Sarai

by Lilya Myers

  They buckled up but Russ sat there without starting the engine. “I know there’s been something rolling around in that empty space between your ears, Roma. I’ve heard it clanging around like a rock in the clothes dryer but figured it was personal. Seeing as I’m your partner, confessional, and personal shrink, I’m not waiting’ any longer for you to start crying on my shoulder. Something up with you and Rachel I don’t know about? The wedding’s gettin’ awfully close. Cold feet maybe – second thoughts? I heard she’s going on a trip.”

  Joey looked over at Russ to try and get a read his expression.

  “No, we’re better than good there. Sarah’s spiriting her out of the country on a business trip. The problem has to do with our killer, all these murders. I wanted to do some checking before I brought it up. Didn’t want to plant any ideas that might set us all down the wrong path. I haven’t even shared this with the Chief.”

  “This,” Joey repeated flatly. “This, meaning what exactly?”

  “It’s a theory. We’ve been to how many of these crime scenes already?” The question was merely rhetorical because they both knew the number. Nine too many. “I think the mutilations are key.”

  “Why that specifically? Why separate that one aspect from the rest of the killer’s M.O.?” Joey asked.

  “It’s not going to taint your perspective?”

  “I promise. Well, that is, not unless some other evidence turns up with a lot more teeth.”

  Russ began by relating a story. “It was one of those things. Sarah told Rachel. Rachel told me. It wasn’t a secret. More like emotion passed down. It was a while back. I think it may have even been Sarah’s maiden voyage to Egypt with Able. Anyway, some girl followed Sarah in one of the markets until Sarah finally put a stop to being stalked and confronted her. She confessed that she picked Sarah out because she was American and thought Sarah would have some kind of power to help her. Being the oldest of a fairly large family, her father made her go to Cairo with him to sell the chickens they raised on their farm. She was fourteen. The family was very poor. Too many mouths to feed. She became another commodity that could help feed the family. I’d say it was probably the real reason he’d drag her off to Cairo with him. Anyway, the father had arranged her marriage to an older man. In essence he sold her. The way she explained it was that the marriage wasn’t really a marriage. He not only got a sex toy, he got his own personal servant. The man had another wife with whom he had children.

  “According to Islam, up to four wives. But because she was so young, and her interests might wander to younger boys and men, he wouldn’t allow that. The husband’s solution was to have her circumcised, an ancient purification custom calling for the removal of part or all of the female’s external genital organs.” Russ explained exactly how it was performed.

  “That’s barbaric! And they still do that?”

  “It’s still practiced even though it’s become illegal in a lot of countries across Africa. The law just doesn’t get enforced. In Egypt it’s known as Sudanese circumcision.”

  “So you’re saying that the men view women as lustful whores? The object is to transform the female into something that’s useful for their purposes but makes damn sure she derives no pleasure,” Joey said with disgusted disbelief. “And our killer is connected to this ritual. Is that about right?”

  “More or less, yeah. I can’t help but think of that girl with every one of our crime scenes. We know that our killer, and I’ve even thought in terms of killers, has taken the brutality way beyond this one aspect. What I’ve read about this purification ritual is hard to ignore in relation to the mutilation that’s been committed on these women. Again, that’s what makes me think there could even be two sickos working together. One has a penchant for the private parts, the other for the eyes. One gets off on tying them up, raping them, and then mutilating them. The other in putting out their lights. Literally.”

  “You didn’t tell me what happened between Sarah and the girl.”

  “They were supposed to meet the next day in that same marketplace. Sarah waited a couple of hours. The girl never showed and Sarah didn’t know how or where to find her. It really upset her but what could she do? On a few subsequent trips back to Egypt, she revisited that same marketplace in the hopes of finding the girl. Nothing. Sarah never saw her again.

