Twelve Days (33 page)

Wells turned away, looked at Salome, but he found no succor in her face. Only hate. He had questions for her:
Did you feel it, too?
And
How did you end up here?
But he didn’t feel like asking. And he supposed he already knew what she’d say:
Yes.
And
How does anyone end up anywhere?

“I should have killed you in Volgograd.”

“I’m glad you didn’t. I wouldn’t have gotten to hear your boss’s stories.”

A reluctant smile creased her lips, and Wells knew her thoughts, knew they mirrored his. Ninety minutes later, the jet began to descend. “We’ll be at King Khalid International Airport in approximately thirty minutes,” the pilot said over the intercom. “After landing, we’ve been told to remain on the auxiliary runway, so that’s what we’ll do. Rendition Airways looks forward to serving you again soon.”

—

As the jet stopped, a dozen unmarked police SUVs surrounded it. The armada taxied slowly away from the lights of the main terminal, to an apron beside a blocky concrete building at the airport’s northeastern edge, as far from the city of Riyadh as possible. “Quarantine Station,” its sign read in Arabic and English.

“If they offer us a welcome shower, I’m going to get nervous,” Duberman said.

“Holocaust humor,” Duto said. “Classy.”

The police trained a half-dozen spotlights on the jet and rolled a staircase to the front cabin door. The flight attendant, who had spent the entire flight in the rear galley with wraparound Beats headphones over his ears, the literal definition of hearing no evil, stepped forward and popped it open. The desert wind kicked dust inside as a spotlight glared through the open door.

Wells stepped forward. A uniformed Saudi officer stood at the base of the stairs and waved him down. Three soldiers stood around him, their rifles trained on Wells. Wells wondered if he might finally have exhausted his credit with Abdullah, if the Saudis might arrest him and everyone on the plane. But when he reached the stairs, the officer extended a friendly hand. He was short, stocky, and handsome, with the close-cut beard that Saudi royals favored. Wells tried to ignore the fact that he looked about twenty.

“Salaam aleikum.”

“As-aleikum salaam.”

“Mr. Wells. I’m Colonel Faisal. A grandson of Miteb.” Prior to his death a year before, Prince Miteb had been Abdullah’s closest ally in the royal family. If his grandson was here, Wells was safe.

“Thank you for coming here.”

Faisal smiled. “Rami”—Abdullah’s most senior secretary, basically his chief of staff—“said it might be the most interesting mission of my career. He said when you were involved, his life was never boring.”

Wells had sometimes wondered why Abdullah let him draw so many favors over the years. He suspected that Faisal had given him the answer. Genuine excitement was as hard to find for a king as anyone else. Maybe harder.

“Do you know why you’re here, Colonel?”

Faisal shook his head.

“A man and a woman aboard that plane have requested asylum in the Kingdom.” This explanation failed to answer any number of important questions, including
Who are they? Why are they claiming asylum? What’s your relationship with them?
And, even more obviously,
Why did you land
here in the first place?
Whether out of deference, or, more likely, because he’d been told to keep his mouth shut and do what Wells said, Faisal asked none of them.

“Yes. I see.”

“I imagine you don’t get many asylum seekers, but I think it would be best if you kept them out here in the quarantine station. Instead of taking them back to the terminal to start a more formal process.”

“Are they dangerous, sir?”

“Not unless you like to gamble.” The joke sailed past Faisal. “No. They aren’t.”

“And shall I question them, sir? To determine whether they have legitimate business here?”

Absolutely, positively not.
“Just hold them, make sure they’re comfortable. Food, a hot shower, whatever they like. Don’t touch them under any circumstances.”

“But then how will I know what to do with them?”

“Tomorrow afternoon, you’ll release them,” Wells said.
Of course. Makes perfect sense.
“Rami will tell you exactly when, but it won’t be too late. Certainly before dark.”

“Release them where, sir?”

