The blankets would make them more comfortable, and they could subsist on the commissary food if they had to. Of course, there was always the prison food that came to their cell three times a day.

  Back in the cell, Tunca was near tears when he saw what the agents had brought and offered to share with him.

  The man’s gratitude made Morgan uncomfortable. The few dollars in commissary items were nothing to Morgan and Conley. Yet Tunca had given his last few sips of drinkable water to men he did not know.

  After lunch they were ushered into the prison yard. Morgan and Conley found a small concrete table, while their cellmate checked in with some of the other inmates.

  When the journalist returned, he said through Conley, “The American scientist, he is still in one of the sponge cells.”

  Morgan didn’t like that. Two weeks was too long for a man to be in solitary. Depending on the person, the effects could soon start to go from temporary to lasting.

  And Dr. Erdem’s ability to withstand the isolation would be diminished if he had no hope of release.

  To Tunca, the agents merely nodded at the news and Conley pulled out his great find from the commissary: a deck of playing cards.

  The men agreed on poker, which Conley explained was extremely popular in Turkey. Tunca introduced them to a few Turkish variations and they passed an hour. As they were wrapping up, Conley relayed that tomorrow Tunca would teach them a game called Maça Kizi, some sort of a Turkish version of Hearts.

  That seemed to please Conley, who quickly grew bored with card games that were too simple. Even nominal betting would have made the game more interesting, but that was a bad idea. The guards tolerated the cards but Morgan knew that any form of gambling was strictly forbidden—for some sort of religious reason.

  After the game, Morgan had Conley ask Tunca for his story.

  The journalist sat quietly and then gave his reply, which Conley relayed. “He says he worked for the Hurriyet, it’s the largest newspaper in the country. He was investigating leaked emails that showed a connection between Turkey’s energy minister and a corrupt scheme to buy oil from various forbidden terrorist groups in the Middle East. Because of his articles he was arrested on charges of ‘terrorism’ and ‘anti-state’ activity.”

  Tunca and Conley chatted a bit more, and then Conley said, “He doesn’t expect his case to go to trial. He thinks they will keep him here, and then he will simply disappear.”

  From the president’s point of view that made sense if the report was true and especially if the president himself was involved or had authorized the deals. Given the iron grip he had on the country, Morgan assumed Shakir was pulling the strings.

  “Tell him I’m sorry to hear that,” Morgan said.

  Tunca shrugged, as if to say that is just the way it is here.

  Morgan recognized the shrug from countless places around the world. It was the shrug of people who didn’t have much hope.

  And given what he knew about the way this country was going, Morgan wasn’t sure there was much hope of things getting better, at least in the short term.

  The three men were silent on the way back to their cell. On the outside, Morgan was just another resigned prisoner heading back to his cell. On the inside, he felt a pit of anger starting in his stomach.

  The snarling face of their guard, the one with the scar on his cheek, didn’t help Morgan’s mood. Just as the man opened the cell door, he put a hand on Tunca’s shoulder while the two agents stepped inside.

  Morgan turned around to see the bars slide shut, with Tunca on the other side.

  “What’s going on?” Morgan said to Conley.

  Tunca said a few words and Conley said, “Interrogation.”

  In the second before he was pulled away, Tunca’s eyes met Morgan’s and the journalist gave a little shrug.

  Morgan watched them go, that pit of anger in his stomach getting bigger by the second.

  * * * *

  “What should I do?” Shepard asked.

  Alex kept her expression neutral and her voice calm. “When it starts, step away. I’ll need some room. And yell if you see either one of them draw a gun,” she said.

  “Okay,” Shepard said. The young man was remarkably cool. He was nervous, but not exactly scared—which was a good enough description of how she was feeling herself. That was good—being too scared or too confident during a fight could get you hurt or killed.

  Alex and Shepard turned into the alley and Alex saw that it was a dead end. That meant there was only one way out—through the two men who were behind them.

  That was fine with Alex; she just hoped that Shepard kept out of the way. For one, she didn’t want to see him get hurt. Secondly, she needed him all in one piece to complete the mission.

  “I see them now,” Shepard said. By now it was impossible to miss them. They were no more than fifteen paces behind Alex and Shepard.

  “Any chance we’ll get caught on a security camera?” Alex asked quietly.

  “No,” Shepard replied. “Zeta will be tracking us by our phones and watching the feeds. They’ll cut them if there’s anything we wouldn’t want the authorities to see.”

  That was good. It meant that Alex could do what she had to do without worrying about having the police see the footage or—worse—having it end up on the evening news.

  The men’s footsteps now echoed in the alley. They were walking briskly, and she estimated they were now less than ten paces behind. That’s when she turned quickly on her heels to face them and said, “Can I help you?”

  That stopped the two men cold. They were of average height, and by the dull, menacing expressions on their faces, they were of maybe average intelligence. They also didn’t move like military men or trained fighters.

