Chapter 9
Chapter Nine
Jack
“We’re being watched,” Noah said as he slid closed the door to the sleeping compartment.
A cold ripple shot down Jack’s spine. He’d known this run of luck couldn’t last. Not with Prescott in the game.
Jack looked up from the newspaper he’d been attempting to read, his eyes locking with Noah’s as the soft thumping of the tracks filled the quiet. From the moment they’d boarded the train in Paris, he’d been worried about this.
“Are you sure?”
Noah nodded and sat on the bed on the other side of the compact space. “I only saw one man. But I’m sure.”
Damn.
“Terrific. I was just thinking this trip was going too well.”
The trip from Penmore had been smooth enough: they’d left the town traveling along the coast via fishing boat until reaching a town where Noah kept a motorcar with a local miller—then driven to Dover and caught the ferry to Calais, where they caught a train to Paris.
That Noah had a planned escape route didn’t surprise Jack—old habits—but maybe Jack had let himself get a little too comfortable with the ease of it all.
Maybe they’d been spotted at the Gare de Lyon.
Jack released a slow breath, his fist flexing and unflexing. “It’s got to be Prescott. If he knew I was in England, he probably expected me to turn up at one of the major travel routes.”
They should have rested in Paris and taken the day train rather than the night train. There were more people in the station during the day, making it easier to blend in.
“We’ll be able to slip away once we get to Egypt. I’m not concerned.” Noah removed his jacket and rolled his shoulders back, an old habit that Jack knew he’d acquired after being shot in the shoulder during the war.
“Spoken with every ounce of confidence I don’t have,” Jack said with a half-smile.
He shook his head. “Did I tell you I was robbed in Cairo? Pretty blonde con artist—took me for a chump. Guess I was a chump, though, considering she got me good. Stole every last penny I had on me and my watch. First night back in Cairo, and I’m relieved of my cash by a slip of a girl with better street sense than I had. My life is really on an upswing.”
Another woman he hadn’t seen coming. His fist curled, thinking of how easily he’d let his guard slip.
Noah raised a brow. “Where did this happen?”
“Mena House Hotel, if you can believe it. Guess they thought I was a rich tourist.”
“That’s bold. What did the hotel staff say?”
Jack cringed. “I didn’t report it. My pride didn’t allow it.”
Noah chuckled but said nothing further. Loosening the button of his collar, he stifled a yawn. “If you were twenty years younger, your pride would be suggesting we jump from this train in the middle of the night to rid ourselves of any shadow.”
“Thank God I’m older and wiser now, right? And have far less enthusiasm for broken bones.” Jack cracked a smile, then ran his fingers through his hair with a heavy sigh. “How did we end up here again, Noah? Midnight trains, spies everywhere. There’s not even a war going on right now.”
Noah murmured as he nodded and lay back against the pillow of his narrow bed.
“Not yet, anyway. The changes in Germany worry me. And the situation in Egypt and Palestine—which is bound to get worse with what I’m hearing from some of my German friends.
Fahad wrote to me last month. Said the tension in Jerusalem is palpable.
Zionist-Arab relations have only worsened since 1929, and the number of Jews seeking refuge in Palestine is quickly growing. ”
Jack met his gaze. The new German chancellor had shown he had a taste for violence and a talent for deception. Noah was right to be worried. The noose on peace was coiling tighter.
“Not that I would wish the administration of that area on anyone, but I’m not sure the British have any idea what they’re doing there anymore,” Jack said wearily.
“Agreed. Though, now more than ever, I’m convinced the people who call that land home and bled for it are the only ones qualified to make decisions for it.”
Spoken like the true Irish Egyptian he was. Jack almost smirked. Noah presented to everyone the face of a blue-blooded Englishman—his wealthy English uncle and aunt had raised him when he’d been left an orphan as a boy—but he shared the opinion of most nationalists.
The Levant and Arabia had always been an area of interest to them both, since they’d come out that way before the war as young, eager archeologists, woefully unprepared for the reality of life for the desert peoples who had been bleeding and battling over their lands for centuries.
Jack grimaced. Empires loved making promises they couldn’t keep—and men like him usually ended up cleaning up the mess.
Unfortunately, when the Ottoman Empire had crumbled at the end of the war, the absence of a ruling government had led to the British and French administrating more colonies, areas that the Arabs who’d joined Lawrence in the Arab uprising had been promised the freedom to rule themselves, like Syria, the Transjordan, and Palestine.
