Spy for Hire (9 page)

“Ah, yeah.” Decker wasn’t about to sandbag Mark, not after all Mark had done for him, but he didn’t see any point in telling Holtz that. “Anyway, you’ll let me know about the flight?”

“I’ll put in a call to the air base, see what I can do.”

14

Daria called Mark, and when he didn’t pick up, left a message for him about the Bahrain connection.

Then she loaded up another
Captain Karim
video for Muhammad. Halfway through it, the boy’s eyes began to droop, so she took the seat cushions off the couch and made a sleeping area for him in the bedroom—on the floor, because she worried he might fall off the bed.

She let him watch the rest of the
Captain Karim
video on his new bed, rubbing his back as he sucked on his pacifier. By the end of the show, Muhammad’s eyes had closed. She looked at him for a moment, marveling at his smooth skin, his lips pursed so sweetly around the pacifier that it almost made her physically ache to look at him. His black hair curled around a tiny, perfectly formed ear, and his shallow, steady breathing was as beautiful a sound as she’d heard in this world.

What happened to you, Muhammad?

One thing was certain, she wouldn’t tolerate seeing this child thrown back to the wolves.

She sat with him for a few more minutes, until she was sure he was fast asleep, and then walked to the living room and sat down on the cushionless couch. She called a potential benefactor she was supposed to meet in Almaty the next day and asked to postpone that meeting until a week from now. A flight to Tashkent, Uzbekistan, that she’d booked for two days from now, she canceled altogether.

And then she closed her eyes. God, she was tired. This pace was killing her. If her period wasn’t just late, then she had to start taking better care of herself, and soon.

Her mind swirled as she started worrying about child care, and preschools, and the lousy health care system in Kyrgyzstan, and how she was going to swing it all…

Four hard, sharp raps jolted Daria out of her sleep. Someone was knocking on the front door.

Her instincts told her that it wasn’t just a neighbor coming to ask for a cup of sugar, that it was some sort of law enforcement, or—

They were here for Muhammad. She couldn’t let them inside.

Daria stood up, took a half second to come up with a plan, then raced silently into the bedroom. Muhammad was still fast asleep. She gently closed the bedroom door just as four more loud knocks sounded.

On her way to the balcony off the kitchen, Daria grabbed her iPod and headset from the living room coffee table. As she eased open the door to the balcony, she brought up the last call she’d made, pushed dial, put on the headset, and slipped the device into her back pocket.

On the left side of the balcony, an old rope had been affixed to a rusted bolt that protruded from the exterior of the building. The makeshift fire escape lay on the floor in a tidy circular coil.

Daria took the rope and tossed it over the side of the balcony just as Mark answered her call.

“God, I was afraid I’d get voice mail again. Pick Muhammad up from our condo.” She spoke quietly as she slid gracefully down the rope. “Now.” The second her feet hit the pavement, she tied a quick knot in the end of the rope.

“I can’t. Complete cluster on this end. Holtz got involved in—”

“No time. They’re here for him, I have to draw them away. I can’t take him, it’s on you.”

“Who’s they?”

“I don’t know.”

“Are you OK?”

With urgency, Daria whispered, “I’ll be fine, just pick up Muhammad!”

She tried to heave the knot, and the length of rope that was attached to it, back up to the balcony. She succeeded, but a several-foot-long loop, too high for her to reach, hung down over the side.

“OK, I’ll figure it out,” said Mark.

“Be quick about it. By the way, I left you a message—he’s from Bahrain. He says the woman he calls Anna, and who’s probably his nanny, is from there.”

Daria ended the call and ran to the stairwell entrance to her condo. As she opened the door, she heard more knocking coming from the hallway.

She climbed the creaky stairs, her footsteps heavy and loud on the oak stair treads. When she reached the second-floor landing, she turned into the hall and feigned surprise when she saw the two men—one a gangly schoolboy redhead with a razor-burn rash on his neck, the other an older man with Asian features—standing outside her door. The redhead held a crowbar in his hand and was in the process of wedging it between the doorframe and the door.

She took a wary step back. As she did so, she noted that the redhead was wearing leather shoes imprinted with the Timberland logo. Bishkek wasn’t like Baku, which had long ago been invaded by Western stores. An American, she figured. Backing away, she said in English, “What are you doing?”

“Miss Buckingham?” asked the older man. He had a long neck and straight black hair that had been parted to the side, and his hairline was slightly receding, resulting in a prominent widow’s peak. He spoke with an American accent, and carried himself like an American—head thrust forward, more overtly aggressive than most of the Chinese intelligence agents Daria had encountered.

“What do you want?”

“We need to talk to you,” he said, adding, “We’re from the US embassy here in Bishkek.”

That she believed. “You’re Agency.”

Neither man denied it.

“Why were you breaking in?” she asked.

“We knocked first. Where are you coming from?”

