Her presence also drew more than a few curious and sometimes hostile glances from their fellow drivers. Saudi Arabia was a staunchly Islamic country with harsh restrictions on women. The notion of female drivers was almost unheard of in this part of the world, not to mention ones with pale skin, icy blue eyes and long blonde hair kept unashamedly uncovered.
‘I don’t think they approve of you,’ Drake remarked as another driver leaned on his horn, shooting Anya a look of pure disgust.
It wasn’t that Drake feared for their safety. On the contrary, he was more concerned for any poor bastard who pushed her too far.
‘I am not looking for their approval,’ she remarked without concern.
‘Fair enough.’
She gave him a sly sidelong glance. ‘Does it make you nervous?’
‘What?’
‘Not being in control.’
‘Should it?’ he challenged her.
‘You did not answer my question.’
He offered a faint smile. ‘And you didn’t answer mine. Nasty habit we have here.’
They were making their way north, albeit slowly, on King Fahd Road, one of the major arteries that ran through the city. Off to their left, gleaming and indomitable in the evening sun, stood the immense Burj Al Mamlaka tower, a 1,000-foot-tall monument to Saudi Arabia’s booming oil economy.
Everywhere he looked, he saw symbols of wealth and prosperity. New buildings were sprouting everywhere; shining glass, steel and concrete had replaced the mud brick and sandstone of earlier eras, with the old largely demolished and forgotten to make way for the new.
He took a gulp of water, wiping his sweating brow with his forearm. It was as if the water was leaking out of him as fast as he could replace it, and he was sure Anya felt the same way.
Spotting a gap in the traffic, Anya gunned the accelerator, ignoring the horn blasts and the hostile stares. She wanted to put some miles in, and she intended to do it.
It had been a fifteen-hour flight from Miami to Riyadh, and neither of them was feeling their best when they finally cleared Immigration and spilled out into the burning afternoon sun. Still, they had made it, and that
was
miracle enough to silence any such gripes. They had been at their most vulnerable while locked aboard that tin can in the sky. If the Agency had found Henderson and learned of their plan, it would have been easy to have a snatch team waiting for them at Customs.
But it hadn’t happened. Somehow, through some miracle, they had made it to Saudi Arabia. Now they were barely a day’s drive from Anya’s contact.
With this in mind, their first port of call had been the nearest used-car dealership, where Anya had parted with 5,000 of her US dollars in return for a ten-year-old Land Rover formerly used by a British survey company.
The vehicle was a little rough looking after being used to haul rock and soil samples across the country, its paintwork scored, dented and weathered by years of sandstorms and hard driving, but a quick check of the engine bay and underside revealed that it had been well maintained. Drake could find no fault with the rugged vehicle.
It was just as well, because they were sure to need it. Their plan was to head north-west on Highway 65, before turning north on Highway 50 to a town called Al Majma’ah near the border. Anya claimed to know a man there who could show them the best place to slip across the border into Iraq.
But however they did it, it wouldn’t be by road. They were going to have to hightail it across the open desert, far from any checkpoints or border control stations.
They had also treated themselves to a Magellan satellite navigation system before leaving the airport. Navigating the featureless desert was a nightmare at the best of times, and they didn’t have time to waste plotting their position on a map. As long as they had the Magellan, they simply couldn’t get lost.
Their stylish Armani business wear was long gone now, discarded in favour of khaki trousers, hiking boots, loose white shirts, vests and sunglasses. Aside from the necessity of having more durable clothing for off-road travel, it was far too hot for anything else.
Drake glanced over at his companion. She was leaning back in her seat, one hand on the wheel, her eyes obscured by aviator sunglasses and her hair tied at the nape of her neck. She looked more comfortable and natural in such clothes than she ever had in a skirt or suit, and he thought he even saw a hint of a smile as she stamped on the gas, the engine roared and the breeze whipped at her hair.
Sensing his eyes on her, she turned to look, and her smile broadened.
‘I’ve wanted to do that for a long time.’
