The Brothers did not as a general rule use suicide bombers to advance their agenda. They were considered unreliable. But there were always exceptions.
Amara hoped he wasn’t to be one.
“Could you become a martyr?” repeated Assad.
“Of course,” said Amara, knowing this was the only answer he could give, even if it did not come from his heart.
“You hesitate.”
“I… only question my worthiness.”
Assad smiled but said nothing. Sayr returned with a small teapot and two cups. He carefully wiped Assad’s and set it down before him. He was much less careful with Amara’s; liquid dripped from the cup.
“He doesn’t like me,” said Amara when Sayr had left. “But I have done nothing to him.”
“You’ve taken his place on an important mission to America,” said Assad.
“I have?”
“We have been asked by friends to help a project they have undertaken. One of our Brothers is in the Satan capital. He needs some technical assistance, and equipment. We think you can help him.”
“What sort of help do you mean?” asked Amara, unsure if the question was meant literally or was a more subtle way of asking if he would be willing to become a martyr.
He certainly hoped it was the former.
“Drink your tea,” said Assad, nodding, “and I will instruct you.”
Chapter 10
They were still about two miles from the city when MY-PID told Danny that the trucks blasting the area occupied by Meurtre Musique had met up with the men on foot.
“Where are they headed?” Danny asked the system.
“Insufficient data.”
“They’re kind of aimless,” said Nuri, watching on his control display. “They’re just intent shooting up whatever they can. There’s a group of men in Meurtre Musique’s area. Looks like they’re planning a counterattack.”
“We’ll go north and come back around from that end.”
“Don’t get too close to the house where Li Han is,” said Nuri. “We don’t want to spook him.”
“We’re the last thing he’s going to worry about,” said Danny.
He pressed the accelerator to the floor, speeding down the road. There was gunfire in the distance.
I shouldn’t have let her go, he thought. He’d put the whole mission in jeopardy.
Why had he given in? The argument that he couldn’t stop her didn’t hold water.
It was because she was pretty, he realized, and he liked her.
What a fool he was.
Despite the fact that Danny had told her not to leave the building, Melissa asked Bloom if there wasn’t a safer place in the vicinity. The clinic, she reasoned, was the largest building in the area, and a ready target for anyone who didn’t like Meurtre Musique.
“There are the huts,” said Bloom. She was shaking. “The walls are mud.”
“It still might be better than staying here,” Melissa told her. She pulled the desk back from the door.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m going to scout the front.”
“What if they’re nearby? Don’t go.”
“Are you OK?”
“Of course not.”
Melissa looked into the older woman’s eyes. She saw fear there for the first time. She hadn’t completely believed the story about Bloom leaving MI6; she thought there was a good chance that she was in fact still an agent under deep cover. But the look in the nurse’s eyes told her it was true.
Or close: maybe she hadn’t quit. Maybe they had eased her out because she wasn’t strong enough.
“They’re not nearby,” Melissa told her.
Bloom nodded reluctantly.
Melissa scrambled across the hall to a room with a window looking toward the road. There was no one outside.
“Marie, come on!” she yelled. “Let’s get out of here.”
“They’re moving out of the building,” said Nuri. “Shit. Why the hell can’t that bitch just do as she’s told?”
Danny felt a swell of anger — not at Melissa, but at Nuri, for calling her a bitch. “She’s just trying to do her job,” he said tightly.
“Bullshit. Her job was getting Li Han. She’s not even doing that. She’s screwing everything up. Typical Agency prima frickin’ donna.”
Boston reached across from the passenger seat and tapped Danny on the knee. Danny glanced over. Boston had his game face on, a look that said he shouldn’t waste his brain on trivia.
Right as usual, thought Danny.
“Give me directions to Agency officer Ilse,” Danny told MY-PID. “Avoid contact. Avoid the warehouse area.”
“Proceed forward one hundred yards.” MY-PID began a terse set of directions that took them over the old railroad tracks, skirting the warehouse area they’d raided. Then the system had Danny turn right and go up a hill; they passed a run of circular huts, each smaller than the next.
A red ball erupted in the city center.
“Mortars!” said Nuri.
“Colonel, these huts are filled with soldiers,” said Flash. “I just saw two guys in a doorway with guns.”
“Yeah, all right,” said Danny.
A second later something tinged on the fender.
“They’re shooting at us,” Flash said calmly.
Melissa heard the explosions in the distance as she helped the woman and child into the front room.
“Come on,” she said in English, scooping up the little girl. The mother grabbed her arm and together they ran out of the clinic, hurrying across the road into the empty field.
“Stay here,” said Melissa after they had gone about twenty yards. She handed the little girl over to her mother. “Here. OK?” She gestured with her hands. “Here.”
“Stay. Yes,” said the woman.
Melissa raced back across the street. She heard automatic rifle fire not far away.
One of the pregnant women appeared in the doorway, holding her belly. Melissa worried that she was about to give birth.
“Here. Quickly,” said Melissa, grabbing her arm. “Marie? Marie!”
“We’re coming,” said Bloom inside.
Melissa started walking the pregnant woman across the street. The woman was gasping for air, clutching her stomach.
“It’s OK,” said Melissa. “Relax. Relax.” A stupid thing to say, she realized, even under much better circumstances.
She steered her toward the other woman and her child. The tall grass made it harder for the pregnant woman to move; it seemed to take forever to get there.
“We have to go farther back from the road,” said Melissa. “Back in that direction — on the other side of those bushes.” She turned and saw Bloom and the other woman just reaching the field. “Come on,” she said, reaching down and scooping up the little girl. “Let’s go.”
A high-pitched whistle pierced the air. A dull thump followed, and the ground shook with an explosion. The girl screamed in her arms.
“Come on!” yelled Melissa. “Come on. They’re shelling us.”
Danny jerked the wheel hard, trying to stay with the road as it swerved between a pair of native huts. Shells fell fifty or sixty yards to his left, and there was sporadic gunfire from some of the houses nearby.
“We’re about a half mile away,” said Boston calmly. He pointed to Danny’s left. “They’re on the other side of that field.”
“That’s where they’re shelling,” said Nuri behind him.
Danny gave his phone to Boston. “Get Melissa on the line and stay with her,” he told him.