27
YOU THINK SHE’S STILL ALIVE,” I said.
“I have to hope—if they wanted her dead, they would have exploded the bomb while she carried it. This video is leverage against me.”
“Why not call the police now? They haven’t returned her.”
“And I would tell them what? That she has been kidnapped, but that she planted a bomb that killed people? If I go to the police, the kidnappers will release that video, and that will be the end of my business.” He wiped a hand across his brow. “I do a great deal of business with NATO governments, with the United States, with Russia. My daughter as a bomber? It would destroy everything I’ve built.”
“People would understand that she was brainwashed. Think of Patty Hearst,” I said.
Zaid’s voice was iron. “Patty Hearst was convicted, Mr. Capra. The world did not see her then as a victim: it saw her as a good girl turned anarchist and bank robber. The world is an even less forgiving place now. There will be enough doubt to undo my entire business. Even the mere suggestion that my daughter could be a bomber would destroy my company.” He closed his eyes. “My company gained billions in contracts when Western governments wanted to show they held no bias against Muslim-run firms. You see the trap they have set for me? I cannot go to the police. I dare not defy their demands.”
“Maybe this isn’t about Yasmin, or the ransoms. Maybe they want to bring you down.”
“Then they would release the video now and destroy Bahjat,” Mila said quietly. “But they haven’t. They’re using Bahjat’s hope against him.”
I glanced at Mila. “So you want me to find and rescue Yasmin.”
Zaid’s stare was steel. “Oh, more than that. I want you to find these people who took her… and kill them.”
“Kill them?”
“Kill her kidnappers. I don’t care if there are only two or two dozen. No one who could tie her to this act can live to indict her name,” Zaid said. “If she is rescued, and any of them survive, they could release the tape in revenge.”
But I needed the scarred man alive to answer my questions. “If I get Yasmin out, surely that is the primary goal.”
“Of course. But all of them must be dead. That is nonnegotiable.”
“You’re afraid once she’s rescued that the kidnappers might come after you?”
“Yasmin has seen their faces. They won’t let her go. Ever.” He looked at me, a long measured stare, and then he looked at Mila. “You said he could rescue Yasmin. I am not sure.”
“I don’t rush in like a fool, Mr. Zaid. This is not a suicide mission, especially since you want to be sure no one escapes your wrath.”
He raised an eyebrow at the dryness of my tone.
“Bahjat,” Mila said quietly. “Let Sam do what Sam does.”
“I would like to ask you both a question. Have you heard the term Novem Soles? Or Nine Suns? Does it mean anything to either of you?”
Both of them shook their heads.
“I would like to know how you propose to take action,” Zaid said.
“You don’t need to know. It’s better you don’t.”
He swallowed. “I want to be sure Yasmin is safe…”
I sighed. “Mr. Zaid. Yasmin may not even be in Amsterdam anymore. In which case I’ve got to find where she’s gone. I have no leads to follow right now. And if her face is on the cameras in the train station, and the Dutch forensics teams figure out she planted the bomb, then the police are going to be looking for her. We’re on a deadline. I am not spending my time asking your approval or permission.”
“It is just… I feel I failed her. I failed to protect her.” The words came from his mouth as though pulled by force. He was a man used to iron control of situations, and I guessed his helplessness ate at him.
I leaned forward. “I know what you’re going through. I know what it is to be missing a loved one. I will get your daughter back for you.”
Bahjat Zaid looked at me and then he smiled: an awful, stressed smile that held no joy. Like a dog showing its teeth. “If you fail, or you take an action that results in Yasmin’s death, there will be consequences, Mr. Capra.”
He was probably good at handling contracts and subordinates and accounts. I was none of those things. “Don’t threaten me, Mr. Zaid. I so easily crumble under pressure.”
He closed his mouth and his stare turned to a glare.
“I need all the information you have on your daughter and the kidnappers.”
He handed me the laptop. “It’s all there.”
“Thank you.” I studied his drawn face, knowing he had just handed me every hope of finding his daughter. “Why you?”
“Pardon me?”
“Why did they target you?”
He blinked, once, twice, glancing at Mila. “My money. Why else?”
“If money was all they wanted, then they could have asked for more. They want more. I’m wondering what it is you have that they want.”
“I expect,” he said, “being savages who are intent on violence, they could ask for arms, for military equipment.”
“They haven’t?”
“No.” He folded his hands on the table.
“What kind of research did Yasmin do?”
“It is classified, and not pertinent to this discussion. And nothing she is working on relates to current weapons systems. I doubt they know or care that she is a researcher. They have shown no interest in her work to me.”
“What about future systems?”
“Yes, like ten years down the line. This is not about her research, Mr. Capra. This is about her belonging to me. That is why they took her.”
I stood.
“I was told you were one of a handful of people in the world who could do this incredible work,” Zaid said. “Yasmin is all that matters.”
I made no promises to him. We shook hands, awkwardly, and Mila walked him downstairs.
I opened up the laptop. Files on Yasmin’s life, photos, listings of friends in London and Budapest and the United States. The e-mails and the video files he’d received. An electronic portfolio of a kidnapping, and I hadn’t an idea where to start looking for her here in Amsterdam.
Mila came back with two steaming coffees and set them down on the small table. “You don’t like him.”
“He strikes me as the worst kind of control-freak parent. And I don’t think he’s telling us the whole truth,” I said. “Same as we’re not telling him.”
“Pardon?”
“They produce this video to rip his guts out and don’t demand a ransom? Bull. They’ve asked him for something and he’s not telling us. He’s just hoping I can find them and kill them before he has to deliver.”
“They simply may not have asked for ransom yet.”
“You didn’t tell him I had a personal stake against the scarred man.”
“He might be concerned you have two agendas. He only cares about Yasmin. Not about your wife.”
“I can’t decide if he’s more worried about Yasmin or his reputation.” I drank some coffee. “How do you know Zaid?”
“Does that matter? I know him and I want to help him. And I want to help you. Tell me why you asked about the name Novem Soles.”
I explained. She leaned back in her chair. “It cannot be a coincidence. The CIA’s interest in this term and the tattoo. There are groups that mark their members.”
I studied the photos. I tapped the scarred man’s face. “There has to be a history on this guy. He’s somebody somewhere.”
“I have access to government databases around the world,” Mila said, “and we’ve found nothing since that photo arrived. It’s like he’s been… erased.”
She claimed access that even people inside governments did not have. “You can work all sorts of magic. You own this bar, too?”
“My employer does.”
“I like this bar a lot,” I said. “It’s nice.”
“When all this is done, then you and I shall have a drink together. Not before.”
“I’m going to get to work now,” I said. The scarred man was within a few miles of me if he was still in Amsterdam; it is an amazingly compact city. Which meant, just maybe, I was far closer to Lucy and my son than I had ever hoped before.
Hang tight, babe, I thought. I’m coming to get you.