  CHAPTER 41

  TWENTY YEARS HADN’T changed some things much, Aswad discovered. The city was still teaming with animal-driven carts that carried anything one needed to move. Beggars with no limbs or diseased eyes took up residence against the walls here and there to replace those who had long since died. Cotton-filled mattresses hung limply over cement balconies, in the hope that the Egyptian sun would kill the bed bugs in them. Looking upward toward the roof tops, it appeared that the people who dwelled there still kept their goats and chickens. Aswad watched cars whiz by and the throngs of people moving through the overcrowded streets as if they had somewhere very important to be.

  Cairo traffic was hazardous at best. A small pickup carrying a raw side of beef in the bed of the truck cut them off the car carrying Aswad just as traffic came to a halt in front of them. They wouldn’t be going anywhere for a while.

  The driver got out to carry on an argument with the driver of the truck in front of them. Aswad just sat and stared as flies and dust settled on the raw meat in the truck. Like most Egyptians, he was oblivious to the fact that it was no different than the meat seen hanging in the doorways of small dilapidated shacks in the market with western sun exposure at 120 degrees.

  Six or seven men helped to right a cart up ahead of them that was top-heavy and had tipped over. The yelling and honking of horns did little to drown out the general noise of the city or speed things up. The cart littered the street with straw and boards and blocks. Some children and others nearby began to help move the objects out of the way for the cars to pass. Whatever patience Aswad had grown in prison was quickly disintegrating. The car started to move again, just in time.

  There were no further delays as they reached their last turn and pulled up to and through the gates of the compound. He was back at last. Aswad stretched as he unwound himself from the cramped front seat of the subcompact French car.

  His eyes flashed with contempt at the outer boundaries of the compound. The sand-colored walls surrounding the compound were now painted a maple gold. He looked down and noticed that the driveway, which had once been sand, was paved with bricks. As he looked into the interior, he noted that brilliant flowering plants spilled to the edge of cement walkways that had once been potholed paths. The garden abounded with lush tall trees and manicured bushes.

  For twenty years, time stood still only for Aswad. If anything, prison had made him even more bitter. His power struggle expanded and became more delusional with every sunrise and sunset. Aswad spent hours planning how he would emerge from prison to prove that he would rise up again and become supreme ruler of Egypt. He sought out prisoners to be his minions, dragging them along into his delusional world. It consumed him so that he never even noticed that no one ever visited him.

  Finally, his sons were informed of his pending release. Twenty years. They hadn’t wondered what he looked like or what prison was like for him. Some fences had been mended between the brothers since Aswad had been out of the picture. If he lived, they knew he would return to the compound and that they would have to present an undivided front. Omar and Saib had made permanent homes in the United States although both traveled to Egypt regularly. They hadn’t come back to give him a release party. There were some ground rules Aswad would be given if he was allowed to continue to live on at the compound. They sent a car to the prison to retrieve him.

  He could feel the heat travel up his neck. As he got out in front of the compound, the driver said something to him, quickly placing a small bag at Aswad’s feet. He couldn’t get back in the car fast enough to pull away. Aswad rubbed his hand over his face. He left his bag where it was and walked very slowly, taking in
the subtle changes in architecture and renovations, among other things. What had been a sprawling base of operations for him in the heart of the city, everything that reflected his military, strength, power, and mirrored his aspirations as leader of a country was reduced to what he was seeing now. This is what they have done? They’ve made this into something resembling a resort with pretty colors and pretty flowers! This is not what I built!

  He began cussing in Arabic while wrapping his left hand around a cluster of flowers. Then he yanked as hard as he could, the action and his anger sending him into a spin that almost landed him on the hard pavement. It felt good to release the fire in his gut without the reprisals he’d received in prison. Just as he was shaking away the petals that clung to his hand, he heard someone call out. The voice was familiar.

  “Father.”

  It was Omar. One of the servants had been told to alert him when Aswad arrived. He’d been watching from a window when Aswad stepped out of the car.

