Carter came out of his reverie when he heard footsteps behind him on the deck. He turned to find Cordelia Stapleton looking toward land. She appeared as worried as he was. Both of them were in the same boat, so to speak, because her boyfriend, Sinclair, was also in Sharm el-Sheikh helping with the operation.
“Good morning,” he stammered. “Did you sleep well? Are you feeling better?”
“Actually, no.” She smiled ruefully. “Not with John on shore.”
Her hair had been freshly washed and hung in damp strands, creating a wet mark on the shoulders of her cotton shirt. She was dressed in white jeans and was barefoot. In the glare of the sun, she looked pale and still a little shaky.
Carter leaped to his feet and offered her a seat.
“They just brought me breakfast—homemade granola. Although I guess that’s an oxymoron. How do you ‘home make’ something when you are on a yacht? Unless, of course, it’s home, which I guess for VerPlanck it is.”
He realized he was babbling. Pretty women did that to him.
“I’m a little too nervous to eat right now,” Cordelia said with a smile.
“Let’s just hope if Moustaffa makes his move they can get that biological weapon,” Carter said, trying to sound a little more serious.
“I can’t quite believe we want him to try something.”
“I guess if he doesn’t we’ll never find the damn thing,” Carter pointed out.
“By the way,” Cordelia asked, turning to Carter, “what’s this I hear about you nearly catching Moustaffa back in Venice?”
“Oh, what an exaggeration!” He grinned, delighted. “Who told you that?”
“The British agent who was on board last night. They’re all very impressed. They want to recruit you.”
“Listen,” Carter said. “I’ll stick to mummies and museum curators—only the dead and the passive-aggressive. You can keep the homicidal maniacs.”
Cordelia laughed, but the smile faded quickly.
“Do you think Sinclair and Holly will be OK?”
“Yes.” He nodded. “If there is anyone I would put my money on, it’s John Sinclair.”
“What about Holly? I’m sure you’re worried.”
“Yeah, it’s been rough.”
“She saved me that night at the opera. I’m so grateful to her. You have no idea.”
“Yeah, I heard,” Carter said. “I’m not surprised.”
“Have you known her long?” Cordelia asked.
“About five years. Not that she pays much attention to me.”
“I’m sure she cares for you.”
“Not really. I’ve stopped kidding myself. She’s way out of my league.”
Carter glanced over. Cordelia was really very lovely, sitting there in the morning sun, her feet tucked up on the cushions beside her. He couldn’t help but think that Sinclair was insane to cheat on her the way he did. Cordelia was too good for him.
“Actually, I hate to mention it, but Sinclair still seems to have feelings for Holly. I understand they have some history together.”
“Oh Carter, no,” she assured him, her eyes wide with earnestness. “That was years ago. John has made it perfectly clear. They’re just friends now.”
When John Sinclair walked into the Sharm el-Sheikh Conference Center, he looked very much the part of a corporate CEO, carrying a file folder emblazoned with the logo of a major U.S. oil company.
“Name?” the security guard asked. “And may I see some government-issued ID?”
“Bob Anderson,” Sinclair said. “Comanche Oil.”
He slid a Texas driver’s license across the desk.
“Thank you, sir,” the guard said, waving him through the turnstile.
Sinclair walked inside to the hallway. It was going to be a long day—the first day of the World Economic Forum. Most of the conference would take place indoors, in the modern air-conditioned complex, away from the Egyptian heat. Today was the main event. There would be an opening address, a full day of meetings, and a formal dinner. The second day was for the working sessions, where participants hoped to make deals and hammer out future business relationships.
With the Middle East in the throes of a seismic power shift, attendance was going to be unusually high. Twelve heads of state would make an appearance tonight, including the presidents of France, China, and the United States; the prime ministers of Britain, India, Japan, Israel, Russia, and Spain; the chancellor of Germany; the king of Jordan; and the ruling prince of Saudi Arabia. There were business executives from 250 of the world’s largest multinationals and delegates from 70 countries.
It was eight a.m. The motorcades from the hotels would be arriving soon. Sinclair needed to be briefed at the security command center before the activity started. As he stood at the elevators, several traditionally garbed Arabs stepped out. Sinclair entered the elevator along with a large Chinese delegation and punched the button for the third floor, the security center.
Sinclair had never been to Sharm el-Sheikh and was astounded at the size of the complex. Many high-level meetings took place here: peace conferences, corporate gatherings. He had been told that press attendance at the World Economic Forum was much larger than in previous years. This morning reporters stood outside, four deep behind a cordon, thirty feet back from the door. Security personnel had been doubled, tripled even. Armor-clad SWAT teams now patrolled the conference site. Their shiny helmets gave them the appearance of a swarm of black flies.
Lady Xandra Sommerset scanned her clearance badge at the electronic door of the conference center and passed through the security checkpoint. She had been prescreened under her false identity—that of a Belgian banker. As she walked through the room, no one even looked up.
In her current guise, even the most avid tabloid reader would not recognize her as an international celebrity. The flat shoes, serious navy blue suit, and ugly horn-rimmed glasses were perfect camouflage. Her brown hair was tied back into a messy ponytail, the earmark of an overworked female executive with little time for personal grooming.
