“I dream too much of blood,” she murmurs.“It has changed me.Once I knew things, all sorts of things.Now I’m not certain of anything anymore.
“Jamil,” she speaks her child’s father’s name.“I think his ghost is real, but maybe I’ve just needed him that much, to keep some piece of him with me.Does it matter?When I was a girl”—she sighs—“I dreamed.”
“How many kidnappers are there?”Roberta asks, trying toregain focus.She looks at me, then stares pointedly at her watch.I get the message.
“I think five.But I don’t know them all.Rafiq and his cousin threw me in the back of their vehicle and drove to the abandoned warehouse.Habib was there.And… and…” Another shrug.Roberta and I can fill in those blanks just by looking at her.“I didn’t talk.I wouldn’t talk.I already knew Habib would kill me.In many ways, it’s only fair.I did kill him first.”
“But you got away?”
“Isaad.Habib decided if I didn’t care about my life, maybe I would care about his.He cut off my hair, put it in a box, and had it delivered.”
“That was quite a riddle,” I comment.
“I wrote it as a warning.Isaad would read it and know exactly what happened.He was to take Zahra and leave.”
“He didn’t.”
“Isaad is a good man.Better than I deserved.He understood the warning, but he chose a different course.An ambush of sorts?I don’t know the details.But he appeared earlier than they’d planned, before the other men had returned.Rafiq started yelling at him; Isaad replied with insults of his own.
“I was able to get loose from my bindings.I ran, assuming Isaad and… thinking my husband would be behind me.But no.I don’t know what happened after that.”
I catch the stutter.Isaad and…?I wait to see if she’ll elaborate, but she doesn’t.
I try a different tack.“Sabera, who were you calling in New York and in Washington, DC?”
She shakes her head, as if she doesn’t understand the question, but just for a moment… a brief hardening of her gaze that comes and goes so quickly, I might be imagining it.
“You saw Isaad.You were there.At the scene of my husband’s murder.”Sabera turns her attention to Roberta.Clearly she’d been watching from somewhere close.I wonder how long she’s been following us.And how she’s been following us.A woman on the run who doesn’t have a vehicle?Let alone, where has she been since fleeing the resort townhouse?
I feel increasingly unsettled.I’ve finally found my target, and yet…
“Did he suffer?Tell me.What did they do to my husband?”
“What matters is that Isaad died protecting you,” Roberta offers gently.“He gave his life out of love.”
“He and Jamil both died protecting me.If that’s love, I don’t want it anymore.”Sabera raises her steak knife again, waving it in agitation.
“Sabera.”I redirect her attention to me.“Remember what we told you in the beginning?They didn’t stop with Isaad.They tried to kidnap Zahra as well.”
Sabera blinks.
“When that failed, they grabbed Aliah instead.”
“Do you know where they might have taken her?”Roberta asks.“The location they held you and the location of Isaad’s body aren’t the same.We have a sense of a general area, but not a place.”
Sabera shakes her head.“Where’s Zahra?I want my daughter.”
“Zahra’s fine.She’s someplace safe and well protected.”
“Take me.”The thin serrated blade, waving again.
Roberta reaches out and slowly lowers it.“Do you truly believe being with you is someplace safe for Zahra?Given all that’s happened?”
The distressed look on Sabera’s face is answer enough.
“Habib… He came back even after I destroyed him.What more can I do?”
“It’s okay.”Roberta pats Sabera’s arm.“We have a plan.”
