Doha 12

by Lance Charnes

  Before he could pursue that thought, his secure mobile rang. He pulled it off his belt, saw “blocked number” on the screen. “Yes?”

  “Good morning to you, Raffi,” Orgad said. The encryption gave his voice a slight gargle.

  “Chaim.” Gur pushed away from the table and paced toward the window. “I’ll assume since you’re calling that there’s been another disaster.”

  “No, nothing like that. The ambassador is working to get Holmeyer out of the hospital, so you may even be able to come home someday. The covers are still missing?”

  “In a way. The news programs are saying the police have them, but we’re still trying to find out which police. We’re having no luck with the sayanim. Perhaps Kaisarut can help?”

  “Forget Liaison.” Orgad’s desk chair squeaked in the background. “They’re in New York City and being held in a safe house by the local police.”

  Gur nodded to his reflection in the glass. The phone number Kelila recovered when she’d searched Schaffer’s flat belonged to Eldar’s paternal uncle in the NYPD. “You know this how?”

  “That’s not something that concerns you right now.”

  A mole in the NYPD or FBI, perhaps, or a communications intercept. That explained why Orgad called instead of sending an email: no paper trail. “All right, we’ll start following Eldar’s uncle. This source of yours…is he going to have more information for us?”

  “He might. Raffi, a word of advice. No one here is impressed by that operation in the train station. Four dead railroad cops, eight civilians wounded, and you managed to let the police arrest one of your people. Consider this your Lillehammer. You need to clean this up soon. Do you understand?”

  “More than you know.” During the hunt for Black September, a Kidon team killed an innocent man in the Norwegian town of Lillehammer. Six of the combatants were captured, five went to jail, and the aftershocks destroyed a huge swath of the Institute’s operations in northern Europe. Gur knew the Director wouldn’t do anything melodramatic like having him assassinated; they’d simply transfer him to field collection in south Lebanon and let Hezbollah do it for them.

  “Good. Don’t disappoint us again, Raffi.” The connection squelched and died.

  Gur stood watching the traffic go by. He tried not to agree too much with Orgad’s verdict, but it was hard. Philadelphia had been a huge goat-fuck—twice—and no matter how misbegotten the mission, it was always the leader’s fault if it didn’t work.

  “Sir?” Kelila asked. The one word carried a lot of worry.

  “Be ready to leave by eleven. We’re going north.”

  FIFTY-EIGHT: Crown Heights, Brooklyn, 10 December

  Miriam shut her book on her finger, closed her eyes and eased her head against the plush armchair that took up a big chunk of her bedroom. Not that she minded its size; it was fine to have a cozy place to get away from all the people who wanted a piece of her.

  A couple hours’ break from the constant interrogation felt like sheer decadence. Since she and Jake arrived here, they’d been grilled by the NYPD, the FBI, Philadelphia PD, the Pennsylvania and New Jersey state police departments, the Amtrak Police and Immigration and Customs Enforcement. They’d looked at hundreds of pictures of Arabs, some mug shots, others surveillance photos. Even now Jake was working with a police artist, making changes to the passport photo of the woman who’d stopped him on the street last week claiming to be a tourist.

  Who else would interrogate them? Foreign police? People from dark places like the CIA…or Mossad?

  How did things like this happen?

  She unmoored her thoughts and let them drift. After a bit, the current nudged them toward Jake.

  Other than her fathers, Bill was the only man she’d ever lived with. It still seemed strange to share three meals a day with someone she barely knew. But Jake was nice, generally polite, cleaned up after himself, was protective of her and loved his daughter desperately. He was learning when to talk and when to leave her alone—something she’d worked hard to teach Bill. She could do worse for a housemate.

  Then sometimes Jake’s eyes would melt or his face would lose its shape, and he’d excuse himself to go to his room or out in the back yard. She knew why, and every time it twisted her heart. She’d done exactly the same thing for months after Bill died; she’d trip over a memory and all her strength would pour from her eyes, leaving behind a dark and heavy emptiness.

  Last night, Jake had left off in the middle of washing the dinner dishes to flee out the back door. She’d almost followed him, but stopped before she could turn the doorknob. He doesn’t know you, and you don’t know him, she’d reminded herself. But she knew what he felt. And she knew how terrible it was to be alone with those feelings.

