The Blue Widows - [Kamal & Barnea 06]

by By Jon Land

  Berger sighed. “Both.”

  “This is a bad time for riddles, Mr. Berger. The same man who killed Zanah Fahury also killed a terrorist named Akram Khalil. That links Layla Aziz Rahani to a plot that’s going to take millions and millions of lives. I’m not sure exactly how yet, but you’re going to help me figure it out.”

  “Nothing I know can help you there.”

  “You know what really happened all those years ago. That’s where it started.”

  Berger shrugged. “Very well, Danielle, very well...”

  * * * *

  Chapter 80

  A

  fter the stoning ceased, Yakov Barnea watched Abdullah Aziz Rahani walk to a nearby car, still clutching his daughter Layla’s hand. He refocused his binoculars on the shape buried up to her neck in the ground. Barnea saw the black cloth covering her face was still moving faintly, evidence that she was still breathing, though shallowly. Rahani had left only two men behind, their task clearly to wait for her to die and then bury the body in disgrace in an unmarked grave.

  “Get ready,” Barnea said to Hyram Berger.

  Berger checked his pistol, making sure no sand had jammed in its slide.

  “You won’t be needing that.“

  “I thought we—“

  “Kill those men and Rahani will know his wife was saved. Leave them alive and they know telling the truth will cost them their lives in much worse fashion.”

  The two Israelis approached out of the sun, dressed in the robes of Arab royalty. The glare and their appearance would make the two men left to dispose of Hanna Frank hesitate, provide just enough time for Berger and Barnea to draw near.

  As it turned out, the Saudis were unarmed and unable to muster much resistance to the fierce attack launched at them. Berger bound their unconscious frames, while Yakov Barnea moved to Hanna Frank, knelt on the gravelly sand, and removed the black shroud fastened around her head.

  Berger was too far away to see her face clearly, but he saw enough to turn his insides to mush. He nearly gagged, had to look away from the sight of a face broken and bleeding, blistered with lumps and swollen to twice its normal size.

  But Yakov Barnea didn’t look away. Instead he smoothed out the patches of her matted hair, whispered words of comfort, and began to dig Hanna Frank out of the ground with his hands.

  Berger located two of the shovels Rahani had used to bury her under a tree and brought them over. He avoided looking at the woman the whole time he and Barnea dug her out.

  “Yakov,” he said, but it took a few moments before Barnea looked at him. “We should be merciful.”

  “She’s alive, Hyram.”

  Barnea resumed his digging at a fever pitch. He barely stopped to breathe. Before long they had freed enough dirt to pull Hanna Frank from the living tomb in which she had been buried. She was unconscious now, and they eased her out tenderly, afraid some of her limbs might have been crushed or broken from the pressure.

  Their truck, stocked with fresh produce as a cover, was parked a mile away and Yakov Barnea carried her as easily as if she were a child. Hyram Berger had left the ropes of the two Saudis loose enough so they’d be able to untie them with a minimum of effort. To save their own skin, they would return to Abdullah Aziz Rahani and report their job finished, confident he would never have an opportunity to learn the truth.

  Riyadh was the nearest city, but Barnea’s only contact was a much farther drive away in Abha. Berger drove while his general sat in the back of the truck with Hanna Frank, the sole success among all the Blue Widows, hidden amid the produce in case they were stopped on the road. He had called in all of the favors owed to him, and many of those owed to others, to get this far. But after Abha they were on their own.

  A doctor was waiting for them in his home when they reached Abha well after sunset. Berger saw him turn away at first sight of Hanna Frank’s ruined face. He forced himself to examine her, professing there was nothing he could do. Yakov Barnea had taken out a pistol and laid it on a nearby table, telling the doctor he must try.

  They had no access to an X-ray machine, but the doctor was able to quickly discern that both Hanna’s jaws and cheeks were broken as well as one of her eye sockets. He suspected a number of skull fractures as well, completing his examination with the grim pronouncement that she would be dead by morning even if they could get her to a hospital. The doctor left the room and came back with a large vial of morphine, asked Yakov Barnea how much to give her.

  “Enough to relieve her pain,” the general ordered.

  “But—”

  “She’s going to live, Doctor,” Barnea said, still tenderly holding Hanna s head in his hands. “She’s going to live. “

  * * * *

  Chapter 81

  A

  nd she did,” Danielle said to Berger thirty years later, “didn’t she.”

  Berger nodded slightly.

  “The woman survived and my father got her back to Israel, where she lived her life out in hiding as Zanah Fahury. The diamonds Abdullah Aziz Rahani made her swallow before she was stoned gave her all the money she needed to support herself.”

