When the Mirror Cracks

by Jan Coffey

  She typed a new message. What do you want? What’s your price?

  Elizabeth sent the message and waited. Staring at the screen, she knew someone was typing on the other end, but it felt like forever before the text came through.

  Must meet.

  They weren’t asking for money. She thought of what Kyle said about the hit list with her name on it.

  Where? she typed.

  46 Sokak in Bahçelievler.

  She stared in disbelief at the reply.

  You remember.

  “No. No. No. This is not happening,” she muttered. She rubbed her aching temple. Bahçelievler was a neighborhood in Ankara. It was the area where she lived. And 46 Sokak was an address near there. She remembered too clearly. He was taunting her, making sure she knew who was behind Christina’s kidnapping.

  No kill list, no extorting money. Her daughter had been taken out of revenge.

  You want me to go to Ankara?

  The answer came through right away.

  Forget that. Meet me on Karaköy Koprusu.

  When?

  Come now.

  Part XII

  —So Adam in his visioned Paradise

  Saw but God’s gifts, till taste of bitter truth

  Taught him what earth’s creation is in truth:—

  Now, O stern angel, none can make relent

  Your steely wrath, your sword of punishment.

  — Ḥafeẓ

  39

  Elizabeth

  Then

  As Elizabeth walked from the street to the courtyard of their Ankara apartment complex, she saw the new facilities man for the first time and realized what all the talk was about.

  Her building was occupied, for the most part, by American and British government employees and their families. The women living here knew each other, and many of them got together once a week for coffee, tea, and gossip. This past week, the room buzzed with discussion of the gorgeous guy who’d been hired to work the grounds and to see to any painting or plumbing or odd jobs that needed doing.

  Elizabeth stopped by the line of mailboxes, close enough to get a good look at him.

  He was hard at work digging, and longish hair fell over his face. The new tree with its burlap-covered ball sat beside the hole. His back muscles flexed, showing through the sweat-soaked shirt. She admired the shape of his powerful ass as he leaned at the waist to wrestle the tree into its new home. It was unfortunate that men in this part of the world didn’t work shirtless, or even wear shorts in public.

  Elizabeth waited until he was done packing dirt around the tree before she approached.

  “As-salamu ʿalaykum,” she said in greeting.

  He pushed the lock of hair out of his face, and she knew with certainty what all the fuss was about. He was young. Twenty-something, she guessed. And from the hazel-colored eyes to the strong jaw and the sharp lines of his cheekbones, he might have easily been the best-looking guy she’d seen in Ankara.

  “Good afternoon, ma’am,” he answered in English.

  “Elizabeth Hall.” She extended a hand toward him. His were dirty, but she didn’t care.

  Instead of accepting the handshake, however, he pressed a palm to his chest and politely bowed in respect.

  “Yahya Rahman.”

  “Welcome to Bahçelievler.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Where are you from?”

  He hesitated to answer and eyed the tools at his feet. Elizabeth had a good idea what the problem might be. Most of the hired help in their neighborhood, especially those doing menial jobs and manual labor, were in the country illegally. She tried to put his mind at ease.

  “Everyone around here is from somewhere else. And no one goes around checking papers.”

  “If you say, ma’am.” He motioned toward the building. “You must excuse me, please. My next job is waiting.”

  She wasn’t ready to let him go. “You live on the premises, don’t you?”

  “Yes, ma’am. Very generous of the building manager.”

  “You can call me Miss Hall. Or Elizabeth.”

  “Thank you, ma’am.”

  He was a stubborn one, she thought. “Do you have family in Ankara, Yahya?”

  “Not in Ankara. But I’m hoping that will soon change.”

  “Getting married?”

  “I am married already. And I hope my wife will join me.”

  The hint of a smile on his full lips made him look both sexy and irresistible.

  “What is your wife’s name?”

  “Zari, ma’am.”

  “Will you please stop calling me ma’am?” she asked sharply. “I understand you are doing it out of respect, but I’m not a hundred years old.”

  “I’m sorry, Miss Hall.”

  “Better.” She nodded her approval. “Where is your wife now?”

  “Qalat Dizah.”

  She’d guessed right. He was a refugee, an illegal from Iraqi Kurdistan. Elizabeth knew what was happening in Qalat Dizah and in the rest of Kurdistan. It was a rarity for couples to reunite once they were separated.

  “I work for the US Embassy here. I live in apartment 2A.” From experience, she knew that people like Yahya got excited when she mentioned her credentials, thinking they might have made an important connection. “After you clean up, come and see me. We can talk more.”

  “My next job is waiting, Miss Hall.”

  She admired his wide shoulders and long legs as he walked away. Maybe he wouldn’t show up today, or tomorrow, or even this week, but she’d get him up to her place soon enough.

  Elizabeth loved younger men. They were uncomplicated, energetic, willing to learn, and eager to please. Their expectations rarely went beyond the physical. And she was an expert at bringing their fantasies to life.

  Yahya proved to be a tough nut to crack, however. Elizabeth met him first in September, and her seduction of him required three months of playful effort. She learned he enjoyed pastries, so she always picked up something from the bakery on her way home. And she bought him gifts—a sweater, a jacket, gloves for the coming winter.

