Under Fire

  “That explains a lot.”

  “Think back: Did his move to the bolt-hole coincide with something you gave him from your group?”

  “Well, the group met once a week and I reported to Seth after each one, so it’s hard to say. He never showed much reaction to anything I gave him.” After a moment of silence, Ysabel stood up and headed down the hallway toward the bedrooms. “I’m going to have a shower.”

  Jack removed his disposable cell phone from its blister pack, powered it up, then called Gavin and gave him the new number. Five minutes later the screen blinked with a text from Gavin: THIS NUMBER SWAPPED TO YOUR OLD NUMBER. Jack punched in Seth’s number and texted: IT’S JACK. CONTACT ME AT THIS NUMBER, ASAP.

  Next he jotted a list of follow-ups on the pad:

  —Make contact with others in network. Have Gavin track.

  —Look into Dr. Pezhman Abbasi? Name, VAJA point of contact?

  —License plate, van. Place of business?

  —Translate doc from Seth’s safe.

  —Info: David Weaver. Gun serial number?

  —Who owns: Spellman/Wellesley safe house; Seth’s apartments?

  —Spellman/Wellesley. Meet again? Confront?

  Of these last two items Jack was uncertain. Digging into the ownership of the safe house would probably reveal nothing but a front, and the probing wouldn’t go unnoticed. He decided to back-burner this.

  As for another meeting with Spellman and Wellesley, if in fact his kidnappers belonged to them, a second visit to the Zafaraniyeh district safe house might land him on the tarp again. Still, wanting to know if they’d heard from Seth was exactly what a friend would do.

  And it might be worth the risk to gauge their reaction to his injured face—and to an unexpected visit.

  • • •

  AFTER TRYING UNSUCCESSFULLY to leave Ysabel at her apartment, Jack gave in and they took her second car, a dark blue Range Rover, to a nearby men’s clothing store and Jack bought a few changes of clothing—khakis, button-down shirts, and a windbreaker—before heading to the Zafaraniyeh. Ysabel parked three blocks away from Wellesley’s apartment, under a blooming linden tree.

  Jack patted his side pocket and felt the reassuring heft of the nine-millimeter, then climbed out and shut the door.

  “Remember,” Ysabel said through the open side window, “one call and I’ll be there.”

  “Another drive-by strafing?”

  “I have my methods.”

  In a short eight hours Jack had learned that Ysabel Kashani was beautiful, smart, independent, and resourceful. As allies went, he couldn’t have hoped for more. Too good to be true? he wondered. If Ysabel wasn’t what she seemed, he hoped he would find out sooner rather than later.

  “Give me thirty minutes, then start calling. If I don’t answer, call this number”—Ysabel powered up her phone and Jack recited Gavin Biery’s cell-phone number—“and tell him everything.”

  “Starting with where you are.”

  “Right.”

  “Good luck.”

  • • •

  JACK WALKED the three blocks to Wellesley’s apartment building and pressed the call button for the correct apartment. Wellesley answered: “Yes?”

  “Jack Ryan.”

  “Come up.”

  The door buzzed and Jack went through. When the elevator doors parted on the seventh floor, Wellesley was waiting. He led Jack into the apartment and offered him tea, which Jack declined. They sat down in the seating area before the windows. Spellman was nowhere in sight.

  “Where’s Matt?”

  “Elsewhere. Good heavens, Jack, what on earth happened to your face?”

  Wellesley’s surprise seemed genuine enough. Which meant nothing.

  They were on a first-name basis now, Jack noted. He took a moment to gather his thoughts. What he was about to say might permanently change the game. Whether he answered Wellesley’s question truthfully or with a lie, the SIS man’s reaction might tell Jack much. He decided on the former; it was the best way, he hoped, to maintain his babe-in-the-woods status with Wellesley and Spellman.

  “Someone grabbed me last night. There were a couple of them.”

  Wellesley leaned forward. “What? Where?”

  “Seth’s apartment. Not the Pardis condo. A second one.”

  “Go on.”

  “I woke up in a van. I managed to get away from them and . . .” Jack touched his forehead and frowned. “I don’t remember much after that. A woman picked me up and then I . . . Well, I guess I did something pretty stupid.”