  Someone was watching her. Miriam opened her eyes and looked warily toward the bedroom door.

  Eve stood in the doorway, her big brown eyes staring at Miriam, wheels turning behind them. She had a book and her doll pressed against her chest, one in each hand.

  “Hi, Eve.”

  The girl watched Miriam for a moment, then slid a half-step into the room. Her eyes searched for the tiger that would leap out and tear her apart.

  “You can come in, sweetie, it’s okay.”

  Eve took a full step this time, slow and cautious.

  Miriam hadn’t yet figured out Eve’s doll. What made Jake and Rinnah think Harem Girl Barbie was a good toy for a little girl?

  Eve stalled out at the foot of the bed. Her feet fiddled on the carpet.

  Am I really that scary? “What book is that?” Eve slowly held the book out to Miriam: Ramona the Pest. “Is that a good book?” The girl nodded solemnly, saucer eyes watching her as if Miriam was a hungry hyena. “Um…would you like me to read to you?”

  After some consideration, Eve nodded.

  Miriam felt like she’d just aced an obstacle course.

  Jake poked his head into Eve’s room and found a cat but no girl. Bastet didn’t bother to raise her head from her nest between the pillows, just fixed Jake with an impolite stare.

  Eve tended to stay in her room when strangers were in the house. Jake stepped across the hall to his own bedroom, where she’d sometimes burrow under his blanket. No girl.

  The first twinge of anxiety poked at his gut. Where was she?

  He sprang for the bathroom door. Not there, either. Unease turned into fear. Did she get out? Where would she go? Would she try to go home?

  Miriam’s voice drifted from her open bedroom door. He followed the sound; maybe she’d know where Eve had gone.

  Eve sat on the floor in the room’s far corner, her back against a floral-print easy chair, Jasmine on her lap. Miriam sat beside her, a book open on her knees. “‘“No!” said Ramona, and stamped her foot. Beezus and Mary Jane might have fun, but she wouldn’t. Nobody but a genuine grownup was going to take her to school…’”

  Jake stepped back so he could just peek around the doorjamb. Perhaps two inches separated Miriam and his daughter. Eve’s face showed not quite happiness, but something close to peace. Miriam’s face, framed as it was with great swoops of her curry-brown hair, was softer and more open than he’d ever seen it. Her voice had a lift and a storyteller’s pacing, and she gave Mrs. Quimby a personality with just a few words. She’d be perfect for Storytime at the Park Slope store.

  Jake’s breath stumbled in his throat. For a moment he saw Rinnah in Miriam’s place, reading to Eve, stroking their daughter’s hair. Sometimes Rinnah would slip in from somewhere just beyond his peripheral vision; suddenly she’d be there, a smidgen out of reach. A sucker punch from a ghost. Did that happen to Eve? Or was she moving on already, leaving him behind with his grief?

  He watched the two of them for a few minutes. A complicated tangle of feelings wrestled inside him. Then he turned and carefully paced back to the stairs so he wouldn’t disturb them, leaving his daughter with a woman who before this moment he thought he’d figured out.

  FIFTY-NINE: Crown Heights, Brooklyn
, 11 December

  “Montgomery and New York, northbound,” Gur announced into his earpiece as he followed Eugene Eldar’s black Crown Victoria through a left turn across the next intersection. He tightened the interval a couple car lengths; the north-south blocks were short.

  “Montgomery and Norstrand,” Kelila replied.

  Gur, Kelila and Sasha had run a classic three-car tail on Eldar, switching off every three or four blocks as they dogged him from Staten Island to One Police Plaza in Manhattan to Brooklyn’s Crown Heights. Now they passed through a neighborhood of turn-of-the-century brick townhouses, hedges lining small front gardens, graffiti on garage doors. Windows shone yellow in the twilight gloom.

  This was a stab in the dark, Gur knew. Would Eldar really lead them to the safe house? Would he deliberately stay away—as he had the past two days—in case he was being followed? The driver had shown no signs he knew he had a tail, used none of the evasion tricks the Institute drilled into Gur’s head. Was this complacency, or was Eldar baiting Gur’s team?