Despite his misgivings, he couldn’t help but return the gesture. There was something infectious about her smile, made all the more so because it was so rare. Already an attractive woman, a smile transformed her features in a way he couldn’t explain, rendering her truly, radiantly beautiful.
For a moment he found himself wondering at the soul lurking behind her icy exterior. He had caught glimpses of it at times, or thought he had, but she remained an enigma. A fascinating enigma.
‘Is everything all right?’
‘Yeah,’ he replied, glancing away. ‘Everything’s fine.’
For perhaps the first time, he actually felt good about their situation. They were almost at the end of their long journey now, their early problems and difficulties behind them. Soon they would find Typhoon, contact Munro, and he would see Jessica again.
He was quiet for a time, just watching the road ahead.
‘You know, when I passed my driving test I couldn’t wait to do stuff like this,’ he said, recalling her sudden burst of speed. ‘I wanted to be out there tearing up the road. Then one evening my dad takes me aside, drives me out to a stretch of road in the middle of nowhere and tells me to floor it – just drive as hard and fast as I can. I actually thought he was joking. He’d never done anything like that before. But he leans in close and looks me in the eye, dead serious – the kind of look that used to scare the shit out of me when I was little, and he says, “I’m not kidding. Do it now.”’
He chuckled a little at the memory. ‘I wasn’t about to argue. So off I went, pedal to the metal. I lasted about twenty seconds before I bottled it and slowed down, but God, those were the best twenty seconds of my life. My heart was pumping so hard I could hear it in my ears.
‘Then my dad turns to me with that same look and says, “Right, you got it out of your bloody system. Don’t ever let me catch you doing it again.” He was acting pissed off and serious, but I saw the look in his eyes. He’d never admit it, but I think he was proud he’d shared it with me.’
But instead of laughing, smiling or even dismissing the anecdote altogether, the woman looked strangely moved by his words. For a moment, an expression of such sadness and longing touched her that he wondered if he had said something wrong or offended her somehow.
‘Your father. He is … a good man?’
Drake shrugged. ‘He was like everyone, I suppose. He had his good days and his bad days. He was no saint, put it that way, and we didn’t often see eye to eye. But … he was my dad.’
He and his father had enjoyed a strained and often tumultuous relationship, especially as Drake grew older.
His
father had been a complex, demanding man; quick to anger, quick to criticise, quick to make him feel unworthy, often cold and distant, yet at the same time capable of quite surprising and spontaneous gestures of love and affection.
He’d spent a great deal of his childhood trying to win the man’s approval and respect, often without success. Then as a teenager he’d grown resentful, moody and rebellious, finding new and innovative ways to get in trouble and piss him off. Their rows had been so blazing during that time that they would go days without speaking to each other.
Only when he became an adult had their relationship stabilised a little, and the two men had at last developed a certain tolerance and respect for each other. For a time, at least.
She hadn’t missed his choice of words. ‘Was?’
He nodded slowly. ‘He died, three years ago. He had a heart attack one Sunday afternoon … died right there and then in his bedroom. The doctor said he didn’t suffer, it was like a light being switched off or something. I suppose they always tell people stuff like that.’ He blinked, pushing the memory away, then turned to look at his companion. ‘What about you? What are your parents like?’
She still had that distant, sad look about her.
‘Come on, even you must have had a mother and father.’
She avoided his gaze, keeping her eyes glued to the road. By now he’d recognised it as her standard way of killing a conversation.
Taking the hint, he leaned back in his seat and watched the suburbs of the Al Aqiq district flitting past. Ahead of them lay an endless expanse of shimmering desert.
* * *
‘Explain to me why we couldn’t intercept them at Immigration,’ Dietrich ground out, clutching his cellphone tight as he strode through the international arrivals terminal at Riyadh International. ‘We had Henderson’s passport number. Why the fuck wasn’t it red-flagged when he tried to enter the country?’
Passers-by gave him curious and disapproving glances, but he ignored them. He was seething with anger that they had missed such a perfect opportunity to intercept Drake, and he wanted to know who had fucked up.
