Wild Storm (20 page)

“You’re pretty geeked on this Egypt stuff, aren’t you?”

She stopped herself, then smiled. “Yeah, I really am.”

“How did that happen to a girl from…I’m guessing Missouri?”

“Kansas, actually. But you’re on the right track. I grew up in this little farming town in Kansas where nothing ever happened and all anyone ever talked about was the weather, how the weather compared to what it had been in the past, and what that might mean for the corn crop. Oh, that and college basketball.”

She laughed at herself and continued, scanning the walls as she spoke. “When I was seven, my parents took me to this traveling exhibition of Egyptian treasures that had somehow meandered its way to a museum in Kansas City. That was the first time I had ever really been confronted with the idea that there were these people who had lived a very long time ago in a very different place, that they had created this remarkable civilization, and that they had invented so many of the things we now take for granted. It seemed so exotic, so wonderful, so foreign in the best way. And it just fired my imagination.

“I started studying everything I could about it and never really stopped. Any time I had a project in school, I would find a way to make it about Egypt. I majored in archaeology with a minor in Egyptian Studies as an undergrad, then went on and got my graduate degree, then my doctorate. In some ways, the more I learn just makes me want to know that much more, and I…I’m sorry. This is really boring, isn’t it?”

“Not at all,” Storm insisted. “One of the reasons I decided to come work for i-apple was that I loved the passion people like you—artists, archaeologists, museum curators—have for their jobs. I would otherwise be a soldier of fortune, a hired gun who worked for whatever company offered the biggest paycheck. At least this way I work for people who are doing things for a higher cause.”

Even though Storm said it to maintain his cover, there were pieces of his own truth hidden within the words.

Katie turned and looked at him with two big, blue eyes. “You’re really going to help us, aren’t you?”

“I’m certainly going to try,” he said.

She hugged him with her whole body. “Thank you,” she said. “Thank you so much.”

He hugged her back, feeling the parts that had been made hard by her work and the parts that stayed soft. Her contours seemed to fit nicely into his. He didn’t really think she was a terrorist.

Which might have made her a perfect one.

CHAPTER 20

A SECURED ROOM

illiam McRae came to slowly, with the same sense of dread he had felt every morning for, what, three weeks now? Four?

He was starting to lose track. When he was first abducted, snatched by a group headed by a man with a wine stain on his face and a gun on his hip, McRae had assumed his captivity would be brief. He thought he would either be killed, or released, or his ransom would be paid.

Instead, they had drugged him, keeping him in a narcotized stupor for perhaps several days. He had the sensation of almost constant motion, like he was being moved somewhere. Sometimes the movement would stop and he would think: okay, now the end is coming. Then it would resume. He often heard an engine. He thought, perhaps, it was a generator. Maybe they were somewhere off the grid, and the engine was what supplied them their power. Or maybe this was a large vehicle of some kind. It was all so disorienting.

Once he recovered from the effects of the sedatives, they put him to work, making it clear to him that they would hurt him badly if he refused. He had not yet tested them on whether they’d carry out this threat.

It never occurred to him that his captivity might stretch this long, that he would start to get confused about the passage of time to the point where he could no longer reliably say what day of the week it was. The things that used to anchor him to time—the busy retiree’s schedule of volunteer activities, the weekly rhythms of the things he and Alida did together, the calendar in his office, and the cell phone in his pocket—had all been taken from him.

In truth, he had not been badly treated in some ways. His confines were comfortable. His bed had a pillow-top mattress and clean, fine sheets that were changed every few days. His “cell,” such as it was, was a windowless interior room, yes. But it had plush carpeting and its own en suite bathroom with a shower, sink, and toilet. It also had a small sitting area, where he took all his meals.

He was given clothes that fit him well. If he ever needed something, there was an intercom in his room. He could press the button anytime, tell the guards what he needed, and someone would fulfill the request. When he had discovered a mild allergy to one of his pillows, it had been removed, and he had received prompt medical treatment for his discomfort. He was being well fed, even overfed, by food that was delicious and nutritive.

The trade-off was that they were working him constantly. Every day after breakfast, they led him from his bedroom, across the hall and to the left, to his workshop. It was also windowless. He was kept under constant guard and made to work all day and into the evening.

After McRae had made the first laser for them, he thought he was done. He actually had stalled on the work a bit, thinking that when it was through, he was through.

Then they came back and said: build another one.

Then another.

