by Davis Bunn
Two chairs were drawn up beside Remy’s. Emma said, “I think better on my feet.”
“Sorry, the headset cord won’t reach.”
Emma needed to focus exclusively on the man at the other end of the line. She picked up the chair closest to the open French doors and turned it to face the sunset. When she’d seated herself she realized the smell of frying peppers had followed her.
Hakim slipped into the third chair. He handed Emma her cell phone, which was now connected to the techie’s equipment. “Your phone has rung twice since we turned it back on. Jack Dauer both times.”
Emma did not reply. There was nothing to say. Hakim had received word that Dauer had issued a formal complaint to Treasury, seeking her dismissal. He also intended to bring her up on criminal charges for willfully obstructing a federal case and aiding the flight of two suspects.
Then Hakim had a call from his contacts in Paris, relaying news about the man Mehmet Ozman had gone to visit, the day his family had died. News that had widened the hole blown by the message about Dauer. A double-barreled barrage to her universe.
Hakim handed her the headset. “All we need is enough to suggest obstruction.”
Emma said, “I still can’t believe Dauer has gone this far.”
Hakim leaned in closer, ensuring she actually heard what he was saying. “We are not after implicating anyone. We just want to free you from the threat of being withdrawn from the case. A couple of minutes, nothing more. When we have enough, I’ll signal you. Then mention the Parisian’s name so that we can officially register his response.”
“Where’s the file?”
Hakim handed it over. “Remy?”
“Green across the board.”
She dialed Jack Dauer’s number from memory. The voice mail kicked in instantly, suggesting Dauer was on another call. An impersonal voice repeated Dauer’s number and nothing else. Emma said, “This is Emma Webb returning your call. I can be reached for the next twenty minutes or so.”
She clicked off. Emma set the phone on top of the file’s cover. She made two fists, mashed down on her thighs, and worked at breathing.
Hakim said, “This man Leon reminds me of something from our past. Most Syrians are Sunni Muslim, the majority sect in Islam. My father was Shia. The divisions between Sunni and Shia are very deep, very old, and very bitter. The Wahabists, you have heard of them, yes? They are the ultraconservative Sunni sect that spawned Osama bin Laden. Wahabist clerics have recently declared Shias to be demonic. The Shias have their own extremists. A thousand years ago, a break-off sect called Ismailis…” Hakim caught her look. “What is it?”
“You shift from now to ten centuries back like it’s just around the corner.”
“To the Arab mind, it is closer than that. It is now. Here. In this room. Alive today. As I was saying, the Ismailis were the minority of a minority and remain so today. They ruled a cluster of mountain fiefdoms in Iran, eastern Iraq, India, and Nepal. Marco Polo visited there. These Ismaili fiefdoms exported professional killers. They were sold as slaves to wealthy pashas and rulers about the Islamic world. Palaces were traded for these men, lifetime treaties, trading routes, entire fiefdoms. Several became generals and sovereigns. One even ruled Egypt for a time. They called themselves aishishin, men without law. From their name comes the word assassin.”
Emma’s phone rang, but she made no move to pick it up. “You’re saying this deal is bigger than what’s happening to me in the here and now.”
Hakim nodded once. “Answer the phone.”
EMMA OPENED HER PHONE AND waited. Remy whispered, “Rolling.”
“This is Emma Webb.”
Jack Dauer snarled, “Just exactly where do you get off? You think a couple of letters signed by people with no connection to this case are going to save you?”
“I have been seconded to Interpol, sir.”
“Wrong, Webb. You have disregarded a direct order from your superior. In case you haven’t heard, I’m bringing you up on criminal charges. Something you’ve basically been begging me to do from the start of this investigation.” He gave her a minute to respond. When he got nothing but silence, the phone’s temperature hiked another notch. “Where are you, Webb?”
“France. We have tracked down several new leads—”
“Don’t give me that. Where are the suspects I sent you to arrest?”
