Chapter 4 #3
The roti was crunchy on the outside, soft and sweet on the inside. They ate it while walking past stalls selling grilled squid that sizzled over open flames.
“You also need to try the mango sticky rice.”
He had. In fact, he’d eaten most of these before, but he wasn’t quite ready to—
A scooter honked, and he grabbed her around the waist, pulled her to the side.
She didn’t seem to mind.
Huh.
She stopped at a stand with sarongs and haggled with the female vendor, then shook her head. He grabbed a pair of bamboo flip-flops. His had worn out.
The scent of incense rose, mixing with the smells of the food. And everywhere, music, the chatter of shoppers, a sense that the night wasn’t quite ready to shut down.
Him either. The dognap on the sofa had sluiced new energy into him. Or maybe it was just—
“Have you ever been up there?”
He followed her gaze toward the distant golden spires of Wat Phra That Doi Suthep.
“Once,” he said. “Years ago, when I first visited here. Three hundred and six steps to the top, but the view . . .”
“Three hundred and six steps?”
“More than worth it. You can see the whole city spread out below. Makes you feel small in the best possible way.”
She was quiet, studying the distant glow of the temple. “Do you think that’s what faith is supposed to feel like? That sense of being part of something bigger?”
“I don’t know. My family wasn’t much for church. Dad said foxhole religion was the only kind that mattered.”
“What about you? Do you believe in foxhole religion?”
He sighed, recalling the desperate prayers he’d whispered while trying to stop Narin’s bleeding. The desperate bargaining.
“I think there are moments when you need something to believe in. Whether that’s faith or hope or just the idea that what you’re doing matters.”
“I grew up in a family of faith. But I’m still trying to figure out how to settle inside God’s love when the world feels so brutal.”
He nodded at that. And he didn’t want to go into the story of Narin, but, “Ham had a lot to do with my believing in a good God who cares. Probably something to do with being abandoned by my dad, but . . . I’d like to believe it’s true.”
She was quiet for so long that he thought maybe he should say something else. She paused at another stall where a vendor was creating perfect little coconut pancakes.
Then, softly, “I’m sure Jake told you about my little sister, Hannah.”
He stilled. “A little. She went missing when she was six?”
“We were at the Minnesota State Fair. Dad gave us all money, sent us into the Food Building to get food—it was a tradition. Selah and I thought Hannah was with Jake. Jake thought she was with us.”
His chest tightened.
She stopped walking, staring at a vendor’s display.
“Hannah vanished. We looked everywhere. Police, search dogs, volunteers—the whole thing. Never found her.”
“Chloe—”
“My parents never recovered. Dad threw himself into work, Mom into depression, and Selah and Jake and I were trying to hold everything together.” She sighed. “We struggled with faith.”
“And God’s love.”
She nodded. “So yeah. I can’t stand watching children get hurt. And this . . . this hit close, I think.”
And yes, he got it.
So now, well, of course she had to find Radi?. And he had to go with her.
Chloe cleared her throat and stepped toward a nearby stall where golden treats bobbed in hot oil. “Try this.” She handed him something that looked like a small golden pillow.
“What is it?”
“Kluay tod. Fried bananas.”
Crunchy exterior giving way to soft, sweet banana. Rich enough that one was probably his limit.
“Too sweet?” She watched his expression with amusement.
“Just different from fish balls.”
“Everything’s different from fish balls.” She gestured toward a cart where a vendor was ladling thick Thai tea. “Want something to drink?”
Oh, he loved Thai tea. Rich, sweet, and creamy, with a distinctive orange color.
“You know what’s crazy?” She paused to watch a vendor flip noodles in a wok.
“What?”
“This feels normal. Walking around, trying weird foods, talking about things I never tell people.”
“And that’s bad?”
“No. It’s just . . . I don’t live in normal.”
No, she didn’t.
“There’s something addictive about the adrenaline.”
“There’s also something addictive about coming home alive.”
She frowned. “Please. So overrated.”
Right now, with her, in the middle of a food adventure? Maybe.
He reached for her hand, and held it.
She looked down at their joined hands, then back up at his face. “What’s this?”
“This is me trying to convince you that there are things worth staying alive for. Good food, live music, handsome company . . .” He grinned. “A good-looking guy protecting you from pickpockets.”
“Modest too.”
“I prefer confident. There’s a difference.”
She laughed, and the sound hit him somewhere behind his ribs. “Okay, hero, what else should we try?”
“Dangerous question. I could stay out all night with you sampling street food.”
Oh—where did that come from?
