Sudden Deception

by Judith Price

  “We have very cheap labor here so we have a lot of people to do the work in a short period of time; they usually clean the streets at night.”

  The loud music filled the car and left no room for more chitchat.

  Suddenly, they made a sharp right, and popped over a speed bump into a giant parking lot. It took Jill several seconds to realize it was not actually a parking lot, but a back street with cars parked in disarray; too many cars for the amount of buildings. Cars were parked down the center of the lot, making forward progress virtually impossible. In some instances the cars were double-parked, making passing unattainable. Nevertheless, the small taxi snaked its way through the vehicles until they came to a bright yellow sign set back from the street. Jill thought it strange to see an English sign for Nestlé Tea in this part of the world, but there it was, its bright yellow glory. Below it was Arabic writing and Jill spied the words in English: Al Binood.

  In front of Al Binood lay several dozen sand-stained, tattered, square cushions about eight inches high. In front of the low seating area was a TV perched on a makeshift stand. The TV itself looked to be vintage 1980s and in poor condition, but a power cord ran from it to a socket in the wall. Dust coated everything. Dingy white plastic chairs on the cobblestone suggested that this must also be an outdoor meeting place. Zayed said something in Arabic or possibly Urdu, Jill wasn't certain, to the driver, and handed him some money, then reached his hand over to help Jill out of the car. It was easy to slide across the plastic fabric and Jill was thankful for his help when the bottom of the abaya touched the ground and got in the way of her feet.

  “So this is it?” He nodded, and with a show of annoyance, touched his finger to his lips signaling her not to speak. This pissed her off, but this was his turf, so she kept her mouth shut and fell in behind him. She wasn't used to being told what to do. They walked past the chairs and cushions, and through a rickety front door. Jill stopped abruptly and took in the scene before her. She stood in wonder at what she saw. The one-room area was in desperate need of repair. One of its four walls consisted of a bank of dirty windows that surely had not let the sun through in a least a decade. One particularly filthy pane had a long taped-up crack in it. An abundance of plastic tables and plastic chairs checkered the room. On the tables were ashtrays and a smattering of faded plastic yellow flowers. There was a door at the back of the room, which Jill thought might lead to a restroom but saw no sign. On the far wall next to the cashier's desk was a large picture of an obviously important Arabian man. A prince or president, she assumed, based on his decorated gold trimmed clothing.

  Zayed motioned her over to a corner table. Jill’s abaya swept the dirt, leaving a hint of a trail across the floor to where she sat down at a wobbly table. There were only two other patrons in the place and looked to be Arabs. A gaggle of slight waiters staff members, all male, stood around anxiously, waiting to serve them.

  One of them broke from the group, brought coffee in an Arabic-style decanter, poured the brown liquid into miniature cups. Looking down at the steaming coffee, Jill tried to work out how to drink it with a burqa. Not wanting to raise suspicion, she decided to let it sit there untouched. She looked around the room for anything that appeared irregular. Everything did.

  Meanwhile, Zayed engaged the waiter in conversation as the tiny man grinned widely and poured him another cup of coffee. Zayed pulled from the slit side pocket of his dishdasha, a photo of David, and showed it to the waiter. It took all Jill had to stop from grabbing the picture and questioning the man herself. Not knowing the language however, she forced herself to stay quiet and evaluate the discussion as best she could. Although she could not speak Arabic, or any other of the many languages commonly spoke in the Gulf region, she did understand body language; and judging by the server’s, he did not seem to know the man in the photo. Too relaxed, Jill thought. The server then called over another of his colleagues. Wanting to have a closer look at the picture, Jill reached over and gently pulled it from Zayed’s hairy hand. Her chest swelled as she looked at David, so close to her heart and now in her hand. He was sitting in the lobby of the hotel, Le Meridien, the same place in which she herself was staying. The picture was taken from afar, as if done under surveillance; David wasn't looking at the camera, but to Jill it felt like he was saying hello.

