Ambush

by Barbara Nickless

  “You can stay,” Avi said to Dougie. Then he pointed at me. “You go to the hospital.”

  “It’s not an option right now.”

  “Then go to the other examination room. I will send one of my techs to take a look. Him, too. Cohen, right? This is your detective? What were you guys doing today? No, do not tell me. Do not ask, do not tell, good policy.” He rounded on one of the techs. “We need X-rays. What are you waiting for?”

  “You’re going to be fine, Clyde,” I said. “I love you.”

  The last thing I saw before Avi closed the door was Dougie in a disposable cap and mask standing next to my partner.

  Handler and K9, together again.

  Cohen and I took seats in the next room. It smelled of antiseptic and anxious dog. Posters advertised deworming medicines and vaccines. A barrage of barking echoed through the room from the training center on the other side of the wall.

  Under the stark fluorescents, Cohen’s bruises looked even worse. I worried that maybe there were other injuries—broken bones, damaged organs.

  I shifted in my seat. “You look like shit.”

  He laughed. “You look in a mirror lately?”

  But the laugh was faint, and he was holding a hand to his ribs.

  A young woman with an auburn ponytail came in and closed the door behind her. “I’m Sara. Avi has asked me to take a look at you.”

  We introduced ourselves. She smiled, eyeballed us, then gestured Cohen onto the surgery table.

  “Remove your shirt, please.”

  She and I both sucked in a breath at the bruises that purpled Cohen’s chest and left side.

  Sara rolled a lamp over to the table. “You are in a lot of pain?”

  “I’ve been better.”

  “One to ten, with one being the lowest and ten being unbearable.”

  “Call it a four.”

  She raised an eyebrow, and I said, “He’s being macho.”

  “We’ll go with six.” She snapped on latex gloves and ran her fingers along his ribs.

  He gritted his teeth. “Maybe seven.”

  Sara was efficient as she moved around him. “Does this hurt? How about here? What do you feel when I apply pressure to this area?”

  When she finished with his face and chest, she moved on to his hands. She rolled a tray table over and asked him to spread his fingers. He did so, but I read in his eyes what it cost him—too much like what he’d undergone in the trailer.

  Gently, Sara removed the tape. She scowled. “This was no accident.”

  “We fell in with the wrong crowd.”

  Her gaze went from Cohen to me. “There’s a story I probably don’t want to hear.”

  She gave him acetaminophen, apologized that she couldn’t give him something stronger, then applied ointment to his wound and rewrapped the fingers with gauze and tape. “Have you had a tetanus shot in the last five years?”

  He nodded.

  “Okay, good. You need to see your doctor. I suspect you’ve cracked a couple of ribs, and you need to make sure there aren’t any internal injuries. Plus, you’ll want something stronger for the pain. You’ll be hurting for a while.” She turned to me. “Your turn.”

  I took Cohen’s place on the examination table and stripped off my filthy shirt. She clicked her tongue as she had with Cohen while she cleaned and bandaged the wounds on my face and arm, then peeled off the now-filthy bandage on my ribs that Dougie had applied earlier. She examined the assorted other injuries, shone a light in my eyes, announced that I should get a tetanus booster, then gave both of us lab coats to wear in lieu of our shirts.

  I slipped on the coat, grateful for something clean. “How are things going in the other room?”

  She finished washing her hands. “I’ll check for you.”

  After she left, Cohen sat and leaned his head back against the wall. I pulled out my phone and dialed. If Sarge turned on his phone as soon as the plane landed, he should pick up.

  The connection went through.

  “Sydney Parnell,” said a voice I didn’t recognize. “I’ve been told to expect your call.”

  The hair on the back of my neck rose. I put the call on speakerphone.

  Cohen opened his eyes.

  I said, “Who is this?”

  “Wrong question, Ms. Parnell.”

  “Where’s Sarge? Put him on.”

  “That’s more like it. But I’m afraid I have bad news.”

  I started shaking. Couldn’t stop. I set the phone on the examination table and shoved my hands under my arms.

  “Do you want to hear what it is?” the man asked.

