“I’d give a lot to learn how you know this.”
“Enough to help me with my own pressing crisis?”
“Can’t and won’t.”
“Then with regret, I must refuse.”
“Even if it means I take my business and my future favors elsewhere?”
Sameh remained silent.
“Look. Whatever it is you’ve got cooking, it doesn’t compare to the problem we’re facing here.”
“It does to the family whose child is missing.”
Duboe chopped the air, as though trying to cut off the words before they reached his ears. “There are people looking for a reason to take my head.”
“Because of these missing Americans?”
“ ’Fraid so.”
“Does that mean I will be made a target as well?”
“Not if you don’t blab.” Duboe had never looked more serious. Or more tightly focused. “Whatever you want from me, it’s going to require going outside the bounds. And I can’t do that now. Give me what I need here, and I’m back in a position where I might be able to bend the rules and help out an ally. But not right now.”
Sameh had a dozen responses, but postponed them all. For the moment. “Tell me the rest.”
“The third person missing is also a woman. Hannah Brimsley. Aide to a local pastor.”
Sameh shut his eyes against the glare beyond the shadows. “You are certain?”
“She worked at the main Green Zone church. Been here about a year.”
Sameh kept his eyes shut against the prospect of carrying this news back to the Imam Jaffar. The vizier would be delighted with this news. Thrilled beyond words. “What you’re telling me is that Hannah Brimsley is a Western missionary.”
“Alex Baird is the number one concern here. The official word is, Alex put in for leave. Personnel claims he took off for the Red Sea. But he didn’t say anything to me about a vacation. Or eloping with Hannah, which is the other rumor floating around. He’s been buddies with Hannah and Claire for a while, sure. But their connection has all been about church, far as I know.”
“Would Alex Baird have mentioned anything to you if there was more between them?”
“I already told you. We were pals. You don’t just fly off from here without letting your buddies know. It isn’t done.”
Sameh looked at Duboe. “Take off your sunglasses, please.”
Barry Duboe obviously did not want to comply, but he did so. He looked intense, combat ready.
Sameh said, “There is more at stake here than simply your concern for a missing friend.”
“All I know for certain is, last week Alex had a serious confrontation with the ambassador’s deputy. Guy by the name of Jordan Boswell. Real piece of work.”
“What was the argument about?”
“No idea.”
“This is very curious,” Sameh said. “It is almost Arab.”
“Alex left a message on my phone. Said he was done trying to go through channels. He was going to go check out something. Might be nothing, might be vital. That was the word he used. Vital. Said he was going with a local man. He called this guy a close personal friend.”
“Let me guess,” Sameh said. “The local man’s name is Taufiq el-Waziri.”
In response, Duboe offered his most chilling smile. Death with teeth. “I knew I was right to come to you. Name your price.”
“I want more than just your money. I want your help with a missing child.”
“You can say that as many times as you like, and nothing is going to change. You get access upon delivery. And not an instant before.” Duboe’s expression was a steel door. “Until you deliver, I don’t know you. It’s safer that way. For both of us.”
Sameh had never demanded payment in advance. It was simply not the Arab way. But it was also thoroughly un-Arab to start a negotiation with a direct refusal. Sameh pictured the amount he had planned to charge and doubled it. “I want ten thousand dollars now, and another ten when this is done. Plus expenses.”
Duboe reached to the back seat, opened his briefcase, and pulled out an envelope. “I came with thirty. Take it. There’s a risk I might get reassigned for asking the wrong questions.”
“What is it you have me involved in here?”
“Apparently something worth thirty thousand dollars.” He slammed his briefcase shut, closed the locks, then turned his bullet gaze back to Sameh. “You’re going to earn every penny of that money. There’s a man just in from Washington. His name is Marc Royce. Brand spankin’ new. He’s also your official liaison. Don’t ask me why. This is just how it is.”
“What do you want me to do with him?”
This time, Duboe’s grin held actual humor. “I have no idea.”
Chapter Eight
T he Jeep ferrying Marc pulled up in front of the trio of giant hangars doing time as warehouses. Marc knew this because they were surrounded by squared-off mountains of what was likely armament and gear, all lashed down and encased in camouflage tarps. The Jeep passed through the right-hand hangar’s main doors and halted beside a pair of desert-colored vehicles. His driver said, “Your contact is the lieutenant sitting at the table there by the Rhino. Have a good trip, sir.”
The lieutenant rose from where he was seated with three other soldiers and a man in civvies. The raw-boned officer was named Lucky. Marc knew this because it was sewn onto his chest lapel. It was also what the driver had shouted before driving off. Lieutenant Lucky.
The officer had the thousand-yard stare of a hard-timer. The first words out of his mouth were, “I owe Barry Duboe big-time.”
Marc replied, “I don’t owe him yet. But I soon will.”
“How did you hook up with the man?”
“Friend of a friend.”
Lucky nodded, then said, “That friend. Was it Alex Baird?”
Marc responded with a quick nod of his own.
A dozen or so guys were clustered at the back of the hangar, playing cards and shouting their impatient nerves. None of them looked directly at Marc, but he knew they were watching. A long trestle table stretched between where he stood with the lieutenant and the two armored vehicles. The hood on the larger beast was open, and a pair of mechanics stood on ladders with their upper halves lost inside the maw.
Marc asked the officer, “You knew Alex how?”
“From church. There’s only one in the Green Zone. For most of the people who go there, one is all they need. You follow?”
Four people remained seated around this end of the table. The books opened in front of each person were Bibles. Well worn. Heavily marked. The civilian seated next to the lieutenant’s chair met Marc’s gaze. His look was as hard as the lieutenant’s. A silent challenge. For what reason, Marc had no idea.
“You’re saying the Green Zone church is a haven,” Marc said. “A place to meet and talk in safety. Find new friends. Forge connections. Find a taste of sanity.”
Lucky exchanged a glance with the civilian. The other troopers seated at the table did not appear to have heard a thing. Lucky said, “Duboe told me you were a civvie.”
“I worked with Alex for almost six years. We stayed in touch. I owe the man.”
“Debts,” Lucky said. “Amazing where they take you.”
The trestle table was perhaps forty feet long. The rest of its length was covered with combat gear, maps, and electronics. Two enlisted men sat at the table’s far end. One answered the phone and called, “Lucky, the ’Racks are good to go.”
