Wara knit her hands together in her lap and made herself breathe. Rupert was tossing coins at the guy who collected tolls at the airport parking entrance. The clunky yellow barrier ground upward and Rupert accelerated through, jerked the vehicle to the right and halted in an empty parking space. Rupert turned to the backseat and gave Wara a knowing look that was just awkward.
Alejo and Wara worked for Rupert, and it was obvious that the two of them were really attracted to each other. Rupert was the kind of guy who was totally not ashamed to make annoying jokes about love and marriage, having those six babies together and living happily ever after. Wara had pretty much gotten used to it during the months she lived at headquarters and was in training to work with CI. Training had been awesome, because Alejo was there too, teaching her things like how to pick a lock and get out of handcuffs and jump out of a window a couple stories up without breaking anything.
She wasn't gonna deny that she had really, really liked their time together.
Before Alejo was sent to work in Timbuktu.
Before she and Cail had headed out to Rabat.
She’d felt so close to Alejo then, but now everything felt weird. Wara hadn't seen Alejo in so long, and the only reason he was now in the Fez airport was because Wara's ex-boyfriend had shown up out of the night like the Terminator and nearly killed her.
"Here," Cail snapped, scaring the crap out of Wara. Cail tossed a white rectangular package at Wara’s chest. "You can carry this."
Wara fumbled and caught what she realized was a dented pack of Starbucks dark roast. She and Cail had talked about bringing a welcome back present for Alejo, because they knew he and the guys hadn't been drinking coffee on assignment in Timbuktu. The whole area was full of Al-Qaeda fighters and no coffee had been getting in. Alejo really loved his coffee, strong and black.
"You bought this?" Wara blinked, feeling rather crappy that Cail had remembered to get the coffee and she hadn't. Cail would have had to visit that crowded warehouse on the outskirts of Fez to get this coffee, rifle through tattered boxes of imported foreign groceries you had to pay big bucks to buy.
"Yeah, I bought it," Cail said. "The guy has been through a lot.”
Wara scrambled out of the car and hurried after Rupert and Cail towards the squatty airport terminal. The smooth shells on her sandals pulled at her ankles and made a sucking noise as she trekked across the asphalt. Her fingers dug into the loamy pack of coffee.
The guy has been through a lot, Cail said.
Wara hadn’t been able to get Alejo to tell her anything over the phone about the school burning down. But it must have been awful. Her shoulders sagged a bit as the electric doors whooshed open around Rupert, letting them into the lobby.
Of course Alejo was upset. He and his team were supposed to be guarding the Christian school from the Islamist extremists who wanted to hurt those kids. Alejo would feel responsible for every one of the children who were killed.
Suddenly, she just wanted to wrap her arms around him. She had wanted to be right next to Alejo for days, because the whole thing with Lázaro had freaked Wara out so badly all she wanted to do was feel him by her side. But now she wanted to see him, to know if he was alright.
Wara could not wait for her best friend to clear customs. It didn't matter if Rupert, the match-maker, and Cail, her deadpan serious friend that didn't have a romantic bone in her body, were watching. Wara was gonna throw herself into Alejo’s arms and do one of those cheesy hugs from a movie, let him know that she was here for him, and was so, so glad he was here with her.
The line trickling out of the customs/baggage area was moving very, very slowly.
"We might as well take a seat," Rupert said. "Looks like it might be a while."
They dropped into a row of sad-looking chairs, chained together and covered in shredded gray vinyl. A majority of the Moroccan men in the airport almost did a one eighty as they walked past, craning their necks to gawk at the two foreign girls sitting on either side of the old white guy in a flannel shirt and outdated jeans. Most of Cail's spiky blond hair was stuffed up under her cap, and she was wearing a really long shirt over her jeans, like Wara. In Morocco, you had to at least wear something that covered your butt, or the staring would just get out of control. Moroccan guys loved to stare, and it was kinda hard to get used to.
Normally when the gaping started, Wara would be tempted to get the scarf out of her purse and throw it over her hair. Tonight, she was way, way too preoccupied. She slouched down farther into the ripped seat, crossed her arms protectively in front of her around the Starbucks coffee as if it were her baby.
