Doha 12

by Lance Charnes

  The Arab raised his drooping head at the sound of the door. His eyes widened a fraction, then set in a scorching glare.

  “Remember me?” Miriam bared her teeth. “I remember you, bala’a il a’air.”

  Miriam’s hate bucked and strained against its leash. Hezbollah. Her father endured three days of agony before he’d died from the burns and wounds one of their rockets left behind. She’d vowed she’d pay them back for that. And now they had Eve.

  Her fingers fondled the butt of the pistol in her coat pocket. It would take only an instant to empty the magazine into this insect, cut off his balls, then hang him by his heels from a street light. Just an instant. Almost not long enough to savor it.

  Jake stepped between her and the Arab. He’d stripped off his body armor and sportshirt and stood facing her in a white V-necked undershirt and jeans. Thick black rubber gloves reached halfway to his elbows. “Find anything in the car?” he asked.

  She took a deep breath, swallowed her fury. This was all about Eve right now, not vengeance. Miriam stepped into the room and held up a black cell phone. “Just this.”

  “Great. We’ll look at it later.” He turned, yanked the duct tape from the Arab’s mouth. “You understand English, right? What’s your name?”

  The Arab smirked at Jake, then turned his face away.

  Miriam wanted to tear that smirk off his lips. Instead, she stalked toward the head of her bed, flung off her coat and ripped at the Velcro on her body armor. Let Jake work, she told herself. You’ll get your chance. She plopped on the bed, one knee on the blanket, one foot on the floor, clamped her mouth tight, folded her arms and watched.

  Jake hammered at the Arab, commanding, joshing, prodding, repeating variations of the same question over and over until Miriam wanted to scream. He stayed close to the man, less than a foot, always touching him, playing with the very compressed personal space typical of the Arabs. The man muttered Arabic curses and defied Jake with his eyes. Finally he spat, “Ziyad.”

  Miriam glanced at her watch. Twelve minutes to get the Arab’s name. At this rate, she’d break long before the Arab would. She recognized what Jake was doing—following the old field interrogation manual page-by-page, insinuating himself, establishing a relationship—but that didn’t make it any easier to sit through. She’d never been patient with prisoners.

  “Okay, Ziyad, another easy one. Where are you from?”

  Miriam kept her mouth shut for an interminable hour while Jake got very little useful from Ziyad. Jake’s voice grew rougher, his face flushed, the veins popped on his forearms and hands from the strain. He started manhandling the Arab, yanking the man’s hair to make him look up, twisting his already-broken nose, and slowly information dribbled out. Ziyad al-Amin was from the Bourj el-Barajneh refugee camp in southern Beirut. He boasted he was with Hezbollah. His team had been in the U.S. for a month. (A month! What happened to all that homeland security money?) One of the other vermin had followed Jake and Miriam from the safe house to this hotel.

  And that was it.

  She checked her watch for the nth time. Almost one-thirty; Ziyad’s relief would come at two. What would happen if he wasn’t at his post? She needed to warn Jake, but didn’t want the Arab to know what was going on. What other languages did that cockroach understand? “I’m going to shoot him, okay?” she said in Hebrew, keeping her voice as calm as she could, as if asking whether Jake wanted a Coke. No reaction from a grimacing Ziyad.

  Jake, however, released the Arab’s ear and stared at her. “What the fuck?” At least he answered in Hebrew.

  “Their watch change is in half an hour. We need to know where Eve is. We won’t have a lot of time once they know he’s gone.”

  “Yeah.” Jake pulled his wallet from his back pocket, flipped it open, shoved it under Ziyad’s nose. “See that picture?” he growled in English. “The little girl? My daughter?”

  Miriam knew the photo; he’d showed it to her at the safe house. Jake and Rinnah in summer clothes seated on a bench in a green, sunny place, a slightly-younger Eve on Jake’s lap, smiles all around. Just thinking about it flared her anger.

  “Got kids?” Jake snarled. “A little girl, maybe? How’d you feel if someone took her?”

  Ziyad twisted away, but Jake grabbed the man’s nose between his knuckles and forced his head to center. The Arab’s face crumpled with pain. Jake thrust the picture into that face.

  “Where is she, Ziyad? Where did you take her?”

  Ziyad broke away, grinned through the blood from his nose. “We feed her to dogs!”

