“Yeah.” She shook her head. “It’s hard to think of him as Saint Bowen. He’s made a real leap from being CIA Creep of the Year to sainthood.”
Sergeant Lee’s mouth firmed as if repressing a smile. “Yes, ma’am.” He turned to Dan. “You need backup? Because Flynn and me, we can take some personal leave, catch your six, know what I mean?”
Dan shook his head. “For now, I’ve got men coming in. We’re on recon. I’ll call you if I need you.”
Lee fixed him with a hard stare. “You do that. Flynn says he still owes you one. A big one. And I do, too.” He turned his hand into a gun and cocked it at Dan. “So you call if you need us, you hear me?”
Dan nodded.
When Lee walked out, Dan went out and watched him walk down the corridor, standing there for two or three minutes. In that time the elevator remained silent and no one came. The hotel seemed almost empty of guests.
Finally, satisfied, Dan closed the door and looked at her. Unwittingly, as if the young sergeant had released some Marine hormones in the air, he stood at modified parade rest, broad shoulders back, hands over crotch.
“So . . . we’re here, we’re armed and we’re pissed. What do we do now?”
Well, for starters, Claire wanted to kiss him. A big fat smackeroo right on the mouth. Not for sex—for one thing that dusty bed was unappealing—but because he turned to her for leadership. They were a team. He was providing physical security and she was supposed to provide guidance and direction.
Claire Day, who had spent three months in a coma, and the next three months learning to walk again, who’d had nightmares every night and had had trouble distinguishing up from down, was now the team strategist. No question.
Dan stood quietly, waiting to hear what she had to say. He was, as he’d said, armed and pissed and now he was ready to strike in the direction Claire indicated.
And she was up for it, oh yeah.
Her constant dizziness was gone, as if it had never been. Though she’d twice escaped attempted murder, though the trip up through to Canada, then on to Paris, Lungi Airport and then Laka had been long and wearying, she wasn’t tired. She felt . . . strong. Energized. Clearheaded.
She was back.
Claire saw clearly what had to be done, and the steps to be taken. It was as if someone had given her her mind back, her ability to reason things through, to analyze situations and decide on the next step.
“First off,” she said, “I want to talk to Marie Diur’s mother and sister.”
Dan didn’t hesitate a second. “Then let’s go.”
If he had had any feeling that they were being tagged, he’d have aborted the mission, no question.
And Claire would have followed his lead, instantly, no question. She was good with strategy, he was good with tactics. Being with Claire on a mission felt like . . . like dancing with a superb partner. Their movements meshed, each willing to give the other primacy where their talents were strongest.
It was teamwork at its finest, and he hadn’t had that since he’d retired from the Marines.
Except in the Corps, though his fellow soldiers had been good men in a fight, they were also smelly and with skin like leather. They were called Leathernecks for a reason.
Man, being on an op with a partner who was the most beautiful woman in the world, with eyes that could make you drown in them and a mouth that made you whimper . . . that was the best.
Dan didn’t know what the future would hold. He didn’t even know if they had a future. Something powerful was arrayed against them and there was no knowing if they would come out on top. But he knew, like he knew right from wrong, that whatever time was allotted to him on this earth, he wanted it to be with Claire by his side. As his partner in all ways.
She tugged on his arm. “In here.”
They’d been walking through the Cité Administrative, built by the French in the nineteenth century for the managers of the companies running the gold and diamond mines. Though the stucco mansions were dilapidated and were often home to multiple families, they still held a residual grace and beauty.
Claire led them through a rusted but graceful wrought-iron gate that was unlatched and down a brick path that was almost completely overgrown with banana trees and huge palm trees at least a century old. The fronds overhead were so thick they blotted out the sun. Claire followed the path around the back and stopped before a solid door painted bright blue.
It looked completely deserted. Nothing moved in the hot, still air except for the buzzing of insects in the lushly overgrown garden.
There were no signs of human habitation, no sounds of people, no kids running around. Dan remembered that a year ago, the streets had been knee-deep in lively, chocolate-colored kids getting into all kinds of trouble. But right now, there was only the buzz of insects and underneath that, silence.
