Dark Waters (20 page)

Stepping into the foyer, she kept her head down and moved quickly into the hallway. Stark light from the hanging bulb illuminated sharp corner edges. Frayed carpet beneath her feet muffled her footsteps.

Once she reached the doors in the back, she waited. She began to wonder if Ganani had been forced to abort when three short taps rattled the emergency door.

Game on.

Jordan moved to the door of apartment four and knocked. She heard a shuffling from inside and then the door opened a crack. A short, gold-colored chain kept it from swinging free. The face peering out looked familiar. Not one of the men from Manger Square, but one from the ambush at Alena’s office.

“What do you want?” he asked.

“I am looking for my cousin,” she answered.

The man’s eyes narrowed, then widened.

Shit
. She’d been made. It took all Jordan’s restraint to keep her hands from checking her
hijab
.

“Who is it, Haddid?”

Jordan recognized the second voice as the one from the phone, the one from the square.

“It’s nobody, Basim,” said the one called Haddid. His head twitched, motioning in the direction of the hall. Was he signaling her to leave? “It’s just a woman at the wrong door.”

A strangled cry from inside drew his attention. Ganani appeared in the back hallway. Basim shouted.

The one called Haddid started to close the door. Jordan slammed her shoulder into the wood. The chain caught, popped, and the door flew open. Haddid fell backward, while momentum carried her into the room.

Jordan drew her gun and trained it on the young Arab sprawled on the floor. “Stay down.”

A man materialized from the back room and grabbed Ganani around the neck. Jordan caught the glint of a blade in Ganani’s hand. The agent swung her arm up and back. A spray of blood and the man collapsed to the floor.

“Close the door,” Ganani said, the dripping knife still in her hand. The man who had gripped Alena Petrenko’s elbow in the square lay on the floor, clutching his throat, blood pulsing from between his fingers. Fear shone in his eyes.

Jordan pushed the door shut and threw the deadbolt.

“You fucking bitch!” shouted a man in the kitchen. The other man from the square. He launched himself at Ganani, his face contorted in rage. In spite of his size, he was quick and knocked her backward. She sprawled onto the floor of the narrow hallway leading to the back of the apartment, dropping the knife. Pinning her arms to the wood with his knees, he smashed his fist into her face. Blood spurted from her nose. Ganani grunted and bucked. The man rode her like a cowboy, his hands circling her neck.

Moving outside of Haddid’s reach, Jordan turned and trained her gun on Ganani’s assailant. “Stop!”

He ignored her. Ganani clutched at his fingers, trying to loosen his grip. He just squeezed tighter, lifting her head and smashing it into the floor.

“Basim,” Haddid shouted, starting to move.

Jordan shifted the gun and Haddid froze. Then, turning the gun back on Basim, Ganani’s assailant, Jordan took aim and fired.

The bullet impacted with his head. Blood from the exit wound spattered the walls and the floor. Basim’s body jerked, arched back, and belly-flopped on top of Ganani.

Haddid lunged at Jordan and grabbed for her weapon. Catching the movement out of her peripheral vision, she sidestepped and brought her arm up into his nose. He dropped to the floor, grabbing her ankle and yanking her down. Her elbow slammed into the floor, sending a jolt of pain up through her arm. The gun, jarred from her hand, slid across the kitchen tiles.

Haddid’s fingers, still clamped around her ankle, dug into her flesh. Jordan exhaled loudly and kicked. Haddid dodged the blow. Crawling forward, he stretched for the gun.

Jordan scrambled to her feet. She stomped down on his hand as he reached forward. He cried out but kept moving forward, closing his other hand on the butt of the gun.

Jordan levied a kick to his groin. So much for civility.

Haddid screamed and released the weapon. He curled into a fetal position, his hands covering his balls.

Jordan snatched up her gun, verified the room was clear, and went to help Ganani. She had managed to push Basim’s body aside and sat propped up against the doorjamb, blood dampening her dark shirt.

“I was doing fine,” she said, gesturing toward the dead man on the floor. “You could have killed me with that shot.”

“But I didn’t.” Jordan holstered her weapon.

Blood spattered the side of Ganani’s face, and blood ran from her nose. She used her sleeve to stem the flow and pointed with her other hand. “You were the one who wanted to interrogate the terrorists. This man can no longer talk.”

“And you’re alive.”

Ganani leaned her head back against the wall. “Three are down. These two, and there is a man in the bedroom. He was dead when I came through the window.”

“All we need is one alive.”

