Fa’iz smiled and stroked his mottled beard. “Good. Very good. We will use that warehouse for our Tel Aviv and Haifa operations as well. How many of these IV units do we now have in Jerusalem?”
“Eighteen hundred and forty 1000 ml bags,” Arif answered. “Most are common saline solutions, but we have also provided a number of 2.5 percent dextrose-added solutions to make sure we can satisfy the medical demands. All of the bags bear the identical imprints of Sexton International, the American health-care company that supplies Mediterranean Medical Supply, the distribution center in Jerusalem. I defy any nurse or technician to tell the difference.”
“And the rest, Arif? Are we making more?”
“Of course. Forty a day. I am working on a process to increase to sixty a day. By the summer, we will have many thousands. But for our immediate needs, we will surely be ready by April sixteenth.”
Fa’iz rubbed his hands together and smiled wide. “This is such good news.”
“Ahmed, have you talked to Sami? Are we confident he knows his responsibility?”
“He knows. Every morning he makes his delivery run. Mediterranean gives him a printout of his route, so many units to deliver to this hospital, so many to that. He knows on April sixteenth to make the switch at the Global Fisheries. Then he will deliver Arif’s bags. He’ll do fine.”
Fa’iz stood and reached for the hands of Fakhir and al-Zahani. He shook them hard. “From the river to the sea, my friends, from the Golan to the gulf.”
“Before we leave,” Fakhir said, “I have passed the ransom information on to Abu Hammad. I told him that Arif would return the girl for five million dollars.”
“Did you tell him to come alone to Hebron?”
“Of course.”
Fa’iz looked at al-Zahani. “Well, if he is foolish enough to come here, then it’s a simple matter to dispose of him and fill our coffers with his money.”
* * *
“CALL FOR YOU, CAPTAIN.”
“This is Okoye.”
“Captain, this is Trooper Colin Watanabe. I saw your APB for Eugene Wilson. I stopped this guy Wilson a few weeks ago for speeding on Highway 99, heading for the North Shore. Blue Acura. License 175 889. I remember the guy. Straw hat. Real nervous. I gave him a warning. I’ll keep an eye out for him, but you might want to alert the patrols in Hale’iwa and Waialua.”
Okoye ordered his communications sergeant to amend the APB for Wilson, last seen on the North Shore, blue Acura, license 175 889. The alert was soon seen on the patrol car computer screens. And on the laptop in the black Cadillac.
FIFTY-EIGHT
MARCY HANDED THE KEYS to Jack outside the Harbor CharHouse. “You’ll have to drive us home. One too many martinis for me.”
Jack grinned. The ride along the North Shore that night was peaceful. It mirrored their mood. They had each other. They had a plan to contact Liam. Their luck was sure to change.
They didn’t notice the sedan parked on the street near Marcy’s house when they pulled into her driveway. Jack opened the passenger door for Marcy, put his arm around her shoulder, and walked with her to the front door. As they unlocked the door, they heard sounds of car doors opening and shutting. They turned and saw two figures walking toward the house. Quickly, they entered the house and locked the door.
“Did you get a look at them?” whispered Marcy.
“Not really, it’s dark. A big guy got out of the driver’s side.”
Sommers took his phone from his pocket.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m calling 911.”
“Are you crazy? You can’t talk to the police. Get out of here. Go out the back door and head down to the beach.”
“And leave you here? No way. I’ll stall them, you go out the back door.”
The doorbell rang.
“C’mon, Jack, the two of us, we can make it to the beach.”
The doorbell rang again. “It doesn’t matter, they found me. Run, Marcy. Get the hell out of here.” He started to press the numbers on his phone.
She slowly pulled back the draperies, just enough to get a glimpse of the front porch. “Wait. It’s a man and a woman,” she whispered. “Don’t call yet.”
“A woman can fire a gun.”
“Glenn said it was two men.” Marcy flipped on the porch lights. “It’s Taggart. It’s Liam Taggart.”
She turned the dead bolt and swung the door open. Liam and Kayla entered the hallway. Sommers stood in the middle of the room and made no effort to move.
Marcy backed up and sat on the arm of her couch. “How did you find us?”