  Cohen got to his feet.

  “You fucker,” I said. “Put Sarge on.”

  “Sarge,” the man said, “has a communication problem right now. Hard to talk when you’re at the bottom of a river. But thanks for locating that video for us. You’ve been most helpful.”

  “I will find you,” I said. “And when I do, I’ll—”

  “Oh, you won’t need to find us, Ms. Parnell. We’ll come to you.”

  The connection went dead.

  I backed away from the phone as if it could keep hurting me. As if it would deliver the terrible news over and over like a viral tweetstorm. I barely felt it when Cohen put his arms around me and turned me so that I could press my face to his shoulder.

  In my mind, I saw Sarge as he headed out that morning.

  For a man who tried to kill me, you’re not a complete asshole.

  For a woman who kicked my ass twice, you aren’t too shabby yourself.

  My knees gave way. Cohen half carried me to a chair.

  I couldn’t feel my body. Not my hands or my feet. Neither legs nor arms. I couldn’t feel anything at all except a vile, bitter lump in my mouth that wanted to slide down my throat, to close off my air and stop my heart.

  I shut my eyes for a moment and saw Sarge’s hand clasped in mine. His grin.

  Eyes in the back of my head.

  “Here’s some water,” Cohen said.

  I looked at his face, tried to see him through the watery film smeared across my eyes.

  The door opened, and Dougie came in. He took one look at me and stopped as if he’d run into an invisible wall. I saw the despair in my mind reflected in his eyes.

  “They killed Sarge,” I said. Even though he already knew.

  CHAPTER 28

  It is not over until God says it is over.

  —Avi Harel. Private conversation.

  We sat around a table in Avi’s shaded courtyard.

  Avi had created the patio as an oasis inside the industrial complex of warehouses, alleyways, and parking lots. Trees lined the slate-floored space. A fountain played in the corner. This time of year, terracotta pots of geraniums and marigolds lined the cement-block walls.

  The table was loaded with what Avi called the food of Jerusalem. Kofta b’siniya—lamb-and-beef meatballs in tahini sauce. Pita bread. A tomato-and-cucumber salad. And, on ice, a bowl of milk pudding—muhallabieh.

  It was all beautiful and smelled fabulous.

  But none of us ate.

  Clyde had come through the surgery with flying colors. The wound involved only soft tissue—no skeletal injuries—and no damage to the sciatic nerve. Avi predicted Clyde would be mostly healed within three weeks and would enjoy a full recovery by eight. While the others gathered on the patio, I’d slipped in to see him.

  He lay in an ICU crate, the IV still dripping fluid into him and three ECG leads clipped into place. His fur was shaved, and a Penrose drain drew blood and fluids from beneath the incision. He wore an e-collar to keep him from chewing on the surgical site. The cone of shame, we called it.

  It used to make me laugh.

  I pulled a chair over to his crate and sat with him, just the two of us. He opened his eyes and watched me sleepily. The room was cool, the lights dim, our mingled breathing and the beep of machines the only sounds. I held his paw and apologized. Promised it wouldn’t happen again. I than
ked him for being the best partner anyone could have and told him that if he wanted to go with Dougie, I’d understand. But that if he didn’t, it would make me very happy.

  After a time, I was done with my tears, and Clyde had drifted back to sleep. I knuckle-bumped his paw and joined the others on the patio.

  While we stared at the food and waved away the occasional wasp, I listened to Dougie fill in Cohen and Avi on the events of the last few days and tell them about Malik’s video—what it was and how we’d tracked it down.

  What it meant to lose it.

  “Even if we can’t prove Valor’s relationship with Iran, we can put Almasi behind bars,” Cohen said. “Kidnapping and torturing a cop, for starters. And if we can link her to Fadden, she’ll go to prison for Kane’s murder.”

  “It’s good,” I said. “It’s necessary. But it isn’t enough. What she did is treason.”

  “So we build our case piece by piece.” Cohen pushed food around on his plate. “We start with Kane and the motivation for his death and work back through time.”

