Chapter Thirty-Eight
Nomad
When Nomad’s phone rang, he snatched it up and swiped the call open.
Without preamble, Red said, “Simone called Kamal and spoke to him as if she were Elena. Simone accused him of trying to kill her to take the ring and not have to pay the prize.”
“Could Simone actually believe that?”
“She might. I mean,” Red was speaking in Turkish again, making herself heard over the sound of traffic. “It’s possible. Simone may have no idea about the treasure hunters that came after Elena at the ball, and honestly, we don’t know what happened. That’s speculation, right?”
“I don’t think they had anything to do with Joel if that’s what you’re asking me. Too many easier ways to handle that. And those men had vengeance in their eyes. That wasn’t a mission tasked to hired help,” Nomad said. “That was personal.”
“I agree. So Simone told Kamal she was not going to the garden. And Kamal was pissed. Simone blew the whole ‘perfect circle through time’ scenario that Kamal wanted to draw. It was apparent that he wasn’t used to someone saying no to him. And honestly, Simone is in the catbird’s seat. Forty million euros would be nice. But if that doesn’t work, there are other buyers. She could get at least four million on the merits of the diamond. Disappointing, sure. But not chump change.”
“What did Kamal end up telling her? Are you walking?” Nomad asked.
“Sitting.” Her words drowned in the blare of horns. “Simone told Kamal to meet her outside of police headquarters, and they could make the exchange there. She wasn’t playing games, and she wasn’t taking chances.”
“Yeah, I saw that her pin has been there for about ten minutes now. What’s she doing?”
“She’s perched on the wall.”
“You think he’s going to buy it that Simone is Elena?”
“I think that entirely depends. If Kamal has only seen Elena’s photograph, it could work. It’s hard to tell a real-life, moving, breathing person from a person in a photo. Especially if it’s a still photo that the person posed for. That’s why front-facing grinning photos are terrible to take. They remove the humanity. Now, if Joel is with him, there would be a problem. Elena danced in Joel’s arms. He’d know right away.”
“So what are you doing?”
“Having a pistachio ice cream across the street, picking construction materials off my clothes. And you?”
“I have some things I’m following up on. I’ll update you later. How’s the ice cream?”
“Oddly, it’s tasteless. But I think that my senses are still in fight-or-flight. That’s twice in one week where I lost someone who was mission-critical just feet away.”
“I thought about that. You’re going to have to take some time to process it.”
“Once I’ve saved the world.”
“Agreed, world-saving takes priority,” Nomad said lightly, but these weren’t nameless tangos squirting out the back of a terror nest. These were humans. They had voices, emotions, and faces that Red had interacted with over time. Nomad knew enough people who pushed that shit down and pressed on, and they paid a heavy price for it. He didn’t want that for Red.
“Out of curiosity, do you have any idea how the team got the scaffold to fall? I didn’t hear an explosion. There was no fire flare.”
Nomad was aware that she’d gracefully but purposefully changed the subject. “Yeah, I have a pretty good picture of what happened. There was a steel cable around the base of the scaffold. It was attached to a motor that was attached to the building.”
“Battery-powered winch?”
“Exactly, no noise. I’d imagine the team’s job was to get Elena under the scaffold. My guess is that the guy at my three o’clock had the motor running silently, waiting for her. Then, as she stepped under, he pressed the app button that would make the cable drag the leg out. It was a temporary structure. Workable but not all that stable.”
“You saw all this?”
“I saw the guy at my three o’clock tap his screen a second before the structure came down. I saw a cable attached to the leg,” Nomad said. “Not wanting anyone to mark my face as the one who figured out the cable, I didn’t trace it to the wall. But the cable was thick, the kind you might use to pull someone out of a ditch if you’re in an off-road vehicle.”
“That’s some sinister stuff. And creative.”
“The three men took all the rings off Elena’s hands while the guy with the broken arm blocked people’s view.”
“Simone has the correct one, of course,” Red said. “I saw her pull off the right-hand, ring-finger ring, pop the Fire of the Desert out of the ring guard, and put the guard back on Elena’s finger. The tracker says the Fire of the Desert is right there across the street. I’m just waiting to see if Kamal shows.”
