “Campgrounds,” “Shooting,” Music,” “Truck,” “Computer.”
All empty.
Marah: “I think I’ve been an idiot. To allow you to go through Ben’s stuff.”
Swift Vengeance Page 17
