by Jade Kerrion
Adara glanced at her mother. “My mother is teaching me to cook.”
Zara smiled. “Even better. The next time I want good Lebanese food, I’ll visit you.”
It was hard to say who beamed brighter—Adara or her mother.
At that moment, Nadira raced back into the room with the dolls Zara had given her the previous year and claimed Zara’s attention for a few minutes until it was time for dinner.
Zara and Klah left the building and headed to Al Mandaloun, where they were met by Rafiq and shown to a table nestled in a cozy nook. After they had given their orders to the waiter, Klah leaned back in his chair. “What can we expect in Baalbek?”
“Napa Valley meets Palatine Hill. The temple complex contains some of the best preserved Roman ruins in Lebanon.”
“And you were kidding, right, when you talked about redecorating it?”
“Only partially. The day we choose to preserve ancient stones over real lives is the day we can say for sure humanity has gone to hell.”
Klah’s eyes widened. He breathed something inaudible and then looked away.
“What is it?” Zara asked.
“You’re not what I expected you to be.”
Zara’s eyes narrowed—a warning to him as much as to herself.
He took the cue and shut up.
Dinner was a silent affair. Zara had never felt obliged to fill the quiet spaces between people with random chatter, and apparently, Klah was of the same mindset. In fact, he spoke so rarely she wondered why he was hoarding words. He was, however, an exceptional bodyguard. He ate with only quick glances at his plate to position his fork and knife. The rest of the time, he watched the restaurant wait staff and guests, all entrances and exits, as well as the rooftops and windows of surrounding buildings. Better yet, he managed to do so without appearing in the least bit jumpy or paranoid.
“When does your tour end?” she asked.
His startled gaze flashed to her, and he grinned. “Your uncle said you might try something like that.”
“I appreciate talent, and you appear to have quite a bit of it.”
He smiled. “Thanks.” His attention flicked to the window as he continued his scan of the area.
The lamb shank stew was as good as she remembered, although her dining experience was ruined by a fetus who apparently enjoyed the stew as much as she did and demonstrated it by doing loops and twirls in her uterus. As a result, she was irritable by the time they returned to the villa after dinner.
Grass eyed her. He opened his mouth to speak but was warned off either by something in her face or Klah’s quick shake of his head. He hesitated for a moment. “Any problems?”
“No.” Zara’s response was clipped.
“Are you still planning on heading to Baalbek tomorrow?”
“I’m leaving tonight. The rest of you will follow in the morning. Plan to arrive before first light.”
“What?”
“We’re an hour and a half from Baalbek. The SEALs are probably used to traveling all night and then jumping, bright-eyed and bushy tailed, into a fight, but if my read on the situation is correct, we’ll have to be opportunistic about the strike. Nothing about the three-hour round-trip says ‘opportunistic’ to me.”
“An operation of this scale has to be planned.”
“Plan away, but you’ll have to flex on timing. Hell, you’ll probably have to flex on location too. My sources indicate that they’re camped out in the temple complex—”
“That’s also what we’ve heard.”
“Then you know that the complex is the worst possible place for a fight. A million nooks and crannies and extremely poor visibility, even if you’re standing on top of a column, which I’ve done. If you’re thinking of storming the place, don’t. We’ll have to crawl over rocks and stones touched by two thousand years’ worth of grubby hands, and take out Nakob’s men one at a time. There will be better or worse times to attack, depending on how many men are in the ruins. You can’t plan for that. We have to be in Baalbek, ready to roll out at a moment’s notice.”
“There is no place to be in Baalbek. It’s a town of eighty thousand. Most tourists daytrip out of Beirut. We’ll stand out, attract attention. It’s the last thing we want.”
“I have a house there, large enough for all of us. You’ll travel there under cover of dark and stay indoors until it’s time to strike.”
Grass’s jaw dropped. “The house wasn’t in your file.”
Zara rolled her eyes. “If you’re referring to the two-gigabyte file the NSA has on me, you should know that it’s only about seventy percent accurate and is missing all the really juicy stuff. Yes, I have a house in Baalbek.” My childhood home.
