Trapping Zero. Джек Марс

she knew about her own father.

      Great, he thought bitterly. Not even one day in and I’ve already ruined it. How am I going to fix this? He took a seat between the girls and desperately tried to think of something he could say or do to return to the cheerful atmosphere of only moments ago.

      But before he had the chance, Sara spoke up. Her gaze lifted to meet his as she murmured, and despite the conversations around them Reid heard her words clearly.

      “I want to know,” his youngest daughter said. “I want to know the truth.”

      CHAPTER SEVEN

      Yosef Bachar had spent the last eight years of his career in perilous situations. As an investigative journalist, he had accompanied armed troops into the Gaza Strip. He had trekked across deserts in search of hidden compounds and caves during the long hunt for Osama bin Laden. He had reported from the midst of firefights and air raids. Not two years earlier, he had broken the story of Hamas smuggling drone parts across borders and forcing a kidnapped Saudi engineer to reconstruct them so they could be used for bombings. His exposé had inspired higher security at borders and increased awareness of insurgents seeking better technology.

      Despite all he had done to risk life and limb, he had never found himself in more danger than he was in now. He and two Israeli colleagues had been covering the story of Imam Khalil and his small sect of followers, who had unleashed a mutated smallpox virus on Barcelona and attempted to do the same on the United States. A source in Istanbul told them that the last few of Khalil’s zealots had fled to Iraq, hiding somewhere near Albaghdadi.

      But Yosef Bachar and his two compatriots did not find Khalil’s people; they had not even reached the city before their car was run off the road by another group, and the three journalists were taken hostage.

      For three days they had been kept in the basement of a desert compound, bound at the wrists and kept in the dark, both literally and figuratively.

      Bachar had spent those three days waiting for their inevitable fate. These men were most likely Hamas, he realized, or some offshoot thereof. They would torture and eventually murder him. They would record the ordeal on video and send it to the Israeli government. Three days of waiting and wondering, dozens of horrid scenarios playing out in Bachar’s head, felt just as tortuous as whatever plans these men had for them.

      But when they finally did come for him, it was not with weapons or implements. It was with words.

      A young man, not twenty-five if he was a day, entered the subterranean level of the compound alone and turned on the light, a single bare bulb in the ceiling. He had dark eyes, a beard trimmed short, and broad shoulders. The young man paced before the three of them, on their knees with hands bound in front of them.

      “My name is Awad bin Saddam,” he told them, “and I am the leader of the Brotherhood. The three of you have been conscripted into a most glorious purpose. Of you, one will deliver for me a message. Another will document our holy jihad. And the third… the third is unnecessary. The third will die at our hands.” The young man, this bin Saddam, paused his pacing and reached into his pocket.

      “You may decide who will carry out which task between yourselves if you wish,” he said. “Or, you may leave it to chance.” He bent at the waist and placed three thin lengths of twine on the floor before them.

      Two of them were approximately six inches long. The third was trimmed a couple inches shorter than the others.

      “I will return in half an hour.” The young terrorist left the basement and locked the door behind him.

      The three journalists stared at the trimmed, fraying lengths of rope on the stone floor.

      “This is monstrous,” said Avi quietly. He was a stout man of forty-eight years, older than most still working in the field.

      “I will volunteer,” Yosef told them. The words spilled from his mouth before he thought them through—because if he did, he would likely hold them behind his tongue.

      “No, Yosef.” Idan, the youngest of them, shook his head firmly. “It is noble of you, but we couldn’t live with ourselves knowing that we allowed you to volunteer for death.”

      “You would leave it up to chance?” Yosef countered.

      “Chance is fair,” said Avi. “Chance is unbiased. Besides…” He lowered his voice as he added, “This may be a ruse. They may still yet kill all of us anyhow.”

      Idan reached down with both bound hands and scooped the three spans of rope in his fist, gripping them so that the exposed ends appeared to be the same length. “Yosef,” he said, “you choose first.” He held them out.

      Yosef’s throat was too dry for words as he reached for an end and slowly pulled it from Idan’s fist. A prayer ran through his head as an inch, then two, then three unfurled from his enclosed fingers.

      The other end fell free after only a few short inches. He had drawn the short rope.

      Avi heaved a sigh, but it was one of despair, not of relief.

      “There you have it,” said Yosef simply.

      “Yosef…” Idan began.

      “The two of you can decide between yourselves which task you will take,” Yosef said, cutting off the younger man. “But… if either of you make it out of this and return home, please tell me wife and son…” He trailed off. Final words seemed to fail him. There was nothing he could convey in a message that they would not already know.

      “We will tell them you boldly faced your fate in face of terror and iniquity,” Avi offered.

      “Thank you.” Yosef dropped the short length to the ground.

      Bin Saddam returned a short time later, as he had promised, and again paced before the three of them. “I trust you have come to a decision?” he asked.

      “We have,” said Avi, looking up into the face of the terrorist. “We have decided to adopt your Islamic concept of hell just so that we have a place to believe you and your bastard lot will end up.”

      Awad bin Saddam smirked. “But which of you will go before me?”

      Yosef’s throat still felt parched, too dry for words. He opened his mouth to accept his fate.

      “I will.”

      “Idan!” Yosef’s eyes bulged wide. Before he could say anything, the younger man had spoken up. “No, it is not him,” he told bin Saddam quickly. “I drew the short rope.”

      Bin Saddam looked from Yosef to Idan, seemingly amused. “I suppose I will just have to kill the one who opened his mouth first.” He reached for his belt and unsheathed an ugly, curved knife with a handle made from a goat’s horn.

      Yosef’s stomach turned at the mere sight of it. “Wait, not him—”

      Awad flicked his knife out and across Avi’s throat. The older man’s mouth fell open in surprise, but no sound came forth as blood cascaded down from his open neck and spilled onto the floor.

      “No!” Yosef shouted. Idan squeezed his eyes shut as a piteous sob burst from him.

      Avi fell forward onto his stomach, faced away from Yosef as a pool of dark blood seeped across the stones.

      Without another word, bin Saddam left them there once again.

      The two remaining endured that night without sleep and not a single word passing between them, though Yosef could hear the soft sobs of Idan as he mourned the loss of his mentor, Avi, whose body laid mere feet from them, growing ever colder.

      In the morning three Arabic men entered the basement wordlessly and removed Avi’s body. Two more came immediately after, followed by bin Saddam.

      “Him.” He pointed to Yosef, and the two insurgents roughly hauled him to his feet by the shoulders. As he was dragged towards the door he realized that he might never see Idan again.

      “Be strong,” he called over his shoulder. “God be with you.”

      Yosef