  As she handed it back to Zayed another waiter nervously approached their table, slight in build. Jill guessed he was from Bangladesh. She based this on her research profiling terrorists from Dhaka. She recalled that they were more frail-looking people; with smaller, rounder, and flatter faces, compared to their Indian neighbors.

  “You know this man?” Zayed asked in Arabic. The small man looked at Zayed then at the photo and back to Zayed. A bead of sweat rolled off his forehead. He looked around the room. Then without further warning, he bolted, towards the back of the café and fled through the unsigned door. It clapped shut behind him. Jill was surprised that her first reaction was one of pause, as normally her instinct would be to run after him. Then she heard Zayed’s chair fall over backwards. The flash of Zayed’s crisp dishdasha told her he was well ahead of her thought. In the next instant Jill dashed past the inquisitive staff and raced after Zayed.

  The sunlight was blinding after being in the dim café and Jill winced at the brightness—only to find Zayed holding the escapee up against a wall and shouting at him in Arabic. They were standing in a small gated courtyard. Jill had read that in Arab culture people were taught not to raise their voices, let alone hit another, but Zayed’s stance was forceful. He was shouting loudly, while he held the man with one hand and threatened him with the other. The trembling man began to speak to him in broken, Arabic when Zayed pressed his body into the wall harder. More shouting from Zayed.

  Finally, he loosened his grip, and the man slumped down the wall onto the ground. He was whimpering and looked like he might break into tears at any moment. Jill knew it was fear. Raw fear. She’d seen it before, she’d felt it before.

  Zayed stomped over to Jill and grabbed her arm. “We must go, now!” He whisked her out of the courtyard and down a back street, where he hailed the first taxi he saw. Zayed motioned her not to speak. “Shuay, shuay. Patience,” he hissed, opening and closing his upright fingers. Anger once again bubbled inside Jill at being ordered around, but the look on Zayed’s face told Jill to stay quiet on the trip back to the hotel.

  Back at Le Meridien Jill and Zayed jumped out of the taxi and, as they started towards the large hotel's glass doors, Jill noticed that Zayed was doing sector scans. This is something she would normally do if she felt threatened. Situational awareness was instilled in trained forces, all agencies, including police or military. Normally a sector scan consisted of assessing potential danger, knowing your exit routes, and understanding who and what was surrounding you. Zayed was doing a sector scan clock style; she knew it well. First, you look ahead: twelve o’clock. From twelve to three is section one. Sector two is from three to six. Sector three is from six to nine. The last is from nine o’clock back to twelve. Military, she thought at once. Telling.

  “What did he tell you, Zayed?” She opted not to tell him that she recognized his trained skills. Not just yet, anyway.

  “We’ll talk in your room, Jill.”

  Jill followed Zayed’s accelerated pace through the lobby into the elevator and up to her room. It seemed the most logical and safest place to go, but when they reached the door, apprehension stopped her. She had not been in a hotel room with another man since she met David. She fumbled with her key and paused again before entering the room. Once the door was closed, she began to remove the heavy black abaya. Zayed watched her, but his eyes dodged hers when she looked back at him.

  She pulled the snug headdress off and threw it onto the bed; she flicked her head, and released her hair. Then she pivoted to face Zayed. “What the hell was that?” Jill hissed.

  “Yani, calm down. David said you had a bit of a temper.”

  “Don't yani me, screw y
ou.” Jill pulled off her abaya with such force that it lifted her shirt up past her black bra. Zayed did not seem to care as he watched her adjust herself.

  “Listen, Jill, khalas, listen.” Jill simmered and listened, adjusting her shirt and fixing her hair. Zayed’s eyes did not leave her body and she recognized his silent attraction. “The server told me that he shouldn’t talk to anyone as it would endanger his life and disgrace his family. He said that David was at the café four days ago and met with two men.”

  “He saw David?”

  Zayed nodded. “These men apparently spoke English and were well-dressed Arabs. He recognized one of the men as a friend of his uncle. The server didn’t think much of the trio—until he overheard them discussing a man’s name that will catch the attention of anyone within hearing distance.” Zayed hesitated. “His name is Matta.”

  “Matta?”

  “Yes, Matta. And they were also looking at a map of Afghanistan.”

