Consummate Betrayal

by Yungeberg. Mary

  No longer belligerent, Derek leaned against the wall and stared at him in consternation, massaging the angry red marks on his neck. The man’s wrenched arm hung limp at his side and his voice was hoarse. “All I wanted to do was talk to Dani, make her see reason. The last thing she needs is to be in this mess. But you…you’re crazy.”

  Danielle spoke from the sofa. “Derek, we’ve had this conversation before. Why can’t you understand? I want to be with Rowan. Get over it and move on with your life.”

  Rowan saw the despair on Derek’s face when the man turned toward Danielle. “If only I could. But thanks to him, I can’t, because I don’t have a life anymore.”

  Bitter irony made him laugh out loud. “Welcome to my world, Derek. And let me tell you something, whatever you need to make a new life, I’ll make sure you have. But you stay the hell away from Danielle. She chose. I didn’t brainwash her. Now – get out of here and don’t come back.”

  Gabriel spoke. “Come on Derek, I’ll go with you and take a look at your arm and your skinny neck. You’re the one who’s loco, coming over here. You’re damn lucky to be alive, gringo.” Waving one hand wildly, Gabriel clamped the other on Derek’s upper arm. “Now move it, let’s go.” With a scowl at him and a grin for Danielle, his friend ushered a cowed Derek from the room and shut the door.

  Danielle remained seated, arms still crossed as he sat down beside her. When she looked at him, he smiled and touched her hair. “You OK?”

  Smiling back at him, she grabbed his hand. “I’m fine, just mad. Derek never used to be like this. The ugly things he said… None of this is your fault.”

  Leaning back, he stared at his hand in hers, reveling in the warmth, the simple touch. He didn’t think he’d ever move past pure gratitude for her presence in his life. On that level he could empathize with Derek. It must be hell for the guy to be in love with Danielle for years, only to have her make an inexplicable choice like him. “He can’t help it, but he’s lucky Gabriel showed up when he did.”

  Danielle sidled closer. “Derek was scared to death. I can’t believe what Gabriel said. Would you really have done anything to him?”

  Thinking about the knife he sometimes preferred to his pistol, and the alarm he’d seen in Gabriel’s eyes, he decided he’d said too much. “Nothing a few aspirin wouldn’t fix.”

  Another knock on the door ended the conversation, and he sighed in relief. Danielle squeezed his hand, jumped up, and opened the door. “Hi Chad, come in. Is Bettina with you?”

  Twisting around on the sofa, wincing at his still sore ribs, he saw his tall friend and smiled. “Hey, what’s up?”

  Chad looked first at Danielle. “Bettina is hoping you’ll come over. She wants to cook out on the beach tonight. Actually, we’re hoping both of you will join all of us. It should be fun. Marion and Janice picked out some great seafood at the local market.”

  Chad frowned at him and then looked at Danielle again. Knowing the look on his face had stopped his friend, Rowan glanced at Danielle. A delighted grin lit her features. Goddamn it anyway. His wily colleague knew he wouldn’t say no if it meant hurting her. Tone carefully neutral, he replied. “Thanks Chad, that sounds nice.”

  Chad shifted his gaze and gave him a complacent smile. “You know it’ll be fun. And now, if you two have the time, Bettina wants to see you, Danielle. And Rowan, I’ve got a bottle of Jack Daniel’s waiting for us on the beach. I gotta talk to you, brother.”

  Since when had his goofy friend gotten so slick? At least if he had to spend an evening with his parents, the whiskey would help.

  * * *

  An hour later, relaxing on a chaise lounge, immersed in a comforting haze of single barrel Jack Daniel’s whiskey mingled with Coke and ice, Rowan stared at the aquamarine waves and thought maybe he could fall asleep after the nightmares now. Every night he woke up drenched in sweat and terrified, certain he was still in the cell at Quantico. And every night, he got up afterwards and prowled the house, peering anxiously out the windows into the darkness, wondering when a cadre of FBI or CIA agents would burst through the doors and haul him back. Listening to Chad’s recitation of what he and Michael had done gave him a much needed assurance of security.

