“Nothing’s funny.” She was beaming at him. “I’m just a happy tourist, honey.”
“Ah. Excellent, dear.”
“I’ve been taking lessons from a world-class pretender.”
“Thanks,” he said. She was still smiling, but there was something behind the smile, or the words, or the way she said them, that unsettled him. Leave it alone, he warned himself. Eyes on the prize.
They sauntered through the exit doors, then took the stairs to the parking garage, moving faster now that they were out of the terminal.
“How did I end up on some sort of airport watch list?” she asked.
“Good question. Maybe Iñigo’s friends have filed a missing-person report. Maybe they said you were the last person seen with him. Who else saw you at the observatory?”
“Antonio!” she said. “The receptionist. He’s the only one. He’s the one who told Iñigo I was there. You think he’s in on it?”
“Could be. Could be this thing’s a lot bigger, and goes a lot higher, than a handful of jihadists. We know your phone was tracked, and I bet your email was hacked. Hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if these folks have been watching ever since you contacted the CIA. They sure didn’t waste much time showing up at your apartment.”
She shivered. “Thank God I was already gone.”
He nodded. “If the authorities here are involved, they’ll be looking for me soon, too. Might be already.”
“What makes you say that?”
“You skedaddle out of the airport with an American guy—a guy who just happens to look like a federal agent. A guy who just happened to rent a helicopter an hour before Iñigo went missing. Doesn’t take an astrophysicist to connect those dots. I’d say we’re in a jam, Megan.”
She frowned. “Well, you were smart not to turn in the car. We’d really be in trouble if we didn’t still have it.”
He shook his head. “We don’t. Can’t use it anymore. They’d be on us like flies on shit. The crumpled fenders and shattered windshield might as well be giant red bull’s-eyes. If the guys in the Audi are in cahoots with the cops, the cops know what to look for, and they know where to look for it.”
She grabbed his arm. “Then what do we do? We’re trapped. We can’t get on a plane—shit, we can’t even get a taxi, can we?”
“Not a good idea.”
“Then what, Chip?”
“Keep walking. Keep blending in, honey.” He lifted his chin, using it to point toward a family coming toward them in the dim garage. A harried-looking woman was pushing a baby in a stroller; at her heels was a small dark-haired boy trundling a roll-aboard bag that was fully half his size. Somewhere in the dimness behind the mother and kids, a trunk lid slammed, and out of the shadows came a man wheeling two enormous suitcases. On his back was a pack nearly as big as the suitcases.
“Hola,” said Dawtry pleasantly to the mother and kids. “Buen viaje—have a good trip.” Smiling, he repeated the greeting as the dad staggered past with his burden. Dawtry turned and watched as they entered the elevator, then took O’Malley’s arm and began pulling her along, almost at a trot. “Hurry,” he said. “We gotta skedaddle.”
“Skedaddle where? How?”
He led her to a dim stall occupied by a squared-off, rusted-out Volkswagen. The car reeked of leaking oil and half-burned gasoline, and the engine radiated heat. “Get in,” he said.
“What?”
“Get in.”
“Why?”
“Duh, Megan. So we can get out of here.”
“We’re stealing this car?”
“If we don’t get arrested or shot while we stand here yakking about it.”
“You’re serious—we’re stealing that poor family’s car?”
“You got a better idea, I’d love to hear it.” Without waiting for an answer, he opened the driver’s door, knelt on the concrete, and angled his head and shoulders beneath the steering wheel, using his phone as a flashlight. A moment later the engine coughed to life. Dawtry scuttled into the driver’s seat and then leaned over to open the passenger door. “You coming with, or staying to chat with our friends in the Audi?”
She got in and closed the door. “Grand theft auto,” she said. Then she added, “Inconceivable.”
He backed out of the parking spot and then headed for the garage exit. “Grand theft? Take a closer look at our ride. Petty larceny, tops.” He looked at her and frowned.
“What?” she demanded.
“You’re not exactly inconspicuous.”
“Hey, I’ve been blending in!”