  “Which was?”

  “I went back to Seth’s apartment.”

  “Why?”

  “There was a safe in there. At lunch, Seth asked me to get it for him. I went back for it, but the safe was open. There was nothing inside, so I left.”

  This was the weakest part of Jack’s story. While the man on the roof had neither seen Jack’s face nor heard his voice, the incident might in Wellesley’s eyes be too coincidental. Jack’s hope was that the SIS man assumed he was lying out of self-protection.

  “Why didn’t you tell us about Seth’s other apartment?”

  “How could I know you were who you claimed to be? Anyone can make up a business card. It means nothing.”

  “Good point,” replied Wellesley.

  “I have to ask, Raymond: I leave here and a few hours later I’m kidnapped. It looks bad.”

  “I understand.” Wellesley lowered his head in thought, slowly rubbing his thumb over his chin. “But I can assure you, Jack, it wasn’t me.”

  “You? Or you and Spellman.”

  Wellesley didn’t reply. “Just be careful from now on, Jack. I can get you some protection if you’d like.”

  “No, forget it.”

  “If you change your mind, call me. And you should go to the hospital and have your head seen to.”

  “Have you heard from Seth?”

  “Sadly, no. As I said, we’re quite concerned. Did you try to contact him?”

  “I texted him. I haven’t heard anything back. Listen, I have to be honest: I can’t believe he’s on the run with your money. That’s not the Seth I know. Could someone have taken him?”

  “Perhaps, but we have no evidence of that. We think he left of his own accord.”

  “Any idea where he might have gone? I could take a leave of absence from Hendley and—”

  “And what, Jack? Hunt for him like you’re in a Ludlum novel? Jack, I do admire your dedication to your friend, but you need to let us handle this. Go about your business. Inform us if Seth makes contact. That’s all you can do.”

  They stood up and shook hands. Wellesley walked him to the door and said good-bye.

  Jack returned to Ysabel’s Range Rover and climbed in.

  “Did they buy it?” she asked.

  “It was just Wellesley. I think so, but that’s one cagey bastard. And if he was behind it, he deserves an Oscar.”

  Jack’s disposable phone trilled. It was a text message. The screen read: IT’S SETH.

  Jack typed: WHERE ARE YOU?

  OUT OF TOWN.

  SAFE?

  Y, came Seth’s reply. FIND WHAT I LEFT FOR YOU?

  Y.

  WATCH YOUR BACK. WILL CALL LATER.

  The screen went blank.

  Edinburgh, Scotland

  The place Helen had found for them, a run-down, side-alley garage with a cramped, two-bedroom flat above it, was private enough, but was filthy and stank of motor oil.

  As Olik sat on the ratty plaid couch watching television, Helen finished cleaning the kitchen and putting away groceries, then started cooking lunch—beans and toast and grilled tomatoes, a UK staple, apparently. A good leader fed her troops, she thought.

  From below came the honk of a car horn.

&
nbsp; Helen said, “Olik, go.”

  Olik headed down the stairs. Helen leaned over the railing and watched as he lifted the main door’s crossbar and swung open the double doors. The garage’s interior was lit by a lone fluorescent light suspended from the rafters. Outside, the alleyway’s cobbles were wet with rain.

  The van rolled inside and Olik shut the doors. Yegor shut off the van’s engine and climbed out, as did Roma.

  “I have it,” Yegor announced with a smile.

  Yegor trotted up the stairs, shrugging off his coat as he went.

  “Did you have any trouble?”

  “Very little. The students have lockers. When she went to lunch, I jimmied the door to hers. No one saw me.” He drew a small notebook from his back pocket and handed it to Helen, who scanned the pages.

  “Class schedule, dormitory room number, appointments . . .”

  “There are only a few here.”

  “The rest would be on her phone,” Yegor said. “I’m surprised they write anything down these days.”

  “Which dormitory is she in?”

  “Chancellors Court.”

  “Good,” Helen replied.

  She walked to a nearby cupboard, opened the top drawer, and pulled out a map of the university’s campus. She laid it on the kitchen table and traced her finger over the legend until she found Chancellors. “Right here. It’s part of the Pollock Halls complex. We need to see it up close. We’ll go when it’s dark.”

