"To start another war."

"Why would they start another war? Don't they have enough problems now?"

"The Americans pay the Zionist gangs to make trouble and war. Then the Americans intervene."

"Who tells you these stories?" Ahamed leaned close to her. "Do you listen to Radio Moscow? You can tell me. The driver cannot hear or see through the glass." He glanced to the tinted, bulletproof partition dividing the front from the rear.

"No, not Radio Moscow. I listen to the people of Beirut. I listen to the lies of Zionists and the Yankee imperialists."

As Ahamed moved closer, she became very aware of the expensive smuggled cologne he wore. For this ride with her into the hills, he had worn his gold rings and Rolex wrist watch, a perfectly tailored uniform and a beret set at a rakish angle on his head. Did he mean to impress the foreign journalist with his elegance?

Or to seduce her?

She considered the value of an affair with Sayed Ahamed. As one of the most effective militia commanders — a chieftain who not only controlled hundreds of trained fighters but also led them to decisive victories against opponents of his Shia people — he had earned the respect of all the other militias operating in Beirut. More, he combined his military knowledge with the skills of politics. When he spoke for the Shias, all other factions listened.

To the citizens of Beirut, Ahamed represented the values of strength and faith. He might emerge as a national leader in the moderate government of conciliation.

An intimate involvement with Sayed Ahamed would advance her career as journalist and as Soviet agent.

He whispered again, his words warm on her ear. "Why do you not listen to me? I can tell you so much more. Always the journalists come and question, but then they print what they believe, what they imagine, not what I say. But you, intelligent... and so very pretty..."

She laughed, putting her head back so that he could look at her throat and down her blouse. "You must be desperate for a press release..."

He kissed her throat, exactly as she intended. A strong hand touched a breast, stroked her body. She glanced to the driver, to be sure he faced forward. She could see only the silhouette of his head as he drove, the lights of cars and buildings causing his shadow on the bulletproof partition to shift and leap.

How should she develop this romance? Should she now push away the Shia commander's hands and pretend he had gone too far? Or should she fake a wild passion?

He spoke beautiful French. He had undoubtedly visited France, perhaps studied in a university there, perhaps lived there for years. What had been his experience with French girls? Had he known only prostitutes? Or had he attempted to bed the good Catholic girls, the sisters of his French friends? As a foreigner, he had certainly encountered French prejudice and chauvinism. The girls in their minis and alluring fashions would flirt, but would they go further?

She did not have time to play a game. The American terror team had come to Beirut to meet Powell, the ex-Marine, the wild-eyed killer of her Soviet and Syrian brothers in struggle. Powell worked with Sayed Ahamed. If she hoped to locate and mark Powell for death, she must overwhelm Ahamed.

Ahamed must dream and rave for his new conquest, his French-speaking Canadian mistress, the mysterious journalist.

Desmarais returned his kisses, her body shifting, moving against him, pushing him back against the door. She covered his mouth with hers, waged a battle of tongues before putting her lips to his throat and tasting the bitter-salt of his cologne and sweat, feeling the fine stubble of his beard against her face.

He's already hard, she thought, feeling steel against her thigh. She reached down to stroke him, found his holstered pistol. She pushed the weapon to the side. As she touched him, she felt him shudder. Kissing his throat, his chest, she slid down.

As she unbuttoned his pants, he watched the dark streets pass. No matter how distant the fighting, no civilians risked the streets. He knew the Syrians fought one another, but the radio and television stations did not carry that information. The announcers repeated only the rumors of a Syrian civil war and the assurances of the Council of Conciliation. The people of Beirut had gone to the uncertain safety of their shelters to listen to their radios and wait. After ten years of war, they disregarded rumors and assurances and went underground when they heard distant shellfire.

She mouthed him and clenched at him. Her head went up and down. Ahamed almost yawned. He gripped her head in both hands and guided her up and down. He did not want her to see him looking at his watch. Checking the time, he realized he should concentrate on this pathetic sex act because if he did not ejaculate quickly she might expect him to join her in her hotel room. And he had other appointments. Already, he had wasted hours to get the woman out of Beirut while Akbar and Powell completed their preparations and departed. Perhaps he should have killed her in the hills. That would have spared him the indignity of a blood test.

The thought of the millions of syphilis spirochetes now writhing and reproducing on his lips after kissing this Soviet whore and the millions more invading his genitals made him shudder with disgust. The woman mistook the shudder as ecstasy and redoubled her fervor.

Get it over with, Ahamed silently screamed. Nauseated, he looked out at the boulevard and saw a Syrian Land Rover pass. A Mercedes troop truck followed, then a truck and trailer.

Akbar, Powell and the other Americans! On their way out of Beirut!

The neon lights of the hotel appeared. Ahamed saw the lead car swerve into the traffic circle, then the limo. The doorman approached. Ahamed knotted his hands in Desmarais's hair to guide and distract her.

As the doorman reached for the handle of the opposite door, Ahamed shoved the woman away and unlocked the door. Her lips gleaming with saliva, Desmarais clutched at his thighs, trying to pull his body down, to drive his rigid organ again into her mouth, and Ahamed pushed her out of the vehicle.

The doorman caught her. Slapping the partition, Ahamed shouted to the driver, "Go!"

Gasping, blinking against the lights of the hotel's entry, Desmarais sat in the gutter and watched the limousine speed away. The doorman, who had seen into the limousine, stared at her. Desmarais twisted out of his hands and stood up. Wiping her mouth, she hurried to the hotel entrance.

As she stalked through the doorway, she turned and saw the doorman talking with a bellboy. The doorman mimicked an erect penis with his fist and thumb, then two men burst into laughter. They watched her watching them and laughed.

"Miss Desmarais!"

Livid, she raged with thoughts of revenge. A car-bombing of the hotel? Assassinate the doorman? An air strike on the headquarters of Ahamed?

She turned and instantly recognized the stoop-shouldered bear of a man at the telephones. Zhgenti! He motioned her to approach. A dark, peasant-faced man from a southern republic of the Soviet Union, he passed without notice among the dark peoples of the Middle East. Only his Slavic accent and faulty French and Arabic betrayed him. But he more than qualified for a field operative with his passion for murder. The KGB would not have sent him for information.

They sat together. Desmarais did not waste time on greetings. "What happened?"

"The Americans destroyed the cruiser. All my men and the Palestinians died. Not a trace left."

"How could that..."

"How does not matter! Why do you not already know this? All day you have been out, searching for that other American. They are with him. Did you find them?"

"No. I tried to get the information from Sayed Ahamed, the commander of the militia gang that Powell..."