“Yeah. But they missed the money.”
He cracks a grin.
“Who was shooting at us?” she asks.
“I’m guessing a Turkish government patrol.” He glances up. “What the—”
Penny follows his gaze to a dark gray long-tailed aircraft nesting at the base of the hexagonal tower. “The plane?”
“Helicopter. Looks like some kind of modified Apache, but without the doors.” His forehead wrinkles. “How’d the Hashashin afford a fifteen-million-dollar bird like that?”
Three tanks hulk near the courtyard wall. There’s been a bonfire here; scorch marks still blacken the paving stones. Charred fragments of gilded, lapis-painted vellum flutter in the dust like candy wrappers. How many centuries did these manuscripts survive until the Hashashin rolled up here in their SUVs? The men doing target practice are using what looks like a mannequin in black monks’ robes. But mannequins don’t bleed.
Jamal starts to haul Connor in one direction, while two unfamiliar men grab Penny’s arms.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Connor objects, trying to sound commanding while in a choke hold.
Penny twists and kicks. “We’re here to negotiate!”
“You said you came alone.” Al-Sadiq’s manner is markedly less civil. “So why were we attacked?”
“I don’t know,” says Connor. “Maybe the Turkish armed forces don’t like you invading their territory and shooting people in broad daylight?”
Penny twists around, trying to look Al-Sadiq in the face. “We demand to speak with your commander immediately.”
Al-Sadiq gives an order in Arabic. Four men grab Connor. Two more pull the onion sack back down over Penny’s head. She kicks and bites and writhes. It has no effect whatsoever.
“Get off!” she can hear Connor shouting, from farther away. “Penny?”
“I’m here! Connor? Connor!”
Hands shove Penny forward, into an echoing place, where the air is colder and smells musty, like the used-book store near U of M where she works weekends during the semester.
She struggles. “Hey, watch your hands, you son of a—”
A creak of hinges, a shove on her shoulders, and she falls down a flight of stone stairs.
She rolls onto the floor, bruised and gasping on the cold, dusty stone.
She yanks the onion sack off again, in time to see the heavy door slam shut at the top of the staircase.
“Come back here!” she roars.
The lock clicks.
“Connor!” she screams. “Connor!”
No answer.
Penny pushes herself up onto her knees.
In the dim fluorescent glow, hundreds of skulls stare back at her from their stone arches. The bones of ten thousand Syriac martyrs are crammed like scrolls into the shelves.
The monastery crypt.
Against the far wall, barely visible in the gloom, a dark-haired figure in jeans and a polo shirt sprawls on the floor as if he’s too weak to get up.
“My God,” Zach rasps. “Penny?”
29
* * *
WHAT YOU WISH FOR
“I don’t believe it.” Zach Robson shoves himself upright.
Penny kneels beside him, throat so tight she can hardly speak.
Zach reaches out. “They said you were dead—”
“They wish.”
He pulls her into a tight hug and doesn’t let go. “What in God’s name are you doing here?”
“I wasn’t about to let them kill you.”
“Little miss tough guy.” He leans back, hands on her shoulders. “You gonna translate all the Hashashin to death?”
“Something like that.”
Zach’s eyes crinkle in a real laugh. Except for a day’s dark stubble and a few half-clotted gashes on his arms, he looks almost sleek, compared to her sore, travel-stained, felt-haired grunginess. He is remarkably unflustered. But then, Penny tells herself, he’s a professional.
She frowns. “They didn’t tie you up?”
“You neither.” His smile dies out. “The walls are four feet thick.”
“Oh.” Penny feels sick.
“Who’s Connor? The one you were shouting for?”
“He’s another officer from—” She hesitates. After all, he never actually told her. “From where you really work.”
“Ah.” Zach freezes. “They told you.”
“You could’ve trusted me, Zach.”
“It was too dangerous.” He brushes the bangs from her face. His voice is softer, as if they were back in Ankara, back on the sun-warmed stone of the citadel. “I had to protect you.”
