Jihad

CHAPTER 28

Dean swung out of the parking lot and headed down the road, waiting for Lia to report back. When she told him it was clear, he pulled into a crowded gas station and made a U-turn, heading back to the lot. Dean decided that he would drive the Mercedes back toward Istanbul before abandoning it, just in case someone connected the two cars.

“Beemer, huh?” said Pinchon as he drew up next to the BMW. “You guys really know how to live it up.”

Dean remained silent. Something about Pinchon rubbed him the wrong way.

“I’ll tell you where to pick me up,” Dean told Lia as they hustled the terrorist into the other car. “I don’t want to leave the Mercedes here.”

He drove about two miles on the highway back toward the city before finding a parking lot where the Mercedes wouldn’t stand out. Lia met him up on the highway; he got into the back, sliding next to the prisoner and Reisler.

“Stuffy in here,” said Pinchon, rolling down the window. The breeze hit Dean full in the face as Lia picked up speed.

“Do me a favor and roll that back up, would you?” Dean asked.

Pinchon smirked — Dean could see it in the passenger-side mirror — and raised the window about an inch.

“So what are we doing?” Reisler asked.

“We’re going to get a sedative to make sure he sleeps through the night,” said Dean. “We have a cache of gear about a half hour outside of the city in the direction you’re going. You can leave Lia and me there. You drive to Bayindr. There’ll be a team to meet you there tonight. You know how to get there?”

“We’ll find it,” said Pinchon.

“I’d put him in the trunk if I were you,” said Dean.

“You gonna tell me how to wipe my ass, too?”

Dean leaned forward, then, in a sudden motion that he could barely control, swung his arm around the headrest and grabbed Pinchon by the neck, pressing his fingers hard against the side of his throat.

“I asked you to raise the window.”

Only when the window was all the way up did Dean let go. No one spoke after that.

Lia pulled up next to the white Toyota Corolla, dust and ash flying up from the small lot. Dean got out and walked around the car, scanning the nearby building to make sure it was empty. Her heart clutched when he jumped over the guardrail behind the Corolla’s trunk; there was only a narrow concrete ledge there before a sheer drop of twenty or thirty feet into the surf below.

“Let’s get al-Qaeda here in the back,” said Pinchon, getting out.

Lia popped the trunk, then watched through the side mirror as the two CIA agents pulled the prisoner out. Either Pinchon had not given him all of the dope, or the dose was somehow bad, because the terrorist was clearly conscious.

“Is the Arabic translator on the line?” she asked Rockman, who was listening to her in the Art Room. “Haznawi just came to and he’s talking.”

“She’s here.”

“He’s asking what we’re doing,” said Reisler.

“What are we doing?” said Pinchon in English outside the car. “We’re saving you from your friends, raghead.”

As Lia threw open her door, Reisler started to explain in Egyptian Arabic that Haznawi’s al-Qaeda companions had tried to kill him at the hospital.

“You’re safe now,” said Reisler. “Very safe.”

Haznawi responded by launching himself headfirst over the nearby guardrail.

Dean didn’t realize what had happened until he heard Lia curse. He turned in time to see their prisoner tumbling over the rocks and then falling into the water head first. Reaching back into the trunk, he grabbed one of the nylon ropes, planning to lower himself down to the water. As he straightened, three shots rang out. At least one hit the prisoner; his body bobbed backwards, disappearing for a moment before resurfacing face down. Even in the dim light Dean could tell he was dead.

“What the hell did you do that for?” Dean shouted.

“What, I’m supposed to let him get away?” said Pinchon.

“He had a cast on his leg and his hands were bound. How far could he have gone before I grabbed him?”

“I didn’t think you’d make it, old man.”

“Get him,” said Dean.

“He’s your prize. You get him.”

“Get him. Then find your own way home.”

“We can’t just leave them here, Charlie,” said Lia as Dean stomped back to the BMW.

Rockman was practically yelling in his head, asking what was going on.

“The al-Qaeda driver is dead,” Dean told him. “I’ll get back to you.”

“Charlie—”

“I can’t explain now.” Dean snapped the com system off.

“Take the Toyota,” Dean told Reisler, who had a stunned look on his face. He pointed to the car, which was parked a short distance away. It was one of their backups. “Key’s in a case under the driver’s side.

“I’m sorry.”

“Yeah.”

Lia ran to Dean as he strode toward the BMW.

“Charlie, we can’t go like this.”

“Are you driving or am I?”

“I’ll drive,” she told him finally, getting into the car.

Lia drove across to the Beyoglu section of Istanbul, parking near a jazz place they’d gone to during their orientation stay a few weeks before. She turned off the engine, then reached to the back of her belt, making sure her com system was still off.

“What are we going to tell Telach?” she asked Dean.

“What do you mean? We tell her what happened.”

“I don’t know, Charlie.”

