It was impossible, of course it was. The chances of detection were high, the chances of survival very low. He had further work to do elsewhere. He could not waste the years of expertise he had accumulated for vanity's sake.
Still, he thought wistfully, it might almost be worth the risk.
Yussuf had reported in with his usual diffidence. Yaqub had written with his usual effusiveness, repeating that his life had had no meaning until Isa came into it. Akil distrusted such fulsomeness, but Yaqub had thus far proved trustworthy. If Yaqub survived the operation-extremely unlikely, in Akil's opinion-a more permanent place might be found for him. His would be a growing organization, after all.
A tentative hand touched his shoulder. "Mr. Sadat, what are you doing?"
He turned his head and saw Zahirah standing behind him, an expression of confusion on her pretty face.
WASHINGTON, D.C.
The familiar tapping of slender heels preceded the equally familiar tap at his door. "Mr. Chisum?" Melanie's artfully tousled blond head came into view. "Mr. Labi on line one. He says it's urgent."
After Omar Khalid was exiled to Tajikistan, Ahmed Labi was one of the few remaining agents fluent in Farsi and Arabic they had managed to keep in D.C, as opposed to the wholesale shipment of anyone with even a passing knowledge of any Middle Eastern language directly to Baghdad. Ahmed also had a working knowledge of Urdu, useful in Pakistan. "Ahmed, this is Patrick. What's up?"
Ahmed's voice was tense. "I've got something. I think you should come down here."
"On my way." Patrick hung up, put on his suit jacket, straightened his
tie, and shot out his cuffs. He marched out into the outer office. "Melanie, you really must start using the intercom to let me know when I have a call."
She said, perfectly calmly, "But I find out so much more when I can hear even a part of your conversations, sir."
His mouth opened, and closed again.
She held her serious expression for as long as she could, before it dissolved in a loud, joyous belly laugh. He stared, transfixed, as her creamy skin flushed; the line of her throat revealed when her head fell back, those lovely breasts outlined by the clinging blue of her sweater set. For a woman getting on forty, she had a lovely figure. He wondered how it would hold up divested of angora wool.
He pulled himself together. Company ink, he reminded himself firmly, and marched out into the corridor with the spine of a soldier on parade. He'd reprimand her later. Not anything permanent, heavens no, just a verbal warning, a hint toward the desirability of discretion in the workplace.
Oh, how he hoped she wasn't sleeping with Kallendorf.
Two floors down he was sitting across from Ahmed, examining a sheaf of papers, printouts of emails and web searches. "They just popped up two days ago," he said, sounding almost as dazed as he looked. "It was like magic. One of the geeks was trying out a new search algorithm, looking for names and pseudonyms of people on the list. We totally lucked out."
Patrick couldn't believe his eyes. "You're sure this is Yaqub Sadiq?"
In answer Ahmed tossed a photo across the desk. "We tracked his IP address to an apartment in Toronto. That's a photo we took of him on the street outside. And you're gonna love this."
He tossed another photograph to Patrick, and grinned. "That's his German passport photo."
Patrick still couldn't believe it. "He actually used his own name?"
Ahmed sobered. "If what you've learned is true, if Isa is operating independently of bin Laden, then he has to be recruiting from outside the organization. Al Qaeda has a pretty discriminatory recruitment process. Fanatics get in. Dummies don't. If it's like you said, Isa doesn't have that discretionary process to draw on anymore."
Patrick still couldn't believe it. "Which means he's hiring morons?" Ahmed grinned, white teeth gleaming beneath a flourishing black mustache. "Let us say rather that young Yaqub Sadiq is very probably not the sharpest tack in the box." He stood up, cramming a wad of paper into his jacket pocket. "Wanna go for a ride?"
15
TORONTO
Until now, his decision to join with Isa had seemed the single most romantic action of his life, a joyous response to a call to adventure. He cast off the shackles of home and family with a light heart-an added benefit was an escape from the increasing suspicions of Janan's husband-and followed where Isa led, first to England where he had thoroughly enjoyed seeking out and recruiting the young men who now looked to him and Yussuf like prophets, then to the camp in British Columbia where he had found the training much less amusing, and now to Toronto, where, using the identity papers their forger had prepared, he had found a job as a barrista in a Starbucks and rented a room in a boarding house.
After a month he had moved in with Brittany, the blond night baker who provided the coffee shop's pastries. She was starry-eyed in love with him, and he with her, too, of course, that went without saying. He was particularly in love with her working nights, as it left her side of the bed free for a rotating cast of young women picked up across the espresso bar, attracted to his dark and (he fancied) dangerous good looks. He played fair, he told them firmly that his heart belonged to Brittany, but he did not discourage them from trying to change his mind.
He'd never suffered from a lack of feminine attention, even in the more strict Muslim community of Düsseldorf in which he was raised. In England his eyes had been opened to the possibilities for casual sex in Western culture, but in Toronto he felt as if he'd discovered a gold mine.
No, he'd never been more content, and he was grateful from the bottom of his heart to Isa for plucking him out of a world where the consequences for sex absent marriage could place one's life in literal peril. He was mindful of the debt he owed; he checked his email religiously, following Isa's diversionary instructions to the letter. He'd written them down, strictly against orders, but they were so complicated he was afraid he would forget them, and he'd taped the scrap of paper to the bottom of a drawer in Brittany 's jewelry box where, amid a tumble of rhinestones and sterling silver, it would surely never be found.
Six months later he felt increasingly at home in the West, and it was a rude shock when he checked his email one evening and found the command to move on waiting for him. He went online and bought the ticket to Mexico City, and made reservations for the second flight, but the adventure seemed to have leeched out of his relationship with Isa. When Brittany came home the next morning, fragrant with yeast and sweat, and launched herself at him with her usual lusty joy, he made love to her with a single-minded ferocity that at first surprised her and then subsumed her. "Wow," she said after she caught her breath. "Where'd that come from?"
"I love you," he said, raising his head. "Let's get married."
She looked surprised and pleased. She was also a little puzzled. "Why now?"
He bent his head to kiss her. "I can't wait any longer."
"I didn't know we'd been waiting," she said.
He made love to her again without answering, and that afternoon they dressed and drove to Niagara and were married. It was a nondenominational service and therefore unrecognized in his religion, but he was nevertheless enchanted with the whole notion of Brittany forsaking all others but him so long as they both should live. They drove home and celebrated in bed, and she was late for work that night.
Naked, he got up and went to Brittany 's computer and logged on to the Internet from home, something else Isa had strictly forbidden. He checked his email. Nothing more from Isa, but a message from Yussuf, a discreet reminder to bring currency, as all of their transactions after they bought their airplane tickets would be in cash.
On impulse he emailed Yussuf back (also forbidden) to the same email address (again, forbidden). Suppose they didn't go?