  Aswad stood there blinking, trying to bring the man’s features into focus. His sight had declined and he wasn’t sure which son was speaking to him. He watched the still strong and virile man move toward him and stop a couple of feet away. The two men said nothing as they sized one another up, each lost in a sea of conflicted feelings. Neither moved closer, neither embraced, neither loved the other.

  Finally, Omar spoke. “It’s me. Omar. Come. We were awaiting your arrival to have lunch. You are probably hungry and thirsty.” He turned to walk toward the main house.

  Aswad didn’t budge. He was still chewing on something Omar said. “We,” he repeated but not as a question.

  Omar half turned as he kept on moving with Aswad in tow. “Yes. Saib is here. He arrived five days ago. He’s waiting for us on the east patio.”

  They walked through a breezeway that had been added when Omar had another small building erected not far from the main house. The new addition was used as an office when he was in Cairo. The breezeway was built mainly to connect the office and villas to the main house. However, it was designed with multiple entry points from the garden or outdoor patios to give protection from the summer sun, or rare inclement weather.

  Walking into the main house stunned Aswad. His eyes bulged as if he had suffered a blow to the stomach. Not a picture, nor a rug, nor a piece of furniture was familiar. The interior architecture had been changed. European-inspired decor filled the rooms, the walls had been painted a pleasing hue, and masterfully woven Egyptian rugs adorned the light marble floors that had been laid in recent years. The once-tiny kitchen had been opened to create a kitchen five times the size of the original and filled with the most up-to-date appliances.

  “I’d like to go to my office first,” said Aswad. His voice reflected his mood and quaked with a hint of anger.

  “There is no office there, any longer,” Omar said without apology. “I had it remodeled, along with the two adjoining bedrooms. It’s what they call a suite. You now have a bedroom, private bathroom and spacious sitting area in that wing of the house. Saib, Kafele, and myself all maintained our original villas on the property. Since Saib and I travel back and forth, it wasn’t necessary for us to have a room in the main house, or anything more elaborate. Kafele comes and goes. He had some remodeling done to his villa and was content to stay in it. We only see him for a short time when we’re here and then he’s off somewhere without a word. That much hasn’t changed.” He didn’t add that Kafele had agreed to keep his villa in order to keep an eye on Aswad.

  Aswad was quietly seething until he freed his voice. Booming with indignity, he shouted, “You had no right to remove my office, or change anything here!” His hand swept around the room. Then pounding his chest, he yelled, “This is mine! I built it, my sweat paid for it! It was not for you to do as you pleased, making it into something like an American resort for spoiled infidels!”

  Omar had expected nothing less of a reaction from Aswad and he was prepared. He turned to face him. His voice was calm and steady, void of emotion. “There were no guarantees whether you lived or died in prison. One thing was certain. You wouldn’t be back for twenty years, if you were lucky enough to survive. Would you have rather me let the beggars and thieves squat here and allow them to waste it to ruin? For your information, Aswad, it was my money that kept this place from crumbling to the ground. And it is my money that has sterilized it from the disease you endowed here. The only thing money could not do was to cleanse you from my soul. That’s why the safe in your office was preserved when we remodeled. Not a penny of your money has been touched.”

  For twenty years Aswad had been thinking about a secret he thought no one else knew – the fortune he had hidden in a storage room in Alexandria. They only knew about the safe in my office. A trip to Alexandria this soon was out of the question. He would have to wait until Omar and Saib returned to the U.S., and Kafele wasn’t around.

  His wandering thoughts smothered a retort as Omar had already swung open the French doors that led outside. Saib looked up just as they walked onto the patio. He stood but not out of deference or respect to Aswad. It was a deprecating move.

  In the twenty years that he was gone, Aswad was no longer the monumental figure he had once been. He had no army, he had no following. He suddenly realized that he no longer had control. Prison had aged him well beyond his sixty-four years in many ways. Beatings by prison guards or other inmates, and poor health conditions took its toll on his once robust and hearty frame. His age, strength, and good health going in were probably the only things that helped him to endure the conditions and come out alive. What hadn’t changed were his quick temper, his drinking, and his hateful disposition.

