by D S Kane
Her past contacts with Tariq and Pesi Houmaz had never been in person. Two months ago, she had hacked into their bank accounts and moved all the cash—tens of millions of dollars—to a friendly government’s current account. But if it was only the money she’d stolen, wouldn’t they have just cut off her hands? That was the traditional punishment for thieves.
Even more important, had someone at her agency sold her out? Was there a mole? Almost as fast as she thought of the questions, the answer to the last one came. Damn. Of course there was. Who?
There were no easy answers. If she survived this night, she might have the luxury of finding them. Still hyperventilating, Cassie forced herself to sit next to the assassin’s corpse on the floor and whispered a mantra: “Regain focus. Be calm. Regain focus. Be calm.”
The hotel’s alarm clock read 12:32 a.m. She took a deep breath and the lessons she’d been taught returned.
I have to get rid of the corpse to give me time to get out of the country. Cassie rose and walked around the room. Where can I hide him?
All the odors from her battle attacked her like battering rams. Their stench overwhelmed her. She ran to the bathroom, opened the toilet seat and threw up, heaving until her gut ached, leaving her stomach dry and empty. I have to get rid of these odors to enable myself to concentrate. Cassie turned up the air conditioning and headed to the bathroom.
She hurried to the shower, feeling soiled and used, scrubbing her body raw.
While she pulled on a sweater and jeans from the tiny clothes closet by the bathroom, every lesson came back to her, as if she sat in class at The Farm. What to do if you’re forced to kill someone while you’re on foreign soil.
Rule One: To buy time, hide the corpse and take all documentation identifying it. She took all of Abdul’s possessions and stuffed them in her pants pocket. There was sufficient toilet paper to wipe the excrement from Abdul. She rolled his body into the top bed sheet and used the sheet to drag the corpse over the carpet. Abdul was every bit as heavy as he looked. Perspiration dripped from her. Cassie left his corpse by the room’s door. She dressed and removed her tool case from her attaché.
I have to assume Abdul has accomplices waiting somewhere in the hotel.
Holding Abdul’s knife in her hand, Cassie took a deep breath to steady herself, then cracked the door. It felt as if her heart was about to explode. She peeked out to see if anyone waited outside.
No one there. It was quiet. She stepped into the hallway and locked her room door behind her. Videocams were mounted in the most obvious places and she could easily avoid them. She explored the hall until she found the door to the floor’s supply room. It was locked, as expected.
Cassie removed a bump-key lock pick from her tool case to force the door open with a blow from the back end of Abdul’s knife. The first blow knocked the pick out of her hand and sent it skittering across the carpet. She tried again but her unsteady hands missed the pick entirely. Take a deep breath and try once more. This time, she felt the lock pop.
Just inside the door a broomstick without a broom head caught her eye. The top of its neck was sharpened to a point. Odd. She stared at it, trying to decipher if her assassin had placed it there. Further inside, she found supplies on shelves, and linen too. She closed the door but not to the point where the latch caught. She walked back to her hotel room and fetched the corpse. Taking a deep breath to quell her fear that her luck might change at any second, she used the bed sheet to drag his body from her room, down the hall, and into the supply cabinet.
This late at night, Riyadh was silent beyond the noises she made dragging Abdul. She was grateful no one on her floor of the hotel opened a door. Six doors down to the linen supply cabinet. Open the door.
She pulled the sheets off the bottom shelf and stuffed him in. Now tidy up. She placed the other sheets on top and around him, until it looked as if the staff had done a poor job of straightening the shelf. Oh, and a sheet to make up my own bed.
Cassie hoped she’d be gone from the country before the hotel staff found the corpse. Her hands were drenched in sweat as she opened her door. I’ve left DNA evidence behind.