  “I guess one of the men caught the guy watching them. It seemed he recognized him too, and went over and took him aside. The man that knew his uncle threatened the server by suggesting to him that he has three small nieces and that he will take them from his uncle’s home if he repeated anything of what he had heard or seen.”

  Jill didn't know what to say. Questions flooded her mind. “Why Matta? Why David?” And does this relate in any way to the case I was working on? “Why were they looking at a map of Afghanistan? What was the name of the uncle?”

  Zayed shrugged. He didn’t know. “The server’s name is Punjabi, so my guess is his uncle’s name would be the same. I got the impression that David must have been planning a trip to Afghanistan. He may be on his way there now. I think David is somewhere along the Turkmenistan border, as the server spouted something about the top of the map. Turkmenistan is above Afghanistan on the map. I did some business in Afghanistan about five years ago. Kabul, mainly.”

  Jill looked puzzled. “What were you doing there?”

  “A family business trip,” he replied evasively. “Airline parts.”

  “Do you think David’s disappearance has something to do with Matta?”

  “I have no idea,” he responded, his accent growing thicker with concern.

  Thoughts entered her puzzled mind and then fled. David must have stumbled upon a great story, something worth risking everything for that Pulitzer. David was a risk-taker, there was not doubt about that it showed in his choice of assignments and stories.

  Jill picked up the hotel phone and started to dial. Zayed’s hand grabbed her hand and forcing her to drop the receiver. She angrily pulled her hand out of his.

  “Don’t touch me. Do that again and I’ll break your arm.” She knew she was bluffing because even with her HTH Hand-to-hand training she could gauge by his size that he would not be an easy mark. Besides she didn't know who she was dealing with and how his fighting skills may be. “I am contacting my office—they can help find David.”

  Zayed looked at her squarely.

  “My contact has access to Interpol,” she said firmly. “They can sometimes pinpoint things such as mobile phones if we know the region or other intel that might be available.” Their eyes were fixed on each other. Neither budged. Then his body language relaxed conceding to her determination to do things her way. He retreated towards the door.

  Just before he walked out, he turned back and said, “It’s in your best interest to have me help you, Jill. David asked me to watch over you. I made him that promise.” He closed the door behind him, leaving Jill to wonder who he really was.

  Chapter Seven

  “Screw you.” Jill flipped the bird in the direction of the closed door. She was more than a little miffed by Zayed’s smugness. She did not know this man nor did she feel like being bullied, but at this point she didn’t have time to waste thinking about Zayed.

  She glanced over at the time and realized that Karine would now be just on her way to work and she would need to wait another forty-five minutes to call her. Jill knew Karine was the most efficient one to call and that she had security clearance to speak to Interpol on her behalf. She looked around the room and began to see things she hadn’t noticed before. Gaudy burgundy wallpaper with twists of gold lined the space. Jill hurried across the room to the desk and turned on her computer, praying for high-speed. The speed from her earlier search was mediocre to say the least. This time she was pleasantly surprised when the speed test proved even higher than at her Catalina home.

  No e-mail from David or Karine. “Damn.” The rest of the e-mails were insignificant. Then she spotted a name she hadn’t wanted to see. Stan Brown, David’s father. When she clicked on the name she wondered just how he had got her e-mail address. It was not public knowledge and for the life of her, she could not remember giving it to him. Perhaps he had called her work and they had given it to him, she half-heartedly thought.

  Jill,

  Please get in touch with me regarding David.

  Stan

  “Whatever,” she said as she closed his e-mail.

  Jill surfed for any information on Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, and LSA. She Google-earthed the region in Afghanistan and got a feel for the terrain. It looked fairly mountainous. The time passed fast perusing different maps and photos, and then she grabbed the phone.

  Jill explained to Karine the encounter with the server and what he had said, and gave Karine her mobile number. “Pay-as-you-go is all they have here, so call the hotel when possible.”

  “I’ll call Issy—you remember my Interpol sleuth—and give you a buzz back,” Karine spouted.

