Mel gets in between the women, squeezing in on the metal tailgate, and the woman to her right yells something to the driver, and the Toyota spurts forward.
She nearly falls out, but the strong hands of the women keep her in place, and they laugh at her, and Mel laughs right back, now not feeling any pain at all.
Chapter
98
Al Sheyab, Libya
Asim Al-Asheed is sitting in the shaded section of a small courtyard in the home of a local tribal leader who is willing to have Asim and his comrades rest there during the hot desert day, unlike the disloyal Omar al-Muntasser. Asim’s vehicles are parked nearby, covered with a canvas awning, and substitute vehicles will be coming here soon from the larger village of Badr so he can continue his travels.
Asim is dining on a late breakfast of coffee, two eggs, and sfinz when his cousin Faraj comes up, tugging a young woman by her wrist. Asim looks up, wipes his fingers on a tan cloth napkin, and says, “Well?”
Faraj pushes the woman in front of him. She is wide-eyed, fearful, wearing a black robe across her body and over her head. Her feet are clad in dusty black Nike trainers.
“Take the cloth off her head,” Asim says.
Faraj tugs off the covering and the woman cries out, and Faraj slaps her face, forces her into place.
Asim stares and stares. The woman lowers her eyes. The body, the face, the bone structure…yes, it will work. She looks to be in her late teens, and Asim says, “You’ve done well, cousin.”
“Thank you,” Faraj says.
Asim can’t help but think of his wife, Layla Al-Asheed, and his three girls, Amina, Zara, and Fatima—now no doubt in paradise—and how when they were alive he would never allow himself to be in a room alone with another woman, no matter the age, to avoid the temptation.
Now?
He does what he must to get his revenge.
“Where did you find her?” he asks.
“At a special market south of Brak,” Faraj says. “She is French, once married to an ISIS jihadist from Syria. He was killed and…here she is.”
“Very good, indeed,” Asim says. “And the hunt for Mel Keating?”
Faraj frowns. “It’s continuing. I am sure we will find her, cousin.”
Asim returns to his breakfast. “So am I. But not with you standing here with this sad girl. Get back to the hunt…and I want her found by this evening.”
He senses that Faraj is angry, but so what?
Faraj knows his job, and more importantly, Faraj knows his place.
“Yes, Asim,” he says, leaving, pulling the teen girl along with him, and she starts quietly wailing as they head to the door, speaking in French, the tone begging and pleading.
Asim shrugs, returns to his meal.
Chapter
99
On Highway 19, Libya
Jiang Lijun of the Chinese Ministry of State Security is sitting in the rear seat of a crowded Land Rover Defender, bouncing along this potholed road, heading south and to the Nafusa Mountains, trying hard to keep his tired eyes open. Two other Defenders are in front of this one, bouncing and jolting along, raising clouds of dust.
A hard jolt nearly cracks his skull against the roof, and next to him, Walid Ali Osman laughs. Walid is a longtime asset of Jiang’s, and Jiang has hired him, a tribal leader, and ten tribesmen to go into the Nafusa Mountains to find Asim Al-Asheed and free the president’s daughter.
Walid, a skinny bearded man, is wearing tan camouflage fatigues, as is Jiang, who’s also wearing a bullet-resistant vest. He has a Chinese-made QSZ-92 9mm pistol holstered at his side, with four spare magazines. He tries not to yawn again. It’s been a brutally long day, beginning back in New York City, where he didn’t even have time to return home before grabbing a Turkish Airlines flight that eventually got him to Tripoli.
A long day, with no end in sight, and when he got to Tripoli, his first thought was that his boss had sent him on a suicide mission. Sent alone to Libya to rescue Mel Keating with no support! But Jiang had to obey the man’s orders; otherwise, he’d be led to a small steel room with a raked dirt floor in the embassy’s basement, where he’d take a bullet to the back of his head.
Walid laughs again at another jolt as they speed through a dull landscape of dirt, rocks, and brush, the rugged mountains and mesas coming into view. In good English, Walid says, “Seems there are many places yet for my Chinese friends to spend on your Road and Suspenders plan, eh?”