  Aswad decided he would let the dust settle a little before he attempted to resume the ambitions that had been cut short twenty years ago. Besides, he had more pressing needs at the moment and he was as bored as hell.

  Waiting for Omar and Saib to return to the U.S. was agonizing. When they finally left, he was relieved. Aswad knew that Kafele was gone off to somewhere and never set foot in the main house anyway. His delusional mindset convinced him that it would take a while to establish his authority with them again. In the meantime, he’d take matters into his own hands and indulge in recreation of his own. He reclaimed the money that had been stashed in his office before he went to prison. It would easily suffice him for a while. He found the key to the padlock of the storage in Alexandria still in the dirt in an obscure place on the compound. Chancing a trip to check too soon to check the storage would arouse unwanted suspicion. However, two days or two months from now wouldn’t make a difference because there was someone listening and watching every move he made.

  There were plenty of profiteering men right outside the compound who would readily fulfill Aswad’s request. At one time, Aswad would never have relied on someone outside his most trusted circle. Circumstances had changed that. Desperation taught him that he had to trust. And no one knew who he was anymore. He approached a man and for a few Egyptian pounds, would receive an answer by the next day. And so he did.

  CHAPTER 42

  HER MASTER GAVE her an Egyptian name. Suma. It meant ask. She knew where she was being taken and had heard many stories about the man that she was about to meet face-to-face. Suma was absolutely beautiful. Not a single one of her features was out of proportion or defective in any way. Her lips were blush and full. A dark liner had been painted on her upper and lower lids to accentuate her large almond eyes which were both dreamy and mysterious. Those eyes held Aswad’s, concealing their defiance until Aswad allowed his to move away and over every inch of her body.

  Suma hid her surprise well. She knew of his reputation, which conjured up an image of a younger, more potent man. She made a quick assessment in her head. Here was a man old enough to be her grandfather. His face was worn and haggard, drooping where there had once been steel eyes, a set jaw, and hardened lines that defined him. His inner strength seemed to have remained strong although it was obvious that his ph
ysical strength was no longer what it had been. He was not much overweight. There were a few stray hairs left on the top of his balding head. Suma supposed his lascivious expression had probably been there since birth.

  The young woman’s clothing had been carefully selected. The fabric was the finest silk and lace, sheer and fluid. The tunic, tailored to her alone, melted over every curve. It was designed to cover some places while revealing others. It accented her full breasts over her toned and sinewy body. Aswad caught himself being mesmerized by her beauty. Of all the women he had brought from Sudan, there was not one who could excite him with so much intensity from a distance. Suma’s escort nudged her closer to Aswad for a better look. He pushed away the thought that twenty years without a woman made him careless.

  The escort, a competent businessman, invited Aswad to run his hands over Suma’s soft skin. She had been taught well how to please a man. Her small frame contradicted the fullness of her breasts and the shape of her hips.

  The woman was of Asian descent. However, her mother had been impregnated by a brief affair with a man from a Western country. The young woman never learned who had fathered her, nor did her father know he had a daughter. The one thing she was sure of was that he was not Asian.

  Aswad touched her and squeezed her as if he were testing a piece of fruit for its ripeness. It took all her discipline not to spit in his face while keeping her own expressionless.

  This was her one last chance at being released from the prison she had existed in for so long. It came at an incredible price. There was no question that she would have to exert every ounce of self-control to get through this. There was one part of the role she was about to play that she knew she would enjoy. The other part made her sick with disgust and revulsion. She just had to keep focused on the fact that this was the only way she would ever see freedom again. If she survived.

  Aswad El-Kalife was a businessman too. He operated under the rule that one can always strike a deal if the price is right. “How much do you want for her?” he asked trying to show indifference and failing miserably.