Dark Escape (DARC Ops Book 10) Read online

  Dark Escape

  DARC Ops Book 10

  Jamie Garrett

  Wild Owl Press

  Contents

  Copyright and Disclaimer

  1. Sophia

  2. Declan

  3. Sophia

  4. Declan

  5. Sophia

  6. Declan

  7. Sophia

  8. Declan

  9. Sophia

  10. Declan

  11. Sophia

  12. Declan

  13. Sophia

  14. Declan

  15. Sophia

  16. Declan

  17. Sophia

  18. Declan

  19. Sophia

  20. Declan

  21. Sophia

  22. Declan

  23. Sophia

  24. Declan

  25. Declan

  26. Sophia

  Also by Jamie Garrett

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Copyright and Disclaimer

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2018 by Jamie Garrett

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law. All requests should be forwarded to [email protected].

  Connect with me on Facebook: http://facebook.com/JamieGarrettBooks

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  Cover design by The Final Wrap.

  Editing by Jennifer Harshman, Harshman Services.

  1

  Sophia

  Phone calls to her friends back home prompted the same sorts of questions about the hotel room view. “Lights? The city?”

  Sophia had been in Afghanistan for three days and was already getting a little tired of explaining to her friends that the country had some infrastructure beyond tunnel and caves. A little more sophistication than a network of wells and warring tribes. There were cities. Actual cities. And not only were there hotels, but beds, and carpeting, and even room service. Sophia had ordered a banana split to boost up her blood sugar enough to feel like socializing for the night. Yes, Afghanistan had ice cream too. She needed the boost, feeling almost lethargic after spending a little too long earlier in the heat.

  Kabul also had BMWs, too, and charming, clean-cut, inoffensive-smelling men who drove them. Through this luxury, Sophia had arrived at tonight’s dinner. A private function at the home of one of Kabul’s leading players in the business and art world. The man enjoyed playing around in both, trading and generating wealth through a variety of means. He also liked to show it off at such events, especially to foreigners. Tonight, Sophia would accept the role, stepping in for her father, a minor yet locally respected diplomat and member of the American embassy counsel to Afghanistan. The stepping in was her idea, as was coming to the country at all. And she was here for more than art appreciation.

  Her father wouldn’t have minded that she’d come to Afghanistan. He’d likely be happy to see her, despite the milieu of danger that hung around every second she was out in public. He knew, through his connections, that she would be well taken care of. What he would mind, however, was her true intentions. A spy mission.

  “Spy” was someone else’s term for it.

  Not for one second did Sophia consider herself any type of spy. With her red hair and pale freckled skin, she stuck out like a sore thumb—despite her attempts to dress like a local. Though not too local. A mild claustrophobia kept Sophia outside of the hot confines of a burka. Instead, she went with a more free and fashionable scarf. The head covering wasn’t forced on her, she just preferred to take at least a little of the attention long red hair brought away when she was in public. She’d even began wondering if she could employ similar measures to cover up her dreaded hair back home. Finely knitted fabrics seem a nicer option than toxic hair dyes.

  Away from the public, in the safe confines of Mr. Abbas’s estate, she wouldn’t have to worry so much about being someone she wasn’t. Art appreciation came naturally. She came with multiple degrees, and was currently on loan herself from the NYC Art Museum, where she worked as an assistant curator specializing in Middle Eastern art.

  Beyond the supposed spycraft was a true interest in the art, and the man behind the collection. But she was also excited about the opportunity, not only because she wanted to see some interesting examples of contemporary Afghan art, but also because she now finally had a chance to prove to General Ironside that she was ready, willing, and able to become an undercover agent.

  Ironside only knew her as her father’s daughter. A knowledge that too many people had of her. After twenty-four years, she was ready to leave her mark. Ready to step out of the shadow and be someone—at least, after she stayed in the shadow just long enough to pull off this “spy mission.”

  Sophia was shown into the well-lit parlor, her eyes ignoring all the art and finding the man himself first. He was the true target, what she’d be zeroing her analytical eyes on. The problem was that not enough other people were performing the same scrutiny. Back in Boston, when she’d met with General Ironside last, he’d discussed with her the extreme likelihood that the collector had been using some of his money to fund local warlords, supplying them with weapons and intel.

  “Sophia,” came a man’s voice, heavily accented.

  She turned to find Sajad, the art collector’s son. They’d first met days ago when he’d picked her up from the airport. He’d looked back to her a little too frequently throughout the ride, his eyes a little too locked and loaded. And then came his proposal to be her personal escort, via car and anyhow else. Mixed in there somewhere, maybe, was an invitation for dinner that she’d shrugged off faster than he could mouth it. She’d declined that, and the rest of his services. Since the info from Ironside, she’d begun to suspect everyone associated with Mr. Abbas, and most definitely his son. In her brief experience with Middle Eastern millionaires, she found that it was usually the sons she had to worry about most.