  To Danielle it all made sense, everything coming together.

  “Then her older daughter, Layla, uncovered the truth,” she continued, “and sent an assassin named Hassan to finish the job her father had started. Hassan made sure Zanah Fahury’s face was bashed in to prevent the medical examiner from uncovering evidence of her past wounds. That’s it, isn’t it?”

  But much to Danielle’s surprise Hyram Berger shook his head. “No.”

  “No?”

  “Are you saying that Hanna Frank died, after all?”

  “You didn’t let me finish my story, Danielle: Hanna Frank survived. But she never left Saudi Arabia.”

  “What do you mean?” Danielle demanded, the walls seeming to close in around her.

  “Just what I said. Anna Pagent, Hanna Frank, that is, survived her wounds, but refused to return to Israel.”

  “Refused?”

  “That’s what your father told me.”

  “Then you can’t be sure!”

  Berger nodded. “I’m sure. I could hear his voice cracking when he told me, see the tears in his eyes. Your father was never much of an actor, Danielle.”

  “He let her stay. . . .”

  “I gather she didn’t give him any choice.”

  “What happened to her?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You must!”

  “I don’t, and that is the truth. The trip he and I made to Saudi Arabia wasn’t sanctioned. Your father was reprimanded for his actions, and I was banished, to Washington. We never saw each other again once I was assigned here; that’s the truth too.”

  “Then Hanna Frank could still be alive.”

  Berger shrugged. “It’s possible, I suppose, but...”

  “But what?”

  Berger’s expression softened, suddenly compassionate. “For all intents and purposes, she died when your father did. You should leave it at that, Danielle.”

  “You make it sound like a warning.”

  “Because that’s what I meant it to be.”

  “Why?”

  Berger turned and walked away from her toward the bar. “We’re finished here.”

  “No, we’re not. Layla Aziz Rahani killed someone she thought was her mother in Jerusalem.” She followed Berger across the room as he poured himself another scotch. “There’s something else going on here. There must be.”

  Berger finished the drink in one gulp. “You loved your father, Danielle.”

  “What? Of course I did.”

  “You trusted him.”

  “Yes. Yes.”

  Berger filled the glass higher this time. “This was something he never, never wanted you to know. That’s why he didn’t tell you himself.”

  “Tell me what?” Danielle grabbed Berger’s hand before he could raise the glass again.

  Berger let go of the glass. “Take t
his. You’re going to need it.”

  “What’s this about?”

  “Kavi, Layla Aziz Rahani’s younger sister.”

  “You told me she was shot and killed in London.”

  “That’s what you assumed from my story, what I led you to believe, but it’s not the truth.” Berger’s eyes bore into Danielle’s. “Kavi wasn’t even wounded. Your father brought her back to Israel and paid Hanna Frank back the best way he possibly could: by raising her as his own daughter. As you, Danielle.”

  * * * *

  Chapter 82

  D

  anielle felt as if the air had been sucked out of her. She stood there, having to remind herself to breathe. She looked to Ben for support, reassurance, but he could only gaze back at her, shaking his head slowly, his eyes glazed with shock.

  Hyram Berger moved to a desk in the corner of his living room. From the top drawer he removed a single photograph, walked back toward Danielle, and placed it on the counter atop a moist ring made by his glass.

  “See for yourself,” he said.

  Danielle took the picture of Layla Aziz Rahani in a trembling hand and studied it beneath the room’s dim recessed lighting. She saw immediately how Colonel al-Asi’s contact in the refugee camp, Hakim, had confused her with Layla; the resemblance was that striking. Danielle returned the picture to the counter and thought of the snapshot al-Asi had found hidden in Zanah Fahury’s chest of drawers.

  Two young girls. Two sisters. Herself and Layla Aziz Rahani, a woman she was now certain was behind the plan to destroy the United States.

  “Yakov Barnea was still your father,” Hyram Berger said, trying to sound comforting. “I knew him better than any man alive. Believe me when I say that.”

  Danielle stared at him blankly.

  “He was already married to your mother when he first met Hanna in 1967. You know how your father was; he wanted to help, to save, everyone.”

  “Stop! I’ve heard enough.”

  “No, the story’s not done yet. You see, it was different with the woman who became Anna Pagent. Her husband had died under Yakov Barnea’s command, which gave him an extra sense of responsibility.”

  “My father fell in love with her,” Danielle said, still resisting Berger’s tale. “That’s what you’re saying, isn’t it?”

  Berger nodded. “He told me as much when we reviewed the recruits for the mission.”

  “The botched raid wasn’t the first time he met Hanna in London, was it?” Danielle asked, starting to realize.

