by Steven James
“I think so. I forwarded his address list and TypeKnot contacts to Cyber for a meta-analysis. Maybe they can compare it to the data in the contents of the other victims’ phones and identify who Bloodbrother13 or Igazi is in real life.”
“That’s—” She stopped midsentence, drew out her phone, and checked an incoming text. “Ah. Good news—well, that is, depending on how you look at it.”
“What’s that?”
“Our briefing has been shifted back to one thirty—so you won’t have to miss it after all.”
Oh.
Wonderful.
“Hang on,” I said. “With everything that’s going on, doesn’t that seem a little much to you? Postponing it four and a half hours?”
“Scheduling issues, I guess. Looks like it was Lieutenant Sproul’s call. He just transferred in a couple months ago. I’ve only worked with him once before, but . . . How shall I say this: I wasn’t exactly sure where he was coming from.”
“That was carefully worded.”
“How about this: the man’s raft is on the water but it isn’t quite inflated.”
“Ah. And yet he made lieutenant.”
“Sometimes it’s not the cream that rises to the top, it’s the foam.”
“True enough.”
As we neared the café she said, “Listen, I didn’t get a chance to eat breakfast earlier. I was on the phone with my lawyer. Custody issues—which only made seeing Kevin here this morning even more, well . . .”
She let her voice trail off. Her words carried a lot of emotion, but I wasn’t sure if it was just frustration or anger.
I tried to think of an appropriate response. “It’s been rough, huh?”
“I just hate that Olivia is caught in the middle of this. Anyway . . .” She swiped her hand definitively through the air as if she were pushing the topic aside—out of sight, out of mind. “With the briefing pushed back, it looks like we have time for a quick breakfast. What do you think?”
“I could eat.”
++++
Ten minutes after their plane lifted off from Teterboro for Detroit, Blake used the Sovereign’s Wi-Fi to download the video that Fayed had sent him. The one of Maria’s death.
As he watched what happened to her, his stomach churned with a surge of nausea that he was barely able to hold in check—even after all the things he had seen over the years, even after all the things he had done—still, he was disturbed by what he saw.
He’d heard about the virus’s hemorrhagic presentation, read about it, but seeing it like that, seeing a real person decline so dramatically, that was a whole different matter. And then there was the end. With her hands.
Why did Fayed even send this to you? Is he that presumptuous? Wouldn’t he know that he’s signing his own death warrant?
“I’m calling Fayed,” he told Mannie, not even trying to quell the antipathy in his voice. “While I’m on the line, I want you to trace it.”
“You think he’s still in Michigan?”
“Let’s find out.”
“It’ll be encrypted.”
“Do what you can.”
It took them a few minutes to calibrate the program on Mannie’s laptop to sync with Blake’s phone, but finally when the frequency was identified and they’d logged in to the tracking program, Blake put the call through.
Fayed Raabi’ah Bashir answered. “Why are you—?”
“I watched the video,” Blake said bluntly. “I saw what you did to her. When I agreed to deliver her, you made me a promise. You assured me that she—”
“As it turned out, she had valuable information for us.”
“You gave me your word, Fayed. You said you would make it quick.”
“We determined that this course of action was necessary.”
“Five days is not quick.”
“She was able to provide passwords and access credentials that would have taken our cyber team weeks to obtain on their own.”
“Passwords and credentials weren’t part of the deal. And both of her hands?”
“That was her decision,” Fayed’s tone had stiffened. “We offered her the choice.”
Mannie tapped his computer screen twice and gave Blake a thumbs-up: he had the location.
As Fayed went on, he spoke condescendingly and used Blake’s real last name. “Mr. Neeson, this is not the time for the timid or the fainthearted.” Blake guessed that it was a tactic to show that he’d done his homework, or perhaps to prove that Maria truly had given him the information he was looking for. “Sometimes,” Fayed said, “sacrifices must be made. This is the time for resolve. For lions, not cubs.”
“Yes. You are right, Fayed. And when I find you, I’m going to show you just how resolved I can be. Blood for blood. Your life for hers. Five days for five days. Sounds about right.”
The jihadist scoffed. “The United States government has been trying to find me for more than three years. Will you really do what they cannot?”
“Actually, that’s my specialty.”
End call.
“He gazed at Mannie. “Michigan?”
“Dearborn.”
“Well, it looks like Fate might just be smiling on us today.”
“We should enjoy the warmth of her smile while we can,” Mannie said reflectively.
“Earlier, Fayed mentioned that his man ran into some trouble in Atlanta last night, but that he’d made it past security. Can you or any of your black hat friends get into the airport’s security cameras?”
“Not Hartsfield–Jackson.” Mannie shook his head. “No. I’m not that good, and neither are the guys I know. Maybe if we had a week. But even then . . . I don’t think so.”
Blake mentally flipped through the hundreds of contacts in his mind from over the years, the names, the phone numbers, all stored in his memory, that one place that could not be hacked, and came up with one.