At first, there was a part of him—the scientist in him—that was thrilled by the work. He had always theorized that given enough promethium, he could make the most powerful laser the world had ever seen. But because promethium had always been in such miniscule supply, with no hope of getting more, it remained nothing more than a theory.

Getting to put it in practice was satisfying, even as he fretted over what they might be doing with the weapons. He kept thinking they would soon run out of promethium—where
were
they getting so much from, anyhow?—and that when that happened he would get a rest.

It was just getting to be too much. He was not a young man anymore. They brought people in to help him with some of the more physical tasks, but some of it was still up to him. His hands, which had a tendency toward arthritis as it was, were getting sore. He worked each day well past the point where his fingers literally ached.

His body was just out of whack. He missed his daily jog, not only for the physical release it gave him, but also for the mental health aspect. The jog centered him, soothed him, made him feel healthy, and released all those wonderful endorphins in his bloodstream.

The absence of the jog, on the other hand, had been a disruption. He wasn’t sleeping as well at night. He was more irritable. The windowless rooms were getting to him. His body craved the fresh air and the sunlight.

More than anything, he missed Alida. He missed her companionship, her steady good cheer, her laugh, her smile. He missed the way she smelled when she came in from gardening, like soil and sweat. He missed talking to her about his work, something that had started long ago and had become an ingrained part of their marriage. He found himself pretending to have those conversations with her, almost because he couldn’t process information himself without thinking of how he’d explain it to Alida. She wasn’t just his ghostwriter. She was his muse.

Some couples take each other for granted, especially after several decades of marriage; or they treat each other shabbily, neglecting to show each other the kindness they’d extend to strangers. William and Alida McRae had never done that. It had made their relationship strong, helped their love grow—rather than wither—through the years.

Being apart from her was, without question, the worst part of the whole ordeal for him. In their entire married life, forty-five years and counting, they had never been separated for more than maybe two, at most three nights—when he went to a conference on the East Coast to present a paper. Otherwise, they were inseparable.

He worried about how she was holding up without him. He worried about the effect her distress might be having on her health. He worried she was worried.

He begged his captors to let him call her, to tell her he was still alive. They had refused. What about an e-mail, he asked? A letter? No way, they said.

All the while, they kept working him. And now he was just tired: of toiling for these men, of his aching fingers, of agonizing over what they might be doing with the weapons he was making, of missing Alida.

He rolled over in bed, much as he wished he didn’t have to. They watched him, he knew. Usually, they came in not long after he first stirred. Lately he’d taken to lying very still in the morning, milking a few extra minutes in bed. It’s just that he was an old man and couldn’t stay in the same position too long.

So he moved. And shortly thereafter, one of his captors came in. There were five of them. McRae assigned them each a Greek letter, based on where he thought each one ranked. This one was Delta.

“Good morning,” Delta said gruffly. “What do you want for breakfast?”

“Nothing,” he said, rolling back over.

Delta paused. He was younger than some of the other ones, which is why McRae had assigned him somewhat subordinate status. Like the others, he didn’t bother hiding his face, which worried McRae: it meant none of them were concerned about him getting out alive to identify them.

“Come on, Dr. McRae, you have to eat.”

“Forget it,” McRae said. “I’m done working for you people.”

The words just came out. He hadn’t much considered their consequences. The man did not respond, just left the room. He heard the door click, as it always did. His captors did not leave anything to chance. McRae wondered if he’d even know what to do if the door didn’t click. He hoped someday he’d get the chance to find out.

Three minutes later, another man came in. It was Alpha. McRae had decided he was the leader based on the deference the other men showed him and also because of his immense size. Alpha was at least six foot six and densely built, well north of three hundred pounds, most of it muscle. With blond hair and blue eyes, he looked like a modern day Viking. He was carrying a manila envelope.

“Dr. McRae, I understand we have a bit of a problem this morning.”

McRae just lay there, and said nothing. He was through. If they wanted to hurt him, fine. He wasn’t building them any more lasers.

“Very well, if that’s how it’s going to be,” Alpha said, sighing like this was nothing more than a minor inconvenience. He opened the manila envelope and began laying eight-by-ten glossy photos on the foot of the bed.

McRae didn’t look at them. They were probably just gruesome pictures of some person they had mutilated. It was the lowest level of coercion. Perhaps the real torture would start soon. But McRae was betting it wouldn’t. After all, if they damaged him, he wouldn’t be able to work for them. This was his trump card, and he was finally playing it.