If the Diur family had moved, he and Claire were in the deepest shit. This was the only part of town that actually had streets, and street addresses. If the Diur family had uprooted and gone to the center of Laka, with its twisting streets and dense population, they’d never find them.
Or if they’d moved out of Laka or, worse, been killed, then he and Claire had traveled halfway around the world only to butt up against a dead end.
Claire walked up to the bright blue door, with peeling paint and splits in the wood, and knocked loudly. “Hello?” she called out. Only the bees answered.
After five minutes of knocking, Claire went farther along the back of the house, feeling for something with her fingers. She gave a little hum of pleasure and held up a key.
“Claire . . .” he said, putting a warning in his voice.
She smiled angelically. “What?” Just as she was fitting the key to the door, it opened. A very beautiful middle-aged African woman stood on the doorstep.
“You. What do you want?” she asked, her voice cold and abrupt.
But Claire had already put her arms around the woman’s slender waist and was hugging her, murmuring something soft in French. The woman frowned, features drawn in pain. At first she stood stiffly in Claire’s embrace. Then she broke down and hugged Claire back, dropping her face to Claire’s shoulder.
When they broke apart, both women had wet eyes. Mrs. Diur looked around carefully and tugged Claire inside. Dan followed, eyes sharp.
Inside, the house was dark and clean, but looked empty, as if nobody lived there. Mrs. Diur led them down a dark, narrow corridor running through the entire house to a living room that gave out on to the street. The curtains were drawn and there was a hush in the air.
They sat down, the two women together on a small sofa, Dan in an armchair at right angles. He kept his right hand free, ready to draw. There was a feeling here he didn’t like. He didn’t know if it was the generally eerie vibe Laka was giving off or this empty house. Whatever. If there was going to be trouble, he was going to be ready for it.
Claire kept her voice low, starting to speak French. Then, with a quick glance at Dan, she switched to English. Ordinarily he would have been happy to have her speak whatever language she wanted to put the woman at ease, but he had to understand what was being said.
Mrs. Diur spoke English with a heavy French accent. “What are you doing here, Claire? I was told you were badly injured.”
“Yes, I was,” Claire said softly. “I don’t remember anything about that day,
Maman
. I wasn’t even capable of talking on the phone until last February. I called here and left a message. Aba called my father’s home while I was in a coma.” Claire closed her eyes briefly. She was pale again, almost as pale as when Dan had seen her in his office. Man, he didn’t ever want to see her that color again, and yet here it was. Whatever it was she was remembering, it was painful. “Aba was . . . angry,
Maman
. And I don’t know why. She said . . . she said Marie was killed because of
me
. Because of something I’d done.” The tears were back in her eyes and her face was drawn. The pale, slender hands holding on to Mrs. Diur’s black ones were white-knuckled with tension. Her voice dropped to a whisper. “I would never have hurt Marie, never. I loved her like a sister. I miss her.”
“I miss her, too,” the woman said simply. “Is that why you have come back to Makongo,
ma chére
? To discover why Marie died? To make—how would you say it?—to make amends?”
Claire released a hand to swipe at her eyes. “I don’t know how to make amends for something I don’t remember doing. I’m here”—she looked swiftly at Dan, then back at the woman—“
we’re
here because someone is after me and I have a feeling in my gut that the answer lies here, in Laka. In what happened a year ago.”
The woman reared back. “After you? What do you mean?”
“There have been two attempts on my life,” Claire said simply. “We have no idea why.”
Mrs. Diur frowned. Her dark features were refined, with high cheekbones and a full mouth. She had to be nearing fifty but she was still a beautiful woman. Dan remembered that her daughter, Marie, had been beautiful, too.
“What makes you think the answer lies here?” Mrs. Diur looked around at her darkened living room, with its empty, deserted air and Dan knew she was also talking about the city outside, just as empty and deserted.
Claire blew out a frustrated breath. “A feeling. I can’t explain it much better than that. But it’s a strong feeling. And the fact that the bombing in Laka is a huge hole in my head, in my life. I don’t remember any of it. Maybe if I filled in the blanks, I could understand what is happening. So I ask you,
Maman
. What happened that day? Do you remember? All I know is that Marie came back to the embassy and called me to come with her. I was with this man.” Claire pointed at him. “He was the head of the embassy guards. He said Marie came to get me and that we both disappeared and then there was the blast. Why? Why did Marie come back to the embassy when there was practically a war outside? It must have taken her at least an hour to get to the embassy, trying to avoid the soldiers shooting in the streets.”
