“Stop!” Saad had his hands up. “I’ve already made a decision, and I am still in charge on this boat. Use tonight to try to extract your information. But when the sun comes up, I want both of you, your entourages, and that Jew off my boat. Understood?”

While Kamal glared at him, Saad could see the rage leaving Mousavi. “I’m sorry, habibi. This should not have happened on Cafala Bahr. You opened your vessel to us, and we have taken advantage of it. We’ll leave in the morning.”

Kamal remained obstinate. “I’m not leaving until—”

“We will both leave in the morning.” Mousavi stared hard at the Saudi until the man nodded his acquiescence. “Good. In the meantime, I’ll tell Ghasemi our time is short and to flay the Jew alive if that’s what it takes to make him finally talk.”

Chapter 59

CHAPTER 59

THREE HOURS LATER

20:40 / 8:40 P.M. IST

I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know,” Nir moaned. He was still hanging against the wall, but he couldn’t feel the pain in his joints anymore. That had all drifted to the background. Right now, all his focus, his entire existence, was centered on the serrated blade tracing across his abdomen. He knew it was serrated because his torturer was insistent that he admire its shape and craftsmanship before he employed it.

“Just tell me, you stubborn fool,” said the doctor as he stepped away. Nir heard the blade clank onto the table. “Let me make it stop,” he added. But then he came back.

Nir smelled the alcohol before he felt it. He cried out, then slipped back into his mumbled mantra, “I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know.”

Mumbled conversation reached his ears. Then the ropes were loosed, and he tumbled to the floor. He immediately balled up for self-preservation. He was clueless as to what bodily fluids he was lying in, but he didn’t care. At least he wasn’t hanging anymore. Then his arms and legs began cramping, and a whole new wave of agony assaulted his body.

The doctor squatted in front of him. “We’ll be back very soon to try again. Use this time to reach into your memory banks for the information we are seeking. And just to give you something to look forward to, when I return, I think it will be time for the torch.”

As the man walked away, Nir could hear him giving orders to the two IRGC men in the room. “Clean my instruments and his scraps from the table. And wash down the floor. It smells like a sewer.”

Please come, please come, please come. Nir pleaded for his rescuers to arrive.

“What’s he saying?” one of the IRGC men asked.

“Who knows? Something in his gutter language.”