  “Sophia, you never called me.”

  “Call you? I was supposed to call you?”

  “For a ride,” Sajad said, tipping an imaginary driver’s cap. “How’d you get here?”

  “I’m sorry to say, Sajad, but there is another. There is another, indeed.”

  He frowned in mock hurt. “Well,” he said, “in case you ever need anything. In case you’re stranded . . .”

  “I’ll be fine.”

  “I should have guessed you’d be here,” Sajad said, scanning around the room, suddenly looking around at anyone but her. “Can I get you anything?”

  “I’m fine.” Sophia did her own bit of looking around, only she had a very specific target. “Well,” she said with a sigh, “maybe there’s one thing.”

  “Yes, Sophia.”

  “Where is your father?”

  This time there was real disappointment on his face. She thanked him for his help and found Mr. Abbas at a painting that Sophia found familiar, even from the distance. She knew the brushstrokes and the palette of a typical Zainab Gaussi. And up close, the subject: a pile of prosthetic legs and feet.

  “Poignant,” Sophia said to Abbas, well aware of the throwaway word. It was a word ma
inly to garner his attention, like a cough or throat clear. Poignant, just clearing away the phlegm. She had studied art long enough to be sick of the verbiage and would be happy if at all possible, to really talk art with this man, Afghan as well as Western art. Just something real. It would be her first test to see where the man’s heart really lay, what his true intentions truly were.

  He continued looking over the painting, silently, until his voice emerged from the meditation. “This to me, my dear Sophia, is a very painful depiction of what our country has become through the last thirty years. But also, a harbinger. A warning of what’s to come, the youth of amputees growing up in a land and a culture scarred by war.”

  Sophia nodded sadly, but said nothing. She knew there was more to come.

  Abbas continued. “Zainab’s series here not only tells the stories of their physical wounds, but also of the unseen. The mental wounds. What I find most fascinating is that, like in life, she never depicts these wounds outright. Rather leads us on, gives us little subtle hints as to the roots beneath the surface. Look here, at the way she has drawn the crushed prosthetic toes.”

  Sophia strained her eyes to see the pain of Afghanistan’s last thirty years. It was apparent in so many ways.

  “See here,” he said, “in the ends of the prosthetic, the opening, she leaves just a little trace of blood.”

  “I see,” Sophia said, not looking in too closely. She could feel the pain from afar. She knew of it back home, following the reports, following along with the stories of her father. She could feel the pain in Abbas’ voice, now, softening, his eyes sweeping off the painting and then gazing across the room.

  “The artist is here,” he said. “Zainab Gaussi. I imagine she’d be most interested in you. Would you like . . . ?”

  Normally, Sophia would love to meet and talk with the creator. Perhaps talk about the possibility of work or some sort of residency back in New York. It was in the interests of the museum to make these sorts of connections, especially while in Afghanistan. On Abbas’ home soil. Maybe a studio tour . . . But it was also in the best interests of her country that she ignore this opportunity and instead focus on the task at hand. Maybe that way she could really make a difference for the country.

  She had to sadly decline the offer, as she did decline many offers during her stay.

  “That makes me a little curious,” she said to Abbas. “Do you normally invite artists to dinners focusing on the mining industry?”

  “Zainab is probably wondering the same about you. Why some museum assistant from New York—”

  “I’m not an assistant.”

  “Right,” Abbas said. “You’re your father’s daughter.”

  This time, forgetting all the fluff words and the faux politeness, Sophia released her full scowl.

  Abbas said, “Lighten up. You know I love and respect your father, and you, by proxy. A most beautiful proxy.”

  “I suppose it would be a lost cause in trying to show you that I’m more than someone’s daughter.”

  “You’re much more,” Abbas said.

  “Certainly more than a proxy.”

  “But I have, alas, brought you for that purpose,” he said, “to meet and talk with Zainab.”

  “Not to talk art with your oil men?”

  “I also just wanted to see you and to make sure you’re getting along okay here. As you know,” he said, sweeping his hand across the painting like a wand exposing the end to a magic trick, “it can be a treacherous place for anyone, let alone pretty, young American women.”

  She didn’t need a second look at the prosthetic limbs. Instead, a third and fourth was required on the sun-worn face of Mr. Abbas. Somewhere in the crags and cracks of his aged face, somewhere there must be some truth. She refocused her efforts to seek out that truth.

  The supposed aim of the dinner was for Abbas and his business friends to explore the economic opportunities opening for Afghanistan with large deposits of copper and lithium. Sophia’s aim was to feel out the real reason, as well as plant a few bugs around the residence while she did it. And ideally, doing so undetected by Abbas or his guards, or the ever-creeping-in-the-background Sajad.

