“No, I didn’t mean it like that.”
Well, that was something. “Then what did you mean?”
“I mean, it’s dangerous to be here with me.”
His eyes widened.Tell me about it.
“No, I don’t mean that, either.”
Shite, how did she followthattrain of thought?
“I’m not very good at explaining myself. I mean, I’m relieved you’re here. But being around me makes you a target.”
“I know that. I’m good with that.” Her gaze practically itched the side of his face.
“Did I ever tell you how my fiancé died?”
Whoa. He hadn’t seen that coming. “I don’t believe so, no.” Come to think of it, she hadn’t mentioned the guy at all in France.
“He died in a US drone strike in Somalia after I called his cell phone,” she said, quiet and precise. “That’s how Hyland’s goons tracked him down—they’d been waiting for him to break cover.”
“Amilitarystrike? How’d Hyland get away with that?”
“Tess reckons he arranged for the US to get intel that a terrorist leader was hiding out where Latif was staying, and then pressured the president to deal with it. Latif was collateral damage, officially. Of course, by then Latif had given enough information to Tess to bring down Hyland’s former company and his cronies, but the senator slipped the noose. We think Latif had been hunting evidence that could bring Hyland down, too. And now Hyland wants me gone, thinking I know too much. Which, unfortunately, I don’t.”
“Oh Jesus. I knew some of that but not all. I’m sorry. And we think Charlotte now has this evidence? She works for GCHQ, right? Why wouldn’t she just tell her bosses?”
“Maybe she did. Or maybe she doesn’t know who to trust. Governments are loath to intrude on other governments’ dirty secrets. And everyone has secrets.” She sat straighter. “Anyway, my point is that if I’m a target, you’re a target. And I already lost one...”
He looked at her, but she was facing the other way. One...?
“I don’t think I could handle losing another...” She rubbed her hands down her thighs.
Ah. So there it was—confirmation. She’d pushed him away last year not because shewasn’tinto him but because shewasinto him. And, hey, he’d left quite enough broken hearts in the rubble of his former life. Which, all put together, made them perfectly wrong for each other.
“Oh God,” she said, planting a palm on her forehead. “That sounds selfish, doesn’t it? What I mean is... I don’t want you to die foryoursake. Not just for mine.”
“Sweet of you,” he said. “And you’re worried you might get me killed?”
“Awo.”
“Awo,”he repeated, mimicking the way she sucked in the word, like a breathy gasp.
“Sorry, it meansyes. I got back into the habit of saying it when I was in hiding in Ethiopia last year.”
“I remember it. I like it—it’s catching. And what’s that other word you use, forokay,noproblem.”
“Eshi.”
“Eshi,”he echoed. “And so...you’re worried the same thing might happen to me?”
“Awo.”
He waited, but she volunteered no more. “I appreciate your sweet concern but I’m here because I want to be. And I’m not leaving until this is done and you’re safe.Eshi?”
“Eshi.”
“But you’re welcome to not want me to die, for purely selfish reasons.”