  Having him where she wanted him, however, required numerous calls for repairs in her apartment, and with every visit, she chipped away at the walls of his decorum. When he changed the light on the ceiling, she held his legs instead of the ladder. When he unclogged her sink, she leaned over his shoulder in the small bathroom, brushing her breasts against him. She was forty-one, but she had the tight, conditioned body of a woman half her age. She always drew his eye by wearing shorts and a tank top with no bra.

  Yahya was a virile young man with a wife who might never arrive in Ankara. It was only a matter of time before he gave in. They were separated in age by eighteen years, but what did she care? She was looking for good sex, not a meaningful relationship.

  About two months after they began sleeping together, Elizabeth noticed the change in her body—sore and sensitive breasts, queasiness at the smell of coffee, an increased sex drive.

  Yahya always rolled on a condom before they had sex. But there were a few times that she recalled not giving him enough time. She’d become pregnant three times in her thirties, each one ending in a miscarriage in the first trimester. Her gynecologist in Ankara said it was due to a chromosomal abnormality in the fetus. There was something wrong with the baby to start with. Better that way, she told herself.

  Once she turned forty, she’d given up hope of ever being a mother. But here she was, pregnant. She confirmed it with her doctor.

  The thought of being a single mother thrilled her. She had money, a good job, and no family left who would lay guilt on her for being unmarried. Friends and colleagues would provide her with a support group. It would all work out fine. A child would complete her life.

  Elizabeth’s only problem was Yahya. He’d know the child was his the moment the news got out.

  When she became pregnant before, the other men ran and never looked back. But it wouldn’t be the case with him. Yahya was pr
otective, honorable. He was the alpha-type male who’d enjoy the idea of having staked a claim on her. Elizabeth guessed he’d push his way into her life and make himself a pain in the ass. She couldn’t allow it, professionally or personally.

  Having him fired wouldn’t work. Everyone at the complex adored him. Reporting him to the Turkish police about his lack of papers wasn’t enough either. They regularly sent people to camps, only to have them return a month or so later.

  Elizabeth needed something more permanent.

  The idea came to her on a steel-gray morning at the end of February. She was sitting in her silk robe by the window and spotted Yahya walking across the frosty courtyard to the street. She knew where he was going. Five days a week he went to exercise before work. A small gym operated in their neighborhood of Bahçelievler. Not much more than a hole in the wall, it was popular with the Kurds.

  Later that day, Elizabeth made a phone call to the anti-terrorism attaché at the embassy.

  The next morning, as he came out of the gym at 46 Sokak, Yahya Rahman was taken into custody and wrestled into an unmarked van. No one at the complex knew where he’d gone or what happened to him. He was here working one day and had vanished the next. Disappeared.

  And Elizabeth happily began making plans for her baby.

  40

  Elizabeth

  Now

  Taking a taxi to the ferry landings, Elizabeth paid the driver and got out. From the pier, a wide walkway led up onto the Karaköy Koprusu, the Galata Bridge, one of the major landmarks in Istanbul. The two-level structure spanned the Golden Horn, and she glanced at the water, gleaming and black and covered with shimmering lights from the bridge.

  Much had changed since the last time Elizabeth stood in this spot. The old bridge had burned and been replaced with this new one. As she walked along the pier, she could see the lower level of the bridge with its brilliantly lit bars and restaurants. The upper level was busy with car and tram traffic, and local fishermen along the railing, casting into the waters below.

  The beat of the city itself was far different from what she recalled. As the crowds wandered along the walkways of both levels, the sounds of Turkish pop and techno music mingled with the horns of the ferries and the cries of the vendors.

  She paused and looked around her. Istanbul was a city that cherished the old as much as the new, and Elizabeth realized she too had changed. Suddenly, she’d been awakened. In her seventies, she was seeing the world with new eyes and new understanding.

  God knows she’d made mistakes, terrible ones—in her personal life and in her career. But worst of all, in the way she’d destroyed other people’s lives. The young Kurdish girl in the alley called her Shaitan. Devil. She’d spoken the truth.

  Her crimes were deep and far-reaching. She’d profited at the expense of innocent lives. And now, once the sale of Externus went through, she’d be very rich. But what was the good of all that money when her heart threatened to implode with guilt and grief? For so many years, she’d been able to curtain off that part of her life, but no longer. The walls had come crashing down.

  Christina. Tiam. She was about to lose them both, and the probability of it was crushing her. Children should not die before the parent or because of the sins of the parent. She pinched the bridge of her nose as tears threatened to fall. She couldn’t let her weakness show. She had to face Yahya with a clear mind. He wanted to hurt her, but she needed to make him understand what was at stake.

  “Mısır?” A young vendor pushed a cob of grilled corn in front of her face, breaking into her thoughts.

  “Yok, sağol. No, thank you.” She shook her head and reentered the current of people moving onto the bridge.

  Elizabeth thought about the history of the Galata Bridge. Traditionally, Turks would gather on the upper level to demonstrate and express their political differences, often violently. On the lower level, people gathered in the restaurants to discuss the same topics in a more civilized fashion, over a glass or two of raki.