  She wasn’t exactly a tech person, but Sophia knew at least how to attach small little buttons sticky-side down to any useful surface. And to do so in effective and reasonably obscure areas of the Abbas’ palatial estate. The buttons themselves had been smuggled in, lined up in a row inside the slit of her dress. She was able to get away from Abbas and his son just long enough to place several through the main room.

  Whatever happened from there on was Ironside’s concern. She did her part, laying the groundwork for what she hoped would be a fruitful surveillance operation. She wasn’t, of course, hoping to find out that Mr. Abbas had been involved in such misdeeds. But if he were, Ironside would know about it. And act on it.

  She wouldn’t be involved with the acting, either. Hopefully by then, if it ever came down to it, she’d be back within the safe confines of the New York art scene. How she’d feel about it, Afghan art in particular, upon her return? There were so many wretched things to associate Afghanistan with, but the art had been one of its shining points for her. A chance for optimism in a soul-destroyed, bombed out black hole of a country. But now even that seemed tainted. All these artists involved with Mr. Abbas. All these works of art being traded through questionable hands. Were they just all instruments for money laundering? Tax havens?

  Or perhaps worse?

  And what of the artists themselves?

  Sophia chose not to speak at all with Zainab. Sometimes it was better not having all the answers.

  After dinner, about midway through the first set of talks about the industry prospects, Sophia had predictably begun feeling the fatigue close in again. It had been lingering the whole day, following close up to her heels since a half-slept night and a strenuous day out in the sun. She had chased it away, momentarily, with the ice cream room service. But now, with a belly full of dinner, and an ear full of increasingly boring energy sector talks, Sophia had begun to feel the strength in her neck give way. Her head drooping lower. Eyelids, too.

  She waved for a tea and the waiter brought it over steaming. The cup felt warm around her hands and already, just the aroma of cardamom perked her up. She took a few small sips, savoring it, hoping the boost would help keep her awake and keep her out of trouble. She still had some more work to do. Bugs to plant. And she still needed to be on guard throughout the whole night. A sleepy spy was an accident, or perhaps worse, waiting to happen.

  The momentary comfort and clear-mindedness faded with the intro of another talk on oil mining beneath some dried-up seabed. Even the tea didn’t help with that. She sipped more, and then began drinking faster when it cooled down enough for gulps. She needed to stay awake just for one last push, a final hour of clandestine spy activities, of working deep behind the enemy lines.

  She blinked, slowly. Her head, oddly enough, felt like it floated, slightly detached from her neck, almost too heavy to hold up on her own. She couldn’t concentrate or follow the topic of conversation. No! She still had to plant a few more bugs . . . perhaps excuse herself for a quick trip to the bathroom. Find a good place for that last bug near Abbas’ home office—surely he would have an office at a home like this, wouldn’t he? If she could slip away and manage to sneak into such an office or even find a good, unobtrusive spot in a hallway near this very dining room, she could rid herself of that last bug. The general was counting on her. To leave that last bug undeployed was to admit failure. She blinked again, her vision blurring a moment and then settling. She had been out in the sun a lot today . . . heatstroke? Silly. She would have felt such symptoms earlier. Still, it did feel rather warm in the room now, despite her lightweight clothing; the three-quarter sleeve linen blouse tucked into a skirt that fell just below her knees. The scarf and a pair of sandals completed her warm-weather attire. Focus! The bug . . . one more. She couldn’t force herself to rise from her seat a
t the table, not quite yet, listening to the bullshitting with artist and oil men alike. She would play the role she was supposed to play. Of surviving Afghanistan. Of proving to her father . . .

  She caught herself almost nodding off and jerked her head up, eyes forced open to strain through the image of where she was. Yes, still in this banquet. Still at a table, postdinner, empty cup of tea. An empty head wanting sleep. She began wondering if the tea had made her feel worse.

  Yes. Yes, it had.

  Damn it, it had.

  She felt nauseated. Her eyes wide, she assessed her stomach, definitely on the queasy side, followed by a rush of chills racing through her body from her neck all the way down her back. Then came the hot flash, leaving her skin sweaty and damp. What the hell? She glanced down at her half-eaten plate of food. Had something been tainted? Not cooked enough?

  Disappointment surged through her along with another wave of chills. She had to get out of here. She wouldn’t have a chance to plant that last bug. At this point, she didn’t care. She needed to get back to her hotel room. The last thing she needed was to draw attention to herself by getting sick here at Abbas’ house. No, that would just not do. Bed. She needed to go to bed.

  She rose and excused herself, claiming a headache. Her host nodded in understanding while Sajad eyed her curiously and then pushed back his chair and approached her.

  “I will take you back to your hotel,” he said, his voice gentle and solicitous.