*
Ariel sprints. She’s heading full-speed in the direction that the car is not facing, toward any traffic that might arrive on the wide roadway. She hears the driver call out, but she doesn’t know what he’s saying, and doesn’t give a damn.
She runs beside the concrete pediment of the embassy’s fencing, beyond the end of the compound, now passing a small open-air lot of parked cars and recycling bins, from which her peripheral vision catches some movement but she can’t tell what, could be someone shifting in the driver’s seat of a dark car but also could be a cat or a bird or a branch rustling in the breeze.
Ariel glances over her shoulder, sees the Audi’s driver climbing into his seat. She faces forward again, looks down at the sidewalk, at her feet, concentrating on not tripping on the uneven paving stones, cracks, roots pushing through the pavement.
She can hear the car door slam as she continues past the end of the parking lot, and now the sidewalk is bordered by low scrub next to a concrete wall.
The driver puts the Audi in gear. The car must be pulling forward in the narrow carriageway, at the end of which he’ll have to merge onto the wide roadway, which is one-way heading away from Ariel. It would be insane to spin the car around and drive against traffic, irresponsibly dangerous, a maneuver that would be undertaken only if he’s maniacally—criminally—intent on pursuit. At any moment speeding cars could arrive on the empty avenue, risking high-speed head-on collision, death. No hired-car driver would do this. Only an assassin would.
Ten yards ahead is an opening in the concrete wall, the entrance to a high-rise compound.
Ariel turns back to watch what the Audi does: Thank God it merges into the roadway, drives away from her. But that doesn’t mean she’s safe. The driver could speed up, make a right and another right and then around the back of this block, to the rear of this high-rise. How long would that take? While Ariel was sitting in the embassy, examining the map, she estimated ninety seconds, at most two minutes.
Maybe he won’t pursue her. She’s desperately hoping he won’t, because there’s no innocuous reason why he would. But she has to assume the worst. Always.
As she runs into the driveway she notices a figure back near the embassy, backlit by the floodlights that bathe the front of the American compound in protective brightness. It’s a man. And he’s walking in her direction.
No, not walking: he’s running. Running after her.
*
Ariel accelerates past the high-rise’s security guard before he has a chance to stop her, into a parking area with angled cars on one side and parallel spots on the other, everything well-illuminated by tall standards.
The guard yells something at her.
She doesn’t slow down until she arrives at the end of the wide-open parking lot, and takes the ninety-degree turn around the side of the building along a paved path beneath palm trees.
The guard yells again, more shrill, more alarmed. He’s answered by another yelling man.
Around the back of the building she can see tennis courts, a swimming pool on a raised pavilion, palm trees, a salmon-colored wall. This is a fancy apartment building, enclosed within a fortified perimeter, bordered on one side by the American embassy and the Brazilian on another.
Footsteps are pursuing her. More than one set.
That wall is not something she’s going to be able to scale. She knows this. The guard knows this. But he doesn’t know that she knows, so he probably assumes that the rear perimeter is her destination, that she’s going to try to escape via the back, and fail, and that’s where he’ll corner her, with a weapon-size flashlight in one hand and cell phone in the other, ready to call the police. Or maybe he’ll prefer to mete out punishment himself. Maybe he’s the type of man who looks forward to that sort of opportunity.
Ariel continues running at full speed beside the tennis courts as if her life depends on it, trying to make it to the far end of the building before the guard comes around the side. She takes the corner without knowing if she has succeeded.
She can’t keep up this pace, she’s going to keel over. She slows to a jog on the path between the building and the tall wall, a close, claustrophobic space, with no angle to take, no escape to make. Ariel doesn’t know if the guard is on her heels or headed toward the swimming pool and the perimeter beyond. She’s now just a few feet from the front of the building, and slows to a walking pace, trying to listen for footsteps behind her … straining to hear …
Nothing. She can’t hear any footsteps. The guard hasn’t pursued her around this corner, at least not yet. She comes to a full stop, doubles over, trying to catch her breath while she has a few seconds; sprinting is hard. She’ll give herself to a count of five to gather her strength for another dash through the parking lot, back out the front gate, across the wide lanes of the hopefully traffic-free avenue, toward the zoo and fast-food restaurants and life and people and hopefully a taxi back to the hotel, or screw it she’ll just flag down the first passing car, throw herself on the mercy of a complete stranger. In her experience, strangers are not the dangerous ones.
Ariel unfolds herself, stands upright. She inhales deeply, filling her lungs with oxygen, as if preparing to dive deep underwater. Then she takes one step forward—
CHAPTER 21
DAY 1. 11:58 P.M.
There’s no way she can get past the man who’s blocking the path, standing there just a few feet in front of her. Her only possible escape would be to turn around and sprint in the other direction; she can probably outrun him, she should go now— But then she recognizes him: It’s one of the embassy guys, the one she beat up in the street, a million years ago, earlier tonight. She thinks his name is Antonucci.
“It’s okay,” he says, putting out his hands in a soothing gesture, as if he’s smoothing a bedspread. “You’re okay.”
Ariel continues to pant, her chest tight.
“It’s gonna be okay,” he reiterates. “Why are you running?”
She doubles over again, still struggling to catch her breath. He gives her time to recover, then to answer, but she doesn’t.
“What are you afraid of? Who?”
Ariel, still doubled over, turns her eyes up at him. She shakes her head.
“How can we help if—”
“Help?” Now Ariel straightens up. “How can you help me at all?” She takes another deep breath. “You people have already proven that you can’t. Asking a bunch of irrelevant questions instead of doing something. You could at least have found my husband’s phone by now. Why haven’t you done that?”
“We have.”
“What?”
“We found his phone.”
“What the—?” She shakes her head. “Why didn’t anyone tell me?”
“It was in a garbage can down by the river. There was nothing there; it was just a place to dump the phone. Probably far from wherever your husband ended up. I’m sorry.”