Layover in Dubai (16 page)

“I should say so,” Amina chimed in.

Laleh bent forward to her bowl of fruit and yogurt. Was she suppressing a laugh? Keller kept his head down, seemingly wary of the family dynamics. Sharaf decided that the young man and he had better evacuate the premises before there was further trouble. He escorted Keller to his windowless hideaway and settled him onto the couch.

“I have a busy schedule planned for you later today, but first I have to keep up appearances by going into the office. While I’m gone I’m afraid you will have to remain locked in this room.”

Keller opened his mouth to protest. Sharaf raised a hand.

“Let me finish. I know this is a trial, but you must be patient awhile longer. Even if you managed to leave the house, without your passport you would not be much use to anyone except the people who want to throw you in jail, or worse. And don’t worry. When we have concluded our chores, I’ll let you make that phone call. I promise.”

That must have been what Keller wanted to hear. He shut his mouth, adopted a resigned frown, and sagged back onto the couch.

“What am I supposed to do all day?”

“There are some books in English here.” Sharaf gestured toward oak shelves along a far wall. “You are welcome to read them. I shouldn’t be more than a few hours.”

“And what are these chores you’re talking about?”

“We will discuss it later.”

Sharaf wasn’t ready to tell Keller they would be attending a Mafia powwow. He hadn’t yet figured out how they would pull it off, and it would only scare the poor fellow. Understandably so. Because if Sharaf’s hunch was correct, Charlie Hatcher’s killers would be among the participants. Now all he had to do was figure out how to let Keller make an identification of the guilty parties without anyone—the Minister included—finding out. It would be a tricky business in the wide-open spaces of the Burjuman Mall. The mere thought of it made his stomach churn and growl. At this rate, he wouldn’t be drinking camel’s milk for days.

Just a few more hours max, Sam thought, and he would be out of this mess. But for the moment he was back on the floor of the Camry, listening to the sounds of stalled Dubai traffic through Sharaf’s open window.

It was just after 8 p.m., well after rush hour, yet they were at a standstill. A cloud of greasy smoke told him they were idling near a kebab shop. He heard sidewalk chatter in three languages. A man and a woman were the loudest, arguing passionately in some Slavic tongue and getting rougher by the moment.

“What’s going on?” he asked from the floor.

“A prostitute and her pimp. The subject is money. She’s Asian; her Russian is terrible. His accent is Georgian, like Stalin’s. Oh, dear.”

“What happened?”

The shouting gave way to the sound of a scuffle.

“He slapped her. Now he’s forcing her into his car.”

“Shouldn’t you do something?”

“I’m not even in uniform. And the last thing we want is attention, especially when the people we are going to see are probably his bosses. In fact, you can sit up now. We are almost there.”

“Russians?” Sam struggled up from the floor and brushed himself off. “You’re taking me to some
Mafia
thing?”

Traffic was moving again. No Asian woman or Russian man was in sight.

“I was hoping you might recognize a few of them from the other night at the York.”

“Are you crazy?”

“My wife thinks so. But only because I brought you into the house, a viper to steal her daughter’s virtue. Do not worry, we will stay well out of sight.”

“You said we were just going to a mall.”

“We are. To observe a
strelka
of rival factions, Russians and Iranians.”

“A what?”

“A meeting. A conclave. These fellows have taught me all sorts of Russian that my tutors never dreamed of. A
strelka
is a meeting of rival thugs.”

“They meet at malls?”

“Out in the open, where they know they can trust each other, and neither side has a natural advantage. They’ll probably stake out part of a restaurant. We’ll watch from a safe distance.”

Sam saw they were only a few blocks from the York Club.

“I didn’t know there were any malls in this part of town.”

“It’s Dubai. There are malls in every part of town. And don’t let the look of the district fool you. The Burjuman is very upscale, although I cannot say it is one of my favorites.”

“You have favorite malls?”

It came out harsher than he intended. Sharaf turned in his seat.

“Tell me, Mr. Keller, have you ever been in Dubai in July?”

“No.”

