Layover in Dubai (30 page)

“I grew up with Massoud, the one from the hospital. He’s a friend of my little brother Hassan. Jean works in the building, a cameraman for French television. He shoots freelance video for us. The Belgian, Paul, is a friend of Jean’s. I think he works for Reuters.”

“I’m guessing Jean and Paul have never met your parents.”

“They’re part of the network my parents know nothing about.”

It wasn’t a boast, or a put-down. It was merely a statement of fact, a casual affirmation of her competence in having rounded up the necessary manpower for a rescue mission on short notice, as if such business was all in a day’s work. And maybe it was.

“What do we do now?” he asked.

“Wait for morning.”

“Do you have coffee? Everything’s fuzzy, but I don’t want to go back to sleep.”

“I’ll brew a pot.”

She left for a moment while he stared dumbly through the darkened window into the pre-dawn sky. He heard running water and, soon afterward, the pop and gurgle of a coffeemaker. It reminded him of his first visit to Sharaf’s house, right before her father burst in on them, scolding and disapproving. She was right. Her parents would be furious. He smiled dopily.

Laleh returned with two steaming mugs. She again sat beside him on the couch—just as close as before, he was pleased to note. It was cozy, sipping coffee with her. Or maybe the anesthetic was still working its magic.

“So what will he do to you?” Sam asked.

“My father? Punish me, I suppose. The first thing he usually tries is to demand that I quit my job. When that doesn’t work he changes my curfew for a while.”

“Even earlier than ten?”

She shrugged.

“It’s hard to blame him. Not that I won’t. But I am so different from all the girls he grew up with. You really have no idea how far he has come.”

“So you’ve said.”

“Because it’s true. And he is under a great deal of pressure in his work. Even before they threw him into prison I was worried for him.”

“He tells you about his work?”

She laughed.

“He’d never tell me, or even my mother. But I hear things. I am a night owl, like him, and sometimes when he goes into his office, very late, I am still roaming the hallways like a ghost. So I hear him on his cell phone, plotting things out.”

“You spy on him, is that what you’re saying?”

She shrugged again.

“Maybe if I didn’t have a curfew, I wouldn’t be there to listen. So in that way he is getting what he deserves. But this case, the one about your friend, I think it is part of something much larger. He has even been to the palace to talk about it.”

“About Charlie?”

“Long before that. A few months ago he went to Sheikh Mohammed’s weekly majlis and asked for a personal audience.”

“You can do that, just show up at the ruler’s weekly audience?”

“Oh, yes. Hundreds of people do. They complain about everything. The lots the government gave them. The traffic in their neighborhood. And like a fool, Sheikh Mohammed actually listens.”

“Did he listen to your father?”

“All I know is that a week later my father met with some cabinet minister, and has been chatting on the phone with him late at night ever since. It’s about other policemen, I think. Bad ones, and the criminals they’re working with. So I’ve been scared for him, and that’s how I knew to be scared for you. And, well, it’s not as if I had anything else to do this evening.”

He was flattered, even honored, by her concern. It was wonderful. In fact, between his warm feelings about Laleh and the lingering effects of the halothane, Sam had achieved a floating bliss akin to mild drunkenness, leaving his inhibitions at a minimum. As he looked intently at Laleh’s face, he knew exactly how her lips would taste, a moist blend of salt and lip gloss, soft underneath. If she had been any other young woman he would have kissed her then and there. But even in his altered state he remained aware of the distance between their ways of doing things. He never would have presumed to touch her, as he had done moments ago.

That made it all the more powerful when Laleh made the first move, by taking his hand into hers and enfolding their fingers. Her eyes told him she was aware she was crossing a chasm, with many perils below. He sensed this even as her face leaned close enough for him to smell her lipstick. The anti-Nanette, he thought. Someone I could happily be brave for.

Such thoughts made for a somewhat solemn first kiss, a little tentative, with passions held in check. The second one lasted longer and ranged further afield, stirring him at a level he was more accustomed to in these situations. She then retreated slightly, as if to take stock.

