Nobody said anything while security went through the car and our scant luggage. The official told us he’d check in our only piece of baggage — the Odessa acquired duffel bag. Everything else, which wasn’t much, we carried with us. It was a stroke of good luck that I didn’t have to explain the lead lined Pelican case to the officers in the terminal with the turkey-roaster x-ray scanners. A Soviet era jeep, sporting yellow flashing lights on a plywood sign that said “FOLLOW ME,” waited on the flight operations side of the fence for us. Security waved us through, and the FOLLOW ME jeep led us along a circuitous path over the cracked and weathered tarmac to the Airbus A340.
The hotel driver got out of the car, leaving the official, Anna and me, in the limo. I watched him strike up a conversation with the jeep driver in front of the car. This was to be an official meeting, CIS style. The airline official looked at our passports, examining them closely. “How is it you are already checked out of Ukraine?” He examined the exit stamp in my passport from the day before. Then he answered his own question, “But of course, you are a professional.”
I let that go, saying nothing as he scrutinized Anna’s passport, holding pages up to the sunlight to look for watermarks and embedded anti-counterfeit measures. Anna sat ramrod straight. Satisfied the passport was real, the official politely excused the wait, pulled out his phone and, reading from Anna’s passport, spoke to someone in an Arabic language. He nodded a few times, ended the call and announced, “The passport will get you into Turkey.”
We both breathed a sigh of relief.
“Now about payment.” He pocketed the phone and pulled a beautifully handwritten invoice from his breast pocket. “You may pay cash if you wish or by credit card.”
“Credit card? Really?” I asked.
“Why not? The airline accepts credit cards. We are not doing anything illegal. Perhaps your employer would be paying. Would it not be easier to use a credit card or wire transfer than to carry thousands of dollars in cash?” The official sounded a little hurt.
“It’s cash, six-hundred American twenties.” I sighed.
“As you can see on your invoice, four thousand dollars is to be held in trust pending your client’s successful entry into Turkey. If you wish, and since this passport appears valid, I can authorize a payment from your credit card that would only be processed in the unfortunate circumstance Turkey denies entry.”
I accepted his generous offer, hanging on to the remaining four thousand. It was the last of my savings and the inheritance from my father. At the bottom of the mobile stairs, I shook hands with the hotel driver, giving him the rest of my Ukrainian cash and asking him to share it with the kitchen staff. He agreed and gave Anna an awkward hug. The airline official escorted us to our seats in first class, had a few words with the pilots and left the plane. The stairs were moved back to an entrance closer to the wing and the tractor-pulled trolley cars showed up with the rest of the passengers.
First class was all ours. Provided one kept her face back from the windows, they provided a particularly discrete way of watching the passenger assembly area at the bottom of the stairs. “Anna, I’d like you to keep an eye on those people boarding the plane. We need to know if there’s anyone you recognize.”
“Okay, why?”
“Because I’ve come to realize you just can’t be too careful.”
I didn’t know where we would end up in Turkey or what we’d be doing there. I sure as hell didn’t know what would happen when the four grand ran dry. Convincing interested Western parties Anna was a valuable asset, was no longer a priority. But still, I stuck to my guns, what counted now was that I wasn’t leaving her to the circling jackals.
I sat back. An airliner seat felt good — first class or otherwise. We were finally getting out of the CIS, going somewhere, moving forward, taking action, and maybe, just maybe, and with a bit of luck, getting out from under The Skater.
TWENTY-ONE
In Istanbul we were the first passengers off the plane. We’d been left entirely alone during the short flight over the Black Sea. An airline agent whisked us up a deserted flyway and through immigration without incident.
We’d done it! The CIS was behind us.
The pressure was off, or so it seemed to my subconscious mind. There’s a cruel metabolic trick the autonomic nervous system plays on migraine sufferers: initiate an attack as the tension eases. Letting down your guard for one second can be crippling. It’s subconscious payback for getting wound up in the first place. I was well on my way with several auras, the warning signs, already flashing in my visual field. In a matter of minutes I’d have a headache with enough kick to have me doubled over in pain and nauseous.
I stopped, took a deep breath and released it slowing, counting to five.
“Jess?”
Blink, blink, blink. Damn, the auras were spreading.
“I need a dark, quiet place! Bar, lounge, restaurant, somewhere dark — now! I’m getting a migraine.”
“A kak zhe chemodan? — What about the bag?” Anna, awestruck by the swirling multiethnic conglomerate of humanity that makes up the Istanbul hub, clung to my elbow.
“Let’s stick with English. Russian’s too conspicuous.” This time I blinked hard enough to evoke tears. No dice. The auras, getting bigger, brought smashed Christmas lights to mind. “Leave the bag. I’m in big trouble if we don’t find someplace quiet right now.” My vision was already seriously compromised. My brain was processing missing data from a visual cortex starved of oxygen by filling in the blanks with shattered stained glass. In minutes, arteries that had gone into spasm would dilate in a crippling overreaction, leaving me with a headache from hell. I had found through experience that using meditation to relax the arteries before they did so on their own was the only way to lessen the oncoming avalanche of pain.
The sprawling Istanbul airport was under renovation, at least, where we were. Then again, big airports are always being taken apart and put back together. The corridors were an endless maze of plywood and construction debris. Workers drilling into concrete, halogen lamps and chaotic activity wasn’t doing me any good. Finally, a cordoned off, “Closed for renovation,” waiting area provided refuge. I lay flat on my back, between rows of plastic bucket seats designed to prevent sleeping. Then, with gloves over my eyes, I forced myself to relax. I imagined myself in a rowboat, drifting on the glassy surface of Pyramid Lake in Jasper, Alberta. Deep breaths, and I could smell the mountain air, the evergreens, and the heat of a summer’s afternoon not quite at its zenith.
Something like fifteen minutes later, I opened my eyes to confront Anna’s visage inches from mine. “Pssst, don’t get up.” She had taken the gloves from my eyes and had a finger to her lips. “I’ve seen my mother.”
The auras were gone, but despite my frantic meditation the headache was brutal. “You have got to be kidding!” I hissed.
“No, I am not kidding. I have seen her walking down the corridor.”
I sat up. Taiko drummers hammered at my temples. We weren’t alone in the cordoned off waiting area by that time. Several travelers had randomly distributed themselves among the rows of plastic seats. None of them looked Slavic. “Did she see you?”
“I don’t think so. She did not turn her head toward here.”
“This really is not good.” I peered between rows of seats, saw nothing but scattered groups of arriving passengers. “Was she alone?”