“They heard the whole thing, Lia.”

“We screwed up.”

“Like hell we screwed up. Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum screwed up. They blew it big-time.”

“It’s our fault.”

“Since when do you cover for the CIA?”

“I’m not covering for them.”

Dean didn’t answer.

“We better tell them what’s going on before they freak out,” Lia said finally. “Before Mr. Rubens calls on the sat phone.”

Dean grabbed her hand before she could switch the com system back on.

“What’s with you and Pinyon?”

“Pinchon. Terry.”

“Yeah, whatever.”

“We worked together on a couple of missions. He was in Delta.”

“And?”

“We worked together. I thought he was dead.” Lia saw the charred car, the bodies. He had to have died. There could be no other explanation.

But he was alive.

“I’m not sure what happened,” Lia added.

“He didn’t tell you?”

“I didn’t ask,” she said, turning on the com.

CHAPTER 29

Tommy Karr found himself zooming up a street narrower than most sidewalks when a pair of headlights turned from a side road and bore down on him. He began to tilt the bike into a skid, then spotted an opening at the right and plunged into an alley just ahead of the headlamps. The alley, barely wider than his shoulders, connected with a second, even narrower one that circled around a large building, spitting him out on another side street. A horn blared in his ears; Karr tucked onto the nearby sidewalk, which quickly turned into a succession of stairs. Karr’s teenage summers spent riding dirt bikes through wood trails didn’t translate well on the misshapen and slippery steps: after about fifty yards he and the bike went separate ways. The bike spun into a row of discarded boxes and plastic garbage cans, which broke its fall. Karr didn’t have nearly as much luck, slamming hard onto the concrete and cracking his head against a metal pole so fiercely that the visor’s display died.

Growling, he jumped to his feet and ran to the bike, a flood of adrenaline and anger pushing away the pain of the fall.

Temporarily.

“What’s going on?” asked Chafetz.

“I fell. Give me directions.”

“Tommy, are you okay?”

“My ego’s busted. But I’m fine.” He laughed. “Got a headache.”

“Mr. Karr, are you all right?” asked Telach.

“Fine, Ma. Sandy, I could use some directions here.”

“Take a left at that next block.”

“Got it.”

Karr wove through a tangled path of streets toward the eastern outskirts of the city, then back toward the center. Karr, chastened by his fall, kept to the main roads, avoiding both steep hills and stairs. He also kept close to the speed limit, for one of the few times in his life.

“They just stopped,” Chafetz told him. “There’s a hotel on the block — hang on while we see if we can get into its reservation system.”

Karr cruised down the block, driving through the neighborhood to get a feel for the area. With adjustments for the profusion of domes belonging to the nearby mosques, the block in western Istanbul would not have been out of place anywhere in Europe, especially Eastern Europe. The buildings were two- and three-story-tall townhouses, the residents prosperous and thoughtful enough to keep the large flower-pots on their stoops watered.

The hotel fit right in, though the flowers in the boxes in front of the over-sized windows on the main floor could have used more attention. It was three stories tall and was perhaps a hundred years newer than its neighbors, which would have meant it was built around 1800.

Karr drove around the block, looking at the houses. The man he was tracking — still unidentified, for all the Art Room’s efforts — might be in any one of them.

In that case, though, wouldn’t there be more lights on? None of the houses had more than two rooms lit.

Not much of a theory, Karr conceded to himself.

“We have a couple of possibilities in the hotel,” said Chafetz.

“What about the houses across the street?”

“We’re running the names through watch lists, the whole nine yards. I’ll tell you if something comes up. Right now just plant some video bugs around and call it a night.”

“Tell you what, first give me the name of somebody who’s not in the hotel, but was, say, last week.”

“You’re going in?”

“Why not? They’ll see me planting the bugs from the lobby anyway. I might just as well go right on in. This way we can have a close-up if he’s there.” Karr laughed. “Besides, maybe they got a restaurant. I’m a little hungry. They wouldn’t let me take my fish with me.”

“How’s your head?”

“Hurts.”

“You should get it checked out.”

“Will do. Get me that name.”

Bright yellow walls and halogen floodlights gave the hotel lobby a hazy glow. Karr sauntered across the cracked marble floor toward the reception desk, rattled off a greeting in Turkish, then switched to English, asking about a friend he thought was staying there. The man behind the counter jerked his head back, then reached for a small button at the side of his desk.

Not good, thought Karr.

“You sure you don’t know him?” he asked.

“Who are you?” said the clerk, a skinny fellow whose face was the color of a Spaldeen after it had survived a dozen stickball games.

“Burt Thompson,” said Karr, throwing out the first name that came to him. He stuck out his hand. “I was in town for a conference and hoped to see my friend.”

The clerk frowned at his hand. Karr looked at it and realized it was scraped raw. The rough skin on the side was caked with blood.