“Zach.” Penny meets his eyes. “What the hell is going on?”
“I can’t talk.” He casts a wary glance up at the door. “Not here. They’re always listening.”
“But, Zach . . .”
“It’s just you and Connor?” he whispers. “They didn’t send anyone else?”
“We . . .” She can explain later. Priorities. “It’s just us.”
Zach lowers his voice. “How the hell did you find me?”
“I saw the photo of what they did to Davut Mehmetoğlu. We took a guess you’d be here, too.”
Zach shakes his head. “They made me watch the beheadings,” he says hoarsely. “Just stand and watch. I’ve never felt so goddamned useless in my life.”
“Beheadings.” Penny stands up so fast she gets dizzy. “Oh my God. Connor—”
He grabs her wrists. “Penny, calm down—”
“Zach, what if they . . . if they—”
“They’re not going to kill him. You just got here. He hasn’t even been interrogated yet—”
As if on cue, the door drags open.
Two heavy silhouettes against the light.
The guards throw a man’s lanky body down the stairs.
30
* * *
QUESTIONS
“Connor!” Penny runs to him.
Connor curls on the stone floor. “I’m fine,” he croaks.
“Yeah, just peachy.” Penny kneels beside him, unknots the thin wire cord around his wrists, and helps him sit up. His left eye is already swelling. Bright blood stains his mouth and chin like a face-paint pirate beard. His shirt is smeared with dirt, and his necktie has been torn off.
“You okay?” he wheezes.
“Better than you.” She takes off her blue-jean jacket and wipes blood off his face. “What happened?”
“Jamal and about twelve of his buddies started kicking me around, screaming questions. But then Al-Sadiq came and hollered at them, and”—Connor gestures, grimacing—“voilà.” He eyes the skull-crowded arches. “Where’s Count Dracula?”
“The name’s Zach Robson.” Zach crouches down next to Penny. “And you’re Connor . . . ?”
“Beauregard.” Connor shakes his hand. “The way Penny talks about you, I was expecting Sean Connery.”
“You should see me in white tie.”
Connor doesn’t laugh. “We’ve got a few questions.”
“I’ve got a few myself.”
“Careful.” Penny lays a hand on Connor’s arm. “Everything’s bugged.”
“Al-Sadiq speaks English plenty well.” Connor rolls the thin wire cord around his hand like wool. “Why not just interrogate both of us right away?”
Zach looks up the stairs. “I’m sure they’ll come back soon.”
Penny swallows. “What happens when they do?”
Silence.
“We’ve got to get out of here,” she whispers.
Zach shakes his head. “How?”
“Connor,” says Penny. “Didn’t you say your dad taught you to fly helicopters?”
“Hold your horses. Just because I know my way around a helo doesn’t mean I can fly an Apache!”
Penny looks up the dark stairs to the light leaking under the door. “If we could just get back to the courtyard, we’d have a chance.”
“We don’t even know if that bird’s fu
eled,” says Connor. “If we even got that far. You saw how many Hashashin were in that courtyard.”
“So we wait here to be beheaded?” she demands.
Connor squares his shoulders. “If you can get me in that cockpit, I’ll give it my best shot.”
“That’s mighty heroic, cowboy,” says Zach. “But the door is locked. The guards up there have semiautomatics. What have we got?”
Penny stands up. “Nothing to lose.”
31
* * *
TURNED
LANGLEY, VIRGINIA
02:30 LOCAL TIME
The offices at the Original Headquarters Building on CIA’s campus are as muggy as the inside of a rice cooker. Christina’s office is white-green under the fluorescent lights. She sent most of her team home around midnight, but some of them refused to leave. Taylor, at her desk outside Christina’s office, has munched her way through a tub of yogurt raisins and soaked most of a pack of Kleenex, watching the phone.