But the most effective transformation was her body shape. Xandra was now middle-aged and frumpy—underneath her clothes, she had padded her midsection, expanding her waistline to very matronly proportions. In a stroke of genius, Lady X had achieved the impossible: she had managed to look plain.
Holly Graham was standing in the kitchen of the Sharm el-Sheikh Conference Center slicing carrots. She had been conscripted into the kitchen staff for the duration of the conference. Moustaffa had alerted his Egyptian henchmen, and there had been no problem getting her hired by the catering company. It was clear his underworld contacts were global. He now stood next to her, arranging salad and shrimp on individual plates for the luncheon.
Holly wished that somebody would recognize her. Moustaffa, however, was hoping for the exact opposite. He had radically altered his appearance, shaving off most of his eyebrows and plucking his hairline. There were two foam tablets in his cheeks to change the shape of his face. Dressed in baggy trousers and a huge white cook’s jacket, he looked much heavier than he was in real life. No one stopped him as he entered the kitchen.
He warned Holly that she was his insurance policy—a human shield. If anything untoward happened, she’d be the first to die.
John Sinclair scanned the monitors of the third-floor security post. There were high-resolution cameras in every hall and conference room. Face-recognition technology was sweeping the participants at ten-second intervals, running it through a central database of international underworld criminals. The sophisticated programs had been fine-tuned to identify the distinctive features of one man: Moustaffa.
So far, the hundreds of scans and checks had turned up nothing. Once or twice a monitor would beep, but closer examination of the person on the screen would reveal it was not the terrorist they were seeking. Nevertheless, Sinclair felt in his bones that Moustaffa was there.
The chief of security leaned over and pointed at the screen.
; “That’s him,” he said.
“Really?” Sinclair asked in disbelief.
“Positive. Look next to him.”
Sinclair leaned forward and examined the grainy monitor to see a woman standing nearby.
“That’s Holly!” he said.
“Correct. We spotted her the moment she came in.”
“Get her out of there!”
“I’m afraid that is not possible, sir,” the intelligence chief said. “We don’t want Moustaffa to know we’re onto him. For now, she’s staying exactly where she is.”
Paul Oakley sat in on the session entitled “Public Health in the Middle East.” It was interesting. He would have liked to concentrate on the discussion. But that was not what he was there for.
The intelligence experts were convinced that Moustaffa was going to target the conference with a biological attack. Oakley had been told to keep his eyes open and not draw attention. He was to report anything he saw. Personally, he was praying that his professional expertise would not be needed.
The grand ballroom was as cool as a refrigerator. The morning sessions had ended, and hundreds of people were swarming in for the midday meal. There were no assigned tables. That was the whole point. People could sit together and continue the discussions with whomever they liked.
John Sinclair selected a table right in the middle of the vast ballroom. Several French oil executives were already seated, discussing the Arab Spring and the current political climate in Egypt.
Two Chinese participants took places next to him. The first course had already been served, so they all began to eat their salad and shrimp. Sinclair picked at the lettuce and looked around.
Large trolleys were being rolled out for the hot entrée—baked chicken in a phyllo pastry. The waitress came from behind and placed a plate down over his right shoulder. Sinclair looked at the food and noticed that he was hungry; it smelled delicious.
“Here you are, John,” she said.
It was Holly’s voice!
Sinclair started to turn toward her.
“Don’t! He’s at the next table.”
“Moustaffa’s here in the dining room?” he whispered.
“Yes. Keep your face turned to the left and he won’t recognize you,” she said, and served the Chinese executive next to Sinclair. The man from Shanghai began to eat and paid no attention to the conversation between the American businessman and the waitress.
“Is he going to strike?” Sinclair asked, moving his napkin up to cover his mouth as he spoke.
“Yes. He says it’s tonight,” she added under her breath, and started to move to the next guest.
“Wait, Holly. Why would he tell you?”
“He loves to brag,” Holly said with a sigh and rolled her eyes. “About everything.”
She continued passing plates to the guests, working her way around the table. In a moment she approached Sinclair from the other direction.
“The team has been watching you since Venice,” Sinclair informed her. “So you haven’t been alone.”
“I was hoping that was the case. Anyway, I had my earring,” she said, reaching up and fingering the hidden alarm.
“Will he try to put anything in the food?” Sinclair asked, looking down at his plate.
“I don’t know,” Holly said.
“Holly, do as I tell you. There are a hundred security men in the hall. Just walk up to them and get some protection.”
“No, John.”
“Don’t argue, do it!”
“No! When this is over, he’ll let me go. He says he’ll disappear and leave me free.”
“And you’re going to believe him? Why did he bring you here to the conference in the first place?”
“I guess because it was too dangerous to keep me on the yacht—too many people on the dock. He says he will kill me if I try anything.”
“Holly, please! Walk out now. Don’t be so stubborn!” Sinclair said.
“No, I’ll stay,” she said, collecting his salad plate. “I’m in the perfect position to learn more about the attack. Keep me in sight. I’ll try to get a message to you.”