  Dougie gave a soft snort. He stretched out his legs and crossed the ankles. The aviators were back in place as sunlight found a way through the trees.

  I knew what he was thinking as clearly as if he had spoken. When the system failed, you took justice into your own hands. The idea was as old as civilization, as common as yesterday’s news.

  Cohen honed in on Dougie, his eyes sharp. He’d picked up on it, too. “You’re thinking about extrajudicial means.” He paused. “Execution.”

  Dougie folded his arms.

  “That’s nothing but vigilante justice.” Cohen’s smile was bitter.

  “But,” Dougie said, “it is justice.”

  “It makes us no different from her.”

  Dougie uncrossed his ankles and sat up. “She’s killing innocents. We aren’t.”

  “We don’t have the right to be judge, jury, and executioner.”

  But Dougie and Avi exchanged glances. Mutual understanding and a bond over similar battles. Some of which, I imagined, they were still fighting.

  I watched Avi from beneath the brim of my hat. There was something contained about him. Like a sheath over a knife. He was tightly controlled in a manner that suggested if he were to move just a fraction faster, you would lose your wallet and maybe your life before you even knew he’d shifted position.

  I’d never seen Avi in this light. Now I shivered in the warm breeze.

  Cohen was looking at me. “You haven’t said anything.”

  “I’m a cop,” I said quietly. “That should be enough.” But I was thinking of my ghosts. Fadden and the Six. I’d passed judgment in the wink of an eye. What did that make me?

  Agitated, I scooped an ice cube out of my water glass and pressed it to my neck. “So what do we do?”

  “We think on it,” Avi said. “What you Americans call brainstorming. But for that we need a little help.”

  He went into the building and returned a moment later with a bottle of clear liquid and four shot glasses. He poured until the glasses were filled almost to the rim, then passed them around.

  “I’m not exactly in a drinking mood,” I said.

  “It is arak. It will feel like a fresh breeze through your mind. Then we will determine our next step.”

  We each picked up a glass.

  “To Sarge,” I said.

  “To Sarge,” said the others.

  We clinked glasses and slammed down the liquid. It blazed a line down my throat, then popped up into my sinuses and swept through my head like a storm. For a second I couldn’t breathe. Then I felt like I could breathe better than I ever had.

  I also felt as though someone had applied a welding torch to my insides.

  Cohen placed a fist to his chest. “Are you trying to kill us?”

  “Usually, we mix arak with water. Or perhaps grapefruit juice or lemon. But medicinally, it is best this way.”

  I set the glass down and let my eyes water.

  Only Dougie looked unfazed.

  “Now we will come up with our answer,” Avi said.

  Sara, the tech, appeared in the doorway. “If you guys aren’t too busy, I have a question.”

  “Of course.” Avi pulled out a chair and gestured for her to sit. “What is it?”

  She dropped into the seat and grabbed a piece of pita bread. “I was looking at the X-rays.”

  A flutter of panic. “Is something wrong?”

  “No, no. Clyde is fine. But I’ve worked with several combat assault dogs. MWDs. They all have microchips, right?”

  Dougie and I nodded.

  “But just one chip.”

  “Go on,” Avi said.

  “Clyde has two chips. As you may know, chips are normally injected under the skin between the shoulder blades. That is where one of Clyde’s chips is. Now, occasionally a chip might migrate down a dog’s body. But this second chip is located under Clyde’s right hind leg. It’s an odd place for it to end up.”

  My eyes met Dougie’s. A whisper of hope ran a finger across my skin, light as a feather.

  “Has Clyde had another owner?” Sara asked. “Someone else who would have chipped him?”

  “No.” I was still looking at Dougie. “You said you trusted Clyde with Rick Dalton.”

  “I left him with Rick several times.”

  “And you said Rick was Mr. Triplicate.”

  A light had come into his eyes. “Always.”

  “So what I’m hearing”—Cohen looked from me to Dougie—“is that this guy Rick had a second chip placed in Clyde.”

  Avi clapped his hands together. “It is as I said. The arak is magic.”

  We all stood and moved toward the building.