“Belt and Road,” Jiang says. “That’s what it’s called.”
The tribal leader laughs. “However you want to call it, it’s just a way for a wealthy nation far away to sprinkle riches around, trying to buy influence and friendships.” A slap to Jiang’s knee. “How is that working for you, friend?”
Jiang says, “You’re here with me, aren’t you?”
That results in another laugh. Yes, after arriving in Tripoli, good fortune smiled upon Jiang, because he was able to make contact with Walid, and now here he is. Maybe, just maybe, this suicide mission has become something less deadly.
Another hard jolt. Even with doors and windows firmly secured, dust is finding its way inside the Defender. Up ahead, the driver is murmuring and cursing while his seatmate holds on to an AK-47 with one hand and is yelling into a sat phone with the other.
Jiang should be thinking and planning what will be done when Asim is located, but he is still haunted by that last conversation with his boss, Li Baodong, back in the basement of the Chinese UN mission building in New York.
Jiang’s father died for his country.
Now Jiang is alone with these desert barbarians, bouncing and racing in this wasteland, to retrieve the daughter of an American president, and he feels as though he should have screamed at his boss back there in New York.
You stupid fat mushroom: if you had told me the truth about my father months ago, I would have gotten Mel Keating rescued back when she was being held in New Hampshire!
Then Asim and his cousin would be dead or in Guantánamo Bay. Mel Keating would be safely back with her parents.
And Jiang wouldn’t be here, in the middle of this wasteland, speeding off to a possible lonely and bloody death up in those approaching mountains. Shudder, bounce, rattle. This time his head does strike the padded roof.
If he lives, this is his last field mission.
No more.
Even if it means returning to Beijing in disgrace, getting shuttled off to some distant office, placed in the middle of ungrateful Tibet or among the restless Uighurs, Jiang is through. He wants to live and be a good father to his own daughter for years and years to come.
The man with the sat phone turns and rattles off a number of urgent words to Walid, who claps his hands with joy.
“We have done it!” he announces. “A small family compound, less than an hour away, inshallah. Rumor has spread that a teen American girl is now in one of the houses there, being taken care of, a guest.”
Jiang says, “Faster. We need to go faster.”
Walid pats the shoulder of the driver, tells him something, and then repeats a similar string of words to the armed man with the phone who’s sitting up front. The two Land Rovers up ahead speed up, and this one accelerates as well.
Maybe I will survive the day after all, Jiang thinks.
Chapter
100
Abrika family residence, Libya
Mel Keating takes another satisfying drink of the slightly cool water from a metal cup and decides once again that it’s the finest liquid she’s ever swallowed. She’s resting in a small room inside a cool stone and plaster house, lying on a pile of carpets and pillows, while an elder woman—perhaps the grandmother of this family?—oversees two young women who are washing and now gently drying off Mel’s sore and abused feet. All three are wearing loose black robes with colorful scarves around their heads, and the younger two seem to be about Mel’s age. They chat and laugh in what she guesses is an Arabic dialect.
The water! Neve
r has she tasted anything so delicious, so refreshing, so filling. The water seems to gently wash away the dust and thirst and dryness that made her mouth feel as though she was chewing cotton balls. Her feet still hurt but it’s a pleasing hurt, part of being cleansed and healed.
Still, as comfortable as she is, Mel is jumpy, fearful, turning at every noise or disturbance. She knows that Asim Al-Asheed is out there looking for her, and being here isn’t like trying to hide in Georgetown, with all its buildings, streets, and alleys. She’s on a rocky desert plain at the foot of these mountains, and she imagines there’s not another collection of houses for miles around.
As refreshed as she is, Mel needs to get out of here.
Earlier she had a moment of panic, as one of the young women took off Mel’s glasses, making her instantly blind, but the woman came back a minute or so later, having carefully washed and dried them, and Mel was ashamed at her fear.
Another woman comes in, her head covering a bright blue, and she puts a ceramic platter in Mel’s lap. On it are small light brown cakes that look like the flapjacks Dad makes—and that makes her tear up, thinking of Dad—and there’s honey drizzled over them, and she eats one, and then two, and after another drink she says, “I’m sorry, does anyone here speak English? Please?”
