To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: Visit
Alisher, I have some very good news. After all of our conversations, I’ve decided that I should, in fact, consider coming out of “retirement.” My old company has agreed to fly me to several locations in Central Asia, including Tashkent, to explore the possibilities. I arrive in Uzbekistan on Thursday for two days and I’d obviously love to take you up on your offer to meet for a drink. I should have enough time to come to Samarkand if that makes things more convenient for you. Sorry for the short notice, but hopefully you can make it work. I really would love to see you again after all of this time.
J
Charlie froze. She’d gone to see Byko? In Uzbekistan? But the LAPD had checked with the FAA and located her flight to London—and there was no connecting flight to Tashkent. Maybe she’d stopped for a layover in London on the way? Maybe she’d bought separate tickets back and forth to Tashkent? But why? Was it for Charlie’s benefit? In case he started snooping, all he’d find was the round-trip to London? If she was going to bother with that, why didn’t she just tell Charlie she was going to London in the first place? Why create the alibi with her sister in New York?
For a moment, the fact that she’d been kidnapped receded and Charlie felt himself in a jealous rage. His wife had flown ten thousand miles from home to visit with an old lover? Who she’d been secretly corresponding with for almost a year?
He read Byko’s response to her.
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: Visit
My dear girl,
I cannot tell you how much it means to me that we will see each other again at long last. I will phone your mobile first thing on Thursday and we’ll make all the arrangements.
As ever yours,
Alisher
My dear girl. As ever yours. It was enough to make Charlie vomit. And clearly, Byko already had her cell number, which meant they must have been speaking on the phone as well as by email. Charlie took a deep breath, realizing that his jealousy would only cloud his judgment and decision making.
As he calmed, he realized that she’d clearly misled Byko as well. She was only gone for four days, yet she’d told Byko she was on a weeklong tour of the region. Charlie jumped online and immediately accessed his and Julie’s joint accounts for their American Express and Visa cards. He scrolled through the recent activity, but there was nothing there. No charges to British Airways, no charges to any airline for that matter. He’d already confirmed that she’d had no contact with World Vision. Who had paid for her ticket to Tashkent?
There were no answers, but then the reality of the situation was clear: she’d gone to see Byko and now she’d been absconded by Special Forces Bull, who was secreting her back to Tashkent. The only reasonable explanation was that she had mistakenly gotten caught up with something dangerous in Byko’s world. Or that someone in that world believed Julie knew something very important about Byko.
And then it occurred to Charlie: what if Bull wasn’t working for American intel? Was it possible that he was working for the Uzbek government? That kidnapping Julie was merely an insane extension of Karimov’s paranoid, repressive regime? Charlie remembered that Byko’s sister had been arrested and tortured last year. Was it possible that anyone close to Byko was now a target? That Karimov’s reach could extend all the way into the United States? That he would apprehend an American citizen on American soil?
At first, it seemed preposterous, but then Charlie considered who Julie was. Who he, Charlie Davis, was. To Karimov and his cronies, they were instigators. Outspoken critics of the regime. It was Charlie’s series of articles which had prompted the rally at Andijan. It was Julie who’d been handing out placards in Babur Square.
Charlie took out his phone to call someone at the State Department. But what if his theory was wrong? Or only half right? What if American intel was working with Karimov on this? After all, Uzbekistan was an important ally in the “war on terror” and Karimov provided the U.S. a military base in Karshi-Khanabad, which gave American troops an access point and supply line for the Afghan campaign.
There were too many things Charlie didn’t know and if there was one seminal lesson he’d learned as a journalist it was this: don’t ask the wrong people questions if you don’t have an idea what the story is.
Hungry to understand how all of this had developed between Julie and Byko, Charlie scrolled back to the beginning, scanning to Julie’s first email, dated June 22 of last year.
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Alisher, It’s so good to hear about many of the things that you’re doing over there. I’m especially encouraged with what you’re managing in Namangan. I know that you always treated your employees at the gold mine fairly, but to hear the expansiveness of your vision for the region is really commendable. Have to run out now and pick up the kids from school, but just wanted to say a quick hello. By the way, I’ve opened up a new email account, so please delete my old email address and use this one from here on in.
J
There was no way to tell when or how their correspondence had begun, but clearly their first few exchanges must have taken place on her gmail account—the one that Charlie knew about—and evidently, she’d decided that it was too risky to continue without Charlie catching wind of it. In spite of the blithely casual way that she’d mentioned her change of address—By the way, I’ve opened a new email account—it was a painfully thin disguise for her deception. And it would have been as obvious to Byko then as it was to Charlie now. It was an admission that they were carrying on something illicit, and it couldn’t help but being read by the other man as a form of encouragement.
Charlie’s blood began to boil but he hungrily devoured the next emails.
At first they were relatively businesslike—particularly on Julie’s end. Quickly they became more personal. Any pretense—if that’s what it had been—of this being purely a friendly business correspondence quickly evaporated. There were small observations on daily life, an occasional bared emotion, philosophical musings—a slow corkscrewing increase of intimacy and trust.