Rule Two: Assemble a false identity and escape looking for all the world like a local. Cassie sprinted back to her room. She rummaged through the false bottom of her attaché case and found several sets of identification papers for a Saudi who looked remarkably like her, including passports and visas. She placed them in a handy pocket to show if demanded by the local authorities. Then she emptied the attaché case of all identification papers—including her Electricity Demand Forecast and the Islamic extremist bank account list—along with anything essential for her journey to safety. She used a large paperclip to bind the documents together, pulled a roll of Scotch tape from her attaché case, and taped the documents to her belly under her blouse. Now to appear like a local. She donned the black abaya and boshiya she wore when in public to cover her Western clothes. Last, she pulled her satellite phone from the case and stuffed it into the front pocket of her slacks. Cassie checked her wristwatch: 2:06 a.m.
She peeked into the hallway. Best to get the hell out of here as fast as I can. Slip out and race down the hall to the fire stairs. Just before she opened the door to the stairwell, a man wearing a business suit appeared behind her, his reflection staring at her in the door’s small window. He held a two-way radio in his left hand, stuck against his ear. He shouted in Arabic, “Stop!” and ran toward her. Hotel security at best. At worst, one of her assassin’s associates.
She popped the door and fled down the stairs. Cassie could hear him calling the hotel’s security center as he pounded down the stairs right behind her. She sped toward the first-floor door at the service exit. Shit. Her plan to escape was unraveling.
As she exited through the hotel’s service entrance, she could hear another radio spark to life. She tore down the street and found a spot to hide in a nearby alleyway. She knew no Saudi woman was out this late at night without a good reason, and she couldn’t think of one. It was best not to be seen at all. She could see the street but the darkness of the passageway protected her. The man who followed her ran past, accompanied by two others similarly dressed. She pushed away the fear she felt, into a small, dark corner of her mind, and waited for ten minutes, until she felt sure they had gone.
Rule Three: If possible, identify the people assisting your adversary. Reaching into her pocket, she used Abdul’s cell phone to dial the number on his note and listened as it rang. She pulled part of her blouse sleeve to cover the cell phone’s microphone and muffle her voice. She waited while it rang. An Arabic voice demanded to know, “Is it done?”
She remembered her mother telling her how her uncle had imitated an enemy’s voice to lure their helpers. Parroting a guttural voice to sound as husky as she could, she whispered back in Arabic, “Yes, but I am hurt. Please hurry.” She snapped the cell closed, and watched the other side of the street for Abdul’s ride to arrive. In five minutes a dirty old Volkswagen Microbus, with the side windows covered, pulled to a stop. Very likely, his transport.
Cassie entered its license plate number and description into her cell phone. Then she moved deep into the alleyway to the exit on the next street behind. After ten minutes, the Microbus was surely gone. She limped, hunched over and trying to appear older, traveling down a series of side streets and alleys toward the eastern edge of the city, near the restaurants.
After several minutes, distancing herself from the hotel and her pursuers, she found a dumpster by an alleyway next to the Marriott Hotel. She hid behind it, with a clear view of the street.
Rule Four: Call for urgent extraction and follow instructions to the letter. Cassie pulled her satellite phone from her pocket. “I am call-sign Swiftshadow, event passkey ‘Cerberus.’ Require urgent extraction, Riyadh, corner of Olaya and Mecca Road. Reply ASAP. End message.” Less than a minute passed and the satphone vibrated. She tried to sound calm. “Details, please.”
A male voice replied, �
��Wait exactly where you are. There in ten.”
Cassie sighed with relief. “Acknowledged. Thanks. I’m being pursued. I don’t have ten minutes. Be here soonest.” She pressed buttons to turn off the satphone and hoped nothing else went wrong. She hoped she’d be gone before they found evidence implicating her in this mess.
What a mistake. Two days in country and all she did was get raped by her hit man. She wondered what to tell McDougal, and what he’d tell his boss, Gilbert Greenfield. She’d be the joke of the agency, and probably end up behind a desk if they didn’t fire her ass.