“A flight to Amman. Rami will arrange the jet. But don’t tell them that you’re going to let them go until Rami tells you so. Most important, don’t let them make any phone calls. Whatever they promise or threaten, no communication of any kind.”

“I understand, sir. And will you be leaving now?”

“Not yet. We’ll sleep on the plane until morning and then take off.” Wells figured the Gulfstream would be at least as comfortable as the quarantine rooms.

Faisal nodded, though his expression remained puzzled. “This seems like a lot of trouble, sir. If they’re going to leave tomorrow anyway.”

Wells shook the young Saudi’s hand. “If you don’t mind my asking, how old are you, Colonel?”

“Twenty-five, sir.”

Nice to be a prince.

—

Back in the cabin, Duberman and Salome hadn’t moved.

“Go on,” Wells said. “I give you my word you won’t be hurt.”

Duberman stood, turned to Duto. “Senator. Your friend is obviously mentally ill. Are you going along with this? It’ll destroy you, too.”

“Good-bye, Aaron,” Duto said.

At the cabin door, Duberman turned to Wells. “You’re going to wish you’d killed me.”

“I already do.”

—

As they watched Faisal and his men usher Duberman and Salome into the station, Wells told Duto what had happened, beginning with Rudi’s call.

“So all of this was to buy an extra day. Not even.”

“Yes.”

“Ever think that maybe we should just have shot them?”

“Shot Aaron Duberman.”

“He’s the one who suggested it. They’re going to come at us as soon as they get out of here. And if we win he’s dead anyway. You think the President’s going to give Duberman a get-out-of-jail-free card?”

“I don’t shoot prisoners, Vinny.”

“All right. Better hope Witwans is home when we get down there.”

A possibility Wells had not even considered. “He’ll be home, Vinny.”

Finally, the jet reached an apron where dozens of other private jets were parked. The pilot opened the cockpit door. “We’ll sleep here. Wake at 0800 and be in the air by 0815.”

“Thank you, Captain.”

“Good night to all, and to all a good night.”

TWO DAYS . . .

AMMAN, JORDAN

W
ith no bags, Salome and Duberman walked untouched past the customs posts at Queen Alia International Airport. They stepped into the arrival hall, a wide, low room crowded with money-changing stations, coffee stands, and men hawking hotel leaflets. Duberman stopped so abruptly that Salome had to dodge his heels and looked around as wide-eyed as an aquarium-bound fish. Salome thought she understood his confusion. The superrich never spent time by themselves in uncontrolled public spaces. Duberman had no guards or minders or drivers to tell him where to go, clear his path. Being threatened with execution didn’t faze him. Having to find his way through this terminal on his own, on the other hand . . .

“Over here.” She led him to a mobile phone kiosk.

—

The previous night in Riyadh, the young colonel had ushered them inside the quarantine station, where a pair of cots were waiting. “Sleep,” he said. “We will discuss in the morning.”

“Discuss what?” Salome said. She lay down and, to her surprise, fell asleep almost immediately.

She woke in confusion, certain she’d had the strangest of dreams. Wells had taken her and Duberman to Riyadh. Then she tasted the desert dust in her mouth.

She’d slept in her clothes, but the Saudis had shielded her cot with a sheet anyway. She pulled it open to reveal a concrete room covered with posters encouraging hand-washing. The colonel sat in the middle, playing a video game on his phone. Duberman was still asleep, lying on his back, his arms folded prayerfully across his chest. The world’s richest monk.

She still couldn’t believe that he hadn’t cracked in Tel Aviv.
She
almost had. After seeing how Wells had eviscerated his guards in Istanbul, she was certain he would follow through on his threat to kill Duberman. She’d been trying to play out what might happen after she gave up Witwans’s name. Maybe they could still stop Wells from getting to him. Maybe she could buy time by giving Wells a fake name. Anything to get him away from Duberman. But she saw that once she spoke, Wells would keep threatening her until he was sure that she was telling the truth and that he had a way to Witwans.

