Blood Trust - Eric van Lustbader [146]
“What will Thatë do to him?” Alli said.
As if in answer, an unearthly howl pierced the night. It came again. There was nothing human about it, nothing familiar. The third howl made Alli shiver. It was impossible to imagine what kind of creature could make that sound, or what could be causing it.
Alli made a motion to go into the woods after Annika and Thatë, but Jack put a gentle hand on her forearm.
“I wouldn’t,” he said.
She looked at him. “She’ll get what she wants, won’t she?”
“I believe she always gets what she wants.”
Alli nodded. “Did you suspect that Thatë was hers?”
Jack sighed. “I should have.”
“In retrospect, it all makes so much sense: his position inside Xhafa’s network, his being sent to Tetovo to spy on Xhafa, his commanding an elite group of Russians in Western Macedonia.”
They saw Annika walking toward them. Thatë appeared out of the pine shadows a moment later. He was cleaning something on a wad of fallen pine needles; they couldn’t see what and Jack refused to speculate on what it might be.
“I know where Xhafa is,” she told them when she came abreast of them. “I also know where he’s holding Liridona. Unfortunately they’re on opposite sides of the city.”
Thatë now joined them. There was no sign of whatever he’d been cleaning off, no sign on either of them that they had been interrogating a member of the enemy.
“These were not Xhafa’s people,” she said to Jack. “They were the Syrian’s.”
“I don’t understand,” Jack said.
“I didn’t, either, until Thatë and I convinced this man—Baltasar—to confess. As I told you, the Syrian has stepped into Berns’s shoes and become Xhafa’s arms connection. This has been beneficial for Xhafa because, believe it or not, the Syrian’s access to cutting-edge weaponry is better than Senator Berns’s was. But the situation is now far more explosive. In return for the weapons, Xhafa allows the Syrian to export his particular brand of terrorism all over the world via Xhafa’s private fleet of planes. The Syrian has connections with the Colombian and Mexican cartels, who are moving massive amounts of drugs from Afghanistan and the Golden Triangle in Southeast Asia for perhaps a half-dozen Muslim extremist organizations who are using the drug money to pay the Syrian for arms. It’s a toxic global network with the Syrian at the center.”
Jack had to stop himself from calling Paull immediately to tell him how much more dire the situation had become. Arian Xhafa was merely a symptom; the Syrian was the disease. He needed some answers first.
“What does all this have to do with the Syrian sending a death squad after us?”
“Let’s get back in the car,” Annika said.
When they were on their way back to the highway, she said, “For the past four months, the Syrian has been trying to get to my grandfather. Having failed in those attempts, I fear he’s now coming after me as the only other way he can think of to get to Dyadya Gourdjiev.”
“What does he want with your grandfather?” Alli asked.
“Dyadya Gourdjiev’s brain. It’s a storehouse of secrets,” Annika said.
“That sounds pretty vague,” Jack interjected.
All he got in response was one of Annika’s enigmatic smiles. “Here’s our problem. We need to get to Xhafa and the Syrian as quickly as possible, but the same holds true for Liridona. She’s being held in a safehouse in the western part of Vlorë. The Syrian’s compound is in the northeast.”
“Which means we need to split up,” Alli said. “Thatë and I will get Liridona.”
“And I said no.”
“You haven’t,” Alli said hotly. “Not explicitly.”
He was about to once again expound on the subject of letting her loose in hostile territory when he caught Annika’s expression, and he remembered their discussion about knowing what was best for Alli. He recalled how he’d bridled when she’d told him that she’d made the decision