“Fell down outside,” he said. “Don’t worry. I won’t sue. My friend’s name was Sergoni. From Russia.”

The clerk shrugged. “Not here.”

“Has he been here?”

The clerk shrugged again. A man had come to the curtain behind him, watching.

“Maybe you should check your computer?”

The man shook his head.

“Well, thanks for your help,” said Karr. “By the way, you happen to know of a good restaurant around here?”

Dr. Ramil shined the light into Karr’s eyes, checking his pupils for a sign of concussion. They dilated nicely, very responsive.

“Your head still hurts?” he asked, going into the bathroom for a washcloth and towel.

“Poundin’.”

“You don’t appear to have a concussion, but of course we’ll want to keep a close eye on you. The brain is a delicate instrument, an egg in a basket. We don’t want to just toss it around like a baseball.”

“Heck, no. A football maybe.”

“These are very nasty scrapes,” said the doctor, examining Karr’s arm and shins. “You must have taken some fall.”

“I’ve had much worse, believe me.”

“No doubt.”

Ramil cleaned the wounds, then applied an antibacterial agent from his medical kit. He daubed the wound delicately, almost afraid of it. Funny how a surface injury could sometimes seem more daunting than something much more serious well beneath the skin.

“What do you say, Doc? Want to get a drink?” asked Karr when he was finished.

“I don’t drink.”

“Naw, not drink drink. Like tea or something.”

Ramil, suddenly glad for the company, found his shoes and followed Karr to the winding spiral staircase at the end of the hall. A blast of warm air hit him in the face when he pushed open the door to the roof terrace; though it was fall, the evening was still very warm.

“Some view,” said Karr, pointing toward the Blue Mosque a few blocks up the hill.

Bathed in light, the mosque had an ethereal glow, light flooding upwards around the central dome. Ramil stared at it for a moment, then went over to the table Karr had commandeered. The only other people on the terrace were two older women speaking in hushed tones; Ramil listened for a moment before deciding they were German.

“Are you off for the night?” Ramil asked.

“More or less.” Karr gave him a broad smile. The young agent seemed to be the proverbial jolly giant; Ramil couldn’t remember ever seeing him frown. “Beer,” he told the waiter. “Want one, Doc?”

Though a Muslim, Ramil did occasionally take a drink, but to do so within sight of a mosque felt more than a little sacrilegious. He shook his head brusquely. “Apple tea,” he told the waiter.

“‘They ask you about drinking and gambling,’ ” Ramil told Karr, quoting the passage from the Koran that forbade drinking. “‘Tell them: There is both harm and benefit in them, but the harm is greater.’ From the Holy Koran.”

Karr nodded thoughtfully. “Maybe that’s an argument for moderation, not total abstinence.”

“It hasn’t been interpreted that way. Are you Christian, Tommy?”

“My mom was Eastern Orthodox, and my dad Catholic.”

“Which are you?”

“Both.” Karr beamed. “I got baptized twice.”

“Is that permissible?”

“Beats me. Couldn’t hurt though, right?”

“No,” said Ramil. He leaned back in his chair as the waiter set down his tea.

For a Muslim, or at least for Ramil, Karr’s easygoing attitude about religion was impossible. Growing up, there weren’t many Muslims in America, and his parents had been among the founders of the first mosque in the Washington, D.C., area. Back then, few people outside of the small Egyptian community where he lived — mostly Christian, as a matter of fact — seemed even to have heard of Islam.

Now, of course, everyone in America knew what Islam was — or thought they did. Terrorists like Asad bin Taysr had libeled the religion and its adherents, making it stand for something it wasn’t.

“You religious?” Karr asked.

“I wouldn’t say so.”

What made someone religious? Going to a mosque or church regularly? By that measure, Ramil wasn’t; neither were the majority of people he knew. He prayed, but most often in his heart.

“You feel funny talking about it?” Karr asked.

“What?”

“Religion.”

He did feel funny, Ramil thought. But he shrugged and smiled, and was glad that the waiter was just arriving with their drinks. Karr was a good kid, but he wasn’t the sort of person one discussed religion with.

Charlie Dean, maybe, though Dean was a man of very few words. Dean had a depth born from experience, a weathered pain that could understand something as complicated as religion, or a human soul.

“Pretty mosque. You been in it?” Karr asked.

“No,” said Ramil. “If I’m not needed, maybe I’ll go visit tomorrow.”

“Sounds good.”

They sat in silence a while. Then Karr suddenly rose, his beer barely touched. “My head’s a lot better, Doc. Thanks for takin’ a look.”

“I got the impression Ms. Telach wouldn’t take no for an answer.”

“Yeah, Mom’s like that.”

“She’s not really your mother, is she?”

Karr laughed so hard his face turned red. The waiter ran over.

“Maybe I better finish this,” Karr said, sitting back down and picking up the beer. “Some thoughts require alcohol.”