Secret Agent Sam

by Kathleen Creighton

  He gave her an uncomfortable, almost embarrassed look, and ran a hand through his hair. “I’ll see what I can do about that.” A smile flickered briefly as he paused with one hand on the door latch. “Maybe I can tell al-Rami you’re my secretary.”

  “Yeah,” Sam said dryly, “that’s just what I’ve always wanted to be. Somebody’s secretary. Wahoo.”

  His smile steadied and grew tender. “That’s the Sam I know,” he said softly.

  After he’d gone, she went on sitting at the windowsill for a long time, arms crisscrossing her body, one hand covering her mouth, eyes closed…rocking herself a little…too emotionally exhausted to cry, hurting too much to laugh.

  “Mr. al-Rami, I have only a few more questions…” Cory leaned forward into the pool of light.

  It was late afternoon, but here, deep in the ravine, twilight had already fallen. Lamps had been lit, lending a degree of warmth and conviviality to the setting that made it hard to remember, sometimes, that the man sitting across from him in the role of gracious host was the same one responsible for the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands, of people, and whose professed objective was the destruction of almost everything Cory loved and believed in.

  “Of course,” al-Rami said, with a magnanimous wave of a long, graceful hand.

  Cory cleared his throat. On his left, he could hear the quiet click and whir of Tony’s camera. He had to fight the urge to glance over at Sam, who’d been sitting silently on his right, every now and then taking a sip of tea or reaching to pluck a piece of fruit from the bowl in front of her. She hadn’t said a word throughout the meal and the subsequent question-and-answer session, except to murmur an occasional “Thank you” when some new dish was placed in front of her, and al-Rami had treated her with the same courtesy he’d shown to Tony. Cory suspected the earlier display had been only a case of the terrorist leader demonstrating his absolute power and control, over both them and the situation. This is my game, and you will play by my rules.

  Knowing how important it was at this juncture that he not waver or show weakness, he kept his eyes fixed on Fahad al-Rami’s. “Sir, it is known that you are currently holding two hostages. A Canadian couple-” he made a point of glancing down at his notes, although the names were etched in his memory “-Esther and Harold Lundquist.” He looked up, once more locking eyes with al-Rami. “Missionaries.” He waited.

  Al-Rami nodded, his expression unperturbed, even aloof. “That is true, yes. They are in my custody. I can assure you they have not been harmed, and are being well treated.”

  “Might I be allowed to see for myself that that is the case? A firsthand report from me would go a long way toward changing the perception most people have of you and your organization.”

  Al-Rami gave a slight shrug, picked up his teacup and sipped delicately before answering. “I wish I could accommodate your request, Mr. Pearson. Unfortunately, the Lundquists are not here at the present time. They are being kept at another location-as I said, safe and unharmed.”

  “These people are missionaries, Mr. al-Rami. They mean you and your followers no harm. What purpose-”

  “On the contrary. They mean us great harm. They have attempted to corrupt the most sacred beliefs of our people.” Al-Rami replaced the cup in its saucer with a sharp click.

  Cory took a breath and tried a new tack. “Can you tell me when they will be released?”

  “They will be released when the time is right, and under circumstances of our choosing.” Al-Rami’s tone was cold.

  “Might I suggest,” Cory said softly, leaning forward once more, “that now might be an advantageous time for you and your cause? Coupled with this interview, such a magnanimous gesture-”

  He broke off, his breath catching as a series of sharp, rapid pops came from somewhere outside, not too far distant. Beside him he felt Sam jerk upright and go rigid, as if someone had jabbed her in the back with a poker.

  Tony said, “Holy momma, what was that?”

  Before Cory had a chance to reply, the room filled with men in camouflage. In an instant, it seemed, a phalanx of them had surrounded Fahad al-Rami and were helping him to rise. Others, with less consideration, grabbed Tony and Sam and jerked them to their feet; Cory heard Tony’s protests as he tried frantically to snatch up his cameras. Then he, too, was being jerked upright. He just did manage to scoop up the tape recorder and stuff it into the front of his shirt before they were all hustled out onto the deck, down the swaying rattan stairway and into the depths of the ravine.