“Storm Syrrell and Harry Bennett are no longer suspects.”
“That is not for you to determine. I am running this show. I decide who is under suspicion. And I did not authorize you to travel to France!”
Dauer’s words worked on Emma’s internal control like a steel rasp, filing off the lid she normally kept clamped shut. She felt the rage and the memories well up, hidden images shooting through her brain, brilliant as grenade blasts. She saw the moment her father had suggested she had some deep-seated mental problem for wanting to become a federal agent. Then she flashed to the first time her mother had called her job an obsession. She remembered the night of her rehearsal dinner, when her fiancé sprung the news that he loved her but hated her cop’s attitude, like they were two completely different things and he could use the ultimatum of breaking off their wedding to force her to abandon her dreams.
Her control snapped with an audible bang.
Emma said, “I’m curious about one thing, Jack. I’ve handed you some major evidence and you’ve blocked me at every turn. So I’m asking. Just exactly whose side are you on?”
Hakim motioned to her. Enough.
“Clamp down on that attitude, Webb. You’re already in over your head.”
“Everybody puts you down as just an extreme version of the fibbie attitude, going for the glory, stealing all the credit. But now I’m wondering if there’s more.”
“You have no right addressing your superior—”
Emma turned toward the wall so as to block out Hakim’s urgent signals. “Just so you know, Jack, I’m recording this conversation and I’m talking to you in front of witnesses. What I need to know is, have you been put in place to make sure we never get too far? Did Washington appoint you because they knew you’d obstruct any real investigation? Was your job to railroad the inquiry, deliver the verdict, hand over a couple of minor scapegoats, and hide any facts that could make trouble for your superiors?”
“Wait…you’re recording?”
“Why does that bother you, Jack? Suddenly grown a conscience? Maybe you’d like to retract some of your garbage and play like we’re on the same team?” She swatted Hakim’s hand away from her shoulder. “Here’s something for you to start with. A name, Jack. Yves Boucaud. Ring any alarm bells?”
“Consider your career officially terminated. I am personally issuing a warrant for your arrest. Aiding and—”
“You were never after the truth, were you, Jack. You were chosen to make sure we never linked that name to your case. You were brought in to hide the agency’s involvement with this man. Well, Jack, here’s some news for you. I’m going straight to the attorney general of the United States. And I’m going to inform him that Agent Jack Dauer’s obstruction of this investigation has resulted in the murder of six people in four countries. Remember that name, Jack. Yves Boucaud. Because my guess is, this is going to turn into the FBI’s very own Iran-Contra affair.”
She snapped the phone shut and slammed it down on the folder. Panted her way out of the rage. She never got angry. Never lost control. When her heaving chest stilled somewhat, she turned in her chair and met Hakim’s gaze full-on. “You got a problem?”
“No,” he said quietly. “No problem.”
“Good. There’s more where that came from.” She turned to face the techie. “I want you to get ready to play that conversation back over my phone. No, don’t look at Hakim. I’m talking here. You’ve got thirty seconds.”
She faced the wall and dialed a number from memory. Waited through two rings and about five dozen rapid breaths.
“MacFarland.”
“Tip,
it’s Emma.”
“Oh, man. You okay, lady?”
She almost lost it. She had no shield against MacFarland’s unexpected concern except cold rage. “Don’t ask stupid questions. Are you recording?”
A pause, then, “I am now.”
“I want you to pay very careful attention, Tip. I am going to play back a conversation. And then I am going to tell you what we have learned. And I am taping our conversation, so there is a clear record of your hearing everything I’ve got to say. You are going to listen very carefully, and then you are going to your superiors. You’re going to do this, Tip, because if you let me down I am going to go first to an attorney in the private sector. I’m going to wrap this up in a neat little file, and I’m going to make two copies, and I’m going to deliver one to the attorney general and the other to the Washington Post. Do you follow?”
He spoke with the slow motion of grinding gears. “I hear you.”
