Chapter 43

 

Charitable Relief Centre, Al Quoz, Dubai:

3^rd March; 7pm.

 

Max stood just outside the yellow tape cordon that surrounded the burned out car. Darkness had fallen, bringing a mild night, and so the smouldering wreck of the Porsche was noticeably hot, despite having been hosed down by the fire department earlier.

“Bloody hell, Jamie!” he exclaimed. “Todd must have wound someone up really well. Do you think this was Polletti?”

Jamie nodded as she circled the car again. She sounded angry. “Not only do I think it was Polletti, but I would place money on our friend Kwong Chong Lee being the bomber.” She paused to look at her notebook. “Forensics says that the bomb was probably external. It was certainly C4, and it must have been triggered to go off when the exhaust reached a certain temperature, otherwise it would have gone off as soon as Todd started the car.”

“Polletti, Khaweini and the Shadow,” Max muttered, shaking his head in anger. “Talk about a triumvirate of evil!”

“Although, if we nail one, we could nail them all, looking on the bright side.” Jamie hesitated, and looked back at the twisted remains of the Porsche before adding, “If there is a bright side, of course.” It was Max’s turn to nod. “I think we may need to add another name to your axis of evil, Max.” The English journalist looked questioningly at his companion. “Sheikha Aara,” Jamie clarified.

Max looked shocked, but doubtful. “She’s the Sheikh’s cousin,” Max pointed out.

“Max, this is a small country. Everybody is somebody’s cousin. She knew the location of our offices, and you were tailed from those offices. She called Todd to ask for help, knowing he’d come running, and then… well, then this.”

There was a pause in the conversation before Jamie continued. “I’d guess she can’t be contacted.”

“Very good. You are right,” a loud Arabic accented voice boomed from behind the two friends. “She is not answering her phones, she is not at her apartment, and her assistant was caught trying to sneak out of the hostel with all of her worldly belongings. It stinks like a bilious camel.”

The Brigadier stood beside Max and Jamie, gazing sorrowfully at the wreckage of the Porsche. “This is my fault. If we had apprehended the Shadow when we had the chance….”

“We can’t think like that, Brigadier,” Jamie said. “There’s a bomber out there who, so far, has caused some loss of life, but we don’t know where he’ll strike next, or what the scale of the next attack will be. I think our next step….”

The Brigadier silenced her by putting his finger to his lips and whispering, “Walls have ears!”

Jamie wanted to point out that they were outside, not in a confined space. He continued. “We should discuss this back at your residence, where privacy is guaranteed.”

***

Khaweini was not overjoyed at having a house guest, but he was prepared to endure the Korean for a day or two whilst their plans came to fruition.

Kwong Chong Lee had altered the explosive devices in line with the recommendations of the late Jussuf Khalid, and sixteen lunchbox bombs were lined up on the kitchen floor. Khaweini was nervous. He didn’t like explosives. He didn’t trust explosives. He had been at a training camp in Pakistan when two activists were blown to smithereens when badly wired explosives went off prematurely. If these sixteen bombs went off earlier than planned, small as they were, they would leave nothing but a crater where the house now stood.

“Tomorrow the volunteers will be here for final training, and on Monday morning the charges will be placed. By lunchtime on Monday we will have brought Dubai to its knees and sent its pampered princes off to their safe houses in Europe and America.”

Kwong tried to look as if he was interested, but he was tired. It had been a long day, narrowly escaping arrest and disintegrating an Australian Federal Policeman. He was looking forward to his bed.

***

Aara removed her burqa to reveal her slim figure clad in designer jeans and a Juicy Couture tee shirt top. She slipped a thin pink jacket over the ensemble as she waited to embark. Pete Adams helped her into the speedboat, and as soon as she was settled he cast off. The man who had been driving the SUV pushed the boat into gear and headed off into the Gulf.

The bright red Triton 33 High Speed craft would have attracted attention in the daytime, but in the dark it was just another light amongst many on the water. The boat skipped across the choppy waters at speed for over fifteen minutes, and Aara was beginning to feel nauseous. Pete saw her discomfort. “We’re almost there,” he said comfortingly.

A minute later the boat settled down in the water as the engines cut out and the boat drifted towards a large yacht. The name on the back of the yacht identified it as ‘The Possum’.

Once on board with her belongings, Aara relaxed in the ivory coloured deep leather armchair. If you had to be at sea, this was how it must be done, she thought.

“How long until we reach Karachi?” she asked.

“Two days. We’re taking it steady. From there we take a plane to Bangkok and pick up our chartered plane to Oz. Your estate in Melbourne is in good hands. I checked on it before I left. I bet you have a great view from the bedroom.” Pete smiled, and Aara shot him a haughty look which let him know that he was never likely to find out.