Haddid groaned and Jordan moved toward the kitchen, searching the drawers for duct tape or cord. She found only mouse droppings and a dingy washcloth. Wetting it under the faucet, she checked the cupboards. All bare. The counters were covered with soiled dishes.

Walking back across the room, she shoved the rag into Ganani’s hand. “Here.”

The agent nodded her thanks and pressed the cloth to her nose.

Jordan’s eyes cut to Basim’s corpse and the jagged hole in the side of his head. His skull had shattered where the bullet tore through. Shreds of brain, blood, and skin clung to the hallway baseboard. Jordan felt her stomach clench. Crossing back to the kitchen, she puked in the sink.

“The first one’s the hardest,” said Ganani.

“How did you know?”

The agent shrugged. “You may have saved my life. Thank you.”

Jordan wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. “We still have to get out of here. Someone will have heard the shot.”

“They’re used to violence,” Ganani said. “We have more time than you think.”

At that moment, footsteps pounded on the stairs and shouts echoed in the hallway.

“So I was wrong.” Ganani pushed herself to her feet.

“We’ll go out the back.” Jordan grabbed Haddid’s arm and helped him to his feet. “If you want to survive, don’t try anything and keep your voice low.”

“Don’t worry,” he said. “I will help you.”

Ganani scoffed. “That is why you made for the gun.”

“I was afraid she would shoot me.”

“Shut up,” Jordan said. “Follow her.”

Ganani squeezed past Basim’s body, then Haddid, then Jordan. They reached the opened window at the end of the hall about the same time pounding shook the front door.

“Basim? Fayez? Is everything okay?” yelled a man. “We heard a gunshot. Open the door!”

Jordan pointed at Haddid. “Can you handle him?”

“Yes. Why?”

“I’m going out first. I’m the only one who’s not injured, and we need to block the emergency exit.”

Clambering over the windowsill, Jordan dropped to the ground and searched for something she could use to wedge under the door handle. She needed a stick. But you needed trees to have sticks, and trees needed water to grow, so sticks were in short supply.

The noise inside was escalating. More voices in the hallway shouted Basim’s name. The pounding on the door increased.

Glad for the darkness, Jordan dashed for the side of the building. She passed the spot where the boy had been digging in the garden and moved swiftly along the side of the building. She stuck to the shadows, squinting in the low light, searching the ground until she found it—the stick the boy had been drawing with. It lay under a lone olive tree near the front door.

Snatching it up, she raced back to find Ganani and Haddid, both outside. She heard the splintering of wood and the shouts of the men as they discovered the bodies.

“Close the window,” Jordan yelled. She tried jamming the stick under the emergency door handle. It was too long.

“Here, let me.” Haddid grabbed the stick and stomped on it with his foot, cracking it in two. He took the longest section and stuck it under the door handle. Jordan grabbed the smaller piece and wedged it into place between the window casing and the frame. It was long and slipped sideways as a hand slapped the glass and a face appeared. The man slipped his fingers beneath the window. Jordan pushed the stick up as he yanked on the window. The stick bowed but held.

“Go to the back,” the man yelled. “They are getting away.”

“Let’s move,” Jordan said. “Now!”

Ganani headed for the street, but Jordan stopped her. “We’ll never make it to the car.”

“We can make it to my car,” Haddid said.

Jordan and Ganani both looked at the man. He dangled a set of keys in his hand.

“Let’s kill him now,” Ganani said.

“No!” Haddid said. “I told you. I want to help. We must go this way.” He gestured toward the side of the building that bordered the next lot and a hedge. The other side of the building was bare to the street and provided no cover.

“We should head to the crossing on foot,” Ganani said. “We can’t pass the checkpoint by car anyway.”

“And we can’t outrun a mob,” Jordan said. “We can cross on foot once we get there. You
can
get us past the Israeli guards?”

“Yes, of course.”

Haddid’s car was parked halfway down the street that ran parallel to the front of the building. The three of them moved swiftly, Haddid wincing with each step. The biggest challenge would be beating the vigilantes to the sidewalk.

It didn’t happen. They were halfway along the side of the house when Jordan heard the front door crash open.

“Circle around!” yelled one man. “Circle around!”

The three of them dove into the hedge of Palestine buckthorn that created a fence between the apartment building and the property next door—Haddid first, Ganani second, and Jordan in the rear. She pushed through just before the mob reached the side yard.

“Say one word and you are dead,” Ganani whispered into Haddid’s ear.

“I would not like that,” he said.

