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No go.
I check my ammo. Well, technically, Dmitri’s ammo. Half a clip.
What the hell? I’m going to die. I’m going to die in a truck that smells like goats. I’m going to die in a truck that smells like goats after failing my most important mission. After failing Hope.
Who turned on me? Gracie, Tony, Dada, or Bridget? I can’t die without knowing—which means I’mnotgoing to die today.
A shot is fired into the truck. A warning shot, because Walid’s men know he does not want me dead. He wants me in pain. There was only one person in this world he loved, and, tonight, I killed that person.
I know the brothers’ tragic story. Two boys, orphaned on the streets of India—granted, they’d made themselves orphans—then, afterward, trafficked to a man in England. They’d killed him, too, and taken over his business. Despite having experienced the pain of being abused and trafficked, they chose to do that to others.
I get that, unlike me, no one plucked them from their path and introduced them to a different way. They’d made their choices from a place of desperation. Later, they’d made their choices from a place of wealth. And paranoia. And cold indifference. The only way to stop the cycle is to stop them. One down. One to go. I can’t die here.
Someone calls out to me in English, “Come now. You are endangering the people here. Come out. We will take you some place to talk.”
Oh. They just want to talk. Silly of me to think otherwise.
Tucking myself onto the floor, I call back, “How’s Aamir? I hope I didn’t break his heart.”
They begin to fire at the truck.
20
SANDESH
Salma prepares Amal for what happens next as I check out front again. A few locals, but the men who’d busted in here haven’t come back.
After Salma has dressed the girl in different clothes, she walks over to me. “You must go after Justice.”
“No. Justice has people. I guarantee she’s already with them. You need me.”
“No, I don’t. These men will let me be. They will not harm a Jordanian woman—a doctor and devoted Muslim with ties to this community. One of my sons is on his way here. He works for the government.” She holds up her cell. “Those men will not want that trouble. They want Justice.”
She pushes my chest, trying to shove me out the door. Pathetic and so damn frustrating.
“No, it’s like you said earlier. I am here for this. I changed my life to be here for you, for this cause, for people who want to make things better.”
Salma lets out a frustrated sigh. “You are a good man, but stupid. Her cause and ours are the same. Do you not see the girl?”
I look at the girl, now dressed in clean clothes. Her eyes pin me with disappointment and fear. Justice saved this child. “But—”
Salma holds up her keys. “When the leaves fall, you will see further. Take the advice of someone who has lived longer. Destiny isn’t always the path we’ve chosen for ourselves. It is the one that most clearly matches the values we aspire to protect.”
The crack of distant gunfire punctuates her meaning. Salma thrusts her keys at me. “Go.”
Keys in hand, I run out into the shot-riddled night.
* * *
Driving slowlydown streets with the windows open and the lights off, I listen. I can’t allow myself to think of Justice as anything but a target that needs to be acquired. How far could she have gotten?
After the gunshots, no one walks the dirt roads in this area. The moon and some lights in the camp allow me to see clearly enough as I swing Salma’s old pickup around a corner.
Shouldn’t have let Justice go. Shouldn’t have made my decision to let her go based on anger and hurt. I’d been so furious. She lied to me. Mukta lied too. No way her mother doesn’t know what her daughter is doing here.
It’s the only thing that makes sense. It explains the early phone call, squeezing Justice into my mission, and yet… If Justice has people, why isn’t anyone coming for her?
Gunshots. There. I turn, drive down the road and park. Slipping out of the truck, I crouch, then run to the end of the trailer. I site around the corner.
