15
“There is no truth to be found,” the Sheikh said to her, pulling her close and wrapping the white parachute-sheets around the two of them, shielding her from the sun as they waited for their taxi. “You should know that by now. The world we live in is built from lies, and those lies are built upon more lies.”
Kathryn turned her head and gazed into his green eyes. “Why do you say ‘we’? What’s your connection to Benson and the CIA, Hyder?” She raised an eyebrow. “And I want the truth. Don’t you dare say . . .” she put on a serious expression and did her best imitation of his smooth accent, “. . . there is no truth to be found, dear Ms. Kathryn.”
“You mock me again,” he said, throwing his head back and laughing as he pulled her closer into his broad, hard body.
Kathryn laughed too, partly at the madness of it all. Here she was, a CIA assassin dressed like a whore, wrapped in parachute fabric, being embraced by a Sheikh whom she knew almost nothing about. In fact she knew less than nothing, because what she’d been told about him might well have been lies.
But this feels real, she thought as she looked down at his thick, strong arms wrapped around her, just beneath her breasts. This feels real. He feels real. We feel real!
Because it is real, came a whisper from somewhere inside her. There’s no faking what just happened. There’s no lies in the way your bodies reacted to one another. Lies are spoken and heard. What you experienced had no sound, no words, no logic or reason. It was pure feeling. Pure emotion. Pure . . . love?
Ridiculous, Kathryn told herself, almost saying the word out loud. If there’s no such thing as absolute truth, then there’s no such thing as absolute love either.
“Remember why we are both here,” the Sheikh had muttered just before he took her, and Kathryn frowned as the words came back to her. What did he mean? Why did this king, this beast of a man who clearly had a powerful, relentless sex drive, follow this weird-ass ritual of staying celibate all year except for ten days? What was he trying to accomplish in those ten days? What was he looking for?
“You’re looking for your own truth, aren’t you?” she blurted out without thinking, rubbing his muscular forearms as she said it, locking her fingers with his.
“What?” he said. “What do you mean?”
“I mean with this ten-day thing you do. Whatever you call it. You’re looking for something. For someone.”
The Sheikh grunted, shifting his body against hers. “Is that a question?”
“If it were, would you answer it?”
“Probably not,” said the Sheikh. “Not even if I were hypnotized.”
Kathryn laughed and squeezed his arm. “I’ll get you sooner or later. You know that.”
“You will get me? Now that is a bit ominous, considering what you do for a living.”
“I don’t just do this for a living. It’s about more than that. You know that, Hyder.”
The Sheikh was silent for a moment. “How would I know that?”
“You’re so damn frustrating! You make all these cryptic remarks, and then you don’t explain them! Clearly you have a connection to Benson and Mel. But you won’t tell me about it.”
“Are you asking about it?”
“Yes! Oh, my God!” Kathryn shrieked, and she would have pulled her hair out in annoyance if her hands hadn’t been locked with his. “Yes, I’m damned well asking!”
The Sheikh stayed silent, shifting once more against her body, but Kathryn wasn’t letting him get away this time. She tightened her grip on his hands, looking down at their intertwined fingers as she did it. And then her eyes went wide when she noticed it.
At first she thought it was just a couple of fingernails that had grown out weird or something. But she’d seen this before.
“Oh, God,” she said, touching the rough nails of his right hand. “Hyder, this . . . you’ve . . . I mean . . . who?”
The Sheikh pulled his hand away from hers, but she grabbed it and locked her fingers with his again. “No!” she shouted. “You goddamn better tell me what happened, Hyder! I’ve seen this before. On prisoners. Terror suspects. Men who’ve been interrogated in secret prisons and in countries which have no anti-torture laws. Someone did this to you. They pulled out your goddamn fingernails.”
“You like the look?” the Sheikh said casually, holding his right hand in front of her face, fingers spread wide. “Did you know that the U.S. Government does nails?”
Kathryn swallowed hard and shook her head. She knew what the men and women who worked in the shadows did. Hell, she was one of them.
“I don’t understand,” she said hoarsely, her head spinning as she desperately tried to put the pieces together: Benson, Mel, Hyder, his step-sister Nisha . . . assassination attempts by Russians one moment, Americans the next . . . what the hell! “I don’t understand,” she said again. “The way you spoke of Benson . . . it sounded like you were friends. Like you worked together. But you’re saying that we . . . I mean the Americans . . . did this to you?”
Hyder grunted, tightening his fingers into a fist. “They might as well have.” He took a breath, and Kathryn waited. She could tell he was not a man used to talking, or telling others his secrets. He was not a man given to trusting anyone. Maybe this was why. Maybe he’d trusted someone before, and they’d betrayed him.
“Tell me,” she whispered, turning to look at him. She could see the pain in his eyes. She could see the uncertainty. But she could also see the need to trust someone. Could she be that person? How could she? She didn’t know enough about him to promise anything, could she? Could she? “Tell me,” she whispered again. “Please.”
The Sheikh closed his eyes tight and then nodded. “All right,” he said. “All right.” He waited a moment and then nodded again before opening his eyes and looking into hers. “As you’ve guessed, I did work with Benson and the CIA. It was unofficial, and kept a secret even from top American officials. You see, I had close connections with many . . . unsavory characters and organizations across the Middle East, and I . . .”