“Yeah, but they’ve got your passport, so they’re sending out your picture. You better crawl in the back and hunker down.”
“Hunker down?”
“Hunker down. A term that here means ‘hunker down.’ If there’s an invisibility cloak back there, this’d be a swell time to put it on.”
O’Malley wriggled between the seats. “Urf,” she said. “It’s gross back here. Smells like pee and poo and sour milk.”
“Think of it as the sweet smell of freedom. Anything you can cover up with?”
“Gag. There’s the world’s nastiest blanket.”
“Perfect. Make friends with it quick, ’cause I see daylight up ahead.” He eased to a stop at the garage exit. “Christ, where’s the ticket?”
“Look on the dashboard,” O’Malley mumbled from the rear floorboard. “That’s where I always leave it.”
“Not there.”
“Cup holder?”
“Loose change and snotty Kleenex.”
“Is there a button you can push for ‘lost ticket’? Or can you just crash through? Aren’t those gates pretty flimsy?”
“Yeah, but it’s a bad idea. They’d come running.”
“Well, we can’t just sit here forever.”
“Whatever would I do without your incisive insights, Professor?” The glove box opened, and a small avalanche ensued. “Crap.” Then: “Aha! Sticking out of the ashtray.” Dawtry rolled down the window, then inserted the ticket into the payment machine. “Here’s hoping my credit’s good here. Unlike everywhere else.” Ten seconds and one beep later, the arm swung upward and the car chugged forward, into the sunshine and away from the airport. “I am reminded of the words of the late, great Dr. King,” Dawtry said. “Free at last, free at last. Thank God Almighty, we’re free at last.”
“Free to do what?”
“I’m still working on that part.”
They headed south from the airport, away from Santa Cruz, on a smaller road in hopes of remaining under the radar of the police and the Audi thugs. The two-lane road was notched into the cliff, flanked on the uphill side by a massive retaining wall—the wall that supported the runway—and on the downhill side by the rocky coastline, its vistas of waters and breakers punctuated by wind turbines and airport approach-light stanchions.
South of the airport, the land grew more rolling, opening out into low hills dotted with banana plantations. At a side road, marked by a break in the stone and cinder block walls of a banana farm, Dawtry turned right, uphill. It was more a farm lane than a road—barely six feet across, with decrepit trucks and rusting farm equipment parked in the occasional wide spot. Soon the lane grew smaller and rougher, dwindling to a pair of cracked strips of pavement. “I don’t like this,” O’Malley said. “Last time I was on a road like this, I nearly died.”
“I don’t love it, either,” Dawtry said, angling his phone display toward her, “but the map shows it connecting to the highway that crosses the ridge. Besides, last time you were on a road like this, it led you to me, right?”
“My point exactly,” she said, but then she laughed.
At almost that exact moment, the road began to improve, and in less than a mile, it intersected an actual highway, one that switchbacked up and over the island’s volcanic spine and down to the west coast. As they topped the ridge and began their descent, through towering stands of pines, O’Malley pointed to a collection of rustic facilities—a r
estroom and picnic pavilion and charcoal grills—to their left. “Hey, we’re at Refugio El Pilar,” she said.
“Huh?” He slowed the car to a crawl. “Looks nice.”
“The trailhead to the volcanoes. Can we stop? Just for a minute? Long as nobody’s chasing or shooting at us?”
He pulled into the parking area and they got out. The air was crisp and fragrant with pine resin and cookout smoke. She pointed. “The trail starts there, behind the picnic tables. It’s truly amazing, in a forbidding sort of way, once you get up high, where the craters are.”
“And that’s where you were, napping in the center of the spiral labyrinth, when the quake woke you?”
She smiled. “You do listen to me! Yeah. That’s when I knew for sure I had to keep digging into this.”
“Wish we had time to hike it,” he said. “Maybe we can come back someday as actual tourists. Regular, happy American tourists.”