  “Oh, and check out a man named Zayed Saleem; he says his family is in the airplane parts business. This Zayed is definitely trained, Karine. Check any military ops you can get. He’s Arab, just not sure from which country. Also any information on who frequents Al Binood or anything that might link him to there. Scan relatives of Al Qaeda. If Matta is involved, then I think David has stumbled onto his Pulitzer.” Jill did not notice that she had gently placed her hand on the small leather bag sitting on the right side of her laptop.

  “Gotcha.” Karine hung up.

  Jill leaned back and propped her feet up on the desk and pondered. Staring blankly at the TV screen beside the desk, she thought, What am I missing?

  The TV was blaring and Jill felt comforted as it drowned out her thoughts. Her thoughts of gloom. No new reports on CNN about the missing journalist as the tag-lines zoomed by. She was on the fence about whether to be happy or not about that fact. With missing people, the faster you got the story onto the news with the details, the more likely it would be to find them.

  David’s not officially missing. He’s on a story. She kept pushing that thought to try to convince herself.

  Jill recalled a document in one of her files that disclosed the Pakistan Secret Police had executed a CNN reporter for obtaining a connection between Matta, Dr. E, and a laboratory located in Pakistan. Trying to remember the reporter’s name, Jill jumped when the phone rang.

  It was Karine … with some welcome information. Karine told Jill that her investigation and conversations had revealed two clues regarding what David might have found of interest to make him go into a dangerous country such as Afghanistan.

  “LSA means Lost Soviet Arsenal,” Karine said excitedly. “There was a report about camps along the border of Turkmenistan and in particular a town called Kushka. Documentation shows that there is evidence of voice recordings to substantiate the possibility that enriched uranium existed in this area back in 2008.”

  At this point Jill felt like kicking her own ass to the door and back to Tucson.

  “What kind of profiler am I if I can’t even figure what LSA means?” In her own defense Jill told herself, We don’t use that term. We use loose nukes, suitcase nukes, or even broken arrows. “Shit!”

  “Well, we know it now, so don’t sweat the small stuff,” Karine chimed positively.

  Jill was still pissed at herself for missing the acr
onym. Karine told her that she would load the documents to the VPN for her to download. “I'll send you an e-mail when I'm done. It shouldn’t be more than a few minutes.” Jill looked over at the mini-bar, contemplating what she should do in the meantime.

  David had commented on the increase in her drinking when she was under pressure. But to Jill it was the one comfort that settled her when her body and mind couldn’t do so on their own. She couldn’t blame that one on McGregor; she’d always been that way. This was her vice. But today was different. This new information affected her life, her family, David. Jill often brought her cases home with her, and although she was not directly out in the field, profiling took her into the dark abyss of evil. Sometimes the darkness overwhelmed her heart, knowing what she knew. Being a terrorist these days does not cost much and finding black market weapons seemed easier than buying ice cream. Unlike some of the major TV news reporting in the US, even as far away as Australia, there were reports of suitcase nukes. They even had serial numbers in some of the articles. Reports of US forces uncovering anthrax camps, reports that Matta had these nukes as close as Mexico—her mind boggled when she didn’t see public warnings on any of the US news stations. Jill often wondered if the President had censored the news so the public wouldn’t understand the threat behind it all.

  What if the nukes were in Mexico? Three thousand illegal aliens crossed the border into the US daily. It’s only a matter of money and time before some of these illegals would be from Al Qaeda. Only a small two percent of those caught were non-Mexicans, or SIAs, Special Interest Aliens from Arab countries. Not long ago, Jill had been asked to assist the CIA in an interrogation of a woman who was a terrorist courier. She had traveled back and forth illegally across the border to and from an Al Qaeda cell located just outside of Los Angeles. It’s too easy, she thought, too easy.

  Jill needed to have a clear mind. She was not going to miss another stupid thing, as she reprimanded herself again about the LSAs. She looked down at her hand after it brushed the leather pouch, almost as if it were calling her. She untied the string and opened the pouch. Inside were eight tablets made of clay, each one branded with its own number. Jill’s mind began to numb … until she heard a familiar sound.