“You would not ask that question if you had. In the summer the malls are our Great Outdoors. Everyone has their favorites. Everyone. Because of this, each mall has acquired its own personality, its own clientele. And the Burjuman, well, it is not to my liking, even though I can certainly appreciate its strengths as well as its drawbacks.”

“Which are?”

“You are an observant man. I am sure you will see.”

Looming just ahead was a sleek glass tower, maybe thirty stories tall, with curving walls that tapered to a sharp point, making the structure a giant wedge. Perched atop it was a huge fan of perforated steel, like the sail of a capsized windsurfer.

“Is that it?”

“The mall is on the lower floors. We will park underneath it.”

They swerved into an underground garage. Sharaf snatched a ticket as the gate swung clear. The Camry was a humble addition to rows of gleaming SUVs and luxury sedans.

“So we’re going to walk up to these guys, just like that?” Sam asked.

“Patience.”

There were plenty of empty spaces, but Sharaf drove to the lowest level. In the middle of the vast deck was a glass-walled chamber with an escalator that climbed past a roaring man-made waterfall cascading from the overhead floors where, presumably, all the shops were. They ignored that entrance, and walked instead to unmarked elevator doors in a far corner of the parking deck. Sharaf punched in a numeric code to open the doors and they rode up a few floors. The rear door opened onto a nondescript hallway leading to unmarked steel doors at the far end. Sharaf knocked. A buzzer sounded and they entered a gray vestibule rimmed in chrome.

A fellow in a security uniform emerged from around the corner. Sharaf, wearing gray Western slacks and a black long-sleeved shirt, flashed an ID, and the man wordlessly escorted them to the next room. Sam had no idea what a mall security center was supposed to look like, but he suspected that, as with so many other things in Dubai, this one was lavish and excessive.

A massive three-panel bank of video monitors fanned out around a semicircle of black Formica-topped desks. Each panel had more than a hundred screens, all of them in full color and crystal clear. The desks were covered with telephones and laptops. A uniformed man sat in front of each panel, watching intently. All three of them wore headphones, so apparently they could listen as well as observe.

“Looks like the control room of a nuclear power plant,” Sam said.

“Except here the stakes are higher,” Sharaf said, with no hint of irony. “Just a few months ago at the Wafi Mall a gang of Serbian thieves drove two Audis through the entrance and smashed their way into a Graff jewelry store. In ninety seconds they stole thirteen million dollars’ worth of loot, then drove back out, right past the fake Egyptian temple and all the shoppers eating ice cream. Here at the Burjuman there are forty different merchants selling high-end jewelry, including Tiffany and Cartier. Extravagant goods call for extravagant protection.”

Sam scanned the screens. Impressive names leaped out from the storefronts—Saks. Chanel. Dior. Versace. Dunkin’ Donuts?

The shoppers were nothing special. Shorts and beach clothes, plenty of blue jeans. Only rarely did he glimpse someone in traditional local dress—the men in white
kandouras
, the women draped head to toe in black.

“Weird,” he said, the word slipping out.

“What is?”

“There are hardly any Emiratis. They almost look out of place.”

“Now you see why it is not one of my favorites. That is why I wore these Western clothes. To fit in, if I have to. I feel like a tourist here. That, plus all the damned Russians, the mob types in particular.”

“This is their hangout?”

“One of Anatoly Rybakov’s, anyway. A local chieftain. People call him the Tsar.”

“I’d have thought he’d prefer Emirates Mall, the one with the ski slope.”

“Russians who come to Dubai have had quite enough of snow and ice. If Rybakov gets homesick he can always turn up the air conditioner and drink a liter of vodka. But it’s mostly their wives and daughters who come here. There. Screen twelve. Look at her. Zoom in, please.”

The security man nodded, typed a command on his laptop, and maneuvered a joystick. The image closed in on a sturdy Russian woman, middle-aged, with rouged cheeks. She stood outside Louis Vuitton. Her bleached hair was piled into a bun, which served as a perch for jeweled designer sunglasses. Tight slacks, fire-engine red, were matched by a bulging spandex top, which was draped by a clingy white cardigan she had buttoned to just below her massive cleavage. She puffed forcefully on a cigarette, inhaling greedily, as if she stood to win a million rubles if she could finish within a minute.

