Portrait of a Spy

floor. It was then Abbas felt something else carving into his neck, and he realized they intended to take his head. It was the punishment for infidels and apostates and the enemies of jihad. Samir Abbas was none of those things. He was a believer, a secret soldier in the army of Allah. But in a moment, for reasons he did not understand, he would be a shahid .
    Mercifully, Abbas began to lose consciousness. He thought of the money he had hidden in the pantry of his flat in Zurich, and he hoped that Johara or the children might one day find it. Then he forced himself to go still and to submit to the will of God.
    The knife made a few more vicious strokes. Abbas saw a burst of brilliant white light and assumed it was the light of Paradise. Then the light was extinguished and there was nothing at all.

Chapter 60
Burj Al Arab Hotel, Dubai

    T HE ELEVATOR STOPPED TWICE BEFORE reaching the lobby. A sunburned British woman boarded on the eleventh floor, a Chinese businessman on the seventh. The new arrivals forced Mikhail to retreat deeper into the carriage. He was now standing so close to Malik he could smell the coffee on his breath. The Glock was pressed reassuringly against Mikhail’s spine, but it was the syringe in his coat pocket that occupied his thoughts. He was tempted to shove the needle into Malik’s thigh. Instead, he stared at the ceiling, or at his watch, or at the numbers flashing on the display panel—anywhere but at the face of the murderer standing next to him. When the doors finally opened a third time, he followed the British woman and the Chinese businessman toward the bar.
    “He’s the second one from the left,” he said into his phone.
    “Are you sure?”
    “Sure enough to hit him right now if you tell me to.”
    “Not here.”
    “Don’t let him leave. Do it now while we have a chance.”
    Gabriel went off the air. Mikhail entered the bar, counted slowly to ten, and walked out.
    Gabriel was packing up his laptop and conducting a false telephone conversation in rapid French as Malik and his four comrades came floating through the lobby in their white robes. Outside, they engaged in a swirl of handshakes and formal kisses before making their way separately toward the SUVs. Despite the final element of physical deception, Gabriel had no problem tracking Malik as he climbed into the back of one of the Denalis. When the five cars were gone, a pair of Toyota Land Cruisers took their place. Mikhail managed to look vaguely bored as he slipped past the valet and climbed into the front passenger seat of the first. Gabriel entered the second. “Put on your seat belt,” Chiara said as she accelerated away. “These people drive like maniacs.”
    The news that Malik was under Office surveillance reached Rashidistan at 10:12 p.m. Dubai time. It provoked a brief outburst of emotion among the skeleton crew, but not among the three spymasters gathered around the pod in the center of the room. Shamron seemed particularly aggrieved as he watched the winking red light making its way along Sheikh Zayed Road.
    “It occurs to me that we haven’t heard from our friend Samir Abbas in some time,” he said, eyes still on the wall monitor. “Would it be possible to call his mobile phone from a number he would recognize?”
    “Anyone in particular?” asked Carter.
    “Make it his wife,” Shamron said. “Samir always struck me as the family type.”
    “You just referred to him in the past tense.”
    “Did I?” Shamron asked absently.
    Carter looked at one of the techs and said, “Make it happen.”
    The residents of Dubai are not only among the richest people in the world, but they are also statistically some of its worst drivers. A collision—be it with another car, pedestrian, or object—occurs every two minutes in the emirate, resulting in three fatalities a day on average. The typical driver thinks nothing of slashing across multiple lanes of heavy traffic or tailgating at a hundred miles per hour while talking on his cell phone. As a result, few people took notice of the high-speed chase that occurred shortly after ten p.m. on the road to Jebel Ali. It was just another night at the races.
    The road had four lanes in each direction with a grassy median down the center and traffic signals that most locals dismissed as unwanted advice. Gabriel clung to the armrest as Chiara ably maneuvered the big Land Cruiser through the herd of other vehicles just like it. Because it was a Thursday evening, the