  Chad coughed, ending his contemplation. Lifting his eyes from the mesmerizing waves, he saw his colleague grinning at him. “Hey Rowan, I saved the best news for last.”

  Raising a brow, he gazed at his friend. “What are you talking about?”

  Looking inordinately pleased, Chad reached down to the sand for his drink. “Let me explain. See, it pissed me off when I found your financial papers, you remember…and I realized that the CIA had confiscated the funds from your two offshore accounts.”

  Precious equanimity shattered, he shivered when the condensation from his glass dripped on his bare stomach. “I haven’t forgotten.”

  Chad smiled at him and took a long swallow of Jack and Coke. “Ahhh, that’s good. I traced those funds and got your money back – all of it. My father invested it for you, conservatively of course, in various ways, in the name of James Hawthorne. And Rowan, well I guess you know. It’s a lot of money.”

  “How… You did?” Dipping his head and wiping his eyes, he looked at Chad and then looked away, squinting at the blue-green horizon. Mortified that his lips were quivering, he hoped his friend wouldn’t notice.

  Chad saved him from having to speak. “Look, it was fun. And it made me feel like I was doing something to help you. It sucked when Michael and Gabriel took you. We didn’t know if we’d ever see you again. Both Ralph and I felt so helpless.”

  Swallowing hard, he met Chad’s eyes. “I don’t know what to say. They took everything from me, and I never dreamed… Thank you.”

  Chad leaned over and clanked his glass. “You don’t have to say anything. Just relax and let’s drink for a while. I’ve missed you, brother.”

  * * *

  Angelo Blevins, psychiatrist, Vietnam Vet, and former POW stared at the email and read it again. Georgia Cristo and he had been friends for nearly twenty years, and he’d always thought of her as one of the sanest people he knew. Slowly reaching for his cup of coffee, eyes never leaving the computer screen, he lifted it to his lips, wondering if he needed to adjust that assessment. Several months earlier they’d chatted online, and she’d asked questions about Post Traumatic Stress Disorder – his specialty.

  While in the Vietnam War, he’d spent over a year as a POW, courtesy of the Viet Cong. Once back home, his life unraveled while he suffered from post traumatic stress. Eventually he’d recovered and found his own brand of revenge against his torturers by becoming a psychiatrist. Working with down-and-out vets had always been his first love. In fact, he’d retired from private practice to work exclusively with the people no one else wanted. That was part of the reason he’d ended up at the Union Gospel Mission in Sioux Falls.

  Unfolding his lean frame from an ancient office chair, he stood up. He needed more coffee to figure out how to deal with the strange email. Pouring another cup of Starbucks, the one indulgence he allowed himself, he breathed deeply, enjoying the aroma. Nothing beat a good cup of coffee. Taking an appreciative swallow, he leaned against the counter in the combination kitchen-living room of his tiny apartment. To say he was intrigued by Georgia’s email would be an understatement.

  Reflecting for a moment, he realized that nothing tied him to Sioux Falls. At sixty-two he had no family other than an amiable ex-wife and a daughter in her thirties who seemed mostly embarrassed by his lifestyle. He’d wrestled with occasional discontent, a feeling that there must be more out there for him somewhere, if he could only find it. Could this be his chance to contribute, maybe make his mark?

  Sliding back into his chair, he perused the email a third time, wondering what in the world Georgia meant.

  Would you consider an opportunity to help someone in desperate need, but not in a position to seek therapy? It would mean moving, going off-grid, so to speak, but y
ou’d be working on a project I know you’d love. Come visit at the ranch for a weekend and I’ll explain.

  Good Lord. Going off-grid? Despite his practical nature, she’d hooked him. With a chuckle he leaned back in the creaky chair and hit reply. It looked like he’d be heading into the wilds of northwest South Dakota. Thank God it was still summer.

  * * *

  Feeling disconsolate, Michael flopped into the recliner he’d lugged next to the window in the living area he shared with Gabriel. Feet crossed, hands in his lap, he stared out at the expanse of lawn that ended at the beach and thought about Rowan. If a more strong-willed man existed on the planet, he’d be surprised. He was grateful for his friend’s intrepid personality, because if Rowan had given in to Sal Capello, they’d all be sitting in a brig somewhere.