“And you’re leaving tonight because…?”
“Because Hezbollah controls most of the Beqaa Valley, and especially Baalbek. Traveling under cover of dark will keep us from alarming the locals, but unless Hezbollah is slacking off, they’ll know when eight Special Forces guys show up in Baalbek. They won’t believe you’re there to see the famous ruins. We’re not here to pick a fight with Hezbollah—unless they’re sheltering Nakob, which they better not be. So, I’m heading out tonight to meet with Hezbollah’s commander in the Beqaa Valley and negotiate safe passage for us.”
“The U.S. government doesn’t negotiate with terrorists.”
“I am not the U.S. government, and Hezbollah considers itself a resistance movement, but that’s not the point. I don’t approve of their politics or their style, but you’re not going to be able to start a firefight in Baalbek or safely remove fifty girls from Nakob’s control unless I can convince Hezbollah to keep their noses out of our business.”
“You’re going to negotiate with them? Will they listen to you?”
“Of course. I hire their top soldiers when they realize fanaticism and religion doesn’t pay nearly as well as working for me.”
Grass’s eyes bulged. “You…what?”
“My mercenary agency, Three Fates, is made up of ex-Special Forces and ex-terrorists. I’m an equal opportunity employer, and no one has killed each other yet.” Zara pulled out her smartphone and glanced at the time. “I have to head out in a half hour. Any final questions?”
“Klah and Annie are going with you. Not open for negotiation. The admiral will have my head if he finds out that I let his niece walk unescorted into Hezbollah-controlled territory.”
“Fine.” She looked at Klah. “Tell Annie we’re leaving in thirty minutes. Bring everything you think you’ll need. We’re not coming back here for your stuff.”
She walked out of the room, but the conversation between Klah and Grass drifted toward her. “A hell of a woman,” Grass said. “Pity the poor sod who loves her.”
7
A half hour later, Zara walked down the curved staircase. Annie and Klah waited for her at the foot of the stairs. Both wore traditional Lebanese clothes, and Annie had donned a headdress over his shock of red hair. His blue eyes, concealed behind brown contact lenses, narrowed at the sight of her white robe and pants. “That’s not exactly inconspicuous.”
“She’s not trying to be inconspicuous,” Klah said. “In Islam, white is the color of the blessed, of nobility.”
“Very good, Klah,” Zara said.
“Where are we going?”
“Ghazze, a village north of Joub Jannine, midway in Beqaa Valley,” she said. “Get in the car. I’m driving.”
Annie frowned as if he was about to protest.
“Don’t.” She cut him off with a weary wave of her hand. “I appreciate the thought, but I know the way and you don’t.”
The conversation did not begin again until they were on their way to Beqaa Valley, their luggage in the trunk and their weapons at their feet. As the bright lights of Beirut conceded to the darkness of the countryside, Annie, seated in the backseat of the SUV, asked, “What should we expect, Zara?”
“Roadblocks outside Joub Jannine. We’ll likely have to ditch the car outside Ghazze a
nd walk the rest of the way. I’ll bring you in with me as far as I can, but they won’t let you go all the way in to see the commandant.”
“And they’ll let you in?”
“Of course.”
Annie shook his head. His tone betrayed a hint of incredulity. “Should I just not ask?”
Zara shrugged. “Ask away. Just be prepared for lies.”
“At what point do we storm the place and look for you?”
“Don’t,” she said. “If I don’t come back, you walk away. Your mission is the retrieval of the kidnapped girls. Without me, your mission is harder, but not impossible. If you lose men trying to get me back, your primary mission will become impossible, and the admiral will be pissed.”
“With all due respect, ma’am, keeping you safe is part of our mission too.”
“You can’t keep me out of the line of fire, so don’t make promises you can’t keep. The admiral recruited me because of my ties to the locals. I suggest you sit back and let me do what I was sent to do.”