The man who’d chased her down the hotel’s staircase reappeared. He stood just a few feet in front of the dumpster. She could see him and hear him breathing hard. Cassie shivered in fear. He faced away from her, toward the street, speaking into his two-way radio. “No sign of her. According to the readout, Abdul’s cell phone is nearby. Let’s regroup and cover the section south of here. I think the little thief is close. I’ll wait for you here, at the alleyway.”
Cassie cursed silently. She snapped the battery out from her assassin’s cell, then watched as two others joined him coming from different directions, converging right in front of her, less than seven feet away. She shrunk deeper into the alleyway. To calm herself, she dug deep for a memory. But all she could think of were the pieces of Evan’s photo, in the trash and now lost to her forever.
She snapped back into focus when another dirty van rounded the corner of Mecca Road and slowed to a stop. At first she thought it might be Abdul’s ride returning, but she looked and listened. Its shape was subtly different and the exhaust from its engine sounded quieter.
The van’s rear door opened. From within she heard “Swiftshadow” whispered. Cassie wondered about the agency mole. Was this ride safe for her? But she had no choice.
The three men who’d followed her all turned toward the van.
She needed a diversion.
Cassie reached into her pocket and found her room key. She threw it as far into the street as she could, away from herself and the van. The three large men twisted their heads in the direction of the sound.
Cassie dashed from the dumpster into the street. A two-step head start was all she got. All three men saw her and sprinted after her, gaining as she hurtled through the air into the arms of one of her three rescuers inside the van. She slipped back and dug her hands into his thighs, trying to gain better purchase, but found none.
“Get us the fuck out of here!” she screamed. The van’s driver floored the gas pedal and Cassie slipped toward the rear and oblivion. One of her legs hit the pavement as hands reached under her arms from within the van. They pulled her in, as one of her pursuers’ hands gripped her ankle, tugging her the other way.
The van continued to pick up speed and Cassie felt as if she was being ripped in half. She kicked at her pursuer furiously with her other foot until she finally connected with his nose with a satisfying crunch and thump. One of her rescuers pulled her the rest of the way in and slammed the van’s rear door.
She turned her face toward the man who’d saved her. “Thanks. I hope the rest of our journey is less a problem for you.”
The man just nodded his head.
Her cover was blown. She’d be useless to the agency.
Worse, those who’d hunted her might still want her dead.
CHAPTER 4
June 6, 4:12 p.m.
Headquarters of Gilbert Greenfield’s
unnamed intelligence agency,
K Street, Washington, DC
“So let me get this straight. Not only did you blow your cover, but you also let an amateur hit man into your room, and then for a grand finale, after he fucked you, you murdered him?” Assistant Deputy Director Mark McDougal, a big man, scratched the top of his bald head.
His face reddened. “All you had to do was follow our orders, Cassandra. We told you, you’re a thief, a computer hacker. No one trained you to be a courier. We have people for that. You weren’t trained to kill because you weren’t supposed to.”
He shook his head. “What a mess. Did it ever occur to you that when the Saudis find out who murdered that man, they’ll extradite you and publicly sever your head?” His face grew darker red, looking to Cassie like a glowing lighthouse signaling danger.
McDougal took a deep breath. “Just how did this all happen? And, sorry for the need for personal details, but I’ll figure out what goes into the printed report and what stays out. So, begin your report now.” He turned on a digital voice recorder.
Cassie edged her body away from the conference room table on which McDougal’s thick arms rested. Before today, she’d always admired the lack of emotions from her mentor. No one has ever seen him lose his temper.
She didn’t expect him to offer sympathy about the rape. She had made the mistake of letting the man enter her hotel room, and the massive failure depressed her. Metallic gray clouds outside mirrored her feelings.
She described the events of her evening in Riyadh, the words coming in a monotone, slow and clear. Cassie felt herself detached, as though someone else was reporting the events in Riyadh. She gave no details about her rape other than to state, “One thing I’m sure of: someone must have spent a great deal of time and money discovering my call-sign.” She didn’t say what she thought. My cover was blown by someone from this agency.
At the end of her report, she shrugged. “Well, I did complete my assignment, if that’s worth anything.”