“I might know of someone. Name’s Terry Manoji—or Wilson—he’s been known to go by either name. He’s with the NSA.”
“I don’t think I know him.”
“It’s from before your time, before we met. I did a job for him. He owes me a favor.” Blake unpocketed his phone. “And I believe this just might be a good time to collect.”
28
The hospital’s café looked a lot more like a Starbucks than any hospital cafeteria I’d ever been in. Ambient lighting. Teak tables and countertops. Lounge seating. Light jazz playing through Bose speakers.
An orderly lounged on the leather couch, typing leisurely on his laptop. Two women dressed in scrubs sat across from each other talking in hushed tones at the table closest to the multi-armed brushed satin floor lamp.
We placed our order.
“This is not your grandma’s cafeteria,” I said.
“Gotta keep up with the times. All Ferilex money. Word is, the CEO is a real coffee aficionado. Small batch. Fair trade. Shade grown. Organic. You know.”
“Sounds like a real stand-up guy.”
“Ah, that’s right. You and your predilection for overpriced java. Folgers would do it for me.”
“Ouch. That’s painful to hear.”
“You’d probably get along well with Idris. If you could ever find him.”
“What do you mean?”
“Idris Kourye. The CEO. He mostly keeps to himself. Pretty reclusive. They say he travels a lot. Charity work. He’s an Arab-American. So, to avoid making it appear that Muslims are being singled out or targeted for scrutiny, the media hasn’t really probed too deeply into the Islamic charities he works with—but some are a bit questionable. If you ask me, they’ve given him a bit of a pass. There are over thirty thousand Arabs in Dearborn—in a way he’s the best known and also the least known at the same time. Sure gives a lot of money to the city, though. Can’t begrudge him that.”
“Well, maybe we’ll meet and be able to compare notes on coffee roasting. Who knows.”
“Sounds scintillating,” she said, with a slight touch of sarcasm.
“Someday I’ll convert you, Folgers Girl.”
“Good luck with that.”
Though I offered to pay for our breakfast, Sharyn refused and put the breakfast burritos, my coffee, and her tea on her American Express.
“I’ll get it next time, then,” I told her.
“Deal.”
I graced my coffee with a touch of honey and cream, just the way I like it. Then we found a table near a window that overlooked an ornate reflective pool and rock garden.
I downloaded the TypeKnot app onto my phone so I could look into it more later, then tried the coffee. My hat went off to Idris Kourye. This was the best coffee I’d had in the last month.
Sharyn had only taken a couple of bites before saying, “I guess I should just go ahead and address the elephant in the room.”
“Which one is that?
“Kevin. We met right after I graduated from the Academy. He was charming and smart and finishing med school to become an emergency room doc and launch out and change the world. I fell for him right off the bat. Fell hard. But the marriage was short-lived and the only good thing to come out of us being together was Olivia—and she was born before Kevin ever proposed. He’s a very good doctor and he loves Livvy, but he was not a good husband. It didn’t take long after we were married before he decided he liked something else better than brunettes. Redheads.”
“Ah.”
“And blondes.”
“Oh.”
“He can be a real jackass sometimes.”
It didn’t feel quite right to agree with her assessment of her ex-husband or his preferences in women. “You mentioned last night that Olivia is seven?” I framed it as a question.
“Yeah. She’s a real girlie girl—the three Ps all the way.”
“Three Ps?”
“Ponies. Princesses. Pink.”
“Oh. Right.”
“I love her more than anything, Pat. I can’t even bear the thought of losing her.”
“Losing her?” Earlier she’d mentioned custody issues, but I didn’t imagine that would mean losing custody altogether. “Why would you lose her?”
“Kevin’s claiming that my job could put her in danger. He’s trying for sole custody.” She shook her head in disgust, then sighed. “I’ve always been a rebound girl. And what can I say? I have a weakness for a scruffy guy with haunting eyes. Hasn’t always worked out well for me, though.”
I didn’t know about the haunting eyes part, but I self-consciously caught myself rubbing my hand across my chin. “Are you saying I need to shave?”
++++
No. I’m saying you don’t, Sharyn Weist thought, but caught herself just in time, and held her tongue.
Thank God, she hadn’t said what she was thinking.
Why did you tell him all that? About Kevin? He’s going to think you’re coming on to him.
Well, maybe I am.
You shouldn’t have hugged him last night or told him you used to know him well—any of those things.
Maybe I should have. Maybe I should have done it years ago.
Ever since picking him up at the airport, Sharyn had been berating herself for not keeping her old feelings toward him in check.
When he looked into her eyes, she felt breathless.
The quickening heartbeat. The slight slipping of focus. That sweep of hot desire crowding in on her attention in ways that were distracting, but also that didn’t seem to be a distraction at all, but instead the way things were really meant to be.
She hated the power he had over her.
And she loved it too.
One day last winter, she’d been talking with Julianne Springman about relationships and Julianne had said, “You know, Sharyn, many women have the fantasy of being powerless in the arms of a powerful man.”
