She was good, he had to give her that. Able to finesse the truth to try to keep some kind of an advantage. But this was his field of expertise, not hers. And given their requirements and the urgency involved, and the realities of what was quickly achievable, he knew they were far more likely to be using an unmanned surveillance drone than a satellite.
Sure enough, he soon spotted it, a tiny dot hovering silently high up in the virgin dawn sky, keeping track of his movements. It was circling at high altitude, but given that it had the wingspan of a 737, it wasn’t exactly invisible. He scowled as he stared at it, studying its trajectory. Evading it would be very tricky—even more so with a prisoner in tow.
Then he saw something he hadn’t expected. The drone entered into a long, banking maneuver before gliding away in an easterly direction, back toward the mountain. He tracked it until he couldn’t see it anymore, then scanned the rest of the sky, looking for another dot.
He didn’t see one.
Zahed smiled inwardly. The drone must have reached the limit of its loiter, and it seemed to him like they hadn’t anticipated needing a replacement to continue its mission. He stayed there for another ten minutes, at the edge of the canopy of the trees, scrutinizing the sky, making sure another drone didn’t show up. Once he was reasonably confident that there wouldn’t be one, he pulled out his cell phone and hit the call button twice, redialing the last number he had called. It was a number he had taken off Sully’s phone.
After two rings, a drowsy voice picked up.
Zahed’s tone went all gregarious. “Abdulkerim? Good morning. Ali Sharafi here. Suleyman’s client. We spoke last night?”
The man he’d called—Abdulkerim, Sully’s uncle, the expert the guide had wanted to contact when they were up by the ruins of the monastery—had clearly been asleep. After a quiet moment, Zahed’s words seemed to have registered. “Yes, good morning to you,” the man blurted into the Iranian’s ear. His voice trailed off, obviously surprised by the early call and still foggy-headed.
“I’m sorry to be calling you this early,” Zahed continued, “but our plans changed and we got here a bit earlier than expected. I was hoping we could meet sooner than agreed, perhaps in the next hour or so? You know, get an early start. Our time here is unfortunately limited, so the sooner we get going, the better, really.”
Abdulkerim cleared his throat audibly and said, “Of course, of course. It’s not a problem. Earlier will be better anyway. Less sun.”
“That’s great,” Zahed said. “We’ll see you soon. And thanks for being so accommodating.”
He took note of where and when they would meet up and ended the call, satisfied with the outcome. He approached the car and glanced through the rear windshield. He could see the silhouette of Tess’s head from behind. His mood darkened. There was something else he needed to do.
He opened the Discovery’s rear hatch, picked something out of it, and slammed it shut again. Then he went around to Tess’s door and swung it open.
“Get out,” he told her.
Tess stared at him for a beat, a look of surprise on her face, then climbed out. She stood there in front of him, in silence. He just looked at her without saying a word—then, with lightning agility, his hand flew up and struck her with a vicious, backhanded slap.
Her head twisted sideways violently under the impact and she fell to the ground. She stayed down, motionless, her head turned away, saying nothing. After a moment, she pushed herself back onto her feet and, brushing the soil off her hands, turned back to face him. Her eyes were tearful, but defiant. Her cheek was seared red, the imprint of his hand and fingers clearly visible on it.
“Don’t lie to me again,” he told her. “Understood?”
She didn’t react. He raised his hand menacingly again, ready to swing again. She didn’t flinch, but this time she nodded faintly.
He lifted up his other hand. In it was a wide canvas belt.
He held it out to her and said, “I’m going to need you to put this on.”
Chapter 34
Reilly was moving fast, as fast as his tired legs could carry him. He was finding it a bit easier, now that the steep, uneven trail down the mountain had given way to a flatter and smoother dirt road. Still, he was barely managing to stay on his feet. The nearest town, a small cluster of houses at the base of the volcano, was still half a mile away. He needed to find some kind of transportation that would give his muscles a rest if he didn’t want his body to shut down in protest at the appalling treatment it was getting. And he had to do it fast.
The drone, he knew, was long gone.
Every second counted.
He cleared a low ridge and spotted something moving a couple of hundred yards ahead. Someone, riding something. The sight gave him a small boost. As he closed in on it, Reilly saw that it was an old man sitting astride a haggard-looking horse. The scrawny animal had two huge straw baskets slung on either side of its rump and was trudging ahead lazily, oblivious to the fleet of flies that were circling it.
Reilly picked up his pace and shouted, “Hey,” waving his arms frantically. He saw the man turn his head nonchalantly, without slowing down. “Hey,” he shouted again, and again, and this time, the man pulled on the reins and the horse stopped.
“Your horse,” Reilly told him, pointing and gesturing wildly, his panting making him sound even more incoherent to the confused local. “I need your horse.”
The man’s weathered face suddenly tensed up as his eyes fell on the weapon in Reilly’s waistband. But instead of going all fearful and panicky, he started shouting at Reilly, seemingly berating him for his affront. Young or old, strong or frail, the men Reilly was encountering didn’t seem to be easily cowed. Reilly shook his head and spread his arms out calmingly, doing his best to get the man to ease back.
“Please, just listen to me. It’s not like that. I need your help, okay? I need your horse,” he told him, making all kinds of gestures that he thought could signal humility and respect.
The man was still eyeing him suspiciously, but after a moment he calmed down a touch.
Reilly remembered something and reached into an inside pocket. He pulled out his wallet.
“Here,” he told him as he fished out all the cash he had in it. It wasn’t much—but it was still more than he suspected the tired old horse was worth. He held it out to the man. “Please. Take it. Come on. Don’t make me reach for the gun.” He knew the man wouldn’t understand that last bit.
The man studied him curiously for a beat, then muttered something and relented. He climbed off the horse with surprising ease and handed Reilly the reins.
Reilly smiled at him, the gratitude on his face clearly coming through. The man’s expression softened up. Reilly looked into the baskets. They were filled with grapes.
“Here, you keep these,” he told him as he loosened the ties that held them in place and helped the old man set them down by the side of the road. He then climbed on the tattered blankets that were there in lieu of a saddle, pulled out Tess’s map, and studied it.
He thought of asking the old man to confirm his heading, but he knew the Jandarma’s backup would soon be crawling all over the mountain and he didn’t want to give them a head start. Instead, he used the sun’s position to orient himself. The road from his location to the target area Tess had marked up, somewhere called the Ihlara Valley, was a circuitous one. That would be the road the bomber would be taking. A more direct route across open terrain, as the proverbial crow would fly, was far shorter and didn’t seem to be intersected by any major obstructions such as a river or a mountain range. And given that his steed wasn’t exactly a Thoroughbred, Reilly decided that any gain in distance that needed to be covered was a gift he couldn’t turn down.