The quality of the roads deteriorated the farther out they traveled. By the time they arrived at Joub Jannine, asphalt had conceded to packed dirt. Houses emerged out of the darkness like pale, chunky monoliths set against the canvas of the night sky. The scattered buildings amid farmed fields welcomed her back to civilization—or whatever passed for it in the Lebanese countryside. Where was the expected roadblock—ah, there. Two men in dusty fatigues and black headscarves, each carrying an AK-47 slung over a shoulder, stepped into the headlights.
Zara slowed the car to a rolling halt and cast a sideway glance at Klah and Annie. One of the armed men sauntered up to her car and looked in through the window. His eyes widened. His Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat as he gulped down his surprise.
“As-salaam-alaikum,” Zara said in flawless Arabic.
The man took several moments to find his voice. “Wa-alaikum-salaam.”
“I am here to see Commandant Farouk.”
“The commandant is not seeing anyone.”
“He will see me. I bring news of his brother.”
The man hesitated. “Wait here. I will ask the commandant.” He turned away, exchanged a few words with the other guard, and then trotted off at a brisk pace, vanishing into the distant darkness.
The other guard strutted up to the car and looked in through the window. Initially, his eyes were wary as he looked at the two men in the car, but when they ignored him in favor of staring stonily ahead, he lost his wariness, and with it his manners. His leering smile grew wider as he stared at Zara, his dark eyes roving over her face, lingering at her chest, and drifting down to her legs, as if he could stare through her robe at the juncture of her thighs. His grin displayed blackened teeth as he reached out with two stubby fingers and touched her face.
She caught his fingers and twisted them, wrenching a yelp of pain from him. “I did not give you permission to touch me.” Her reprimand was offered in the casual tone she might have used to comment on the sweetness of the grapes in the vineyards around Joub Jannine.
His aching hand pressed beneath his opposite armpit, the guard stumbled back to his post. His muttered words—whore, bitch—traveled through the quiet night air.
“Don’t take much crap, do you?” Annie asked, his voice lowered.
“Crap makes for a slippery slope. Take a bit now, and you’ll be taking a whole lot later. I’d rather we didn’t have any misunderstandings. It saves on bullets and funeral expenses.”
“You’d kill a guy for touching you without permission?”
Danyael touched me without permission. He was the only one. She shoved the thought away. “Would you kill someone for touching your wife or girlfriend without permission?”
“Of course,” Annie replied.
The brittle snap of his voice scraped against Zara’s nerves. Alarm shot up her spine, and she glanced over her shoulder, half expecting to see a gun in his hand.
Annie held up his hands in a “who me” gesture. “I don’t have a wife or girlfriend, though, luckily for the world.” His grin bared white teeth in a humorless smile.
His weak joke rang hollow—social niceties thinly layered over deep hurts. Zara glanced at Klah. Lines furrowed Klah’s brow, but he said nothing. If Annie’s officers weren’t bothered enough to dig deeper, it certainly wasn’t her problem.
Conversation lapsed until the first guard returned several minutes later. The man cast a curious look at the other guard before walking over to the car. “The commandant will see you, and you only.”
Zara stepped out of the car. The wind tugged at her white robes as she wrapped the headscarf around her face, leaving only her eyes exposed. She followed the first guard and was not surprised when the second one fell in beside her. She did not have high hopes that he would have learned politeness. The AK-47 he carried was not really the issue. He would not turn it on her; dead whores weren’t nearly as entertaining as live ones. The jagged-edged hunting knife in the sheath strapped to his thigh, however, was potentially problematic.
But only if he was faster than she was.
The first guard led her to a concrete house at the edge of Ghazze. A dim orange glow emanated from behind the drawn curtains. The guard nodded at her, and then he and his companion flanked either side of the door.
Zara called out a greeting as she entered. “As-salaam-alaikum.”
“Wa-alaikum-salaam.” A deep voice responded in Arabic before switching to English. “What news of my brother? Is he still hiding in his ivory tower?” The Hezbollah commandant turned to face Zara, his robes snug around his broad waist.
Zara eased into smile. “Yes, he is.”
