He looked up and smiled at her and then watched as she walked away to the ladies’ room. She was an incredible creature. He had made the right decision bringing her. He could feel it in the deepest recesses of his heart.
The security operatives followed her with their eyes only. They had no reason to accompany her to the restroom. Damien was their primary, not her.
The necklace was beyond incredible. She wanted to stare at it in the mirror, but there would be time for that later.
Locking the door, she pulled out her phone and took care of her business first. There were so many damn apps on her phone that it was hard to find the one she was looking for. But that was the point. If Damien or any of his people had ever picked it up, and someone probably had, there was nothing unusual about any of it. Not even the banking apps.
In fact, she had noticed a story in one of Damien’s financial newspapers one morning and had made a throwaway comment about what she thought a certain Eastern European country might do if Russia cut off its natural gas supply. She finished with her opinion on how it might affect the markets.
It had impressed him. When he asked how she had come to such an erudite conclusion, she took the opportunity to tease him, explaining that she had dated a British investment banker for a while. The thought of her with another man drove him crazy and only made him want her more. All she had done was set the table. It was Damien who sat down and gorged himself on her.
Finding and opening the app she wanted, she placed her bets. This would turn out to either be the smartest thing she had ever done, or the most foolish. She would know soon enough, and she consoled herself with the knowledge that as bad as things might get, she had lived through worse, much worse, and it had only made her stronger.
Closing the app and tucking the phone back in her purse, she removed a tube of lipstick and a small travel pack of tissues.
Unscrewing the false bottom of her lipstick, she removed the tiny memory card from its hiding spot, and placed it between her teeth. Peeling off the sticker that held the tissue package closed, she placed the memory card in the center and then reached down and stuck it under the vanity, behind the sink.
Bentzi’s little blonde was going to have to work to find it, but Helena couldn’t have cared less. She had completed her assignment. The Mossad would have Damien’s damn password. Once it was confirmed, they would give her their file on Enoch and she would simply disappear.
At some point she would take her revenge on the man who had been responsible for stealing her away from her family and subjecting her to so many unspeakable horrors. There was always the possibility that the Mossad would try to double-cross her, but not Bentzi. She knew him well enough to know that he would honor his promise. He was a man of his word, if nothing else.
Standing in front of the mirror, she applied fresh lipstick and fixed her hair. The necklace was amazing. She would find a buyer for it somewhere in Central or South America at some point. There was no rush. She had nothing but time.
Smiling at her reflection, she decided to leave Bentzi a note and pressed her lips up against the mirror and left a lipstick kiss.
He was going to be upset at her leaving. No one left the service of the Mossad without being granted permission. But it would go deeper than that with Bentzi; he would take it personally. It would be an affront to him, like having a weekend guest who never sent a thank-you note.
His problem was that he had always seen himself as her savior. In the beginning, that’s how she had seen him too. In fact, to such a degree that she had fallen in love with him. But as time wore on, and he sent her on assignment after assignment — making it perfectly clear the lengths he expected her to go for Israel — her feelings for him shifted.
She had traded one jailer for another. As a sex slave, she had been physically abused and threatened with death. As Bentzi’s asset, she had been psychologically abused and threatened with prison.
Like her desperate hope that the pimps would eventually stop and let her go free, she had grown to begin hoping the same thing under Bentzi. And then she finally realized that she would have to facilitate her own escape.
Bentzi’s anger at her leaving would be his own problem. He had more than gotten his money’s worth out of her. She was ready to disappear. She had put all the pieces in place. He had taught her well, and now the student was preparing the final lesson. Trail after trail would end in dark alleys and dead-end streets. Bentzi and the Mossad could spend the next twenty years looking and they would never find her.
Considering all she had done for them and all that she knew, she hoped that they wouldn’t come looking. They owed her that much. They owed it to her to leave her alone. There were other girls out there — younger, worse off. Replacing her wouldn’t be a problem.
Adjusting her sweater, Helena opened the door and exited the ladies’ room. She only had to keep Damien happy for a little while longer. As soon as she had everything she needed, her new life could begin. And once that new life began, the only thing that would matter would be what she needed.
CHAPTER 40
Ben Mordechai paid the check while Sloane Ashby was in the ladies’ room. When she returned, they left the restaurant together.
It had pained him to see Helena with Damien like that. She really was in love with him, and he was head over heels in love with her. No one was that good of an actress.
Even from across the room, the necklace was amazing, and Mordechai questioned not only where he had lost control of this operation, but of her.
Making matters worse, there was a front moving in. Though it was bright and sunny outside, he could feel it in his hands. As they stepped outside, a cold burst of wind blew a rumble of fallen leaves down the sidewalk. Mordechai turned up the collar of his coat and kept pace with Ashby back to their car.
She didn’t talk much, except during the meal where it had been important for them to appear as two colleagues out having lunch. When Damien’s security men had clocked the room, their eyes had fallen on Mordechai and stayed there a beat longer than they had on anyone else. Then they had moved on.
He had assessed them too — the cut and fabric of their suits, the shoes, the haircuts — even their eyes, jawlines, and facial structures. They were good-sized men, all over six feet tall, and they appeared European. Western European, probably, definitely not Eastern European or Israeli. The world was changing so fast, though, that it was getting harder for Mordechai to tell anymore.
The takeaway was that the men were disciplined and carried themselves with military bearing. With the kind of money Damien had to spend, they were likely former soldiers who had seen combat in multiple war zones. Not men to be trifled with, or underestimated.
“She’s quite lovely,” Ashby said as they neared their vehicle.
“Who?” Mordechai replied, lost in his own thoughts.
“Helena.”
He nodded, not sure how to reply. It was an uncomfortable situation he found himself in. He wasn’t exactly their prisoner — Deputy CIA Director Ryan had made that clear — but he also wasn’t free to go. He either cooperated fully, or they would eject him from the country, along with a handful of Israeli intelligence agents known to the CIA to be operating out of Israel’s embassy. Mordechai had no choice but to comply.
Hopefully, he now had what he needed and would be able to part ways with the Americans. Per their agreement, though, the Americans would get to copy the memory card before turning it over to him.
When they got into the car, Ashby unlocked her phone and swiped to the picture she had taken of the lipstick kiss on the bathroom mirror. “I think she left this for you.”