"Welcome to the Marshall Islands," she announced.
Jones stared at her, then glanced back at Payne, who was struggling to hold in his laughter. He'd been dying to tease Jones about the kissing incident with Kia for several days, and now he had managed to do it in style.
"You know what?" Jones said. "Screw you and screw Kia. That's not funny."
"You're right," he said with a laugh. "It's hilarious."
"Ha, ha. I get it. Make fun of the pale black guy." He dropped his bags and glanced into the cockpit, where even the pilot was laughing. "Driver, I've had enough. Take me home."
Which made Payne laugh even louder.
"Fine," Jones said. "Be that way. But I'm telling you, I'm marching down there and slipping her the tongue."
"You better not," said Kia, who had snuck up the stairs behind him. "She'll charge me extra."
"She's a hooker?"
Kia laughed and gave him a hug. "She's not a hooker, but she is single."
"In that case, we can stay." Jones turned toward the cockpit and shouted. "Bellman, change of plans. Please get my bags. I'm going downstairs to make a friend."
Payne waved him off, glad he was being such a good sport.
"Wow," said Kia, who had set everything up at Payne's request. "That worked well."
He nodded in agreement. "Perfect. Simply perfect. No way you can top it."
"You don't think?" she flirted.
Payne smiled at the possibilities. "Honestly, I can't wait to find out."
AUTHOR'S NOTE
Even though Sword of God is a work of fiction, most of the locations in my novel are quite real. Al-Gaim is a military housing compound in Taif, Saudi Arabia. Lava tubes stretch for miles underneath Jeju, South Korea. And the Abraj Al Bait .Towers are being built across the street from the Great Mosque in Mecca.
(Payne and Jones showed me the blueprints. They look amazing!)
Anyway, when I first started researching this book, I quickly realized an important fact: I can't read Arabic or Korean. Heck, I can barely read English. That meant I was forced to rely on translated documents to provide several details in my story. Normally this wouldn't be a problem, but there was one major issue that kept popping up over and over. Translators tend to disagree on the spelling of proper nouns. I swear, to this day I still don't know the official name of Jeju. Some call it Jeju-do. Others use Jejudo. Then there is Jeju Island. And Cheju-do. And Cheju. And, well, you get my point. After a while, I realized that I needed to choose one spelling for every location-even if many linguists disagreed with my choice- and stick with it throughout.
Then again, I guess that's what writing is. A series of choices.
That being said, I think the riskiest choice I made was the concept of a terrorist attack in the holy city of Mecca. My goal was to entertain, not to offend. If I crossed any lines, I sincerely apologize. As I mentioned during my story, there are a number of similarities between Islam and Christianity. That might seem strange, considering the clear cultural differences between Saudi Arabia and the United States, but if you take the time to examine the sacred texts of the two religions, you will find many shared beliefs.
Obviously, it would be great to live in a world where everyone got along.
Until that day, stories about terrorism will continue to be written.
FB2 document info
Document ID: fbd-55496e-edf4-0d4f-5498-5af1-005e-b2f4d3
Document version: 1
Document creation date: 03.06.2011
Created using: calibre 0.8.3, Fiction Book Designer, FictionBook Editor Release 2.6 software
Document authors :
alaskin
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