Byko shared his feelings of anguish about his sister’s death, his weariness with the constant wrangle to keep himself on the straight and narrow in the midst of Uzbek corruption, oblique references to “personal demons.” And all the while Julie was becoming more confessional. She spoke of missing the times in Uzbekistan when she felt she was doing something important and complained, however gently, about the humdrum life of car pools and t-ball practice and laundry. At times, she protested a little too stridently about how they’d made the right decision to settle in Los Angeles, as if to paper over the sadder truth. She never said anything overt, but there was a strong implication that things weren’t right in their marriage.
Meanwhile Byko was slowly planting seeds in Julie’s mind: she would find more fulfillment if she was working, wouldn’t she? She had so many gifts to offer the world. She had barely scratched the surface of her talents. He had projects in Uzbekistan begging for people of her natural ability, judgment and charisma. Slowly his finely tuned references to her wonderful personal qualities and his need for managerial talent in his development projects began to converge. It was a seduction. And a very good one.
When Charlie had finished deciphering the emails, he simply stared at the screen. As if gazing at the words long enough might somehow change them.
Grasping at straws, he noted that there were no emails between Julie and Byko since she’d gotten back to Los Angeles. Perhaps the sparks weren’t there after all. Perhaps she’d had second thoughts about throwing their marriage under the bus.
Was it possible there was some other explanation altogether? That she genuinely wanted to return to Uzbekistan? That she really wanted to work for Byko in some capacity? That she wanted to get all her ducks in a row before broaching the idea with Charlie?
/> It seemed ludicrous that any of that would require such deception on her part and he felt like a sap for even trying to convince himself that this was not what it seemed.
Apparently, Julie had become a bored housewife, restless with her suburban life, tired of her husband, seeking adventure in old places with old lovers. She’d gotten herself into a world of trouble and now here he was, chasing her down the rabbit hole.
Charlie shook his head, trying desperately to exorcise the image of her and Byko together. The issue of her infidelity—and how they would deal with that—would wait until he found her. For now, all that mattered was that he figure out how to save her. Even if their marriage couldn’t be repaired, he would deliver her back to Oliver and Meagan.
And then he had the awkward and humiliating realization that the one person he needed to get hold of right now was Alisher Byko. Byko would be infuriated to hear that Julie had potentially paid such a price for their rendezvous and he would undoubtedly have some insight into what might have happened to her. Most important, Charlie had to admit that Byko might in fact be more equipped to find his wife than he was.
Back in the day, Charlie had used Byko for background on a number of stories and he still had Byko’s old cell phone number in his contacts list. He dialed it, but almost immediately heard the irritating singsongy chimes that told him he’d reached an inactive phone number.
Charlie muttered under his breath, but at least Byko had an active email account. He typed in Byko’s address and a message:
Julie’s been kidnapped. I think she’s in Tashkent. I’m on my way. We need to talk. Charlie Davis
He tapped in his own email address and cell phone number then pressed send. As he did, he heard the announcement for the final boarding call.
Charlie packed up his computer and headed for the gate. He’d be out of range for the next thirteen hours. By the time he touched down in Tashkent, there would surely be a reply from Byko.
Chapter Sixteen
Alisher Byko walked up the long stretch of waving green grass toward the simple stone structure. The hill was long and steep, but this didn’t trouble him. In fact, he enjoyed the exertion and the solitude. From the top of his private oasis, the grim city and its problems seemed very far away.
This was one of the largest tracts of undeveloped land in Tashkent and Byko had purchased it for the graves of his family. He could have built a monument as elaborate as the Taj Mahal if he’d wanted, but that would not have suited him. The large but unadorned mausoleum was enough. Flanking the mausoleum where his wife, son, and sister were buried were a handful of additional gravestones marking the resting places of friends who had died in Babur Square, their simple inscriptions all carved in Uzbek.
Byko stopped when he reached the graves, his mind drifting back to the time just after the massacre. If he had not been as rich and powerful as he was, he probably would have died in prison six years ago. Instead, after his wife and son had been killed, he had visited President Karimov and begged forgiveness.
The tyrant had sat at his huge and grotesquely carved desk in his gymnasium-size office, the walls covered with vast, ugly murals depicting various scenes of invented Uzbek history, and listened in silence as Byko humbled himself. Byko had said that he was sorry, that his opposition to the regime had been a youthful indiscretion, and that Karimov would see: Byko would become his biggest supporter.
Byko had walked out of Karimov’s palace with his life, but he’d left a piece of his soul there. In the weeks and months that followed, he had stumbled around in a haze of humiliation, rage and pain, a choking cloud that had kept him from being able to concentrate, to think, to act. He neglected his businesses, instead holing up in rented villas in Bangkok or Abu Dhabi or Gstaad, drinking and banging a virtual United Nations of socialites, debutantes and whores. Gradually, the humiliation dissipated and the anger turned inward. Yes, Karimov was a ruthless and brutal dictator. But it was he—Byko—who’d been the fool to try to play revolutionary. It was, in fact, his own hubris that had killed his wife and son.
