Damascus Station

by Unknown

  In the end, Sam led the charge for the cleanest approach: use the BANDITOs. They had been polygraphed. They were in the game. They are our only shot, Sam argued. The approvals were thorny, the lawyers nervous about foreign nationals directly involved in a lethal op. But Bradley and Procter heaved their weight behind it and soon all held a copy of the revised finding for CIA lethal authorities targeting General Basil Mahkluf. Sam locked it in the safe under his desk. Other than a scattering of empty Dunkin’ Donuts cups, his temporary workspace in the Langley cube farm was bare.

  There was just one piece remaining. The most important step. They had to find him. Sam wouldn’t sleep for two nights.

  It began at lunchtime on a Wednesday. Sam appeared outside a basement room at Langley marked with the bland nameplate: Global Technology Solutions. He carried the piece of paper Ali had placed inside the folder in Damascus. An NSA tech opened the door and showed Sam into a darkened room with a bullpen of sterile cubicles at its center and a bank of television monitors covering each wall, all displaying cable news. The tech led Sam into a side room. Procter’s face was already splashed on a screen and one of the CIA linguists, Abdallah, a native Syrian, sat at the table. There was a single telephone and a set of computers stacked against the wall. The tech sat at the computer and motioned for Sam to sit.

  “As discussed, if the MOIS or the Russians or anyone tries to trace this call, it will look like it bounced from a tower in the Mezzeh suburb,” the tech said, pointing to a satellite image of Damascus’s western rim with the cell towers marked by blue dots.

  “We’ve been over this like twenty times, Jason, for fuck’s sake,” Procter said to the tech, whose name was not Jason. “Everyone put on the goddamn headsets and let’s get this moving. Sam, it’s your show.”

  Sam reviewed the plan with Abdallah once more. Then he unfolded the paper and dialed the number. It was eight o’clock in Damascus. Ali was probably in his office. The phone rang twice before he answered.

  “Hello?”

  “Hello, my friend, I am sorry for not calling back last night, but I wanted to let you know that I’ve sent over the wine,” said Abdallah in flawless Levantine Arabic, reading from the paper Ali had passed Sam.

  A lingering pause. Sam heard breathing, the phone shuffle between ears, the rustle of a drawer and papers.

  “Thank you. How much do I owe you?” Ali said.

  Abdallah read out three prices that could be constructed into a phone number.

  “Okay, thank you,” the man said.

  The line went dead. Sam’s neck prickled, the hairs strained upward.

  He turned to the NSA tech. “You can run the voice-recognition cross-checks, but it’s him. It’s Ali Hassan.” Sam swiveled to Procter. She gave two thumbs up.

  “If he calls back, he’ll help us find Basil,” Sam said.

  Procter sliced a thumb across her windpipe and the screen went black.

  SAM FOUND IONA BANKS SITTING at her workbench in the OTS spaces, nestled inside a windowless room of the Original Headquarters Building saturated by fluorescent lights. Smiling, she ran a hand through the hair on the unshaved side of her head and waved him over to the table. Pushing aside several black Gucci messenger bags—“all the Chinese intel guys carry these,” she said—she removed from a drawer a single manila folder and slid it to Sam.

  “I have so many questions I’m not asking,” she said.

  “Smart.”

  She put her hand on the folder, pulling it back an inch. “But I have to ask one: What are the odds this gets me fired?”

  Leaning over, he rested his forearms on the table and absentmindedly looked at the picture on his badge. He had been so young. “Low.”

  She smiled and released the folder. Her eyebrows wrinkled at the sight of his blue badge. “When do you lose that, by the way?”

  “Soon. I have some business in Amman. Then the PRB process starts.” He opened the folder. In it was an envelope bearing French postage. It held several flyers for vacation rentals and hotels. Thumbing through the papers, he stopped when he reached an advertisement for a chateau in Èze.

  “How did you get this picture?”

  Iona just frowned.

  “What did you tell the guys in Documents?”

  “I just told them to make it. They didn’t ask questions. They love this stuff.”

  “It will look like it came from Villefranche?” he asked.

