The Blue Widows - [Kamal & Barnea 06] Read online

  The terrible incident during her brief college tenure in the United States could have driven a stake between them, but instead it served only to draw them closer. From that moment on, Abdullah Aziz Rahani stopped visiting the palaces of his second wife and family. It was as if Layla was all that mattered to him in this darkest of times, and that, more than anything, was what gave her the strength to survive.

  Today she was every bit as beautiful as she had been then, her features virtually unchanged. But her eyes had lost their spark, their life. She saw it herself in the mirror, knew the sheen returned only when she was immersed in the completion of her father’s plan to make sure the decadent world of the United States would soon ruin no more lives.

  American civilization had to die. If only that could be as easy as killing a person, as easy as letting the rock go and watching it. . .

  ...soar forward, climbing briefly before it came down and smacked her mother’s hooded cheek with a dull thwack.

  Layla stepped back and listened to her mother groan. Then her father took her hand in his as he raised a rock in the other. He hurled it downward and it caught her mother’s skull, snapping her head back a little.

  She cried out this time, as the solemn men dressed in robes came forward, feet crunching the sand, hands clutching rocks and stones of varying sizes. They stopped even with Layla and her father, looking to him for a signal. He muttered a quiet prayer under his breath and then Layla watched him nod ever so slightly. , . .

  “We did what we had to do,” she said, holding her father’s frail hand. “I never loved you more than in that moment, until the day you knelt by my bedside in the hospital and vowed vengeance. You read me the passage of the last of days from the Koran, and I never forgot a word of it.”

  Her father had known the answer lay not in bullets, or atoms, or tiny microbes, all of which would leave the United States free to emerge stronger to seek revenge. That was where the terrorists had erred so badly in their calculations. Misjudging America’s resolve, her capacity and willingness to strike back.

  So the answer was not to kill, not to strike overtly. The answer lay in subtlety, striking America in a way so that the realization of the attack would come too late to matter. By that time the great power of the West would be dying, powerless to help itself. A slow, lingering death that would leave the United States no one to lash back at.

  Smallpox was just a tiny beginning, utilized to bring about a much more definitive end.

  Because the smallpox would merely provide the catalyst. And once it was released the true substance of her father’s plan would be set in motion, unstoppable, its ultimate success inevitable.

  Fate smiled. Fortune grinned.

  Then, suddenly, fate’s expression had changed a month ago when she made a trip to a London jewelry store and saw a diamond ring featured in the display case. A ring she knew very well because her mother had often let her wear it on her thumb as a child. Once she thought she’d lost it and spent the entire day in terror searching, only to learn her mother had slipped the ring from her hand as she slept. Layla had stared through the glass of the London jewelry store’s display case at the ring in utter disbelief, trying to make sense of the sight, find some explanation for it other than the incredible possibility that her mother was still alive.

  Suddenly the culmination of her father’s plan of vengeance against America no longer seemed as important. Another task awaited her, equally dire and pressing. She had traced the ring’s origins from the London jewelry store to a much smaller one in the Old City of Jerusalem. Then she dispatched Hassan to Umm al Fahm in Israel, which should have been the end of it and would have been if an Israeli detective hadn’t doggedly pursued the investigation.

  Why would the murder of an old Israeli-Arab woman matter to Danielle Barnea? Why would it matter to anyone?

  Layla Aziz Rahani’s thoughts were interrupted by the chirp of her cell phone.

  “Barnea’s in Washington,” said the voice of the Saudi Arabian double agent with a pipeline into Israeli intelligence. “She’s been to the Israeli embassy.”

  “I’m still waiting for you to send me everything you have on her.”

  “Everything?”

  “Is that a problem?”

  “Not if you have a lot of time to read.”

  “I intend to have plenty soon,” said Layla Aziz Rahani.

  * * * *

  Chapter 55

  T

  hey’ re led by a man named Hollis Buchert,” Van Dam resumed when Ben said nothing. “Formerly based in Idaho but with satellite groups in a dozen locations all over the country and still dedicated to overthrowing the government.”

  “Formerly,” Ben repeated.

  “The brigade’s base compound was raided ten months ago, almost two dozen killed and at least that many captured by the FBI, after one of their agents died in the shootout. The details remain sketchy. A private group was suspected of doing some of the killing. There are stories about a woman infiltrating the base on her own. You haven’t heard any of this before?”

  “No,” Ben said, even number.

  “You know nothing of this woman.”

  Ben shook his head demonstratively.

  “And you’ve never had any previous contact with the People’s Brigade?”

  “None.”

