They sat in the small living room after Khan told his wife to get out and bring them chai. A few minutes later she brought them green qehwa tea and a plate of qalaqand sweets and left, silent as a ghost. The Palestinian showed the photo of the young woman, Bharati, to Khan, and they went over the plan and the al Jabbar code sign. The helicopter pilot demanded more money.
“You any idea how expensive it is in Fortaleza? That’s where her family’s from. Once I leave here, there’s no coming back, bro’,” Khan said.
“You’re getting half a million dollars. You’ll be a king in Brazil,” the Palestinian said. “But if you really aren’t interested…” He got up to leave. Khan grabbed his arm. The Palestinian looked at him, and there was something in the look that made Khan let him go.
“Who said I’m not interested?” he protested. “I just need more.”
“I got false passports for you and her. What more do you want?”
“Another two hundred thousand. That’s it, I swear.”
“A good Muslim doesn’t swear.” The Palestinian started to leave. “What you ask is impossible.”
“Wait! One hundred thousand.”
“I don’t have it,” the Palestinian said. He’d expected the Pakistani to pull something like this, and it could destroy the entire American operation. His bluff had to work. “I’ll find another pilot.”
“Fifty thousand. That’s all! I’ll fly so low she’ll be able to count the fillings in people’s teeth.”
The Palestinian stopped. “Fifty thousand. Five now, the rest after-in Brazil.”
“Fifty,” Khan agreed, and they shook hands.
The Palestinian took the subway to Sunset Park. He went to the bank, got the five thousand, and FedExed it to Khan. The rest of the money didn’t matter. He knew he’d never have to pay it.
That evening he caught a flight to Chicago. He met Liz on the curb outside Terminal 5 at O’Hare Airport. She had set up the Chicago part of the operation with an Afghani college student from Marquette Park. The American operation was almost finished. She would fly to London, say hello to Mum, because she wasn’t talking to Daddy, then fly back to Rome to help at the warehouse; he would go to Los Angeles and join her the next day in Rome. He kissed her, and for a moment she clung to him. People pulled their wheeled luggage around them on their way to the terminal entrance.
“It’s really going to happen, isn’t it?” she whispered.
“Inshallah, yes. God willing.”
“I don’t like being without you,” she said, pressing against him.
“I’ll see you in Rome,” he said, pulling away and heading over to the shuttle.
On the flight to Los Angeles he wondered whether these extra actions were worth the risk. What happened in Chicago and L.A. didn’t matter. At best they were diversions. In fact, if there were any problems, he might call the FBI himself with an anonymous tip. Anything to keep them from focusing on the Bangladeshi girl and her cargo. He landed in Los Angeles before noon, and by nightfall he was back at LAX to catch the Lufthansa flight via Frankfurt to Rome.
Sitting in business class and pretending to read a Stern magazine over a Bloody Mary, he tried to sort out the thousand pieces that still needed to come together: the group, training, and fitting that still needed to be completed, the final arming, the forged papers. So many pieces. The biggest piece was the twenty-one kilos that weren’t enough to make a bomb, and whether they could complete the circle. He couldn’t be sure till he got back to Rome.
And then, whether it was the vodka or his letdown at having the American part of the operation finally in place, or the sheer femaleness of Liz, the memory of the day that had made him who he was came to him like a nightmare. His hand gripped the arm of the seat as he remembered the night lit bright by the flares and the intense heat, the sounds of soldiers, the fear that made him wet himself, and her eyes looking at him.
He finished his drink and tried to get control of himself. He pressed the button for the stewardess to bring him another. This jihad he had committed himself to was so hard, so schwierig, he thought in German. He checked his watch. Hamburg was nine hours ahead of Los Angeles. It was just after six in the morning there. No one would be in the management company office yet, but he could leave a message to be forwarded. He wondered if he should chance it. He was losing a full day on the flight to Europe due to the time change, and was almost certain that in less than a week he would be dead.
His hand trembling, he started to reach for the phone in the seat back in front of him and was about to call when he remembered all the security cameras at the Frankfurt airport and that all in-flight calls were monitored, and knew it was impossible. It was stupid to have even thought of it. He took a deep breath and reminded himself who he was. “You are the most important man in the world,” the blind imam in Utrecht had told him.
“Dankeschon,” he said to the stewardess when she brought him the drink. He finished it and, once more in control, his hands dead steady, tilted the seat back to try to get some sleep. He would kill the nightmare, he thought. He felt better now. He was ready to die.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Castelnuovo, Italy
The safe house was a villa in the Lazio region, some twenty-five kilometers north of Rome. It was on an unmarked country road off the SS3, shaded by overhanging trees, their leaves dusty in the sunlight. The villa was surrounded by high hedges and could not be seen from the road, and the minute Scorpion turned his rented Fiat into the lane, he knew he was under surveillance. He spotted glints of sunlight reflected from camera lenses hidden in the foliage, and a man at a villa across the way, dressed in shorts and a gaudy shirt that only a tourist would wear, was taking enough time watering a row of flowers to drown the roses. As he parked the car on the grassy shoulder, he glanced in the rearview mirror and saw a Mercedes sedan parked on the side of the road near the corner behind him. If it was a trap, it was already too late; he was boxed in.
He got out of the car, and as he opened the wrought-iron entrance gate, caught the shadow of a silhouette on the roof. Sniper, he thought. They had him. He wasn’t going anywhere. He walked up the flagstone path to the villa, painted a holiday pink and white, and rang the bell. A trim young woman in shorts and a U2 T-shirt opened the door.
“Signor Mangazzoni?” she said. Although she was smiling, she kept her right hand behind her, and he’d have bet serious money she was holding a gun.
“Sono Nicolo Mangazzoni.” I am Nicolo Mangazzoni. “I’m here to see Signor Fantini,” he said in his limited Italian.
“Entri prego. He’s waiting for you in the dining room,” she said, indicating the way. He walked into the dining room and found Bob Harris, looking like a Ralph Lauren ad in white slacks and a polo shirt, fiddling with a computer hookup. The dining room opened to a terrace that looked out over the trees and across the valley to the medieval town of Castelnuovo di Porto perched on the steep green hills.
“Have a drink,” Harris said, gesturing at the bottle of J amp;B whiskey on the terrace. Scorpion went outside, mixed himself a drink with ice and soda, and came back in.
“Nice view. You feeling nervous?”
“What do you mean?” Harris said, looking annoyed at the computer.
“The SAS team crawling all over this place. Why didn’t you take out an ad?”
“There’s a lot going on,” Harris said, raising his glass. “Cin cin.”
“Vaffanculo,” Scorpion said, putting his drink down without drinking. “Why did the DGSE detain Najla Kafoury at the Marseilles airport?”
Harris’s answer was a stunner. “They didn’t.”
“What do you mean they didn’t? Who did?”
“We’re not sure.”
“This is bullshit. Where is she?”
“We don’t know.”
“You’re becoming tiresome, Bob. At the very least, these little meetings of ours always had a certain entertainment value.”
