"I won't feel better for the waiting," he said, and had a point at that. As long as the bleeding was under control—and it seemed to be—then getting him to Suwan as fast as possible was his best bet. Just the same as Cole. He met her gaze, straight on. "At least it was me."
She blinked in shock. "Say that again?"
"This." He gestured at the mercenary. "My fault."
Selena pressed her lips together, hard. It was his fault. But…"Okay, yeah," she said. "Your fault. But I would prefer for you to come out of this whole so I can rag you about it as extensively as possible." She took her backpack and coat from Aymal; Dobry's gaze sharpened at the hair hanging out of one pocket. She shrugged. "Sometimes you use these things, sometimes you don't. Now get your ass into the truck so we can reach Suwan before this evening. I figure on driving straight to the capitol to warn them there." There was, in fact, probably a phone somewhere between here and there that would serve. But finding it would be a crapshoot, taking time they couldn't afford to lose. If she drove them straight there…plenty of time.
"Sounds good to me," Cole said. "And from there to the hospital, I'm guessing."
"We do things right, and you'll both ride to the hospital in style." Do them wrong, and they'd all four end up there…or worse. "You gentlemen get settled. We're outta here. And be nice to our guest…as long as he behaves himself."
"I'll wager my Browning that he behaves himself," Cole said, giving the merc a meaningful look. The man only waved him away from behind closed eye, lost in his own misery.
Selena gave the coat a second thought and tossed it Cole's way. "Have some padding. At least Dobry's got the blanket."
He wadded the coat up into something resembling a seat cushion, using his own abaya for warmth. "I left cash," he said. "Dollars. We owe them enough…and we used supplies."
"No argument from me." Selena assessed them, pinning Aymal with one last look. "Let me know if anything goes wrong back here."
"Yes, Mr. Jones." Aymal's response came as drolly as she expected.
"That's Mr. Shaw Jones, and don't you forget it." She caught Cole's mystified and amused look, and winked at him. She'd tell him later.
Because she was quite determined there would be a later.
Chapter 21
Selena only stalled the truck out once, backing it up off-road until she could find a place just big enough, just flat enough, to turn the ungainly vehicle. But as she made her way to the main road, she found the junction blocked. She didn't think there could possibly be any adrenaline left in her system, but her body proved her wrong. Even once she saw Lufti on the hood of the diminutive vehicle, her pulse raced on.
"Shut up," she muttered to herself, and plied the heavy brakes until the transport came to a stop. At second thought, her hands sought the hijab still loosely draped over her shoulders; she settled it into place over her head. Her hair escaped and the scarf was more a loose cloak hood than a concealing hijab, but it was better than nothing.
At that signal, the magistrate unpeeled himself from the side of the little produce-crate-stacked flatbed vehicle and came to the driver's door, waiting as Selena cranked the resistant window down. "You got what you came for?" he said, his sardonic tone a clear reference to her rebelliously persistent behavior in town.
She chose not to notice. "Yes, thank you." More than what she'd been looking for, to be honest. Much more. Betzer's treachery revealed, Aymal's manipulative ways exposed…all leaving them no choice but to head back to Suwan instead of getting Aymal over the border and Cole directly to medical care. And Dobry had indeed paid for his ambition, so determined to turn this operation into a personal success that he'd withheld crucial information until Betzer was nearly upon them.
She just had to make sure that Prime Minister Razidae and his people didn't pay for any of it.
"Miss?" the man said politely. "Or should I say, Miss Selena Shaw Jones!"
Selena winced. "How lucky for me that once I leave this place, I can leave that little incident behind."
Don't be so sure. You didn't exactly leave the hostage incident behind when you left Berzhaan the first time, did you?
"It would perhaps seem best if you didn't return," he agreed. "Considering that young Lufti seems to find himself in dire trouble whenever you arrive…for his sake alone."
She didn't answer that one directly, either. "We just learned about the strike against the capitol. We're going to stop it."