  Chapter 8

  All hell was breaking loose behind them. Shouts, small explosions and the crackle of gunfire chased them as they zigzagged through the jungle growth, stumbling and tripping over vines and rotting logs, trying to dodge the stinging slap of ferns and fronds and branches. Then came a flash, and almost immediately after that the thump of an explosion-and then quickly two more. From the indescribable but unmistakable sounds of destruction that followed the blasts, Cory felt certain the unique bamboo house in the ravine was no more.

  In the confusion he’d lost track of Fahad al-Rami, though he assumed the terrorist leader must be somewhere in the tangle ahead of them, no doubt surrounded and protected by his special cadre of security forces. Only three or four of the guards had been left behind to shepherd the three “guests,” and it was obvious the selected ones weren’t happy about it. Every time Cory tried to pause to see where Sam and Tony were, he felt the impatient thump of a rifle barrel against his back, and heard the same guttural command repeated harshly over and over. He didn’t have to understand Tagalog-or whatever dialect these people were speaking-to recognize “Go, go, go!” when he heard it. And go he did, with his head down, heart pumping, adrenaline squirting through his veins and his mind in useless turmoil.

  He had no idea how long that headlong flight went on or how much territory they’d covered before he was ordered, with pushes and shoves and barked commands, to halt and crouch down in the dense undergrowth. Moments later, to his intense relief, Sam and Tony came crashing through the brush and dropped-or were pushed-down beside him. Tony’s face was glistening with a mixture of sweat and blood from a scratch over one eye. Sam’s face was unmarred but stony. The guards, meanwhile, had gone darting and leaping back the way they’d come and were hunkered down in cover a short distance away, rifles at the ready, avidly scanning the jungle for signs of pursuit.

  As soon as he had his breath back, Cory rolled over, propped himself on his elbows and wheezed, “Everybody okay?”

  He got all the reassurance he needed from Tony when the photographer began swearing as only he knew how. He left him muttering and fretting over his precious cameras and turned to Sam, who was sitting silently with her arms draped over her drawn-up knees, staring into the darkening canopy.

  “Sam?”

  She flashed him a glance that stung, and in a voice so low he could barely hear it, muttered, “Yeah, I’m fine.” She turned her face away from him then, but not before he’d registered, with a small sense of shock, the fact that she was angry.

  Angry? Why in the world would she be angry? He sat without moving, the question spinning in his brain. Fear he could have understood-not that he’d have expected it, this was Sam, after all-but…rage? It didn’t make sense, but there it was: unless he was mistaken, Sam was about as furious as he’d ever seen her. And Sam-the Sam he knew-didn’t get mad. Oh, she had a temper, for sure, but she’d almost never let herself show it. She cared too much about keeping her cool, keeping it together. She’d just about rather die than let anyone see her upset, angry, hurt or scared. He understood that part of her so well, maybe because she’d developed her armor the same way he had, as a fatherless child learning to survive among unsympathetic strangers. It was, he realized, one of the things that had drawn him to her from the beginning, that intuitive recognition of a kindred soul. He’d understood her, then, better than she’d understood herself.

  He wondered when all that had changed. Because he sure couldn�
��t say the same thing now.

  Night fell with a crash, the way it does in the tropics. The guards returned from their reconnaissance, muttering amongst themselves, and the retreat through the jungle resumed, although in a somewhat more calm and orderly fashion than before.

  It was the third night in a row of these moonlit treks, with only catnaps for sleep, but Sam was a long way from feeling tired. She was too angry to be tired.

  Idiots!

  The word had zapped through her mind when she’d heard the first spatter of gunfire, and it repeated there now like a drummer’s cadence keeping time with her plodding, crashing footsteps. Idiots-they were supposed to wait for my signal! Why didn’t they wait?

  She’d given the message. She was certain it had been received and understood. Stand by.

