Ava is still asleep when I sit up, shaking the cobwebs out of my head.
“I need you to come and look at this,” Bennito says as soon as he notices I’m awake. The tone in his voice has me worried, and I’m not sure whether it’s the harsh glare of the interior of the airplane or whether he has really lost all color in his face, but he looks like shit.
“Bad news, is it?”
“Pretty much the worst.”
He slides the screen around so I can look at it. Norse and Rodrigo crowd behind me.
The emails and phone conversations that have been recorded and transcribed are no ordinary ones. The information on Bennito’s screen is a collection of names and heads of state. Not just from the U.S. but from everywhere. The information reveals for the last ten years the payments governments have made to various insurgent groups to kill off political rivals, spies, and what I presume to be inconvenient lovers by the female names on the list. It’s a hit list. A dirty, worldwide hit list.
“I kind of wish you weren’t as good at encryption as you are,” I tell Bennito.
“Shit, I know. But this was child’s play. A fifth-grade coder could have cracked this.” Bennito jabs the screen with his finger.
“Duval must’ve thought that he was invincible. But why?” Norse muses.
“Stupid is as stupid does. He’s French and they always have a flair for the dramatic.”
Bennito lifts the receiver. “Do we want to keep a copy of it?”
“No. If it’s known that we have a copy, we will become targets. The only way we stay safe is by making sure that people fear us. But we can’t have them always knocking down our door trying to kill us because we know too much.” I take the receiver and place it in a small nylon bag that holds the USB sticks.
Everyone looks relieved that I’m taking responsibility. It’s a ticking time bomb, and I think if I had opened an escape hatch and dropped the information out of the plane, they would’ve been just as happy. I hate spy games. It’s one thing to kill a man. Lots of men need killing. I certainly don’t mind protecting them in trying to keep people alive, either. But with secrets like these? There’s always someone who’s willing to kill to obtain them and to make sure they never see the light of day. Information like that can only harm you. But it can also keep you safe, a voice whispers at the back of my head.
When the pilot comes back to tell us that the refueling is done, we all breathe a sigh of relief.
“Break out the cards, boys, we’re almost home,” I say and then turn back to the still-resting Ava. Even though she is asleep, I begin to tell her about everything that she can expect. The palm trees, the fresh fruit we’ve planted, the windmill that we’ve set up to harness clean energy. I tell her that the island is thick with lonely men and that if she had lots of model girlfriends, we could set up a love connection. Norse snorts at this but doesn’t voice any objections.
A small smile touches her lips as if she can sense, even in her unconscious state, that the mood is lightening.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
AVA
I’m having all kinds of messed-up dreams. I know they’re dreams, but it doesn’t matter because my brain is determined to stay in them. Rose holds my hand and we sit on the beach, our toes in the sand.
“I met a guy,” she tells me.
“Me too,” I say, and her fingers are warm against mine. “He’s amazing. The most wonderful guy I’ve ever met.”
“How?” she asks. “What does he do that’s so great?”
“He’s protective and kind and funny. He’s sexy and he’s got a big dick.”
“Big dicks are important.”
“But so is being kind. And he’s treated me so good. Better than I’ve ever been treated.” I think about Rafe and the way he touches me, like I’m gold. Then I add, “He gives me good orgasms. That’s important, too.”
“It is important,” Rose says solemnly. “You should marry him.”
I laugh, high and wild, because in my dream, apparently I have a crazy laugh. “He doesn’t want to marry me. He doesn’t even think we should have sex.” This makes me sad, and I begin to cry. I love Rafe, and he doesn’t want me.
“Everyone should have sex,” Rose says, her voice dreamlike. “It’s how we connect.”
“Sometimes I think he doesn’t want to connect to me.” I stare unhappily out at the ocean. In the distance, a gigantic dinosaur—no, Godzilla—stomps past, moving through the waves. “There he goes.”
“Is that your boyfriend?”
“Yeah.”
“He seems nice,” Rose says, and she squeezes my hand again. “The guy I met isn’t so nice.”
“What are you going to do?” I ask, because it worries me to hear her say that. Her eyes are filling with tears and she looks so sad.
“Oh, Ava,” she says, and gives my hand a little shake. “Ava. Ava. Ava. Wake up. I’ve always done what I wanted.”