“What information have you passed to the Chinese?”
“None. None at all.”
One time, after the questions were done, Secret Agent Man said, “I’ve seen Caroline.”
He pulled his phone out of his shirt pocket and showed her a photo of her daughter coming out of her middle school building. He said, “She has a bruise on her left arm. See there. I think she may be getting into fights. Or maybe Khalid did this to her.”
Then he’d asked her another of the everyday questions. “Who is your contact in China? Who were you going to meet when you got there?”
“I didn’t have a contact. I was going to be met at the airport. That’s the truth. That’s the truth. It all happened very fast. Remember, please. I am still CIA. I was only going to work over there for us. Molinari knows this. Please. I’ve told you everything. What do I have to do to get out of here?”
Today, after the usual bull, Secret Agent Man had said, “Your meal is a cheese and mushroom frittata. I had one. It’s very good. Bon appétit. I’ll see you soon, Ms. Muller.”
And then he’d left.
Alison had thought of killing herself. She had run headfirst at the wall, but she really couldn’t get any momentum going and had only given herself a headache. A hidden camera watched her. The one time she’d tried to hang herself on the bars, Sam had appeared and said, “No, Ms. Muller. Don’t do that unless you’d like us to take away your clothes. Keep you here in the nude.”
She wasn’t yet desperate enough to drown herself in the toilet. But she was close.
She was going to be here for life.
She was going to die in this underground stone box.
The sooner the better. There was no way out and nothing left to live for. She couldn’t even fantasize anymore. She just couldn’t fool herself into believing in happiness.
She went to the cot, which was chained to the wall, and lay down. She pulled out strands of hair, one at a time, and she started the countdown to the one thing she had to look forward to.
The next meeting with Sam.
He was all she had.
CHAPTER 101
ALISON THOUGHT SHE’D finally gone insane.
She heard men’s voices out of sight in the corridor beyond her cell. She knew both voices. One was Sam, her tormentor. She knew for sure she was crazy, because the other man—was Joe.
First the muffled voices, then the shadows falling across the stone floor. And then they were both at the bars.
Secret Agent Man said, “You have a visitor, Ms. Muller.”
He put the box with her dinner and her one-piece outfit under the chair and then said to Joe, “Take your time. When you’re ready, you know where to find me.”
Alison rushed to the bars and grabbed them.
“Joseph. Have you come to get me out?”
“I could only arrange a visit,” he said.
He brushed her hand with his, then sat in the chair outside the cell. She sat on the floor right against the bars so that she could be close to him.
“Why are you here, then?”
“I wanted to see if you had charmed management into giving you silk sheets and an ocean view.”
“Oh, yes, it’s just like the Ritz. And no one even asked me to put out.”
She grinned but couldn’t hold the pose. Her smile crumpled. She put her hands into her ragged hair and pulled it away from her eyes. She looked up at Joe. His expression was cool. But still, she could read that he felt sorry for her. That he still cared.
“I look terrible, I know. I never wanted you to see me like this. How are you, Joseph? What’s it like for you now?”
“I’d like to say it’s like nothing ever happened, but there’s been fallout, of course. Professional and personal.”
“You want to talk about it?” she asked.
He shook his head.
“I understand. But to the point of all this, Joseph,” she said, making a gesture with her hand that took in all twenty square feet of her cell. “I have to get out of here.”
“I know.”
“I’ve answered all their questions. I’ve been tortured, Joe. I’m not holding anything back. They’re not giving me anything off for my time and service in the Agency. They just keep hammering me with the same questions, and I’ve told them I don’t know anything more.”
“OK. Well, they’re not convinced, I guess.”
“But you can help me. You can speak for me. You know what I’ve done and what I’ve sacrificed.”
“I’m not considered a clean source on you, Ali.”
“Joe, please, please. I’ve got kids. I have more to give to the Agency. I’m a valuable person. You can save me, Joe. I know you can save me.”
“Is there anything you can tell me that I can pass on?”
“I’ve given up everything.”
“I was told we only had five minutes,” he said.
“Will you be back?”
“I don’t know.”
He patted her hands and left her.
CHAPTER 102
SECRET AGENT MAN was at the bars of her stone cage at what seemed to be his usual time. Alison noticed that he was dressed as was his style, in a khaki-colored jacket with a white shirt, a blue-striped tie, and a pair of dun-colored pants. His hair was neatly combed and he was clean-shaven. But he hadn’t brought her fresh paper jumpsuit and the boxed meal, her only food for the day.
He said, “Ms. Muller. My name is Anderson.”
“First or last?”
“Just Anderson,” he said. “We have to clean your cell. And I thought maybe you’d like a hot shower before we bring you back.”
“Are you kidding?”
The idea of standing under hot water was just tremendous. “Not at all. I have a Taser,” he said. “Need I say any more?”
“No. I’ll behave. Where would I go, anyway?”
“Exactly,” said Anderson.
Alison thought Joe had arranged this. At least he had done this much. Maybe this shower was incentive for her to be more cooperative. Maybe that would work.
Anderson opened the cell door and stepped away, out of Alison’s reach. He patted the waistband of his pants under his jacket so that she could see the bulge of the Taser gun.
“Straight ahead, Ms. Muller. You’ll see an opening on your left at the end of the corridor. There’s a short flight of stairs, and the staff bathroom is up there. There’s soap and shampoo and a clean towel on a hook. Your dinner is being prepared now. Pork loin and boiled new potatoes. Chocolate brownies.”
“Wow,” Alison said, giving him a big grin. “Must be my birthday.”
She had walked about ten paces down the hallway when Anderson fired a .44-caliber bullet into the back of her skull. He fired again into her back as she fell. He stooped next to her, flipped his tie over his shoulder, and felt for a pulse.
There was none.
He sighed. Then he walked around her body on his way to the office to make his report.
CHAPTER 103
I WAS HAVING a dinner party. This was the first time in maybe a year since I’d had people over, and I was up for it. Julie was in a sparkly party dress, and she had a new word.
“Mommy.”
It was the best word in every language all over the world.
Mrs. Rose had spent the day helping me cook, and my buds were all in my house: Claire and her adorable husband, Edmund. Yuki and my boss and idol, Jackson Brady. Richie and Cindy, of course, and Jacobi had come with a date.