“I’d like that. If there is an America, and if happiness is still possible, after all this is over.” Suddenly, without warning, she began to cry. “God, what if we can’t stop it, Chip? What if it’s already too late?” She folded against him, shuddering in his arms.
“It’s not too late,” he said. “As long as it hasn’t happened yet, it’s not too late.”
“You don’t know that,” she whispered. “It could be past the tipping point. Like the ice sheet melting in Antarctica.”
“Never give in,” he said. “Never give in. Never, never, never.”
“What’s that from?” she said into his chest. “I know the line, but I can’t remember the movie.”
“Not a movie, Megan. Real life—a speech Winston Churchill gave in the fall of 1941, when Nazi Germany looked unbeatable.” He gave her a squeeze. “‘Never give in’ was a last-minute substitute for Churchill’s original line, by the way.”
“Yeah? What was the original line?”
“It was ‘Don’t stop picking at it.’”
She balled up a fist and pounded on his rib cage. “Smart-ass,” she said, half crying, half laughing. She sat up and wiped her eyes, then pulled away and locked eyes with him. “Speaking of picking at it, I need to talk to you about something.”
“I hope it’s about how you have the world’s first portable transporter beam in your back pocket,” he said.
“It’s not. It’s about last night.”
His internal alarms began to sound. “What about it?”
“What were you saying?”
“Can you narrow that down for me?”
“After you talked about your family. After I talked about Gracie. I was falling asleep. I had my head on your shoulder. I could feel your breath on my hair, and then I heard you whispering. Were you praying?”
He didn’t answer right away. “No,” he said eventually. “I’m not a praying man. I must have been talking in my sleep.”
“Bullshit, Chip.”
“I talk in my sleep. I told you that. Always have.”
“I don’t believe this. You’re lying to me. Why?”
“I’m not lying, Megan. I—”
“There! You just lied to me again! This very instant. You looked me right in the eye, and you lied to my face.”
“Megan—”
“Never mind.”
He groaned. “Never mind what, Megan?”
“Never mind anything. I’m sorry I asked.”
She whirled and stormed away, limping but trying not to.
Dawtry caught up with her and took hold of her arm. “Megan, wait.”
She shook him shook him off and kept going. “Leave me alone.”
“I can’t.”
“Why? Because that would be against FBI regs?”
“Yes! It would!”
“You know what? I say the hell with FBI regs, and I say leave me alone.” She slapped one hand across the other, as if knocking a bit of filth off her palm, and walked away, leaving him stunned and rooted to the spot.
“It was a poem,” he shouted at her retreating form. “It was a goddamn poem.”
She stopped, her back still turned . . . but she did stop. “A poem,” he repeated. “Called ‘A Prayer for My Daughter.’ By Yeats.” Damnably, Dawtry felt tears rolling down his cheeks. Well, shit, he thought. I hate to cry.
She turned toward him. “How does it go?”
“I . . . uh . . .”
She turned her head toward him. “Tell me.”
Dawtry looked up—up at the dark-green tracery of the towering trees and the azure backdrop of the sky, and he seemed almost to be falling upward, tumbling skyward. He drew a breath. “Once more the storm is howling,” he began, but then faltered. He shook his head and cleared his throat. Then he closed his eyes and began again.
Once more the storm is howling, and half-hid
Under this cradle-hood and coverlid
My child sleeps on.
He heard his voice strengthen as the words took him outside himself and into the poem itself.
There is no obstacle
But Gregory’s wood and one bare hill
Whereby the haystack- and roof-levelling wind,
Bred on the Atlantic, can be stayed.
As he said the words, he felt the pine-scented breeze on his face. He paused, took another breath, and quoted the rest of the passage, ending—as before—with the words, “Out of the murderous innocence of the sea.” He stopped, his eyes still closed. He didn’t even know if she was still standing there or if she’d walked away again. Slowly, as if awakening from a deep dream, he opened his eyes.
She had not walked away; she had walked toward him. She stood two feet away, wide-eyed, her face streaked with tears. “That’s lovely.”
He searched her face. “There’s more,” he said. “That’s not the end of the poem. But that’s where I stopped last night.”
