Chapter 9

Looking into Pearson's eyes Clay knew that they had been compromised. Pearson had had the information beaten out of him. As he looked back at Clay his eyes silently begged for forgiveness. Clay knew the only thing they could do at this point was to try and bluff their way out of this situation. His eyes gave nothing away as he stared at Pearson. The only give away point had been his start of surprise when Pearson had at first been drug into the room.

Turning his gaze back to Yalda Clay said, "We've never seen this man before so I have no idea what he could possibly have told you about us."

"Is that so?" Yalda asked.

"What reason would I have to lie to the man I plan on doing a large amount of business with?"

Yalda looked back and forth between Charles and Katherine and asked, "So you claim to have no knowledge of this man?"

Clay, pretending to become indignant, replied in a slightly aggravated voice, "I do not know why you are insisting my wife and I know this man. I thought we came here to discuss the purchase of the product you provide. If that is not the case then my wife and I will be on our way."

While Clay had been speaking, Yalda had opened the long shallow desk drawer in front of him. As Clay finished speaking he began to pull out photographs and place them on the desk one by one in front of the Moore's. They both had to lean forward a bit in their chairs to look at the photographs placed on the desk. There were three pictures each of the two different meetings they'd had with Agent Pearson at the outdoor cafe.

"So you do not know this man?" Yalda asked once again.

With the proof of his lie in front of him Clay had to think quickly of how to get them out of what was becoming a dangerous situation. Taya had sat there passively throughout this conversation. She gave nothing away of her reactions to what was going on. However when she looked over at Clay she could see telltale evidence of fear in his eyes. She prayed that Yalda, not knowing Clay like she did, would not interpret his expression that way. As Clay sat there trying to come up with a response to the blatant lie they had been caught in, Yalda once again snapped his fingers and two armed guards joined them in the room. "I will know the truth, Mr. Moore, and until I do your wife and you will be detained." Looking at the guards he told them, "Take them to a guest room."

They were shown to an elegant second floor bedroom with a king-size bed and a bathroom attached. The two armed guards remained just outside their bedroom door. Checking out all possible escape routes, Clay opened the balcony off the bedroom and saw that they were over the front of the house where the driveway was, but because of the two armed guards at the front door this would not work as an escape route either.

They were well fed at regular intervals, but hung in limbo from their meeting with Yalda from Saturday afternoon until early evening on Monday. The guards opened the door and one instructed them to follow him and waited as they did with the other guard bringing up the rear. They were taken into the back courtyard where they saw Yalda sitting at a patio table with the tea service sitting next to him.

A guard stood on either side of Pearson who was kneeling between them in obviously poor condition. After what seem like a nearly endless silence Yalda spoke, "Because I could get no more information out of Mr. Brown, (Pearson's alias) he is no further use to me."

One of the guards pulled out his pistol at Yalda's nod and placing it at Pearson's temple and drew back the trigger. Pearson's eyes met Clays' and pleaded for forgiveness saying only, "I'm sorry," before the trigger was pulled and his brains were splattered across the tiles of the patio.

Yalda looked at Clay and Taya and asked, "Are you going to make this easy on yourselves or do we have to do this the hard way?"

To be continued…