Emma said to the techie, “Okay, roll.”
When the recording of the conversation with Dauer was done, Emma gave the rest to Tip fast and cold—the prison break, the unnamed attacker with the false Romanian documents, the French attorney, the murder of Mehmet Ozman’s family, the nephew put in place. “The day his wife and daughter were murdered, Mehmet Ozman was traveling to Paris to see one Yves Boucaud. We tracked that name through the Paris authorities. Yves Boucaud is an international financier. He has no record. But get this, Tip. When Interpol ran his name through their own system, they found a link to the Justice Department.”
“Don’t tell me.”
“The FBI has a top-secret seal on his file. Which suggests they are being intentionally blind to an international conspiracy to murder, extort, and subvert the course of justice.”
It was Tip’s turn to huff through a couple of very hard breaths. “When I told you to go find yourself a major prize, I didn’t mean you needed to bring down the US government.”
“You’ve got twenty-four hours. Then I go public.”
“No, Emma. Calm down. That’s not enough time.”
“You’re not the one who’s got a wrecking ball aimed at her career. Not to mention a warrant. A warrant, Tip. For my arrest.”
“I’ll take care of that. But I need more time. Where can I reach you?”
She gave him her two cell-phone numbers. Hakim slipped something into her hand holding the file. She did not realize her vision had blurred until she could not read the numbers on the card. She swiped at her face. “You need to be in touch with my superior here at Interpol. Hakim Sundera. I may be off the map for a while. You want more time, I have to trust you to get Dauer off my tail.”
“I told you I’d take care of it. Give me two weeks.”
“Five days, Tip. Five. Then you can hear all about this on CNN.” She slapped the phone shut. Stripped off the headset. Forced herself to her feet. Said to the two men watching her, “That’s how we do it in the good old US of A.”
THIRTY
VERY EARLY THE NEXT MORNING, Hakim insisted upon accompanying Emma to the Nice airport. After she had checked in, they took a table at the airport café and Emma had the finest croissant and cappuccino she had ever tasted. Hakim gave that minimalist smile of his, barely creasing the edges around his mouth and eyes. “There are some things which the French do really quite well.”
She studied the imperial palms beyond the taxi stand, the beautiful people loading into waiting limos, the mountains, the dawn light. “Someday I’m going to come back here and see it all for real. Someday soon.”
Hakim used his thumb and forefinger to press the coffee’s froth from his moustache. “You were most impressive yesterday.”
“I didn’t exactly follow orders.”
“You did your job. That is what is most important.”
“Is it?”
“We share the same objectives, Agent Webb.”
“Emma.” She caught his look. Two smiles in one morning. A record. “I bet you are a superb boss.”
“Something I would like you to keep in mind.”
That was a direction she had no interest in taking. Not after a semi-sleepless night, jerking awake after repeatedly dreaming her way through the conversations she’d had, totally losing it in transatlantic phone calls to her superiors. Over and over and over. “How did you track down the information on Yves Boucaud so fast?”
“I did nothing except make one phone call. What I said to Harry Bennett was the truth. Interpol has no place for action heroes. No stars. No headline grabbers. Our director general is an American who spent decades in the Washington intelligence services. He loathed the infighting, the way they battled with local police forces, scrabbling like dogs over bones. His objective is very simple. To protect and to serve.”
Hakim finished his coffee, then used his napkin with a surgeon’s precision. “Let us say you successfully conclude this case. You would gain all the attention, because we take none. You return to a stellar position at Treasury or at Homeland Security.”
She was pierced by a desire so strong her heart missed a very painful beat. “Fat chance.”
Hakim contradicted her with a moment’s silence. “So you return, taking all the credit with you. And one day you receive a call. Perhaps from me, perhaps from another Interpol officer who uses my name. What would you do?”
“Star service. Top of the pile.”
“Precisely.”