“I have to say, that sounds a tad sexist.”
“It’s not sexist to acknowledge our differences or desires. Come on, Sharyn. Look at the covers of romance novels—how many of ’em show a woman losing herself in the embrace of an effeminate man?”
Actually, she did have a point.
“A woman,” Julianne went on, “wants to be independent and also fawned over. It’s only when she’s captured that she’s really set free. Romance trumps utility every time. A computer might cost a thousand times more than a rose, but if a man gives a laptop to his woman, she’ll be grateful and thank him. If he gives her that one single rose, she’ll melt.”
Yeah.
No kidding.
Pat gave her six roses during their relationship, one at a time, and every one of them had spoken volumes to her.
A rose waiting for her on her pillow, then one beside her mirror, on her desk, next to her plate on the dinner table, awaiting her at that sushi restaurant, and then he even left one on the front seat of her car after picking the lock. Just as a surprise—not a creepy, stalkerish one, but one touched with a brand of romance that only an FBI agent who can pick locks could offer.
“Yes, she will melt.” Sharyn had agreed with Julianne. “And feel loved.”
“Yeah. And feel loved.”
Pat made her feel weak in a way that gave her more strength than she ever knew she had, and that had helped her cope with the tragedy that still lingered in her heart, in her life, from the night she turned twenty-one and went home with that man who did those things to her.
And in her terror, she’d promised not to tell, never to tell, if only he would set her free.
And he had.
But she had told.
And then, three months later, during the trial, she’d made the most difficult decision in her life: she’d tried to erase the memory of that night and aborted that man’s baby—something she’d never told anyone about, not even Pat.
But she hadn’t done it because she’d been raped.
It was because of something else altogether. Something that brought her so much shame that she couldn’t even bear the thought of it.
However, later, when Pat accepted her, it helped make the stain fade. He didn’t look at her the way other men did. And he didn’t ask her to share secrets that she didn’t feel comfortable sharing.
He was the kind of man you only find once in a lifetime.
She had found him.
And lost him.
When he broke things off back at the Academy, she’d tried to turn her sense of loss into anger, or even a feeling of betrayal, but it’d never worked. The love had never been dispelled, never faded, never gone away, even when she’d been with Kevin.
So, of course, when she requested his help on this case she’d been curious if the sparks would still fly between them. And yes, she’d been hoping that they would, but she hadn’t had any idea how hard it would be when they did.
Now she looked past him out the window at the courtyard and tried to regain her composure to be able to look at him without holding his gaze so long that it revealed what she was truly feeling inside.
Don’t step any closer to the edge, Sharyn. It’s been too long. He’s probably seeing someone. Besides, he’s living in New York City. It could never work, anyway. Don’t even entertain the thought!
“Are you okay?” Pat was looking at her curiously, with a hint of concern. “Did I do something wrong?”
“No. Sorry. I just got lost in my thoughts there for a minute.”
She promptly veered away from the topic of what kind of men she was attracted to and asked him, “How’s the coffee?”
“Very nice, actually. Mild acidity, a warm lingering finish. Uganda Bugisu is always a good breakfast choice. Especially when it was just roasted in the last two weeks.”
She blinked. “You can tell all that just by drinking it?”
“Well—”
“That’s amazing.”
“And from that sign hanging behind the counter.”
“Aha. And see? You had the chance there to really impress me and you passed it up.”
“I’ll save it for later,” he said, clearly oblivious to how forward the words could’ve been taken. “By the way, I saw you jotting some notes in there. In Canyon’s room.”
“Just trying to track all the threads, keep them straight. Feel out if he was lying.”
“You were always better at that than I was—at reading people, I mean. Do you think it’s possible he sent in the previous tips regarding the victims’ locations?”
“Hard to say,” she told him. “And, by the way, don’t sell yourself short.”
“Sell myself short?”
“About reading people. You always seemed to read me well enough.”
Stop it, Sharyn. Don’t—
“Oh, well, you were easy to read.”
“Was I?”
“As I remember.” He took another sip of the Ugandan coffee. “Yes, you were.”
“Read me now. What am I thinking?”
You’re flirting, Sharyn. Stop!
“That you wish they had Sriracha sauce instead of just ketchup for that breakfast burrito.”
“I have always been partial to—”
++++
My phone dinged: the nine thirty reminder to call Christie and find out why she’d been so upset last night.
I quieted the alarm. “Listen, Sharyn, I need to make a call.”
“Sure.” She rose and hastily gathered the rest of her food to go. “Should I wait outside? Would you like to follow me to the Ninth Precinct station?”
“I’ll meet you there. Since the briefing isn’t until this afternoon, I think it’ll be worth my time to drive to the sites of the previous homicides, hopefully get a better feel for the layout of your city. It’ll help me with the geoprofile.”
A nod. “Alright. I’ll take a closer look at the apps on the victims’ phones and have the officers check their informants and contacts to see if we can find anyone fitting Igazi’s description. I’ll see you at the briefing.”