Then, out of the corner of his eye, he caught a glimpse of one of the photos being laid on his bed.

It wasn’t some sick, blood-and-guts picture of some anguished prisoner.

It was Alida. Gardening.

McRae sat up, his heart pounding like a jackhammer against his rib cage.

“Nice pictures, aren’t they?” Alpha said. “Really captures the care she puts into her work.”

Alpha took out another photo. It was Alida, clutching the newspaper as she walked up the steps to their house. “I like this one, too. Action photo. And if you look very carefully, you’ll see the date of the newspaper is yesterday. So it’s very recent.”

McRae’s mouth was dry. He couldn’t find any words.

“Let me talk this out for you, Mr. McRae, in case you’re missing the point of all this. We have a man set up at your house, watching your dear Alida closely. If you refuse to work for us, we won’t harm a hair on your scrawny little head. You’re too valuable to us. We’ll just hurt Alida instead. Are we clear?”

McRae nodded.

“I’m going to need to hear a word or two, Mr. McRae. Are we clear?”

“Yes,” McRae said, hoarsely.

“Very good,” Alpha said. “Now—and this time, I suggest you answer—what would you like for breakfast?”

CHAPTER 21

WEST OF LUXOR, Egypt

hey had extracted Bouchard the mummy the night before, packing him in a crate with all the care they could to ready him for transport along with some of the other artifacts the expedition had unearthed.

Storm had kept his eyes open throughout the evening, still convinced there was more to the archaeological site than just some old bones. He was undeterred by his failure to find anything of significance. It was like the hieroglyphs on the walls: for years, no one knew what they meant; not until the other Bouchard, good ol’ Pierre-François, tripped on that stone. Then it all became clear. Sometimes, in detective work as in life, you just had to be patient and wait for a break.

In the meantime, Storm immersed himself in the role of IAPL protector. He had pressed for leaving in the middle of the night and traveling through the desert under starlight. After all, if the bandits tended to attack in the morning, why wait?

But Professor Raynes nixed the idea. There were no roads where they were traveling, and the raw desert had too many furrows and trenches that would be hard to see at night. If they got stuck in one it could be disastrous.

Plus, the camels needed their sleep. Being familiar with the complications posed by an angry camel, Storm acquiesced. They planned a predawn departure and now, here it was: the first hint of light was glowing on the horizon when Raynes gave the order to move out.

Their caravan consisted of eight camels and three twenty-foot-long cargo trucks, one of which had been specially designated to carry Bouchard. The other two were more fully packed. Storm had not personally overseen the loading. That, he figured, was best left to the professionals.

But he did exert his influence on how the caravan would be organized. He placed the trucks, which were being driven by grad students, in the middle. He and the professor rode up front on their camels. The four hired guards were split between the two side flanks. Strike and Katie Comely brought up the rear.

As long as they were in the desert, they had to move slowly up and down the dunes. Their payload was too fragile and too valuable to risk jostling it. All it would take was one bump traversed a little too quickly to result in catastrophic damage to one of the pieces.

As a result, the cargo trucks were put on a strict speed limit of five miles an hour. Even the camels had to be reined back to match that torpid pace. It was fifteen miles to the nearest blacktopped road and the relative safety of Egypt’s highway system. Once they reached it, they would be able to stable the camels and increase their speed for the remainder of the journey.

But they would not be getting there with any particular alacrity. Fifteen miles at five miles an hour. It didn’t take a mathematical wizard to know that meant three hours—three hours during which time they would be fully exposed to anyone who wanted to take a shot at them or their precious cargo.

The International Art Protection League’s unintentional stand-ins were more than ready for any outlaws who might try. Storm had assembled his CheyTac sniper rifle and wore it strapped across his back. Strike was, likewise, ready with her M16.

Just with those two weapons—and their proficiency at using them—they could repel a substantial force.

“So, Mr. Talbot, how is it you came to work for the International Art Protection League?” Raynes asked as they got under way.

“Friend of a friend recommended me. They pretty much hired me on the spot,” Storm lied smoothly.

“There was no interview process?

“I guess I’ve got that useful look about me,” Storm said.

Antony punctuated Storm’s boast with a loud belch. The camel had been his usual cantankerous self that morning. But at least he hadn’t tried to mate with anyone.

“And how long have you been working there, Mr. Talbot?” the professor asked.

“About two years now. And, please, call me Terry.”