She tried to clear the burning from her throat, but it only seemed to shove it up behind her eyes. “I’ve never wanted to do anything else with my life but this.”
In response, Hakim rose and hefted her suit bag. He badged the officers handling the security checkpoint and waited while her bag was scoped. The passage leading to the planes was ribbed with Riviera sunlight. Hakim said, “There is one other item we must discuss. Something I require your help with.”
“Name it.”
Hakim led her to a window just down from her gate. He set down her case. “I have had my associates check on Harry Bennett. He has been at the forefront of several discoveries. Treasures whose appearances have become true international events. This was prior to his being arrested for bringing up almost a ton of gold doubloons inside Barbados waters without a license.”
“He claims he was in international waters and was framed. I believe him.”
“For the moment, that is irrelevant. What we need to accept is, if the prize is big enough, Harry Bennett will take whatever risk is necessary. And for a prize as large as the hidden treasures from the Second Temple of Jerusalem, Harry Bennett might be capable of anything at all.”
Emma did not have anything to say. Swallowing was hard enough.
“Trafficking in salvaged treasures found within international waters is a crime covered by international treaty.”
“I’m aware of that.”
Hakim’s gaze had magnified to where the airport’s clamor was filtered down to a faint whisper. “When I said that I or my colleagues would call upon you for assistance, Agent Webb, I was speaking about a very real tomorrow.”
AFTER AN EARLY BREAKFAST, HARRY shepherded Storm down to the Bodrum Harbor and bought two tickets for the ferry to Rhodes. Storm waited until they were crossing the gangplank to say, “Last time I checked, the Greek islands are in the opposite direction from Cyprus.”
“I was planning to tell you yesterday,” Harry replied. “But the way things were, I figured your brain could use a night off.”
Hakim had arranged for them to fly from Istanbul to the coastal village of Bodrum. Harry had been there once before, just after he’d gone full-time into salvage work. In the nineteen years since then, Bodrum had grown from an idyllic fishing village to a tourist mecca. They had spent the night in a portside hotel, dined by room service, and slept with the connecting doors opened between their rooms. Twice Harry had awakened to the sound of a strong woman using her pillow to stifle her sobs.
This morning Storm looked fragile but intact. They took a pair of seats on the ferry�
�s top deck and stowed their bags under the bench. Storm pulled out Sean’s tattered Bible, opened her phone, and began tapping the little keys. She would turn to a page marked by a slip of paper, lean over a passage, then type. When she noticed Harry watching, she said, “Sean had these verses he fought with. I’m making a list of them.” She tapped a passage almost obliterated by Sean’s angry scrawl. “I don’t understand what he was after. I don’t understand why they were so important. All I can say is, even accepting the mystery has given me some very real peace.”
“You want, I could take a walk around the boat, give you some space.”
“No, Harry. I’m very glad you’re here.”
So he stayed where he was, warmed by the day and by the lady beside him. If following Sean’s tread along this spiritual quest helped Storm reknit the fabric of her heart, then Harry was all for it.
Forty-five minutes later, Harry watched the sailors cast off the mooring ropes. The motors drummed under his feet as the ferry pulled away from the harbor wall. Storm must have noticed how he breathed easier, for she said, “You were worried we’d been followed?”
“Not really. But it’s good to be away, just the same.” Their ferry was an ancient vessel whose ulcerous wounds wept rust. He watched as they passed the harbor’s encircling arms and said, “Outward bound again. That’s what skippers of the old sailing vessels used to write in their log-books when they left safe harbor and entered the deep. Outward bound.”
“How long will the trip take?”
“Three hours. This was Hakim’s suggestion. Rhodes is the closest major Greek island to the Turkish coast. We’re just trying to cover our tracks a little. Emma will meet us there with a plane.”
Storm stowed away the book and her computer. “We need to talk.”
Harry watched her bundle her hair away from her eyes with a rubber band, then shuck off her pullover and stow it away. The lady was getting down to business. “Fire away.”