"At some expense, it would seem." He nodded at her passengers.
"Yes." She spoke tightly, resisting the urge to turn and check on Cole and Dobry. "I'm sorry to say we left something of a mess. If you care to contact the embassy, I'm certain the MPs will come for those we left behind. We're grateful for your protection, and we hope the gift we left will make it seem worthwhile."
"It will be worthwhile," he said, very much the disapproving magistrate, "if you protect the capitol. A stable government is the only chance my people have, and if your people would cease to meddle, Razidae might even accomplish that."
So many responses sprang to mind—a number of them right on the tip of her tongue. But she stopped them there. She had no business arguing with this man, not when they had yet to stop the final Kemeni assault on the capitol. She had no business arguing with a man who had done more than most to make his village a place where insurgency was not tolerated, and where the vulnerable could come for sanctuary. What he thought of her…
Let him think it.
But as she shifted the truck back into gear, the magistrate's signal to step back, she couldn't help but look at the lone vehicle blocking her path, and at the boy now standing on the hood. "What would you have done if it hadn't been us? If the other men had come back down this road?"
At that the man only grinned, the first real humor she'd seen on his face. He lifted his hand, and the rocks sprouted turban-covered heads, manifestations that grew into men with rifles. At that, Selena grinned back at him, fully appreciating the savvy that had kept this village separate from the terrorist underground for so long. She nursed the truck past the shift-point and into movement, and in the side view mirror saw the men behind them lift their rifles in salute. Okay, cool. Maybe they don't think you're a complete ass after all.
Now for Suwan, and the end to the last of the Kemeni rebellion.
IF ONLY THEY'D MADE IT THAT FAR. With a matter of miles to go after a grinding journey during which Dobry, Cole, and the wounded mercenary endured, the transport rumbled quietly to a stop. Selena barely had time to crank it to the side of the road, glancing at both her watch—nearly six, with the sun heading toward the horizon directly before her—and the gas gauge. It read half-full.
Broken gauge…broken truck. Who knew? They didn't have the time to mess with it. They didn't have the wherewithal to go out on foot.
At least, some of them didn't.
Selena rubbed her hands over her face, taking a moment—one sweet short moment—to remember those hours before the day had started, when she'd been warm next to Cole in a cave so quiet they might have been the only ones there.
Okay. Moment over. Time to get moving. She climbed from the truck, hauling her backpack along.
Aymal leaned over the sideboards of the truck bed. "Why have you stopped?"
For a moment, she had no idea how to respond to such a question. In the end she decided against responding at all. She climbed up on the wheel to look into the truck, realizing that Cole had somehow found a way to bandage the mercenary's face even as they traveled the uneven dirt road. To judge from the man's relaxed mouth, he'd popped some morphine into the guy, too.
But Dobry looked terrible, in spite of the lack of blood. She traded a look with Cole, sharing his concern. Cole needed a hospital damn toot sweet to survive in the long run, but Dobry needed that help if he was going to make it through even the next hour.
And she was about to leave them.
"I've got to go," she said, speaking to all of them, looking only at Cole. Cole with
his dark hair and his stained skin and his amazingly bright blue eyes. Understanding what she was about to do…and what it would cost her.
What it might cost him and Dobry.
"I'll send someone as soon as I can. I've even got my damned cell phone—but I don't dare—"
"Betzer might not be the only one at the end of that leak," Cole agreed. "You go, Lena."
"Na Baba!" The words burst from Aymal. "You cannot be serious! You cannot leave us here unprotected!"
"Ahem," Cole said, and gestured with his pistol. "Not entirely."
"You! Who knows when you'll faint again!"
"I don't—" Cole started, but Aymal interrupted.
"I'm coming with you," he said, most decisively.
"Sure," Selena agreed, suddenly glad to be in her sneakers. "How's your six-minute mile?"
This stymied the man for a moment. A short moment. "Then at least leave me with a—"
Selena and Cole reacted in unison. "No!"