Maybe half the people from the Bamako-Fez flight had already cleared customs and were racing toward the parking exit.
What was Alejo gonna do when he saw her?
Wara's stomach throbbed with an explosion of butterflies as she scanned the travelers with suitcases crossing the tiles. Some foreigner with a tweed jacket and a riot of blond-white hair tried to weave his way past the slow-moving line of people, silver Swiss Gear suitcase whining across the tiles. Wara's breathing stalled, fixed on that hair. She squeezed her eyes shut as the scene from the futon in Montana flashed across her skull.
She almost hadn't recognized him that day, because the Lázaro she remembered was tanned with gelled hair the color of nutmeg. It had scared her to death to have him show up and pin her down that night, scars running down his neck, hair wild and bleached around his face.
She realized she was about to poke a hole right through Alejo's crinkly package of coffee. Wara forced herself to breathe, not follow the pudgy traveler with the wild curls's progress out the airport door.
She’d traveled here on another passport, nothing connected with Wara Cadogan. Lázaro couldn’t know she was here.
He thought he’d left her for dead.
Wara grimaced and rubbed fingers down her upper arm. Her shoulders and arms still hurt a lot, thanks to the way the jailers at Evin prison had treated her during the Big Mess in Iran last year.
The nightmares about Iran didn’t help her muscles relax, either.
“Rupert,” she said. “What’s the plan?”
She’d heard talk of the plan involving Timbuktu. Rupert had Wara and Cail reading up on Mali. Timbuktu was the definition of remote, so it did seem to make sense as a place Lázaro Marquez would never find her.
Rupert shifted his eyes to her. Wara was still watching the people exiting customs.
"Listen,” Rupert sighed. “When Alejo gets here, we’ll talk. But we’re your family now. We’ve got your back and we’re gonna take care of you.”
Ok.
Wara forced herself to just leave it at that. For now.
She let go of the Starbucks coffee she was killing and left the packet on her thigh, went back to crossing her arms in front of her and eyeing the people leaving customs. The point of muscle right under her shoulder blade was throbbing harder than ever.
"There he is." Cail’s voice made Wara jolt. Cail speared Wara with sea-green eyes. "Don't forget to give him the coffee." When Wara just sat there like a deer in the headlights, Cail narrowed her eyes. "Come on," she enunciated each word slowly. "Go tell him we're over here. Go give all these sick Moroccan guys staring at us something to be jealous of. Go on."
Cail flicked a long pale hand at Wara and Wara jerked, climbed to her feet. "Oh…ok. I'm gonna go get him?"
"Yeah," Cail rolled her eyes. "No sense in us all getting caught in the crush of people over there. Or would you prefer if we all went and did a big group hug and kiss?"
Ok, that was enough. Wara felt a low simmer spreading over her face. "Going. I'm going." She returned Cail's scowl. Wara crossed the tiles with the coffee clutched in both hands like a shield.
Alejo was walking pretty slow, hunched under a scuffed backpack, wearing a green and navy flannel shirt and the usual khaki pants. Instead of pockets all down the legs, this time the khakis were tailored and dingy around the bottom with the grime of the Sahara.
Alejo's skin was dark, tanned about three shades deeper than his usual coffee with a touch of milk. The dark curls had grown out again, covering half his ear and forehead.
Wara felt something tighten in her heart, because it was pretty obvious he had lost weight. She remembered the coffee in her hands, how Cail said the guys hadn't been able to drink coffee or eat well. When Wara talked with him over the past few months, Alejo hadn't mentioned anything about the kind of food he was eating over in Mali. There was never any complaining.
Wara was almost at Alejo's shoulder, and he was still staring straight ahead. His dark lashes shifted over those hazel eyes as he tried not to get jostled against five Moroccan guys in front of him, all of them gaping at veil-less Wara with saucer eyes. The Moroccans seemed disappointed when Wara reached out and touched Alejo's arm, brushing the soft flannel. He jerked, then saw her.
