There she met Pooh’s older brother, Scimitar, but he talked to her like she was a child, so she didn’t like him too much.
What she did like was Pooh’s demolition shed out beyond the mansion’s stables. An explosives expert, Pooh had all manner of blasting supplies there. He even showed Lily a strange foamlike epoxy that Wizard had given to him: it was called Blast-Foam and it came from the famous Sandia Laboratories in the US. You sprayed foam from a small canister around a live grenade and it could absorb the blast of the grenade.
He also showed Lily how to use C-2 plastic explosive—a small-radius/high-impact explosive used by archaeologists on delicate sites. It could blast away tight sections of rock but not damage nearby relics.
“It can also blow locks,” Pooh Bear whispered to Lily. “Which is why Huntsman always keeps a little wad of it in a compartment in his artificial arm, and why I keep some in this”—he indicated the ornamental bronze ring that kept his massive beard in check. “Don’t leave home without it.”
Lily grinned. Pooh Bear was cool.
AWEEK LATER,the team celebrated the New Year on the rooftop helipad of the Burj al Arab tower, watching a fireworks display in the Arabian sky alongside many of Sheikh Abbas’s powerful friends and associates.
Despite the fact that she should have been in bed, Lily sneaked out in her gown and slippers and watched the gathering from the storage shed on the helipad.
The women wore sparkling dresses—even Zoe, who Lily thought looked just beautiful—and all the men wore smart dinner suits or Arabian-style robes. Even Jack wore a tux, which Lily found very funny. It didn’t suit him at all, and he seemed very uncomfortable in it, but it did make him look very handsome.
Arriving late at the New Year’s celebration, just before midnight, had been Jack’s brother-in-law, J. J. Wickham.
Wickham was a few years older than Jack and seriously good-looking, with short brown hair and a rough unshaven jaw; a sexy guy. All the women on the pad cast sideways glances at him as he walked by.
Accompanying Wickham was an exceedingly tall and skinny black man named Solomon Kol. His skin was a deep, deep black and his eyes were kind. He walked with a long loping stride and stood with a stoop, as if to diminish his considerable height.
Lily stared at the two men, frowning, struck by a strange feeling of recognition. She felt she had seen both of them before but couldn’t remember where.
“Why if it isn’t the Sea Ranger!” Pooh Bear exclaimed, clasping Wickham’s hand warmly.
“Hey, Zahir,” Wickham said quietly. “Sorry, it’s Pooh Bear now, isn’t it?”
“It is indeed and it is a name I wear with pride. ’Tis a great honor to be renamed by young Lily. I hope you have that honor one day.”
Lily smiled inwardly. She just loved Pooh Bear.
“Wick,” Jack said, coming over. “Glad you could make it. And Solomon, my old friend, how are you?”
The giant African smiled broadly. “We miss you in Kenya, Huntsman. You must visit again soon. Magdala misses young Lily terribly. She yearns to see how she has grown.”
“Oh, she’s grown all right,” Jack said. “And she’s hiding right now in the shed over there. Lily! You can come out now.”
Lily emerged, head bowed, in her gown and slippers.
Jack put a hand on her shoulder. “Lily, I’m not sure if you remember Solomon. He used to live next door to our farm in Kenya, and would come over often. He now looks after it for us, just in case we ever return.”
“My, my, you have grown, little one,” Solomon said. “Soon you will be as tall as me!”
Wickham was also gazing down at Lily, but silently, sadly.
Then he turned to Jack: “I can’t stay long. Got the Man on my tail again. But thought I’d swing by and say hi.”
Jack said, “They came asking about you last month. Arms smuggling. Said you grabbed an American weapons shipment by mistake.”
“Oh, it wasn’t a mistake. I knew exactly what it was,” Wickham said. “And I knew exactly where those weapons were heading.”
“Be careful, Wick,” Jack said. “One man’s crusader is another man’s pirate.”
“They’re calling me a pirate now?”
“You keep grabbing CIA weapons shipments to African warlords and soon you’re gonna have the whole Seventh Fleet combing the Indian Ocean for your ass.”
“Bring it on,” Wickham said. “The American military can be beaten. I mean, hell, look at whatyou did, and you’re a chump!”
Jack smiled. “Watch yourself is all I’m saying.”
“I will. Call me if you’re ever in Zanzibar,” Wickham said. “Buy you a beer.”
Then the midnight fireworks started going off. Seen from the helipad of the Burj al Arab, they were simply spectacular. The assembled crowd oohed and aahed as the desert sky lit up in a million colors.
But when Lily turned back from the dazzling fireworks display, J. J. Wickham was gone.
A few days later, when they were alone, Lily asked Jack about him.
“He’s a good man,” Jack said. “A decent man who got court-martialed by the US Navy for doing the right thing.”
