The Phoenix Affair - Dave Moyer (smart ebook reader TXT) 📗

warned. “If there is a problem our men may be martyred or captured.” He shrugged. “It is a risk, my friend, it will be as God wills.”

“Then let it be so, and may the Grace of God be with your men, Mohammed. But let it be today, tonight, tomorrow, not later than the next day, my friend. I am worried about this man, he must be dealt with quickly.”

They arrived at the small restaurant; it was crowded. The conversation was over as far as business was concerned. Khalid began to talk animatedly about the retail gold jewelry market as they found a table near the doors and ordered their breakfast. Mohammed did his best to make the small talk, but his mind was racing ahead to all the things he would have to do today.

When it came, the bread was hot, the hummus flavored with garlic and onion. Mohammed tried not to hurry, but he was out of things to talk about and he needed to get on with his mission. He was glad when Khalid pushed his chair a little way back from the table and laid his napkin on the table, rising to leave.

“Salaam,” Khalid said. “Go in the protection of God.”

“Salaam, go in the protection of The Generous One” Mohammed replied. He watched Khalid leave and sat a few more minutes to finish the last of the bread.

For his part, Khalid felt better now that he had put things in motion. “Mohammed is a good man,” he thought. “Careful, almost to a fault, but a good man anyway. He knows how to get things done at any rate, and once I have him moving he will do what he’s told. When he has had more action, seen more people killed, he will be a real lion.” This made him smile.

But he had much more to do. It was now nearly nine-thirty, and things would be starting to move in Paris by this time. He quickened his pace, taking a different route back to his apartment to retrieve his car, a white Nissan sedan. He did not go to the apartment, but unlocked the car and slid behind the wheel. He pulled out into the heavy traffic to weave his way out to the highway and from there onto the causeway to Bahrain. He had a message for Ibrahim, and it must be delivered this morning when the man checked his email at ten Paris time. IX. Paris/Langley/Dhahran

Just a half a block West from the Hotel Agora Saint-Germaine along the Rue des Ecoles there was a small patisserie with really excellent French breads and pastries, and the coffee might just have been the best one could buy in Paris. It was strong, viscous, and with the right amount of steamed milk and a teaspoon of sugar it packed almost the same punch as a café cortado in Miami, only in a bigger cup. The bakery was not large, but large enough, and in this part of Paris it did a brisk breakfast business for tourists and locals alike.

It was not yet crowded, seven-thirty is early for everyone in Paris outside the modern business district to the west of the old city. There were only a few locals in the shop, and perhaps one or two visiting businessmen who were not over their jet lag yet. There was one couple, speaking Dutch, who were evidently out to make the most of their day in Paris with an early start. One of the businessmen was obviously French, dressed in dark olive slacks and square-toed polished black shoes, a black ribbed turtleneck sweater, a Breitling watch on his left wrist, and dark hair and piercing blue eyes, very awake at this time of the morning. A thigh-length black leather jacket hung from the chair across the table from his own, his briefcase on the chair as well. He was remarkable only in that he could have walked off the page of any fashion magazine for sale that day in Paris, and therefore not remarkable at all. He was drinking one of the café’s cups of excellent coffee with obvious joy, munching on croissants and crusty rolls with butter and marmalade, reading the early morning edition of Le Monde.

Inside the newspaper was a copy of USA Today. Paul Cameron read intermittently as he watched the street outside the windows in the direction of the hotel, checking to his left occasionally up the Rue Vallette in the direction of the Metro station at Maubert-Mutualite. The joy he was getting from the coffee was completely genuine.

True to his usual pattern, he’d come wide awake at around two in the morning, his first night after a trip across the Atlantic. There had been no sleep from two until around four, and then a restless thrashing that lasted until the alarm clock rang at five-thirty. It was the same every time he came East, it would be worse tonight and hell tomorrow night, but by the fourth night he always slept well. In the meantime he would eat heartily and enjoy the coffee. It was the only thing that seemed to help with the adjustment. Even if it didn’t the coffee kept him alert.

He’d showered and shaved quickly and was out of his hotel by six. From the Metro Station at Les Halles, he hopped the number 4 purple train to Odeon, then switched to the gold number ten line to Cardinal Lemoine station. There he’d left the metro and stepped into the all-night Kinkos shop to check his email and see what he could expect out of Smith today.