“Simone and Elena, what do you think their relationship is? Was?” Nomad corrected himself.
“Simone has to be a cover name. I don’t recognize her. But Color Code has a team of targeters who are very good at what they do. The spider software on Elena’s phone will give them access to everything available. Since both Gustav and Simone contacted Elena on that phone, their phones have also been corrupted. The targeters will be putting together the pieces of the puzzle to get a clearer picture. Though I’m never allowed to see the whole picture, I just act on orders.”
“Need to know.”
“Yeah. Do you know what I n eed to know right now?” Red deadpanned. “If and when is Kamal going to show? I need the ladies' room.”
“Ah, the joys of a stake out.”
“Exactly. Someone’s moving to the table near mine,” she said in a low tone. “Hanging up.”
***
When Red unlocked the door at the Riad and walked in, she put her phone on the shelf with her key. “I just got off the phone with Grey.”
“Yeah?” Nomad lifted his brows. “What did he have to say?”
She shut the door before answering, moving over to Nomad and lowering her voice. “I quote, ‘You two are hitting it out of the ballpark. Great work. This is exactly the information we needed.’ Since I was in the middle of the Medina, I just said, ‘Good news.’ And we hung up. I assumed you’d know what he was talking about or that I could call him back at some point.” She looked at him pointedly. “But I can tell you’re pleased.” She toed her shoes off. “Fill me in.”
“I figured I’d go to Elena’s room before the police arrived, so I could document her things. Taking pictures of her passport gives us some important information.”
“Agreed. Did you have trouble getting in?” She unwound her head scarf and tossed it into the corner.
“It was a straightforward security system. What I found was that Elena had two computers and she had a burner phone.”
Red reached for the hem of her robe and pulled it over her head, muffling her words as she said, “If data flowed between the devices, we’d have all that, right?”
“I called our support team to ask for instructions. One of the laptops was files only and wasn’t connected to WIFI.”
“To protect the data from the very thing we tried to do.” She pitched the robe into the corner, leaving her dressed in a bra and panties. “I’m begrudgingly impressed with Elena.”
“There was no cross-contamination with the second phone either. It’s all fresh data.”
“You took the computer?” Red asked.
“Didn’t need to. I put in the flash drive, and it bypassed her security. The team made copies of the hard drive and phone. That information was sent to the AI software to develop preliminary reports on imminent attacks. They can remotely wipe it if they see it moving somewhere that Uncle Sam doesn’t like.”
“Congratulations, that was a coup.” Red moved into the bathroom and ran the water. From the reflection in the mirror, he saw her wash her face and hands. “That’s not all.” She came to the door, toweling off as she caught his eyes. “You’ve got more.”
“I have our next task.”
“So we’re not done.” She leaned into the door jamb.
“Sadly, no.”
They stilled and looked into each other's eyes. Yeah, it would be good to have this wrapped up, to have the terrorists cornered, their plan thwarted. But when it was done, so were they. That would be it.
“Sadly no,” Nomad modified, “in terms of protecting innocent lives.”
“That’s how I took it.”
“I found out that the Algeria connection is still a go,” Nomad said. “Simone and Gustav will take a tourist trip over the Atlas Mountains.”
“Is that what you were working on when I came in?”
“Yes. Gustav went to a tourist guide in the Medina and set up the glamping trip. I got us places on that trip, too. The bus will pick us up in the morning.”
“What’s the goal? Wait.” She paused and looked at the floor. “Okay, that clarifies their last phone conversation. So Simone will break off from Gustav and go with someone else to Algeria.”
“Exactly. And I think I’ve figured out how they’re going to pull it off without alerting anyone on the Moroccan side. Command wants us to take pictures of the people that connect with Simone.”
“That’s it? Pictures in Algeria of Simone making contact?”
“Sarcasm?”
“I’m waiting to hear how you think this going to go down. How are we going to accomplish the goal of photographing people meeting Simone in Algeria?”
Nomad pointed at the boxes on the nightstand— a honking big smartphone zoom lens. “Photography is my hobby. I can’t wait to capture sunrise on the Sahara dunes.”
“You do love it so much.” She hung up the towel. “What’s the range? I’m guessing we can probably hang out—What?—like a kilometer away with a lens like that?”
