Fernando drew on his cigar as he contemplated one of his other virtues: cunning. He thought about the plan that he already had in place, and how he could modify it to ensure that whoever had taken his son would pay a terrible price.
Yes, he thought as he exhaled a cloud of smoke. There will be a reckoning... There will be vengeance...
Two months later
Istanbul, Turkey
Clayton Tragg watched as the miserable little man used a jeweler’s loupe to inspect the two halves of the hand-carved ivory spheres. This professor, Higgins, the handpicked expert his employer had selected to accompany them, was almost as pathetic as Lucien Bruns himself had been when he was originally contacted about the artifact. How two grown men could get so excited about a pair of old hand-carved pieces of ivory, much less be willing to pay a fortune for them, was almost beyond Tragg’s comprehension. Still, it was what he was getting paid for, on two fronts if the truth be known, so who was he to complain? With things drying up in Iraq and Afghanistan, lucrative new work for the dark ops section of what remained of Granite Security, Inc., was getting more and more scarce. Plus, it beat the hell out of escorting some US-backed mullah and aspiring politician around a perpetual war zone worrying about snipers and IEDs.
He watched the Turkish art dealer, Hakeem Karga, who had “acquired” the artifact known as The Lion and the Lioness Attacking the Nubian, purported to be from the Islamic Period, and made even more valuable because it dared to show human figures when such depictions were considered idolatry by Sharia Law. Two corresponding circular spheres of hand-carved ivory and mother-of-pearl over twelve hundred years old...
Tragg reflected on that. The piece had been around for over a thousand years, the last several decades of which it had spent in the National Museum of Iraq, only to have been “removed” when American tanks rolled into Baghdad. From there it passed through various hands before ending up here, in the possession of one of the biggest crooks in Istanbul, who’d most likely bought it from ISIS or al Qaeda, or one of the other regional bands. Once the militants finally realized they could make themselves some money selling stolen stuff from the museums instead of getting their religious rocks off by destroying it, they quietly set aside their strict ideology of demagogy and covertly entered into the more profitable black market business. Maybe they were smarter than they looked. And then again, maybe not. Tragg was sure that Karga had paid them a fraction of what he figured he could get selling it on the black market to some rich American or European collector.
Or maybe even a Mexican one. Tragg silently chuckled at the thought.
The dingy little room had a sour smell to it and the four Turks were smoking those foul-smelling cigarettes with the extended filters that had been mashed one too many times. Tragg could hardly wait to get the hell out of there. His eyes went to his partner, Tyrone Dean, who stood by impassively with his hand in the pocket of his black shirt. His shaved head was gleaming with sweat, but Tragg knew it wasn’t from nerves. He’d been with Dean on too many missions. He was an iceman. No doubt he had his hand around the grip of his Walther PPK, ready in case the art dealer tried to pull something. Not that Tragg thought he would. He’d dealt with this Karga before, and the man always made a substantial profit on these black-market dealings. If word got out that he’d pulled a double cross during one of them, his reputation would take a severe hit.
Besides, Tragg felt confident that he and Dean could take them all out if it ever came to that.
The mousy professor squirmed in his chair, his tiny fingers rubbing the mother-of-pearl inlays with the care and tenderness of someone stroking a beautiful woman’s body, all the while murmuring under his breath, “Yes, yes, yes.” Tragg watched with amusement, figuring the little man’s reaction must be a good sign.
Karga brought his cigarette to his lips, drew on it deeply, and then said with a smoky breath, “See? Did I not tell you it was genuine?”
The professor gazed up, the loupe still in place over his right eye, his lips pulled back showing a row of small inward-slanted teeth. “I do believe it is.”
The art dealer cocked his head to the side. His features curved into a knowing expression as he winked at Tragg. “Then we have only to discuss the price at this time, correct?”
He snapped his fingers and then wiggled them back and forth, indicating that the professor should hand the item back to him. The little man complied with the utmost care.
“Now,” Karga said, placing the two pieces into a velvet-lined box and then placing that box into a metal briefcase that he secured with a special lock. He handed the briefcase to one of his big bodyguards, who stood close to him. “Are we ready to do business?”
“We need to phone our employer first,” Tragg said. “In private.”
Karga said something in Turkish to one of the bodyguards. “Very well. He will show you to a private room. But advise him that I am a very busy man.”
Tragg, Dean and the professor followed the big Turk down a narrow hallway. The professor was walking briskly at Tragg’s side trying to keep up.
“It’s authentic,” the little man said. “I’m sure of it. Of course, we’ll need some typing of the carbon thirteen to be absolutely certain, but I am ninety-nine percent convinced of its authenticity.”
“Good,” Tragg said. “You can tell that to the boss.” He took out his satellite phone and punched in the number. The big Turk stopped and pointed to a door. Dean disappeared inside for a few seconds, then stuck his head out.
“It’s clear,” he said as he stepped out into the hallway.
Tragg pulled the professor into the room and pressed the button to initiate the Skype call. He held the phone in front of him with his left hand and positioned the professor in front of him with his right. After completing the call and going through a series of underlings, Lucien Bruns’s round face came into view. His fat cheeks were somewhat distorted on the small flat screen, his eyes enlarged behind his thick spectacles.
“Professor Higgins has verified the item, sir,” Tragg said. “The L and L, A N.”
It was their code name for the artifact, which was no doubt on several Interpol and US Customs and Border Protection lists as having been stolen from the National Museum of Iraq.
Below Tragg’s chin, the little man’s head bobbed up and down like a yo-yo. “It’s definitely from the Islamic Period, and all the more rare due to the idolatrous aspects of its depiction of the human forms. I’d say it’s the genuine article, all right.”
Bruns’s eyes widened, and the tip of his pink tongue glided over his lips.
“That’s good news,” he said. “I assume the price is within the range as previously discussed.”
“Yes, sir.”
Like that would matter, Tragg thought. He knew how much Bruns coveted the damn thing. It had been all he’d talked about before sending Tragg and Dean on this special assignment to Turkey.
The Lion and the Lioness Attacking the Nubian... Two intricately carved little spheres of ivory that Bruns was willing to pay more money for than Tragg could ever hope to make in two decades. But if he and Dean played this one right, it would be a windfall for them that would set them up for the rest of their lives. And, there’d be enough left over to pay off the rest of the dark ops team, too. This wasn’t something the two of them could manage on their own. No, it would take a team effort, just like