  Jake seized Ziyad’s throat. His face twisted and reddened; his knuckles popped white. “Is she alive? Where is she? Where’s my daughter?”

  Miriam snapped in Hebrew, “He can’t talk when you’re strangling him.”

  Jake eased back a fraction. Ziyad coughed out, “You see her! Soon! In hell!”

  Miriam didn’t see the slap coming. Jake put his weight behind it, a roundhouse with his right hand and a big follow-through, gunshot loud. Ziyad’s head snapped to his right; blood sprayed the dingy wallpaper. He sagged in the chair working his jaw, then pivoted his face fast and spit blood on Jake’s chest. Jake backhanded him so hard Ziyad and the chair crashed sideways to the worn carpet.

  “We kill her!” Ziyad choked out. Jake slammed his foot into Ziyad’s chest; Miriam heard a rib crack. The Arab coughed, “We kill you!” Jake kicked him again, harder, then again and again, crimson-faced and absolutely silent. Ziyad half-screamed, half-laughed.

  Miriam sprang off the bed. “Jake! Stop!”

  Ziyad, gargling blood: “We kill all you! All!”

  Suddenly Jake had the Glock in his trembling hand, aimed at Ziyad’s head.

  “No!” Miriam lunged toward him and thrust her hand in front of the pistol’s muzzle, just as he had done to her two hours before. “Stop it!” she said in Hebrew. “We won’t find Eve if you kill him!”

  Jake sucked fast, deep breaths, as if preparing to dive underwater for a long time. He stared at Ziyad for an eternity before he shifted his focus to Miriam. White ringed his irises.

  Miriam forced a deep breath down her throat, trying to tamp down her alarm at seeing Jake this way. “If we wanted him dead, I would’ve shot him two hours ago.” She swallowed, ratcheted down the heat in her voice. The Arab might not understand her words, but he’d be able to read her tone. “We still don’t know where they took Eve or how many of them there are. We won’t find out anything if he’s dead.”

  Jake’s panting slowed, but his eyes were still blown. After a moment he spun, let out a strangled groan, and whacked his forehead against the wall. He stood with his back to her, trembling, head still bent, gun hand hanging at his side.

  “We’re running out of time, Jake, and you’re out of control. He’ll use that against you. I saw that in Magav. He wants you to kill him so he can be a martyr.” She glanced down at the hacking, choking Arab. “Let me try. I’ve done this before, you haven’t.”

  He turned and exchanged silent stares with her. She could tell Jake understood what she was offering. After a moment he nodded.

  She stole another peek at Ziyad, still strapped to his chair, groaning. It’d been years since she’d done this; could she now? The hate was still there. Was that enough? “Strip him and put him in the shower,” she said in English.

  “The shower?”

  “It’s easier to clean up.”

  Ziyad’s bloody face whipped from Jake to Miriam and back. When he peered at Miriam again, she saw fear creep through his defiance. She gave him the nastiest smile she could dredge up. In her dreams, she’d felt triumph at this moment. Right here, right now, she was sick to her stomach.

  Jake shoved his pistol into the back waistband of his jeans, crossed to the chair and dragged it upright using Ziyad’s hair for a handle. He leaned his mouth next to the Arab’s ear. “You should’ve talked to me when you had the chance, Ziyad.”

  Jake left Ziyad strapped naked to the chair in
the stall facing the shower head. Ziyad wasn’t so cocky anymore; resignation shadowed the man’s face.

  The scarred brass floor lamp lay dissected on Miriam’s bed, the shade tossed on a pillow, the cord coiled in her hands. She’d produced a small multitool from her purse. What else was in there? “What’s that for?” he asked. “We’ve got lots of wire ties.”

  “You don’t want to know.” She stood, squared her shoulders, re-tied her hair behind her head. Her eyes were brown diamonds, bright and impenetrable. She stripped off her watch and earrings and tossed them on the ratty gold bedspread. “Lend me one of your undershirts.”

  “Why?”

  “Because blood doesn’t come out of silk.”

  Their Chinese take-out dinner lurched into the back of Jake’s throat. He couldn’t tell if he was crashing off his adrenaline high or reacting to the picture Miriam’s words painted. He dug a clean undershirt out of his duffel and tossed it to her.