“It depends on the atmosphere. But on a good day, that might be true. Of course, it’s going to depend on topography, too. If we’re still in the dunes, and they’re down in the trough, things could get sketchy. The rallying point isn’t that far distant from our ATV tour. Look at this map. Nomad scooted to the end of the bed and held up his tablet. “This is the glamping site.” He pointed at a picture of two rows of cloth tents with a cement sidewalk and footlights.
“That’s romantic.”
Nomad popped his brows. “They have bathrooms.”
“Bonus. Where does the water come from?”
“My question, too. I discovered that there are deep wells dug out in the desert, and they have pipes that lie across the top of the sand that bring the water in. The itinerary. Eleven-hour bus ride. Take camels to our tents. In the morning, we take ATVs to watch the sun rise over the dunes, and then we return to the bus for a ride home.”
“I don’t think I’d have chosen a twenty-two-hour bus ride for camels, tents, and ATVs.”
“You get to see the breadth of Morocco. And Simone gets to go to Algeria.”
“You said rallying point?” Red reached for an oversized T-shirt that covered her to her knees, and Nomad was disappointed when she pulled it on.
“Gustav got a GPS meeting point ping in his messages.” Nomad moved back to the map. “Here. This other pin is the well. This one is our tent. And this one is the nearest town.”
“Close.”
“If you get to the well and head east—”
“Which would be apparent if you’re going to watch the sunrise.”
“Exactly. This is the red line that would move us from the Morocco to Algeria. It’s a hard kilometer of walking the dunes.” Nomad moved the tablet to the side table, then scooted back in the bed with his head resting on a stack of pillows. “Come here, please.” Nomad held out his hand. “I’d like you to come lay down for a few minutes.”
“Why, what did you have in mind?” She crawled on top of him and lay down with her head to his heart.
“I had in mind that we have a lot of planning to do, but it can wait for a bit. I’ve had a chance to turn off the engines and rest. You haven’t.”
“When did you have this time? I’m calculating all the things you were up to, and I was eating ice cream.” She didn’t sound like she minded this. But maybe she wasn’t used to someone helping her to stop and take a breath.
He was part of a team; they looked out for each other. From what Nomad could tell, Red’s team was all over the place, and she worked solo on missions.
Since Red seemed to be resting but not sleeping, after a while, Nomad ventured, “Have you ever found love?” He’d said it from out of the blue, without thinking through how Red would hear that question. But honestly, he knew nothing about her. She could be married, have someone at home…
Love had been on his mind a lot these last few days. He’d listened to plenty of “How I Met Your Mother” stories. But he couldn’t recall anyone ever telling him how they knew they were in love. He wondered if it was a gradual awakening or if it were a flash of lightning.
“I have loved in my lifetime, yes.” She kissed his chest. “Loved deeply. Loved hard. Loved many. But one by one, they’ve slipped out of my arms until my arms were left empty.”
He was sure by her tone that she wasn’t talking about couple relationships that had come and gone but love in general. And it expanded his heart to know that she had the capacity to love and to keep on loving. That took courage. “And then what do you do?” he whispered, pressing the clasp of her claw open and setting it on the side table so he could comb his fingers through her hair.
“I have all that love and nowhere to put it. It piles up around me, and I stumble over it all the time. I try to shift it to the side to make room and space to move freely. But it’s liquid – a thick sticky ooze, and it slides right back in my path, gets on my shoes, and I track it wherever I go. I find that it’s easier to wash off if I have a hard outer shell. But it’s still there, nonetheless.”
“And you’re aware of it.”
“All the time. It still catches at my feet and sometimes tumbles me end over end.” She pressed up to look him in the eyes. “But I don’t think that’s what you’re asking me. I think you want to know if I’ve ever fallen in love before. And the answer is no. I don’t know what that feels like. I don’t know what this is between us, but it’s something. Don’t you think? It’s like we were offered an opportunity. It could be there, we could have that, but it wouldn’t be free. The price would probably be very high.”
She curled back into his arms, and Nomad pressed a kiss into her hair. That was exactly right. It was there for the taking. But there would be a cost extracted.
Nomad knew that he had to treat every moment with her as precious.
He would have this mission, and then she’d be gone.