“Ma’am!” Taylor’s ponytail swings around the edge of the door. “There’s been a shooting in Mardin. Hashashin.”
Christina tenses. “Mor Samuel?”
Taylor is breathless. “No, in the town center, but—”
“Are we talking dozens? Hundreds?”
“Just one guy—”
“AmCit?”
“Turkish, but—”
“Turkish?” Christina fixes her with an exasperated glare. “Taylor, you can log the little stuff without wasting my—”
“The witnesses described two foreigners at the scene with the Hashashin. Civilians, a young man and a woman, speaking English. The media doesn’t seem to have picked up on it yet—it wasn’t in the public police reports. No ID on the woman—we’re guessing she’s a local. But the description of the guy sounds exactly like Connor.”
Christina sits very straight and very still. Her voice is quiet. “Incredible.”
“So maybe he’s got a lead to Zach Robson!”
“If it’s him.” Christina fixes Taylor with a laser stare. “Keep this strictly compartmented. We don’t want to raise false hope. Any leads on the woman?”
“Not yet, ma’am,” says Taylor brightly, “but I put in a request to Turkish intelligence.”
“You what? On what authority?”
“Connor needs all the help we can send! I can call Incirlik. We can get planes, tanks, coordinate with Ankara—”
“Out of the question.” Christina glances at Elastigirl. “We have no secure comms with him. The Hashashin could pick up on anything we send. If it is Connor, we’d be signing his death warrant.” She pauses. “There’s something else. I wanted to substantiate first—I don’t believe in tarnishing a good officer’s name. But you deserve to know.”
Taylor looks scared. “Ma’am?”
Christina sighs. “I have new intel from State indicating that shortly before his disappearance, Connor was behaving—suspiciously.”
“Suspiciously?”
“To be perfectly candid, they think he may have turned.”
“Connor?” Taylor blanches.
“And now, if he’s gone rogue and run off to contact Zach Robson, there can be little doubt . . .”
“Ma’am, there must be some mistake. Connor would never—”
Christina gives Taylor a hard look. “It’s never easy to realize how little we know the people closest to us.”
32
* * *
NOTHING TO LOSE
MOR SAMUEL MONASTERY
10:18 LOCAL TIME
From beneath the earth, below the door of the monastery crypt, comes a man’s howl of rage. A shattering crunch, as thousands of dry bones splinter against stone.
The two guards stationed outside the locked door of the crypt exchange glances.
Another man starts shouting, an ugly, furious bellow. Flesh punches into flesh. A woman screams.
One of the guards unlocks the crypt door and pulls it open. His companion stands poised behind him, gun at the ready.
In the beam of dusty daylight, the dark-haired prisoner stands over the bloodied blond one, fist raised. Broken skeletons are splayed around the floor, flotsam of their fight.
“Stop!” roars the guard in accented English. “Commander Faisal wants them alive!”
Heedless, the dark-haired man grips a femur and raises it over the fair one’s head.
The guard, a heavyset Belgian, plunges halfway down the stairs.
The second guard steps into the doorway, Walther P99 raised.
From where she crouches near the door, Penny rears up out of the shadows. She wraps her hands around his knees and shoves him down the stairs.
With a shout, the first guard turns around. But Connor tackles him.
The second guard struggles to his feet with a strangled shout. He grasps for the trigger of his gun.
Penny leaps from the top of the staircase. She topples the guard to the ground, knocking the wind out of both of them and ripping open the knees of her leggings. Zach wrests the guard’s gun away and smashes the grip across the man’s face.
Connor is still grappling with the first guard. They slam into a rack of skulls, and bones crunch down around them. The guard lands a punch in Connor’s gut. Connor staggers back, as if he’s about to fall. The guard closes the gap, fist raised. Connor surges forward, grabs the guard by the shirt, and hurls him into the stone wall. The guard slumps like a scarecrow.
Penny is flushed, dizzy with the airless heat. Connor and Zach stand panting for a moment.