The self-loathing only made the pain more dear. And all the drinking and women and skiing and Ferraris couldn’t dull it. Couldn’t even begin to touch it. Then one day at a club, a girl handed him an opium pipe. It was the sort of thing that the old Byko, even the partying Byko of his college days, would have rejected out of hand. But he had come to feel by then that doing one thing was hardly different from another. Any distraction was a worthy distraction. And so he’d taken a hit.
Instantly, there was a shift. The opium filtered out the noise that had been threatening to overwhelm him for nearly every instant of his life since the bullets had taken his wife and son. The pain didn’t go away, but he was able to pack it neatly into a little box in the back of his brain. And as soon as he did that, he was able to see the world with startling clarity. Like a snapshot caught in the brilliant flare of a camera flash, he saw that it was not he who was to blame. Or even Karimov. It was the larger political system—the inheritance of a corrupt Russian autocracy mixed with the financial backing and tacit approval of the West. Yes, the opium allowed him to see all of this. See it clearly.
Of course, every drug has its cost. As he quickly came to find out, opium sapped your will, your drive, your energy. And so there had been cocaine. Which required a certain delicacy of application—and, for want of a better word, management. That “management” had taken the form of various other mood enhancers, stabilizers and modifiers, both legal and illegal.
But it was all carefully administered, neatly titrated, scientifically applied. The drugs didn’t control him. Quite the contrary. All the drugs were in the service of keeping Alisher Byko—the purest, most crystalline version of Alisher Byko—focused like a laser beam on his plan of action.
That plan, originated in an opium den in the hills of Thailand, began as a way to take back his country. The assassination of Karimov and his cabinet, a military coup, the installation of himself and a handful of respected tribal and sectarian leaders in a transition government. He would spend the next four years scrupulously calculating how it might be done. Gradually, after hundreds of clandestine meetings feeling out generals, clerics, and strongmen, Byko felt confident that he saw a path.
And then his sister was taken.
The revelations which followed her death would change how he saw everything. With that change in vision came a change in plan. A plan that was now, at long last, about to come to fruition.
Byko knelt before the graves of his family, the soft wind stirring his hair. He kissed each one in turn. “You will be avenged,” he promised. “All of you.”
Chapter Seventeen
As Frank Hopkins made his way down the hallway toward the War Room in MI6’s headquarters in Vauxhall Cross, he had a queasy feeling about the impending operation. Apparently he wasn’t the only one. Eyes probed him watchfully from the offices that lined the hallway and he knew there was talk going around. Something to the effect that perhaps he didn’t have the magic anymore.
Hopkins had been an MI6 field man since leaving the British Army twenty-seven years ago. He had been a Sandhurst-educated infantry officer and spent his career working in the Middle East with a reputation as one of the best in the business. But one’s reputation, he reflected as he put his eye to the retinal scanner at the door of the War Room, was only as good as one’s last successful assignment.
And this one wasn’t going well.
The door opened and everyone in the room looked up.
“Everything sorted?” he asked.
“Comms online, sir,” the communications officer said. He hit a few buttons as Hopkins picked up the headset.
“Bird’s online,” a technician said. As he spoke, the feed from the MI6’s TopSat-II spy satellite appeared on the big screen at the front of the War Room. It was an infrared image from seventeen miles above Samarkand, Uzbekistan, the picture composed of a series of greenish blobs that were not easy to make sense of. Then a greenish-w
hite blob moved, revealing itself as a human figure.
It was Osprey—real name Marcus Vaughan—the sole MI6 agent operating under diplomatic cover at the British Embassy in Uzbekistan.
“How’s my level, Osprey?” Hopkins asked. A second screen blinked to life. This one monitored a microcamera in Marcus’s glasses.
“Five by five,” Marcus responded.
“Give me a sitrep,” Hopkins said.
“I don’t bloody like it, that’s my situation report. Two big abandoned factories to my left and right. In between we’ve got a big space about the size of a bloody football pitch. And it’s full of machinery. Gantries, locomotive parts, cranes, can’t even make them all out. They could be hiding an army in there, I’d never see it.”
“Looks clear,” Hopkins said. “No heat signatures.”
“What about in the factories?” Marcus asked, the fuzzy outline of his head moving from side to side as he attempted to track activity in the adjacent buildings.
“You know how it works,” Hopkins replied. “The bird can’t see through walls.”
“Right. Just thought I’d ask,” Marcus said. “I’m heading in, recon a bit, see if I’ve got company.”
Through the minicam, Hopkins saw a pair of headlights swing around the far corner of the factory.
“Too late,” he told his agent. “Visitors. Vehicle incoming.”
Marcus muttered something under his breath. He was frightened and Hopkins didn’t blame him. To do this right, they ought to have an eight-man team in there. But Marcus was there by his lonesome on the most important piece of intelligence Hopkins had worked in years.
As Marcus began walking between the two buildings, Hopkins stood at the shoulder of an expert video analyst. “Mercedes S-Class,” the analyst said matter-of-factly, pointing at the image on the big screen. Two men climbed out of the car. Even here, at a two-thousand-mile remove, Hopkins could feel his agent’s palms sweating.
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