"Wara." Alejo fumbled out of the line and they stepped a few paces away. He searched her face and Wara tried to remember what her plan had been. All her thoughts just drained right out onto the floor, confused by the way Alejo’s shoulders hung under the backpack, the way his eyes wandered across her face as if he barely knew her.
It looked as if Alejo's soul had been sucked out through his eyes.
"Alejo." Wara felt herself crumple, remember how much she wanted to be close to him. She crossed the tiles between them in her shell sandals and fell into his chest, hugging him backpack and all.
He was thinner. Wara's hands brushed along his ribs as she pulled away, feeling cold when he did not hug her back. She looked up at him, but his eyes were a few million miles away.
"I…I’m so glad you’re here." As soon as she said the words, Wara felt really, really dumb.
Alejo tried to smile, one corner of his mouth turning up as he did his best to really look at her. She saw him turn sideways, saw that Rupert and Cail had shown up next to them. Alejo glanced back at Wara. "A surprise welcoming committee." The backpack lurched on his shoulders and Alejo inhaled sharply, still staring at Wara. "Wara. It's good to see you safe," he said.
And then he was hugging Rupert. And Cail. And turning away from Wara.
She felt her arms dangling at her sides, the Starbucks coffee almost slipping from her fingers.
Seriously?
Wara, it's good to see you safe?
He wouldn't even put his arms around her. Not even the usual Bolivian-style kiss on the cheek. They always said hello with that kiss on the cheek.
She was kind of in shock. They all started to walk out towards the Land Cruiser and Wara trailed behind, alone with the coffee.
She should have realized it, but distance could cover up a lot of things. Face to face was another ball game.
All those times the past few months, when they talked on skype and Alejo tried to tell her she shouldn't be so critical of the church after everything that happened in Iran…
I thought it was ok to be honest with him. That there was no way he would take it so seriously.
Every day since what happened last year, Wara had felt herself growing more annoyed with organized religion. She had seen how that big, famous church in the United States left Sami to die in prison in Iran.
And then there was the more personal stuff. Yeah, Lalo and Caspian had rescued Wara and Alejo from Iranian prison, but the price still gave Wara nightmares. She'd been sitting next to Hourmazd, the guard who was hardly more than a kid and had a really cute smile. He bled all over her when he was shot. So Wara could get out of Iran and live. And go home with shoulders that hurt, all the time.
Instead of really listening to how Alejo was doing in the oven of Timbuktu, Wara had been ranting about all the crap going on in her head. And Alejo had tried to tell her to not be so bitter.
In front of her in the airport entryway, Wara could hear Rupert in powwow with Alejo, talking about the school and Al-Qaeda and Timbuktu.
Alejo had to fly halfway around the world, leaving an important assignment right on the edge of armed fighting, to babysit Wara. To protect Wara from a guy who was only gonna make Alejo think about the past….Lázaro and Wara together.
Wara stifled a deep groan. The bridge of her nose was burning.
He wasn't happy to see her.
And there could be a million reasons why.
She should have told Rupert not to call him.
But it was too late now
Worst Plan Ever
THE LAND CRUSIER ZOOMED THROUGH the darkened cedar forest in relative silence. Wara stared out the window at the starlight, trying not to mope about Alejo’s disappointing reaction. Cail fiddled with the radio to fill the quiet with peppy Arabic pop music. Alejo slumped into the backseat next to Wara and hugged his backpack, barely awake.
Thanks to antiaircraft missiles around Timbuktu, Alejo hadn’t been able to get a flight to Bamako. He’d had to do the grueling 24-hour trip overland, across the sand in a rented Land Cruiser.
It made sense he was in a stupor.
But he had hugged Rupert and Cail.
Thank God, when they entered headquarters Silvia already had some coffee brewed. She was a sweet lady Rupert knew from Bolivia, forty-something, single, and definitely under five feet tall. Silvia helped Rupert out with office work and cooking around the huge cedar cabin in the Moroccan mountains that was CI headquarters.
When Alejo’s eyes fell on the coffee, he cracked the first real smile since they’d picked him up at the airport. Silvia got them all seated around the long wood table in the dining section of the Great Room. This part of the house had ceilings about three stories tall, sloped with a mosaic of wood in shades of red and golden white. The other side of the open room held a very cozy U-shaped couch. The tan fabric was worn clean through in some places, and they tried to cover it up with orange Moroccan pillows embroidered with little mirrors.
