Uzi pulled the Smith & Wesson from his belt, but kept it beneath the flap of his jacket as he worked his way through the crowd of tables toward the far left wall. After slipping behind the tall folding room divider, he entered the stairwell that led to the basement. With his back to the wall and his weapon now out in front of him, he slowly descended the steps.
The long, white-tiled basement hallway fed into, and dead-ended at, the kitchen. A room service cart stood off to the right, opposite a black elevator door. Uzi craned his neck, trying to see around tall industrial plastic containers and boxes of Evian stacked six rows high.
Close quarters and impaired line of sight. Great.
About the only positive was that the fire alarm was not nearly as loud down here.
He turned right into the main area of the kitchen. Aside from adobe tile flooring, stainless steel dominated the room. Ovens, cook stoves, refrigerators, and deep sinks brimmed with the matte-finish metal. Sizzling steaks sat on the broiler to his left. With the fire alarm ringing, the cooks had shut off the burners and evacuated. Uzi pushed forward into the adjacent room, where a walk-in freezer swallowed the far wall. Clear.
He lowered his Smith & Wesson and took in the lay of the land: this portion of the basement consisted mostly of the kitchen — which itself was a dead end. Though there was only one way in or out, an elevator and two feeder staircases spilled into the corridor twenty yards away, near where he’d entered.
A rumble in that direction grabbed his attention. Stepping out of the elevator was a ski-masked man with a compact assault rifle, followed by a bloody, handcuffed Gideon Aksel.
And Batula Hakim.
Uzi swung his S&W toward Hakim’s head. Their eyes met and he saw something in them he had never seen before. Deep-seated contempt. His probably said the same.
“Should I call you Leila Harel or Batula Hakim?”
“You’re a fool, not to know the woman who killed your beloved wife and daughter.” She spit the words, her tone full of disdain. “To make love to me, to dishonor your wife like that.”
Uzi’s glance fell to Aksel’s eyes. They said nothing, if not agreement with Hakim’s statement. Uzi did not bother defending himself, did not bother explaining that she looked vastly different from the grainy intelligence photo he had seen of her so many years ago. He stole a look at her masked conspirator— the man was letting the scene play out and presented no immediate threat. Uzi turned back to Hakim. “Your problem’s with me. Let him go.”
“You! The man who killed my brother—
you think you can order me around?” She pressed her submachine gun against Aksel’s temple. “Would it hurt you to see his brains blown out, Uzi? Would it?”
“I didn’t kill your brother, Hakim. Your own man killed him. His bullet ricocheted. I was pinned down and couldn’t get off a shot.”
“Liar.”
“Ask the Director General. He saw my report. If I’d killed Ahmed, there’d be no reason to say I didn’t. I fucked up the op. If I’d said I killed Ahmed, I would’ve looked a whole lot better.”
“He already told me what happened. Haven’t you, Gideon?” She looked at Aksel and smiled out of the left side of her mouth, then turned back to Uzi. “Years ago he told me what happened.”
Uzi’s brow furrowed. Why is she calling him by his first name? Why would he have told her anything? “What are you talking about?” He looked to Gideon for confirmation. But the man averted his eyes.
With her free hand, Hakim yanked on the knot holding Aksel’s gag in place, then tossed the rag to the ground. “Tell him, Gideon. Tell him who I worked for.”
Aksel kept his eyes on the ground and said nothing.
“I worked for Mossad,” Hakim said. “Just like you. Just like Ahmed. Yes, my brother was on Mossad’s payroll the whole time he lived in Egypt. Both of us recruited by your friend here. A fact that remains hidden from everyone at Mossad even to this day. When you were sent to kill my brother, it was because Gideon discovered Ahmed was a double agent who’d given him bogus information. Ahmed was playing him. And it cost two agents their lives.
“Mossad was still in trouble after several high profile fuck-ups, and Gideon Aksel — brought in to ‘save the day’—was going to take the heat if the new prime minister found out his grand master had been duped.” Hakim looked at Aksel, drew back, and spit in his face. “My brother would never betray his allegiance to the Palestinian people.”
The director general leaned away in disgust.
No. She’s lying. “Gideon?”
Aksel still would not look at him.
Uzi faced Hakim. “You killed an innocent woman… a sweet little girl.” He swallowed hard, fighting to keep his composure. “You’re a woman, how could you have done that?”
“Their lives were unimportant. You killed my brother. It was my right to take revenge, to give you the same pain you gave me. Relentless emotional pain, tortured forever.”
Uzi felt tears filling his eyes but fought back the emotion. “I told you, I didn’t kill your brother!”
“Deny it all you want. But I saw the mission reports. Gideon showed me the classified file. He told me he was sorry for what had happened and wanted to set the record straight, that you were acting on your own.”
Uzi looked at Gideon. “That’s bullshit. Our mission was to take out Ahmed and his cell before they could bomb the Knesset. About the only thing I’m guilty of is not following orders. I couldn’t believe Ahmed would do such a thing. I liked him, I wanted to give him a chance to explain.” Uzi stopped himself, realizing that his assumption as to why Maya and Dena had been murdered was incorrect. It wasn’t the terrorist who escaped who lied about the ricochet killing Ahmed. It was Gideon. He told Hakim I shot her brother.
“Why, Gideon? Do you realize what you did?”
Aksel looked up at Uzi with war-weary eyes. “It was a price that had to be paid, Uzi. It took me two years to clean up Mossad’s reputation and restore its credibility; even countries we’re supposedly at peace with give terrorists safe harbor, weapons, and money to attack us. You know that. An effective Mossad is essential to Israel’s survival.” He sighed, looked down, and then lifted his chin. “We made a mistake. I made a mistake. Recruiting Hakim and her brother… It was a fatal error. My fatal error. The only one I’ve ever made.”
“You needed a scapegoat,” Uzi said. “So you pinned it on me, falsified the mission reports.”
“I never intended for her to kill your family, Uzi. I never meant for that to happen. For that, I am sorry. But what I did, I did for the survival of our country.” He turned to face Hakim, the barrel of her gun jabbing him in the bloodied portion of his temple. “Uzi didn’t kill your brother.”
“He’s a Jew,” Hakim spat. “A Zionist. That makes him guilty. Whether he killed Ahmed or not, it doesn’t matter. He deserves what I did to him. And you deserve what I’m going to do to you.”
Uzi’s arms were still extending the gun out in front of him. “You got your revenge, Hakim. But this is a different time, a different place. This is where it ends. Drop your weapon.”
Troy Rodman leaned against the wall, his physique, black tunic, and assault gear leaving the ignorant bystander no doubt that he was some sort of Special Forces operative. Headset firmly atop his shaven scalp and the boom mike an inch from his lips, he stood outside the basement stairwell listening to the goings on thirty feet away and around the bend.