She turned to serve the adjacent table and then moved away, passing out the lunch plates to two more groups.
Sinclair watched, anxious and frustrated. That was typical; she wasn’t going to listen. Holly turned and gave him a quick glance, then pushed the empty catering trolley back to the kitchen.
Incredible! Holly Graham had just turned herself from a hostage into the best asset they had.
The sessions beginning at two o’clock were filled to capacity. In one room, the Japanese prime minister talked about alternate energy sources for the Asia Pacific region. In Conference Room Two, participants grappled with the topic of how new technologies would help Middle East economic development.
On the third floor, intelligence officers were glued to the screen, watching Moustaffa in the kitchen. They had redirected all their surveillance to him and hung on his every move.
Sinclair’s attention was focused on a grainy, live image of Holly Graham. She was taking luncheon plates off a trolley and stacking them near the industrial dishwasher.
“I want to get her out of there!” Sinclair demanded.
“No, it might spook him,” the chief of operations said. “We need him to stick to plan.”
“He’s right under your nose,” Sinclair said, pointing to the monitor. “You’re just going to let him do this?”
“Of course not, but we need to find out where he put the bioweapon. We can’t have bubonic plague floating around out there.”
“What if he doesn’t make a move?” Sinclair asked.
“We need to find the weapon, regardless. The canisters could be on an automatic trigger. A timer. We need him to lead us to them.”
“But what if he doesn’t and we don’t stop him in time?”
“Short of shutting down this conference and evacuating the building, we have no other option but to watch and wait. There are Egyptian relations to consider. Things are at a delicate stage, politically.”
“To hell with that!” Sinclair burst out. “People are going to die!”
“We couldn’t convince the world governments to cancel the event. All the high-level participants were informed of the threat, and they opted to stay.”
Sinclair sighed resignedly. “I assume you went over the ventilation systems and that sort of thing, to make sure he can’t put anything through the air ducts,” Sinclair said.
“We have been here since two a.m. Air-conditioning ducts, heating units, ventilation systems, the works.”
“Do we know what the substance looks like?”
“Most bioweapons are aerosols. It’s probably in a canister. We searched the building top to bottom and removed anything that could possibly contain a bio-agent. We even replaced the fire extinguishers. So far, nothing.”
“Something could be brought in later,” Sinclair suggested. “By someone on a second shift.”
“No. There’s only one shift. Twelve hours straight. They come in at luncheon prep and stay through the dinner.”
“Why’s that?”
“The hotel didn’t want to have to deal with double the number of kitchen staff.”
“What about a delivery?” Sinclair asked.
“We are screening all incoming packages. And the workers are not allowed outside, not even for a cigarette.”
The room fell silent as they considered the options. A panel of forty camera monitors flickered; the screens reflected the normal activity of a conference. People stood, walked around, and talked together.
Sinclair’s eyes were drawn again to the camera that recorded Holly’s workstation. The kitchen was active. She turned and picked up a stack of plates. As she went by the security camera, Holly suddenly looked up at the lens. It seemed to Sinclair that she was staring right at him.
Then deliberately and slowly, she winked at the camera! He simply couldn’t believe the nerve of the woman. Holly Graham w
as a very cool operator.
It was late afternoon on The MoonSonnet, and about eighty degrees, but it felt comfortable with the breeze blowing across the aft deck, the perfect combination of hot and cool. Beyond the railing was the gorgeous turquoise sea. The Sinai Peninsula formed an unbroken line of land on the horizon.
Carter Wallace sat with Ted VerPlanck, saying very little. They were both drinking gin and tonics, and with each sip the ice tinkled in the glasses enticingly. Carter marveled at how the rich do everything to absolute perfection—the heft of a crystal glass, just the right squeeze of lime.
He glanced across the deck at his host. VerPlanck appeared to be waiting for events to unfold with dispassionate equanimity. He certainly looked as if he hadn’t a care. Lounging in the wicker chair, impeccable in his Nantucket red pants, white oxford shirt, and blue linen blazer, he was every inch the gentleman.
Of course, that kind of sangfroid came with the turf. VerPlanck had been trained to hide his feelings from birth. He was the bluest of the bluebloods, and that blood ran cold. The old joke was that the only things these people showed any emotion about were their dogs and their horses . . . and their boats, apparently.
Ted clearly loved his. And, Carter had to admit, VerPlanck’s yacht was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen—very old school. This was no vulgar gleaming superyacht. The billionaire had explained it was a 125-foot, three-masted schooner that had been built in the Netherlands. The lines were extraordinarily elegant. The hull was painted a deep navy blue, which offset the beautiful teak deck and woodwork. The masts were thick, each fashioned out of a single Douglas fir.
He had learned that The MoonSonnet was a type of boat known as a motorsailor, because it had both sails and engines. Six-hundred-twenty-four-horsepower Caterpillars for a cruising speed of twelve knots, VerPlanck said.
The sails were mesmerizing. Sitting under the expanse of white, the sound of the taut fabric straining and snapping in the breeze made his blood stir. With sails up, The MoonSonnet skimmed over the blue water as smoothly and swiftly as a magic carpet.
The Stolen Chalicel Page 28