“I am afraid that the only practice I’ve had at this is from watching movies,” she said softly. “Forgive my awkwardness.”

“You’re doing wonderfully.”

He was touched by the thought of her watching movies from the end of her bed, studying a passionate scene from an American film as if it were a manual of love. And in a way, this was new for him as well. Never before had he kissed a woman who thought of him first and foremost as someone who had survived against all odds, a risk taker in a foreign land. With Laleh, he was someone altogether different from the careful young auditor.

They kissed again, the best one yet. His right hand found the open space at the bottom of her blouse at the small of her back, and he slid it up her spine. She followed suit, pressing closer, skin to skin, their sighs on identical wavelengths. Her left hand slid across his thigh, and then the telephone rang.

It was her cell. She primly disengaged and sat upright, blinking fast. She smoothed back her hair and drew a deep breath before answering.

“Hello.
Father?”
She blushed and switched to Arabic, but even through the indecipherable rush of words Sam could tell she was flustered and trying to improvise. After a minute or two she calmed down. Then she turned toward him, handing over the phone with a solemn expression.

“He wants to speak with you.”

Sam took the phone, expecting the worst. He hadn’t felt this way since he was seventeen, when he had walked shakily to the door to pick up his date for the senior prom. He cleared his throat.

“This is Keller.”

“Please assure me, Mr. Keller, that nothing improper has happened between you and my daughter.”

“Nothing improper has happened, I assure you.”

“By your standards or mine?”

“By anyone’s standards.”

“Not anyone’s, Mr. Keller. In some Muslim families she would already be a scarlet woman just by occupying the same room with you—uncovered, no less, and at this low hour of the night. It also disturbs me that you are beginning to lie almost as skillfully as my sons, especially when I have come to regard you as a decent and honest man. Perhaps I should simply stop asking questions for which I really do not want to know the answer.”

“I, uh, don’t know what to say to that.”

“To business, then. Laleh told me what happened to you at the camp. I have not fared much better. So from now on we’re going to have to operate differently. More like spies, or undercover men. We will stay low to the ground and keep our exposure to a minimum. I am not sure yet where we will be staying, but it will not be at my house. Can you handle that? Or shall I have Ali drive you to the airport and put you aboard a private jet for, say, Canada, or some other neutral location, to work things out for yourself?”

“I can handle it.”

“Very well. Meet me later this morning, then, ten o’clock at Ibn Battuta Mall. It will not be safe for you to take a taxi, so unfortunately Laleh will have to bring you, much as I hate to involve her further. Ali will bring me, and we will meet inside the mall. It is the only way I will be able to tell if one of us is being followed.”

“Won’t it be too crowded for that?”

“Obviously you have never been to Ibn Battuta Mall. Beautiful place, but no one goes there.”

“Ten o’clock, then.”

“Park near the entrance to the Egyptian pavilion. Laleh will know. Bring her phone with you and tell her to wait in the car. Call me after you have entered the mall. I will be waiting inside. And Mr. Keller?”

“Yes?”

“I would like for you and Laleh to please leave her office building now. Drive around if you have to. Even eat breakfast if you must, but only if you are seated at separate tables. Do not risk any further temptations by remaining alone in an empty office. Understood?”

“Very clearly.”

“Now if I may please speak to my daughter again.”

“Of course.”

The father-daughter conversation lasted a few moments longer. Her tone was no longer flustered, but by the time she hung up, the earlier spell between her and Sam was broken. She smoothed her clothes and cleared her throat.

“I told him you had only regained consciousness a few moments ago. I don’t think he believed me, even though he wanted to. Apparently he’s not in much better shape. He said someone had hit him on the head.”

“Where is he?”

“On the way to Ali’s house. Ali refuses to let him work until he has had more rest and something to eat. That’s why he set your appointment for ten. I’m supposed to drive you there, but he didn’t tell me where you were meeting.”

“Some mall. Ibn Battuta.”

She smiled.

“Of course. Malls are his touchstone, his home turf.”

