by Lynda Filler
Luke watched the big screen.
“Dr. Azar was carrying a Nike gym bag and his laptop case. His wife was in the background.” RB typed something on his laptop.
“The boys are sending a video.” Two of Luke’s operatives stood over an apparently dead body.
Sahar gasped! “No!”
“And his wife?”
RB received a call on his cell phone. He nodded, looked at Luke and shook his head.
“She’s disappeared.”
Luke shook his head.
“Alright. You know what to do. Get the rest of the tapes. The CCTV shots too. Go back to the airport and follow the trail. Get the car info and trace it.” Luke stopped. “Why am I telling you what to do?”
“Habit. I’m all over it.”
Luke needed a break. Jack paced in the back of the room, quietly speaking with Sandy on his cell. Nothing was happening at his compound. When one of Luke’s teams reached Jack’s family lake house, everyone was safe and secure. Raven told the team to stay in place until further notice.
“RB, you might receive a call from Luci. She will probably have some specific requests. She’s on her way to Hungary.”
RB nodded without looking up.
Luke left the room. Rolling his shoulders, he headed towards the gym. Even fifteen minutes would help him ease the tension Raven felt in his body. He needed to forget about the soft and sexy side of Samaar. That woman had just threatened his life.
He wished he could be upset. Unfortunately, he understood Luci correctly.
27
Serbia, Hungary Border
THE DAY DAWNED dark and dreary in the wintry town ten miles from the city of Szeged Hungary. Ten miles from the city and freedom. Rasha hung her head in shame. She’d promised to protect herself and her daughter. She’d sworn a vow to her husband she would get to France. She would somehow get revenge for her husband and the insanity that’s torn the family apart.
The child clasped her mother’s hand. She was too young to know everything that was happening, but she understood enough to no longer complain when she was hungry or to cry for her father.
Rasha looked out from the back of the packed school building. The cement was cracked, worn, and fatigued from the thousands of refugees who had converted it into lodging. The desolate town was overrun with dejection and displaced people.
“I’ve been here with my husband for three weeks. No one is crossing through.” A woman covered in a full burqa whispered softly in classic Arabic, so most would not understand.
“The Hungarians have closed their borders. The Human Rights workers said it was illegal and that a battle was raging in the higher courts. Still, they are re-enforcing their border walls and have stopped taking any requests for passage through. I hope you have access to another way to cross.”
Rasha watched large military trucks pull up to the barbwire fence. Further down the muddy roadway, they were constructing a secondary wall.
“This new fence is electrified and has cameras. You can hear guard dogs roaming at night.”
The woman smiled sadly at Rasha and looked down at her daughter.
“My three children were killed when military forces bombed their school.”
Rasha was horrified. How could the woman go on living with so much pain in her heart? She reached for the woman’s hand.
The child sensed her mother’s despondency. She pulled on her arm and mumbled something Rasha couldn’t here.
“What is it Amira?” The mother’s heart was broken, and her mind thousands of miles away.
“Momma.”
“Yes, Amira.” Rasha leaned down to hear her.
“Momma, why do you have blood on your face?”
Rasha swiped at the wound from last night’s encounter. She probably needed first aid. She had no idea precisely what had happened. But she was grateful that she had no blood between her thighs. She turned back to the woman she’d been speaking with, but she’d already left.
“Come little one. It’s nothing. Let’s go see if we can find the kind man from last night. He will know where I can find a doctor to check me.”
Reassured, Amira dragged her child’s knapsack on the floor behind her, no longer caring if Cinderella got dirty. Sometimes when her mother was distant and sad like that, Amira became afraid. If momma would only smile, she would know everything would be all right.
Rasha pushed her way through scores of depressed and destitute people arriving on foot and by the busloads. They all smelled of desperation and defeat. But some refused to let go of their only hope, passage through Hungary. Most were Syrian, proud, sometimes educated, and fearful of the bias they knew existed for Muslims in the West. Still, they pressed forward. There would be no turning back.
She walked through overcrowded town squares, occasionally stumbling on broken concrete or empty tin cans. She imagined this town was once charming; but now it was so overrun with refugees and refuge, it was dirty and rancid. She glanced behind her, worried her attackers from last night would come back.
Hastily set up tables lined the main streets, blankets, clothing, and the food was offered to the weary crowds. Rasha searched the faces of the aid workers looking for her savior from last night but couldn’t find him.
After some time, she was ready to give up. They’d arrived late at night. Everyone needed sleep, and these people were volunteers. She should be grateful, not annoyed.
“We’ll go over there and get something to eat.”
Rasha stood in line. When it was her turn, a woman passed out cheese and bread and warm liquid. Maybe it will be a broth with meat. She and Amira found a place against a wall and sat down to eat.
“Excuse me,” Rasha asked an aid worker for help. “Is there a medical facility here?”
“Yes, Doctors Without Borders are out that doorway and two buildings down in the fire hall.”
“Thank you.”