“Does it matter?” Liam said.
“Well, yeah, it does. Did you follow me from LA?”
Liam shook his head. “You opened your purse when you paid the bill. I saw your ID.”
“You looked in my purse? You goddamn snoop.”
Liam smiled and tilted his head. “I’m a private investigator. I snoop for a living.”
“That doesn’t mean you can look in a woman’s purse. Didn’t your mother teach you any manners? You violated my privacy.”
“I deeply apologize. Can we move off this subject?” Gesturing toward Sommers, Liam said, “I assume this is Jack.”
“Maybe,” Marcy said. And are you going to introduce the person that came in with you?”
“Sorry. This is Kayla Cummings. She’s a spy. We just want to talk.”
“I’m not saying anything,” Jack said.
“Jack, would you relax,” said Marcy. “One’s a private investigator and the other’s a spy. They found us and they didn’t bring the cops. So they’ve come out here for a reason and I’d like to know what it is.”
“Thank you, Marcy,” Liam said, still standing by the door. “May we come in?”
“I’m sorry. Now I’m the one who has no manners. Please.” She gestured to the couch. “Would either of you like a soft drink or a glass of water?”
“Water for me, thank you,” said Liam.
“I’ll have a glass as well,” Kayla said.
Marcy started for the kitchen, then stopped. “Or a beer, if you’d like.”
“Now you’re talking,” Liam said.
“I’ll stick with the water,” Kayla said.
Marcy returned to the living room with a tray. She placed the drinks on the table. “Three beers and a glass of water for the spy.”
Kayla pursed her lips and scolded Liam with her eyes.
With all four sitting around the coffee table, Marcy said, “To tell the truth, Mr. Taggart, I was planning on contacting Deborah to meet with you again. But now that you’ve discovered where we live, you go first. What do you want?”
Liam took a sip of beer, pointed his index finger at Marcy. “I like this girl, Jack. She’s got spunk. She’s a tough little firecracker.”
“No kidding,” Jack said.
Liam took another drink. “I saw Sophie.”
Sommers leaned forward. “You did? Where did you see her? Did you talk to her?”
Liam shook his head. “Didn’t talk to her. She’s in Hebron and she appears to be fine. We saw her from a distance. She didn’t know we were there.”
Sommers looked at Kayla. “You went too?”
Kayla nodded. “I work for the State Department. We have a mutual interest in Arif al-Zahani.”
“Why didn’t you bring her back?”
Liam answered, “It’s not that simple. Can we start at the beginning and have this conversation on a more organized platform?”
Jack nodded. “If you didn’t go to retrieve Sophie, can you tell me why you went to Hebron?”
“We were under the impression that there was an arrangement to pay a ransom to al-Zahani for Sophie’s return,” Kayla said. “The US cannot allow eighty-eight million dollars, or any sum, to be paid to suspected terrorists.”
“He’s a terrorist?”
“We think so,” Kayla said. “We think his group is planning something.”
“Well,” Jack sa
id, “I also believed there was an arrangement to pay a ransom, but I’m beginning to doubt the deal was ever made.”
“So are we,” Liam said.
“You wasted your time coming all the way out here. I don’t have any money here. You can have me arrested, but that’s not going to get Kelsen his money.”
“We can talk about that later. I think there’s a play here and you might want to consider it.”
“All I want is Sophie, and I’m not interested in talking to anyone about anything until Sophie is returned.”
Marcy reached out and touched his arm. “Jack, why don’t we listen to what he has to say instead of digging our heels in?”
Liam nodded and pointed his finger at Marcy again. “This girl’s got common sense, Jack. You’d be smart to listen to her.”
Sommers sat back in his chair. “Okay, I’m listening.”
“First, I’m going to advise you that your country wants your help. That ought to tell you that there might be something in it for you. It could be a little dangerous, but it might be a way to rescue Sophie and do yourself some good.”
“I don’t care if it’s dangerous. I’d do anything.”
“I know you would. Why don’t you begin by telling me how this whole embezzlement scheme began?”
