AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Of course she hadn’t dared tell him about seeing Jamal. “So you’re thinking Jamal acted on his own this morning?”
Freya nodded. “I think he was sent there to grab her, but he had his own ideas. If Rafiq wanted her dead, the wine would have been poisoned, not drugged. They weren’t trying to spare you. They were trying to make her easy to grab. They want her for information. Not to kill her.”
“They’ll kill her once they have the information.”
“Of that I have no doubt. If we could figure out a way to protect her from that, I’d send her in right now.”
He glared at Freya. “I was sent in to rescue her twice in Jordan. I’m not about to lose her on American soil.”
He wasn’t about to lose her at all.
“We don’t have any reason to put her in danger right now.”
“And if that changes?”
“Then it will be Diana’s choice.”
“This from the woman who sent her to Jordan to be abducted. Once a manipulative spook, always a manipulative spook.”
“Hey, now,” Ian said, but his tone lacked heat. Like he was just offering the expected umbrage.
“My husband might agree with you at times, but no. It’s up to Diana. It was always up to Diana. She approached us in the beginning. And this is all hypothetical. Diana has no intention of showing her face unless we know it will draw out Rafiq. He’s pulling the Gardners’ strings right now. All he has to do is reveal he’s been their supplier for the Signature Line and they’re fucked. They can’t hide behind their billions when the whole world sees they’ve been funding a terrorist for more than a decade.”
Chris nodded. “They knew he was alive, and they got him in the country, probably on one of their private jets.”
“Easy-peasy with a fake passport. Especially when in every photo the Intelligence Community has of him, he has a long beard.”
“He shaved?”
Freya nodded toward Ian. “Raptor’s finest got access to the Mayflower’s security recordings and got this from one of the elevator cameras.”
Freya slid a printout across the table. It had been enhanced by Raptor techs and was crisp and clear. Much better than the photo Diana had run though the free enhancement program online a few hours ago.
He stared at the face, seeing the known scar and the new one Diana had described.
Blood drained from his face. He’d never looked at the guy straight on. The man had kept his head down, but at one point, Chris got a glimpse of his eyes above a beer mug in the mirror behind the bar.
Older man. British accent.
It was all clear now.
Makram Rafiq was the man who’d given Chris relationship advice Friday night in the bar inside the Mayflower.
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Diana hit Refresh at least thirty times before the email subject line changed to her name. Freya had told her Chris was safe, but she wouldn’t believe it until she’d confirmed for herself.
The words were his. Only Chris would call her babe.
She remembered how he’d said it when they’d made love on the couch. She touched the computer screen. Pixels over cyberspace.
A replica of his words. A representation.
And as meaningful and valuable to her as anything handwritten could be.
She leaned back against the headboard in the hotel room Freya had arranged for her and cuddled the computer.
After Salim died, she’d printed out the early emails between them. The love notes they’d exchanged as the thrill of being together bloomed.
