Sandstorm

The oldest section, called, cleverly enough, Old Town, appeared as the jet banked to the right. Stone walls and ancient buildings lay nestled up against a sweeping crescent bay of blue water, its white sand shoreline dotted by date palms. Surrounded by the old gated city walls, the town housed the Alam Palace and the dramatic towering stone forts of Mirani and Jalai.

Memories overlay all she saw, as tenuous as the reflections in the smooth waters of the bay. Events long forgotten came alive: ru

Safia felt a chill that had nothing to do with the cabin’s air-conditioning. Home and homeland blurred in her mind. Tragedy and joy.

Then as the plane angled toward the airport, Old Town vanished, replaced by the Matrah section of Muscat-and the city’s port. One side of the docks moored modern hulking ships, the other the slender single-masted dhows, the ancient sailing ships of Arabia.

Safia stared at the proud line of wooden masts and folded sails, in stark contrast to the behemoths of steel and diesel. More than anything else, this typified her homeland: the ancient and the modern, mixed together, but forever separate.

The third section of Muscat was the least interesting. Inland from the old town and port, stacked against the hills, rose Ruwi, the modern business center, the commercial headquarters of Oman. Kara’s corporate offices were there.

The plane’s course had mapped out Safia and Kara’s life, from Old Town to Ruwi, from riotous children playing in the streets to lives confined by corporate offices and dusty museums.

Now the present.

The jet dropped toward the airport, aiming for the stretch of tarmac. Safia leaned back into her seat. The other passengers gaped out the windows.

Clay Bishop sat across the cabin. The grad student bobbed his head in sync with the current digitalized tract on his iPod. His black glasses kept slipping down his nose, requiring him to push them back up repeatedly. He wore his typical uniform: jeans and a T-shirt.

Ahead of Clay, Painter and Coral leaned together, staring out a single window. They spoke in hushed tones. She pointed, and he nodded, fiddling with a tiny cowlick atop his head that had formed while he napped.

Kara folded back the door to her private suite and stood in the threshold.

“We’re landing,” Safia said. “You should sit down.”

Fingers flicked away her concern, but Kara crossed to the empty seat beside her and dropped heavily into it. She didn’t buckle her seat belt.

“I can’t ring up Omaha,” she said as introduction.

“What?”

“He’s not answering his mobile. Probably doing it on purpose.”

That wasn’t like Omaha, Safia thought. He could be dodgy sometimes, but he was all business when it came to the job. “He’s surely just busy. You left him hanging out to dry. You know how touchy and territorial the cultural attachйs can be in Muscat.”

Kara huffed out her irritation. “He’d better be waiting at the airport.”

Safia noted how large her pupils were in the bright light. She looked both exhausted and wired at the same time. “If he said he’d be there, he will be.”

Kara cocked a questioning eyebrow at her. “Mr. Reliable?”

Safia felt a pang, her gut wrung in two different directions. Reflex made her want to defend him, as she had done in the past. But memory of the ring she had placed back in his palm constricted her throat. He had not understood the depth of her pain.

Then again who could?

She had to force her eyes not to glance at Painter.

“You’d better buckle up,” she warned Kara.

12:53 P.M.

DANNY’S SNEEZEwas as loud as a gunshot, startling a pair of caged doves in a neighboring shop. Wings fluttered against bamboo bars.

Omaha watched the masked gunman turn toward their booth, stepping toward them. A yard away, Da

The police sirens wailed, piercing now from their proximity to the market. If only Da

The gunman held his rifle shouldered, pointed forward, moving in a crouched stance, experienced. Omaha clenched his fists. He’d have to knock the rifle up, then dive low.

Before he could move, the robed proprietor of the shop shambled forward, into plain view. He waved a fan in one hand and wiped his nose with the other.

“Hasaseeya,” he mumbled as he straightened some baskets over Omaha’s head, cursing his hay fever. He feigned surprise at seeing the gunman, threw up his hands, fan flying, and fell back.

The gunman gave a muffled curse, waving the old man back with his rifle.

He obeyed, retreating to a low counter, covering his head with his hands.

Off in the direction of the souk’s entrance, the squeal of brakes a

The gunman glanced in their direction, then did the only thing he could. He stepped to the large urn sheltering Da

Anonymous.

Except Omaha had stared hard. He saw her face.

Mocha skin, deep brown eyes, a tattoo of a tear under the left eye.

Bedouin.

After a safe stretch, Omaha stepped out of hiding. Da

The proprietor appeared, straightening his robe with pats of his hands.

“Shuk ran,” Da

With the typical self-effacing custom of the Omani people, the man shrugged.

Omaha stripped off another fifty-rial bill and held it out.

The shopkeeper crossed his arms, palms facedown. “Khalas.” The deal had already been struck. It would be an insult to renegotiate. Instead, the old man crossed to the stack of baskets and picked one up. “For you,” he said. “Gift for pretty woman.”

“Bi kam?” Omaha asked. How much?

The man smiled. “For you? Fifty rial.”

Omaha returned his smile, knowing he was being swindled, but he handed over the bill. “Khalas.”

As they left the market and headed toward the entrance, Da

Omaha shrugged. He had no idea. Apparently Da

Omaha pictured the riflewoman’s face again. Skin aglow in the sunshine.

The resemblance was unmistakable.

She could’ve been Safia’s sister.

7

Old Town

DECEMBER 2, 05:34 P.M.

SEEB INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT

PAINTER KEPTpace behind the trundling cart of gear and equipment. The heat off the tarmac seemed to boil the oxygen right out of the air, leaving only a heavy dampness to sear the lungs. Painter fa