  He didn’t say where exactly they were to meet tonight, but she guessed he would be waiting for her on top.

  Once she was on the bridge, the smell of the sea filled her senses. The breeze was picking up. Elizabeth moved steadily along the wide walkway. The metallic clacking of a passing tram occasionally competed with the heavy growl of slow-moving traffic. As she walked, she maneuvered past men and women casting their fishing lines over the railing.

  There was no sign of Yahya yet, but she guessed he was already watching her. He was probably making sure she was alone, and that no authorities were standing in the wings, ready to pounce. Not quite halfway across, she leaned against the railing and watched the ferryboats coming and going from the pier.

  Elizabeth’s phone rang, and her heart gave a sharp kick. She turned her back to the river and looked at the screen. Kyle was trying to reach her. She let it go to voice mail. At the whine and revving of a motorcycle engine, she looked up as its helmeted driver weaved between cars on the roadway.

  A little girl, no more than four or five years old, ran into her. Another one, not much older, was in close pursuit. They were wearing exactly the same jackets and looked like sisters. A Turkish woman called to them from a few feet along the railing, and they ran back to her.

  Elizabeth’s mind flickered back thirty years to two others.

  “Sister.” Tiam liked to pat Christina on the head or the hand.

  Zari corrected her. “No, Tiam. She is your friend.”

  “No, Maman. Kız kardeşi. Sister.”

  Elizabeth wondered if, even then, Tiam instinctively knew she shared a blood connection with Christina.

  Three men passed her, carrying fishing equipment and speaking Kurdish.

  Before she ever decided to remove Yahya from her life, she’d warned him not to mix with the PKK, the militant and political Kurdish group. They were very active in Ankara at the time, and depending on the fickleness of Washington, the organization went back and forth from ally to enemy numerous times. Perhaps it was her ego, wanting him to know how connected she was, but Elizabeth had told him how easy it was to make people disappear forever.

  Yahya had texted the address of the gym in Ankara where she’d had him taken into custody. He was making sure Elizabeth understood that he knew she was responsible. She worked for the US government, whose operatives had picked him up.

  Back then, very much like now, there was no trial for men and women who were detained by US agents. A phone call was enough—a vague mention of an unconfirmed back channel hint of a terrorist connection—and a person would disappear into a CIA ghost prison. Elizabeth had done that to Yahya. She’d lied and used her influence to make him vanish from her life forever. But somehow he’d survived. And sometime after she left the country, he’d been released. After whatever he’d been involved with since then, he was now capable of kidnapping.

  The image of Christina—bound, bloodied, and alone on that filthy floor—burned into Elizabeth’s brain, and she clenched her fists to keep from screaming.

  Yahya’s grudge was deep and fierce and deadly. This was not about some Kurdish or Iraqi group putting her name on a kill list. His business was personal. He wanted revenge.

  After seeing him at the hotel, she knew what he looked like now. She studied the crowd on the bridge. He was not among the people who were passing by her—the fishermen, the sightseers, the fun-seekers.

  She thought about the message Yahya sent her. He’d texted her from Christina’s number. She read the exchange again and then typed in a message.

  I’m here.

  The reply was immediate. I know.

  Of course, he knew. Elizabeth stepped away from the railing and searched for him among the faces around her. She moved to the edge of the roadway and scanned the sidewalk across the lanes of traffic. Another motorcycle weaving through the crawling traffic swung close to the curb, causing her to back away.

  She quickly typed a response. Please talk to me before you kill me.<
br />
  After a pause, he answered. As you talked to me before they took me in Ankara?

  She couldn’t blame him, but she had to try. I’m not begging for my life. I’m begging for Christina’s.

  “For your daughter.”

  Elizabeth jumped back. Her heart was in her throat. She hadn’t seen him approach, but here he was, looming over her.

  In the years since Ankara, the lanky youth had matured into a muscular man. His arms hung confidently at his sides. If he was armed, she guessed the weapon was inside the jacket of his dark suit. But he probably didn’t need anything more than his bare hands to break her neck or throw her over the side of this bridge. She looked into his face, searching for any sign of the gentleness that once resided there. All she saw were the cold, empty eyes of a man who had seen the world for what it was, hard and ruthless and lethal. And he had survived.

  “You did not send your dogs. You came yourself.”

  “And I came alone,” she told him.

  He held out Christina’s phone to her. “I think they are tracking this. No?”

  She took the phone and stared at it as if the device could somehow tell her where she could find her daughter. “It’s possible the Turkish police are doing it, but I don’t think they move that fast. They know she was kidnapped. But I haven’t spoken to them or to anyone else since you texted me.”

  “I should believe you, Elizabeth?” He glanced up at the dark sky above them. “Maybe Blackhawk helicopters will be landing on the bridge at any moment.”

  He was mocking her. And he was clearly unafraid.

  “Is she alive, Yahya? Is Christina okay?” she asked. “Please tell me that you haven’t hurt her. Please.”

  “Stop. Such fine acting is wasted on me. Do not pretend that you care for anyone but yourself. I know you better.”