SANCTION: A Thriller (26 page)

Ben wrapped his arm around her waist and began kicking his way toward the stern, which he estimated to be at least fifty feet away. The only sound that could be heard was the loud clapping of the sea as it lapped up against the exterior of the ship. Ben swam for some time, laboring to carry the reporter’s dead weight with the pain that thrust through his leg.

He neared the stern and slowed his pace. He moved past a set of large bronze screws and under the deck on the back of the ship. Ben inched closer to the edge and slowly broke the surface with his face.

• • •

The c
aptain listened
intently as Parviz gave him the details he had been waiting for. Parviz didn’t think the ship would sink but he also didn’t think it was a good idea to lift anchor before it was repaired. He relayed that several of the transverse frame members had been ripped apart, as well as the bilge strake below the water line. A stanchion beneath a deck beam had a new thirty degree bend in it also.

The captain grunted under his breath and got up from his chair. He would have to tell his boss in person and immediately. He exited the interior of the ship on the lower deck platform, where a Zodiac was perched and ready for deployment. The Zodiac was a ten foot long nylon inflated boat, complete with an eighty horsepower outboard motor. Two crew members watched the captain’s distressed face as they lowered him and the craft into the water below. Once in the water, the captain pulled a chord to start the engine. It took six attempts to turn the engine over and when it did, it belched out a tiny cloud of gray exhaust. It hadn’t been started in months, as the owner of the ship preferred using the helipad to travel to shore. The captain skimmed across the water toward Azraq Jiden island, leaving the wounded yacht behind.

Ben looked up
at the hulking mass of the ship’s rear flank, its pearl white skin was blazoned with the name, “Sea Wind”. Now he understood the note that had been in the guard’s pocket back in the auditorium. Two Japanese Jet Skis sat on the lower deck. They were large, each with a bench long enough to accommodate three adults. Ben eased himself up and out of the water, keeping his profile below that of the Jet Ski’s so that no one from the shore would spot him. He laid down next to the expensive toys and slid an arm under Emily. He hoisted her onto the deck, rolled her onto her back and removed her facemask. He began to see the soft tissue of her eyelids move as her eyes rolled beneath them. After nearly a minute, she opened them and stared at Ben’s hovering face. The Israeli held a single finger up to his lips.

“Shhh.”

Ben peeked his head over the seat of the Jet Ski and surveyed the shore. The men who had so eagerly emptied their magazines on Ben’s boat, now mingled about in a dense cluster of smoke and idle chatter. They obviously assumed that no one had survived the accident aboard the smaller craft.

Ben needed to get inside the ship and use the communications gear to contact Avner. Telling his superior at Mossad everything he knew about Nazari was the most important task on his list; even more important than surviving. He decided to move up the ladder on the far side of the bottom deck. He waited until the men on shore turned their back to watch as the aggravated captain beached the zodiac on the white sands of Azraq Jiden and stumbled over the top of a berm as he headed toward the private residence.

Ben left Emily on the deck behind the Jet Ski and scaled the chrome ladder, while keeping his eyes trained on the men at the beach. He got to the top of the ladder and peered over the edge. Though he saw no one, he could hear the clamor of frenzied voices. The voices were too far away and too jumbled together for Ben to make sense of them. He took one last look at the shoreline and then threw his body over the top rung of the ladder.

He landed on smooth rows of polished honey oak planks with his palms and feet. He got up and crept along the deck, keeping his head lower than the three foot wall that jutted up from the flooring until he came to the starboard side of the promenade deck. He passed by several porthole style windows and came to an open door. He leaned his back against the wall and craned his head through the door. There was a stairwell that lead to the lower promenade deck and one that lead to the upper. He was interested in the navigation deck. He took the stairs that traveled up higher into the ship and carefully rounded a corner. Urgency surged through his body as he combed the interior of the massive yacht. After ten minutes of painstakingly slow progress, Ben found the room he was looking for. It however, was not empty. One of the crewmen that worked on the bridge was leaning against a bulkhead door with a well-worn novel in his hands. He read the book while sipping from a bottle of Coca-Cola. Ben’s position on the stairs was directly in front of the man but the Iranian was too engrossed to notice the well-trained spy.