  Only one way to find out.

  Eldar slowed to let the traffic signal turn green. Gur faded back, allowing another car to slip between them from a driveway. “New York and Crown, northbound.”

  The unmarked police car slowed dramatically once through the intersection, then swung right into a narrow alley between two 1920s brick apartment blocks.

  Aha. Gur swooped into a no-parking spot just short of the alley, pulled his pocket binoculars from the center console and watched the Crown Victoria flare to a stop at the top of a rise a few dozen meters away. Two dark man-shapes lurched from the car, one on either side, and dissolved through the shadow of a gate. Gur touched his earpiece. “Carroll Street, cross New York, south side, eight frontages east of the intersection.”

  “I’ll get it,” Kelila said. Her blue Toyota hissed past, then turned right at the next corner.

  Sasha said, “I’ll check from Crown.”

  Gur kept his binoculars locked on the car. It was still idling; steam rose from its exhaust, and its lights washed the dark alley with pale blue and stoplight red.

  “Twelve-eighty,” Kelila reported. “All the curtains are drawn in front.”

  Two men pushed out the now-invisible gate and piled into the car. Neither had Eugene Eldar’s blocky shape. A good sign; he was staying for a while. The brake lights bloomed, then the car trundled away.

  Gur said, “Alley’s clear.”

  If he hadn’t been watching for it, Gur wouldn’t have seen the black silhouette slide along the charcoal blocks defining the alley’s southern edge. A ghostly Sasha popped up on an invisible ledge, melted into the wall behind him. Nothing else moved in the alley, not even rats.

  “I see Schaffer and Eldar in the kitchen,” Sasha reported.

  “The uncle,” Gur asked, “or the nephew?”

  “Nephew.”

  Gur allowed himself a whispered “Yes!” and a pump of a fist. “Good work. Return to base, both of you.” He put aside his binoculars, thunked his gray Taurus into drive and lunged away from the curb. Three blocks later, he found a parking space.

  How long would Hezbollah flail away at trying to find Eldar and Schaffer? Those Arab bastards had wiped out half his team and disgraced the rest; if they gave up and left America, they’d get away with it. Gur had been able to come up with only one solution—not an especially nice one, but to hell with that. Eldar and Schaffer had proved they could take care of themselves.

  Orgad answered on the third ring. “Yes, Raffi.”

  “Hello to you, too. The covers are staying at 1280 Carroll in Brooklyn. We have visual confirmation.”

  “Very good. And Hezbollah?”

  “I doubt they know about it yet.” He hesitated, but only for a moment, one last quiver of conscience. “Chaim, pass that address to the Hezbollah desk. Have them feed it to their moles. We need Alayan’s team to know where the covers are so they’ll surface, otherwise we’re done here.”

  Orgad breathed into the phone several times. “All right, I’ll tell them. Make this count, Raffi. It’s your last chance.”

  SIXTY: Cherry Hill, 11 December

  Five days since the shootout in the Philadelphia train station. Excruciating, endless days.

  Alayan’s haggard reflection in the dark window reminded him he was chewing himself up. Lately he’d done well to get three full hours of sleep a night. Fatigue shot a low fog through his brain; nerves put a slight tremor in his hands he’d worked hard to hide from the men. His stomach twisted and squeezed nearly nonstop now.

  Rafiq had called a whole slate of police agencies while posing as a reporter for the Washington Post, trying to get one of them to admit to holding the two Jews. None did. They’d kept watch on Schaffer’s flat in case she came home, but she never did. Two days ago, Rafiq went to Brooklyn to check Eldar’s flat. A van from a crime-scene cleanup company was outside, but Eldar was nowhere to be seen.

  He had to be missing something. There had to be something they could do, some way to salvage the situation. Alayan wished desperately for Kassim’s advice, his patient, methodical mind. Why did he, of all the men, have to die?

  Eleven days left.

  The team’s pictures filled the TV news and the newspapers. Disturbingly accurate police sketches and security-camera frame captures made Sohrab, Gabir and Ziyad as familiar as American movie stars. All three were prisoners in their rooms twenty-three hours a day, leaving only when the hotel maids drew near with their carts. Gabir and Ziyad were gradually recovering from their wounds, but like Sohrab were going mad from the inactivity.

