Storm Clouds

by Steven Becker

  Ahmed was not deterred. He'd known Beecher for years. Greed was his motive for everything. “Name your price.”

  “Nefertiti's bust—either way.”

  Ahmed was in shock. The famed wooden carving was going to be the centerpiece of his future museum tours. After the initial crush of tourists waned, the next step in his business plan was to send the tomb on tour.

  “You know that it is not mine to give.” Ahmed realized the trap, but it was too late. “Your choice of whatever we find.” In this case, the unknown was worth the risk. If eyes hadn't been laid on the cache for millennia, they would never know what they had missed.

  “Right. Me and the boys’ll get right to work. About that help, though . . .”

  Ahmed knew who what he was referring to. “Just a moment. I too have a Plan B.” He picked up his phone and dialed a number from memory. Cursing when the call went to voicemail, he disconnected and set the phone on the table.

  Beecher drank and belched. “Plan C then?”

  The files had been too important to rely on just one source. Hoover had the information to locate the cache. Whether he knew what he had or not was open for debate.

  Working with what he called “the guilt of the West,” Ahmed had manipulated the American government into helping find the treasure. They, of course, needed deniability, which led to the contract with Alicia Phong and the American man downstairs.

  With both of her field agents under his control—the father by his men and the son downstairs—Ahmed had the leverage he needed to pressure the woman to cooperate.

  Except that something had gone wrong in Maryland.

  He checked his phone again, surprised to see that it was almost noon. Adding nine hours told him that his men had missed their check-in time. The previous night, everything had been in his control. Since then, the pieces had all been rearranged.

  He experienced an instant of relief when the phone rang, but it lasted only as long as it took for the voice on the other end to explain the current situation.

  His plan for the father had unraveled. Ahmed took the phone and stepped into the bathroom.

  “Did you get anything out of him before he escaped?”

  Ahmed tried to hold down his anger at the answer. “The woman in Key Largo. Get down there and secure her before something else happens.”

  Ahmed disconnected and stormed back into the room.

  “Everything alright, mate?” Beecher laughed.

  Ahmed ignored the excavator’s obvious pleasure. When the time was right, Ahmed swore, Allah would serve justice on the man. But for now, he needed Beecher. Ahmed left the room, signaling one of the guards to come with him. They took the elevator to the seventh floor.

  Ready to vent, Ahmed took a deep breath and stormed into Room 707.

  “I don’t know what you were thinking, but this is not America.” He let his pent-up tension out on the one person who he no longer needed. “Your names can be added to the list of explorers who have vanished in the desert.”

  After this morning’s encounter with the gunmen, the American had to know the statement was true. With close to a quarter of a million square miles of desert in Egypt, there were plenty of places they would never be found. He glanced at the woman, who met his gaze. She had reached the same conclusion.

  “Is that your big plan, then?” Mako asked.

  Ahmed sensed denial in the man’s tone. Next would come resignation. It sounded like the threat had been received. Ahmed breathed deeply, his anger replaced by a controlled calm. He knew acting out of emotion would sabotage the larger plan. As he settled into his minister persona, he realized that the couple was still a tool. They might still lead him to the treasure. He began forming a plan to use them as a lever to manipulate the woman in Florida, if his man headed down there failed.

  He glared at the couple. It was doubtful they knew who he was, but if they did, he needed to maintain the aplomb of his position. The threat had been received. Now was the time for diplomacy.

  “Go home. Forget all of this and get on with your lives.”

  He studied the pair as they processed the statement. In less than a minute, they had gone from being unmarked graves in the desert to alive and well. Their expressions confirmed his guess.

  “We are a civilized nation. The last thing we need is your CIA quite literally digging around the country looking for you.”

  Ahmed folded his arms in front of his chest. “Do you even know this cache exists?” The minister felt like he had regained his grasp of the situation.

  “We need to talk,” Mako said.

  “I believe you are misunderstanding me extending a polite invitation to leave. There is no need to RSVP.”

  Ahmed turned to his man. “Get them on a plane to Cairo and see that they leave the country on the next flight. I don’t care where.”

  A quick call to the head of his security team modified the orders he had just given the men in the room. As he quietly explained his ruse in Arabic so Alaa couldn’t hear, he studied the couples’ faces to make sure they didn’t understand his new orders. Their blank looks gave him little satisfaction as he prepared for his next task. He waited until he reached his room to make another call.

  “Rashi.”

  Ahmed was smart enough to understand the gamble he was taking and had tried to be pessimistic when dealing with Rashi. He had warned her not to get too excited about what lay behind the portal. Many graves, even those that appeared to have remained sealed, had been violated in antiquity—many by their own builders, who looted and then resealed empty graves.

  “Where are you?” he asked.

  “At the cavern conducting tests.”

  “I’ll be there shortly.” The foundation for disappointment had already been laid. With the complications in locating the cache, it was time to lower her expectations another notch. That was better done in person. Whether the relics were located and installed in the tomb before it was officially opened meant success or failure—possibly life or death. In the moment, he wanted Rashi to remember his as the voice of calm and reason.