The man leading the mob slowed and shined his flashlight into the brush. Jordan froze. Her arms stung from the scratches, but she remained still—a chameleon in natural camouflage.

“Hurry,” another man yelled.

The flashlight beam played across the bush above Ganani’s head. The man moved in, spotted her, and opened his mouth to yell. Ganani’s arm shot out and she slit his throat. Deadly and silent, she killed two more men the same way as they rounded the building, while Jordan and Haddid crawled through the hedge and made for the street. Jordan heard a siren in the distance.

“Go,” yelled Ganani. “The police will only draw more attention.”

Haddid tugged at her sleeve. “She’s right. We must go—now.”

Under the cover of the buckthorn, they reached the sidewalk. Jordan checked in both directions. “It’s clear.”

Haddid pressed the keys to the car into her hand. “Take these. I can throw them off your trail.”

“No, you’re coming with me. I have questions for you.”

“The fact that I am alive and my friends are dead makes me suspect. If I stay here, Zuabi will never trust me again. I might as well be dead. If you take me as your prisoner, I will become a
martyr to the cause, and my family will be safe. I will meet you near the crossing.”

Ganani joined them at the sidewalk, picking up on the tail end of his speech. “We cannot trust him. He will turn against us.”

Haddid looked over his shoulder. “You must hurry. They are going to come.” He pushed Jordan toward the sidewalk. “Wait for me at the turnstile. I give my word to Allah. I will be there.”

Jordan hesitated. Haddid had sent mixed signals. At first, in the apartment, he seemed to want to protect her. But then he had gone for her gun. Was he trying to save his own neck, or was it possible he really did want to help?

“Okay,” Jordan said. “At the turnstile.”

Jordan held Ganani back as Haddid pushed into the yard and hobbled toward the rear of the building. She heard him shout, telling the men to head down the street toward the mosque.

As their footsteps faded, Jordan and Ganani ran for the car.

“We need to move fast,” Ganani said. “The police will be here any moment.”

“I’ll drive. You navigate.”

Ganani climbed into the passenger’s seat and Jordan headed for the driver’s side door. Reaching for the handle, she found herself pinned in a beam of light.

She turned, expecting to see an officer. Instead, it was the ten-year-old boy. In one hand, he held a high-powered flashlight, pinning her in the beam. In the other hand, he held a stick, which he pointed and pretended to shoot.

J
ordan stood frozen, trapped in the beam of the flashlight.

“Get in,” Ganani shouted. “Put it in gear.”

Jordan slid into the driver’s seat. “He’s only a boy.”

“Pretending to be a Palestinian fighter.” Ganani watched for the reinforcements she knew would come. Taking the keys from Jordan’s hand, she stuck them in the ignition. “Do you want to die?”

“No.”

“Then start the car.”

Jordan turned the key and ground the car into first. “Which way do I go?”

“Turn right at the next street and go up the hill to the top. We have to go back the other way, a little more than two kilometers. It’s across the city, and only certain roads will work. Can you see the Dome of the Rock?”

“No, but I’ll keep my eyes out for it.”

Ganani felt the car accelerate and was impressed with the speed with which Jordan threaded the vehicle through the narrow streets. The American could drive.

“There’s no one behind us—yet,” Jordan said.

“Trust me, they will come.”

“Do you think Haddid will meet us there?”

Ganani coughed out a laugh. “Are you crazy? He took the chance to escape.”

“He didn’t give us away,” Jordan pointed out. “He seemed to feel he was in danger here. We need to know what information he has.”

“Perhaps you should have considered that before letting him go.”

“He saved our lives.”

“He won’t be there.” Ganani twisted in her seat, trying to keep an eye on the road behind them. A blue flashing light appeared in the side mirror. Ganani could see the police car closing the gap behind them. “Time is up. Drive faster.”

“We’re about maxed out here.”

“Drive faster!”

Jordan goosed the gas and the car leaped forward. In front of them, cars lined either side of the street. She threaded them like a needle. “Are you sure the checkpoint is open?”

“It’s open.” Ganani remembered how angry she’d been when a judge in Jerusalem ordered the Sheikh Sa’ad checkpoint to be manned twenty-four hours a day. She had thought him soft at the time, caving into Palestinian demands. Now she silently whispered his praises. His action may have just saved their lives.

The checkpoint was nothing more than a fence with a built-in, eight-foot-tall turnstile that one passed through to get into Jabel Mukaber. The roadway that used to pass cars was blocked by a ten-foot line of barbed wire and a row of three-foot-tall cement posts. By day, the checkpoint bustled with a full contingent of IDF soldiers. Now there were only two soldiers present—one male and one female.