Still, she wanted to tell.
She loves you,
Wells had said to Duberman. More accurate to say that Salome couldn’t imagine a world without Duberman. She understood her hypocrisy. For five years, she had insisted they had to stop Iran from building a bomb at any cost. Now, with victory days away, she was about to risk their success to save one man.

Luckily, Duberman had somehow known that Wells wouldn’t pull the trigger. He had called Wells’s bluff.

Yet Wells still wasn’t finished. She supposed his ability to adapt to crisis, never give up, was the reason he’d survived so long. So they had wound up at this concrete quarantine station at an airport in Riyadh, watched over by this ridiculously young colonel.

—

He put away his phone as Salome rose from her cot and approached him.

“Salaam aleikum.”

“Don’t pretend to be polite. We’re your prisoners.”

“Not at all.”

“Then let us go.”

“Miss”—he pulled her passport from his pocket, made a show of looking at it—“Leffetz. I understand you’re upset, but there’s nowhere for you
to
go. You’re in quarantine.”

“Then let me call my office. Or email.”

He tucked away the passport. “Once you’re out of quarantine.”

“And when will that be?”

“Soon.”

“Days, weeks, months?”

“Soon.” He wasn’t smiling, but she couldn’t help feeling he was mocking her.

“What kind of quarantine is this, anyway? We’re not sick.” As she spoke, she knew she’d lost. Even speaking the word meant accepting his ridiculous premise.

“We are processing your request for asylum.”

“We haven’t—” She broke off, forced herself to keep her voice level. “That man over there. You know who he is?”

This time, he pulled Duberman’s blue American passport. “Aaron Duberman. Born Atlanta, Georgia.”

“He’s worth almost thirty billion dollars. Why would he want asylum in Saudi Arabia?”

“We have excellent free health care.”

Now she knew he was mocking her.

“When the processing is complete, we’ll inform you of the outcome.”

“I hope you’re enjoying this, because it’s going to end badly for you.”

“Would you like some coffee?”

—

When Duberman woke, she explained what had happened.

“How long do you think they can hold us like this?”

They were speaking Hebrew, ignoring the stares of the guards.

“Not long. No doubt they’re already getting calls from Jerusalem. Washington soon enough.”

Gideon would have realized quickly that Riyadh was their most likely destination, especially since Duberman had investigated Wells and knew of his relationship to the Kingdom.

The more important question was
why
Wells had dumped them here instead of Cyprus. Presumably, the phone call he’d taken in the minutes before takeoff held the answer. He would have needed a good reason for such a desperate play, and Salome could think of only one.

“Someone told him where we got the stuff.” Though she couldn’t understand who’d tipped him off. Maybe Shafer really had talked his way clear of the CIA. “If he gets to Witwans—”

“I understand, Adina.” He used her real name only when he was annoyed. “If I thought shouting would do any good, I’d shout. But it’ll just piss them off. And no matter what, I’m sure they’ll put us on a plane soon enough.”

—

Once again Duberman’s instincts proved right. As the digital wall clock over the door turned to 3:00, the colonel handed back their passports.

“I regret to inform you that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia cannot accept your asylum request. You’re going to have to leave Saudi soil.”

“Too bad,” Salome said.

“We will provide a flight to Jordan, free of charge. Further transport
will be your responsibility.” The colonel walked into a back room, returned with a dusty black abaya and headscarf. “You don’t have to cover your face, but please put these on until you are clear of our airspace.”

“Come on.”

“Your flight leaves in forty-five minutes.”

She would argue over Saudi dress codes for women another time. She wiped off the shapeless gown as best she could, threw it over her clothes, stuck her hair under the scarf.

“Gorgeous,” Duberman said.

The colonel drove them to the main terminal, where they boarded a Saudi Arabian Airlines 737. Salome had figured they’d be given a private charter, but this was a standard public flight to Amman. More evidence that the Saudis wanted to resolve their detention without fanfare.