  I struggled to sound matter-of-fact. “Who could have done it?”

  Dougie opened the door and held it. “The CIA had a veterinarian in Baghdad for their K9s. Or it could have been someone on the base. Maybe even a local vet—that would have been safest. No questions, no explanations.”

  As we walked into the room, Clyde opened a sleepy eye. He wagged his tail when we approached.

  “Good boy,” I said in my squeaky voice. “Good boy, Clyde.”

  He got the other eye open.

  “How do these chips work?” Cohen asked.

  Sara held up a scanner. “Every microchip has an identification number. The number is unique for every chip and thus for every pet. If someone brings in a stray dog, we scan the number, then call the manufacturer and notify them we’ve found the animal. They look up the identification number in their database and contact the owner.”

  She opened the door to Clyde’s crate.

  “Like this.” She held the scanner between Clyde’s shoulder blades, then showed us the screen. “This one’s a nine-digit number, and the chip is manufactured by HomeSafe. This is the chip Clyde had when you took ownership, is that right?”

  I nodded. “I just updated the owner information on their database.”

  “Here is what I get when I scan the second chip.” She reached farther into the crate and held the scanner over Clyde. “Another nine-digit code. Standard. It also has ISO code 368, which usually indicates where the chip was manufactured. But in this case, I think it’s almost like a message.”

  Avi said, “What do you mean?”

  She closed the door to the crate. “I’m familiar with the more common ISOs—I’ve seen them often enough. But this code I had to look up.”

  “Iraq,” I breathed.

  She gave me a surprised look. “That’s right. And since Iraq doesn’t manufacture microchips—”

  “Someone was telling us the chip was placed in Clyde in Iraq,” Cohen finished.

  “That’s what I’m thinking,” Sara said.

  Avi opened a laptop on the counter. “Because of our animal rescue work, I have access to a national pet-registry database. We should be able to find the contact information for whoever placed that chip.”

  We crowded around him while he open
ed up a database and logged on. Sara read off the identification number and Avi typed. A minute later the system chimed, and a box appeared.

  Avi rubbed his chin. “Curious.”

  We were looking at:

  BLOWFISH.COM

  MANINTHEFIELD

  *&5MANI#N#THE)$5^FIE4LD678

  “It’s a cloud account,” Cohen said. “He uploaded files to Blowfish. That must be his username and password.”

  Avi opened another tab and navigated to the Blowfish website. When prompted, he entered the rest of the information. Another screen appeared, this one with a list of file-folder icons. We peered over his shoulder while Avi read the labels out loud.

  “Email. Audio. Video.”

  He clicked on the icon labeled “Emails,” and a list of file names appeared. He scrolled down. And down. And kept scrolling.

  “There must be a hundred emails,” he said. He double-clicked on one, and the email opened in a second tab. We stared at an unformatted string of upper and lowercase numbers, interrupted by an occasional symbol.

  “It’s gibberish,” I said.

  “He used encryption software,” Avi answered. “The Feds will be able to decode it.”

  “Maybe.”

  “They will use something like BULLRUN or another decryption software. No problem. And you see, you can read the sender and receiver. OsborneJa to LAlmasi.” He looked up at me, his sun-creased face jubilant.

  “I hope you’re right.” I pointed. “Open up the video folder.”

  Avi clicked and a single file popped up. BorderTapeMalik. Another click, and a window opened with the video. Avi enlarged it to full screen and clicked play.

  We watched in silence as the video opened with the interior of a truck. It was clearly night, the footage grainy. A man’s face shone faintly in the dashboard lights. This, presumably, was Malik’s uncle.

  He turned toward the camera and murmured something in Arabic.

  Avi translated. “He says to put away the phone. It is best to not take any video. Not tonight.”

  The action stopped. When it started again, Malik’s uncle was now helping other men move wooden boxes from the back of one truck and into the other. The action took place in the white wash of headlights, the men talking softly, their voices faint in the rush of wind against the microphone. The filming was jittery and at a bad angle, as if Malik had tucked himself on the other side of his uncle’s truck, afraid to be caught.