Jordan skidded the car to a stop near the turnstile.

The soldiers raised their weapons. One stepped forward.

“Halt,” he shouted in Hebrew.

Ganani jumped out of the car holding up her ID.

“Halt!” The woman soldier stepped to the fence and signaled Ganani to move closer.

“I am Shabak.” Ganani glanced over her shoulder. The sirens were getting louder, the blue lights closer. “Come here, Jordan.”

The female soldier waffled her aim. She pointed her rifle first at Jordan, then back at Ganani. Had their roles been reversed, she being the soldier and the soldier her, she would have been dead by now. Keeping her ID aloft, Ganani moved around the car, pushing Jordan toward the gate. “You must let us pass.”

Jordan pushed back. “What about Haddid?”

“Forget him.” Flashing lights filled the wide area near the turnstile. The sirens hurt her ears. “They are almost upon us.”

“Wait!” Jordan yelled. “There he is.”

Ganani glanced in the direction Jordan pointed. Haddid was limping toward them along a narrow footpath. Jordan met him and, for show, yanked his arms behind him like a prisoner.

“Step forward,” the male soldier ordered. He reached through a slit in the fence and grabbed Ganani’s credentials. “I will check these. You wait here.”

Ganani heard the slide of tires. “You do that and we’re dead. Take us through and you can call it in after that.”

The Palestinians shouted as they poured from their cars.

Ganani heard the sound of guns being readied. The soldier turned back.

“Hurry.” The soldier signaled for Ganani to move forward and for Jordan and Haddid to stop. “You cannot enter.”

“She is an American agent,” Ganani said, ushering Jordan into the turnstile ahead of her. “He is our prisoner.”

“Stop,” shouted a voice behind them.

“Let her pass!” Ganani ordered.

The soldier relinquished his ground and Jordan swept through. Ganani waited until she heard the click of the turnstile resetting, and shoved Haddid forward. “You’re next.”

A Palestinian Authority officer broke from the crowd and rushed forward. “Do not let them pass.”

Ganani turned back. The Israeli soldier raised his weapon at the mob surging forward. Jordan had taken custody of Haddid and was moving him away from the guard shack. The woman soldier was calling for reinforcements.

Someone seized her arm.

Then Ganani heard the click of the turnstile. Twisting free, she shoved hard against the rotating gate. It spun, and she was through.

*

It took several hours to sort out the situation at the checkpoint. The Palestinians retreated in the face of the IDF tank patrol, but by the time Jordan and Ganani had filled out all the reports, it was 1:00 a.m.

Jordan was surprised when Lotner showed up to drive them back to Tel Aviv, and even more surprised when Ganani agreed to interrogate Haddid at the Israeli Tel Aviv District offices of the Israeli police.

The police station was practically empty. Most of the officers were home in bed or assisting with security preparations for the U.S. secretary of state’s arrival later that day. A sergeant at the desk had glanced up and waved them through. Now they were situated in a stark interrogation room. Haddid faced Jordan across the interrogation table, his hands cupped around a glass of water. Lotner and Ganani leaned against the pale gray walls, bookends on either side of the two-way mirror. Jordan wondered who was watching through the glass. She hadn’t called Daugherty. She wasn’t ready to answer his questions yet.

“What is your full name?” Jordan asked.

“Umar Haddid.”

“What exactly was the plan?”

Haddid appeared to hold nothing back. He started at the beginning: crossing the border with his friend Mansoor at T
ū
lkarm.

At the mention of the town, Lotner moved toward the door. “I’ll be back.”

Jordan nodded. It was important he pass along the information about the porosity of the T
ū
lkarm crossing. Securing the Green Line was not an easy task.

“Go on,” she said. “Why did you come to Tel Aviv? What were you after?”

Haddid explained how the American had contacted Najm Tibi. “He wanted him to bring him some information from his place of work and offered to make an exchange. At first, they were going to use the Internet, but the American grew more and more afraid. He was convinced his keystrokes were being tracked. Najm suggested he use an Internet café, but the American insisted on making the exchange in person.” Haddid paused, took a sip of water, and then set the glass back on the table. “He was right to be worried.”

Jordan thought about that. Brodsky had known about the exchange. He had ordered Ganani to be there.

“Do you know what they were trading?”

“Only that Najm had information the American wanted. In exchange, he was to give Najm specifics about the U.S. secretary of state’s visit.”

That much was true.