  Ben tried to make sense of what Van Dam was saying, pictured the People’s Brigade wiping out the rest of the terrorists Operation Flypaper had lured together and ending up with the smallpox. But this wasn’t Buchert’s plan; Akram Khalil’s assassination proved that. Khalil had set up Buchert, just as someone else had set up Khalil.

  “We should talk more about your brother, Mr. Kamal,” said Van Dam.

  “This isn’t about my brother,” Ben told him, forcing the words out. “It never was.”

  “But he’s been involved, knowingly or not, through sponsorship and support, with terrorists. He’s helped a few of them melt into our society and disappear, including two of the men who were found dead in that house. It’s not a good time to keep the wrong friends in this country, Mr. Kamal. I shouldn’t need to tell you that.”

  Ben rose to his feet so he could look Van Dam in the eye. “You’ve got to let me out of here.”

  “We can help you find your brother. Tell us where to look.”

  “And I’m supposed to trust you. . . .”

  “I’m all you’ve got.”

  “The State Department was all Lewanthall had, Mr. Van Dam, and look where that got him.”

  * * * *

  Chapter 56

  W

  hat now, Mr. Jenkins?” Danielle asked the CIA man, when they pulled up across the street from the State Department.

  She had rendezvoused with the man near the Korean War Memorial on the Mall, not sure if Jenkins was his real name or not. She had expected the CIA man to be standoffish and bitter over being forced into this favor. Surprisingly, he was simply relieved, it seemed, to finally be rid of the debt he had owed Colonel al-Asi, who had saved the life of his son.

  For her part, Danielle fought against the distraction caused by Hyram Berger’s final words to her: If Hanna Frank had been stoned to death, who was Zanah Fahury? Danielle thought she had begun to figure everything out. Now she had to reconsider her information, especially the connection between the old Israeli-Arab woman’s murder and the killing of Akram Khalil. That had been the link she had followed to the source of the end of all things. Without it, she had nothing.

  Soon, though, she would have Ben.

  “How do we handle this?” Danielle continued, when Jenkins remained silent.

  “I have something for you,” the man from the CIA said, reaching into his pocket.

  “Transfer documents so you can take Ben Kamal into your custody,” she said hopefully.

  His eyes scoffed at her. “Hardly.”

  “I thought—”

  “You thought we could simply walk into the State Department and take custody of their prisoner
? This isn’t Israel, Ms. Barnea.” Jenkins finally produced a single, thin envelope. “You’ll find a State Department identification and badge inside the envelope, complete with your picture.

  “My picture?”

  “There are tunnels running under the State Department connecting it to the White House, Capitol, every major building in Washington. Updated in the wake of September 11, 2001, for use in an emergency or to access the underground bunkers reserved for high-level personnel.”

  Jenkins stopped and gazed across the street at the State Department’s imposing structure.

  “There are no detention facilities inside the State Department,” he continued. “Your friend Mr. Kamal is being held in an area of rooms for personnel stranded in the city, or too busy to go home.”

  “The access to these tunnels...”

  “I’ll get you that far and point you in the right direction. The tunnels rely on an electronic surveillance system that includes video cameras that will be conveniently down for the next two hours until. . .” Jenkins checked his watch. “. . . six o’clock. But if you’re caught in the tunnels or the building, I won’t be able to help you.”

  Danielle opened the envelope and inspected the ID card and badge. “You mean, if these don’t hold up.”

  “I did the best I could on short notice, Ms. Barnea. You can tell your friend the colonel this makes us even.”

  * * * *

  Chapter 57

  B

  en sat on the edge of the bed, face buried in his palms. He felt helpless again, his mother lost to him just as his wife and children were years before. The feeling too painful, too familiar, too much to bear.

  We’ll be safe, his brother Sayeed had assured him, confident in the protection provided in his own world by men beholden to him. But those men had not been enough. Two had died, taking two of the enemy with them. The others had fled.

  Ben started picturing it in his head, battling his brain to stop and failing.

  The house stormed in an all-out assault by Hollis Buchert’s men deep in the night. Sayeed’s guards caught by surprise but still able to fight back, mount enough of a response for Sayeed to gather up the family. His mother killed, sacrificing herself so Sayeed and his family could get out. This final part was cloudy and vague but Ben somehow knew it was true. Or maybe that was merely his way of lending some value to his mother’s death and helping to absolve himself of the guilt that racked him.

  Ben imagined what it would have been like if Van Dam had delivered the news that Sayeed, his wife, Irsi, and their two children were dead too. He shuddered, wrapped his arms about himself, and drummed his feet on the tile floor.

  If you get in trouble, if you can’t reach me, go to the cabin on Saginaw Bay and I’ll meet you there. . . .