The Arabs—Muslims, Christians, and Jews alike—were understandably furious, especially as the Zionists advocated for statehood in Jerusalem on the grounds of the conflicting promises made through the Balfour Declaration.
The result: a powder keg that was being roasted like a pig on an open spit.
As the men lapsed into comfortable silence, Jack folded the newspaper and started to put it away, glancing at the name emblazoned on the front—The Manchester Guardian, which Noah favored. As he did, a name on the cover caught his eye under a headline: Gretchen Herbert.
He froze.
A memory, long sealed in his brain, floated to the surface.
The last night he’d spent with Kit, they’d been in a quaint hotel room, lying in bed.
“You know, you might have picked an alias I would be able to use to find you a bit easier,” Jack had teased, pressing a kiss against the soft curve of her throat.
She smiled and rolled her eyes. “You weren’t supposed to find me, Jack. And even if you had, you weren’t supposed to come into my life like this again.”
“And after this? We both know this won’t last forever. America is in the war now—I can’t live with myself if I don’t join in. Where do you go after here?”
She shrugged, her gaze traveling away from him and focusing on the ceiling overhead. “I could find you a role in the State Department, I’m sure. My contact—”
“I don’t want one. I’ve had enough of rubbing elbows with my enemies while calling them friends. I’d rather just meet them face-to-face.”
“I don’t know any other way at this point,” she murmured, her body tensing in his arms. “Once upon a time, maybe. Before I married. I thought that dream of being a housewife with an armful of children might even appeal. But Paul killed that dream.”
Jack’s throat clenched at the thought. What she’d gone through with that man—Jack hated him for it. Hated that he hadn’t been able to protect her. But she was resilient. Smart. Hadn’t really needed his help or protection.
Whatever else Kit was, she was first and foremost a survivor.
“Well, then, promise me this.” He rolled onto his side so he could hold her gaze. “No matter what happens, where we go, you’ll give me a way to find you in the future.” He reached for her hand, interlacing their fingertips. “Maybe starting with an alias I already know.”
“Jack—”
“I’m serious. Promise me. I’m yours, Kit. You know that. I don’t need rings or vows or anything else. I’m never going to marry anyone else. Wherever I am in the world, I’ll be waiting for you.”
For a breathless moment, Jack feared she would refuse. That she would vanish again into the shadows he couldn’t chase.
She swallowed hard, her blue eyes glistening with tears. At last she nodded, then leaned forward and whispered, “All right. I promise.” She kissed his lips gently then sniffled. “Gretchen. Gretchen Herbert. That’s the next alias I’ll use.”
He chuckled. “Already have one lined up?”
She grinned. “My father will keep looking for me—and I can’t use the one I had anymore. Gretchen was my grandmother’s name. And Herbert was the name of the first horse my father bought me.”
Now he arched a brow. “Herbert is an awful name for a horse.”
“I was seven,” she said, looping her arms around his neck.
“Doesn’t make it any better,” he said, kissing her as she dissolved into laughter.
Jack blinked hard, his heart squeezing even tighter as the memory faded and he focused on the name staring back at him from the byline.
Gretchen Herbert.
It had to be a coincidence—didn’t it?
He peered closer at the headline.
Attacks on Assyrians Continue: Terror Tactics Increase
His throat clenched. Whoever this journalist was, she appeared to be a foreign correspondent. Reporting on Iraq, of all places.
He let out a slow breath, loud enough that Noah stirred. He shot him a questioning gaze.
“You ever see this name before?” Jack asked, crossing the space and thrusting the paper in Noah’s face.
Noah frowned as he focused on the name in question, then he nodded. “She’s the foreign correspondent for that whole region. Probably working out of Baghdad.”
If there was one thing he could count on, it was Noah’s nearly perfect recall of anything he read.
And he noticed things like that—names of journalists in bylines that everyone else seemed to ignore.
His obsession for detail had always made it easy for Jack to rely on him, considering he was far less interested in the minute.
Noah gave Jack an alert, penetrating gaze with his dark-blue eyes. “What is it?”
“It’s … her.” Jack cleared his throat, his brain buzzing. “Kit. S-she told me that was the next alias she’d use.”
“Gretchen Herbert?” Noah asked with a skeptical look. “Are you certain?”
“I’m certain that’s the alias she said she’d use.” Jack pulled the paper back. “What’s the date on this paper?” He’d brought it and several others from Noah and Ginger’s house to catch up on some of the news he’d missed over the last few months.