Zach checks the tiny round witness holes bored into the Walther 99’s magazine. “Eight rounds left.”
Connor examines the other guard’s gun. “Same.”
Zach grins. “A whole lot better than nothing.”
“Sixteen bullets?” Penny shakes her head. “There are hundreds of Hashashin. The only way we’re getting out of here alive is brains. Not guns.”
Zach locks the magazine back into place. “Why not both?”
They climb the stairs, up into the light of a high, circular room. Zach turns the lock in the crypt door behind them.
The fifteen-hundred-year-old walls rise around them, smooth concentric circles of ancient golden stone. Hot white sun pours down from a single oculus, staring open to the sky in the center of the ancient dome.
Penny breathes in the library scent she’d smelled before. This must have been a church once, but now the only furnishings are rows of bookshelves, dozens of them, dark with that dim gloss ebony gets after a few centuries of careful tending. They’re empty of everything but streaks of dust, where the contents have been pulled from the shelves.
A library without books.
Connor walks silently to the door and peers out through the keyhole.
“Can you see the helicopter?” whispers Penny.
“It’s a different courtyard. A little one with an olive tree.”
“The main courtyard is on the other side of the library,” says Zach.
Connor leans away from the door. “There are at least a dozen guys out there. We’ll never make it.”
“If you distract them, Penny and I might make it to the next building.”
“Thanks, but no thanks.” Connor scowls. “Even if it worked, there would still be shots. The whole camp would come running. And even if you made it, who’s going to fly the helo?”
Penny grabs one of the bookshelves. It must be every ounce of a hundred pounds. She heaves it a few inches toward the center of the room. Wood squeals across the stone floor.
Zach crosses his arms. “I’ve heard of rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic, but . . .”
Penny points upward. “We can reach the oculus if we stack them like a pyramid.”
“A pyramid?” echoes Connor.
“We can climb across the roof.” Penny leans against the side of the bookshelf, using her weight to shift it another few inches. It gives a resentful creak. She shoves harder. “It won’t make so much noise if we all lift it.” She tips t
he shelf gently over, staggering in an attempt to muffle the crack as it hits the stone floor. She wipes her forehead. Her hand comes away red. Blood is pumping again from the cut on her scalp.
Connor grabs the other end of the bookshelf. “Let’s shove that one over here. Then we can lift another one on top.”
“CIA Movers,” Zach drawls. “ ‘We cover your assets.’ ”
Penny grits her teeth and grinds the second bookshelf toward the center of the room. “You want to help?”
A few minutes later, twenty feet up and kneeling on a pyramid of shelves, Penny grips the rim of the oculus and pulls herself up into the searing sunlight. She squints. “I can see the main courtyard.”
Zach, one bookshelf down, glances back at the door. “We’ve got to hurry. They’ll be back any minute.”
“Come on, then.” Penny grabs Zach’s hand and helps him up beside her. It feels good to have him close.
Zach peers out at the helicopter and ducks back down. “That’s just a two-seater!”
Connor hoists himself up on Penny’s left. “The pilot station’s in the back.” He sounds clipped and startlingly assured. “You two go for the gunner’s seat, in front. Robson, you ever have any missile training?”
“We had an Xbox in my prep-school common room,” deadpans Zach. “If I played any more Apache Death Ultra, the Air Force would’ve owed me a medal.”
“Lucky us,” says Connor drily.
“The wall looks rough enough to climb down,” says Penny. “We can hide behind the tank—”
Connor nods. “We wait for all three of us to reach the ground. Then we run. And then we pray.”
“I’ll go first.” Penny grabs the rim of the oculus.
“Like hell you will!” says Zach.
“No,” seconds Connor. “You have no training!”
“Exactly. I’m the expendable one!” She jabs Connor in the chest. “You’re the one who can fly the helicopter. And you”—she puts a hand on Zach’s arm—“you’re the one with the information. So if anyone is going to get shot, it’s going to be me!”
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