“That’s none of your business.”

“Your prior ties to the US government require that you cooperate with us now, Ms. Buckingham.”

That much was true, Daria allowed. Just because she’d been kicked out of the CIA didn’t mean all her obligations to the Agency had ended. Her original contract had made that clear. There were restrictions on what she could say and do that would apply for the rest of her life.

The young redhead maneuvered himself so that he was between Daria and the exit. Daria didn’t move to stop him.

“I’m fully aware of my obligations,” she said. “What does that have to do with you breaking into my home?”

“We’ve been told you have a child. Not a child of your own. An orphan.”

“And what of it?”

“The US government has an interest in this boy and believes he’s in danger. We’ve been sent to protect him.”

“By breaking into my home?”

The Asian opened his palms. “We were simply searching for the boy. As we were ordered to do.”

“He’s not here. I just returned from dropping him off with friends. And you don’t have to worry about him. He’s safe.”

“Others don’t see it that way. Listen, we don’t have much choice in the matter. We’d appreciate it if you didn’t fight us on this. All we want to do is recover the boy and bring him back to the embassy, where he’ll be safe. Can you help us?”

Daria pretended to consider the matter. “If I take you to the boy, can I go with him to the embassy? He’s young, and scared. No offense, but neither of you guys looks like the mothering type.”

“I don’t have a problem with that,” said the Asian.

It was clear the redhead didn’t get a vote.

Daria paused again, as though hesitant. “OK. I just brought him back to Balykchy.”

“
Back
to Balykchy?”

“Yeah. He was taken from an orphanage there.”

“We haven’t been briefed. Is he at this orphanage now?”

“No, I left him with friends who live near it. I wasn’t sure it was safe to bring him back to the orphanage itself. I was afraid someone might try to take him again.”

The Asian sighed. “Then let’s get going.”

Daria led the way down the staircase. When they got to the street, she began to talk rapidly about what had transpired earlier in the day, drawing the attention of the two CIA officers away from the rope dangling from her balcony.

15

After getting off the phone with Holtz, Decker took off his climbing harness, put on his hiking boots—which he’d stored in a bag near the base of the cliff—shouldered his backpack, cinched it tight, and began to jog down the trail that would eventually lead him to his Ford Explorer.

Jessica had already packed up, and was running a few steps ahead of him, stepping from rock to rock as she rapidly navigated the steep, narrow trail. Her pack was strapped tight to her back, her dirty-blond hair tied back with a blue bandanna.

She’d been a good sport about having to abort the climb, Decker thought. And supportive, without being overly doting, after he’d told her about his father.

Decker’s phone rang. The normal ring tone told him it wasn’t his mother, but he figured it might be one of his brothers.

Still jogging, he pulled out his phone and pushed Talk, wondering as he did so whether this was
the
call—one of his brothers telling him he was too late.

“Deck, it’s Mark.”

“Oh. Hey.”

“What are you doing?”

“Ah, climbing. Actually, I’m descending. Had to stop the climb, something’s come up.”

As if he hadn’t heard the bit about something coming up, Mark said, “You in country?”

“Yeah, just south of Bishkek.”

“Great. Listen, I need you buddy.”

“You know, this is kind of like a
really
bad time.”

Decker was still jogging. He kept his eyes on the trail.

“We’re talking emergency.”

“I’m hoping to catch a flight to—”

“Delay it. I’ll cover any costs for the switch. We’re talking five-alarm fire.”

“It’s not the money…”

Decker was about to tell Mark about his father, but then he stopped himself. When had Mark ever called him for help before? When had he ever used the word
emergency
?

Never.

Dammit, he thought. Mark was his friend, arguably his best friend.

Mark didn’t like to climb. Or hike. Or pound beers at the expat bars and talk about football, or do a lot of the things Decker liked to do. But Mark was a friend in the sense that he was a guy Decker had been able to rely on in the past—if Mark hadn’t bailed him out of a tight spot in Iran last spring, he’d be dead—and knew with absolute certainty he could rely on in the future.

Mark said, “I wouldn’t need you for long, I hope. Maybe for just a few hours, maybe for a day or two.”

“Damn, Mark, it’s just that…”

Mark didn’t say anything.

“OK,” said Deck. “I’ll make this work.”

What are you saying? You can’t make this work.

“Thanks. I need you to power down your phone, remove the battery, then get rid of any other electronic devices you might be carrying. Go to the place where I taught you to play narde. Take extensive SD measures before you get there. When you arrive, you’ll find a package.”

SD was short for surveillance detection. Which told Decker that Mark was mighty worried about something. “What is it?”

Tell him you can’t do this.

“Not over the phone. I can’t be sure yours is secure. You’ll know it when you see it. Just be gentle, remove it immediately from the site, hide it, and protect it. We’ll communicate through our mutual account. Check it every two hours. I’ll deliver more intel as soon as I can.”