Layover in Dubai Read online

  “I hope the rest of your stay in Dubai is not so unfortunate,” Sharaf said.

  The door shut in his face.

  Any sort of run-in with Assad was potentially troublesome. But Sharaf supposed it was inevitable, because he was already thinking he wanted to pursue this case further. Unofficially, of course, just the way the Minister wanted it. This might well be the opening they had been seeking—a suitable spot for diving deeper, so to speak, to see if there was anything worth retrieving from the seabed. A few oysters, perhaps. Maybe even a pearl or two. And the Minister wouldn’t exactly be sorry if Assad was involved, seeing as how they were from rival clans. That was an aspect of Dubai that outsiders never quite fathomed. They might all dress the same, and draw wealth from the same pools of oil and real estate, but deeper loyalties were still sometimes determined by long ago battles in the dunes.

  Sharaf’s only reservation had to do with whether he had the guts to take the plunge. Not only were the waters potentially deep but he already sensed fins breaking the surface, mostly due to the personalities involved. For every minister in his corner, surely there would be at least two on the other side. Perhaps he should simply embrace the danger, as Ali had once counseled. But that was not so easy for a man who had come to value contentment above all else.

  Whatever was down there, Sharaf felt certain that the best secrets would be hiding in the trickiest locations, right there with the eel in his cave. Make a move now, and he might have to hold his breath for a very long time. He only hoped the Minister would remain steadfast up at the gunwale as the seas turned rough, prepared to haul Sharaf to safety at a moment’s notice. Anything less, and he might never resurface.

  Just thinking about it made him a little short of breath. Or maybe he was just tired. He sighed deeply, shut his notebook, and headed for the exit.

  4

  “Who the hell was that?” Sam asked after Lieutenant Assad shut the door.

  “A nuisance. One you needn’t worry about.”

  “Callous jerk is more like it.”

  Sam hadn’t liked the look of him. Another officer in green, but his uniform had sagged like the skin of a toad, or a balloon losing its air. Hot air, at that.

  “Will he be wanting to talk to me?”

  “No,” the lieutenant said. “It is not his case. If he tries to contact you, I want to know immediately.”

  Just what Sam needed, to get caught in a turf war between rival cops. For the moment at least, he seemed to have landed on the right side.

  “Should I refuse to speak with him?”

  “Yes. And you will be perfectly within your rights.”

  “I’ll tell him you said so. I’d like to keep this as uncomplicated as possible, at least until our chief of corporate security arrives. She’s due later today.”

  “She has already phoned.” Assad consulted his notes. “Miss Weaver?”

  Nanette had moved fast, and Sam was grateful for her efficiency. He supposed he should have expected no less.

  “Where were we, then?” Assad asked.

  Sam hoped to avoid revisiting the awkward subject of why he had searched through Charlie’s pockets.

  “I, uh, believe we were talking about how long we’d been in the country.”

  “Thirty-six hours, you said. Meaning you arrived Friday afternoon.”

  Assad flipped back a few pages in the notebook. Sam cleared his throat and wiped his palms on his trousers. Charlie’s datebook was burning a hole in his pocket.

  “What I’d like you to do now, Mr. Keller, is to take me back through everything you two have done since your arrival. People you met, things you saw, particularly with regard to Mr. Hatcher, even on occasions when you might not know a name. Physical descriptions, whatever you can tell us. I know you are tired, and much of this may seem trivial. But there are people in Dubai who prey on wealthy businessmen who come to places like the York. Someone may have been following you all evening, or even from yesterday. The sooner I have any sort of lead, the sooner I can find who is responsible.”

  Where to begin? Sam had seen quite a lot in a short time, and most of it had left a vivid impression, beginning with Charlie himself. Sam had been nervous about how the old boy would greet him. But when they met at JFK Charlie bounded forward with the easy warmth of a shaggy retriever, a little overweight and a little untrimmed, his eyebrows arching readily in good humor. It was as if the Brussels job they’d cooperated on had ended only the week before, and they were picking up where they’d left off. Sam spent a few minutes feeling guilty about the role he was about to play, then decided to relax and let Charlie set the tone.

