Throughout three years of therapy, Carrie had learned to trust the mild-mannered doctor as much as she trusted anyone in the world. Andrea Soto knew more about Carrie than her own mother — the intimate details, private things you didn’t tell your closest friends. Even friends made judgments. Everyone made judgments about certain things — everyone except Dr. Soto.
Soto’s voice was firm and matter of fact. It had surprised Carrie at first that the doctor hadn’t whispered when she put her under. “Okay,” she said. “How do you feel?”
“I feel fine,” Carrie said, watching the movie of her earlier, unspeakable life unfold before her eyes.
“Are you comfortable?”
Carrie’s long eyelashes fluttered but didn’t open. “Yes,” she said, feeling thick and sleepy.
“Good,” Soto said, and Carrie heard the sound of her pencil zipping across her notepad. “Let’s begin.”
“What is the date?”
“Today or then?” Even under hypnosis, Carrie couldn’t help but be argumentative. It was her nature, and in the end, it was what had gotten her into such trouble.
“Then,” Soto said, ever patient.
“June 8… al-Zarqawi has just been killed by a U.S. air strike.”
“Where are you?”
“Baquba,” Carrie said, holding her breath. Her moist lips were set in a hard, grimacing line. “Do I really have to come back here?”
“No, honey,” Soto said gently. “You don’t have to. But I think it will help you heal if you do.”
Carrie sat for a moment, saying nothing. Long purple nails with snow-white tips dug at her jeans. The trembling grew more pronounced.
“All right,” she sighed. “I’m here, in Baquba.”
“What do you smell?”
“Earth… orange groves… trash,” Carrie said. “And gunpowder.”
“Good. Now, when you’re ready, tell me what you see.”
Carrie Navarro suddenly grinned. “Damn, Doc!” she said. “I’m lookin’ hot in my sexy reporter outfit!”
Carrie Navarro got up early, stepped into her purple Crocs and shrugged on a heavy flak jacket. They didn’t call the place Baquboom for nothing. It was not uncommon for a half dozen mortar rounds to pound the camp each day. It was a short slog from her bunkered CHU — containerized housing unit — through mud and pelting rain to the concrete shower stalls so she decided to carry her towel and toiletries inside her folded poncho. Wind whipped shoulder-length black hair against her sleepy face. Soaked to the skin in her T-shirt, perky little gym shorts, and incongruous flak jacket, Navarro got more than a few raised eyebrows from passing soldiers. She was on her way to the shower. Why shy away from a little water beforehand? Besides, if the solders at Camp Warhorse weren’t used to her behavior by now, they would never be.
For some female reporters, being embedded with a crew like the Alaska-based 172nd Stryker Brigade would be seen as tough duty. Navarro considered it a plum. She ran with them, drank with them, and matched their dirty jokes punch line for punch line. If she fluttered her long, curly eyelashes and pouted her lips at just the right moment, she could even shoot with them once in a while. They were good boys, treating her more like a baby sister than a would-be girlfriend. She supposed the suicide bombings and daily mortar attacks had a lot to do with their desire to lord over and protect her. Most times their efforts were appreciated, but today she had a meeting and it just wouldn’t do to have an armed convoy of overprotective Stryker vehicles dogging her every move.
Almost giddy at the prospect of her interview, she toweled off quickly after the tepid shower, stepping into a relatively clean pair of khaki cargo pants and her favorite sky-blue button-down. Stuffing the pockets of her desert camo photographer’s vest with pens, paper, and a small digital camera, she threw on a rain jacket, then looked at her watch. 0730. She’d still have time to run by the Green Bean and grab a cup of coffee before her ride made it to the front gate.
The stubby black Mercedes box truck slowed to a creaky stop in front of the water station tent. The driver, a nervous-looking Jordanian man named Hamal reached across the seat to fling open the passenger door. He smiled a forced, half smile.
“Please to embark to my truck,” he said in halting, book-taught British English. “No delay…”
Carrie tossed her small day pack full of PowerBars and water bottles into the front seat and climbed in.
The overwhelming smell of cardamom and human sweat hit her like a punch in the face. Hamal was evidently chilled by the rains and had the heat turned to full blast. He smiled at her again, patting the chest strap of his seat belt.
“Please to fasten safety belt,” he said, fluttering dark eyelashes. “American soldiers wish all be… safety.”
Carrie snapped the belt at her waist and cracked the window a hair to keep from suffocating.
“So,” she said. “This Dawud has finally agreed to meet me?” Dawud was a tribal leader in the village of Chibernat, on the outskirts of Baquba proper. According to Hamal, the man was willing to give an interview about how the American presence in this Sunni stronghold was affecting local lives. If it panned out, it would be a tremendous coup and very likely get her promoted to editor.
Getting out of Camp Warhorse proved a lot easier than getting in. Hamal was a regular as was his Mercedes delivery truck. Though the sentries at the front gate gave her some funny looks at leaving the compound alone with an Arab, no one stopped them. One, a freckle-faced, blond specialist named Brennan, tossed her an infatuated wave from his post at the fifty-caliber machine gun.
“Please to cover head, young miss,” Hamal said as the Mercedes sloshed away from the bunkered gates of Camp Warhorse and into the mean and muddy streets of Baquba.
Carrie pulled a navy-blue scarf from her daypack and wrapped it around her head and face. They passed a patrol of “her boys” from the 172nd Strykers. She waved, but didn’t realize until they’d passed that there was no way they could have recognized her behind the scarf.
Ten minutes out of the camp, Hamal began to tap a weathered hand on the steering wheel. Carrie tried to make small talk but got little more than grunts and single-word answers. The Jordanian had always been the quiet type, but this was way outside the norm. A tiny nagging began to push its way to the surface of Carrie’s gut as Hamal turned west toward the winding Diyala River.
She decided to bring up the only thing the quiet Jordanian had ever been happy to talk about.
“I spoke to my editor about your reward,” she said, watching the man for a reaction. The corner of his mouth twitched, but he said nothing. He didn’t even look in her direction. Her belly tightened.
“If this interview with Dawud turns out like I think it will,” she baited, “I’ve been authorized to pay you two times our agreed sum.”
Hamal nodded slightly. “Very well,” he all but grunted. This from a man who literally had to lick the drool from his lips when money was mentioned. Something was wrong.
He slowed the truck to make a sharp right onto a deserted stretch of muddy road that reminded Carrie of the scrubby patch of land her grandfather had owned in West Texas. Through the road grime and pelting rain, she could just make out a rough tumble of earth-toned buildings in the distance, half hidden by a lone copse of orange trees. It looked like some sort of dilapidated power plant.
“I thought we were meeting Dawud at a coffee shop in Chibernat,” she said, trying to keep her voice from sounding as shrill as she felt.