Farouk sighed. “And here I thought you had come to deliver a wedding invitation.”
“My father will never remarry. I don’t think he’s dated since my mother died.”
“Ah, your mother. A remarkable woman. No wonder he can find none to compare.” Farouk held out his arms. “And you, my little Zara? Come, let me see you. Ah…” He, too, grinned. “So beautiful. How many hearts have you broken recently?”
“Only one that really mattered.”
Her uncle’s eyes widened. The bitterness in her tone must have caught him off guard as surely as it had caught her off guard. “Zara?”
She waved his concern away.
“Does he not love you? How can anyone not love you?”
“Oh, you’d be surprised,” she said. As far as she knew, her list of shortcomings—not the least of which was her tendency to be trigger-happy—far outweighed her positive character traits.
“He hurt you. I can arrange for someone to break his legs.”
“He’s already crippled.” She shook her head. “I didn’t come here to talk about my love life, ya ammi.” She addressed him as uncle in Arabic—an honorific she paid to her father’s brother, a Hezbollah commandant, but not to her mother’s brother, an admiral in the U.S. Navy. What that implied about her perverse rebellious streak she wasn’t certain, but she did not care to dwell on it. “I’m here for Nakob.”
Farouk sighed. “That’s what I was afraid of.”
“Why have you allowed them to get away with it? Doesn’t Hezbollah control the valley?”
Her uncle’s broad shoulders slumped on a silent sigh. “Peace is bad for militant groups. The current Lebanese government is so reasonable that we’ve lost the grounds for our cause. The young people are abandoning Hezbollah because there is no reason to fight, not when we can get our way simply by negotiating.” He snorted with disgust. “I don’t have enough men to hold the valley, and certainly not enough to get into a fight with Nakob.”
“How many men does Nakob have?”
“In this splinter cell? Fifty, maybe more.”
Zara frowned. “That’s more than we heard.”
“We?”
“U.S. Special Forces.”
Farouk’s eyes widened. “What? You’re here with them?”
“They didn’t have a chance of staying out
of it; not when the ambassador’s daughter was taken. They’re going after Nakob. I strongly recommend you have Hezbollah look the other way when the shooting starts. I can guarantee the SEALs won’t stop to ask which terrorist group an AK-47-toting Arab is in before they shoot him.”
Farouk nodded. “I’ll get word to Hakim to pull the men out of Baalbek by dawn.”
Zara arched her eyebrows. What was her cousin doing down in Baalbek? “When did Hakim leave Paris?”
Farouk shrugged. “About two months ago. He said he was tired of western materialism and wanted a simpler way of life.”
“Sounds good in concept, but nothing is worth giving up central air conditioning.”
Her uncle laughed. “Ah, Zara. I have missed you. No one sees life the way you do. Will you come back and share a meal with me and Hakim after you’ve taken care of Nakob?”
“Of course, ya ammi. Tell Hakim to stage the evacuation so that Nakob doesn’t catch on.”
“He will know what to do. We’ve done it lots of times; evacuate a town while leaving the Lebanese army camped on the outskirts, thinking we’re still in there.” Farouk stepped forward and embraced her, the gesture one of grave formality. “Allah’s blessings and protection go with you, my child, and speed your hunt.”
She inclined her head, the gesture equally solemn. When she stepped away from him, she tilted her head. “The guard at the check post, the one with the shifty eyes—”
“Abdul?”
“How attached are you to him?”
Farouk blinked hard several times. “Did he insult you?” Without waiting for Zara’s reply, he sighed. “Of course he did. It is not new or unexpected. I’ll reprimand him.”
“I already did, but I suspect he’s something of a slow learner. The second lesson will be more pointed.”
He shrugged. “As you will, Zara. No real loss, I suppose.”
It occurred to her then that her uncle probably understood her best out of all the men in her life. She walked out of his modest home to find the two guards still waiting outside. The car was a hundred feet away on the outskirts of the town—near enough for visual contact, far enough away that the SEALs could not easily reach her if something happened.