“We begged her not to go.” Mrs. Diur’s eyes welled. A tear tracked down over a high cheekbone and dropped to her lap. She didn’t wipe it away. “Aba fought with her, tried to physically restrain her. But Marie was convinced that you were in danger and she wanted to get you out of the embassy. She knew you were working that day.” Her huge dark eyes burned with emotion. “Marie loved you almost as much as she loved Aba. There was nothing we could say. In the end, she simply ran out the door.”
Claire was crying too, now.
“Oh God. She should have just waited for the Red Army’s troops to wear themselves out. I was safe there in the embassy. Or at least we thought we were. Who would have thought the Red Army would blow the embassy up?”
Mrs. Diur sat up straight, wiping her eyes. “But
ma chère.
That’s the point. That’s why Marie wanted you out of there. Those weren’t Red Army soldiers shooting in the streets.”
“What?” Dan spoke for the first time. “If it wasn’t the Red Army, then who was it?”
“Mbutu’s men. We recognized them. Their plan all along was to bomb the embassy and blame the Red Army. It worked, too. Mbutu was able to portray himself as the enemy of terrorists, the friend of America. And anyone who knew, or who said anything, they had them killed. My husband published an article on the Red Army, on how they weren’t capable of trying to take over Laka and certainly weren’t capable of bombing the embassy. He was obsessed with trying to find out who had killed Marie.” Her voice turned harsh, bitter. “A month after the bombing, masked gunmen came to our house and dragged him away. I never saw him again.”
“
Maman
,” Claire murmured, and placed her hand on her arm. “I’m so sorry. And Aba? What happened to her?”
The woman swiped at her eyes again, but the tears were rolling down her face now. “Aba’s husband was killed, too. She shut up. What else could she do? She works at a hospital, the Hôpital Générale de la Charité. She’s very agitated about something but she won’t tell me. But there’s something going on that is tearing her in two.”
Suddenly she turned her head, staring blindly out the window, tears shiny against her dark skin. “Go away,” she said dully, without turning her head. “Please, Claire, if you ever felt something for us, go away now and never come back.”
CLAIRE was shaken when she left
Maman
Diur’s house.
Mr. Diur had been a university lecturer and there had always been students and other professors hanging around. And Aba’s doctor friends, cynical and dedicated. And Marie’s friends, who loved music and art.
There’d been good-natured arguing, teasing, friendliness, a sense of family. Claire had been considered a third daughter and she’d simply lapped it up. An only child growing up in a household grieving for her lost mother, she’d been used to the quiet of loneliness.
Though her father had never forbidden her to bring her friends home, she could tell he didn’t enjoy noise and confusion, so she just grew into the habit of stopping friendships at the door.
Not that there had been that many. Claire had been a studious girl, from a sad home. It had turned out to be easier to just close herself away with her books and her computer.
Marie’s home had been an eye-opener and she dove in happily, soaking up the chaotic and cultured atmosphere, full of noise and laughter and arguments and delightful food and unquestioning friendship.
All lost, forever gone. The Diur home now was even sadder than her own in Safety Harbor, because its walls had once held happiness and companionship. Hers never had, and now never would
They were walking along the street, Dan helping her to navigate around the cracked pavement of the sidewalk because she was lost in space. Last year, it had been a well-maintained street, full of traffic, people strolling in the evenings on the smooth asphalt. Now it looked like it had survived a war.
Maybe it had.
Dan was not only helping her navigate the cracks and holes, he was watching the street and the houses, vigilant and prepared. He had his left arm around her, right loose, ready to reach for a weapon. Just like a Marine. Trusting in God and firepower.
Claire wasn’t any help at all, she was still stunned by what she’d heard, and she stumbled along, impervious to the outside world.
She stopped and Dan stopped, too, eyes roaming expertly along the tops of the buildings.
She wasn’t doing any good here, dazed and sad. She had to regroup.
“Let’s go back to the hotel,” she said.
Dan nodded.