  As instructed, Shepard moved sideways, ending up with his back against the alley wall as Alex kept herself in the center of the space. To her surprise, the men ignored her and kept their eyes on Shepard.

  Because of course they did…

  Like the cab drivers, they would only deal with the man she was with. You’ve got to be kidding me, she thought.

  Shepard spoke up. “Maybe you can help us, we got turned around.”

  The men responded with something incomprehensible in Turkish. Shepard continued, “We’re trying to find Tanis. There’s this map room that’s supposed to get us to the Well of Souls.”

  Alex smiled as the men each pulled out a small club—no, a blackjack.

  So a robbery then, she thought. Or worse.

  She said a silent thanks to her Zeta martial arts instructor Alicia Schmitt, who had made her train in the kind of clothes she’d be wearing on this mission: dresses and high heels. The dresses actually made movement easier but the heels had been a bit of a challenge at first.

  Alex launched herself at the man closest to her. She considered her options, running through several different scenarios for a first strike. In the end, she decided not to get too fancy. She had nothing to prove, and she didn’t want to take any chances.

  Alex brought her Prada bag around in a long arc, the weight of the pistol adding quite a bit to the force of the blow when the bag made solid contact with the side of the man’s head.

  The thud was loud and the man dropped to the pavement.

  The second man turned in surprise and Alex saw that the dull look on his face definitely wasn’t an act. Of course, that didn’t mean he wasn’t dangerous.

  Once he realized what had happened, he re-directed and swung the blackjack at Alex.

  She side-stepped the blow and saw that the purse and gun wouldn’t be much help here. She tossed the purse toward Shepard and assumed a ready position.

  He lunged forward and swung the blackjack again. She dodged by pulling her head back and to one side. He missed but his weapon came within an inch of her face.

  That was too close, Alex thought. She had to end this quickly.

  He was fast and he was gaining confidence. Plus, even though he didn’t have any training and depended wholly on his weapon, if the small club made contact with her head she would be in trouble.

  They circled each other and she realized that the man wasn’t even glancing at Shepard. She now had his full attention and didn’t know if that was the good news or the bad news.

  She realized that he had been driving the fight and decided that she had to take charge and direct what happened next. Alex pretended to stumble on her left heel and he struck quickly, swinging the blackjack at her.

  She pushed off with the same left heel and threw herself into the arc of his attack. This time, however, she raised her left forearm to block the blow before the swing was complete.

  It was still a jarring blow, but it was his wrist and not the club that made contact—and that was the difference between a bruise and a broken arm.

  While he was off balance, Alex launched a kick with her right foot while grabbing his wrist with her left hand. He grunted in surprise as she pulled the blackjack out of that hand and clocked him in the head with it.

  He fell with a look of dumb shock still on his face. Alex turned him over and pulled out his wallet.

  “Grab his I.D.,” she said to Shepard, who did the same with the first attacker.

  Half a minute later Shepard handed her the man’s I.D., which she photographed and sent to Zeta for a background.

  Meanwhile, Shepard had found both men’s phones and used their thumbprints to unlock them.

  He scrolled through the devices, a frown on his face.

  Then the report came in from Zeta. She gave Shepard the highlights. “Petty crime. No connection to terror groups, kidnapping rings, or the government.”

  “Not just petty crime. Some of this stuff is rough,” Shepard said.

  “Well, maybe they’ll think twice next time,” she said.

  “I think we can do better than that, if I can take a minute,” Shepard said.

  “We don’t have much time. We’re lucky no one has come by.”

  “This won’t take long,” Shepard said.

  Alex stepped forward to take a lookout position. At the sound of rustling, Alex turned around to see Shepard removing one of the attacker’s pants, and then his shoes. Then he repeated the operation on the second man.

  “You taking their pants?” she said.

  “It will give them more to explain when they’re found,” Shepard said as he tossed the pants and shoes into a trash bin.

  “You’ll want to turn around for this,” he said. Alex did and she heard more rustling as Shepard removed their undershorts and tossed them as well.

  “I wish we could hear their explanation,” Alex said as they walked calmly and purposefully out of the alley.

  “They could always tell the truth: a female tourist beat them unconscious and then some guy took their pants,” Shepard said.

  Alex laughed out loud at that one, as she felt the adrenaline from the fight slowly dissipating. She was impressed that Shepard had kept his cool. He was even making jokes.

  When they were a good distance and a few turns away from the alley, Shepard pointed to a bench and they sat. He pulled out the phones, took out a screen cleaner, and wiped them for prints.

  As part of Zeta, Shepard’s prints would not appear on any database in the world, but it was better to be safe than sorry.

  “Now what? We can’t just turn them into the police,” Alex said.

  “I hadn’t thought that far ahead,” Shepard said.

  Alex scanned the area. “How about that?” she said, pointing to a mailbox outside of a bank.

  “Sure. If we drop them inside they’ll probably find their way to the police.”

  Before Alex got up she realized why she was shaky. The heel on her right shoe was loose. Of course, that was the foot she’d used to kick the second attacker.