Haddid reached out his shackled hands. Jordan hadn’t thought it necessary, but Ganani had insisted. “You have to believe me,” he said. “I never wanted any part in all this. If I had refused, my family would have been in danger. They may still be in danger.”

“From Zuabi? He is the one behind all this, right?”

Haddid looked straight at the mirror and nodded.

He only confirmed what they already suspected. Jordan stared blankly at the file in front of her. “Do you know what Zuabi plans to do with the information?”

“No, only that it’s personal.”

Jordan looked up. “How is killing the secretary of state personal?”

Haddid looked surprised. “The secretary is not the target.”

Jordan leaned across the table toward him. “Why else would he want information about the secretary’s visit?”

“It is the man that Zuabi is after.”

“What man?”

“The man he blames for killing his niece. She died in an ambush in Denver, Colorado.”

Suddenly the pieces fell into place. Jordan got to her feet. They were protecting the wrong person. Zuabi was going after Posner. “When are they planning the attack?”

Haddid shrugged. “I told you. I don’t know any details.”

Jordan was halfway to the door when Haddid spoke out. “This is a minor thing compared with what the American and his associates had planned.”

Jordan turned back around. “You just said you didn’t know anything about that.”

“I don’t know the specifics. But it’s something big, very big. It’s something that will impact all of Palestine, all of Israel. Zuabi was preparing for an apocalypse.”

“Then we’re fortunate the exchange never happened.” Jordan headed for the door again. She needed to contact Daugherty and make Posner aware that they were coming for him.

“There are other ways to get information,” Haddid said.

His pronouncement stopped her cold. Cline was after information from Tibi’s place of work, from GG&B. Brodsky had sent Ganani to Dizengoff Square to oversee the exchange. He had
commandeered the investigation, stonewalling them at GG&B. But why? What was the end game? And were her suspicions enough to force Daugherty to listen?

“Wait here.”

Haddid jangled his chains in response.

Jordan tapped for the guard and stepped into the hallway. Ganani followed her into the hall.

“I know what you’re thinking, but Brodsky would not do something to harm Israel,” Ganani said. “He may be ruthless and calculating, but he is a Jew.”

“Maybe, but how far would he go to further a cause?”

Ganani wet her lips but kept her mouth closed.

“Exactly,” Jordan said. “Does he know Haddid is here?”

“Yes. Agents are on the way here to pick him up.”

“You called him.”

“What else could I do? The soldiers at the border checked my credentials. He knew that three of us crossed the border.”

Gutted by Ganani’s confession, Jordan fell silent. If Brodsky got his hands on Haddid, the Palestinian was as good as dead.

“We need to get Haddid out of here,” Jordan said. “You know what will happen if we don’t.”

“You would trust the Palestinian over Brodsky?”

“Yes,” Jordan said, but she could tell Ganani still wasn’t convinced. “Steven Cline was a radical. He and his wife were tied into a group that believes in uniting Israel as written in the Old Testament. By our own admission, Brodsky wanted the information that Najm Tibi was handing off to Cline. Knowing that Brodsky was once part of the Russian government, how sure are you of his motives?”

Again, Ganani didn’t respond.

Jordan shook her head. “You realize that Brodsky has implicated you in his plans. If I am right, if Haddid’s right, then you
will share the blame for what happens. Unless you do something to stop it by helping me now.”

Before Ganani could answer, Lotner approached from his office, looking pleased with himself. “Thanks to our friend, we have plugged the leak at the border.”

“Good,” Jordan said. “Now I need to ask you for a favor. I need to take Haddid with me, back to the embassy.”

“That is not going to happen.”

Jordan considered appealing to him about the danger Haddid was in, but Gidon didn’t seem the type to care. She needed to contact Daugherty. “Who is the new Israel PD liaison assigned to the U.S. embassy? Have they appointed one?”

“Yes. I am your new liaison.” He smiled and then excused himself when someone signaled to him from the front.

Jordan watched him walk away and then turned to Ganani. “This isn’t good. Lotner is very by-the-book.”

It was a funny assessment coming from her, but recent experience had altered her thinking.

“What do you expect me to do?” Ganani said.

“Take Haddid into your custody. Tell him you have orders to deliver him to Brodsky.”

“What if he checks with the colonel?”

“Haddid can help us identify the men who want to harm one of our agents, and he can help me convince Daugherty that something far worse is coming. If we wait too much longer, Haddid dies and there is no one left who can corroborate either threat. No one left to help exonerate you. Are you with me?”