CHAPTER 32
As soon as her father left, Elise Courville’s expression hardened as well. She walked across the room and picked up a cell phone from the mantel.
She pushed the Disconnect button. For the last two hours, it had been transmitting their conversation to another phone halfway around the world.
It was through her father that Courville had first met the man in Paris. On an earlier trip to forget her problems, Charles Courville had hosted a dinner party for some up-and-coming Parisian elite.
Among the guests was a handsome and well-dressed man—an Algerian who’d found early success directing one of the city’s large financial firms. Haracat al Marrak was thirty to her thirty-five, and was polite, respectful, and confident in everything he said and did.
From that first meeting, Courville had felt like she had known him all her life.
During their brief encounters, which almost never happened in public, he was such a good listener—so quick with reassuring words for her troubles—that she wondered why he had no other woman in his life.
He kept a low profile and encouraged her to do the same.
Only when she told stories of her life as the wife of a US senator did the Algerian show the slightest impatience, and his temper would almost imperceptibly flare.
If she mentioned her hurt and anger at her husband, he’d remind her that personal and spiritual growth outweighed any discomfort from her challenges. Be a dutiful wife, he urged her.
As their relationship grew stronger, Elise Courville would lie awake at night contemplating the Algerian’s latest advice. She didn’t agree with everything he said, but she couldn’t dispute its logic.
When Coleman Harrison decided to run for president, the man in Paris told her what she must do.
At first she wasn’t sure she could go through with it. But night after night, as she listened to his persuasive voice on the phone, Courville slowly came to terms with the reality he presented.
Every week she received a new cell phone. It was used to communicate only with him. He assured her that it could never be traced, that she would be safe from any repercussions. As each new package arrived, she destroyed the old phone and separately trashed its broken parts.
Courville trusted the man more than she had trusted anyone in her life.
So long as you follow my instructions and we finish the plan, he promised her, our lives will be complete.
He considered her one of his most faithful, he told her, and promised that he would lead her to glory in Paris, where they could continue their journey together. Allah would welcome her.
She looked forward to the day when she could be with him in Paris.
Now Elise Courville stood on her balcony and watched the late-afternoon sun descending. Almost every day at this time, she would sit on this very balcony and warm her body in the rays of light.
She looked at the people on the lawn of the house not far away. The owners seemed nice enough. They lived mainly in Florida, where he was a banker of some kind and had a son in college. In their years as neighbors, they had exchanged pleasantries every so often.
She could see a group gathered, obviously enjoying the company of weekend guests. They all looked so happy—so oblivious to the troubles of the world.
She dreamed of the future in Paris, when she could invite the new friends she would make to a party just like theirs.