The woman serving the cakes smiles. “Yes, I do…some. For two years I went to university in Tripoli…”
“Oh, my God, thank you, thank you so much for picking me up,” Mel says. “I was so thirsty…and lost.”
The woman steps back. “My name is Tala Abrika. What is yours?”
Mel hesitates. All right, she’s been rescued, but who are these people? Can they be trusted? Are they friends of Asim Al-Asheed?
The taste of the water is still in her no-longer-dry mouth.
“My name is Mel,” she says. “Mel Keating. Thanks again for rescuing me.”
Tala smiles, nods. “It is what we do.”
Mel nibbles on another of the delicious cakes while the other women in the room chat amongst themselves. “I’ve heard that the Libyan people are kind and gracious to strangers,” Mel says to Tala.
Tala’s smile fades some. “We are not Libyans. We are Amazigh, what some call Berber.”
Mel sees something haunting in Tala’s dark eyes, and senses she’s made a mistake. “I’m sorry,” she says. “I didn’t mean any disrespect.”
“Don’t worry,” Tala says. “We Amazigh, who live here and in the Nafusa Mountains, we were hunted, killed, and oppressed by whatever evil men were ruling Libya, for the crime of being different. Only in the past few years have we had any semblance of peace.”
The other women, still laughing and chatting, leave the room. Now Tala is alone with Mel. She stares at Mel with her sharp dark eyes.
In a firm voice, Tala says, “How did you come to be lost, Mel Keating? A young American like you, wearing the wrong clothes, wearing no shoes, on our land?”
Mel recalls the times she’s heard Dad swapping stories and tall tales with his SEAL buddies about how—despite the years of training and experience—sometimes you just have to go with your gut, what it’s telling you, what you’re feeling.
Mel goes with her gut.
She trusts this woman.
“I was kidnapped in the United States by terrorists and brought here,” she says. “I escaped last night. Please: can you help me? Do you have a cell phone?”
Tala’s face is solemn. “We do, but there is no…what you say, coverage. Here. One needs to drive up to Miraz, before it works.”
“Please…”
Tala’s face breaks into a smile. “My cousin, Abu Sag, is coming here within an hour or two. He will take you to Miraz. There you can make your phone call. And you will be safe, Mel Keating. Mushiiyat Allah, you will be safe.”
Mel is wearing soft black slippers that the elder woman slipped onto her bandaged feet, and she even dozes for a while. She is awoken when Tala comes back in and says, “Quickly now. My cousin Abu is here.”
Tala helps Mel get up. Holding Tala’s arm, Mel is led outside, into a dusty dirt courtyard. She sees the old truck that picked her up, and now a dark gray Toyota Land Cruiser is parked nearby. A squat young bearded man wearing blue jeans and a white buttoned shirt gets out of the front seat, smiles, and gives a quick wave in her direction.
The other women are standing near the entrance to the one-story home. There are three other similar homes, built in a semicircle. Goats and chickens scramble around, and on two of the homes there are satellite dishes.
Tala grasps Mel’s hand, gives it a squeeze.
“Safe travels, Mel Keating. I hope we meet again.”
Mel chokes up, remembering Mom once saying, years ago, Most people are nice people, Mel. It’s our curse that it’s the evil ones who get so much attention.
“Me, too,” she says.
Abu waves a hand. “Come. Let’s go, miss, let’s go!”
The inside of the Land Cruiser smells of incense and cinnamon, and beads and trinkets dangle from the rearview mirror. Abu is a wild and reckless driver, and Mel finds that the seat belt mechanism doesn’t work, so she ties the belt across her waist with a square knot, hoping for the best.
The radio is loud, and Abu sings along. The road isn’t much of a road, just a wide dirt lane, with lots of ruts, but Abu drives as if he could do this with his eyes closed.
The sun is high up and the sky is a deep blue, not a cloud in sight, and Abu says, “We get to Miraz, I let you use my phone, true?”
“That’s right,” she says.
He slightly leers. “Will you give me something in return?”
