Veiled Freedom (56 page)

But Amy hadn't forgotten how Aryana's in-laws had paid their way to this compound. Soraya had been troubled over some financial emergency. Certainly she'd shown distress over Fatima's injuries, but had she even realized the teacher had returned ahead of her from the holidays?

And Rasheed. Surely he wouldn't destroy so much property, some undoubtedly his own. Unless he was paid enough to compensate. Hamida had evacuated the New Hope residents, not Rasheed. Did he really not realize the danger they'd all been in? And those past comments about wanting the Welayat women off this property. Had he perhaps thought only to add a further scare that would drive them away? Or been paid to allow someone else that privilege? Maybe he hadn't known how much damage those stored chemicals could cause.

No, please let it be a stranger. Even one of the mechanics.

Walking through Rasheed's quadrant, Amy stepped through the French doors. The plastic window panels had been pulled down to air out lingering smoke and fumes, and a cold wind whistled across the salon. From the other side of the paneling, she could hear male voices, Steve and Phil among them. What were they doing? What had they discovered?

Amy considered opening that small wooden door in the paneling to demand a report. But she felt too weary, her throat too raw to carry through on the thought, so she headed instead toward the door leading to the inner courtyard. Now that things were settling down, maybe it wouldn't hurt to retire to her own suite. It must be breathable because she'd seen Soraya helping Fatima upstairs to her quarters as soon as the all clear was given.

A quick tap of sandals signaled Jamil before he appeared through the door. “Miss Ameera, I was just coming to find you.”

“What is it?” Amy's sore face managed a perplexed smile as she looked her assistant over. He wore a patu for warmth over his shalwar kameez, and a bundle was tossed over his shoulder. “You look like you're hitting the road. Are you going somewhere?”

An answering smile flickered in the dark eyes as Jamil set his pack down. “The police broke the lock to my quarters in their searching, and since there are strangers present, I thought it best to retrieve my belongings. But I wished to speak to you because—” he glanced at the wooden barrier beyond which drifted those voices—“well, I was thinking it would be good to go to the bazaar. I have cleaned the infirmary, but there are no more bandages left or cleansing solution. And some injuries must be dressed again tonight.”

“Good idea. Let me give you some cash for that. And we'll have to ask Phil to get you past the guard.”

“Not so fast!”

The dry command spun Amy around.

Steve was ducking through the door in the paneling. His scrutiny going from Amy to her assistant showed none of the concern she'd seen when she recovered consciousness.

As Jamil stiffened, Amy stepped between the two men. “Is there a problem, Steve? Phil let Becky leave. Or is it just expats who can break quarantine?”

“Not at all. Your assistant is welcome to go to the bazaar—with an escort—just as soon as we get his fingerprints. Since he's been helping out, we left him till last. But Phil tells me you're all done now.”

The tension left Amy's muscles. “Well, sure, I was kind of expecting that. Do you want to fingerprint women and children too? I can promise you none of them have access to that storage unit. So if it isn't essential, I'd sure hate to get them all upset again.”

“No, just the men.”

When Steve didn't explain further, Amy turned to Jamil. Guessing the reason for that frozen immobility, she said gently, “It's okay. It doesn't mean they're accusing anyone. They just have to take everyone's prints so they can eliminate them against any strange ones, right?”

“Something like that,” Steve murmured, but he was watching Jamil with narrow-eyed intensity. “Do you have a problem having your prints taken? You do understand what fingerprints are.”

Jamil came back to life, something unreadable flaring in his eyes as he said bitingly, “I am not ignorant. I know about fingerprints. And I have no objection. Why should I?” He stalked toward the door in the paneling. “Come, let us be done with this. I have nothing more to hide.”

Amy would have followed, but Steve put out an arm. “He's a big boy. He doesn't need you to hold his hand.” His expression softened fractionally as he looked Amy over. “You look all in. Not to mention, that's quite a black eye you're developing. Ask Phil for an ice pack, and go get some rest. I'll call you if you're needed.”

“No, call me when you're done,” Amy answered tightly. “If Jamil has to have an armed guard just to go to the bazaar, I'm going too.”

“Afraid we'll hurt your pal?” Steve jeered softly. Before Amy could reply, he shut the paneling in her face.

Amy picked up Jamil's pack and went upstairs. She didn't trust all those policemen and mercenaries any more than the strangers detained next door. The pack was disturbingly light to hold a man's entire possessions, so its burden wasn't the reason Amy found herself dragging each foot to set it on the next step the way a toddler climbed stairs. Her only thought now was to reach bottled water so she could take Becky's ibuprofen and lie down.

Steve's right; Jamil doesn't need me to hold his hand going to the bazaar.

She had stepped into the upstairs hall when she heard voices. Not unexpected since Soraya had retreated to their suite with Fatima. Except that one of these voices was male and angry. It wasn't Rasheed's, and Amy's first thought was that a policeman had drummed up some pretext to harass her female residents. Then as she hastened down the hall, she made out Soraya's raised cry.

“Nay! I cannot ask for more. I will lose my position. I have already given you my—. It is still two weeks until my next—”

If Amy had missed some Dari terms, she could guess they referred to salary by the harsh reply. “The infidels have money to throw away. They can spare some to you. If you do not succeed, then do not bother to come home. Or ask again to see Fariq.”

So the man was no stranger to Soraya. It was a measure of how completely Amy had been immersed in Afghan life that she found herself profoundly shocked Soraya would permit a man inside the shelter of their suite. She was hardly less shocked that her proud, even arrogant, housemate could sound so pleading.

“Nay! Please do not say such things!”