  Iona smirked. “It will. It is in fact a promotional package delivered by the good people at the Villefranche Office de Tourisme, hoping to entice her to return to the area for another holiday.”

  “Perfect.”

  There was a silence. “Is she okay?” Iona asked, her face darkening.

  “I don’t know.” Now the picture of the Èze chateau made his chest feel tight. He closed the folder.

  She nodded and kept silent.

  He reread the Damascus address on the front five times to be sure it was correct. Tucking the flyer of the Èze chateau back in the envelope, he passed the manila folder to Iona and rapped his knuckles twice on the table.

  A FEW DAYS BEFORE HE left for Amman, Sam hobbled to the Global Deployment Center with his black diplomatic passport and Procter’s cable approving his TDY. The nameplate on the counter proclaimed the grandmotherly attendant to be Cornelia G. The cane on the floor and the magnifying-glass eyewear suggested an EOD (entrance on duty) date during the waning days of the Eisenhower administration. Sam smiled and introduced himself. Cornelia did not. She stood, shakily reaching for his papers, and began typing his employee identification number into her computer.

  After a few minutes she looked up and reread Procter’s cable approving his travel. “You forge this, dear?” she said.

  Sam laughed. Cornelia’s face screwed into a grimace. He erased the smile. “I did not,” he said. “You can check the cable database.”

  Cornelia did. It took a long time to enter the numbers. Finally, she looked up and spoke softly. “How’d you pull this one off, dear, being on administrative leave and all? Never seen this, and I’ve been here a good while. You shouldn’t be able to access this approval cable, much less travel on Agency business.”

  Cornelia motioned toward his badge. “What color is that, anyway? You got the red one? Escort required? One of these nice people here keeping an eye on you, minding you don’t lift classified paper from the vaults?” She motioned toward the people in the line behind Sam, which was now stretching into the hallway.

  Sam held up his blue badge. “Still blue for now, Cornelia.”

  Now she grinned, and her rheumy gaze lingered on his fresh scar. “Well, dear, I want to ask what horrible thing you’ve done, but I’ll spare you. You don’t keep a job like this being nosy. Let’s get you ready.” Unprompted, Cornelia read aloud the provisos of Agency Regulation 41-2 as if it were Holy Scripture. “Any journey must meet or exceed thirteen hours in duration, including layovers, to merit the purchase of an airfare above Basic Economy Class—or its nearest equivalent—on a U.S. carrier (Delta, American, United, etc.).” The et cetera said like Amen.

  Sam knew you don’t fight with Deployment, so he smiled and nodded and said of course, a middle seat in the back near one of the lavatories would be excellent. She booked the ticket and printed out the papers identifying him as second secretary (Communications) and set to arranging the hotel. “Room has to be above the fourth floor and below the tenth, dear, you know that. No exceptions. Above the fourth to keep you away from the car bombs, below the tenth so the fire truck ladders can reach you. Can’t be booking the penthouse for you ops boys willy-nilly.” She looked at his ringless left hand and clicked her tongue.

  TELEVISION OFF, SAM SHUFFLED BACK to the bed in his room at the Four Seasons Hotel in Amman. He sat on the edge as daybreak traffic swirled and whined in the circle below. He looked down at the carpet, toward the closet. He smoothed the sheets and took a deep, painful breath.

  Awkwardly and painfully, he got dressed. He heard four knock
s as he walked toward the door. He checked the peephole, unspooled the chain lock, and opened it. “Jaggers. Time to roll. Big day today.”

  At the Station, late afternoon slid into evening. Procter emerged from her office. An Amman support officer brought in Bennigan’s for the ops team, now gathered around a conference table picking at Styrofoam containers of American chain-restaurant fare: burgers, chicken tenders, onion rings, and heaping plates of fries. “Last Bennigan’s in the world, I’m told,” Procter said. “Right here in the middle of the desert.”

  Bradley held watch at Langley. Sam would arm the bomb from Amman.

  The trigger now sat between Susan, the facial recognition expert, and an untouched platter of fried potato skins. Procter told Sam that she had to pee. “I’m your minder here, so you come with me.”

