The Reykjavik Assignment (Yael Azoulay #3)(30)
And now there was a new addition to the mix: Eli and his friends. Masters’s resignation and the ever-louder questions about the privatization of UN security and peacekeeping were all just temporary setbacks, to be expected when the stakes were this high. Prometheus, EGS, KZX, and the DoD would never give up. Nor would Eli. And she knew sooner or later, Eli and his gang would try and take her. But forewarned was forearmed, especially when she knew precisely how they operated.
Yael picked up her iPad, connected it to her speaker system, and opened a sound file. Then she sat down on the floor in a half-lotus position, breathing slowly and deeply through her nose as she began to zone out.
*
Clarence Clairborne glanced briefly at his wounded hand. The bandage was clean but his palm was throbbing. He could feel his pulse under the Band-Aid, his blood pressure rising before the phone call.
He looked at the two framed photographs on the corner of his desk. A family of four, half of it now reduced to two sheets of printed paper. A tall boy—with sandy hair, freckles, and a winning smile—held a soccer ball and stared out from one frame. Clarence Clairborne IV. The memories were hardwired into his brain, and no amount of bourbon could erase them. Waving goodbye to his son as the limousine rolled out of the driveway to Ronald Reagan National Airport and the Prometheus Group’s waiting executive jet; the phone call apologizing for missing his son’s birthday party, with fulsome promises of the time they would soon spend together; sitting on the airplane telling himself that yes, he had locked the liquor cabinet. Most of all, he remembered the phone call he received when the airplane had landed. The cabinet had not been locked. His son had gotten drunk and drowned in the swimming pool. His wife had never recovered, and he had given up trying to reach for her through the fog of gin and tranquilizers.
A plump, pretty teenager looked out from the second frame, smiling shyly at the camera. But Emmeline Clairborne was no longer Daddy’s girl. She was someone else’s girl, living on Sanchez Street in San Francisco. With Abby. Her partner. He could barely vocalize the word, even in his head. But he was still Emmy’s father. He glanced at his watch. It was six o’clock in the evening in California. They should be home by now, back from the school for children with special needs where they worked. Clairborne took a deep breath, picked up the phone on his desk, felt his cut hand throb even harder, and punched in a number. He heard the ringing, imagined the sound echoing across the kitchen. Emmy and Abby had bought the apartment for $200,000 under market value. The realtor had told them it was an emergency sale and they had to move quickly to complete the purchase. They did. Neither she nor Abby had any idea that Clairborne had flown to San Francisco, chosen the place, and paid the realtor the extra $200,000, plus another $5,000 in cash to keep his mouth shut and make sure Clairborne’s daughter got to buy the apartment.
“Hello, this is Abby,” said a female voice.
“This is Clarence Clairborne,” he said, the receiver slippery in his palm.
“Mr. Clairborne, hello,” said Abby politely. She paused. Clairborne could visualize her looking at Emmeline, the stern shake of his daughter’s head. “She’s not here, Mr. Clairborne.”
Clairborne forced a smile to keep the desperation from his voice. “That’s fine, Abby. Actually, I wanted to talk to you. Congratulations on your promotion. You are now director of the school?”
“Thank you. Yes. I am.” Abby was wary.
“You may know that the Prometheus Group has a charitable foundation. We would like to make a substantial donation to the school, to be used as you see fit.”
Abby did not hesitate. “No thank you, Mr. Clairborne.”
The line went dead. A few seconds later the phone rang again. Clairborne pressed the speakerphone button. “Your visitor is here, Mr. Clairborne,” said Samantha.
* See: The Budapest Protocol
12
She is sitting on the beach where Jaffa meets Tel Aviv. The rhythm of the waves as they break is soporific. Her eyes are closed. The sun is pleasantly warm on her face, the sea breeze cooling. The water swirls around her toes, the undertow pulling gently at the sand beneath her feet.
*
Yael felt calm—transported, as she intended, to a conscious state somewhere between sleeping and waking.
Eli’s voice boomed around the apartment. Traffic roared. Sirens wailed. Handheld radios hissed and crackled.
She focused on her breathing, feeling the flow of air in and out, in and out. After two minutes, the cacophony stopped as suddenly as it started. Five minutes later it erupted again, for another ninety seconds, then stopped. Yael opened her eyes and checked her pulse. Fifty-five. She was ready.
*
Ten minutes later, Yael devoured her sandwich in three bites. Ordering in was always an option in Manhattan—the restaurant flyers scattered across the coffee table offered Thai, Italian, Korean, Mexican, sushi, and any number of regional Chinese cuisines—but that would have taken at least another thirty minutes, so a search at the very back of her kitchen cupboard had produced a packet of crispbread, a tin of sardines, and a jar of chili-flavored olives: enough for an instant, if makeshift, supper. There were two more sandwiches on her plate. They were surprisingly tasty for a slung-together meal. Or perhaps the wine had sharpened her hunger. In any event, her appetite had returned and her mind was clear as she sat at her dining table.
She picked up a postcard with a Turkish stamp, featuring a catamaran racing across the Bosporus, one of its two rudders out of the water. There was no message written on the back, but there didn’t need to be. Next to the postcard lay a rectangle of thick white card, embossed with gold lettering. The invitation had arrived with a covering letter, personally signed by Daintner in his capacity as corporate communications director.