The sob in Soraya's denial shot Amy's hand to the doorknob. It was unlocked. Stepping inside, she froze in disbelief as she recognized the man who whirled in her direction.

It was the stocky Afghan she'd first glimpsed two nights ago, then among the detainees below. Up close, Amy could see he was younger than Soraya and good-looking. Curly hair and beard. Olive-skinned, aquiline features. A high-bridged, strong nose. Though his good looks were spoiled by the disdainful glare that took in Amy's intrusion, the angry compression of lips. He looked in fact enough like Soraya to be a family member. Which hardly excused his presence in Amy's sanctuary.

Turning his back to Amy, he said sharply, “You will do what I say. I will wait for you below.” Spinning around again, he strode past Amy so close she had to scramble out of his way.

Across the room, Soraya stood tall and motionless, her proud, beautiful features as stony and blank as though Amy had never heard her pleading. And now through a crack in Soraya's bedroom door, Amy could see Fatima's frightened eyes peering out.

Stepping into the room, Amy set Jamil's bundle on the floor. “Who is that man? What is he doing in our quarters?”

How he'd slipped up here, Amy didn't have to ask because she'd glimpsed ink-stained fingers. The man must have stolen up the stairwell after he'd gone through the fingerprinting process. Soraya groped for a chair. Only as she sank into it did Amy realize she'd done so to keep from trembling. Looking down at her hands, Soraya didn't speak.

Amy sighed. “Soraya, I don't want to lose you, but it's clear something has been going on you aren't telling me. Either I get the truth, or I'm going to have to let you go. Who is that man, and what does he have to do with you?”

Slowly, Soraya raised her head. Then the impassivity of her perfect features crumpled. “His name is Ibrahim. And he is my husband.”

Nothing more to hide.

Jamil's final statement nagged at Steve as the Afghan man rolled inked fingers across white paper with a competence that said he'd done this before. That very personal hostility in his glance as he obeyed Steve's order was one reason his inclusion was little more than procedure. The man would do nothing to hurt his employer, and he'd been as shocked as Steve when he rushed in. But did he have other reasons to avoid police inquiry?

Steve had set up a command center in the schoolroom at the far end from its windows. Technically part of the crime scene, it was also the least damaged area, and Steve was reluctant to intrude further on the compound's residents by annexing more of their living area. The fingerprinting zone was the teacher's desk, where a pair of police trainees were taking down personal data as well as fingerprints.

Phil strolled over as a pair of uniforms escorted Jamil to a knot of inky-fingered Afghans who'd been the last of that crowd next door. “Anything new?”

Jason Hamilton held up a bag containing a chunk of duct tape and plastic. “Here's why we're running fingerprints. It's definitely part of the detonator. And it looks identical to the one in that suicide vest. Even if assembly's different, I'm betting the same bomb maker.”

The difficulty with bomb-scene evidence was that the blast itself left little behind. Even fingerprints that might have been inside that storage depot had burned off in the explosion and ensuing flash fire. But a bomb was a funny thing. Its primary effect wasn't fire (those stored chemicals had been a bonus), rather to propel its pieces outward at unbelievable velocity. Which was why the shrapnel embedded in a suicide vest did far more damage than the explosive itself.

And if a piece was thrown hard and fast enough to escape incineration—well, more than one bomb maker had been identified by a print surviving on some bit of debris its creator presumed destroyed in the blast. In this instance, a shard of cell phone casing had been sniffed out by a K-9 unit in a low-lying fork of an apricot tree. Neatly preserved under the duct tape holding the device together had been a single, perfect thumbprint. A man's print by the size. Hence their current undertaking.

Steve had become well acquainted with such devices in Iraq, where cell phones were favorite triggers for IEDs. Connect a detonator to a phone's internal alarm clock, and you had a time bomb. Connect one instead to the phone's ringer, and it could be set off by a single tap on the speed dial. If you knew what you were doing, it took less than five minutes with screwdriver and duct tape to take a phone apart, wire it to a bomb, and put it back together.

Steve's blood ran cold at the thought of someone with murder on his mind slipping in so easily to leave that deadly offering. Someone who had to be part of New Hope's regular routine, Amy's daily life. What if the bomber had chosen the schoolroom or inner courtyard or even those upstairs offices instead of an uninhabited room?

Because there again was the hole in the best defense strategy. Security systems were designed to protect against outside assault. There simply was no foolproof defense against an insider with free access to the innermost circle of trust. Which was why a traitor from within was always the most deadly and effective of enemies.

The police were now shepherding the final detainee group back to the mechanics yard. Steve frowned as his gaze settled on a stocky man in his thirties two uniforms were restraining by the arms. Hadn't that guy been part of the last batch?

“My money's on one of the mechanics,” Ian spoke up. “They come and go. And they have access only to the storage area and only during work hours—which would explain why they didn't go for a more lethal target. Or maybe some guy slipped past when they were working on his car.”

“I guess that's possible,” Phil said. “But how could the perp count on carelessness?”

“Which brings it back to the mechanics—or chowkidar,” Ian insisted. “What makes no sense to me, if the bomber couldn't get through this morning's security, why choose here as backup? Granted, it's easier than Khalid's primary residence. But why not the ministry or some regular part of Khalid's routine? If it's the same guy, he didn't have any difficulty getting inside the MOI last time.”

“I can't even hypothesize—this thing makes so little sense.” Steve turned back to Jason Hamilton. “You're the expert. Hasn't your team squeezed anything out of the locals we rounded up?”

“Hey, you were there. Name. Address. What are they going to say about the bomb but no? The Afghan commander wants to take the entire lot down to Pul-e-Charki, even the neighbors who just stepped in as volunteer firefighters.”