  HOW DO we even know it was him?” Ysabel said.

  They were back at her apartment, again watching the sunrise streaming through her balcony windows and enjoying a cup of her nuclear-powered coffee. Jack had slept fitfully, half hoping for an update call from Gavin Biery while his brain worked the “Seth problem.” Jack wanted to move, to take action, but the smart course was to do nothing until he got Gavin’s results.

  “We don’t,” Jack replied. “If it wasn’t him, it means someone’s got him. Or at least his phone.”

  “If that’s true, and they were asking about what we found in the safe, it means you might have been talking to the men who took you. Oh, that reminds me . . .”

  Ysabel got up, walked to the credenza behind her couch, opened a drawer, then returned with a fifteen-inch MacBook Pro and sat back down. When the laptop booted up, she started typing. After a minute she said, “The van’s placard was real enough—Yazdani and Son Electrical Contractors. The address is in an industrial part of town, on the east side—Ehsan and Tenth Street. Should we go?”

  Jack considered this. While they weren’t going to find Balaclava and his partner loitering about in Yazdani’s offices, it was a lead. Seth’s trail was growing cold.

  • • •

  THEY DROVE YSABEL’S RANGE ROVER to a public parking lot a half-mile from the Yazdani address, then got out and hailed a cab. As the car pulled to the curb beside them, Ysabel said, “When we get there, I’m going in alone.”

  “No—”

  “It’s better this way. Trust me.”

  Jack hesitated. “Okay, but call me and leave the line open.”

  “Worried for my safety, Jack?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s sweet. Let’s go.”

  The cab took them into the industrial district, two acres of streets lined with cracked sidewalks, sliding security gates, and warehouses fronted by faded red and green awnings and signs in Persian/Farsi. The driver pulled up to a strip of warehouses and stopped.

  Ysabel said something in Persian to the driver, then climbed out and headed for the door to Yazdani’s office, dialing as she went. Jack’s phone rang. Ysabel said, “Can you hear me now?”

  “Very funny.”

  Ysabel slid the phone into her purse, opened the door, and disappeared inside.

  After a minute of silence Jack heard her talking to what sounded like two men. The conversation quickly turned into an argument, Ysabel and the men talking over one another in rapid-fire Persian until finally only one man was replying to her questions, his voice softer. They spoke for another couple of minutes, then Ysabel emerged from the office. She got in the taxi, said something to the driver, and the car pulled away. Jack opened his mouth to speak. Ysabel shook her head slightly.

  Once back at her Range Rover, Jack said, “Well?”

  “Two men, both Persian. The owner—Vahid Yazdani—and an employee, maybe his son. They were old-school, angry that a woman was in their shop, wearing no headscarf and being shockingly assertive.”

  “Sounded like you set them straight.”

  “Those types are bullies at heart, Jack. Push back and they usually back down. Plus, I’m well dressed—wealth has some social currency. Anyway, Yazdani claims the van was stolen two nights ago. He informed the police, but nothing has come of it.”

  “Dead end,” Jack muttered.

  “Not at all. While I was storming and ranting, I peeked out the back door. There’s a fenced storage area behind the shop. The van was there.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “There was a bullet hole in the door. Right where I put it.”

  • • •

  HALFWAY BACK to Ysabel’s apartment, Jack’s phone trilled. It was Gavin Biery.

  “Your phone should be there this afternoon,” he told Jack.

  “That was quick.”

  “We aim to please. I’ve got some info for you.”

  With his phone braced between his shoulder and his ear, Jack pulled out his pad and balanced it on his knee, pen at the ready. “Shoot.”

  “First, there’s no activity on your credit cards. Second, the van’s license plate belongs to an electrical contractor—”

  “Yazdani and Son. I was just there. The van was there. The owner claimed it was stolen.”

  “On paper, they look legit. I also checked out Dr. Pezhman Abbasi. Age seventy-two, been teaching at University of Tehran for thirty-plus years. No red flags, no criminal record, no interesting affiliations.

  “Now, this David Weaver guy is interesting. The Albany address on his International Driver’s Permit is bogus; it’s actually a store that offers short- and long-term P.O. boxes.”

  “How the hell does that work? Isn’t that something Homeland Security keys on?”