Wara slid in next to Cail at the table, and she had to admit that despite her awkward mood the food smelled amazing. Silvia had whipped up some Moroccan couscous, a national dish of tiny grain-like pasta you could make a ton of ways. Tonight it smelled like mint and cumin. And maybe dates with some spicy chicken.
Alejo was across the table from Wara, huddled around a mug of steaming coffee. Silvia beamed at him and kissed him on the cheek, welcoming him back.
He might have even smiled at Silvia with more gusto than he showed Wara at the airport.
Wara rolled her eyes and stifled a frustrated grunt, dumped some more coffee into her mug. They always drank coffee at night here, because CI headquarters was right in the middle of the Atlas Mountains. When the sun went down, the temperature plummeted.
Rupert and Silvia lived here, so they were used to the chilly temperatures. Wara and Cail had been living in steamy Rabat, and the few days Wara had been back here at headquarters hadn’t been enough to get used to the cold. She was glad she’d had her favorite gray and orange Roxy hoodie with her in the Land Cruiser.
Alejo was practically shaking with cold. Wara blinked at him as she realized that his hand was trembling against the clay of the coffee mug. Goosebumps ran across the tan skin of his hand and up into the sleeve of his flannel. His eyes met hers and Alejo tried to smile at her. He left his mug on the table and walked over to the grubby red backpack he must have hauled all through West Africa and pulled out a black sweater. He slid back onto his chair and gulped coffee, still looking very cold.
Well, it must have been hot there in Timbuktu. Wara felt her face soften, thinking about how Alejo had just come from a world she couldn’t imagine.
In Rabat, she and Cail lived in an apartment with running water and a silky floral sofa and only the occasional cucaracha. They had access to pizza and pretty decent croissants and coffee.
Alejo had been living in the desert, in the middle of an armed conflict.
“Well if no one else is hungry,” Cail said loudly, “I’ll start. I love Rupert’s couscous.”
“Silvia cooked with me tonight,” Rupert called from the kitchen just around the corner. “
Her idea to add the slivered almonds.”
“Slivered almonds,” Cail grinned at Silvia. When Cail grinned, she always looked a little bit evil. “Sounds tasty.” She dumped a couple large spoonfuls of food on her plate, then passed the serving dish across the table to Alejo. “Oh. Sorry. I guess you’re kind of the guest.”
Alejo actually grinned at her. He grinned. Not at Wara, but at Silvia and Cail. “Thanks,” he said. “You have no idea how wonderful this smells.”
Despite Alejo’s big act to look all excited over the food, Wara noticed he didn’t serve himself that much at all. He chewed each bite about a million times, as if it was a colossal effort just to get the food down.
Once everyone was eating and sufficiently caffeinated, Rupert cleared his throat and crossed his fingers over his belly in that way that meant it was time to talk business. Since it was night time in the mountains and all, Rupert had pulled on a cream-colored old man cardigan over the red plaid flannel.
It was a good look on him.
Wara had really liked working in Rupert’s organization since she met him in Bolivia a year ago. Rupert Cole’s grandfather had run an export business here in Morocco, called Cole Incorporated. After leaving the CIA, Rupert inherited the business. He’d turned it into something else altogether: Cole Inc., or CI, an organization that employed people with different backgrounds and worked to help people being persecuted for their religious or political beliefs. Their cover was an educational NGO.
Everybody liked Rupert, even if he was sometimes way, way too nosy.
“Just a short briefing,” Rupert said, “because I know you’re all tired. Cail and Wara have been reading up on Mali and the political situation. This is the situation: Lalo and his team have been in Timbuktu for four months. They replaced Tabor’s team, who was sent to provide security for the kids after the bombing attempt last September.”
Nearly a year ago. The school building had gone up in flames, but all the kids had made it out in time. And now, the second attack on the Christian school in its new location had actually succeeded. Everyone looked pained.
Burn (Story of CI #3) Page 3