The Last Orphan -
Chapter 63
The elderly man with tousled white hair walked with some difficulty across Concourse C of the Dubai International Airport. His nose was wide and puttylike, his spine curled arthritically, and he relied heavily on a cane to move his right leg. Behind him he pulled a rolling carry-on composed of Tumi’s trademark black ballistic nylon. Attached to the handle was a canary-yellow circular luggage tag emblazoned with a tour-group name: GOLDEN YEARS CRUISES.
It was slow going.
The beautiful modern facility exuded a timeless weariness and excitement, the forever-day and forever-night of airport terminals. Between gates C21 and C23 waited the cheery leprechaun-green façade of McGettigan’s Irish Pub, its neon sign sprouting the inevitable clover.
DXB served as a gateway to most of America’s endless wars, operators and mercenaries rolling through on their way to Baghdad, Sana’a, and countless other hotspots. For them McGettigan’s was the pub of choice.
The elderly man entered and scanned the cheery interior. A long, curved bar underlit with a purple glow, TVs piping in US football and European fútbol, a library wall of antique books and another composed of a neat stack of stripped firewood on which customers had written initials or love equations with permanent markers. One set of windows overlooked a runway, the other offering a glimpse of distant green hills. The elaborate fabric lamps dangling from the ceiling looked like roses or crumpled tissues depending on one’s Rorschachian tendencies. Along with illuminated glass shelves housing spirits, they suffused the bar with a welcoming light.
Trudging forward on that bum leg, the man took a seat at the bar next to a tall, slender man nervously sipping a pint and slotted his carry-on between their stools where the other man had left his.
“Hallo,” the elderly man said, offering a hand. “Matthew Ross, but you can call me Matty.”
The slender man gave an irritated shake and turned back to his drink. “Derek Tenpenny.”
The sole TV devoted to news scrolled headlines on the crawl—a fresh outbreak of violence in the Gaza Strip, another celebrity divorce, the American environmental bill stalled out.
“Where you headed to, friend?” the old man asked.
“Look, I’d prefer not to chitchat, okay?”
“I suppose you don’t want to see pictures of my grandkids, then?”
“That would be correct.”
“Suit yourself, friend.”
The old man leaned his cane against his stool, but it clattered to the floor by the carry-ons. With a g***n he bent down and picked it up. Given his age, it took awhile, but he found his way back up. The music was a bit louder than he would have liked.
He hailed the bartender with a tremulous hand, and the handsome Arab man bounced over. “What’ll it be, sir?” he asked in pristine English. “We have cold beers on tap.”
“No, thanks,” the old guy said, peering around the barkeep at the beautifully displayed vodka bottles. “Is that Kauffman Vintage?”
The elderly man shuffled his way through the private-jet terminal, his pace starting to quicken. His gait evened out as he straightened up by degrees, trashing his cane into a metal waste receptacle. He rolled a Tumi international carry-on just like the one he’d entered McGettigan’s with, the same circular tag bobbing atop the handle.
But it wasn’t the same piece of luggage.
The matching piece he’d brought into the pub, the one that Derek Tenpenny had left with, contained several ounces of gunpowder for the explosives-sniffing canines and numerous documents accusing members of the House of Al Falasi, the royal ruling family of Dubai, of pedophilia and treason.
Boarding the Embraer Lineage 1000 he’d reserved for the long haul, Evan peeled off his putty nose and cracked his back.
Tenpenny had name-dropped Qatar-based Al Jazeera enough times that Evan had asked Joey to monitor travel into the Middle East. Sure enough, Tenpenny’s name had popped up on the databases, a flight from JFK to Dubai on Emirates, after which he’d switch planes for the shorter hop to Doha.
That is, if he cleared security.
Aragón Urrea needed the luxury jet back in Texas, but Evan would certainly enjoy it while he had it. A queen-size bed, a full-length couch, silk cut pile carpet—everything at peak design.
He collapsed into a leather seat and let out an exhale.
Mission complete.
It was bizarre how it had started and where it had wound up. The more distance he got from Tartarus, the more vague his recollections of Luke Devine had grown, as if he were something from a dream.
Evan’s blinks grew longer. He needed a short rest. And afterward he could relax and clean up.
The bar was stocked to his liking. The plane even had a shower in which he could rinse the dye out of his hair and the old-age makeup from his face.
He’d be a new man.
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