“Unless you were keeping them somewhere other than your bag,” Lena says. “Remember, you put them there after our flight two mornings ago? I already checked.” It’s true, I’d taken both passports that morning because I had the bigger bag and Lena had brought just a small clutch. She had wanted to keep the passports on one of us, though, rather than leave them in our luggage.
“No,” I whisper, moving toward my bag. I check the front pocket, where the passports had been. “But there’s a lock—”
“Broken.” Lena lets out a humorless laugh. “Those locks aren’t exactly built to withstand pickpockets.” The lock was the reason that I had purchased the bag before my trip to Paris, but I’m not going to tell her that. I feel embarrassed, naive. And panicked.
“I’m sorry,” I say, sinking to the floor in front of where she sits.
“It’s not your fault,” Lena tells me. “If anything, it’s my fault. I’m the one who dragged us on this stupid trip. You never would have chased his ghost if I hadn’t made you.”
“You didn’t make me.” It’s the most honest conversation we’ve had in a while, but it does little to calm my nerves. “What do we do?”
“I’m not sure. Go to the consulate? God, I don’t even know where that would be around here. It would be one thing in Bombay . . . Oh god. I don’t even have other ID to fly back there with. There’s got to be an American consulate here, right?”
“I don’t know. This is the first time I’ve ever really traveled. Maybe he’s still around somewhere?”
“Right. He robbed us and then stuck around to see how we’d take it.” Lena rolls her eyes and draws her long blond hair over one shoulder.
I stare down at the pile of things Anand left us: my library card, a Snoopy keychain, a little notebook that must be Lena’s. Some receipts and a few American coins. The hotel key we never gave back to the Taj. The lipstick and some nose-blotting pads. Nothing of any use; thank goodness I had my emergency credit card in my jeans pocket yesterday—something I’d normally consider irresponsible but probably the thing that will save us. I’m thinking about this when I hear Lena call my name from the outside deck. I hadn’t noticed when she left the cabin.
“Aubrey, come here! They’re out here. The passports.” I drop the pile of junk that I’ve been mindlessly sifting through and run to the deck to join her. I don’t know how I missed it before. On the picnic table where we were sitting last night, there’s the knife Anand used to gut the fish. It’s pinning our passports to the table.
“Oh my god” is all I can say. It’s so creepy. What was he hoping to prove? Lena yanks a few times on the handle but it doesn’t budge—it’s firmly wedged into the wood. She moves aside to give me a try. I pull a few times and feel the knife loosen, and I can’t help but shudder at the thought of Anand’s hands having been where mine are now. I give the knife a solid tug and it flies across the deck with the passports still attached, landing just short of the railing. Lena and I dash over—she gets there first and begins to pry the passports away from the knife.
“Be careful.” My voice is trembling. I’m still half convinced Anand is going to jump out of the shelter of the other boats and attack us. “Hurry, though—I want to get out of here.”
“I do too,” Lena says. “Obviously. Do you think these will still work? Even though they’re sliced? Wait.” She pauses, then slides them the rest of the way off. “There’s a piece of paper on here too.” I peer closer at the white square she’s holding. I recoil at the thought of the knife puncturing the passports and the folded square of paper. Chills run up my spine when I consider what else the knife could have pierced while we were passed out.
“We could have been gutted like those fish,” Lena whispers, echoing my thought. She unfolds the paper and I lean over her shoulder, wrinkling my brow. The sun bears down on us and I have to squint into the light to see. Lena’s mouth falls open, and she lets out a little gasp. She passes the paper to me, and it takes me only a second to see why she’s shocked. Anand has left us an address with a note that reads, “Quid pro quo—in exchange for settling Charlie’s debt, ask Dane for the truth about his ‘death,’ little lamb.” The address is scrawled firmly, like he pressed hard with a sure hand, though his writing is messy. I peer closely at the last line.
“Bangkok?” I breathe. But Lena doesn’t answer. Her face is white.
“‘Little lamb,’” she says. “He wrote ‘little lamb.’”
“It could be a coincidence,” I start. “Maybe he just happened to see your tattoo.” But I know it’s not a coincidence. We both know it’s not. I’m starting to get the terrible feeling that none of this has been coincidental.
17
Lena