Ben looked for the radio console that serviced the ship to shore and other communications needs of the vessel. He spotted a bank of radio equipment catty corner from where the crew member was. He had no time to waste. For the moment, Nazari’s men had grown silent, seemingly satisfied with the thought that Ben had perished in the wreck. That could change at any time, especially when the debris field in the water failed to produce a body, blood or evidence.

Ben’s calf muscles squeezed tight and his body tensed as he prepared himself to pounce. Before he attacked however, the man grunted and set the novel down on a ledge below the wall of windows that provided the vessel’s pilot with a panoramic view of the ocean. One of the other crew members was calling him from beyond the bridge. He disappeared through a door on the opposite end of the wheelhouse that led to the deck on the port side of the ship.

Ben shot up the last few treads of the staircase and materialized from the shadows. The room was vacant and silent, except for the constant soft pinging of an underwater range finder on the pilot’s console.

The Israeli stepped up to the wall of radio equipment. The decks of electronic instruments hummed and glowed with digital lights and numbers. He grabbed the handset and placed it to his ear. The system was sophisticated enough to accommodate a simple version of ship to shore calling as well as its more modern successor. Ben punched in the familiar keys and placed the headset snug against his ear.

It rang several times and then a woman picked up. Ben went through the usual spiel and security verification. He waited while she patched him through. The intensity of the moment felt like someone was twisting his nerves around his body. He could hear his heart pumping in his ear, the blood sounding like a wild river in his head. Ben was still waiting when he heard the voice of the crew member that had just left. The man was returning to the wheelhouse. Ben was about to set the handset down when Avner’s voice flooded the speaker next to his ear.

“Ben, where are you?” He asked.

“No time for that. Imam Nazari is dirty. He is planning…”

The port side door swung in on its hinges and the crew member stepped through the door frame. Ben dropped the handheld mic and ran over to the bulkhead. As the Iranian crossed the threshold, Schweitzer reached for his forearm and grabbed hold. Startled, he looked up at Ben. He attempted to jerk his arm loose but Ben was stronger. The spy reared back and kicked the door into the man’s face. Ben held the arm tight and thrust his foot into the metal door a second time. A flow of blood burst from the man’s nose and his body collapsed on the floor.

Ben secured him by the bottom of his pant legs and drug him through the opening. Satisfied that he had bought himself a few minutes, he returned to the radio station.

“Nazari is not bluffing. I saw him shoot Izz al Din Kalif. Avner, Nazari has assembled everyone from Al Qaeda to Islamic Jihad here.” Ben said into the radio transmitter.

The Mossad leader was hunched over his desk in his chair, the news of Kalif’s assassination caused him to slump lower. They weren’t friends, they were enemies, Kalif being the worst kind but Avner knew that it would end up on his country’s doorstep by midnight. They would be blamed for his death and Kalif would be used as a martyr to incite Israel’s enemies to violence.

Avner cleared his throat.

“Ben, I’m sure you already know that Nazari has lifted the ceasefire. Gaza and the West Bank have exploded in a mass of chaotic violence. Earlier today, they received a shipment of advanced military vehicles and small arms.” Avner said solemnly.

“How?” Ben said in frustration. He never worried about the Palestinians or the Hamas because they were still pretty much in the dark ages, militarily speaking. But it had always been an underlying fear of his that they would one day have the means and equipment to build and mobilize an army.

“The Americans. They threatened the Prime Minister with sanctions if he tried to intervene.” Avner said, knowing Ben would take the news hard.

Ben felt his face flush red with anger. He was aware of the liberal politics of the new American President but he never thought he’d see the day when the United States would cave so easily to public pressure. He bit his tongue as he thought about the reckless actions of a man thousands of miles away from the fray. Ben never understood how men like Nazari so adeptly fooled the World when they appeared so obviously guilty to him.

“I only have preliminary Intel but there was a small contingency of American troops that accompanied the shipment. We believe they were ambushed. No survivors.” Avner said quietly.

