Free The Prophet Conspiracy by Bowen Greenwood Page A

getting no results. Then, one day back home in the states, a recruiter from the Mossad came and knocked on my door.
    “In comparison to America, Shin Bet is the FBI, and the Mossad is the CIA. The Mossad actually wanted me to work in America. To them, it’s not spying. To them, they have people who help them understand what’s going on in their main ally. But to me, it felt a bit too much like spying on my own country.”
    He shrugged.
    “So I wound up in Shin Bet instead. But the thing is I came because I love Israel. I love the idea of Israel. I love the cause of Israel. After the Holocaust, Israel set out to be a place where Jews would always be safe. It’s a democracy surrounded by a nest of dictatorships. It’s a force for good in the world, and I wanted to be a part.
    “I lost my job at Shin Bet, but I didn’t lose my love of Israel. Tour guides do important work. They help tourists — usually Americans — understand Israel. They help our main ally know us better and give them more reason to see us as good friends to have.
    “I have a really good friend named Ibrahim. He’s my father’s age. He’s been almost like a mentor to me since I came to Israel. He did some time in the IDF but now works as a tour guide. When I was feeling like my world ended after I got fired, he came and told me all that stuff about guides I just mentioned. He suggested it was a way to still serve the country I loved.
    “I became a tour guide because it was a way to do what the Mossad originally wanted me to do: strengthen the ties between Israel and America by helping both understand each other better.”
    He lifted the left half of his face into a partial grin.
    “Now it’s your turn. How does an American tourist wind up tangled in a conspiracy involving fake Shin Bet officers and her cell phone?”
    She told him the whole story: staying for an extra day to dig, finding the wall with an ancient language carved into it, the murders, the chase, the bad encounter with the IDF troops — all of it.
    “So that’s why you didn’t want to go visit the police tonight. Well, given they faked being Shin Bet officers, it wouldn’t surprise me if they faked IDF soldiers too. Everything you described about them is wrong. They would have been kinder to tourists. They should have spoken better English. Those are standard IDF procedures - for the same reason I became a tour guide. American tourists are the best relationship-building opportunity we have. Most importantly, from what you described about their weapons, those were AK-47s, and the IDF uses M-4s.”
    Cameron saw the blank look on her face and said, “Names of different guns. Not important right now. Just take my word for it, they weren’t the IDF.”
    The conversation drew to a close, and Cameron got up to go prepare his bedroom for her. Siobhan tried one last time to persuade him she would be willing to sleep on the couch. His point was a good one, though. Better to have him covering the most likely point of entry.
    While he was out of the room, she walked over to his bookshelves and knelt down to study what he read. There were so many titles about Middle Eastern history there, she felt instantly at home. Many she had read, others she hoped to read someday. She remembered the conversations they had had when he was her tour guide. He knew this subject at least as well as she did — maybe more.
    And then she saw the book by Professor Kendrick. Siobhan sighed. After all this time, it still came so easily to the surface. The mixture of anger and grief for the lost career felt half boiling hot and half simply empty.
    Kendrick had adapted her paper into a little book; she’d known it for a long time but seeing it on Cameron’s shelf nearly set her off again. She tried to remember what her boss at the church said about letting go of it. She tried to turn her mind to other things. Gradually, the anger at Kendrick receded.
    She heard Cameron return to the room and rose to her feet.