“Two years. Impressive,” Raynes said. “Have you ever bumped across a man named Ramon Russo there?”

Storm did not allow even the faintest wrinkle to appear on his face. With no access to the Internet, he had been unable to do any research on the International Art Protection League. But he had faked his way through many such conversations during his years undercover. The trick was to answer the question without answering it. Politicians called it a “pivot,” and had usually perfected it by the time they finished their first campaign. Spies were no less masterful at it.

“You know, every time I hear the name Ramon Russo I think of the guy who played the part of the jock in
2 Cool for School
back in the nineties,” Storm said. “Did you ever watch that show?”

“I can’t say as I did.”

“Oh, it was so funny. Every time this one character saw a pretty girl he’d say, ‘Hubba-hubba.’ So when you say the name Ramon Russo it makes me think, ‘Hubba-hubba.
’
”

Storm let out a belly laugh and added, “Classic. Just classic. Hubba-hubba! Hey, you want to quote movie lines? It’s a great way to pass the time. I’ll say the line. You say the movie. Okay, here goes: ‘Over? Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? Nothing’s over until we say it is!’ Okay, what’s the movie? Come on, that’s an easy one.”

Storm caught Raynes looking at him with utter disdain and kept it going for the next hour, seldom letting the man cut in as he ran through the entire canon of
Animal House
,
Caddyshack
,
Vacation
,
and other American film classics.

He was just getting into
My Cousin Vinny
when he saw a dust cloud rising in the distance. He cut off his version of Joe Pesci’s rant about the biological clock to say, “Looks like we’ve got company.”

STORM DIRECTED THE CARAVAN TO CLIMB
to the top of a dune, where it would have the greatest visual and tactical advantage, then called for it to halt. He scrambled down off Antony, climbed to the top of one of the cargo truck’s cabs, unslung the CheyTac, and began setting up its legs. Given the cowardice of Raynes’s security forces, these bandits—assuming it was the same ones—had never encountered the slightest resistance. They had just stolen whatever they wanted, laughing the whole way. Things were about to change.

This was not, in the truest sense, his fight. It was surely not why he had come into the desert in the first place. But the basic framework of this confrontation offended his sense of decency. It was the strong picking on the weak. And to a man like Derrick Storm, that was always a fight worth having.

“What are you doing?” Raynes asked.

“In my experience, bullies are pretty much the same, the world over,” Storm replied, continuing his preparations. “Whether it’s the playground back home in America or the Sahara Desert, you need to punch them in the mouth before they take you seriously.”

The bandits continued their approach. Storm almost thought of himself like a chemist running assays to identify an unknown element. This particular test involved making one of the bandit’s heads explode like a target practice watermelon. Then he’d really see what these assailants were made of.

He was a good enough shot that, even with the raiding party closing in at fifty miles an hour, he was reasonably sure he could drop one of them at five hundred yards. He could then retarget and take out another one by the time they were within three hundred yards.

Then see how brave they were.

With his rifle set, Storm began a deep breathing exercise that would slow his heart rate. It was one of the first things an elite sniper learned: you had to pull the trigger in between beats. The slower your heart, the more of a window you had to squeeze off a shot.

Storm quickly got himself down to where he was going at least a second between beats. He decided his first target would be in the lead car, the one that was at the point of the rough V shape in which the bandits were approaching.

Storm drew a bead on the man’s head. It was a harder shot than going for center mass, yes. But it would also have a more dramatic effect—head shots being bloodier, more spectacular, and less unambiguous. A guy slumping over from being hit in the chest could have just fallen down. It scared no one. The same guy losing a chunk of brain matter before he dropped tended to take his comrades’ swagger away in a hurry.

There was no wind, which helped. Storm did some quick, rough math, judging how far the bullet would drop over the course of those five hundred yards. He set the crosshairs of his scope just above the man’s head, knowing gravity would bring the bullet down to hit him square between the eyes. He put his finger on the trigger, felt his heart. It was a rhythm thing. Storm always liked to pull the trigger after the third beat.
Th
ump
, pause,
thump
, pause,
thump…

“Wait! Don’t shoot!” Raynes shouted.

“Why not?” Storm asked, without moving himself.

“Because I had a suspicion this would happen,” he said. “I had the workers replace all of the valuable finds with garbage.”

“Including Bouchard?”

“Especially Bouchard. That’s actually a box of sand in that truck. There’s nothing of value worth protecting. Let’s just give it to them. We’ll get Bouchard out another way.”