  Alayan’s computer rang.

  The sound jarred him out of his increasingly dark thoughts. He rushed to the fake-wood table that served as a desk, jammed the headset on his head, shoved the jacks into the side of his laptop, and clicked “answer”.

  “Majid,” the voice said.

  Alayan had been waiting for this call he’d hoped wouldn’t come. His handler had told him who Majid was and what he’d do on the 23rd of December if Alayan failed to kill the Jews. Alayan swallowed. “Jabbar.”

  “I need two things. First, a safe place to put a vehicle. Second, a safe house for four men.”

  No pleasantries, no preamble. Straight to business, and Alayan was clearly just a clerk in this man’s world. “How big a vehicle?”

  “Larger than a saloon, smaller than a lorry.”

  Helpful. “When?”

  “Tomorrow.”

  And so much time to work, too. “That’s when you’re arriving?”

  “I didn’t say that. I want it done then. I’ll call tomorrow night. Any questions?”

  The calling number was blocked. No way to get back to Majid. “No. I—” The line was already dead.

  Alayan stared at the Skype screen, reminded himself it wasn’t personal, it was just tradecraft, security. Still, the man was an ass. But Alayan couldn’t afford to trip him up yet. He remembered his handler’s words: “If you don’t liquidate the remaining targets, the only way you can redeem yourself is to ensure Majid’s mission succeeds.”

  Succeed or don’t come home. Alayan didn’t doubt this mysterious Majid would be happy to kill him and his entire team if given a reason.

  Alayan reached for the room phone, punched a number. “Rafiq. I need you to do something for me tomorrow…”

  SIXTY-ONE: Crown Heights, Brooklyn, 13 December

  Jake pulled the back door closed behind him, flipped up his coat collar, and let his eyes adjust to the dying twilight. Scattered snowflake shards burned his face. Snow and low clouds dampened the constant rumble from the city beyond the fence.

  Miriam stood in the middle of the yard, face tilted up. Jake had become pretty good at reading her; she’d get a distant look in her eyes and a flatness in her features that told him she was someplace else and wanted to stay there undisturbed. Now her back was to him. Risk it?

  The slushy snow squeaked under his feet. He stepped slowly and heavily so Miriam could h
ear him coming. He didn’t want to know what happened when someone crept up on her.

  Snow burrowed into her hair and perched on the lashes of her closed eyes. “Got room here for someone else?” he asked.

  Miriam peeked at him. “Yes,” she said, then closed her eyes again.

  He stood beside her for a long few moments, judging her mood. Then he said, “You okay? You’ve been awfully quiet this afternoon.”

  She took a deep breath. “I don’t know.” She blinked her eyes open and gazed into the falling snow. “I got fired today.”

  “Aw, shit. Those bastards. Why?”

  “Unauthorized absence. I offered to take vacation, but I guess that wasn’t the point.”

  “Are you going to fight it?”

  Miriam shrugged. “How? I’m not stupid enough to sue a law firm. I could complain to the state, but on what grounds? I never got Dickinson’s permission to have people try to kill me.”

  “Want the PD to help? Gene might be able to get the Commissioner to call your boss.”

  “No, thank you. Really.” She pressed her lips into what could have been a grim smile if the corners had turned up. “You sound more upset about this than I am.”

  “It’s a shitty way to treat you. Incredibly unfair.”

  “Yes it is, not that that means anything anymore.” She stood a little straighter. “I think maybe they did me a favor. I’ve hated the past year there, ever since my last boss retired and they gave me to that prick Dickinson. Maybe this is the push I need to find something new.”

  “On top of everything else?”

  “I have a choice?” For the first time, she turned her head to look at him full-on. “What about you? You and Gene looked pretty tense just now.”

  “You didn’t hear what he said?”

  “I don’t listen to your private conversations.”

  “Gotta be hard to tune out when Gene’s talking.” Worrying about Miriam’s problems had briefly taken his mind off his own. Now they were back. “The medical examiner’s released Rinnah. I asked Gene whether I could go to her funeral if we had one, and he said no.”