The Night Ranger

“I’m glad you like them. But they’re just glasses. And the Makarov’s just a pistol and you need a better one.”

“You get in these spots, it’s not a video game. You’re in close, and whoever shoots first wins. As long as your gun doesn’t jam, and believe me, that thing never jams. Muzzle velocity, caliber, that stuff doesn’t matter. It’s for basement soldiers. Guys playing Battlefield 3.”

“You’re telling me extra rounds wouldn’t have come in handy last year. Or more stopping power. I don’t mean an assault rifle. I’m talking about a better pistol.”

She was right, he knew. “I’ll think about it.”

“When you get back, that might be your Christmas present. If I’m allowed to call it that.”

Wells, who was one-quarter Muslim by birth, had taken Islam as his faith on his first mission for the agency, when he’d gone undercover in Afghanistan to infiltrate al-Qaeda. Over the years, his attachment to the religion had waxed and waned. His relationship with Anne fell outside its bounds. She wasn’t Muslim and they weren’t married. But his faith had returned in other ways in the last few months. He was praying every day, avoiding pork and alcohol. He’d even signed up to audit a class on Islam at Dartmouth, his alma mater, a way to learn more about the religion’s cultural and theological foundations.

“My stocking will be heavy with a Glock.”

“If you’re lucky.”

“You’re my Christmas present. Every day of the year.”

“Listen to you. Getting soppy.”

“The way to a man’s heart is through his trigger finger.” He rested a hand on her thigh.

—

The evening rush was done when they hit Boston, and Anne pulled up to the curb at Logan two hours before his flight. “Be careful over there. And come home quick.”

“I will. I love you.”

She pointed at her eyes, touched her heart, pointed at him. “Now go.”

He went.

3

NEAR THE KENYA/SOMALIA BORDER

Even with the hood blinding her, Gwen knew the others were close. The heavy black sack allowed only flecks of light, and Gwen wasn’t even sure if those were real or her imagination. But she heard Hailey humming tunelessly, Owen clearing his throat. More than anything, she wanted to see them. At least talk to them. But she’d learned her lesson.

—

Five days before, a few hours after they’d been brought here, wherever here was, a man warned them not to talk. She’d been hooded then, too. The drawstring was pulled tight around her neck, chafing, a constant wordless warning. She was in a hut, she knew that much, and her right hand was handcuffed to a chain that seemed to be attached behind her. They were left alone for a while, and then a man walked into the hut with heavy flat steps. Gwen thought he was a big man. Like Suggs.

“Nod if you can hear me,” the man said. The words seemed silly. Of course they could hear him. But Gwen nodded.

“Good. You don’t speak unless spoken to.” He had a soft British lilt, like lots of Kenyans. Gwen had always liked British accents. No more. “If you need the toilet, say toilet. Elsewise, you stay silent. Stay silent and we’ll take off your hoods. If not, they stay on. And I promise, they don’t get easier. We’re going to take care of you. Not hurt you. Do what we say and everything will be fine.”

He walked out with those heavy jailer’s steps. Gwen listened to him go like she could see with her ears. Then nothing. Someone murmured in a language she didn’t know. So much she didn’t know about this place. She wasn’t even sure whether night had fallen. The hut was hot and stifling, and the hood made judging the passage of time nearly impossible. She was exhausted but couldn’t sleep. A while later, she closed her eyes. She imagined Thanksgiving with her family, sitting in her aunt’s dining room, the house warm and bright. Outside, her cousins ran around playing football, tackling each other too hard. When she was thirteen, her uncle Conor nearly sliced off his thumb cutting the turkey. He’d been working hard, straining at the big leg joint, and the knife slipped away and cut into the webbing of his palm. He raised his eyebrows and grinned as the blood pulsed out. Gwen had been just old enough to notice that he’d topped off his scotch glass all afternoon. Her dad tied a dish towel around Conor’s hand to stop the bleeding and drove him to the St. Patrick emergency room downtown.

The kicker came the next year, when Conor brought out a new toy, a power carving saw. Her dad couldn’t lay off. You want to chop off your whole hand? Slow-cook it, serve it with the yams? Conor waved the saw like a baton and muttered about know-it-all doctors until her dad retreated to the living room to watch the Lions. Is he really going to cut off his hand? Gwen asked. Only if we’re lucky, her dad answered.

But now she wished she hadn’t thought about her family. Soon they’d hear about what had happened. She knew how desperate they’d feel. Three years before, her sister Catelyn had swerved for a deer on US 93, wrapped her RAV4 around a tree. She was put into a medically induced coma to relieve the swelling in her brain.

Gwen refused to leave Catelyn’s bedside for forty-eight hours, until her dad told her if she didn’t take a nap he would ask the docs to sedate her. All along she bargained silently with God—Let Catelyn live and I’ll go to church every week/never speed again/stop fighting with my mom/be a better sister. She couldn’t help herself, though she was certain that God didn’t make deals like that. And of course she hadn’t kept her promises, even though Catelyn came out of the coma four days after the accident and recovered completely.

Until now those days had been the worst of Gwen’s life. Her parents probably felt the same. But at least they had known Catelyn was being cared for and wasn’t in pain. This time, they wouldn’t have those certainties. They would be in hell, thanks to Gwen’s own foolishness. Let’s go to Lamu! What a great idea!

She wanted to cry, but she bit her lip so she wouldn’t. She had to control her emotions, focus on the reality of this place. She leaned against the rough brick wall, counted to one hundred and back to zero. Up and down and up and down. The air in the hut cooled. Her back ached and her legs cramped. Her belly was empty and her mouth was dry. They hadn’t given her any food or water. In the infinite darkness she pressed her lips tight and rasped her tongue against her teeth. Weirdly, she wasn’t scared. Not at the moment. She was sure she would be in the days to come. But for now she was just deeply physically uncomfortable.

She remembered her sixth-grade teacher, Edwin Granger, explaining the rule of three: three minutes without air, three days without water, three weeks without food. Granger had been teaching them state history, the Johnson party. The Johnsons were pioneers trapped by an early-season blizzard in the Bitterroots. They would have been Montana’s version of the Donners, only they got lucky and caught a thaw and found their way back to the plains.

The story stuck with Gwen in part because Granger had creeped her out so much. He had pockmarked skin and jet-black hair that she knew now must have been dyed. In September he treated her like everybody else. By June she couldn’t escape the way he looked at her. Fortunately, he didn’t try to touch her, never even said anything inappropriate. But his squinty blue eyes had stayed with her. Her first taste of unwanted male attention.

Granger lingered over the tale of the Johnsons. I want you all to understand the power of these mountains, he’d said. Gwen wasn’t impressed. Everybody in Montana knew that blizzards could hit the Bitterroots as early as in October. The Johnsons should have waited for spring. Instead, only the blind luck of a warm December saved them from their own stupidity. Otherwise they would have been sharpening axes like the Donners. What’s for dinner, honey?

Now Gwen knew what had happened to all the pioneers who hadn’t made it. One big mistake and then a couple small ones. For example, Let’s go to Lamu. Followed by Forget the main road. Just like that the wagons were stuck in axle-high drifts with the snow still coming. And all the Africans in the world couldn’t dig you out. Not in three days or weeks or years. Suddenly she was back in Granger’s class. She needed water, she was so thirsty. She raised her hand and said, I’ll do what you want if you just let me get a drink, whatever you want. He said, Wake up,