  Clearly, either the government forces hadn’t gotten the second message-the one after Target located-or they’d ignored it. Either way, they’d jumped the gun and attacked al-Rami’s hideout without waiting for her signal to move in. What were they thinking? We could all have been killed!

  Even worse, Fahad al-Rami had escaped. The mission had failed. And all this-the risk of seeing Cory again, digging up old memories, stirring up so much pain-was for nothing.

  In the singing, sweltering jungle night, she felt angry, and cold…and finally numb.

  As nearly as Cory could tell, given the overcast skies, it was getting on towards noon when they came to the village. The smells of freshly turned earth and cooking fires assailed him the moment he emerged from the jungle into the open swath of cultivated fields, scents as rich and brown and mouthwatering as the aroma from a king’s banquet table. And carried on the breeze from somewhere out of sight, sharp and heady as wine, came the unmistakable salt tang of the sea.

  “Lord, I hope that’s food I smell,” Tony said plaintively, pausing beside him to dip his head and mop his face on the shoulder of his T-shirt. “I’m so hungry I could eat a bug. Better yet-a whole lotta bugs.”

  Cory grunted; his own stomach had been complaining loudly and painfully since before daybreak. Small wonder-they’d had nothing to eat or drink since the meal they’d shared with Fahad al-Rami the previous afternoon, other than some fruits they’d found growing wild in the jungle which Sam had assured him were safe to eat. He’d been hungry enough to take her word for that, but once again had been left to wonder where she’d come by such knowledge.

  He looked over at her now, walking a little apart from everyone else, her gaze fixed straight ahead, her expression aloof and distant. “Any idea where we are?” he asked her in an undertone, with a wary glance at the nearest guard.

  She looked up at the lowering clouds and shrugged. “We’re near the ocean. Can’t be absolutely sure, we’ve been doing quite a bit of circling and backtracking, but if I’m right, this would be the south side of the island.”

  He gave her a long, meaningful look. “That would put us only a few miles from where we left the plane.”

  “Yep.” She aimed an almost undetectable nod toward the right. “Wind’s coming from there, so I’m guessing that’s where the water is. That puts the plane-” she tilted the nod back toward the left “-over thataway.” She flashed him a stiff and humorless grin. “Just in case…”

  Once again he didn’t question her conclusions, but as he returned her smile he felt the same nagging sense of unease that had troubled him since they’d left the house in the ravine. Truth was, for the first time since he’d known her she was a stranger to him. He couldn’t read this new Sam at all, and that bothered him. He’d always been able to tell when something was troubling her, and it had never taken much effort on his part to get her to spill what was on her mind. Which was so typical of Sam-didn’t mind telling you about her feelings, even if she did hate showing them. But now he felt certain she was shielding herself, evading, deliberately keeping secrets from him, and it came as something of a surprise to him that he found that so disturbing, and even felt vaguely wounded, as if he’d had a door politely but firmly shut in his face.

  The village was as tiny and primitive as the others they’d seen, no more than a cluster of houses tucked away on the far side of the cultivated fields, nestled between the base of a mountain and a wide gully that had been cut by a river on its winding way down-to the right, Sam had been correct on that score-to a small sea cove. There wasn’t much water in the river now, this close to the end of the dry season, but when the monsoon rains began, Cory imagined it could become a raging torrent in a matter of minutes.

  They crossed the gully on a swaying footbridge, their armed escort sandwiching them, two in front and two behind. As they made their way along a dusty road between haphazard clusters of houses, once again Cory saw few signs of life save for the usual placidly foraging chickens. But here, instead of a feeling of emptiness and abandonment, he had an uneasy sense of eyes watching avidly from shadowed doorways.

  After passing through the village, the road narrowed to a footpath that zigzagged up a grassy slope to where a large house with a thatched roof perched, half-supported by pilings, on the side of the mountain. It had a large veranda that looked out over the village and cultivated fields, the fringe of jungle beyond, and probably even, off in the distance, a hazy glimpse of ocean.

  A short distance away, to the right of the main house, Cory noted a smaller house sitting by itself in the shade of a large tree. He could just make out the figure of a man leaning against the wall in the shade on the near side of the house, cradling an automatic rifle in his arms.

