NINETEEN
Jack Raines watched as Ehud worked his way through the people moving along the pedestrian mall near a corner café. Police in light blue shirts and dark blue flak jackets watched over everyone as they walked in pairs along the street. Soldiers in the distance kept watch from their posts.
Jack paused to wait as Ehud, the Mossad team leader in plain clothes, approached. Ehud stepped back out of the way momentarily for a gaggle of older women in a tour group, chatting and laughing among themselves as they moved up the street, all of them loaded down with bags from recent purchases. They were all in a cheerful mood, giving little thought to any danger that might be among them. That was human nature. It was the job of Jack and those watching with him to think of little else.
There were tourists of every variety and speaking a variety of different languages visiting the pedestrian malls in the Jerusalem Triangle. Shops along the stone streets were busy selling artwork, clothes, shoes, religious souvenirs, fresh fruit, housewares, and baked goods. Once the tight knot of tourists had passed, Jack signaled with a tilt of his head for the man to come closer.
“We have everyone in position,” Ehud said as he joined Jack. “We’re ready to begin again.”
Jack nodded. “I’ll get Uziel and start a sweep. Stay close. He’s already nervous. I don’t want anything spooking him. And I certainly don’t want him getting hurt. He’s too valuable.”
Jack scanned the people all up and down the street. The Triangle seemed unusually crowded. Maybe it was just his anxiety playing mind tricks. The plan was to go up Ben Yehuda Street, past the colorful shops, sidewalk cafés, and food stands where the heaviest concentration of tourists visited. Crowds drew threat.
Jack and his team were hunting threats.
“Don’t worry, we will keep in constant contact with both of you,” Ehud said.
“Be ready for my signal if Uziel spots anyone.”
Jack watched for anything out of the ordinary as the light rail cars swept by, carrying a whirling rush of sound with them. Once they were past, the sound of shuffling shoes and conversation seeped back into the sunny day. Jack could hear music in the distance, and closer in, some bubbly laughter.
In the street beyond, three green buses lined up at the curb to let people out for the Triangle area. Squadrons of white taxis prowled the surrounding streets, waiting for fares or to drop people off. Soldiers, police, and men and women in plain clothes watched over everyone, hoping that the visitors had a pleasant, uneventful day in the Triangle.
Not long ago Uziel’s rare vision had been spot-on and they had captured an assassin before he could do any harm. They didn’t know where he was from, or what his target had been, but they knew by the way he kept his mouth shut that he was well trained. Jack thought that it would be quite a while before they got much of anything out of him.
It took time with men like that. The Mossad would have to find an angle, a crack they could exploit to open him up. Jack knew that they would eventually succeed, at least to some extent, but it would take time. For now, what was important was that he was off the streets.
With the heavy crowds in the area the difficulty of identifying threats was increased. The more people there were, the easier it was for a terrorist to hide among them. But that was why they were using Uziel. He could see what none of them ever could.
“Keep your eyes open,” Jack said. “I’ll go get him.”
Ehud melted into the people perusing the rows of bread on display in a shopwindow next door. He and his team would be close by at all times.
Inside the café, Jack saw Uziel standing off to the side, next to a tall wrought-iron table where a couple of Americans were talking. The tabletop was only big enough for a few people to rest their drinks. Uziel, one forearm resting on the table, idly turned a cup of coffee round and round as his gaze darted about, looking at everyone.
He was nervous and with good reason. Those very rare individuals with his ability to recognize killers were often the targets of rare predators who could recognize them for that ability. Human predators, just like the four-legged kind, didn’t like any interference with their hunting. If spotted, the four-legged kind would usually move on and come back to hunt another time. The human predators, on the other hand, sought to eliminate anyone who could recognize them to give themselves free rein to hunt as they pleased.
More than that, though, Jack knew that Uziel was tense for other reasons. His young wife had recently died of a brain tumor. They had been married for only two months when the tumor had been discovered. Her health went downhill rapidly from there. Three months after the tumor had been discovered, she was dead. Uziel was left dazed by the trauma and feeling lost.