The colonel and a nameless man in a suit whom they’d picked up in the boarding area walked them into coach. Despite herself, Salome had to smile. She wondered when Duberman had last sat in cattle class. Three empty seats awaited them near the back. Salome took the window and smirked as the man in the suit gently steered Duberman to the middle seat.

“I’m sorry we weren’t able to grant your request,” the colonel said. “Gabir will accompany you to Amman. After that, as we’ve discussed, you’re on your own. Safe journeys
. Ma-a salaama.”

—

Gabir didn’t speak during the two-hour flight. Salome and Duberman didn’t, either. It seemed safe to assume he was a
mukhabarat
officer who spoke Hebrew and English. But when they landed, he disappeared and the Jordanians treated them like ordinary passengers.

Now they were back in the world. It was just past 6 p.m. A day had passed since Wells kidnapped them, eighteen hours since he dumped them in Riyadh. If he and Duto had flown to Johannesburg overnight,
they could already have found Witwans. Worse: They might already have grabbed him. They might already have put him on a plane to the United States.

“You call South Africa,” Duberman said. “I’ll call home, get us a jet.”

Salome punched in Frankel’s mobile number, wondering what she would do if he didn’t answer. After five rings, the phone went to voice mail. She reminded herself that he would be seeing a Jordanian number on his screen, called again. One, two, three—

“
Shalom.
”

“Amos.”

“Adina? Where have you been?”

“Don’t worry about it. What’s important, do you still have Witwans?”

“Of course.” He sounded surprised at the question.

“Can you control him? He’ll do what you say?”

“Without a doubt. He’s been drunk since I got here, and he’s scared out of his mind.”

“Take him and go.”

“Where?”

“Cape Town, a safe house not far from the airport. I’ll fly down, meet you there.” Witwans’s mansion was in the Free State province, the middle of South Africa. She guessed it had to be eight or ten hours by car to Cape Town. The city was on the Atlantic Ocean, in the country’s southwest corner. She had a safe house in Johannesburg, too, but keeping Frankel and Witwans on the road as long as possible seemed smart. For her, the difference was immaterial. Depending on how quickly Duberman arranged the jet, she would arrive in Cape Town a couple hours after Frankel and Witwans.

“That must be a thousand kilometers from here. More. You want me to leave now, drive all night? Why not just let me shoot him?”

“Wells is on his way to you. Get out of there. No bodies. Nothing to find. Give Witwans a few more drinks, he’ll sleep the whole way.”

“He smells terrible, you know. Old
shicker
—” Yiddish and Hebrew slang for drunk. “Probably throw up in the seat.”

“Amos. Go.”

“The address.”

“I’ll text it.” She hung up.

—

Beside her, Duberman cooed into his phone in Hebrew, “No, everything’s fine . . . I’ll explain as soon as I’m home . . . I love you, too, babe. Bye.”

Babe.
She supposed she was happy to hear that he was as banal in love as everyone else.

“They were waiting for us to call. There’s a jet fueled up at Ben Gurion. Be here in half an hour, forty minutes.”

Salome explained the call with Frankel.

“So you’re going to Cape Town?”

“Yes.” She wanted to ask him to come, though she knew he wouldn’t possibly.

“We’ll stop at Tel Aviv, drop me off. Gideon has four guys on the jet. You can have two, I’ll take two, just in case you’re wrong and Wells somehow got back to Israel.”

Wells wasn’t in Israel, and Duberman no doubt had another squad of guards at his mansion anyway. But two reinforcements was better than none.

—

Ninety minutes later, they were back in Israel, their round-trip complete. Salome suddenly was certain that she wouldn’t see Duberman again.

As the cabin door opened, she hugged him, too long and too close. She bent her head to his chest and smelled his musk, his scent true and ripe after almost two days without a shower. “Aaron.”

“Adina.” His voice was gentle and as distant as the break of the ocean. She would have told him she loved him, but why? He didn’t love her. The words would have been just one more coin for his fortune. So she pulled away, unwound her arms.

“I’m going to find him,” she said instead. “And I’m going to kill him.”