Storm lifted his head from his gun. The bandits were getting closer. Four hundred yards now. Whatever advantage Storm had being able to pick them off at a distance wasn’t going to last. According to Katie, the bandits had AK-47s. It was a weapon that grew vastly more effective at shorter range.

“I don’t care what’s in those trucks,” Storm said. “We have to send them a message.”

Storm moved his eye back to his scope.

“No! With all due respect, Terry, we are an archaeological expedition here to venerate this country’s great history, not a bunch of outlaws ourselves. We are here as guests of the Supreme Council of Antiquities. Part of the agreement we sign with the Supreme Council of Antiquities is that we will be law-abiding and peaceful. We’re not even supposed to have firearms. Please! There’s no point in shedding blood to protect a pile of sand. Let me just talk to them.”

The professor urged his camel toward the oncoming bandits. He raised his hands high in the air as the camel made a slow walk out.

“I don’t like this,” Storm said to Strike, who had come up from the rear on Cleopatra, with Katie trailing not far behind.

“This isn’t your party, Storm,” she said in a hush. “And, remember, we’re not really here to protect anyone’s art. Would you at least
try
to keep a low profile and not go shooting up the citizenry? If Doctor Dolittle thinks he can talk to the animals, let him try.”

Raynes and the raiders came to a stop about fifty yards away. There were four enemy pickup trucks with seven armed assailants standing in the backs of the flatbeds. The professor kept his hands in the air and began chattering in Arabic with the man who appeared to be the head bandit. The conversation was, to say the least, tense in tone and body language.

But then Storm began dialing in on what was actually being said.

“Start shouting at me, point the gun at me, and sound really angry,” the professor said in smooth, easy Arabic, never realizing that the boob who was just quoting Ferris Bueller was, in fact, quite fluent in the language.

The lead bandit, a tall man with a prominent nose, complied with the professor’s instructions, lifting the muzzle of his gun and shouting something about how the professor had better stop playing games, saying it loud enough that everyone could hear it.

“Very good,” the professor said calmly. “Now take a swing at me with the butt of your rifle. But for God’s sake, Ahmed, would you miss this time? It hurt like hell last time.”

The lead bandit—whose name was, apparently, Ahmed—unleashed another angry burst of words, punctuating it by swinging his rifle like an axe, coming within two inches of his head.

Strike, who also spoke Arabic, turned to Storm and asked, “Are you getting this?”

Storm nodded. He wanted to see how it would unfold. He trained his ears back toward the distant conversation.

“Okay, thank you,” the professor said, his hands still raised. “Now, I’m going to give it to you for the same price as last time, but next time the price is going up, understand?”

“We’ll see about that,” Ahmed replied. “Let’s just worry about this time.”

“Very well. But we’ll have to talk about next time,” the professor said. “In the meantime, what you’ve come for is in the second truck. You’re going to have to make a show of taking it forcefully, of course. You might want to be particularly careful of the big guy on top of the cab of the truck there. Keep a gun trained on him in case he tries anything. Shoot him if you want to. But otherwise you’ll find everything wrapped real nicely for you.”

Ahmed said something Storm couldn’t quite make out—his accent was thicker than the professor’s. But, at this point, Storm didn’t need to hear more.

“Katie, I’ve got bad news for you,” Storm said. “What you’re seeing isn’t a stickup. It’s more like a negotiation. Professor Raynes has been selling you out.”

“What?” Katie said.

“He and the bandits are in cahoots. I’m sorry.”

Katie was, at first, too stunned to form a full sentence. Instead, she sputtered, “What do you…He’s…But that’s not…”

“Katie, who owns the stuff you guys dig up?” Strike asked.

“Well, ultimately, the Egyptian people,” Katie answered. “That’s part of the agreement we sign with the Supreme Council of Antiquities.”

“That’s why he’s selling you out,” Strike said. “He doesn’t see a dime if these pieces end up in a museum somewhere, but I bet these bandits are giving him a nice percentage of what they get for this stuff on the black market.”

“So what are we supposed to do?” Katie asked.

Storm didn’t answer. He had already resumed his position in front of the CheyTac, where he began counting heartbeats.

HE DID NOT AIM FOR HEADS.

He aimed for shoulders. Right shoulders, in particular. Storm knew the left hand was seen as unsanitary in Islamic culture. He was therefore betting all seven of the armed men in front of him shot with their right.