Andrew Gross - Reckless

Over half an hour had passed. There had been no report of any sightings of the Mercedes. That wasn’t a good sign. Hauck knew whoever had taken them would have had a plan. They would have known the security cam situation better than anyone. Even if the vehicle turned up, the more time elapsed, the less it boded well for the al-Bashirs.

Naomi did her best to hold it together and oversee the scene. But inside, Hauck saw, she was dying. She was on the phone back to DC, to British security. They had set up a coordinated local command-traffic police, Scotland Yard. The counterterrorism unit, SO15. Every passing minute throbbed with tension. It only made their likely fate more clear.

At some point, the grim finality setting in, Naomi stepped outside. She was a desk agent, not a field supervisor; this was her big case, and the pressure of losing the al-Bashirs, seeing them whisked away in front of their eyes, even being party to it, was a hard one to take. Even for a seasoned agent.

Hauck gave her a few moments alone, then went out after her. He found her on the landing, staring blankly at the square, her eyes moist and her fists clenched. She tapped them against the limestone railing in frustration.

“They were my responsibility, Ty.”

He went up and put his hand on her shoulder. “No, it was al-Bashir who was responsible for whatever happened to him, not you. He was a dead man the minute he got into bed with these people. You did everything you could.”

“I keep seeing that kid,” she said, her teeth clenched. “It’s like that one in Iraq all over again. Looking back at us through the rear window. You saw it too, didn’t you?”

“Yeah,” Hauck said. He pulled her toward him and she sank against his chest. “I saw it.”

“He was mine to protect, Ty. That kid didn’t do anything wrong. They were mine.”

Tears dampened his shirt. He squeezed her close. Hauck, whose own dreams were haunted by many such faces and scenes, did his best to make her feel it was okay. He remembered how she had told him about the boy with the open chest in Iraq, who she tried so hard to breathe life back into after the ambush. He stroked the back of her hair.

“I’m sorry.” She sniffed back guilty tears. “I know this isn’t exactly out of the procedure manual. I’ve been in combat, for chrissakes…”

“Don’t worry about the manual,” Hauck said, letting her stay. “It’s in my manual. It’s okay.”

Finally, Naomi pulled back and looked up at him, nodding.

“You’re still in charge.” He winked. “With me.”

She smiled a bit and cleared her throat. “Thanks.” She turned back to the house and wiped away the tears. “There’s got to be something here…Al-Bashir took his computer. But he had to leave something behind.” She seemed to say it more out of a need to believe it than out of any actual hope. She sucked in a deep breath. “I have to do something, Ty.”

“I know.”

They went back inside. The lavish house was decorated as if money was no object. Beautiful moldings. Ornate rugs. Polished antique tables. Each room bore the mark of the family that had just disappeared. Naomi kept checking her watch, calling central command, hoping they’d hear some word.

It was like the SUV had just disappeared.

More in desperation than anything, they both started searching throughout the house. The dining room on the second floor, with a view of the park. There was a modern media room. A huge Sony screen built into the walnut bookshelves. Reminders of the family were everywhere-photos, clothing they had elected not to take, the kids’ games and toys.

While Hauck spoke with one of the inspectors, Naomi found the investment manager’s study. The large cherry desk was piled high with fund brochures, old copies of the Financial Times and Forbes. Reams of annual reports and analysts’ opinions. Naomi was able to access his desktop computer. The password was simple. Sheera. Mostly, what was there was all personal. Gmail messaging and various investment sites. She reconstructed a history of al-Bashir’s most recent Google searches. Wine buying, travel sites. All perfectly legit. Naomi pushed away from the desk in frustration.

Whatever al-Bashir had that might have incriminated Hassani was lost on his laptop.

It had been an hour now. No word. She searched the drawers for some kind of flash drive, anything he might have downloaded that could’ve been left behind.

Nothing. Her heart beat with the realization that now there was not much hope. Desperate, she leafed randomly through the piles of papers stacked about.

Again, nothing.

Nothing related to Thibault or Hassani or Ascot. Nothing on Donovan or Glassman. Or on any matter connected to al-Bashir’s involvement in the case.

She wheeled back from the desk, riddled with anger. She’d felt so close to making a case against Hassani-al-Bashir had basically admitted it! Now, how would she make him answer for what he’d done? Six people were dead. Now you could add to the list the al-Bashirs. Never before had she wanted to prove something as badly as she wanted to implicate Hassani. She felt the same sense of drive and intensity as when she’d seen her brother in the hospital after he lost both his legs and she enlisted herself the very next day.

Find something, Naomi. Find something! It’s here…

Within hours, British government agents would be plowing through every inch of this room. Every sliver of RAM on his computers. She got up and walked around. It’s here. I feel it. Her blood was hot with blame. This was her case. She had felt the whole thing from the start. Now she had screwed up. She didn’t want to lose it. Not now.

She spotted a kid’s Transformer on the carpet. Sadly, Naomi picked it up. She held the toy in her hand, her mind flashing through a hundred scenarios. Out of answers, she sank back on al-Bashir’s couch.

She put the toy on the glass coffee table.

Something met her eye.

It hit home immediately, a spark of hope, recognition, firing up inside. Can’t be.

She reached forward. There was a stack of art and coffee table books on the glass tabletop. One was from the New Tate Museum. Another was on the Gauguin and Picasso exhibition from a couple of years ago. Naomi had seen it in DC.

But it was the third book, underneath, that, like some kind of superconducting magnet, held her stare.

Yes, it can.

Naomi removed it from the pile. It was a travel book, about a destination the al-Bashirs might have once visited.

The thing was, she had seen the very same destination just two days before.

On the ski-lift ticket at Dani Thibault’s farmhouse. In Serbia.

She fixed on the cover. A snowcapped mountain rising from a valley bathed in amber light. It couldn’t be a coincidence. At this stage, there were no coincidences. Her heart started to beat like crazy. She had found it. She had found the link that bound them together.

Gstaad.

Naomi motioned Hauck inside with a concealed wave, closing the door behind him. She showed him what she had found.

“Two days ago,” she explained. Her voice was hushed yet driven with renewed emotion. “In Thibault’s farmhouse. I didn’t think it meant anything. Just one of the things I found searching through his possessions. A ski-lift ticket.” Naomi’s eyes twinkled. “To Gstaad.”

“Okay.” Hauck nodded, picking up the book and staring at the cover.

“It’s a ski resort,” Naomi said. “In Switzerland.”

“I know it’s a ski resort,” Hauck replied.

“Sorry. Just check out what’s inside.”

He leafed through the glossy pages. It was filled with scenic photos of ski runs, the snow-covered mountains in winter, and in summer, the picturesque village. He found a bookmark inside. On the highlighted page, one side had a description of one of the resort’s most treacherous runs, the Chute; the other had a shot of beautiful people in expensive ski clothes sunning themselves on a deck at lunch. At a fashionable restaurant, high on the mountain.