Jack took a sip of his beer, set the bottle down, and drew a deep breath. “That Sunday, when Sophie didn’t come home on time, I knew in the pit of my stomach they had snatched her. I immediately called the police and the FBI. I told them to alert the airports, the train stations. We put out an Amber Alert.” Jack shook his head. “I don’t know how they got out of the country. The FBI monitored all the flights.
“I was sure he took her back to Hebron, but as you already know, he’s got quite a fortress. It’s not like I could go knock on his door and take my daughter. And it’s not like I could call the Hebron police and show them my court order. So I went the political route. I tried everything. Every US agency, every foreign agency. Everything. Do you understand? There was nothing I could do. I had hit a stone wall.
“Then, maybe a couple of weeks later, Dennis Harrington calls and tells me to meet him at the Rockit Bar and Grill up near Wrigley Field. We were both working on the sale of his company, so I figured it had to do with a problem in the paperwork. He’s the CFO of Kelsen Manufacturing, and my law firm was representing Kelsen. They were selling out to Leland Industries. The net profit payable to Kelsen was over ninety million dollars.
“We sat in a booth in the corner of the bar, and Harrington starts by telling me how sorry he feels that Sophie was kidnapped.”
“How did he know?”
“Shit, everyone knew. There was an Amber Alert. It was on the damn TV. So, Harrington says, ‘Why don’t you go get her or offer the guy money to return her?’ I told him that al-Zahani was very wealthy and well protected, and besides, I didn’t have that kind of money.
“So we talk some more and Harrington says, ‘Kelsen’s such an asshole. He’s been on my case for twenty years and I’m glad he’s selling his company.’ Then he leans over and he says quietly, ‘If you help me get back at him, I can help you with your daughter.’
“It’s obvious to me that Harrington wants to run some kind of scheme on Kelsen, and I’m also certain there’s no way this middle-aged accountant can help me do anything to get Sophie out of Hebron. I tell him his problems with Kelsen are his business and I don’t see that he’s in any position to help me. He looks at his watch and says, ‘Not so fast. You want your daughter, don’t you? I know a guy. He’s real important. He can make things happen. He’s the kind of guy who can get Sophie back for you.’
“‘I’m listening,’ I said.
“‘Give me a few minutes,’ he says, and he gets up to make a phone call.
“Ten minutes later, a man walks into the bar. My first impression is, this guy is made of money. He’s dressed in a camel cashmere coat, white silk scarf. He smiles, hands his coat to his driver, and slides into our booth. He’s got a diamond ring on his little finger, a Patek Philippe watch, a tailored suit with a silk pocket square, and a thick Russian accent. We’re in a neighborhood bar and he looks like he’s sitting down for a five-hundred-dollar dinner on Michigan Avenue. He sits right next to me and orders a vodka martini, straight up.
“‘I’m very sorry to hear this thing about your daughter,’ he says. ‘I myself have a child and I don’t know what I’d do if someone tried to take him from me.’ I say, ‘Thank you for your concern.’”
“Did this man give you his name?” Liam asked.
“He did not, but when he left, I heard his driver call him Dmitri.”
Liam turned to Kayla. “Does that mean anything to you?”
Kayla shook her head. “No.”
“What else did Dmitri say to you?” asked Liam.
“Nothing to begin with. He just drank his vodka and made small talk. Then he moved the conversation to the Middle East. He told me he had just returned from Dubai. He had business interests all throughout the Middle East: Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar.
“He told me it was important for his business to have discreet relationships with highly placed officials throughout the Middle East. As a result, he could get things done in Arab countries. ‘Especially,’ he says, ‘in the lands of the Palestinians. Dennis has told me of your sad story, and I can help you. I can get your daughter back for you.’
“I said, ‘How are you going to do that?’
“He smiled. He smugly tipped his head from side to side. ‘It can be done.’
“‘What do you want from me?’ I said.
