The Aleppo Code (The Jerusalem Prophecies) (33 page)

“Do you really think we can look like a documentary television crew?” asked Rizzo. “I don’t know anything about television except for
Amazing Race.
”

“And
Barney
,” said Joe.

Rizzo waved the back of his hand toward where Rodriguez was sitting with his wife. “Funny man. If you took the time, you’d realize there’s a lot you can learn from
Barney
.”

“Like how to dress?” Joe needled.

“Like how to count to ten, Brillo-head.” Rizzo got up from the table and walked into the kitchen as his tower of cards collapsed.

Annie felt a pang of compassion for Rizzo. She saw Joe steal a quick glance in Deirdre’s direction.

“I think we’ve got the old Sammy back with us again,” he said in a low voice.

Annie’s compassion turned red. “I think you better be careful,” she snapped. “He’s still the old Sammy, but he’s a wounded and damaged Sammy who’s trying to show us a brave face. He’s emotionally brittle, and he could shatter at any moment.”

Joe turned to face Annie head-on. “Sure, he’s hurting,” he said. “But I don’t think applying kid gloves is the best way to treat Sammy right now. He’s tough—tougher than you may realize. And the way to help him through this—I think—is to help him be the tough Rizzo that he is at heart. Needle him and let him needle you right back. Get his combative juices flowing again. Sure, his heart is broken. He’s grieving. But he’ll stay broken and grieving if we don’t challenge him. He can go through the eight phases of grief when we get home, but right now we need Sammy ready to fight.”

“You’ll all need to be ready to fight, I’m afraid.” Rabbi Fineman was picking up the playing cards, trying to rebuild Sammy’s tower.

Annie could see the concern on his face. “We know it will be dangerous,” she said.

The rabbi slowly shook his head. “No, I don’t think you do,” he said. “You are venturing into the most unstable geography on earth, and probably the most deadly. Syria is in the throes of implosion—there is no government control in half the nation, and Al-Musawi thinks pouring poisonous gas on his own citizens is the way to maintain the legitimacy of his rule. Lebanon is still in the grip of a terrorist organization with scores of rockets pointed at Israel. Hundreds of thousands of refugees are fleeing over every border to the point that national boundaries are obscured. And there’s a naval battle going on in the Persian Gulf that might already be a third Mideast war.

“Westerners are not only viewed with suspicion in Arab nations, but they are often harassed and threatened by mobs of Islamists. Saddam may be gone, that war may be over, but ISIS has overrun nearly one-third of the country and they are cutting off the heads of people they don’t like. You won’t be that far from the fighting. It may be a simple thing to get into Iraq, but with what you’re seeking, it will be much more difficult to get out.”

8:12 p.m., New York City

Secretary of the Treasury Robert Gephart walked down Maiden Lane with the confidence and aplomb of a man who used to own the real estate upon which his soft, Italian calfskin loafers walked—which he did. Once. Once, the movers of Wall Street shook at the mention of his name. Now, operating in service to the president he admired and supported, Gephart no longer owned, officially, the power he once held at Lehman and Bear Stearns. Not legally, anyway.

At the tiny dot of a park called Nevidon Plaza, Gephart turned left on William Street and stopped in front of an ornately carved wooden door. There was no number at the entrance, no name on the three-hundred-year-old Federal-style building.

Sunday nights in the Financial District of Manhattan were as quiet as Coney Island in January. Gephart knocked once, looked over his shoulder at the empty street, and entered the darkened building as soon as the door was opened.

“Robert, I believe you know Finance Minister Lin.”

“Yes, thank you, Abraham. The minister and I were undergrads at Stanford together. Minister Lin, I am blessed to see you again, and grateful for your support.”

Lin Hu Na was CEO of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China. With three trillion dollars of assets, ICBC was the largest bank in the world. He was also the most powerful financial official in the government of the People’s Republic of China.

His host, Abraham Rothschild, was chairman and owner of the Rothschild Group and Rothschild AG Bank in Switzerland, but more importantly was also the controlling force behind what was called the Bern Consortium, the shadow cabinet of the Swiss private banking system. These two men controlled more of the world’s wealth than even the Arab conspiracy trying to conquer Europe. Lin stepped toward Gephart, his hand outstretched. “No need to thank me, Mr. Secretary. We’re all here with one purpose, to save the world we know from the world we fear. Let us get to work.”

Gephart’s heart warmed. After all these years, the most important thing in finance was still true. Life was all about relationships. Sure, nations and agendas were important. But when push came to shove, who you knew was so much more important than where you lived or who you served.

Rothschild put a snifter of brandy on the table next to Gephart and returned to his chair on the far side of the empty fireplace. “As the euro continues to devalue, Abbudin has ordered Saudi banks to demand immediate repayment of loans they made to eurozone countries. The European Union is facing bankruptcy. Economically speaking, Spain, Greece, and Italy have ceased to exist.”

Gephart picked up the snifter and swirled the golden liquid around its crystal sides as he calculated why these men were here … and what the next few moments might cost.

“Mr. Secretary,” said Rothschild, “the Saudi banks, the Arab world, have eaten us for dinner. They own everything … everything that matters. If something dramatic doesn’t happen in the next twelve hours, the Western world will cease to exist and the Second Caliphate will extend from Germany to India and beyond for as long as any of us will live. Minister Han and I don’t intend to allow that to happen. You need to know what we intend to do.”

M
ONDAY
, A
UGUST
31

8:15 a.m., Jerusalem

“Do you have the water bottles, Sammy?”