There was silence as the senior Mossad agent fused what Ben had said about Nazari and what he had already known about the Imam together in his head. Avner feared that the cleric may have achieved the unthinkable; consolidating Arab resistance into one broad and powerful sword, while completely convincing the entire globe that he was the mythical Middle East peace maker they had always dreamed of.

“How many?” Ben asked.

There was a pause as his boss sought his mind for an answer.

“We’re not sure, maybe two hundred. My contacts in the State Department tell me that Major General Kirkland was one of the victims.” Avner replied.

“Were we there?” Ben probed, not sure if he’d get a straight answer. Men like Avner were used to stretching or elaborating on the truth to avoid giving up an angle that could be useful at a later date. But Avner had nothing to hide, besides that, if there was anybody he did trust, it was Ben Schweitzer.

“No. We haven’t been active for days.” He said.

Ben thought for a long time about the information he had just been given. The two didn’t utter a word for more than a minute. Then Ben continued with his report.

“Nazari has forcibly disbanded all of the major, and some of the not so major, terror networks. He is calling the new group ‘Ikwhan Jihad’.” Ben said. “Some sort of a throwback to Ibn Saud’s days, I think.” He said referring to history’s first Saudi King.

“Nazari is backed by somebody on high. The runway here is littered with forty million dollar jets. Not to mention the island itself. This place must rent for two million a week. I don’t know where he’s getting it all but whoever his benefactor is, there seems to be no limit to his investment in Nazari’s operation.” Ben said as he glanced out of one of the windows in the ship’s bridge. No one was coming. Surprisingly, the man on the floor hadn’t even stirred.

“Where exactly are you Ben?” Avner asked.

“Somewhere in the Arabian Sea. We came here from Nazari’s Syrian compound two days ago.” The field agent replied.

“Speaking of the Syrian’s, they’ve mobilized their military. Their President asked for full cooperation from its citizens as they began occupying every major city.” Avner said.

“For what?”

“We don’t know.” Avner finished.

Ben felt as if a mountain of pressure rested on his shoulders. He had spent his entire career keeping his country and its people safe from a wide array of enemies. In a matter of months, Imam Nazari had managed to maneuver himself into the position of being the Nation’s greatest threat and they barely knew anything about him.

Ben’s eyes were wandering around the wheelhouse when the ship’s log came into view.

“Hold on.” He said.

He let the handset dangle from its thick, corkscrew shaped cord and retrieved the record book. It was thin, leather bound, with a gold leaf inlaid on the front. The ship’s name was stenciled over the leaf in Farsi.

Ben thumbed through the volume. It began with an entry, by the executive officer, about the “Sea Winds” christening and then slowly moved to dates and times that she had entered and exited ports. The ship was new, less than five months had passed since it left dry dock. Ben flipped a couple pages and stopped when he found the XO’s last entry. The “Sea Wind” had sailed from a port in Bushehr, Iran two days before and was headed for an undisclosed location. Ben threw it on the floor and turned to face the bank of radios. The log was useless to him. He picked up the headset placed it back to his ear and waited for a minute to allow his frustration to subside.

“We need to find out who owns a ship named “Sea Wind”. It’s probably flying an Iranian flag but I just want to make sure. We may find out the name of another attendee of Nazari’s ‘Terror Summit’, perhaps even his benefactor.” Ben said into the microphone.

“I’m speaking to you from the bridge’s radio right now.”

His boss put him on hold while he gave the name to an analyst in his section.

Avner came back on the line and spoke first.

“Ben, I know we didn’t get into this business by being afraid of finding out what’s in the closet or around the next corner. But this has got me more than a little nervous.” Avner said quietly, whispering as if the details of his insecurities were classified.

“If we were just dealing with Hamas and a bloodthirsty leader, then I would hardly lose an hour of sleep. I mean…we know Hamas and they’re right here in our own backyard. We can keep a close eye on them without their ever knowing it. But this…this is much bigger than Hamas. This is shaping up to be a legitimate nightmare.”

Ben didn’t know what to say. He was feeling the same angst but he failed to see where talking about it would get them.