That was when Jack discovered him. He had been shopping for dinner and saw Uziel doing the same. Jack couldn’t tell if someone was a killer by looking at their eyes, the way Uziel could, but he had the singular ability to recognize those who could. He struck up a conversation with the young man, and eventually Jack filled a void in Uziel’s life, giving him a purpose.
To an extent, Jack understood Uziel’s pain. A woman he had once been fond of had that same special ability as Uziel. Jack had tried to convince her of the danger she was in, but she wanted nothing to do with Jack’s help. At least, not until it was too late. One of those predators had recognized her for her ability and murdered her. That experience had made him realize that in his calling he couldn’t afford the risk of emotional entanglement.
But that was before he had met Kate. Kate was different. She had of course been confused and skeptical at first, but she quickly came to grasp everything Jack had told her. He had helped teach her how to survive. Together they worked to stop a highly unusual nest of predators bent on hunting and killing those with her ability.
Over time, Kate had come to mean more to him than he thought anyone ever could. Every line of her face, her mannerisms, the sound of her voice, were now stitched into his soul.
Her ability far outstripped that of anyone he had ever found before. Not only was she able to recognize killers, but she had vague visions of what those killers had done. This was the ultimate type of person Jack searched for. From years of research he was sure they had to exist, but Kate was the only one he’d ever found with that higher-level ability.
Unfortunately, in a battle with that nest of murderers, Jack had been gravely wounded. He had died for a time even as a team of Mossad combat medics worked on him. No one thought he would make it. He didn’t remember anything after that hail of bullets, except the fading vision of Kate’s horror-stricken face.
That memory still haunted him.
He never regained consciousness before being flown to Israel to see if there was anything the doctors there could do to keep him alive. To save Kate the trauma of what they believed would be his inevitable death, and at best a vegetative state even if they were able to save his life, they told her that he had died. Everyone thought it best.
After he’d eventually come out of the coma, Jack had spent seven months in the hospital recovering from his injuries, and then there were more months of physical therapy. By the time he had been aware enough to do anything, Kate had vanished.
She was highly intelligent, as those at her level of ability were. She had come to understand both what her ability meant, and the danger it put her in. She had done what Jack had taught her to do—what he’d told her she would need to do. She had gone off the grid and disappeared. Not even his friends in the Mossad could locate her.
For people like Kate, who could recognize killers, the safest thing to do was to be invisible. Their kind were always hunted by rare super-predators. Since the ability ran in families, that kind of killer often murdered the entire family to make sure that none with the ability survived.
Jack circled an arm around Uziel’s shoulders. “How are you doing?”
Uziel forced a smile. “I’m fine.”
He didn’t look fine. He chewed gum with his mouth open as if his life depended on it while his gaze darted around at the people outside on the street.
“Let’s not draw attention, all right?” Jack put a finger under the young man’s chin to close his mouth. Uziel smiled self-consciously and spit the gum into his empty coffee cup.
“How about we get going?” Jack said. “You did good before spotting that last killer. Just remember what I told you—don’t fixate. Scan and take in as many different pairs of eyes as you can.”
Uziel swiped a lock of straight brown hair back off his forehead. He leaned a little closer.
“I’m fine, Jack. Really.” He let out a deep breath to calm himself. “I want to do this. I want to stop anyone else from losing a loved one.”
Jack pressed his earpiece, listening to his team calling out their location, before leading Uziel out of the café. The streets in this area of Jerusalem, known as the Triangle, had long been closed to automobile traffic and turned into an open-air pedestrian mall. It was a beautiful area, with trees in planters down the center of some of the streets and a wide variety of shopping along with a vibrant nightlife.
The nightlife also drew crowds, which were also a target for terrorists. But with Uziel’s talent it was easier to spot killers in the daytime. Uziel needed to be able to see their eyes. Darkness provided cover. Of course, so did sunglasses.