“You could?” She raised an eyebrow.
He stilled. Um . . .
“Calm down there, Mr. Suddenly Serious. I’m just saying, don’t think you can stop me from going to Bangkok. I’m not so full that I don’t remember what you said.”
Right. But, “I know you have to do this.”
“You do?”
“Yeah. Just like I know I have to go with you.”
She stopped walking, studying his face in the neon light from a nearby stall. “Why?” She held up her hand. “Not because Hamilton ordered you to, not because you promised Jake. Why do you want to help me?”
The question deserved an honest answer.
“Because that’s how I’m made.”
Aw, that sounded sappy. And raw.
And he just stared at her, his heart thumping.
“Okay then,” she said.
Wow, she had a pretty smile.
Yeah, he’d go with her. And frankly, he didn’t need a reason.
Behind them, a band was setting up on a small stage, warming up their instruments. A mix of locals, expats, and university students gathered around the open area.
He led her over and they found a spot near the back as the band launched into a blues number.
Chloe closed her eyes, bobbed her head to the music.
Oh, she was interesting. The kind of interesting that said he didn’t know her at all, really. Not the girl he remembered from Jake’s parties at his parents’ home, her in a pair of shorts, a T-shirt, wet hair from waterskiing, hanging out with her sisters.
He remembered beating the girls’ team in volleyball once. If he recalled right, she’d spiked a ball at him, her eyes on fire.
Maybe that’s when the slow burn had started. He just hadn’t noticed it until it ignited inside him.
When the song ended, she opened her eyes and caught him watching her.
“What?”
“Nothing. You just look . . . happy.”
“I love live music.”
The band started another song. He no longer held her hand, but oh, he wanted to reach out, take it again.
What was going on here?
When the set ended, they applauded. And then she looked at him. “We should go. It’s getting late.”
Maybe too late.
The bazaar was winding down—vendors packing up their stalls, crowds thinning to couples walking hand in hand. The air had cooled, carrying the scent of ylang-ylang from hidden gardens.
“I’d forgotten,” she said quietly.
“Forgotten what?”
“What it feels like to just . . . enjoy an evening. Without thinking about deadlines or investigations or people who might be in danger.” She glanced at him. “When was the last time you did something just because it was fun?”
“Like go on vacation? Um . . . like . . . never?”
She raised an eyebrow.
“I mean—I just got home from a Caribbean island, so does that count?”
“You were working security, so no.”
“I got a tan.”
“I see that.” She smiled. “Still no.”
He laughed. Their steps slowed as they left the main streets behind, moving into the quieter residential area where she lived. Streetlamps cast pools of golden light on the sidewalk. They walked through the villa’s garden gate, the pool glowing turquoise in lantern light.
They climbed the external staircase in silence. Although, weirdly, his heart had started to thump, trying to break out of his chest. She could probably hear it.
At the top, Chloe turned to face him. “Okay.”
“Okay what?”
“Okay, I’ve decided you can come with me to Bangkok.”
She flashed a grin, then disappeared through the door, leaving him standing on the landing.
He smiled, something slow to match a warmth that syruped through his entire body. Then he walked inside and shut the door.
Clean sheets sat folded on the pullout sofa on top of a pillow that smelled like lavender fabric softener. She’d thought of everything before disappearing into her bedroom.
But from behind that door came humming. Soft, off-key, unselfconscious.
“Okay,” he said to the empty room. “I’m going to Bangkok.”
And maybe, inside, he heard a little hoorah.
MOSCOW, MARCH 2010
The odor of diesel fuel slammed into Alan Martin’s lungs the second he stepped off the bus at Red Square. His chest seized—sharp, sudden, brutal.
Breathe.
Six months. Six months since the explosion that killed Timea, and still the smell could drop him.
Focus.
St. Basil’s candy-colored domes stabbed at the steel-gray sky overhead.
Defiant. Beautiful against the grime and chill of Moscow.
Dark, sticky snowbanks outlined Red Square, the brick tiles lined up in rows.
The Kremlin’s tall red walls rose, a fortress inside the city.
He shoved his hands into his coat, ducked his head.
No one would recognize him anyway.
Probably.
The temperature display above GUM department store glowed minus fifteen Celsius, but the cold burning his face? Nothing compared to the ice that had carved out permanent residence in his chest.
The metro entrance gaped ahead. Concrete maw swallowing streams of black-coated Muscovites into the underground. Cyrillic letters above the entrance spelled out ПЛОЩАДЬ РЕВОЛЮЦИИ. Revolution Square Station.
How fitting.