  Graciously, she let him wait outside the ladies’ room. When she emerged, she pointed to a row of empty desks and took a seat. He slid a chair across from her. She pulled a rubber band from her pocket to tie up her hair.

  “You won’t get redemption from me, but you’ll get forgiveness. Best I can do.”

  He wanted to hug her. “Thanks, Chief,” he said instead.

  “And I’m sorry about ATHENA,” Procter said. “She was our girl in Damascus. Gilded, primo asset. Plus the not knowing what happened and all that shit. I ran a guy in Kandahar who disappeared on us. Just vanished. Poof. Drove me nuts. Bothers me to this day. And I wasn’t even fucking the guy.”

  Sam was sufficiently attuned to Procter to interpret this as genuine feeling, not a backhanded reminder of his infidelities to CIA. This was empathy.

  Sam nodded. Procter’s eyes leveled at his. “You do understand that even if she surfaces you’ll be about as welcome around the case as a Jew in Mecca, right?”

  “Yeah, of course. C’mon, Chief.”

  Procter nodded and spat into a trash can. She unwound her hair and stretched the rubber band around her fingers. “The night you confessed to me. In that shitty D-town safe house. You said something interesting.”

  “I said a lot of things.”

  “You did. But you used an intriguing word, one I did not report to CI or Security when they asked me for the story after you came clean in Landstuhl. You said, ‘I’m in love with her, Chief.’ Direct quote. Not, I fucked her, Chief, or We’ve been having sex, Chief. Love. Ring a bell?”

  Sam leaned close to Procter. “Bradley told me once you can lie to anyone except CIA,” he said. “So I told you the truth.”

  She shook her head. “So what’s the plan, then?” Procter said. “I’d imagine if it was about the sex you move on, get over it eventually. But love, I’ve been told by reliable sources, is a stickier fucking feeling to shake.”

  “There is no plan,” he said. “There’s nothing to be done.”

  Procter tied her hair back up. “I suppose. But let me ask you a question, Jaggers. When you joined me in Damascus, you were a gung-ho case officer on his way to a glorious future. Now . . .” She trailed off. “You’re a smidge diminished, let’s say.” She offered a wan smile.

  “Diminished is a good word,” Sam said. “Accurate. So what’s the question?”

  “Was Mariam worth it?”

  Procter’s mention of ATHENA’s true name, a breach of tradecraft—an intentional one, he suspected—caught Sam off guard. But before he could respond, Susan’s voice interrupted from the conference room. “OGC just joined.” Sam and Procter walked back into the room to see Elias Kassab training the camera on the Security Office building. Sam sat next to Procter, shifting in his chair, wishing he hadn’t neglected his evening dose of Vicodin for the foot.

  They watched Ali Hassan emerge and begin walking slowly down the sidewalk.

  “Where the hell is Basil?” Procter said. “We aren’t trying to kill fucking Ali Hassan anymore.”

  ALI LIT A CIGARETTE AND walked toward the guardhouse, looking up into a night sky dotted by clouds. The last few weeks had been among the worst of his life. He had not been home in fifteen days. He had stopped looking in the mirror. It no longer mattered.

  Ali’s title had not changed, nor had his pay, neither unusual for a promotion in Syria. But what had been unusual, and terrifying, was the scope of his new responsibility. “You take your brother’s position,” Assad had said, flinty-eyed, after Ali explained that he had killed Rustum. The President had not responded to that admission. “The Republican Guard is yours. Do anything you must to smash the rebellion.” Ali suspected Assad had set in motion a parallel effort to investigate him, but so far this ghost had kept its distance.

  Since then Ali had worried that his own sanity might be bending. He now had a recurring nightmare in which Layla screamed, then disappeared into fire. It repeated itself on a cot in his office, usually just before dawn.

  But he had one more distraction tonight before he returned to his work and the nightmares. He stubbed out his cigarette and lit another as he snaked between the cars on the sidewalk.

  Ali walked leisurely, inflating his lungs with smoke. He imagined opening Rustum’s throat and scratched his scar as he thought of his brother, hoping that it would conjure some feeling. Anger, guilt, loss, joy.

  Anything.