“I’m sure Director Greenfield will be pleased,” McDougal said sarcastically. “Okay, so for as long as it takes for us to complete our investigation, you’re on leave. Consider it unpaid vacation. Now, please remove your sorry ass from my office and from this building.”
Her career with the agency had been a point of pride with her until now. Was this the end of it?
As she left McDougal’s office a hard rain fell. She didn’t bother with her umbrella. Rain washed over her, merging with her tears.
* * *
Cassie paced her small DC tenement apartment on F Street NW, avoiding the windows out of a fear that someone might be watching. I’m getting paranoid about all that’s happened. She knew the building was once an office, then during the days of rock-bottom mortgage interest rates it had gone condo. When they renovated, could they have failed to seal all the entrances that were originally here in this pre-911 office building?
She sat in the center of the studio. Her “chair” had once been a large spool for telephone wire, which she’d salvaged off the street after moving into the apartment. It remained her favorite.
She tapped her fingers on the wood. Being trapped here is making me crazy.
Evan’s death haunted her once more, and the memory mixed with that of her rape in some disconnected bit of logic. Evan had enlisted in the army. Dangerous. She had let herself be hired into a clandestine role. Again, dangerous. Was she trying to prove she could handle what killed him? She whispered to herself, “What have I done?”
Desperate to change her mood, she picked up her Martin D-18 guitar, stroking its smooth wood lines. After Evan’s death, she’d sought solace and spent way too much money on this guitar, then learned to play it. It had become a mirror for her soul. Cassie’s thumb alternated bass while her index and middle fingers picked out the tune. She sang the last verse of “One Kind Favor,” an old Blind Lemon Jefferson song that ended with the line, “See that my grave is kept clean.”
The words of the song reminded her again of Evan’s funeral. What would he think of her now? Cassie found her tears falling onto the guitar, blues personified.
She placed the guitar back on its little stand. The instrument cost almost a month’s salary. It had been her act of spite for his selfishness in enlisting. Now, the guitar felt like his memorial.
Cassie peeked out the window at the alleyway between her apartment and the building next door. She stared down the narrow path, her face blank, her body damaged, her soul as empty as the alley.
Was a grou
p of assassins out there, biding time until tonight?
She wondered again what had triggered her attack. The agency had her steal money and hack secrets from so many terrorist groups. Could that be what had made them want her dead? Or was it some secret she’d stumbled on? She couldn’t think of anything she’d learned that might alarm anybody. What did she know that she wasn’t aware she knew?
Cassie had been warned by McDougal, “avoid friendships. Friends are intrusive.” Even her parents had no idea what she really did. Almost every phone call she received at her apartment was agency business or business of Brewster Jennings and Associates.
Days passed, and she grew lonelier. The phone remained silent. Even a conversation with McDougal might improve her mood.
The wait was driving her crazy. She thumbed absently through the address book on her cell, and saw it. Kiril, her father. Today was his birthday. She gulped down a cup of hot coffee to jar her into focus. Her daddy had taught her chess when she was nine years old. While they sat in the old house, the ocean waves outside pounding the surf under the fog, he’d smiled and said, “Kitten, logical thought is what separates common from genius. Learn to do this well and you will always be able to outmaneuver others.” This advice had always worked for her before. But now, her trouble defied logic.
She thought of her home, where her mama ruled the kitchen. She remembered learning how to cook the dishes Mama called “the beauties of Russia.” She ached to be with them.
She couldn’t restrain herself; dialed the number in Half Moon Bay, California. Her mother’s Russian accent droned, “Natasha Sashakovich.”
“Mama.”
“Cassandra! We wondered if you’d call.”
“How are you and Daddy?”
“I’m fine. Your father is in garage, in office, working on Markov chains for forecast of Swiss franc differentials against US dollar. Hold on, kitten, I go for him now.” She heard her mother shout, “Kiril! Your daughter.”
Cassie could visualize him keying mathematical formulas into the input-output forecasting system he’d developed. Her eyes filled with tears.