“I know,” she said. “I was listening. Don’t lie to me again, Chip.”
“I won’t. I promise.”
“Thank you.” She was still just standing there, still just looking at him, the pupils of her eyes open fully—so fully that her irises were only a thin band of green and gold, like a bright ring around a dark planet or a black hole, its gravitational pull irresistible. Was it his imagination, or could he actually see the irises pulsing with each beat of her heart?
“I need to tell you something else, Megan,” he said. “Since you want me to tell you the truth. I said I’m not allowed to leave you alone, and that’s true. I’m not. It’s my job to protect you. But that’s not the only reason. I think you’re amazing. You’re smart, you’re strong, you’re brave.” He shook his head. “If it weren’t against regs, I’d be seriously falling for you.” He blushed. “I don’t mean to make you feel awkward. I’m sorry.”
“Sorry? You’re sorry? You big dummy. Do you always apologize for saying sweet things to women?”
“Generally.” He sighed with relief. “Okay, you love movie dialogue. Here’s a line for you. ‘You make me want to be a better man.’ Who said that?”
“I have no idea.”
“Jack Nicholson. As Good as It Gets. Thing is, Megan, I actually am a better man with you.”
She blinked. “Excuse me?”
“I said I’m a better man with you. I like that.”
She stiffened. “Well, congratulations,” she said. “Good for you. So that’s what this is about? That’s how you see me? A self-help program with tits and ass?”
“What? Dammit, Megan, why do you do that? Why do you seek out the flaw and focus on it, to the exclusion of everything else?” He looked up at the sky, opening and closing his fingers, then back at her again. “Here’s how I see you. I see you as admirable and inspiring. I see you as a role model and a hero and somebody I want to emulate. Why do you have to twist that into something demeaning to both of us?”
He turned and walked away, although he didn’t go far.
He wasn’t allowed to go far.
She watched him walk away. Way to go, O’Malley,
she thought bitterly.
In her mind’s eye, she flashed back to her first day on La Palma—two weeks and a lifetime ago—when she had spotted a single chin whisker in the fifty-foot MAGIC mirror and had felt compelled to pluck it. You really can’t stop picking at it, can you?
“Wait,” she said. “Come back.” He held up a hand and kept walking. “Please come back.” He stopped and turned, staring at her, his eyes raw with hurt. “Don’t,” she told him. “Don’t look at me. I need to say this, and I don’t think I can if you’re looking at me that way.” He stared at the ground. “You’re right, I do have a keen eye for the flaw,” she went on. “And I can be relentless. I know that. It’s how I was raised. My foster mother taught me well, and I was her prize pupil. But that doesn’t make it right. You deserved better—deserve better—and I’m sorry. Ashamed, actually.” She took a deep breath, blew it out. “If it’s any comfort,” she added, “the person I’m hardest on is me.”
“Yes, I know,” he said. “And, no, I take no comfort in it. Why would I want you to treat yourself badly?” He looked at her now, shaking his head. “I hate this. I hate being in . . . I don’t know what to call it . . . in disharmony with you.” He growled, then gave an odd, unexpected laugh. “Jesus. Truth is, if you weren’t the way you are—if you didn’t zero in on the flaw, or the inconsistency, or the seismic tremor screwing up your observations—we’d still be totally clueless about what’s going on here on this pissant island off the coast of Africa. We’d be waking up one morning, next week or next month, to a hundred-foot wall of water crashing down on us.”
“It could still happen,” she pointed out.
“Might could,” he conceded. “But thanks to you and the Acme Flaw Detector—”
“Don’t forget the Amplifying Catastrophizer.”
He smiled. “Thanks to you and the Acme Flaw Detector and the Amplifying Catastrophizer, we’ve got a chance to stop it. Are you sometimes a pain in the ass? Yeah. But are you pretty damned fabulous, too? Hell, yeah.”
She stared at him. “Hey, Chip?”
“Yeah?”
Wave of Terror Page 19