They wasted a moment trading glares, and were interrupted by a car tootling on out of the city, zipping along here where the road was still paved. Selena and Aymal tried to wave it down and failed; they resumed glaring. Then, with brusque, economical movement, she pulled a small semiautomatic from her backpack, one of the guns she'd taken from the first sentry. She released the magazine, ejected the chamber from the cartridge, and shoved the magazine back home without racking the slide. "Here," she said, and handed the gun to him. "Just don't touch anything but the trigger." And she caught Cole's eye, checking for awareness there. If they truly got into trouble, Aymal would have to rack a cartridge into the chamber before he could add to the firepower.
Cole gave her the slightest of nods, and shifted to remove her coat from beneath himself. "Here, you'll need this."
She snorted. "I can't run with that thing."
Aymal caught her meaning and his jaw dropped slightly. "You cannot run in those clothes out in public!"
"Mr. Shaw Jones can do a lot of things in these clothes out in public," Selena told him. She lifted her head, spotting another vehicle on the way out of Suwan.
A vehicle of sorts, anyway. One with real horsepower. One that would bring Cole and the others right along with her. This time, she didn't wait to see if the driver would stop at her waving. She hopped off the transport wheel and into the road, waving her arms, backpack and all.
Clearly, she'd encountered a horse who'd seen everything. The animal didn't so much as flick an ear, but the driver pulled back on the reins with alacrity, eyeing Selena and the truck with such wariness that she knew he was on the verge of making a break for it. "Peace to you," she told him in Berzhaani, pretending she wasn't wearing other people's blood and that her face wasn't still smeared with her own. She eyed his wagon, a square box with high sides and a bench seat up front. Built on a car axle, from the looks of the tires. When she thought he'd backed off to a lower personal DefCon, she cut straight to the chase. "Can I interest you in a trade?"
"You aren't serious!"
She was inspiring a lot of that particular reaction this day. "I am." And losing time, to boot. If she ended up running after all of this…
Just a couple of miles. She could do it. Even after a day like this. And if this worked, she wouldn't have to leave the others behind.
The man spent his time looking at the transport. "I will talk to your men," he said grandly, resting his forearms across his thighs to let the reins dangle.
"Only if you speak Russian." Selena rested her hand on the horse's nose; it nuzzled her. Sorry, no treats…only various dried body fluids. "Or English. But I assure you, I only convey the wishes of my husband, who is in that truck."
"He lets you go out like—"
Selena shrugged an interruption. "I'm an infidel. What can you expect?" And then she got down to business. "We want to trade this truck for your horse and wagon."
"If the truck worked, you wouldn't be sitting here." He'd dropped into haggle mode, which was all for the good. He might even forget she was inappropriately clothed and that he was indignant about it.
"Very true," she said, which startled him. The horse sighed and shifted its weight to one back leg, the sun low enough to shine between its ears and make a mule of its shadow. "But I believe it to be out of gas."
"And how will I get more gas from here?" He shook his head. "It is an old truck, and ugly. And it might not even work at all."
"Come into the city with us," she said promptly. "You can pick up gas and find a ride back out. And you risk nothing but time. The horse and wagon will be yours again, if you pick them up at the capitol."
"What business have you at the capitol?" He might as well have said the likes of you; it came through in his voice.
"Oh," Selena said, most cheerfully. "Just a tourist."
He just looked at her.
"You risk nothing," she repeated. "You get your horse back, and you can sell the transport for parts."
"And you get..?" Too good to be true, that's what he was telling himself.
"Where I want to go, when I want to be there." She gestured at the transport. "Which obviously won't happen in this."
He could hardly deny that. His eyes roamed over the vehicle another long moment, while Selena petted the horse, her hand not so coincidentally close to the reins. She was preparing to reach into her back waistband for the Cougar, tense and ready, when he finally nodded. "You are, of course, insane," he added. "Or in a great deal of trouble, or perhaps about to get into a great deal of trouble."