There had been no email, but he sent one of his own:

Smith,

I have re-located Falcon and he is safe for the time being. What do you have on our friend Mr. Kisani?

If you’re in Paris it’s time we met. Set it up. If you are not, arrange for someone who can provide some support to meet me, either military or agency, but not at the embassy. Needs to be someone discrete, not obviously American, and above all effective in the field. No bullshit. I’m a bit out of my depth here, and time for you professionals to pitch in.

I have some initial information I think I should pass on as well, it may be time-sensitive and I’d like someone working on it as soon as possible.

I will try to check this address again around noon Paris time. Meantime, I’m going to pick up a cellular phone, will send the number with my next mail.

Phoenix.

If Smith was at Langley Cameron hoped he was the type who started early and worked late. He didn’t want to wait six hours or more for a reply, things needed to get moving today. Before he left he’d also sent a note to his wife, from the address he usually used when they traveled together:

Elizabeth,

Strange to be in Paris without you, but things are going well. I had lunch yesterday at the little restaurant in the Place Chatelet that we used so many times on our last trip. Good sandwiches still.

Listen, let’s plan on a trip to Grand Cayman when I get back. See what you can find for tickets, maybe the week after next. The high season will be over, so it won’t be too expensive. I’m going to need some scuba diving, sun, and daiquiris when I’m done here, and so are you.

Love you,

Paul

The Kinkos clerk knew a cellular kiosk a few blocks away that opened around nine. He planned to buy two phones, one for himself, one for Fahd. Email was too slow and the cafés too exposed for quick communication, and he had a feeling they might need to be easily in touch.

He’d approached this café from the East, across the street from the Hotel Agora which had been Fahd’s home until the move last night. There was almost no car traffic at this time of the morning, and no foot traffic at all. It would have made any one staking out the hotel stick out, but there was no one. He was sure that would change relatively early this morning, which was why he’d come so early himself. Either that, or these guys were stupid, sloppy, and not worth worrying about, but he didn’t think that was likely to be the case.

Cameron ordered another cup of the coffee. It was getting close to eight o’clock, and foot traffic was beginning to pick up on the street outside. Inside, too, things were starting to get more crowded, the noise level increasing with more conversation, more sounds of eating and cooking. The Dutch couple got up and left, turning west on the Rue des Ecoles toward the Sorbonne, no doubt. The woman caught his eye as she passed by outside the window and smiled the warm, Dutch smile. He returned it and raised his cup in salute, watching her and the husband go, turning his head left to look over his shoulder as they went.

It was a lucky thing, seeing him then, although he would have seen him anyway eventually. The big man came walking down Rue Vallette from the Metro station there to his left. He walked heavily, but not in a clumsy way, a walk that said “strength” but not “grace” or “speed”. He was dressed much like the Spanish hoods who’d done the mugging, black from head to toe. His hair was jet black, prominent nose, dark eyes and bushy brows, the skin dark even for an Egyptian. Cameron decided immediately that he was Egyptian, the features unmistakable in his mind, so similar to all the Egyptians he’d drunk tea with in carpet shops from Bahrain and the Emirates all the way to Morocco.

Cameron made another show of toasting the retreating Dutch woman and returned to his paper and croissants, watching the big Egyptian in his peripheral vision as the man turned the corner and walked away East toward the hotel. Halfway down the block he looked to his right and left, then abruptly crossed to the South side of the street where was lost from Cameron’s view. The angle was not right. It didn’t matter. He’d been seen, Cameron had been right to come. The Paris cell had resources beyond Ahmed al-Kisani, and from the looks of this guy they were ready to start playing for keeps.

“Wonder if they know we rolled Ahmed, or if they know about him at all, yet?” he thought to himself, chuckling quietly. Not likely, yet. He settled in with his paper and coffee to waste the time between now and nine when the phone kiosk would open. He had time, the Egyptian was not going anywhere, not without Fahd, who wasn’t likely to come walking out of the Hotel Agora anytime soon. “Good guys are ahead in this game so far,” he mused. When he went out for the phones he’d take a better look at the big guy.

*****

The phone woke Patrick Ripley out of a very deep sleep, a sleep he was having trouble swimming out of as the phone rang and rang, somewhere out of reach. Finally, having knocked the alarm clock and a lamp off the nightstand, he seized hold of the handset and managed to mumble, “Hello” into the phone.

“Sorry, must be