Rasha turned to look for Amira. She had sat down beside a scruffy young Syrian boy. He was unkempt and listless. Amira touched his face and wiped tears that were falling down his cheeks.
Rasha stood speechless listening to her seven-year-old daughter.
“Where is your mother?” The child looked away and wiped tears from his eyes.
“Did you hear me?” Amira sounded so much like Rasha that she had to smile. Rasha looked around at the long lineups of people. Where was his family?
The child’s hair was matted, and his wool jacket was too big and falling off his frail body. Rasha guessed his age at five, maybe six.
Amira carried on a conversation which consisted of whispers and shrugs. Finally, she reached for the boy’s hand and stood up.
She walked toward her mother.
“Momma, this is Karam. He has no mother. He’s hungry. And he is coming with us.” Amira’s determination was scary. Who is this child?
“Where is your mother?”
“Gone.”
“Momma. Karam says she went to sleep on the bus. But a doctor told him she is with the angels now.”
The boy named Karam looked down, tears falling again. “Do you have any papers?”
He shook his head.
Rasha looked around. She noticed an aid worker watching the exchange. She took Amira and Karam and walked behind the table to speak with the woman.
“Do you know this boy?”
The aid worker nodded, eyes wet, such regret in her eyes.
“What can you do for him?”
The young college-age blond girl shook her head.
“His story has been verified. We don’t know what to do for all the people who are stuck on this border. It’s heartbreaking. He’s not the only child who’s lost his parents. But what can the aid workers do? We are trying so hard. But the world doesn’t seem to care about this human tragedy.”
Rasha saw the hope and determination in Amira’s eyes. She nodded her head and announced.
“Come with us, Karam. We will be your family now.”
Amira
beamed at her mother and put out her hand for her new friend. “Karam. Now you will be my brother!”
What will happen to all the orphans? We can’t save all of them.
The town people were out of sight. Garbage dumpsters stank, filled with useless broken belongings and lost hope. Some shops did business, while others were boarded up. Where were the local people? Then she saw the sign. The language was foreign, but the meaning was universal. Go home. Go back to your country. We don’t want you here.
“Believe me, I don’t want to be here either.”
“What Momma, what are you saying?” Amira’s spirits were lifted by the addition of Karam to her family.
“Nothing my love.”
Rasha reached into the pocket in her coat. Her fingers could feel the paper she carried stitched into the lining pocket. She needed privacy to access more of the Euros she’d added to the hem of her coat. Her husband was a brilliant man. He’d also duplicated his work on a tiny thumb drive, the one Amira had inside the cover of her backpack. They’d been physically equipped, but nothing could prepare Rasha for this feeling of utter hopelessness.
Rasha tripped over more rubble on the street corner and landed on her side. She cried out from the hopelessness of their situation more than the pain to her shoulder.
“Momma?” Amira sat down on the broken pavement, in the forlorn dilapidated border town in Serbia. “Momma.” Amira leaned in and hugged her mother and gave her a kiss. “Everything will be okay Momma, I promise you.”
Where has my child gone? Rasha was sore and despondent from her encounter last night, and her child was trying to mother her.
She’d have to be very careful tonight. Now she had another life to care for. She vowed to be strong for all three of them.
28
Paris, France
THE CESSNA CITATION was waiting for Luci at Le Bourget. Luke’s Paris office had provided the equipment and papers Luci would need. She had no plan other than to arrive at the closest border to Serbia where Rasha and her daughter were waiting.
A file folder had been prepared with the most up-to-date material available on the area surrounding Dala, Tiszasziget, Serbia.
The pilot received takeoff instructions while Luci settled in to read. The entire world was aware of the refugee crisis, but most were so involved in their own lives they had no time to understand or care.
Over 6 million people are displaced within Syria and another 5.6 million are refugees. Luci quickly pulled up Wikipedia on her phone—out of total pre-war population of 22 million. How is that even possible?
Over 3 million of those people are living in Turkey. Some have integrated into Lebanon and Jordan. The rest have journeyed to the West. On boats, through the mountains, and on foot. Anyone that has the moral fortitude to make that journey should be welcome in any nation. She continued reading.
Close to half a million Syrian citizens have been killed in Syria. In 2013 the Assad regime was accused of using chemical weapons against rebel-held suburbs outside Damascus. More than 1,400 people were estimated to have suffocated to death in Ghouta including women and children. At that time, Syria had to acknowledge the possession of chemical weapons, and the U. N. Security Council got them to agree to destroy their stockpile.
The world hailed “The Framework for the Elimination of Syrian Chemical Weapons.” Israel expressed cautious optimism but was skeptical that Syria would comply. Now Israel’s a country she understood well. It grew out of the refugees that fled Hitler’s war. Millions of people were gassed in the greatest genocide of the twentieth century. But the 21st century would most likely see even worse atrocities.
She pulled her thoughts in and continued. Years after Assad had supposedly destroyed all the country’s chemical weapons, new reports were coming out of Syria. U. N. investigators concluded: “chemical weapons continue to be used in the ongoing conflict between the parties in the Syrian Arab Republic, also against civilians, including children, on a relatively regular basis.”