"Or perhaps both," she muttered.
DEFINITELY BOTH.
Back in Suwan with a defector who's desperately been trying to leave, carting along her injured mercenary, a wounded fellow CIA officer, and a husband well into a systemic infection that would kill him as surely as a bullet. And was she headed for safety?
Of course not.
If only she could call Allori at the embassy. He'd get the word to Razidae's people. But as often as she found herself tempted to do it, she stopped herself. Phones were not a given in Suwan. If she wasted time looking for one—in one of the already closed establishments she passed, in a private home—and didn't find one, then she'd never make it to the capital in time to give her warning in person. Not to mention that Allori himself was most likely at the endangered open house. She glanced at her watch again, unable to stop herself.
"We'll make it," Cole said.
"Of course," she said. "How could we not, when we've got Seabiscuit here on our side?" The truth was, they did have time. They could do it. The horse trotted along, oblivious, nicely responsive to her hand and offering enough energy that it had probably only traveled those few miles out of Suwan before they'd intercepted the wagon. At least she'd had those miles of open road to get reacquainted with the heavy feel of the lines…not much like holding a contact on the short rein of a horse under saddle.
And, most unexpectedly, the ride was actually smoother than that of the jarring truck.
Cole sat beside her, having climbed into the seat the wagon owner had vacated when they dropped him at the edge of the city. She'd taken the back roads from there…horses and donkeys were common enough on the edges of the city, but rarely seen in the majestic central area that held the rebuilt capitol, the government buildings, a few exclusive apartments and hotels. It was an area overlaid with the stone remains of old walls and fortifications, ancient vines and carefully tended trees. As they drew closer to the capitol, the streets narrowed. She learned from experience that the horse tended to slip on cobbles, and kept it to asphalt.
She again wore the bulky coat, and she could still feel the heat off Cole's body.
"I'm fine," he'd said—again—when she'd once taken her eyes from the road to convey her concern with a look—just before the sun went down, and the light of it shone clearly off his face to reveal how not-fine he was, his blue eyes shining so eerily that Selena couldn't decide if it was the sharp sunlight, his dyed skin or the hollows the fever had already carved
in his face. Right. Just fine.
Now the light was fast fading and the old-fashioned streetlights struggled to fill the void. They trotted on through back streets and alleys almost too narrow to take them, until at last the familiar outline of the square, stolid capitol building filled the marginally lighter sky before them. Selena pulled the horse in beneath a streetlight…and a rare public phone. She checked her watch. "We've got a few minutes. Time enough to do this carefully." She looped the harness lines over the stout U-bolt on the front of the wagon meant for just that, and stood, digging into her pockets as she looked back at Aymal. "You," she said, "are going to make a phone call."
His brows drew together in vast doubt. "You're going to leave me here?"
"Damned right," she told him. "You're too valuable to risk. And those schoolchildren are too valuable to risk, too."
Startled, he said nothing.
"You're going to call a woman named Bonita at her personal cell phone. She'll know how to get a message to Dante Allori, the American ambassador—be sure to mention the rumors about Davud Garibli. And then you're going to lurk around this building until one of us comes for you. It's full of government offices—there won't be anyone around to bother you."
"And what if you don't come back?" His voice rose slightly, and Selena figured this was one defector who'd been pushed to his limits.
"Then forget the CIA. Head straight to the embassy. Tell them you have a special appointment with Dante Allori and Selena Shaw Jones. Tell them it's regarding pest control."
Cole unsuccessfully muffled his snort. "And I thought the Agency got corny sometimes."
Selena cleared her throat, a little more loudly than necessary. "That'll get you in the door. You'll probably have to wait for Allori, maybe all night. But don't tell anyone but Allori who you are. Let him know the local station has been compromised. Got it?"
Aymal muttered a few quick phrases to himself and nodded. "Give me the number." And then he sent her a sour look. "If you think I believe this will work, after all I've been through…"
Comeback Page 22