  Not wanting to deplete his security crew any further, he decided to drive himself to the site. In order to cross the Nile, he had to follow a circuitous route that took him through downtown Luxor, then detour well south of the site, crossing the Nile at the Luxor Bridge. On the western bank of the river, he followed several winding roads until turning left onto a dead-straight drive cut through the desert. Ahead was one of the most famous monuments in Egypt, the Temple of Queen Hatshepsut. Looking as if it had been built yesterday, which in a way it was, the reconstructed structure stood sentinel over the desert beyond.

  Ahmed ignored the line of vehicles waiting to get into the monument. He swerved and cut around the taxis and busloads of tourists. The rifles were quickly lowered when the guards saw the government plates. They called over to a man in a suit, who pushed through the guards to get to the car. After inspecting his credentials, he gave Ahmed a toothless smile and waved him through. Ahmed continued to the western end of the parking lot, where he slowed for a makeshift barricade. Instead of the police, Ahmed recognized the uniforms of the men guarding it as army. There was no line.

  He was waved to the side, where after a brief conversation with the commanding officer, Ahmed was assigned a driver and directed to a Jeep. A half-mile ahead he could see activity at and below the site. The cavern’s location was behind it, closer to the Valley of the Kings, but due to the terrain, the Temple of Hatshepsut offered easier access to the site.

  As the vehicle cruised over the newly graded road, Ahmed rehearsed what he was planning to say. The half-mile trip took less than five minutes. The Jeep stopped below the scaffolding, where several large tents were set up for the academics and their scientific equipment.

  He was about to ask where Rashi was when he saw her standing in the mouth of the cavern. Ahmed climbed the steps built into the reinforced scaffolding and stood beside her.

  “How are things progressin
g?” For once the painfully slow process of opening a tomb was to his advantage.

  “Slowly, but everything still looks good.”

  Ahmed had no idea how Beecher had constructed a portal two days ago that passed the test of the dozen scientists, most determined to find fault with it. Rashi was in the other camp. She wanted it to be true.

  “What if there is nothing inside?”

  She didn’t hesitate. “The find itself is more valuable than any treasure inside. If the tomb is Nefertiti’s, there is bound to be something to fill the void in the history books.”

  Ahmed doubted that. The walls of the cavern were plain stone. The inclusion of a sarcophagus and even a small amount of burial goods would be enough to accomplish his purpose, but to add to any actual historical knowledge would require the elaborate carvings found on the walls of the other tombs.

  Ahmed wasn’t concerned with history. He was grounded in the present with an eye for the future. To him, Nefertiti’s name alone would be enough to revive the tourist industry.

  He left the Egyptologist inside the cavern and climbed down the scaffolding to the desert floor. Readjusting Rashi’s expectations had been important. She might not fall at his feet when the cavern was void of treasure, but it was reassuring to know the history was enough for her.

  Hope was not lost, though. Losing John Storm was a problem, but the other American and his girlfriend, though they didn’t know it, were still in play.

  Ahmed stepped back into the Jeep and glanced at his phone. It was too early to expect an update from his man heading to Florida, but he knew the entire enterprise now rested on the woman in Key Largo.

  27

  Cairo, Egypt

  Mako and Gretchen had remained silent during the short flight to Cairo. There was no disagreement or friction. They had simply hit a wall in Luxor. The capital of the New Kingdom hadn’t yielded any secrets. It was time to try something new and that discussion would have to wait, because at no point until they reached the gate of the departing flight to Frankfurt were they left alone.

  The men assigned to ensure they boarded the outbound flight to Frankfurt had been vigilant. Just before the plane began boarding, they walked the couple to the attendant, showed their IDs, and handed the man Mako and Gretchen’s passports. The airline attendant took the passports and motioned for the couple to follow him.

  They were escorted to two seats just behind the exit rows, where the man left them with a stern look. Mako was surprised they weren’t tasked to accompany them on the flight. It was the break he was looking for.

  “We have to get off,” Mako whispered, once the guards were out of earshot.

  “Agreed,” Gretchen said. “I’m going to use the bathroom.”

  “Good idea. Check things out.”

  “Well, I really have to go, but I will.”

  Mako rose to allow her access to the aisle. Gretchen slipped past and walked toward the rear of the plane. Standard procedure during most flights was for Mako to chat up the flight attendants. They were often good sources of local knowledge and in many cases were willing guides. On this flight, he needed to be invisible and ducked back to his seat, but not before doing a quick scan of the aircraft.

  A larger craft with dual aisles would have made escape easier. With multiple bulkheads, lavatories, and service areas, the line of sight from any one position on the jumbo jets was limited. This Airbus A320 was a single-aisle design with nothing except a flimsy curtain to block the view from front to back. It was going to be very difficult to escape unnoticed.

  Mako sat down to evaluate the situation. His attention was drawn outside, where a fuel truck had just moved away. Baggage was being loaded, and he noticed the caterer’s truck parked at the rear of the plane.

  “The rear is the only viable exit,” Gretchen whispered, slipping back into her seat.

  Glancing forward, Mako saw a few passengers settling into first class. Next would come the families with small children who would undoubtedly clog the aisles. They needed to move now. “Let’s go, then.”