Luci thought of Alice and the life on the run that she’d lived with Luci. The world was a scary place. As long as evil existed, and it had since the beginning of time, there would be men and women demanding more, overthrowing governments, murdering and slaughtering their own people—generally in the name of some twisted and mis-interpreted doctrine of a higher power.
Luci fingered the knife inside her boot, and the Glock on the seat beside her. Inevitably her thoughts went back to her teenage years and the day she’d heard her parents had died by a suicide bomber. Her fate had been sealed that day. Her burning desire to right the world’s wrongs was embedded in her soul. The difference between today and then, Israel no longer controlled her. Luci became an assassin for their ideas of right and wrong, and she was forced to kill on their behalf. Even when she was lent to MI6 for joint intelligence operations, she was expected to move in and out of Arab countries and kill. She was done with rationalizing murky wars and working with corrupt first-world politicians. Today, she fought for what she believed to be right. And Luke would never ask her to risk her life for anything that wasn’t morally correct.
Luci turned to the topographical map of the surrounding area from the airport to Dala. Then she switched to Google Earth to formulate a plan. They’d already determined a rendezvous. Now the question was how to get in and out without causing an international incident.
But first, she needed to send a message.
30
The Port of Seattle, WA
TWO MIDDLE EASTERN men parked their SUV on a busy industrial street. They placed hard hats on their heads and reflective vests over their suit jackets. To the casual observer, they would appear to be busy executives inspecting the reconfiguration work on Pier 4 at the Northwest Seaport Alliance Office. One carried a clipboard, the other a Nike sports bag. They knew whom to look for and precisely where to go.
They paid for an additional night at the airport hotel and hung a ‘do not disturb’ sign on the door. The scientist would be found tomorrow. All signs would indicate a heart attack.
His wife had been clueless. Her husband had left her in the lobby, waiting for him to do business and return to the airport for their trip to Paris. Ahmed’s partner had walked her back to the vehicle on the pretense her husband was on his way down from his room. He gently assisted her now dead body to a less visible position on the back seat of the car. To the casual observer speeding by at 50 mph, she would appear to be asleep. In a more private location, they moved her corpse to its resting place in the trunk of the vehicle. The cleaners would dispose of her body and the SUV later today.
The exchange went smoothly. The captain of the freighter carried the precious cargo and an envelope filled with cash towards his vehicle and would drive to the pier where his fishing trawler was moored. He was scheduled to take the boat out to sea and rendezvous with a helicopter later this evening. He’d done some very lucrative business in the past carrying “medical” supplies—some might call it trafficking in human organs—and simply assumed this was more of the same.
The businessmen took their time returning to the SUV, their part of the project complete. By midnight tonight, they would be in a car, out of state, past Oregon, and over the California border. By morning they would board a flight heading towards Damascus.
“Allah be praised.”
Their boss would be pleased. Ahmed prayed he would live to see the results of their work. As they drove away, they hoped to avoid a nasty looking squall moving in from the northwest. The unseasonal sunshine slowly disappeared behind moody clouds.
31
Anacortes, WA
“LUKE, THE BOYS have checked in.” RB found Raven in the kitchen.
Luke sat at the counter in the cozy farm-style kitchen, a complete contrast to how he lived in his high-tech world. RB always thought it must have been a throwback to his early years spent on a ranch in New Mexico. RB suspected Luke’s mind was on Luci.
“How’s Dr. Faisal doing?” Luke had a soft side
to him that he allowed very few people to experience.
“She’s sleeping. I didn’t want to wake her.”
Lorena, who’d kept a laid-back profile during this ordeal, arrived with Alice in her arms. Alice was smothering her with kisses and begging for ice cream.
Luke looked up from his sandwich.
“Alright, have you figured out what they did at the docks?” He spoke to RB, but his eyes were on Alice. She’d grown so much since he’d last seen her.
“Yes, our guys went in with Homeland ID’s and demanded the security tapes for the past three hours.”
“Good.”
“Luke!!” A tiny person stood before him pulling on his pant leg.
“Yes, Miss Alice. How can I help you?”
“Where ith my momma?”
“She had to take a trip on a plane. But she’ll be home soon.”
“How much time is thoon?” She gave Luke that stubborn look she’d learned from Luci.
“Let me think. Maybe tomorrow or the next day. But she left me instructions for you.”
Alice looked up warily, her Dolly clutched in her arms.
“Yeth?”
“She said Lorena and Maggs were to give you ice cream with chocolate sauce every day she was gone.” Luke scooped Alice up into his arms, and she covered his face with kisses.
“I love you.” She whispered into Luke’s ear.
Luke’s heart was catapulted back in time. Another little girl once sat on this very lap, saying those exact words. The loss of his family had eased but would never truly heal. Having Samaar and Alice in his world again reinforced that it was time to put the past away. Maybe he could get Samaar to listen this time around.