  Miriam turned her back to him, her elbows wavering as she unbuttoned her gray long-sleeved blouse. Jake winced when she dropped her shirt on the bed; a malignant purple bruise the size of a bread plate sprawled across her spine just above her black bra strap, a near-match for the one on his breastbone. He knew how much his hurt.

  She carefully slipped his t-shirt over her head, pulled it smooth and stood still for a moment, the hem in her fists. Her ribcage swelled and compressed with each slow, deep breath. When she opened her hands, they trembled slightly. Jake didn’t dare say a word.

  Miriam turned to face him, scooped up her blouse, the multitool and the lamp cord. “You should move his car.” Her voice stretched tight enough to deflect bullets. “Those terrorist bastards should think he just disappeared.”

  “Yeah.” He handed her the gloves, then reached for his coat. They couldn’t meet each other’s eyes. She was going in there to finish what he couldn’t. Thank God she’d jumped in. If she hadn’t, he’d have kicked that little shit to death—and maybe lost Eve forever.

  “Jake?” He looked up. There was a lot going on in her face, none of it good. “Don’t come into the bathroom unless I call you.”

  He heard the unstated you don’t need to see this. “Okay.”

  Miriam stood rigid before the bathroom door for several seconds, her mouth working itself into knots. Jake watched her until the door banged shut behind her.

  Seventy-five minutes later, Miriam sleepwalked into the room.

  Jake had tried to ignore the sounds coming from the bathroom: Miriam’s low-pitched growls in English and Arabic, yelps and groans from Ziyad, and especially the ominous silences. Occasionally the lamp on the nightstand and the overhead light in the entry would dim for a second or two, accompanied by a strangled, muffled animal noise behind the closed door.

  He muted the TV and waited for Miriam to speak.

  She wore her gray blouse again and was far cleaner than he’d expected. She worried at her hands with a flimsy hotel towel; her eyes focused on a place somewhere on the other side of the ocean. “Eve is still alive. A man named Rafiq is taking care of her. There’s five of them. They’re in the Sleep Inn on 49th Street in Brooklyn. Do you know where that is?” He nodded. “The leader’s name is Alayan. They killed all those people on the list. The one called Gabir shot Rinnah. They’re coming here at four. They’ll use Eve to draw us out.”

  Miriam’s voice was drained of all emotion, all energy, everything except her accent. Her skin crawled across her cheekbones and forehead. Jake tried to read her eyes, but the shades were drawn tight. He reluctantly glanced away long enough to check his watch. “Half an hour, if he’s telling the truth.” He watched her stare though the wall for a moment. “Is he still alive?”

  She sagged onto the foot of her bed, fixed her gaze to the floor. Her ragged breathing rasped across the room. Finally, she gave her head one quick, sharp nod. “He probably wishes he wasn’t.”

  Miriam’s shoulders shivered. He hadn’t expected this reaction; he’d figured she’d be amped, like she’d been at the train station. He slid off his bed, carefully sat beside her, and wrapped his fingers around her forearm. Close up, he noticed reddish-brown stains under her fingernails, at her hairline, and in the crinkles around her eyes. “You okay?”

  The tremor in her hands became a rapid shake. “I’ve dreamed about getting one of these evil fucks in my hands,” she whispered. “Ever since I was ten years old. Every time someone I knew was hurt…every time they were killed…because they were in the wrong place…I wanted it more.” Her chin trembled for just a moment, then she squared it so hard the cords in her neck stretched tight. “When I met Bill, it was…it was like starting new, I started to…let it go. Then these shits blew him apart in Kandahar.” Her voice slid into an animal growl. “And I wanted their blood. I wanted to tear them apart like they’d torn him apart. I wanted to make them suffer like they’d made my father suffer. I wanted it so much. It gave me a reason to go on.” Miriam’s entire body started to shake as if she was freezing, even though heat sheeted off her. “And tonight…tonight…”

  Jake slid his fingers down her arm, grabbed her vibrating hand. She clamped her other hand over his so hard it hurt. “It’s done,” he whispered. “It’s done.”

  She finally showed him her eyes. The brown diamonds from an hour ago had turned to shattered glass puddles. A drop crept out of the corner of her left eye, hung on her lashes, then slid down through the residue to become a tear of blood. Jake smeared it away with his thumb.