  “No. That was their rendezvous point once or twice a year. I remember when he came from a trip there around the time Layla was two. He broke down and told me what had happened. How sad Hanna had become, how desperately she wanted to come back to Israel.”

  “One thing led to another,” Danielle nodded, unsure how to feel, her emotions scrambled. It hurt to picture her father with another woman, actually hurt.

  “It wasn’t like that. I don’t think your father realized that Hanna loved him as much as he loved her. They shared that one night and one night only.” Berger sighed deeply. “A month later she included in her report that she was pregnant with her second child. His child. You, Danielle.”

  Danielle shuddered. “And he still left her in place?”

  “On the contrary, he informed Hanna she was being recalled immediately. But she refused, saying she would never be able to forgive herself if she returned under those circumstances. Her job wasn’t finished. So she stayed, had her second child, and established her cover even more firmly.”

  Danielle plopped into the nearest chair and put her hand to her forehead. “I have no memory of those years. Nothing.”

  “Your father was always concerned that you would. He had prepared himself for the day you’d come to him with questions he prayed he wouldn’t have to answer. But you never did.”

  “And my mother?”

  “He told her everything. She cried a lot, then insisted that they raise you even before your father suggested it. He had made a promise to Hanna Frank, after all. And he wasn’t a man to renege on his obligations, any more than your mother was.”

  “I miss both of them so much,” Danielle said, feeling warm tears start to pour down her cheeks.

  “He never wanted you to know. He was afraid you’d think differently of him. Less.”

  “I don’t. Not at all. How could I?”

  Berger’s eyebrows flickered. “Imagine for a moment if Hanna Frank had been recalled once she became pregnant with you. We would’ve received no advance warning about the surprise attack planned for Yom Kippur seventy-three. Israel, possibly, might not even exist today.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “That both your mothers were heroes, Danielle, each in her own way.”

  “They were victims too, both of them, of Operation Blue Widow.”

  “But one of the Blue Widows saved Israel, Danielle. There’s no escaping that.”

  Danielle desperately tried to remember the gunfight in the Hilton lobby, being hustled into the backseat of a waiting taxi while bullets thundered everywhere. She wondered if the seeds of what she had grown into herself had been sewn that bloody night.

  “Wait,” she said suddenly, her mind veering in a different direction. “What about the governess Habiba? You said she plunged into the backseat of the taxi with . . . Kavi in her arms.”

  Berger looked confused. “I don’t know. I forgot all about her.”

  “Say my father brought her back to Israel. Say she could never return to Saudi Arabia.”

  “Zanah Fahury,” Berger realized. “You think Zanah Fahury was this governess?”

  “It makes sense, doesn’t it?”

  “Then why did Layla Aziz Rahani have her killed? Why would she think this woman was her mother?”

  “Because of the diamonds the old woman was living off of, that could only have been supplied by the real Hanna Frank! Layla Aziz Rahani must have found out, learned about the diamonds somehow. Killed Fahury because of the obvious conclusion she would have drawn from that. You know what this means, don’t you?”

  “I’m sorry, no.”

  “Hanna Frank may still be alive!” Danielle insisted, thinking again of the picture of two little girls taped inside a chest of drawers. Hidden there by a loving governess instead of an equally loving mother. “Otherwise, Habiba would have stopped receiving the diamonds long ago.”

  “No,” Ben said suddenly, rising to his feet. “Why would this governess need to sell her diamonds so frequently?”

  Danielle shrugged, wondered where Ben was going.

  “Because,” he resumed, “you must have it backwards. Hanna Frank wasn’t sending Habiba diamonds; Habiba was selling them in part to send funds to Hanna Frank!”

  Danielle’s mouth dropped. She should have seen that before. This was the missing piece, proof Hanna Frank must still be alive. . . .

  “Even if your Palestinian friend is right,” Berger said disdainfully, “this woman is not your mother, Danielle. Your mother was the woman who raised you.”

  “You don’t need to tell me that.”

  Berger hesitated, started to raise the glass he’d refilled with scotch, then stopped. “You asked for a business visa for Saudi Arabia.”

  Danielle looked at Ben. “Two.”

  “Layla Aziz Rahani is beyond your reach, Commander. Whatever happened all those years ago—”

  “This isn’t about that, Mr. Berger.”

  “I was a soldier too. And when things become personal. . .”

  “That’s the problem,” Danielle told him. “They’ve been personal for Layla Aziz Rahani ever since she turned in her mother, my mother, thirty years ago. And now it’s personal for me too.”

  * * * *

  * * * *

  Chapter 83

  B

  en left Danielle to herself through the long flight aboard Saudi Arabian Airlines, wishing he could find the words to comfort her.