  They rose and moved toward the rear of the plane. The flight attendants were all forward to aid the boarding process. This left only the caterers in the rear galley. Mako had heard of people sneaking onto planes by way of the caterers, but not off. There were a handful of people loading carts from the rear exit doors into the galley. Mako noticed they weren’t uniformed, but wore similar work clothes—none of which matched his and Gretchen’s clothing. They appeared to be just about to finish and depart.

  “Hurry up. We’ve got to get on the truck,” Mako said.

  They lingered in the aisle, as if waiting for the restrooms, while the last cart was wheeled into place and locked down. The worker performed a cursory examination of the galley and stepped onto the loading platform extending from the truck. Mako looked at Gretchen and nodded.

  They both casually stepped into the galley. Once they were out of sight, or thought they were because there was no time to check, they darted toward the door and onto the loading platform. Gretchen stared down the man while Mako pushed the airplane hatch closed.

  There were two workers in the loading box, and neither seemed to care that they had visitors. They glanced at each other, causing a moment’s apprehension for Mako and Gretchen, before taking the bills Mako extended to them. They smiled, amused and thankful for their good fortune. The language barrier made verbal communication impossible, but they understood what the intruders wanted.

  The box lowered onto the bed of the truck and, with nods at their benefactors, the workers closed the large back door and departed through a smaller side door.

  “You think we’re good?” Gretchen asked.

  Mako knew there was every chance that when the door opened again they would be staring into the barrels of a dozen rifles. But he had a feeling that, like low-wage workers everywhere, the men were grateful for the break in their day—and the cash.

  The truck jerked, throwing Mako and Gretchen against the back door. They slid to the floor and hung on as the vehicle picked up speed. Unable to see outside, Mako could only imagine the truck speeding through the taxiways—they were, after all, still in Cairo. Finally, the driver hit the brakes.

  “Moment of truth,” Gretchen said as she rose.

  “Not waiting for that.” Mako moved to the side door and, before the truck had come to a stop, released the latch. Sunlight flooded the truck, blinding Mako and Gretchen, but it was only for a brief second until the truck entered a large hangar.

  “Now.” Mako leaned out the door, placing his hands flat against the outside of the box. Just as the truck slowed to a stop, he jumped, landing easily in a squat. Gretchen followed. She stumbled slightly, but recovered. Mako grabbed her hand and they ran toward the exit.

  Once outside, they looked at each other. The Where to now? conversation had never taken place. The answer, at least temporarily, was to get out of the airport and blend into the city. At some point, probably when the flight attendants did a head count before takeoff, they would be missed.

  “Let’s get out of here,” Gretchen said. She started toward the terminal building.

  Mako glanced around at the barren landscape, trying to recall the layout from the air. Carved out of the desert, the airport had plenty of open space around it. There appeared to be a perimeter road with a fence surrounding it. Undoubtedly in an effort to at least appear secure, there would be patrols at periodic intervals. Mako had noticed the security in country was mostly for show, but armed men were always a problem.

  “We’ve got to get to the terminal building. We can get a cab there,” Gretchen said.

  They started to jog, but Mako slowed and stopped. Running across the tarmac would draw unwanted attention. Several golf-cart-type vehicles were parked outside the hangar. In an enclosed environment like this, he expected they were available for whichever workers needed them and probably had keys. Leading Gretchen toward the passenger side of the closest one, an open cart with the caterer’s lo
go, Mako hopped in. The key was in the ignition. He turned it to the on position, released the brake, and sped toward the main terminal.

  Mako glanced at his watch. The plane was still boarding, so it was unlikely they had been missed, but that would only last another few minutes. They needed to get out before then. Unless there was an alarm, airport security was more focused on people and objects coming in than those leaving. Although taking the cart through the airport exit might be one of those things that attracted their attention.

  They had reached the far end of the departure terminal, where he pulled over behind the building. They were in plain sight, directly below the building’s windows, but to most anyone looking they were doing nothing wrong. Driving the cart closer to the terminal, though, would put them under scrutiny.

  They reached the chain-link fence built across the line of demarcation separating the working area of the airport from the front of the terminal. They could see a gaggle of people by a set of doors about a hundred yards away. Signs in Arabic and English hung overhead, directing residents and foreigners to different lines.

  A lone gate separated them from freedom. Mako walked toward it and was fishing in his pocket for his wallet when he noticed the padlock hanging from the latch. He took out a credit card and popped out the lock-pick tools embossed in the plastic material. Seconds later the lock opened. They walked through, turned the building’s corner, and stepped onto the concrete sidewalk. Offers for taxis came quickly. They were soon besieged by men dressed in untucked polo shorts and khaki pants. It seemed every one of them wanted to practice their English and promised to be the best guide ever. As soon as Mako made eye contact with one, he had a follower. They had soon amassed a tribe before they even reached the doors.

  Mako tried to negotiate with several, but somehow their English broke down when it came time to talk money. One man was more astute and called out he would take American dollars. Mako pulled him aside, and they settled on a price of one hundred dollars for all day. Mako knew it was probably double the going rate, but he had always been a generous tipper and decided they might need the man’s goodwill. Bartering any longer to save fifty dollars might put their lives at risk.