  But he felt nothing, and the memory burned away into the night as he walked.

  SAM WATCHED THE VIDEO FOOTAGE of Ali’s walk and scratched at his own scar, which ran from the left side of his neck onto his lower cheek. He traced it with his thumb. Sam felt Procter watching him, and he dropped his hand.

  “Anything yet, Jaggers?” Procter asked.

  “No. Still nothing.” Ali was about fifty yards from the Pajero.

  “He’s turning around,” said Elias. “Very, very slowly.”

  “Fuckin’-A,” said Procter. “Go back inside and bring me Basil.”

  KANAAN WAITED FOR ALI IN the Security office lobby. “He’s finally started talking, boss. I know you’re busy, but I think you should have a word.” Ali followed Kanaan into the basement toward the same cell they’d used to hold Mariam Haddad’s cousin, the skinny girl with the unfortunate eye patch. Kanaan opened the door and Ali entered the freezing room, joining the prisoner on the slab bed and lighting a cigarette for warmth.

  “Ibrahim,” Ali said. “Or should I say Abu Qasim?” He smiled. “I understand you have confessed to building the bomb that almost killed the President?”

  “And you,” Abu Qasim grunted. “It almost killed you.”

  “Yes,” Ali murmured.

  “And your brother.”

  “You would have been doing me a favor. As it happened, I had to do it myself.” Ali blew smoke in his face.

  Abu Qasim turned his head in surprise before shifting his eyes back to the floor.

  Ali clicked his tongue. “But I don’t want more information about the past. I want to know the future.”

  “What?”

  “Where is the Black Death? Your wife, the sniper. Where is she now? Where is she going?”

  Abu Qasim closed his eyes. He wheezed. Then he smiled. “That, General, is the one thing I cannot give.”

  Ali stood and put out his cigarette on the floor. “You cannot, but you will.” He nodded to Kanaan, who brought in a bucket of freezing water and doused the prisoner to prepare for another session. Abu Qasim screamed, then mumbled: Sarya, Sarya, Sarya. The way he said her name reminded Ali of Layla.

  ALI HEARD THE DISTINCTIVE VOICE when he returned to his office.

  “I’m still not getting the answers I need from Kanaan,” Basil said, seated inside. Ali joined him at the table and lit a cigarette.

  “I’m surprised you can sit down, Basil, what with the buckshot that insane CIA woman blasted into your ass during your lunatic raid on the embassy.” Ali smiled. Basil ignored him.

  “You are responsible for disrupting my operation—an approved operation—against the U.S. Embassy,” Basil said. “I need answers, and I don’t want them from Kanaan. You called me here to your office. So you meet with me,” he growled. “
Don’t send me to your underling.”

  “I am trying to win a war you and my brother nearly lost. It’s kept me very busy.” Ali nodded toward the door, telling him to leave. Basil spat on the floor. He licked his mustache and lit his own cigarette, blowing the first fumes across the table into Ali’s face. He remained seated.

  “Get out, Basil.”

  “You’re making—”

  “Get out.”

  Slowly, Basil stood, stubbed out his cigarette on the table, and turned to leave.

  Ali normally did not threaten. Nor did he reveal secrets in fits of anger. You did not get to the top of the Syrian mukhabarat by running your mouth. But there were accounts to settle. “I saw what you did to those Americans in the embassy, Basil.” Basil, the Comanche, stopped walking to the door and turned around slowly, his brows furrowed in confusion. “You did it to Valerie Owens in this basement. You did it in Hama.”

  Basil began to smile broadly.

  “Basil,” Ali said, putting out his cigarette in the ashtray. “I had always thought of you as an imp, a demon. But you are merely a rabid dog who wants to be praised for the carcass he brings back to his owner. He stood and approached until he could smell Basil’s humid breath, see the spittle-slick mustache. They stood eye to eye. “Your owner is dead, Basil.”

  Ali delicately sliced a finger across the top of his forehead.

  Basil had stopped smiling. He turned and walked out, spitting again on the floor.

  Lighting another cigarette, Ali opened a desk drawer and removed a used notepad. He flipped toward the back until he found the page. A trio of prices. A phone number.