  It made for an easy passage, despite all the long hours on the plane, and from the moment they landed, Charlie had offered a running commentary on all things Dubai, beginning with the modernesque airport, which to Sam looked like a spaceport with palm trees and Armani billboards.

  “Take a good look,” Charlie said as they stood in the passport line. “But reserve final judgment ’til departure, when we run the gauntlet of Duty Free. Gold, caviar, Cuban cigars, shoppers in a frenzy. Last time I came through, a single planeload of Poles packed away sixty DVRs and eighty cases of Johnnie Walker Red. I just wish you could’ve been here for the arrival of one of those all-girl Aeroflot flights. Five a day, sometimes.”

  “All-girl?”

  “Whores. Flew ’em in a hundred at a time, like mail-order brides on the Wells Fargo. But that was before the government started paying attention. Not so easy anymore, alas.”

  Good to hear, Sam thought. Maybe that meant Charlie would be keeping his nose clean. The old boy kept up his patter in the taxi through some of the worst traffic Sam had ever seen. They wound up on a clogged ten-lane thoroughfare, Sheikh Zayed Road, that led to their hotel.

  “And you said you’re staying at the Shangri-La?” Lieutenant Assad asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Did you meet anyone there, you or Mr. Hatcher?”

  “I was supposed to meet the head of our new regional office, Arnie Bettman. But he canceled. Otherwise, nobody, unless you count the bellhops and doormen. We pretty much kept to ourselves.”

  “Nice place, the Shangri-La.”

  An understatement. Even the lobby was a palace, with a ceiling four stories high.

  “Eight hundred a night,” Charlie had boasted as they stepped from the cab. “But if you let me handle the check-in, they might knock it down. I’m a regular. Give me your passport.”

  Someone whisked away their bags on a gilded cart. Still dazed from the flight, Sam wandered past the front desk toward the lobby bar, where a chef in a high hat was building an abstract tower of gourmet breads, cheeses, and swirled oil, none of it ever to be eaten. It looked like a place where you could spend a week’s salary in ten minutes.

  Sam wandered out the entrance facing onto Sheikh Zayed Road. A liveried Filipino doorman bowed as he approached.

  “Good afternoon, sir!”

  An Asian woman was waiting in the foyer to open the second set of doors. She, too, bowed and offered her regards. Sam stepped into a wall of heat and traffic noise. Maybe it was the jet lag, or the alien climate, but he again experienced the sensation of having arrived at a spaceport. He gazed upward, half expecting to see a glass bubble protecting the atmosphere. In every direction, tall, gleaming buildings were topped by spires, globes, and bizarre structures that resembled regal turbans and papal miters. It was as if the world’s most playful architects had been lured here by blank checks and a huge box of toys.

  At a glance he counted more than twenty towers under construction. The largest, off to the right, was the Burj Dubai, already the world’s tallest at 160 stories and climbing. Two giant cranes swiveled atop it. From the ground they were tiny, like antennae on a gleaming cockroach that had reared up on its hind legs, begging for crumbs.

  Directly across the way, a quadruple-width billboard advertised the next project: PENTOMINIUM: THE DEFINED HEIGHT OF LUXURY. 120 FLOORS OF ALL-PENTHOUSE LIVING.
Good luck making it to your apartment in a power outage. Sam decided this was how the Emerald City must have looked after the Wizard flew off in his balloon, taking all the rules with him.

  But he already noticed one problem with this Oz—a gritty breeze that stung his eyes. Sand was the source of the haze. Not pollution or exhaust, but the desert itself, airborne and hovering. It was piling up against the curbing and along the sidewalks. A hotel worker vacuumed the excess from the marble porch. It reminded Sam that somewhere beneath all this grandeur was still the sandy bed of past encampments and barest survival. The moment man let his guard down, the desert would reclaim it all.

  A flurry of “Good afternoon, sirs” announced Charlie’s arrival from behind.

  “What do you think, old son?” He was grinning like a mischievous wolf.

  “I was just wondering how you’d ever cross the street. Look at it. Ten lanes, four Jersey walls, a bunch of guardrails, and a fence. Plus the traffic.”