“He didn’t answer directly, but he said, ‘Getting your little Sophie back will be no problem for me.’ He shrugged, like it was as simple as ordering a pizza. ‘I can be a very good friend to you. I will talk to this al-Zahani and he will make agreement. That is what I do. I make agreements. I’m a fair man. When I propose a business transaction, it’s fair. People never turn me down. Especially not some pip-squeak like this Palestinian doctor.’ Then he breaks into this sardonic laugh. ‘Ha. Ha. Ha.’ But it isn’t a laugh, it’s a warning. ‘And even if this al-Zahani is foolish enough to turn me down, I am certain the Palestine authorities will help me. I’m big supporter.’
“I say, ‘That is very good of you. I don’t know why you would offer to do this. What can I do in return?’
“He smiled and said, ‘I do this partly because it is wrong to kidnap a man’s child and partly because I myself need a favor.’ Now the sweat starts running off my brow. I don’t know what he’s going to ask me to do, but I’ve already crossed the line. Short of murdering someone, there isn’t much I wouldn’t do to get Sophie back.
“‘All you have to do is sign a paper,’ he says. ‘Nothing more.’”
“And the paper is the escrow instruction for wiring the eighty-eight million dollars?” Liam said.
“Correct.”
“So, now you’re in a fix,” Liam said. “You do what he asks and maybe you get Sophie in return, or you refuse…”
“No. You can’t refuse, that’s not an option. Remember, no one turns him down, ha ha ha. At that point I had no choice. But, truth be told, I’d have agreed anyway if there was even a spark of hope to get Sophie. He said that Harrington would get in touch with me in a day or two with the details of the plan. With that, he raised his hand and his driver came over with his coat and the two left the bar.”
“One question,” Liam said. “How did you know the other man was his driver?”
“He had keys in his hand. I just assumed.”
Liam nodded. “What happened next?”
“The next day, I got a call from Harrington and we set a meeting for my office. It was natural because we were busy working on the sale of his company and he was in our office a lot. It was on a Thursday. He laid out the plan to divert the Exchange loan payoff to Panama, but he said that Dmitri wanted me to go to Panama and set up the account.
“‘Me? Why me?’ I said.
&
nbsp; “‘Because Dmitri thinks it will be better,’ said Harrington. ‘He thinks Kelsen will notice if I am gone for two days.’ With that, he hands me a round-trip ticket to Panama City. I set up the account at the First Republic Bank in the name of Capital Investment Funds, Inc., spent the night at the Hilton, and came back the next day.
“I knew that I couldn’t stay in Chicago after we diverted the funds, and my plans started taking shape on that long flight from Panama. If I had any chance of not getting caught right away, I would have to leave before the escrow was scheduled to pay out and the theft was discovered. I knew I’d have to move far away and tell no one where I was going, not even my sister. The funny thing is, I trusted Dmitri. I didn’t fear him because I wasn’t going to double-cross him. In retrospect, I was a fool, but I really believed that Dmitri would honor his promise. You know, honor among thieves.
“The farthest place I knew where I could go without using a passport was Hawaii. I’d been here three times with Alina. So I start to formulate a plan to move Sophie out to the islands. Deb would find a way to bring her out. We could stay together for a little while until I was sure Sophie was emotionally strong enough for me to leave. If I got caught, Deb would raise her. I cashed in my retirement, set up my own separate Panama accounts, and did everything so I could leave Chicago as soon as the money was wired. I thought there was a good chance for us to hide out as long as we needed to. Stupid, huh?”
Liam shrugged and nodded. “Yeah.”
Jack continued. “I wanted to meet with Dmitri again, but he insisted we communicate only through Harrington. In fact, I never saw Dmitri again. I told Harrington that I needed a way to communicate with Dmitri, and we set up this private e-mail account. We’d leave messages for each other in the draft message folder. Dmitri said it might take him a month or two to get Sophie, but there would be no problem, and he’d give me updates by e-mail. The deal was closed, the money was wired to the phony account, and I left town.
“Now we know he never intended to do anything, just to trick me into stealing the money.” Jack pursed his lips. “He couldn’t do the heist without me, and Sophie’s kidnapping provided the perfect opportunity. Guys like this rich Russian, they just seem to stumble onto dumb-ass luck. He just happened to find Jack Sommers, a guy whose daughter had been kidnapped, who was so desperate he’d do anything. And who just happened to be in control of eighty-eight million dollars.”
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