She stood up abruptly, swaying slightly.
“Okay, I’m done.Too hot.I need a cold shower and another drink.You coming?”
“In a minute.”
Poppy grabbed her towel and stumbled back out, leaving Marielle alone in the sweltering heat.
She sat there for another few minutes, her mind working through what she’d learned.Hanna had information—was supposed to give it to someone who never came for her.Shipping routes, customs issues, the Vice President’s possible involvement.Shell companies and money laundering.
And Hanna could connect all the dots.If she could convince the frightened woman to trust her.
10
When Marielle returnedto their stateroom, Omar was standing at the window, his posture tense.He turned when she entered, and she saw the question in his eyes.
She crossed to him, wrapped her arms around his waist, and pressed her face against his chest.“Bathroom,” she murmured against his shirt.
In the steamy privacy of the running faucets, she told him everything.Hanna’s revelation about being betrayed.Poppy’s drunken oversharing about shady business deals.
“Hanna was waiting for an extraction that never came,” Marielle whispered.“She has the intel, Omar.She’s been gathering it for months.But whoever was supposed to get her out abandoned her.”
Omar’s jaw was tight.“Leave it to the CIA.”
“So the agency decided to burn their asset.She’s too hot, it’s too complicated, so they’ll leave her here.They probably know Idris will never let her leave or talk to anyone.”Marielle felt sick.
“But they still want the information—even if only to sit on it.So they outsource the mission to Jake.”
“And now we show up, asking questions, and she doesn’t know if she can trust us.”
“Can she?”
It was the question Marielle had been avoiding.“I don’t know.We’re not authorized to extract her?—”
“Jake also ordered us to abort the mission entirely and we didn’t.”
They looked at each other for a long, humid moment, the sound of running water filling the silence between them.
“What do we do?”Marielle finally asked.
“We find the intel.And then we figure out if we’re the kind of people who leave Hanna behind.”
Marielle already knew the answer to that question.She suspected Omar did too.
They just weren’t ready to say it aloud yet.
11
Omar neededto clear his head.Idris had arranged a big midday meal on the yacht—one last celebration before the reached Marseille later in the evening.When Stefan delivered this invitation, he made it clear that it was actually a command performance.
They were running out of time, and he needed a plan.Marielle offered to pack their luggage while he got some air.
He kissed her, not bothering to wonder if the camera caught it, then slipped out of the stateroom.The corridor was empty, but as soon as he reached the stairs, he heard raised voices on the deck above.As he climbed up, the voices grew louder.Brad and Idris were arguing, and it was getting heated.
Omar climbed the stairs and stayed in the stairwell, out of sight but close enough to hear.
“—not my problem if your father can’t deliver—” Brad snapped, his voice sharp.
“Watch yourself.”Idris’s tone was ice.“My father has more connections than yours could ever dream of.”