  “You’d need a commando team. Even then you’d take heavy casualties. See that restaurant, just across the highway? Ten-minute cab ride. But stop staring at the traffic—you’re making the doorman nervous. Few months ago they had a rash of suicides. Desperate men throwing themselves in front of speeding cars, hoping to earn blood money for their families from whoever mowed ’em down. For whatever reason, this was their favorite spot, right here at the Shangri-La. Got so bad they posted a cop.”

  “Mr. Keller? Mr. Keller?”

  It was Lieutenant Assad, snapping Sam out of his daydream. Or night dream. It was now 4 a.m., and the York Club had gone silent.

  “Continue, please. So you arrived at the Shangri-La in late afternoon. Did you or Mr. Hatcher go anywhere that first evening?”

  “Emirates Mall. To the ski slope.”

  “Ah, yes. Very popular with the tourists.”

  Pretty much what Charlie had said—but with gentle tolerance—when Sam suggested going.

  “We could do that. We could do that, Sam. Of course the way I see it, if you want to ski, then go to goddamn Aspen.” He laughed aloud. “But I can see the novelty appeal. Big hill of snow inside a shopping mall, smack in the middle of blazing Arabia. So, by God, let’s buckle ’em on. Who knows, maybe with a little exercise we’ll sleep better. More energy for the real action tomorrow.”

  It turned out to be like the rest of Dubai—surreal, an artful con, worthy successor to the mirages that must have once fooled thirsty caravans. Super-strength air-conditioning kept the temperature at 29 degrees Fahrenheit beneath a sky blue ceiling. You rented parkas and snow pants along with the skis and poles, and caught the lift straight for the top. Not exactly Aspen, but still fun in a discombobulating sort of way.

  Sam, who slalomed down with an easy grace, waited for Charlie at the bottom. The older man descended like Laurel and Hardy, a slapstick of tumbles and splayed legs that ended with an ignoble roll at the bottom. But when he stood, snow in his stubble, his cigarette was still clamped in his lips and he wasn’t at all embarrassed.

  “Haven’t done this in a while,” he said. “I think I’ll watch from the bar.”

  He nodded toward a big plate-glass window up high in the back. Everyone on the other side looked cozy, steaming drinks in hand, video fireplaces ablaze. A little like the Alps, as long as you didn’t glance to the right, where another big window faced out from the mall’s main concourse. A line of shoppers peered in, all in a row with their sunburns, their bags, and their ice cream cones.

  “Did Mr. Hatcher meet anyone in the bar while you were skiing?” Assad asked. “Did anyone approach either of you?”

  “No.”

  Sam’s only conversation had been with Charlie, afterward in the Alpine bar:

  “So how’d we end up traveling together, anyway, young Mr. Keller? Any insights you’d care to share?”

  Obviously Charlie hadn’t bought Nanette’s rationale—the idea that Sam needed a chaperone. She had given him a cover story in case this subject came up—a lame one, but it was all he had.

  “The travel office thought it would be a good way to save money.”

  “Some sort of package deal, you mean?” Charlie snorted. “They obviously don’t know the way things work at the Shangri-La. But tell me something. You weren’t summoned to meet with the lovely Nanette by any chance, were you?”

  He had a story for this, too.

  “I was. She wanted to update my security status, seeing as how I might be stopping in Pakistan on the way back from Hong Kong.”

  Charlie nodded, but didn’t seem convinced.

  “Tell me,” he said. “This earlier departure of yours, the one that put you in sync with my schedule. Was that Nanette’s idea as well?”

  “Uh, no.” He felt terrible lying. “The travel office handled everything.”

  Charlie smiled.

  “Whatever you say, boss. But I do kind of like the idea of making her squirm. And I don’t mean in the carnal sense.”

  He must have noticed Sam redden, judging from what he said next.

  “So even you think she’s kind of hot, huh?” He laughed. “Well, I guess we’re always doing it, aren’t we?”

  “Doing what?”