“Sure. Same as the last time you—”

“How many?” Annie didn’t stop as she crossed the living room of the apartment, just turned her head in Rizzo’s direction.

“Six, just as many—”

“Good. Fold them tight.”

Annie heard Rizzo’s grumbles as she looked out the window. But she had more on her mind than Sammy’s gripes. She looked across the parking lot, down the Bar Lev Road.
Is there enough time?

She turned away from the window and passed close to Rizzo, who was still wrestling the five-gallon, collapsible plastic water jugs into the bottom of a knapsack. “Cushion them so they don’t squeak,” said Annie, her voice low and soothing as she laid her hand on Rizzo’s shoulder. “We’ll need every one of them where we’re going.”

Annie walked down the hall and past the bathroom, headed for the kitchen. The bathroom door was open. “Got the first-aid kit?”

Joe looked up, a brush in his hand and his mouth full of toothpaste. “Yessh,” he spluttered.

“Make sure there’s extra antibiotic and extra bandages.” She left a gurgle in her wake.

Tom was in the kitchen, carefully packing boxes of dried food, cushioned by his surrounding clothes, into a large duffel bag.

“Is the satellite phone turned off?”

“I’ve got the battery in my pocket. Reynolds won’t be able to track our position.”

“Sugar and salt?”

“Yes, I told—”

“Spoons, knives, forks … cups?”

“Yes,” said Tom, turning to his wife. Annie could see objection in his face, then it changed. “Oh … forgot the cups. But you’re marching through here every ten minutes like a general getting his army ready for a long march. You’re giving everybody the willies.”

Annie opened her mouth, but took a deep breath instead of snapping at Tom. “I know. I’m sorry. There’s just so much to remember. The
NG
crew has enough supplies for themselves, but not for the four of us. And we have so little time. Sam Reynolds could be here any minute, and I don’t think we’re ready.”

“I’ll be ready,” said Tom. Annie could feel the comfort of his hand on her cheek. “We’ll be as ready as we can be. I just hope this plan works.”

Annie placed her hand on his. “It has to. It’s the only one we have.” She swept her gaze across the kitchen once more. “Bring some bleach—we’ll need to keep things clean, or we’ll all end up with—well, we don’t want it. Let’s huddle in five minutes.”

Without a glance back, Annie turned on her heel, exited the kitchen, and entered the small dining alcove. Deirdre and McDonough leaned over, looking down at a map spread across the table.

“Aye … it’s a trip I wouldn’t wish on me uncle Seamus, and I wasn’t too fond of him to begin with,” said McDonough, shaking his head. “That’s a long way. Too much for me, even if I wasn’t required back at Trinity. ’Tis a marvel the old gent, Jeremiah, could make it to Babylon and back.”

“Over six hundred miles,” said Annie as she came up behind them. “Desert all the way, very little water, and too many bandits just waiting for people foolish enough to wander off the main highway.”

Deirdre looked up from the map and caught Annie’s gaze. “Are you sure you need to go … not get home to your kids? Are you sure this is the best way back?”

“Sure? I’m not sure of anything,” said Annie. “It’s my idea. I’m the cover. But first we need to get there, and then we can hopefully maneuver around Iraq with some level of freedom. I don’t know if it’s going to work, but it’s the best I could think of. At least we have a legitimate reason for being in Iraq. After that—well, who knows what we’ll find.”

“Or how you’ll get home,” said McDonough.

Annie put her hands on her hips and let out a sigh. “Fly out, I hope. Krupp’s going to leave his plane there for us. And if we can’t fly out, we rely on Fischoff. If absolutely necessary, we come back across the desert.”

“Where do you meet the
National Geographic
crew?” asked Deirdre.

“They’ll meet us at the airport in Baghdad. So once we hook up with them, our cover should be pretty solid.” Annie had pulled in some pretty heavy favors, and she would be in their debt a long time. She, Tom, Joe, and Rizzo now carried official
National Geographic
IDs and work documents connecting them to the photo team already in Iraq.

Annie looked down at the faint line crossing the al-Anbar Desert, and her hopes felt almost as faint. If it came to a race across the desert wastes, her final phone call last night, after Tom had fallen asleep, might be the one that saved their lives. Tom wouldn’t be happy about this one, but it was Annie’s ace. And she was pretty sure they would need to play it at some point.

“What about Reynolds?” asked Deirdre. “He’s the first big hurdle. He’s smart, he’s cagey, and he’s experienced. I think it’s going to be pretty difficult to pull off the sleight of hand you’ve got planned.”

Annie turned to fully face her sister-in-law. Deirdre had recently turned forty-five, but time failed to diminish any of her stunning beauty—flawless skin, flaming red curls, and blue eyes bristling with mischief. “Honey, that’s where you come in. We need you to flash those big blue eyes so that Sam Reynolds will forget what country’s he’s in. You’ve got to keep his attention, and his mind off us. You just get between Reynolds and the van, and lead him on. Make sure he’s not looking at anything but you.”

Annie glanced once more at the map. She was about to call across the room to Rizzo when the front door buzzer cut short her thoughts.

“Showtime,” whispered McDonough.

6:24 a.m., London

“A long, sad day, Mr. President. I am so sorry to hear about your son.” The United Kingdom’s prime minister, Michael J. O’Neill, stood in front of a bank of computer screens in a fortified room under 10 Downing Street, the Admiralty’s three senior officers in an arc around him, all studying the deployment of ships in the Persian Gulf.

“Thank you, Michael. What will Parliament decide?”