Alongside her was a formidable old babushka in a scarf and peasant garb, strictly Old Country, and shaped like one of those Matroyshka nesting dolls—the big one that all the little ones would fit into. Maybe they were in there now, squirming to get out.

“The younger one is Rybakov’s wife,” Sharaf said. “I am guessing that’s one reason he chose this place. Give her a night of shopping while he takes care of business.”

“So the Russians picked the place?”

“They usually do.”

“And the Iranians don’t mind?”

“They are outnumbered here. Or outgunned, anyway. The Indian mob, now that would be another matter. As for the Iranians, when your people have been here for four hundred years as traders and smugglers, you don’t get too worked up about little things like who picks the meeting place, as long as you are still making money.”

The woman on screen 12 was on the move.

“Follow her,” Sharaf said. The security man nodded and moved the joystick. The camera panned left, tracking her progress, which was hobbled somewhat by the slow-moving babushka.

“She’ll appear next on thirteen,” the security man said.

They followed her across three more screens until she approached a man sitting on a bench. She opened her Louis Vuitton bag to show him the fruits of her labors. He nodded, neither smiling nor frowning. Then he stood. He was compact and deeply tanned, with bristly gray hair trimmed close to the scalp. Black jacket, black slacks, shiny black shirt, with the top two buttons undone to reveal silver chest hair and a thin gold chain. Two younger, bigger men reared up behind him, peeking over his shoulder into the shopping bag as if it might be carrying a bomb.

“That’s Anatoly Rybakov. Recognize any of the muscle?”

“No. Sorry.”

“Do you have sound?”

The security man nodded and clicked a mouse. A garble of Russian and ambient noise burst from a nearby speaker, muffled by the raindrop crackle of a fountain.

“Will the audio be clearer in a restaurant?”

The security man nodded firmly, a man certain in his judgments.

The wife and the babushka headed off for more shopping, while Rybakov chatted with his bodyguards.

“Is this how he always operates?” Sam asked. “‘Hi, I’m a Russian thug, let’s chat?’”

“Officially he is the regional executive for RusSiberian Metals and Investment. Their specialties are Russian commodities and real estate development.”

“Is any of it legit?”

“The commodities were all looted at subsidy prices. The real estate is for laundering money. Yet another reason you see so much construction here.”

Rybakov and his bodyguards began walking. They stepped aboard a rising escalator.

“Stay with him,” Sharaf said.

“He’ll be coming up next on one-thirty-seven,” the security man said. “Center panel.”

Sharaf and Sam eased behind the next fellow with headphones, watching over his shoulder. They followed Rybakov’s progress across four more screens to the uppermost of the mall’s four levels, where he entered a restaurant called Bella Donna. The view of level four, offered panoramically if you scanned enough screens at once, was fairly spectacular. It was a darkened area of subdued lighting. The mall’s arched glass ceiling was underlaid by teak framing and a spaghetti of blue neon, which cast an eerie glow on the restaurant’s rooftop tables, where Rybakov was now taking a seat with his bodyguards. They were the only customers up there. Two minutes later more Russians arrived. Four more beefy fellows, nearly indistinguishable in dress and demeanor.

“That’s him!” Sam exclaimed, hardly believing his eyes. “Second from the left. One of the guys from the York.”

“In the gray jacket?”

“Yes. I’m sure of it.”

“Yuri Arzhanov. One of the Tsar’s lieutenants. A real
vory-v-zakonye
type of enforcer, which is another word my tutors never taught me. A leadership title he would have earned in prison. And you’re positive he’s the one you saw at the York?”

“Absolutely. He stared right at me.”

“Interesting. People of his rank don’t normally dirty their hands with blood errands. Recognize anyone else?”

Sam watched the group fill a second table. Two chairs across from Rybakov were still empty. Presumably they were reserved for the top Iranians.

“The one on the far right. I think that might be the second guy, but I’m not as certain.”

“He is not familiar to me. Probably one of Arzhanov’s minions. Could we have some sound, please?”