“I’ve noticed.”

“Well, at least it’s convenient. Only a few minutes away. That leaves us plenty of time for breakfast.”

“He said we should eat at separate tables.”

“He also said that I have a new curfew. Nine o’clock. Do you see me rushing home to obey it? I am going to pay dearly for all this, so I might as well get my money’s worth. Meaning we will eat at the same table, side by side if you prefer. I know I do.”

They took the elevator to the main lobby. Sam was surprised to see that it was light outside. A few early birds were already arriving in the parking lot for lonely Saturday shifts. They stepped through glass doors into the coolness of a fine morning. The mist of a nearby sprinkler made a small rainbow in the low sunlight.

“So does this mean we just spent the night together?” he said, trying to keep the tone light.

“I’m sure that’s how my father sees it.”

“Sorry. I shouldn’t joke about it.”

“No. It’s funny, actually. Another new thing for him to get used to, poor man. But it’s not like we removed any clothing.”

“Well that’s one thing to be glad for.”

“I suppose.”

She, too, maintained a lighter tone, and as they crossed the parking lot she reached across the gap between them and quickly squeezed his hand. Just as quickly she let go, and she didn’t turn to face him, or slow down, or offer any other opening that he might have exploited for a kiss or even a sidelong hug. Demure and defiant, all at once, and very much in control. It restored his earlier good mood, and left him intrigued and aroused.

But as Sam turned to open the door he saw the stubble of the Marina district on the far horizon. Cranes were already swiveling into action. The blue helmets were too distant to spot, but he knew they were in motion as well, with a long day ahead. It was a reminder of the world he was about to reenter, a hide-and-seek frontier with no margin for error, where those who disappeared were easily forgotten. Sharaf had warned him that from here on they would have to operate like spies, trusting no one. Frowning, he checked their flanks. All clear for the moment. With a sigh, he eased into the front seat of the BMW, back on the job.

Ibn Battuta Mall looked more like a theme park than a place to shop—yet another Dubai monument to slapdash ostentation. Its vast and elaborate courtyards had been built to resemble the fourteenth-century glories of China, India, Persia, Egypt, Tunisia, and Andalusia—the onetime destinations of Ibn Battuta, the Arabic Marco Polo.

Sam pushed through the door and gazed at the painted-on skies, the massive colonnades, and the elaborate fountains. Disney or Vegas? Both, he decided. But the striking facades concealed pretty much the same retail offerings you’d find in Indianapolis—Borders, the Sunglass Hut, a twenty-one-screen multiplex, and so on.

He dialed up Sharaf on Laleh’s phone.

“Look around you,” Sharaf commanded. “Are you alone?”

“Far as I can tell. It’s like you said. Hardly anybody here.”

“Where are you now?”

“Somewhere in Tunisia.”

“I am in China, at the Starbucks. Why don’t you come and meet me. If anyone follows, I will be able to spot him.”

“See you in a minute.”

A Starbucks loomed around the next corner, but it was in Persia, situated beneath a huge dome painted in magnificent colors. It was like those splendid tiled ceilings you saw in the world’s most beautiful mosques, although the aura of holiness was somewhat diminished by a lingerie shop, its window filled with mannequins dressed in gauzy items you never would have seen on the streets of Persia, ancient or modern.

Sam forged onward through India until he finally spied the China Starbucks near a massive replica of a shipwrecked junk with a split hull and red sails. The ship appeared to have run aground by the food court.

Sharaf lurked at a table near the back, watching carefully. Sam almost didn’t recognize him at first because he was wearing gray slacks, a navy sport coat, and a button-down blue shirt, and everything was a few sizes too small. Not that Sam had room to criticize, since he was still wearing the oversized clothes borrowed from Sharaf’s son.

“Interesting place,” he remarked, taking a seat.

“Do not get comfortable. We will be heading straight back to Laleh’s car, but by a different route. I just had to make sure there was no surveillance.”

“Where’d you get the clothes?”

“They are Ali’s.”