Great, Mel thinks. “We’ll make the deal after I make the call.”
“Ha ha,” Abu laughs, and they keep on driving, the road wide and empty through the desert. Then Abu says, “Ah, look. Look there. Up ahead.”
The windshield is smeared with dirt and dust, and Mel can’t see what Abu is seeing until they are almost upon it.
Three SUVs, parked in a row, a huddle of men around the first one, examining a map on the hood.
Abu speeds by. “Did you see that? Did you?”
“What?” Mel asks. “What’s there?”
“A man from Japan. Or China. Standing there, with the others.” Another barking laugh. “So lost, eh?”
Mel says, “I know the feeling.”
Some minutes later, Abu seems to curse in Arabic and taps the display above the steering wheel. “Ah, so damn stupid. I forgot to refuel. We’re running low on petrol.”
Mel puts one hand on her seat belt and the other on the door handle. She thinks, If this clown is going to try the “We’re out of gas” bullshit line, I’m bailing out the moment he slows down.
“No worries,” he says. “Up there. The crossroads. The Dajout family. A service station, a little store. Mel, would you like a cold Coca-Cola? Would you?”
Would she!
“Yes,” Mel says. “That would be great.”
He whistles, slaps her on the knee—okay, she’ll let that one go—and says, “It will be my delight. And unlike the phone call, no charge.”
The road widens and Mel sees two pickup trucks cross before them, both raising clouds of dust, and there are three one-story buildings in a row, with other trucks parked nearby and men in long white robes or pants and shirts standing outside, talking amongst themselves.
Abu pulls into a narrow alleyway and says, “Just a few minutes, young lady. I will refuel, will get you the promised drink, and soon enough, you will be making that phone call.”
A laugh, and then he gets out, shuts the door, and goes into the rear entrance of the nearest building. Another truck roars by on the main road. Mel gently rubs one sore foot against the other.
Who to call? How to call?
Sure, 911 won’t work.
But there is a phone number that Agent David Stahl had her memorize back when Dad was in the White House.
Use this number and we’ll find you, he said.
&nb
sp; But will it work overseas?
Maybe, if she can figure out how to dial international from Libya.
What is the overseas code for calling the States?
She doesn’t know, but maybe Abu can find out.
Mel unties her seat belt and is reaching down to rub at her feet again when the driver’s door opens.
She looks to her left and freezes.
A smiling and satisfied Faraj Al-Asheed is looking in.
Standing beside him, calmly sipping from a bottle of Coca-Cola, is Abu.
“Do you think, young lady,” Abu asks, “that I will risk my family’s safety for you, a foreigner?”
Faraj reaches in and grabs Mel’s shoulder, hard.
“Come along,” he says. “Asim is eager to see you.”
Mel slaps his face—hard!—and breaks free, opening the passenger door, jumping out, nearly crying aloud from the jolt of pain in her right foot. She moves as quickly as she can up the alleyway, sees a road out there. Maybe she can wave somebody down, or scream for help, or—
Two men with pistols are blocking the end of the alley.
Mel turns.
Faraj and Abu are coming toward her, looking relaxed and confident.
She says, “But I don’t want to see Asim.”
Faraj laughs and grabs Mel’s shoulder, and as she is brought past Abu, she lashes out with a free elbow and shoves the hard glass bottle into the man’s face.
Chapter
101
Aboard Granite Four
Mediterranean Sea
We’re about fifteen minutes outbound from the Tunisian Air Force base at Sfax-Thyna when Claire Boone—Mel’s friend and an operative for the National Security Agency—comes out of the KC-135’s lavatory and walks over to me, squats. Next to me, Agent David Stahl is fast asleep, earplugs in his ears, arms folded across his chest.
“Matt?” she says.
“Yes?”
She leans in so I can hear her better.
“We’re going to be kinda busy once we get on the ground,” she says. “And I know I’d never forgive myself if I don’t use this opportunity to ask about a mystery that’s been bugging me for years. What did you say in the letter to President Barnes? The one you left in the Oval Office desk on Inauguration Day? Usually the text is always released, but not this time. Why?”
The President's Daughter Page 35