  Those had been Ben’s instructions to Sayeed, and now everything rested in the hope that he had complied. The cabin, pride and joy of Ben’s father during his brief time in the States and a place few were aware existed. Ben’s mother had stubbornly refused to sell the cabin, even though no one in the family had used it since his father had left and never returned. She’d never even had the deed changed from the fake name Jafir Kamal had given the seller after the real estate agent had warned he didn’t like Arabs. So anyone trying to follow Sayeed’s movements would be hard-pressed to trace him to the cabin, nestled hundreds of miles from Dearborn.

  Ben hadn’t told Van Dam about his instructions to Sayeed and had no intention of doing so. That would lead only to more men being dispatched and the very real possibility that the wrong ones would reach the cabin first.

  Hollis Buchert. . .

  If only he and Danielle had killed him when they’d had the chance. Because they hadn’t, Buchert had gone underground and had ended up taking delivery of the smallpox from Mohammed Latif after it was stolen from USAMRIID.

  Ben rose from the side of the bed and felt his knees crack from the sudden movement. He tried to stretch some blood and life back into his arms, then lowered himself to the floor, slid under the bed, and began to feel along the mattress for a bedspring, something steel and sharp he could turn into a pick to unlock the door to his room. It took only a few minutes for his probing fingers to find a strand of thick steel wire looped through a slot that allowed the bed to be adjusted.

  He shimmied farther under the bed and worked his hand about the wire, trying to loosen and stretch it. The final twist came quicker than he expected and the wire hit the floor with a clink. He pawed the floor for the wire, closed on its still-curled shape, and pushed himself back out from under the bed.

  * * * *

  Chapter 58

  T

  he tunnels underneath the buildings of the State Department were well lit and surprisingly clean. Not what Danielle had expected at all. Then again, they were seldom used, and few knew of their expansive extent.

  The tunnels were constructed of ten-foot-wide channels that curved their way beneath the center of Washington, twisting in corkscrew fashion to avoid the adjacent Metro tunnels. Jenkins had guided Danielle to an entrance disguised as a Metro stop under construction.

  “How many of these are there in the city?” she had asked Jenkins.

  “Enough,” the CIA man had said evasively. “Not all of them disguised the same way this one is.”

  “And not just for emergency escape either.”

  Jenkins hadn’t bothered trying to deny her assertion. “No. They also provide essential personnel a wide number of access points to use in the event of that same emergency. These are people who have to get to their desks no matter what. The world ends, that’s where you’ll find them, so long as they can get there,” he’d said. “Thanks to these tunnels, they should be able to.”

  Jenkins had led Danielle down the stairs to a steel slab door marked construction personnel only. He’d used a strangely shaped key to unlock it and then shoved the door open. Its bottom had scratched against the rough asphalt, screeching metallically.

  “Don’t I need that?” Danielle had asked, as he repocketed the key.

  “The doors open from the inside, not the out,” Jenkins had explained. “This is the closest one to the State Department annex, but there are others located close by to the west and south. Follow the tunnels with the red lines along the walls to station forty-two. The door there leads directly up into the section of the State Department equipped with the overnight rooms.” Jenkins had reached into his pocket and emerged with a key card, which he handed to Danielle “You’ll find Ben Kamal in the room marked R on the fourth floor of the building.”

  Ben had managed to straighten the bedspring wire but was having no luck at all deciphering the door’s delicate lock mechanism. He had never tried to pick a door from the inside, much less one that was activated electronically. For all he knew, it might not even be possible.

  Still Ben continued to try, easing the wire into the mechanism, searching for tumblers that continued to elude him. At least he was doing something, although it was hardly enough to take his mind off his mother.

  He had thought his return to America would reinvigorate the relationship with her as well as with his brother. But his work for Security Concepts had conspired against his plans, both in terms of time and logistics. He could do nothing about the relocation of the company’s headquarters from Detroit to Boston and very little about the long hours and travel the job required. Ben had never really quizzed John Najarian on his exact responsibilities, assuming they would be mundane if not boring.

  But 9/11 changed all that. Suddenly private security companies were being asked to take on jobs previously entrusted to professional law enforcement personnel, now severely strapped for time, or never entrusted to anyone at all. Ben’s police experience, coupled with his expertise in languages, had made him a valuable asset to a company that grew tenfold in a single year. There were background interviews to be conducted, allegations of corporate espionage to be investigated, security procedures to be designed and taught to dozens of Fortune 500
companies who woke up one morning and found themselves in a different world.

  Danielle’s departure in the wake of Pine Valley had led him to plunge even deeper into his work. Security Concepts became all-consuming, as if he had come home to a business instead of a country. But the money was good and allowed his mother to keep the family cabin when an overdue tax bill climbed well into five figures.