‘It took time for the orders to filter through. Plus the Saudis weren’t being very cooperative,’ Franklin said from half a world away, sounding as tired and strung out as Dietrich felt. ‘You should consider it a miracle they even let a Shepherd team into the country. You don’t want to know the kind of favours I had to call in to make this happen.’
If Franklin was looking for gratitude, he was talking to the wrong man. Something wasn’t right about this. As contentious as their relationship might have been with the Saudis, the Agency wasn’t without resources in this part of the world. They should have had their own team on standby when Drake and Anya touched down, ready to lift them when the time was right.
‘Seven hours, Dan. They’ve got seven fucking hours’ head start on us.’
‘Then I suggest you don’t waste time bitching to me,’ Franklin snapped. ‘Don’t give me problems, Jonas. I’ve got enough of them here in DC. Do your goddamn job and find Drake.’
‘That went well,’ Keegan remarked as Dietrich ended the call. After their long flight, he looked even more crumpled and careworn than usual.
Dietrich gave him a sharp look but said nothing.
According to the briefing they had received just before leaving the United States, a representative of the Saudi government would be there to meet them in the arrivals area. That was all they had been told – no name, no description, nothing.
Dietrich scanned the sea of faces that confronted him, all eagerly awaiting the arrival of friends, loved ones and business colleagues. He had no idea who or what he was looking for.
Typical government operation. Then again, these were the same people who had once sent him a FedEx with nothing in it, and a cheque for zero dollars.
Just then, a tall, slender man in a grey suit emerged from the crowd and approached him. He was in his mid-fifties, with short greying hair swept straight back, and a neatly trimmed beard.
With dark unsmiling eyes and a hard, severe-looking face, it was obvious this guy wasn’t from the country’s tourism board.
‘You are the team I was briefed about?’ he asked without preamble, speaking in a hard staccato-like fashion that reminded Dietrich of a typewriter. His dark gaze took in all three operatives, resting a moment longer on Frost.
For her own part, Frost returned his unwelcoming gaze with a hard glare of her own. She was on the wrong end of a fifteen-hour flight, and looked it.
‘We are,’ Dietrich replied.
‘My name is Tariq. I represent the Mabahith.’
Dietrich’s brows rose. He had expected state police or some other security force, but this man was from the General Investigation Directorate. It was an innocuous enough name, but it represented a very murky and dangerous agency tasked with rooting out political
dissidents
and enemies of the kingdom, by any means. The Mabahith had been targeted by numerous human rights groups over the years for sanctioned torture, imprisonment without trial and summary executions based on flimsy or falsified evidence.
‘You will come with me now,’ he said, gesturing towards the terminal’s distant exit. It wasn’t a request. ‘We have a car waiting.’
As Tariq led the way, forcing his way through the crowds like an ice-breaker, Keegan leaned in closer to Frost. ‘Not real big on conversation, is he?’
‘Let’s hope he’s better at cooperation.’
Chapter 52
ANYA DIDN’T SPEAK
much unless she had something to say, and seemed to have a general dislike of small talk in others. Thus, their journey north-west on Highway 65 was often interspersed with long spells of silence.
With nothing but the drone of the engine and featureless desert for company, Drake’s thoughts returned, as they often did, to his sister. Again and again he replayed their brief phone conversations, analysing every word, every nuance of tone and inflection, trying to discern some hidden meaning, gain some insight that might help him find her.
Again and again, he came up with nothing.
It was maddening being kept in the dark like this. She could be dead already. This whole journey might be for nothing, and he had no way of knowing.
Stop this, he said to himself. This line of thinking would achieve nothing. She was alive; he knew it, because he refused to accept any other possibility.
His thoughts were interrupted when a sudden bang reverberated through the vehicle. Straight away the Land Rover slewed sideways as if it had a mind of its own, and only Anya’s frantic counter-steering prevented them from rolling over.
Stamping on the brakes, she brought them skidding to a halt by the side of the road, kicking up a cloud of dust and sand.
Drake was out first, already bracing himself for the worst, with Anya close behind. One look at the driver’s side front wheel was enough to confirm the cause of their problems.