  Miriam recoiled when she glimpsed the red stain on his thumb. The pain and horror in her face erupted out her pores. “I wanted it so much,” she pleaded in Hebrew. “I wanted it so much, Jake. And now…now I just feel…” She tried one last time to get control, to suck down the sobs pulsing visibly in her throat, but her will broke with the grinding sound of the gears of her soul stripping under the strain.

  Miriam began to weep.

  Jake pressed her tight against him, her back arching in great spasms against his arms, her tears burning his neck. She clung to him as if he was the only thing keeping her demons from dragging her away. Seeing her like this was almost physically painful. She’d been so strong, so confident. He’d relied on that. He just held her and rocked her and tried to find something to say to comfort her, to give her back some of the strength he’d borrowed over the past couple weeks.

  She finally settled into ragged sucked-in breaths, tiny hurt sounds deep in her throat and occasional shudders. Jake let her hang on, even though he was aware of the minutes ticking past. He knew from experience with Rinnah and Eve that rushing her would only make things worse. Just like them, she’d let go when she didn’t need him anymore.

  Eventually Miriam sat straight, turned away from him, snuffled, scrubbed her face with the towel. “I’m sorry,” she said to the entry hall. She dropped her hands to her lap, twisted the towel in her fingers. “I hate sniveling like that.”

  Jake gently took her nearest hand and traced a circle on the back of it with the pad of his middle finger. “If all this didn’t freak you out, I’d worry.” She snorted, which turned into another snuffle. “You okay?”

  Miriam glanced at him with bright red eyes. “Enough.” She sat watching him for a few moments, sniffed occasionally, rubbed at her eyes or nose with the hand towel. Then she leaned forward, brushed his cheek with her lips, straightened again. “Thank you,” she whispered.

  Jake nodded. He tried to ignore the guilty burn her kiss left behind. “It’s almost four. That phone rang three more times while you were…decompressing. They’re looking for him.”

  With a parting squeeze of his hand, Miriam twisted and scooped her watch from the blanket. “They could be here already. They could be outside.”

  “I don’t think so. I’ll bet they’re laying low, trying to figure out if he’s been arrested. We may have some time.”

  “To do what?”

  He stood, crossed to the nightstand, hefted Ziyad’s phone. He thumbed on the screen; twelve mis
sed calls. Jake held up the phone for Miriam to see. “We’ve got a direct pipe to them. We know who they are now. How many and where.”

  “So we go to their hotel?”

  Jake shook his head. “Too public, and they’d be playing defense. We set up a trade on our home turf—their guy for Eve.” He watched Miriam consider this, then nod. “I’m tired of reacting. It’s time to take control.”

  SEVENTY-THREE: Brooklyn, 22 December

  Rafiq watched from the black high-backed hotel desk chair as the little girl twitched and rocked under the folded-over bedspread on the closer of the two double beds. Her broken whimpers were the only sounds in the room other than the whooshing of the wall-mounted heater. Every baby-bird noise, every jerk of her feet stabbed him deep in his soul.

  When he was eleven, his younger sister Aishah had contracted blood poisoning. He’d helped with the vigil, watching her struggle through her fever and chills each night. She’d made the same sounds Eve did, twitched the same way. Aishah survived. Would Eve?

  Rafiq stretched, rubbed his gritty eyes. Two hours of sleep last night? Maybe three? None yet tonight. He’d spent most of the previous evening trying to calm the little girl before she eventually sobbed herself into a restless sleep. Did it help or hurt that she’d seen him as the Con Ed man just before Gabir killed her mother? At least he’d been able to tell her that her father was alive, not that it helped much.

  Kidnapping a child. Had Alayan lost the last of his mind? He’d disintegrated over the past couple of weeks, both mentally and physically. It was a shock to see him now—bleary eyes, ragged hair, a hollowness in his face that spoke of missed meals and foregone sleep, a tremor in his hands he tried but failed to hide. The other men whispered about it, too. They’d never seen their leader like this.

  Alayan had been irritable and snappish since Eldar killed Kassim. The closer the deadline came, the more prone he was to biting off the head of anyone who questioned anything. Desperate men don’t think clearly, and Alayan was clearly desperate. That could mean nothing good for the rest of them.