Pitt slid the photo out of his breast pocket and handed it and the memory stick to Kurt. “This photo was taken in Bandar Abbas, straight across the gulf from Dubai.”
Kurt studied the photo. The man looked like a thug, but the woman—was it Sienna? Even he couldn’t be sure. “I don’t have any contacts in Dubai.”
“I do,” Pitt replied. “Check into the Excelsior Hotel. A man named Mohammed El Din will find you. You can trust him.”
Kurt was momentarily speechless. He’d expected
to be fired, or suspended, or raked over the coals. Instead, he’d found support. “Thank you” was all he could come up with.
“Since you’re playing spy,” Pitt added, “make sure you destroy the photo and the flash drive when you’re done studying them.”
Kurt nodded and then thought of one more thing. “Tell Joe not to follow me. I don’t want to drag him into this. I already got him arrested by the capitol police. They’ve even banned him from the Air and Space Museum. You know how much he loves that place.”
Pitt hesitated. “I’ll find something for him to do,” he said. “When do you think you’ll be back?”
It was a difficult question. Kurt could only answer it by turning it around. “If Loren were out there, or if you’d known Summer was alive all those years, how long would you have looked for them?”
“Until I found them,” Pitt said truthfully.
“That’s when I’ll be home.”
Pitt grinned and slid the ID badge back across the desk to Kurt. “Put it in a drawer,” he said. “No one quits on my watch.”
Kurt did as ordered, and the two friends shook hands, a rock-solid handshake between men cut from the same cloth.
Pitt turned to go but stopped in the doorway. “Be careful, Kurt. You know there is a chance you might not like what you find.”
With that, Pitt slipped through the door and disappeared. Five minutes later, Kurt was backing out of the driveway in his black Jeep and heading for the airport. Unknown to him, Dirk Pitt and Loren Smith were watching from their car a hundred yards up the road.
“So he’s going off half-cocked after all,” Loren noted.
“No,” Pitt said, “he’s fully loaded and gunning for bear.” He started the engine and put the car in gear. “But he’s not going alone. I’m going to round up Joe and the Trouts. At some point, Kurt is going to need some help. And, officially or not, we’re going to be there when he does.”
United Arab Emirates
Dubai
Kurt Austin watched through binoculars as rich dark soil flew from the hooves of a chestnut Thoroughbred that was thundering down the track at Meydan Racecourse. Seven other horses trailed, but most were so far back that it seemed as if the leader was the only horse in the race.
Thousands cheered, others groaned. Kurt noted that the long shots hadn’t stood a chance.
“Nothing here is what it seems,” someone mentioned. The voice was an aged whisper. It carried wisdom and even a warning in its tone. “That is the first thing you must understand.”
Kurt watched the horse cross the finish line. Its jockey stood up in the stirrups and slowly eased back on the reins, allowing the animal to gently run off the speed.
With the show over, Kurt lowered the binoculars and glanced at the man who was speaking.
Mohammed El Din wore a crisp white dishdasha, a shirt that went from the neck to the ankles. A white gutra, or headcloth, covered his hair, kept in place by a checkered band. His face looked small beneath the cloth, his shoulders were slight. Kurt guessed his age to be seventy or more.
Kurt placed the binoculars down on the edge of the table. “Are you referring to the race or something else?”
The man smiled. The corners of his eyes crinkled. “Everything,” he said, and then pointed toward the track. “This race is not a race but a staged sales pitch. There are buyers down there. The lead horse is the prize. The other jockeys are paid to run slower. It makes the victory seem more impressive than what the stopwatch actually says. Even the soil beneath their hooves is artificial; it’s actually a synthetic mix of sand, rubber, and wax. All of it a carefully staged deception, much like the city itself.”
Kurt nodded thoughtfully. Trying to distinguish between fiction and reality seemed to be a recurring theme in his life.
“Is it a mirage, then?” Kurt asked.
“In a manner of speaking.”