  Rubbing his face wearily, he tried to exorcise the disturbing images that replayed in his mind. Thinking that someone needed to know what had happened to Rowan, he’d asked Chad to hack the video records from Quantico’s brig cameras. They’d sat together and watched, sickened at the debasement their friend had endured.

  Rowan would be the first to insist that he hadn’t been tortured, but damn… Both he and Chad had ended up drunk, taking shots directly from a bottle of Jack Daniel’s to get through the unsettling images. In the end, he knew Rowan would have died before giving up their names or admitting to treason. And he hoped his volatile friend never found out what they’d done and seen, because the humiliation would be devastating. He shook his head. There was no telling what Rowan might do.

  His lips twisted in a grimace as he thought about the next task he and Chad had agreed upon. After what Rowan had been through, spending a quiet evening with family and friends should be child’s play. But Rowan hadn’t seen his parents in years because of something that had happened between him and his mother. And now it was his job to talk to Khalil and Janice, to ask them to hold back when they saw their son and not overwhelm him with emotion he couldn’t handle.

  How would they react? Meeting them, he’d found Khalil to be kind and intelligent, and Janice reminded him of Rowan. He could see the same passion in her eyes. No wonder the two of them had clashed. Dreading the conversation, he decided to get it over with. Hopefully they would understand and cooperate. Gazing out the window for a moment longer, he resolutely put aside his troubled thoughts about Rowan’s suffering and stood up.

  While he trudged reluctantly through the maze of hallways connecting the wings of the rambling house, he thought about flying back to South Dakota. No doubt Gabriel was antsy to head for San Diego, where his wife, young daughter, and son lived. And he couldn’t wait to see Asal – his honey, as he called her, because that was the Farsi translation of her name.

  Five years earlier, one of their clandestine operations had turned deadly, and Asal, an Iranian operative who worked with them on rare occasions, had been compromised. There had been no time to plan, she either left with them, or died. He’d been in love with her for a while, so when they returned to the United States, he’d asked her to be his wife and she had laughingly said, C’mon Mikey, I’m not a believer in arranged marriages.

  But he didn’t care about that. She lived in Pierre, South Dakota’s capital, in a house he’d purchased for the two of them, and had never batted an eye at the new identity he’d created for her, complete with birth certificate and social security number. Thinking about her made him smile. Independent as hell, Asal did her own thing, as she proudly told him, although she seemed to enjoy the weekends they spent together. So did he. No one outside their small circle knew about her, not even his parents.

  Asal spent her time monitoring and infiltrating numerous Islamic websites, posing as a jihadist. Thanks to her, they’d garnered a treasure trove of valuable information. Because of her finesse, he’d known about Muusa Shemal and his connections to the Muslim Brotherhood before Chad had found out, although he hadn’t let on. Asal had discovered Sa-id Harandi’s unwilling betrayal of Rowan, too. Someday, when he was sure Rowan could handle it, he’d tell him about the demise of his unfortunate friend. Looking up, surprised to see he’d mindlessly walked right to the door of the Milanis’ suite of rooms, he took a deep breath, held it, and knocked.

  * * *

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Standing on the stage with the Imam of his most beloved Houston mosque, Muusa Shemal gazed with pleasure at his gathered holy warriors. Handpicked by him, these men would search diligently until they located Rowan Milani. Since the Brotherhood had finally, by Allah’s immeasurable grace, given him permission to pursue the ghost agent in his own way, he had chosen men of Iranian descent to find their brother. He smiled. There could be no sweeter requital than for the man to be vanquished by his own kind.

  This time there would be no piddling with American Intelligence agents. Stunned and enraged by the inability of the FBI and CIA to keep Rowan Milani in custody, he’d retreated to Houston for succor. Thinking of the precious resources wasted, he ground his teeth. The Americans were – how had the pundit on one network described them – Keystone Cops? They were imbeciles.