  He moved close to Sam and nudged her with his elbow, then nodded toward the smaller house. Without moving her lips she muttered, “I see it.”

  As they approached the big house, Fahad al-Rami stepped out from the shadowed doorway and moved to the edge of the veranda. He was dressed in a white robe now, with a colorful open vest over it, sandals on his feet and on his head an Indonesian-style cap similar to the one he’d been wearing before. Above the graying beard his cheekbones looked gaunt, and his eyes were sunk deep in shadowed sockets.

  “Now you see what I and my people must endure,” he said, his voice cold and austere, looking down upon them as he might an invasion of cockroaches. Al-Rami almost spat words as he continued, “Persecution by government forces, aided by your American army rangers, is constant and unrelenting. Every day my people mourn the slaughter of our innocents-old people, women and children. Where are your highly touted ideals? Your concern for human rights? Your so-called Geneva Convention? Pah-I would be entirely justified in holding you three as my prisoners-hostages, if you wish-to secure freedom for my people and the withdrawal of all invaders from our lands.”

  He made an angry gesture with his hand as he turned, and said on a regretful exhalation, “But…I have given my word and I will honor it. Again, I offer you the hospitality of my house. Please-come. Rest and refresh yourselves. Food is being prepared for you. Tomorrow my men will return you safely to your plane.” With that, he stepped back through the doorway and disappeared inside the house.

  “Well,” Tony said brightly, looking around at his companions, “I feel all warm and fuzzy-how ’bout you guys?”

  Cory let out the breath he’d been holding. “We should probably consider ourselves lucky,” he said dryly. Lucky we’re here, and not in that other house-the one with the armed guard.

  He was just glad he’d gotten the interview pretty much wrapped. Not that he’d wouldn’t have liked to spend more time with his subject, maybe get him to let his guard down and open up a little, maybe get some personal stuff. But it looked as though what he already had on tape and in his notes-and Tony’s photos, of course-was going to have to do, and he was grateful enough for that.

  Yeah, and all I have to do is get the material-and us-safely out of this place. When I’ve done that, maybe I’ll be able to breathe again.

  “Might not be the best time to bring up those other hostages again, either,” Sam said in an expressionless undertone as they mounted wooden steps t
o the veranda.

  Cory wanted to glance at her to see if she was needling him, but he didn’t, and made do with a noncommittal snort instead. Yeah, breathe again, he told himself. And think about other things.

  Once again Sam was taken to a room segregated from the men-not that she minded; the privacy was welcome, and she’d reconciled herself to these people’s attitude toward women. It was just that-and oh, how she hated to admit it-she was beginning to feel annoying twinges of anxiety whenever she had to let Cory out of her sight.

  Childish. The hated word whispered derisively in the back corners of her mind. Maybe he was right about you, Sammi June.

  Except she knew he wasn’t. Never had been, really, and especially not now. It wasn’t for herself she felt anxious, but for him-for Cory. For Tony, too, of course, but Cory was…well. Face it, Samantha June, you still love him. Okay, she did-but even if that wasn’t true, she’d have plenty of cause to be worried about two civilians running around in the middle of a fire-fight, getting caught in the crossfire. Not that both Cory and Tony weren’t experienced when it came to being in battle zones; they were war reporters, after all. But they hadn’t had the training she’d had. Not by a long shot. And if anything happens to him out here…how will I live with that?

  Anyway, for better or worse she was alone again, in a room that looked less like something out of the Arabian Nights and more like your basic primitive jungle hooch, with a sleeping mat on the floor and a lashed-bamboo table and chair shoved against the wall under an open and unscreened window. A patterned curtain drawn across one end of the room hid the pre-indoor-plumbing equivalent of a private bathroom: a basin of water sitting on a low bamboo bench, and on the floor, an empty pail. There were towels on the bench, too, and a folded garment that turned out to be a robe, the wraparound kind that closes with a belt tie, made of a heavy white cotton material that reminded her of martial arts uniforms.