  Pulling the shoe off, she saw it was a loss. Besides the heel, the scuffs were bad.

  They were too expensive and very impractical, but even so, they were a nice pair of shoes and it was a shame to waste them.

  “Call us a cab. Alex Jackson needs to go shopping,” she said to Shepard.

  Chapter 8

  The guards didn’t bring Tunca back until the next day.

  The man took one step into the cell and fell into the hands of Morgan and Conley. Morgan didn’t dare make eye contact with the two guards. It wouldn’t help anything for them to see how he felt about them.

  As they helped him onto his bed, Morgan saw that Tunca wasn’t just thin, he was emaciated.

  Conley gave the journalist a quick exam while keeping him talking.

  “No concussion. Nothing broken that I can see,” Conley announced.

  “Of course, they are very good at what they do,” Morgan said.

  The agents got some water into Tunca but he turned down food.

  “He just wants to sleep,” Conley said.

  When Tunca was comfortable Morgan asked, “Do they want information?” Morgan said.

  Conley had a quick exchange with Tunca and then said, “He told everything he knew in his articles.”

  “So this is just part of the punishment?” Morgan asked.

  Conley didn’t respond. He didn’t have to.

  After a minute Conley said, “I know everything you’re thinking. In a few weeks we can just get the hell out of here.”

  It was true, Morgan thought, but what about Tunca and the tens of thousands of men and women across the country like him?

  And what about the millions of people left in the country who knew that places like this awaited them if they stepped out of line…or told too much of the truth?

  Suddenly a few more weeks seemed like a hell of a long time.

  Less than an hour later the guards returned and Conley said, “Dan, you have a visitor. Your daughter is here.”

  That got Morgan’s attention.

  He got up and the guards brought him to the central hub, and then into a room with a long counter that was partitioned into ten individual cubbies. Each cubby had had two chairs with a glass partition in between them. The glass was high enough that visitors couldn’t pass anything to the inmates but low enough that they could hear one another.

  Morgan saw his daughter sitting in the cubicle on the far end. That was better; it meant other people on only one side of them. Of course, Morgan had no illusions about privacy here. Especially in a political prison such as this, they had to assume the administration was listening in on prisoners’ conversations with visitors.

  Alex was blonde and wearing a brightly colored dress. She was also heavily made up and appeared more like a minor wannabe celebrity than the intelligent, practical daughter he’d known for more than twenty years.

  That’s undercover work for you, he thought.

  “Hi Daddy!” Alex said with a forced brightness in her voice.

  “Hi Honey,” he said, taking a seat.

  “When are you coming home?” she asked.

  “Soon, but aren’t you early? I thought you were too busy to come right away,” he said. The fact was that she wasn’t due for weeks.

  “I hated the idea of you all alone here,” she said, taking in the room. “It’s awful.”

  Though Alex Jackson may not have exactly been his daughter, on that they could agree.

  “I don’t want you exposed to this, sweetie,” he said.

  She ignored his comment and said, “Do you want Mommy to call anyone? Can’t we just fix this?”

  “We can. It’s all a big mistake. I’ve got a great lawyer and he’ll sort it all out in no time. Is everything okay at home?”

  “Yes, but now Mommy and I have to do all the arrangements for my birthday party without you,” she said with a pout.

  “Like I said, it won’t be long and I don’t want you to worry,” he said.

  “I’ll stay as long as it takes,” she replied.

  “Then try to have fun while you’re here and stay out of trouble,” he said.

  As they filled out the rest of the visit with pleasantries, Morgan decoded what she’d told him so far: Everything was on track and she’d simply decided to set up the back office early.

  All he had to do was sit tight and keep to the timetable.

  The problem was that as they spoke he realized that something was wrong. Alex wasn’t nervous. And she was doing an excellent job maintaining her cover. These weren’t his agent’s instincts kicking in; these were his father’s instincts.

  As they got up and said good-bye, Morgan realized what it was. Alex was wearing a cardigan over her dress.

  A long-sleeved cardigan.

  She was intentionally hiding something from him. An injury?

  Had there been trouble? He was suddenly sure of it. And she’d just been here a few days. If they kept to the mission plan, they would all be here for more than another month.

  And there would be plenty of opportunities for real trouble when the mission went into its active phase.

  Suddenly his frustration with what was going on in this country and this prison threatened to boil over. On top of everything else, the longer the mission went on, the greater the danger to the back office personnel—the greater the danger to Alex.

  He was sure she could handle anything they threw at her…and yet that pit in his stomach was growing by the second.

  Heading back through the hub, Morgan passed a series of offices. There was a man in a suit talking to two subordinates, and suddenly the posture of the guards escorting him changed. They stood up straight, grasping him firmly.

  Who was the man in the suit? The warden? Probably. Well if that was the case, Morgan thought he might like to file a few complaints…

  The man turned around and Morgan got his first good look at him. He would have recognized him even without the eye patch.

 

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