  “Sizing them up. Stripping them down in our heads, whether they’re our waitress, our boss, or our second cousin. Wondering what it would be like. Or, if they’re a little too old, what it might have been like ten years ago. Doesn’t take much to set us off, really. A curve of the hip. A certain look in the eye. But let me tell you something about our Nanette. Put together nicely, I’ll grant you, but she’s cut from solid granite. Cold, hard, and sharp at every edge. Probably a little bitter for her own good, but very effective at pretty much everything she does.”

  “Why bitter?” Sam immediately wished he hadn’t asked. Better to have let the subject die a natural death.

  “Passed over for bigger and better things one too many times, I suspect. That tends to happen when you blow the whistle and no one listens. And, yes, I know all about that poor veep for finance she busted in Africa. But he was an easy mark. The stronger ones with better protection always survive. And after that happens a few times maybe the inclination is to say, hey, if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.”

  Or maybe, Sam thought, the inclination was to take out your frustrations on smaller fry, like a quality control officer with a penchant for randy behavior. Assuming that what Charlie said was even true. Obviously there was no love lost between the two of them.

  “Well, if you think she’s interested in me now,” Charlie said, “just wait ’til a week from Monday, on the fourteenth. She’ll get all of me she wants.”

  “Monday? In Hong Kong?”

  “That’s another thing. I won’t be going to Hong Kong. I’m staying here through the week. Go ahead and tell her if she happens to ask. But it’s strictly for business. Tell her that, too. The reckoning is coming, old son.”

  Sam told none of this to Lieutenant Assad, of course. Too much to explain. Nor did he even consider revealing his role as Nanette’s spy, which would have raised unwarranted suspicion. But with Charlie now lying dead on the floor, the man’s earlier words took on a new significance. What was supposed to be happening on Monday the 14th, and what was Charlie’s “reckoning”? Or had he prematurely brought that on himself, tonight at the York?

  “So, then,” Assad asked, “where did you go next?”

  Dinner, drinks in a few places he now barely remembered, followed by a fairly early bedtime. Sam then showered and crashed into a dreamless sleep, with the whine of the Emirates jet still roaring in his ears as he drifted off.

  “And this was what time?”

  “Maybe ten. No, later. I was pretty beat.”

  “So for all you know, Mr. Hatcher could have met someone downstairs. Or gone back out on the town.”

  “I suppose.” The idea had occurred to him as he showered, but he had been too tired to stay out longer, and he had counted on Charlie’s age to keep him grounded as well.
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br />   “What about the next day?”

  “I was up pretty early. Caught a cab to the beach at Jumeirah to take a walk. Charlie slept in ’til noon.”

  “Yes. He almost definitely went back out without you.”

  Great, Sam thought. Just don’t put that in your report, in case Nanette reads it.

  “We had brunch, then took it easy in the afternoon around the hotel pool. We both did some business by phone.”

  “Local contacts?”

  “Not for me. With Charlie, who knows?”

  Assad scribbled a note.

  “These calls. He would have been using a smart phone or BlackBerry, correct? Which you say you weren’t able to find?”

  “Yes.”

  It made Sam curious to see what was in the datebook. He wondered if he should hand it over. But that would be admitting he’d hidden it to begin with.

  “And in the evening?”

  “We had dinner at Al Mahara in the Burj Al Arab, the seafood place with the big aquarium.”

  Assad smiled wryly.

  “Did you happen to see a fat local gentleman in a very ugly brown pin-striped suit?”

  “Not that I recall.”

  “My boss, Brigadier Razzaq. He is there at least twice a week. His banker friends know it’s his favorite. He has been observed drinking alcohol there.”

  “I wouldn’t know.”

  “And you dined alone, just the two of you?”

  Was it Sam’s imagination, or was Assad beginning to leer, as if he suspected a homosexual relationship?

  “Yes. Just the two of us.”

  “Very cozy. And then?”

  “Barhopping for the next few hours. Except for a stop at the Palace Hotel.” Sam realized he actually had an item of possible interest for Assad. “Charlie had an appointment there. Someone I didn’t know.”

  Assad sat up straighter and flipped a page.

  “The Palace Hotel at the Royal Mirage? The big resort?”