  “More the Postal Inspection Service, but yeah. I’ll keep plugging, but I wouldn’t hold my breath. As for Weaver himself, I drew a blank. No Social Security number, no credit history—all the standard stuff, nothing. The guy stinks of special ops.”

  “And his gun?”

  “Now, that’s really interesting. It’s not a SIG Sauer, but an Iranian knock-off called a Zoaf PC9. The serial number is actually a version of what’s called an NSN—NATO Stock Number. In this case, it’s a DMC—Domestic Management Code. The two-digit country code makes it an export to the UK.”

  Raymond Wellesley’s homeland, Jack thought. Too obvious, an oversight, or a coincidence? The black-market handgun business was booming, as it always had been. Heavy weapons were tougher to smuggle, especially after 9/11, but not so with handguns. Iranian or British or otherwise, the nine-millimeter’s origin was proof of nothing. Interesting, though, that it led directly back to Wellesley.

  “What the hell are you into, Jack?” asked Gavin.

  “I’ve already asked myself that more than a few times. Tell me about my phone.”

  “It’s powered down now, but it was on, briefly, yesterday morning. The best I could do was a rough location. Somewhere between—and I’ll try not to butcher these names . . . Enghelab Road, Rashid Yashemi Street, and Vali Asr Street.”

  Jack said, “Hold on a second,” then asked Ysabel: “The area of Enghelab Road, Rashid Yashemi Street, and Vali Asr Street—mean anything to you?”

  “Of course. That’s the neighborhood where Seth’s apartment is—not the bolt-hole, his real one. It’s on the other side of
Mellat Park, about a mile from mine.”

  “Good work, Gavin. What time was Seth’s phone on and for how long?”

  “About thirty seconds or so, at 10:09.”

  “Thanks. Talk to—”

  “Hang on, Jack. At exactly the same time, your stolen phone powered up, and it stayed on for the same duration.”

  Someone had hijacked his old phone.

  • • •

  TWENTY MINUTES LATER they were back at Ysabel’s apartment.

  “Your phone? How is that possible?” she said, pushing open the front door and laying her purse on the kitchen counter. “Is that even doable?”

  Jack closed the door behind them.

  “It’s doable.” The Campus had done it before, and Wellesley and Spellman would have access to their own sophisticated tech nerds. “Assuming my phone was actually pinging from Seth’s Naseri Street apartment, somebody’s laying a trap.” He had to also assume they’d seen the earlier text exchange between him and Seth, though it would do them little good.

  “You think they want the folder we got from Seth’s safe?”

  Jack nodded. “It’s a good bet. Let’s see if we get an invitation.”

  • • •

  JACK’S NEW PHONE arrived mid-afternoon. He pored over his notes, trying to make sense of the glut of information he’d amassed over the past two days, and occasionally checked his e-mail; earlier he’d sent a curt “Contact me” e-mail to Ervaz, the other agent Ysabel knew about. He’d received no reply.

  Jack wasn’t sure of his next move. Irrational though it was, he felt he had a lot of leads, and no leads at all. Wellesley, Spellman, Yazdani and Son, Balaclava Man, David Weaver, Seth/Not Seth texting him, and a pile of papers in Cyrillic that was clearly important to both Seth and . . . whoever.

  Jack briefly considered going to Pardis and sitting on it, but decided against it. And while he couldn’t be sure the text had come from the apartment itself, Jack’s gut told him it had. Such a move made tactical sense. They knew he was looking for Seth, so why not lure him there with exactly that?

  How could he turn the trap to his advantage? Contingencies, countercontingencies, evasion, and escape . . . It was a chess game with the highest possible stakes, and no matter how well pre-plotted your game, something would go wrong. Something always went wrong. What mattered is what you did about it. And with whom. He was mostly convinced that Ysabel was who she claimed to be, and she’d so far proven herself reliable, but part of him wanted to leave her behind. Was this sexism or overprotectiveness? The latter, he decided. He’d have to get over that. Ysabel was in this because she wanted to be. Plus, with him overprotectiveness tended to precede attachment, which tended to precede deeper feelings—in his case, a sequence that often happened prematurely. It was a complication he didn’t need right now. It’d be so much easier if she were unlikable.