He trailed off, and Kathryn nodded. “You were an asset. You told the CIA about powerful men you knew who were involved with terror groups, either supporting or financing them.”
The Sheikh snorted. “I did more than that. I arranged meetings. I gathered information. I organized underground fundraisers where I pretended to share in the hatred of the West. I brought these secret financiers of terrorism out of the shadows and into the light. I lured them in and then I gave them up to the CIA or MI6 or Mossad.” He looked at his fingernails again and smiled. “And then, when the time was right, I was given up.”
Kathryn took a breath. “You were betrayed. By who? Benson? Mel?”
The Sheikh’s eyes narrowed. “I will give you one more guess.”
Kathryn thought a moment. Who were the other players in this twisted story? Then her eyes widened and her breath caught in her throat. “Your sister?” she asked softly.
The Sheikh shrugged. “I cannot say. All of them. In the end it was all of them.” He sighed and shook his head even as Kathryn noted he hadn't actually given a clear answer to any of her questions. “Ah, my sister. We share a father, but Nishaani’s mother was American.” He grinned again and shook his head. “The CIA wanted her to be what they now want you to be. The half-American queen of Sehaar.” He paused a moment and shrugged. “Though in fairness, I am quite certain it was my dear sister’s idea to begin with. John Benson trusted me. He knew I was a man of principle, a man of peace, a man of justice. He believed I would be a strong ally to the United States, and he opposed the idea of replacing me with my sister. But this was years ago, and John was still young, without the power and influence he has now.”
“So he was overruled. The CIA decided that it would be a safer bet to put an American citizen on the throne, and so they ratted you out.”
The Sheikh half-nodded. “It is justice, in a way, I suppose.”
“Well, you’re awfully forgiving,” Kathryn said, trying to make light of things as she breathed deep and took his rough hands in hers again, leaning in against him. He felt good against her. Right against her. This felt like justice in a way, too, didn’t it? The two of them.
“What makes you think I have forgiven anyone?” the Sheikh whispered into her hair as he pulled her close, and the way he said the words scared her for a moment. “We are long past the point of forgiveness. Too much has been done. Too much.”
Kathryn nodded against his broad chest. She could hear his powerful heart beat within him, and she listened and nodded again. She didn’t want to hear any more. Not now. Already she could put some of the pieces together: Since Hyder was alive, he clearly gave his captors something valuable—information, loyalty . . . something. Or someone.
“Who?” she finally said, nuzzling into him as she felt the warm desert breeze blow grains of sand against her bare ankles. “Who did you give up to buy your freedom?”
The Sheikh’s body tightened against hers. “What makes you ask me that?”
“Well,” said Kathryn. “You said the people you’d betrayed to the CIA were wealthy and powerful, which means you couldn’t offer them money. You could offer them loyalty, but they couldn’t possibly trust you. Which means—”
“Do you trust me?” the Sheikh asked, interrupting her. “Tell me now. Without thinking. Without allowing reason, logic, or common sense to dictate the answer. What does your instinct say? What does your intuition say? What does your heart say?”
Kathryn’s heart almost stopped when she saw the urgency in his devastatingly green eyes. Already she could feel those triplets of reason, logic, and common sense pounding at the door and screaming for her to stop, to say no, to back off. You’re being played, manipulated, seduced by the man you were sent to seduce. He’s a professional liar, just like you are! There is no truth here! There is no trust here! There’s just . . . there’s just . . .
There’s just you and him, came the thought, and it came straight from her heart. Just you and him. There’s no other truth right now. Perhaps there never will be any other truth. Hold on to this, Kathryn. Hold on.
But reason and logic still came on hard, and finally Kathryn looked up into his eyes and sighed. “If it were just the two of us, then yes. I feel like I can trust you, Hyder. But it’s not just the two of us. There are so many others with stakes in this game that’s unfolding. If it were just the two of us, then—”
“Then it will be just the two of us,” growled the Sheikh, grasping her hands and looking down at her. “We are dead, as far as the world is concerned. Those F-16s did not fly down to take us out, which means they did not see us eject. The smoke from the exploding chopper must have given us initial cover, and once we were below a certain altitude, the pilots would not have been able to see our parachutes from above. We are dead, Kathryn. Which means we can be reborn. New lives. You and I.”
Kathryn stared at him like either he was mad or she was mad. Then she decided they were both mad. Completely insane. A day ago she hadn’t even been in the same room as him. Now she was looking into his eyes, thinking about having babies and living like Arab gypsies in the goddamn desert.
She couldn’t speak. Even those voices of logic and reason were struck mute at first. But then they started to whisper from the background of her mind. After all, those inside voices muttered, if the people trying to kill you think you’re dead, it does make sense to stay dead for at least a while, doesn’t it? Until you figure out what’s going on? Yes? Sure, said those voices. It makes sense. Say yes, Kathryn. You can say yes. It’s not insane at all. It makes total sense. Go on, girl!
She started to nod like in a trance, and as if the desert was acknowledging her choice, she caught movement against the dunes to her left. She turned, and it was a train of four enormous camels, majestically moving in slow motion, two with riders and two with empty saddles.
“Ah, excellent!” said the Sheikh. “Our taxis have arrived.”