  This time, when his warriors captured Rowan Milani, they would deliver the jinn directly to Egypt. And, Allah be praised, no one – neither the greedy ones in the Brotherhood who wanted to barter his prize to the highest bidder, nor the cunning man’s friends – would remove Rowan Milani from his grasp.

  The Imam touched his arm. “Teacher, your warriors await their instructions.” Private reverie ended, he smoothed his black-and-silver pinstriped suit and adjusted the red silk tie. Dabbing at the beads of sweat on his forehead with a matching red silk kerchief, he silently thanked Allah for the air conditioning in the cleverly hidden room, built inside a Houston warehouse. Without it, the heat and humidity would have been unbearable. Taking careful steps from the stage to the floor he strode into the midst of his jihadists. The men parted like a subservient river until he stood in the center of the secret sanctuary.

  The group of thirty-odd men talked quietly among themselves, casting surreptitious glances his way. Raising his arms and turning in a slow circle, he began. The years of searching, the thwarted plans, and the intolerable loss of his prize lent passion and power to his words. “My brothers, you have been chosen by Allah for a quest. You will devote all your capacities – your mental, spiritual, and physical resources – to finding Rowan Milani, the Shayton who has defied the will of Allah, sending our martyrs to paradise at a time of his choosing, ruining countless stratagems for jihad.”

  Sweat soaked his shirt and trickled down his face. He mopped it off with the red kerchief. “You will scour the internet for information, hack the banking and computer records of every known associate of Rowan Milani, and travel to airports around the globe in search of the aircraft that carried the kafir to freedom. Allah will guide each of you in this holy endeavor.”

  Breathing hard, he waved the silk kerchief like a red flag of victory. “Clues and a trail will emerge. You, his rightful brothers from Iran, will expose and unearth him. Then you will vanquish the jinn to Egypt to fulfill Allah’s destiny for one such as him.”

  The men exploded as one in a fiery roar of assent, shouts of Allahu Akbar punctuating the bedlam. These holy warriors would complete his vision. Arms flung over his head, he shook his fists. “By the gracious mercy and power of Allah, you will succeed.”

  * * *

  Rowan sat on the edge of the bed and massaged his forehead, wondering why he’d let Chad talk him into spending an evening with his parents. What could he say to them? Thinking about them brought back too many painful memories, and goddamn it, he didn’t need that. If he never saw his parents again, it would be all right with him. Why couldn’t he be left alone to deal with his screwed up mind and body.

  Danielle poked her head in the bedroom. Eyes sparkling, she smiled at him. “Are you getting ready? Want some help picking out a shirt?” Her smile changed to a worried frown. “What’s the matter?”

  W
hen she sat down beside him, all thought of his parents vanished. Dressed in a sleeveless halter top sundress that matched her eyes, her skin glowed from the month she’d spent on the island. Sliding his hand down her arm, he wished they could just lie back on the bed. But no, Sal Capello had fixed that for a while yet. Taking a deep breath, wincing at the sharp twinges and frustrated because of the still healing ribs, he fought an uprising of bitter rage at the man who’d inflicted so much pain.

  Danielle laid a hand on his cheek, drawing him out of the angry thoughts. “Your mom and dad are excited about seeing you. Your mom was so kind to me when I first arrived. She sat and talked to me, and we even said a prayer for you to be strong, and that you’d be rescued quickly.”

  Her words refocused the rage, turned it white hot. Janice had no right to shove her religion down Danielle’s throat. He stared at her and saw the uncertainty in her eyes. “That was nice. You want to pick out a shirt for me? I’ll wear anything but white.”

  Danielle gave him a quick kiss and stood up, tantalizing in the dress. “Thanks for doing this. I can see it’s hard for you. If you ever want to talk about it, I’m willing to listen.”

  If it were up to him that would never happen. “It’s OK, I’m fine. Let’s go, before Chad comes looking for us.”

  She nodded and turned to the closet. “All right, here’s my favorite color on you.” Her smile was innocent when she swung around with a royal blue Hawaiian print shirt, but he knew better. Amazed at how well she could read him, he stood up and took the shirt from her. He was still buttoning it when she put her arms around him and snuggled close.